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The communities that most oppose marijuana legalization tend to be the smaller and more isolated reserves in the northern part of the country where the people will be consumers of the drug but have little chance of cashing in on the potential financial windfall of the cannabis business.
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"Marijuana is just another drug that people will take advantage of," said Ignace Gull, the Chief of Attawapiskat in northwestern Ontario. "It will affect the community because we don't have the resources to deal with this. There is no funding to educate or make people aware of what cannabis is all about."
But the chiefs in parts of the country that are closer to urban areas see advantages to legalization and want to be left to their own devices when it takes effect.
"They want in on the economic benefit to create jobs and earn revenue," said Donald Maracle, Chief of the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte in southeastern Ontario.
And while there should be regulations that prohibit driving while under the influence and that stop children from getting their hands on the drug, Mr. Maracle said "there is a huge question about whether Ontario's laws can even apply on reserve."
Randall Phillips, the chief of Oneida Nation of the Thames, near London, Ont., said the legalization of marijuana is just another way for the federal government to profit from a product that otherwise has been sold on the black market. But the First Nations should also benefit, and on their own terms, Mr. Phillips said.
"We will decide who gets it. We will decide how it gets distributed. We will decide how it gets protected and we are going to look at all those things. But I don't need a regulatory framework," he said.
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His community is applying to become one of the limited number of licensed growers of cannabis. It is also home to a marijuana dispensary and the people who run it do not believe they need a licence to operate it, Mr. Phillips said.
As for the First Nations who want legalization to be delayed, he said "there's all sorts of ways they can stop it from coming in. We don't have that luxury down south, so we have to think about it in a different way and with a different approach."The US Army has confirmed its pursuit of a light reconnaissance helicopter that will assume the role left vacant by the retirement of the Bell OH-58D Kiowa Warrior.
Army military deputy for acquisition, technology and logistics Lt Gen Michael Williamson suggested the army might move quicker on its Future Vertical Lift-Light (FVL-Light) programme because it might be more achievable in the near term.
“I think what you’ll find is there’s still a requirement for us to have a light reconnaissance helicopter, so as we looked at the dollars that are available and the timing to get to a platform, we saw the light helicopter probably gave us the most in terms of schedule,” Williamson said at a conference on US fiscal year 2017 defence programmes in Washington DC on 10 March.
US Army
The army is moving forward with FVL by funding a “medium” category programme in its latest spending submission, but recently released two separate industry surveys seeking ideas on potential platforms in the light and medium categories. The light category would perform a similar role to the armed Kiowa Warrior, which is being retired under the army aviation restructure initiative (ARI), whereas the medium category will succeed the Sikorsky UH-60 and Boeing AH-64.
Sikorsky says it will offer a version of its experimental S-97 Raider for the light reconnaissance role if the army launches an acquisition.
The light attack/assault rotorcraft must at a minimum carry up to six heavily equipped troops over 229nm at 200kts, according to the 18 February request for information. It would be fielded in the 2030s.
The army’s interest in future vertical lift comes as it cuts funding for helicopter procurement in its 2017 submission.
Army procurement official Lt Gen John Murray says aviation took the biggest hit in the army's latest funding submission to protect accounts for ground vehicle modernisation. However, he hopes to restore aviation procurement if the army’s fiscal situation improves.
“Our intent is to get back to where we were in aviation procurement as quickly as we possibly can,” he says.Pro-Assad forces captured at least three east Aleppo districts and continue to make near-hourly gains on Tuesday, reducing rebel control of Syria’s second city by more than 50 percent since Russian and Syrian regime forces launched their campaign three weeks ago to reclaim the provincial capital.
The three-week battle for east Aleppo, the opposition’s largest urban stronghold, has killed hundreds of civilians, sent tens of thousands more fleeing and decimated the city’s medical infrastructure. If Aleppo falls, it will be the single largest victory for the Assad regime since rebel forces first took the city in 2012. But will it end the war?
The loss of Aleppo “would be a huge defeat for the Syrian opposition—both militarily and politically—but I don’t think it will bring an end to the civil war,” Robert Ford, the last American ambassador to serve in Syria, tells Syria Direct.
When peaceful demonstrations first began in Syria in 2011, Ambassador Ford traveled the country in an unprecedented show of support for the protestors. Most notably, in July 2011, thousands of demonstrators received the ambassador with olive branches and flowers in tow when he visited the tank-lined city of Hama, days before the regime cracked down and began firing on the protests.
Ambassador Ford resigned from the Foreign Service in 2014, saying he could “no longer defend US policy” towards Syria and has since publicly criticized the Obama administration's “strategic incoherence” and unwillingness to support the Syrian opposition.
This conversation with Syria Direct’s Justin Schuster is the latest in a series of interviews with analysts, academics and diplomats examining the future of US-Syria policy. Previous installments include Syria Direct’s conversations with Dr. Joshua Landis, former US Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte and the executive director of the Syria Institute, Valerie Szybala.
While the larger external powers negotiate the future of Syria, Ford reminds us that, ultimately, this remains a war by Syrians against Syrians.
“You cannot expect this war to end until there is some kind of an agreement whereby a much larger number of Syrians accept the government in Syria as legitimate.”
Q: In the past week, the Assad regime has captured up to 50 percent of rebel-held east Aleppo. What would the surrender of Aleppo mean for the Syrian opposition?
It would be a huge defeat for the Syrian opposition—both militarily and politically—but I don’t think it will bring an end to the civil war. I don’t think the opposition will surrender to Bashar al-Assad and accept the terms of a Russian- and Iranian-imposed peace settlement.
That means the fighting will go on despite the big loss to the opposition.
The armed opposition’s challenge going forward is to adapt their tactics. They have tried for the last five years to hold territory—cities and suburbs—which is becoming impossible when the Assad government and its allies have superior airpower and superior firepower. The armed opposition is going to have to think about adopting new tactics, more along an insurgency. Otherwise, the regime will gain ground slowly but surely.
Q: With the regime closing in on an estimated 200,000 citizens in east Aleppo, do you expect to see a protracted street fight with block-to-block urban warfare over the next few weeks, or do you believe that it is in the regime’s best interests to instead allow Aleppo’s rebel forces to leave to Idlib?
I’m not sure. I can imagine that the Syrian government might allow them to withdraw to Idlib and that the fighters would accept such a deal once they reach a point of absolute desperation. It still won’t change the political and military loss that the opposition suffers, even if some of their several hundred fighters in Aleppo survive and move to Idlib or another place.
Q: Idlib has become the Syrian badlands, with the regime relocating thousands of rebels there as part of the negotiated surrenders of more than half a dozen towns and cities across Syria. Do you see the regime positioning itself for a final battle with the opposition over Idlib?
The armed opposition’s strategy now would be to hold the major cities and towns of Idlib province, places such as Idlib city, Maarat a-Numan, Kafr Nubul and Jisr a-Shughour. But they will not be able to do that against sustained Syrian government, Russian and Iranian militia attacks. It’s impossible even with the closer supply lines to Turkey. They won’t be able to overcome that firepower. They couldn’t do it in Aleppo even though Aleppo was originally very close to their Turkish supply lines.
Moreover, with the introduction of such large numbers of Iranian-backed militia from Iraq, Lebanon and even Afghan refugees, the war of attrition no longer works in the favor of the opposition. It actually works in favor of the Syrian government. If the armed rebel groups want to sustain their opposition, they’re going to have to change their tactics and develop more of an insurgency strategy rather than trying to hold ground against superior firepower.
Q: Can the Syrian-Russian-Iranian alliance win this war militarily?
I can easily imagine that if the armed opposition changes its tactics to an insurgency, what you will get is the Syrian government in control of major cities but sustained fighting in rural areas and even occasionally in towns. It will make it even more difficult than it already will be for the Syrian government to rebuild the country.
Q: In a June interview with Robin Wright for the New Yorker, you said that there are “many indications” that the opposition can be “unified enough to present a relevant and cogent program and alternative” to the regime. Since August the regime has made significant ground advances both in the Damascus countryside and Aleppo. Do you still believe that the opposition can meaningfully unify? Would the United States even want to work with this opposition, or will it be so strongly dominated by Islamist opposition groups that a “moderate opposition” would be unrecognizable?
I distinguish between Islamists and extremists. I don’t think all Islamists are extremists. There is a broad political program embodied in the High Negotiations Committee, with a large amount of consensus between someone as secular as Riad Hijab and someone as Islamist as Mohammad Alloush. On that level, I can see the outlines of a moderate, political opposition. There’s enough unity there that you can take that seriously.
However, [the opposition] has two big hindrances. First, they are becoming way too sectarian in terms of a failure—an unwillingness even—to reach out to communities that are still supporting the Assad government. It is not a secret that communities in places like Tartus, Latakia and Qardaha have suffered terrible casualties. A lot of their young people have fled the country because they don’t want to be sucked in to military service. But despite that, neither the political nor the armed opposition has ever reached out to them. They’ve never said “we’re not coming after you, we’re just trying to rid the country of Assad.” I think that’s a terrible mistake by the armed and the political opposition. They have allowed extremist language to seep into their normal day-to-day language. How many times do you hear the word Nusayri [Ed.: A derogatory term for Alawites] instead of saying “people who support the Assad government?” It’s a terrible mistake.
The second problem is that there’s an unwillingness to publically confront the Sunni extremist elements that are also fighting Assad. In so doing, the opposition leaves Sunni Arab communities in places like Damascus, Homs and Hama thinking that Riad Hijab or Mohammad Alloush actually support the Al-Qaeda program for Syria even though they do not. This isn’t a new problem. It goes back years, but the opposition’s time to fix it is diminishing.
Q: Looking where we are today, you wouldn’t say that it’s already too late?
That’s a fair question. I know they are running out of time, but I don’t know if it’s too late. But it shouldn’t matter because the opposition has to do it no matter what if they hope to succeed. They have no choice but to adapt their military strategies and their political outreach strategy.
Here’s another example. The opposition is fighting tooth and nail against Iraqi Shiite militias in Aleppo. They’ve captured some Iraqi Shiite militiamen, and I guess they’re holding them as prisoners. To what end? I don’t understand why they don’t take those prisoners and deliver them to the Najaf clerical authorities and say: “We’re not fighting Iraqi Shia. You had to live under Saddam Hussein; you know what that’s like. We’re trying to get rid of Bashar al-Assad who’s just as bad as Saddam Hussein. Why are you doing this to us?”
That’s a sophisticated political outreach to separate the Iraqi Shia from the Iranians, but the political opposition seems completely incapable of doing that because they’re so sectarian. They have allowed the extremist language to seep into their thinking. It’s a real problem.
Q: Come January 2017, what can the new administration realistically do that is both in the best interests of the Syrian people and serves America’s national interests?
The most important thing for the administration to do in the Middle East writ large is to re-stabilize traditional alliances, whether it be with Turkey, Saudi Arabia or even, to a certain extent, with Egypt. There is a real incongruence of strategies.
I think the new administration has to understand why Saudi Arabia and Turkey perceive what’s happening in Syria to be against their interests, and Americans need to understand that these are our friends. They help keep the Middle East stable so that we don’t have to have American forces on the ground as we do in Iraq and now in Syria. If there’s an agreement between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United States, for example, to support Euphrates Shield and to not promote the PKK-affiliate PYD party, that makes huge sense to me if it’s part of bolstering Turkish-Saudi efforts to stabilize the region against Iranian expansionism.
If there’s a plan to help the remaining moderate opposition, I’m all in favor of that, but it only makes sense if Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the United States work together. If everybody is off supporting their own clients in a completely uncoordinated manner—as has been the case for the last five years—it’s useless.
We need to get the Turks and the Saudis to work in a more constructive manner with us rather than everybody chasing their own particular little clients, which has led to the fracturing of the armed opposition.
Q: In November, Dr. Joshua Landis told Syria Direct that to keep on sending arms and money to the rebels would only “prolong the civil war,” and the United States should not do so “unless it means it.” How do you respond? Will further American involvement inevitably prolong the war and increase the rates of casualties and displaced Syrians?
I read what Josh Landis said, and I have two thoughts on it. Number one, the United States does not control Turkey and Saudi Arabia, and it certainly doesn’t control Turkey and Saudi Arabia when it stays aloof from the Syrian crisis.
Turkey and Saudi Arabia have their own interests in Syria, and they will pursue those interests regardless of what Washington does. The question is, how can Washington steer them. By just saying, “We accept Assad. We fold and go home,” it would leave Turkey and Saudi Arabia to go ahead and do what they do. Yemen is a case in point.
The second point I would make to Josh is that it doesn’t really matter in the end what the foreigners think because the Syrians are still fighting against Assad. It’s not American soldiers, it’s not Turkish soldiers and it’s not Saudi soldiers that are fighting Assad. It’s tens of thousands of Syrians, and you cannot expect this war to end until there is some kind of an agreement whereby a much larger number of Syrians accept the government in Syria as legitimate.
That’s how this started in the first place. It wasn’t started by foreigners; it was by Syrians. Until you address that problem, you will not bring the war to an end. Josh seems to think that it’s only because of foreign states that there’s fighting, but there was fighting in Syria long before foreign states ever got involved. I was on the ground in 2011 and 2012, and there was very little foreign involvement at all back then. There was growing fighting and it escalated. It’s not so simple as the foreign states come to an agreement, and it ends magically. I wish that it were.
Q: On a final note related to regional partnerships, today, the US is simultaneously supporting both the SDF-led advance on Raqqa and the Turkey-backed advance on Mosul, both with airstrikes. Moving into the new administration, do you think it is sustainable to continue walking the fine line between these two diametrically opposing Turkish-Kurdish agendas, or are they bound for a collision course, forcing the United States to choose a side?
They are obviously bound for a collision course. We’ve already had multiple instances where the Syrian Sunni Arab opposition groups—basically the same ones that are in Euphrates Shield—have come in to violent armed clashes with the YPG and its allied SDF forces. This is part of the strategic incoherence of the Obama administration, and I do mean strategic incoherence.
The Americans need to decide who would be the best over the medium and long term to contain and limit extremist recruiting in Syria among the disgruntled Sunni Arab communities. I would suggest that the Syrian Kurdish YPG and its PYD political overlord are not the ideal partner for that mission.
Q: The Kurds have proven to be the Untied States’ most successful partners in combatting the Islamic State. Why are they not best suited to limit extremist recruiting in Syria?
A variety of Sunni Arab officials and fighters bitterly resent what the PYD has done in northeastern Syria. They reject the idea of an imposed autonomous zone. They reject Kurdish language instruction being imposed. They reject Kurdish separatism out of Syria. That’s one of the few things that the Assad government and the Sunni Arab opposition both agree on.A tourist carrying a Union Flag umbrella walks in the rain during a spell of wet weather, next to The Tower of London, in London, Britain January 15, 2017. REUTERS/Peter Nicholls
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Ombudsman called on the EU’s Brexit negotiators on Thursday to give the public access to documents and accept their input during the talks on Britain’s withdrawal, which are due to start in the coming weeks.
Emily O’Reilly, who as Ombudsman has power to investigate complaints from the public about the EU authorities, wrote to European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker asking for assurances the EU executive would share information during the two-year process, especially as it concerns citizens’ rights.
Her office, she said, had already had complaints from people seeking clarity on how Brexit will affect them. Firms trading between Britain and the continent, EU citizens living in Britain and Britons living in continental Europe face uncertainty.
Acknowledging a need for some confidentiality, O’Reilly, an Irish former journalist, said: “It would be helpful to... give citizens access to relevant information and documents at the appropriate time and without the need to ask for them.”
British Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to trigger the exit process later this month under Article 50 of the EU treaty. Preparations on both sides have been marked by secrecy and conflicting demands. EU officials are particularly anxious to prevent London sowing division among the 27 other EU states.
In other EU negotiations, notably over a controversial free trade pact with the United States, the Commission has yielded to calls from campaigners to publish some documents in a bid to ally public suspicion of what was under discussion.
In a tweet, Juncker’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier said on Thursday: “Transparency and democracy (are) essential for success.” His comment came after a meeting with the speaker of the European Parliament, which must endorse any Brexit deal.By Alia Beard Rau | The Republic
State leaders from around the nation will gather in Arizona this week to plan what would be the first Article V convention in American history.
The intent of the Arizona Balanced Budget Amendment Planning Convention, scheduled to begin Tuesday at the state Capitol, is to lay the groundwork for a future gathering at which state leaders propose to restrict federal spending.
According to Article V of the U.S. Constitution, states can force Congress to call a convention for proposing amendments to the U.S. Constitution if two-thirds of the states pass resolutions calling for them to do so.
“I don’t think people realize the states have the power and authority to use this,” said Arizona Rep. Kelly Townsend, R-Mesa, chairwoman of the Arizona delegation and one of the event organizers. “The states are the closest to the people and we know what we’re doing.”
Arizona is among a dozen states that have passed nearly identical proposals in recent years. But more than a dozen more have passed various versions of legislation calling for conventions over the decades.
READ ON:Session 1: The Current State of Online Privacy
Ibrahim Altaweel is an undergraduate student studying computer science at University of California, Santa Cruz. He is a web security engineer at Good Research, and a privacy engineer at purrivacy.org. More information about Ibrahim Altaweel is available at his website at manip.io.
Steven Englehardt is a Ph.D. candidate at Princeton University’s department of computer science and a graduate research fellow at the Center for Information Technology Policy. Mr. Englehardt’s research focuses on the privacy and security of the web. In his research, he has developed a web measurement platform, OpenWPM, and has published several impactful measurement studies on web tracking.
Chris Jay Hoofnagle is adjunct full professor at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Information. An elected member of the American Law Institute, Mr. Hoofnagle is author of the forthcoming Federal Trade Commission Privacy Law and Policy (Cambridge University Press 2016).
Joseph Turow is the Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication. Professor Turow is an elected Fellow of the International Communication Association and was presented with a Distinguished Scholar Award by the National Communication Association. In 2012, the TRUSTe internet privacy-management organization designated him a “privacy pioneer” for his research and writing on marketing and digital-privacy. His forthcoming book with Yale University Press explores how retailers are using mobile devices to replicate internet-like surveillance and data gathering in physical stores. He has authored ten books, edited five, and written more than 150 articles on mass media industries.
Justin Brookman is the Policy Director of the Federal Trade Commission’s Office of Technology Research and Investigation. Prior to joining the FTC, Justin was Director of Consumer Privacy at the Center for Democracy & Technology and Chief of the Internet Bureau of the New York Attorney General’s Office.
Omer Tene is Vice President of Research and Education at the International Association of Privacy Professionals. He is an Affiliate Scholar at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society; and a Senior Fellow at the Future of Privacy Forum.
Elana Zeide is an attorney, consultant, and scholar focusing on student privacy, data-driven education, and algorithmic assessment and credentialing. She is a Research Fellow at New York University’s Information Law Institute, an Affiliate of the Data & Society Research Institute, and an Advisory Board member of the Future of Privacy Forum and iKeepSafe. She writes for both popular and academic publications, recently including Algorithms Can Be Lousy Fortunetellers on Slate, Moving Beyond FERPA and FIPPs: Student Privacy Principles for the Age of Big Data forthcoming in the Drexel Law Review, and Unpacking Student Privacy in the upcoming Handbook of Learning Analytics & Educational Data Mining.
Session 2: Consumers’ Privacy Expectations
Serge Egelman is a Senior Researcher at the International Computer Science Institute (ICSI) and holds a research faculty appointment in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences (EECS) at UC Berkeley. He directs the Berkeley Laboratory for Usable and Experimental Security (BLUES), where his research focuses on consumer decision-making with regard to computer security and online privacy. This involves studying how people make decisions about their privacy and security, and then creating data-driven improvements to systems and interfaces that help them make better decisions.
Ashwini Rao is a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research interests include privacy, security, and usability.
Heather Shoenberger is an assistant professor of Advertising at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. She received a J.D. from the University of Missouri School of Law and a Ph.D. from the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Her research focuses on “targeted” messages spanning multiple types of media. Her current interests in this area are privacy issues relating to digital media.
Jasmine E. McNealy is an assistant professor in the Department of Telecommunication, in the College of Journalism and Communications at the University of Florida, where she studies information, communication, and technology with a view toward influencing law and policy. She holds a Ph.D. in Mass Communication with an emphasis on Media Law, and a J.D. from the University of Florida.
Andelka M. Phillips recently defended her thesis for the degree of doctor of philosophy in law (D.Phil., equivalent to Ph.D.) in the Faculty of Law at the University of Oxford. Her current research is concerned primarily with the appropriate regulation of direct-to-consumer genetic testing (DTC). She is also working on responsible innovation and the appropriate regulation of new and disruptive technologies more generally. Her doctoral research considered the regulation of DTC and included a review of the wrap contracts (clickwrap and browsewrap) of DTC companies that provide testing for health purposes. Her future work will examine the contracts and privacy policies of DTC companies offering non-health related testing. Ms. Phillips will be resident at the Brocher Foundation in August and September 2016.
Jan Charbonneau is an academic who has taught Marketing at the undergraduate, postgraduate, MBA, and Executive MBA levels in Canada, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Australia, and throughout the Asia Pacific region. Her publications focus on public attitudes and behaviors, survey methodology, and educational materials, including two textbooks. She has honors and postgraduate qualifications in Political Science, Economics, and Business from Queen’s University in Canada, as well as honors and postgraduate qualifications in Law from Queensland University of Technology in Australia. She is taking time off from marketing to pursue an evidence-based Ph.D. in Law at the Centre for Law & Genetics, Faculty of Law, University of Tasmania, looking at how best to protect consumers in the emerging DTC Genetic Testing market.
Kristen Anderson is an attorney at the Federal Trade Commission, in the Bureau of Consumer Protection’s Division of Privacy and Identity Protection. Her practice focuses on consumer privacy and data security. Ms. Anderson joined the FTC in 2011 after earning her J.D. at the Georgetown University Law Center and her M.P.P at the Georgetown Public Policy Institute (now the McCourt School of Public Policy).
Alan McQuinn is a Research Assistant with the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. His research areas include a variety of issues related to information technology and Internet policy, such as cybersecurity, privacy, virtual currencies, e-government, Internet governance, and commercial drones. He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a B.S. in Public Relations and Political Communications.
Darren Stevenson is a Ph.D. Candidate in Communication Studies at the University of Michigan and an Affiliate Scholar at the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Mr. Stevenson’s research examines the personalization of digital media, investigating the roles of trust, privacy concerns, algorithms, and data analytics. He provides digital strategy expertise to organizations and has served as a consultant on a range of technology projects for Fortune 500 companies, governments, and non-profit organizations.
Session 3: Big Data and Algorithms: Transparency Tools Revealing Data Discrimination
Michael Carl Tschantz is a researcher at the International Computer Science Institute, with a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University. He uses the models of artificial intelligence and statistics to solve the problems of privacy and security. His current research includes automating information flow experiments, circumventing censorship, and securing machine learning.
Anupam Datta is an Associate Professor at Carnegie Mellon University where he holds a joint appointment in the Computer Science and Electrical and Computer Engineering Departments. His research area is security and privacy. His current focus is on information accountability — foundations and tools that can be used to provide oversight of complex information processing ecosystems (including big data systems) to examine whether they respect privacy, and other desirable values in the personal data protection area, such as fairness and transparency. His work has produced accountability tools deployed in industry, and studies that rigorously demonstrate concerns with privacy, fairness, and transparency in online behavioral advertising. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Roxana Geambasu is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Columbia University. She joined Columbia in the fall of 2011 after finishing her PhD at the University of Washington. For her work in cloud and mobile data privacy, she received an Early Career Award in Cybersecurity from the University of Washington Center for Academic Excellence, a Microsoft Research Faculty Fellowship, a 2014 “Brilliant 10” Popular Science nomination, an NSF CAREER award, an Honorable Mention for the 2013 inaugural Dennis M. Ritchie Doctoral Dissertation Award, a William Chan Dissertation Award, two best paper awards at top systems conferences, and the first Google Ph.D. Fellowship in Cloud Computing.
Daniel Hsu is an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science and a member of the Data Science Institute, both at Columbia University. Previously, he was a postdoc at Microsoft Research New England, and the Departments of Statistics at Rutgers University and the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from UC San Diego, and a B.S. in Computer Science and Engineering from UC Berkeley. His research interests are in algorithmic statistics, machine learning, and privacy. His work has produced the first computationally efficient algorithms for numerous statistical estimation tasks (including many involving latent variable models such as mixture models, hidden Markov models, and topic models), provided new algorithmic frameworks for tackling interactive machine learning problems, and led to the creation of highly scalable tools for machine learning applications.
James C. Cooper is an Associate Professor of Law, and director of the Program on Economics & Privacy, at George Mason University School of Law. Prior to moving to George Mason, Professor Cooper spent several years at the Federal Trade Commission, including serving as Deputy and then Acting Director of the FTC’s Office of Policy Planning, and later as an advisor to Commissioner William E. Kovacic. He also worked in the antitrust group at Crowell & Moring LLP in Washington, DC, for several years before joining the FTC. James is the editor of The Regulatory Revolution at the FTC: A Thirty-Year Perspective on Competition and Consumer Protection, and his research has appeared in academic journals including the Antitrust Law Journal, Journal of Regulatory Economics, and the International Review of Law & Economics. He has a Ph.D. in Economics from Emory University and a J.D. (magna cum laude) from George Mason University School of Law, where he was a Levy Fellow and a member of the George Mason Law Review.
Dan Salsburg is the Chief Counsel and Acting Chief of the Office of Technology, Research and Investigation (OTech) in the Bureau of Consumer Protection (BCP) at the Federal Trade Commission. Prior to joining OTech, Dan served as an Assistant Director in BCP, where he supervised investigations and cases involving spam, Internet fraud, and mobile technologies. Previously, he served as a Senior Trial Attorney in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s Division of Enforcement. Dan received his B.A. and J.D. degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.
Deirdre K. Mulligan is an Associate Professor in the School of Information at UC Berkeley and a co-Director of the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology. Prior to joining the School of Information in 2008, she was a Clinical Professor of Law, founding Director of the Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic, and Director of Clinical Programs at the UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall). Ms. Mulligan is the Policy lead for the NSF-funded TRUST Science and Technology Center, which brings together researchers at UC Berkeley, Carnegie-Mellon University, Cornell University, Stanford University, and Vanderbilt University. Her current research agenda focuses on information privacy, security, and cybersecurity. She is Chair of the Board of Directors of the Center for Democracy and Technology, and a Fellow at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Session 4: Economics of Privacy & Security
Jens Grossklags is the Haile Family Early Career Assistant Professor of Information Sciences and Technology at the College of Information Sciences and Technology, the Pennsylvania State University. He directs the Security, Privacy and Information Economics Laboratory (SPIEL), which focuses on economic and behavioral foundations and applied challenges in the areas of privacy and security. Previously, he served as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Center for Information Technology Policy, and as a Lecturer of Computer Science at Princeton University. In 2009, he completed his doctoral dissertation at UC Berkeley’s School of Information. At UC Berkeley, he also completed master’s degrees in Computer Science, and Information Management and Systems.
Veronica Marotta is a Ph.D. student in Public Policy and Management at the Heinz College, Carnegie Mellon University. Her background is in economics and quantitative analysis with a Master of Econometrics and Mathematical Economics from Tilburg School of Business and Economics. Ms. Marotta’s research interest is at the intersection of economics and information systems, with a particular focus on economics of privacy and digital economy.
Alessandro Acquisti is a Professor of Information Technology and Public Policy at the Heinz College, Carnegie Mellon University. He researches the economics and behavioral economics of privacy. His studies have spearheaded the application of behavioral decision research to privacy decision making and the analysis of privacy and disclosure behavior in online social networks. He is an Andrew Carnegie Fellow, sits on the Board of Regents of the National Library of Medicine, and holds degrees from UC Berkeley (Ph.D., Master), London School of Economics and Trinity College Dublin (Masters), and University of Rome (Laurea).
Catherine Tucker is the Sloan Distinguished Professor of Management Science and Professor of Marketing at MIT Sloan and Chair of the MIT Sloan Ph.D. Program. Her research interests lie in how technology allows firms to use digital data to improve their operations and marketing, and in the challenges this poses for regulations designed to promote innovation. She has particular expertise in online advertising, digital health, social media, and electronic privacy. Generally, most of her research lies in the interface between marketing, economics, and law. She holds a Ph.D. in economics from Stanford University, and a B.A. from the University of Oxford.
Sasha Romanosky researches topics in cyber security, privacy, law enforcement, national security, and law & economics. He is a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation. Mr. Romanosky holds a Ph.D. in Public Policy and Management from Carnegie Mellon University and a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Calgary, Canada. He was a Microsoft research fellow in the Information Law Institute at New York University, and was a security professional for over ten years. Mr. Romanosky holds a CISSP certification and is co-author of the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS), an open standard for scoring computer vulnerabilities.
Kevin Moriarty is an attorney in the Division of Privacy and Identity Protection in the Bureau of Consumer Protection of the Federal Trade Commission. He works on investigations and litigation involving privacy and data security.
Doug Smith is an economist at the Federal Trade Commission in the Division of Consumer Protection of the Bureau of Economics. His focuses include consumer disclosures and online privacy and security. His research interests include mechanism design, online privacy, and markets with fraudulent goods. He received his B.A. from Harvard and his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Michigan.
Siona Listokin is an associate professor at George Mason’s School of Policy, Government, and International Affairs, where she specializes in regulation, privacy, public finance and corporate governance. She is also the director of the Master of Public Policy (MPP) program.
Session 5: Security and Usability
Sarthak Grover is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Computer Science, Princeton University. He received his bachelor’s and master’s in Electronics and Communications Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Roorkee in 2010. Mr. Grover’s research focuses on home network measurement and security, in particular, measuring home broadband performance, traffic usage, and security & privacy of devices in a home network. He received the STEM Chateaubriand fellowship in 2015 for pursuing research on security of Internet of Things.
Vitaly Shmatikov is a professor of computer science at Cornell University and Cornell Tech. Dr. Shmatikov works on computer security and privacy. In recent years, his research group received the PET Award for Outstanding Research in Privacy Enhancing Technologies twice, Best Student Paper or Best Practical Paper Awards at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy three years in a row, as well as the Best Applied Security Paper Award, NDSS Best Student Paper Award, and CCS Test-of-Time Award.
Dr. Florian Schaub is a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. His research focuses on human factors of privacy, human-computer interaction, ubiquitous computing, and mobile security. Dr. Schaub has a doctoral degree and Diplom in Computer Science from the University of Ulm, Germany, and a Bachelor in Information Technology (Multimedia Technology) from Deakin University, Australia. He is an IAPP Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/US) and Privacy Technologist (CIPT).
Norman Sadeh is a professor in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University, where he also co-founded and co-directs the Master’s Program in Privacy Engineering. His research focuses primarily on usable security and privacy, machine learning, mobile computing and the Internet of Things. Dr. Sadeh is currently serving as lead principal investigator on two of the largest domestic research projects in privacy, a National Science Foundation frontier project on “Usable Privacy Policies” that combines machine learning, natural language processing and crowdsourcing to semi-automate the annotation of privacy policies, and a DARPA Brandeis project to develop personalized privacy assistants for the Internet of Things.
Aaron Alva is the Tech Policy Fellow at the Federal Trade Commission. Prior to joining the FTC, he focused on multidisciplinary cybersecurity research and policy. Mr. Alva has published work on a variety of topics including cloud forensics, digital evidence admissibility, and legal requirements engineering. Mr. Alva jointly completed a Master of Science in Information Management and a J.D. at the University of Washington as an NSF CyberCorps scholarship recipient.
Geoffrey A. Manne is the founder and Executive Director of the International Center for Law and Economics (ICLE). A nationally recognized expert in the law and economics of antitrust, consumer protection, privacy & data security, and telecommunications, Mr. Manne is the editor, with former FTC Commissioner Joshua Wright, of Competition Policy and Intellectual Property Law Under Uncertainty: Regulating Innovation from
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We have now explored all the options we have for self-signed certificates, but in all those cases, the limitation remains that web browsers are not going to trust those certificates unless you tell them to, so the best option for server certificates for a production site is to obtain them from one of these CAs that are well known and automatically trusted by all the web browsers.
When you request a certificate from a CA, this entity is going to verify that you are in control of your server and domain, but how this verification is done depends on the CA. If the server passes this verification then the CA will issue a certificate for it with its own signature and give it to you to install. The certificate is going to be good for a period of time that is usually not longer than a year. Most CAs charge money for these certificates, but there are a couple that offer them for free. The most popular free CA is called Let's Encrypt.
Getting a certificate from Let's Encrypt is fairly easy, since the whole process is automated. Assuming you are using an Ubuntu based server, you have to begin by installing their open source certbot tool on your server:
$ sudo apt-get install software-properties-common $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:certbot/certbot $ sudo apt-get update $ sudo apt-get install certbot
And now you are ready to request the certificate using this utility. There are a few ways that certbot uses to verify your site. The "webroot" method is, in general, the easiest to implement. With this method, certbot adds some files in a directory that your web server exposes as static files, and then tries to access these files over HTTP, using the domain you are trying to generate a certificate for. If this test is successful, certbot knows that the server in which it is running it is associated with the correct domain, and with that it is satisfied and issues the certificate. The command to request a certificate with this method is as follows:
$ sudo certbot certonly --webroot -w /var/www/example -d example.com
In this example, we are trying to generate a certificate for a example.com domain, which uses the directory in /var/www/example as a static file root. If certbot is able to verify the domain, it will write the certificate file as /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/fullchain.pem and the private key as /etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com/privkey.pem, and these are going to be valid for a period of 90 days.
To use this newly acquired certificate, you can enter the two filenames mentioned above in place of the self-signed files we used before, and this should work with any of the configurations described above. And of course you will also need to make your application available through the domain name that you registered, as that is the only way the browser will accept the certificate as valid.
If you are using nginx as reverse proxy, you can take advantage of the powerful mappings that you can create in the configuration to give certbot a private directory where it can write its verification files. In the following example, I extended the HTTP server block shown in the previous section to send all Let's Encrypt related requests to a specific directory of your choice:
server { listen 80; server_name example.com; location ~ /.well-known { root /path/to/letsencrypt/verification/directory; } location / { return 301 https://$host$request_uri; } }
Certbot is also used when you need to renew the certificates. To do that, you simply issue the following command:
$ sudo certbot renew
If there are any certificates in your system that are close to expire, the above command renews them, leaving new certificates in the same locations. You will likely need to restart your web server if you want the renewed certificates to be picked up.
Achieving an SSL A+ Grade
If you use a certificate from Let's Encrypt or another known CA for your production site and you are running a recent and maintained operating system on this server, you are likely very close to have a top-rated server in terms of SSL security. You can head over to the Qualys SSL Labs site and get a report to see where you stand.
Chances are you will still have some minor things to do. The report will indicate what areas you need to improve, but in general, I expect you'll be told that the options the server exposes for the encrypted communication are too wide, or too weak, leaving you open to known vulnerabilities.
One of the areas in which it is easy to make an improvement is in how the coefficients that are used during the encryption key exchange are generated, which usually have defaults that are fairly weak. In particular, the Diffie-Hellman coefficients take a considerable amount of time to be generated, so servers by default use smaller numbers to save time. But we can pre-generate strong coefficients and store them in a file, which then nginx can use. Using the openssl tool, you can run the following command:
openssl dhparam -out /path/to/dhparam.pem 2048
You can change the 2048 above for a 4096 if you want even stronger coefficients. This command is going to take some time to run, specially if your server does not have a lot of CPU power, but when it's done, you will have a dhparam.pem file with strong coefficients that you can plug into the ssl server block in nginx:
ssl_dhparam /path/to/dhparam.pem;
Next, you will probably need to configure which ciphers the server allows for the encrypted communication. This is the list that I have on my server:
ssl_ciphers 'ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DHE-DSS-AES128-GCM-SHA256:kEDH+AESGCM:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:DHE-DSS-AES128-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA256:DHE-DSS-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:AES128-GCM-SHA256:AES256-GCM-SHA384:AES128-SHA256:AES256-SHA256:AES128-SHA:AES256-SHA:AES:CAMELLIA:!DES-CBC3-SHA:!aNULL:!eNULL:!EXPORT:!DES:!RC4:!MD5:!PSK:!aECDH:!EDH-DSS-DES-CBC3-SHA:!EDH-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA:!KRB5-DES-CBC3-SHA';
In this list, disabled ciphers are prefixed with a!. The SSL report will tell you if there are any ciphers that are not recommended. You will have to check from time to time to find out if new vulnerabilities have been discovered that require modifications to this list.
Below you can find my current nginx SSL configuration, which includes the above settings, plus a few more that I added to address warnings from the SSL report:
server { listen 443 ssl; server_name example.com; ssl_certificate /path/to/cert.pem; ssl_certificate_key /path/to/key.pem; ssl_dhparam /path/to/dhparam.pem; ssl_ciphers 'ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384:DHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256:DHE-DSS-AES128-GCM-SHA256:kEDH+AESGCM:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256:ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384:ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA:DHE-DSS-AES128-SHA256:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA256:DHE-DSS-AES256-SHA:DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:AES128-GCM-SHA256:AES256-GCM-SHA384:AES128-SHA256:AES256-SHA256:AES128-SHA:AES256-SHA:AES:CAMELLIA:!DES-CBC3-SHA:!aNULL:!eNULL:!EXPORT:!DES:!RC4:!MD5:!PSK:!aECDH:!EDH-DSS-DES-CBC3-SHA:!EDH-RSA-DES-CBC3-SHA:!KRB5-DES-CBC3-SHA'; ssl_protocols TLSv1 TLSv1.1 TLSv1.2; ssl_session_timeout 1d; ssl_session_cache shared:SSL:50m; ssl_stapling on; ssl_stapling_verify on; add_header Strict-Transport-Security max-age=15768000; #... }
You can see the results that I obtained for my site at the top of this article. If you are after 100% marks in all categories, you will have to add additional restrictions to your configuration, but this is going to limit the number of clients that can connect to your site. In general, older browsers and HTTP clients use ciphers that are not considered to be the strongest, but if you disable those, then these clients will not be able to connect. So you will basically need to compromise, and also routinely review the security reports and make updates as things change over time.
Unfortunately for the level of sophistication on these last SSL improvements you will need to use a professional grade web server, so if you don't want to go with nginx, you will need to find one that supports these settings, and the list is pretty small. I know Apache does, but besides that, I don't know any other.
Conclusion
So there you go, this is how you can implement top-of-the-line SSL security for your Flask application. Is there anything that I left out? Do you do things differently? Let me know below in the comments!Dramatic arrest captured on video after high-speed #chase suspect crashes into police cruiser in Van Nuys https://t.co/FeZquW7yaq pic.twitter.com/IeIk8C3fby — ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) October 31, 2016
Officers smashed windows and used non-lethal rounds after a suspect crashed into a cruiser during a police chase in Van Nuys on Monday.The chase sparked at about 3 p.m. in the Sherman Oaks area and the suspect could be seen in a stolen Chevrolet Volt reaching high speeds on residential streets while swerving in and out of traffic.After several close calls, the suspect became cornered in a cul-de-sac on Keswick Street near Burnet Avenue and was crashing into a police cruiser at about 3:45 p.m.Several officers surrounded the suspect with guns drawn.Officers broke out the windows to the car and fired non-lethal rounds at the suspect before pulling him out of the vehicle."Waited patiently for him to come out and to see if he would," Sgt. Megan Glaister with the Los Angeles Police Department said. "At some point he was trying to injure himself and at that point we stepped in and used non-lethal force and took him into custody without any incident."The suspect was placed in handcuffs and paramedics were spotted at the scene treating him.The officer who was in the police cruiser the suspect crashed into walked away from the scene, but was later taken to the hospital with injuries. The officer was listed in good condition.By Christina Passariello ▲
Christina Passariello The Wall Street Journal BiographyChristina Passariello
@cpassariello
[email protected] July 26, 2017 6:00 a.m. ET 8 COMMENTS
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ON A SUNNY DAY in May, Jonathan Ive —Jony to anyone who knows him—first encounters a completed section of Apple Park, the giant campus in Cupertino, California, that has turned into one of his longest projects as Apple’s chief designer. A section of workspace in the circular, Norman Foster–designed building is finally move-in-ready: sliding-glass doors on the soundproof offices, a giant European white oak collaboration table, adjustable-height desks, and floors with aluminum-covered hinged panels, hiding cables and wires, and brushed-steel grating for air diffusion.
Ive’s characteristically understated reaction—“It’s nice, though, isn’t it?”—masks the anxiety he feels each time a product he’s designed is about to be introduced to the world. “There’s the same rather strange process you go through when you finish a product and you prepare to release it—it’s the same set of feelings,” says Ive, who turned 50 in February. “That feels, I don’t know, encouragingly healthy, because I would be concerned if we lost that sense of anxiety. I think that would suggest that we were not as self-critical, not as curious, not as inquisitive as we have to be to be able to be effective and do good work.”
Apple Park is unlike any other product Ive has worked on. There will be only one campus—in contrast to the ubiquity of Apple’s phones and computers—and it doesn’t fit in a pocket or a hand. Yet Ive applied the same design process he brings to technological devices: prototyping to minimize any issues with the end result and to narrow what he calls the delta between the vision and the reality of a project. Apple Park is also the last major project Ive worked on with Steve Jobs, making it more personal for the man Jobs once called his “spiritual partner.”
“After Steve died, he was the one who carried it forward with the same intent,” says Laurene Powell Jobs, who was married to Jobs for 20 years until his death in 2011. Ive describes small elements of the new headquarters of the world’s most valuable company—with a market cap of $750 billion and a $257 billion cash stockpile—that connect directly to Jobs’s past, such as cherry and apricot trees, recalling the orchards of Jobs’s youth in Silicon Valley. At the same time, he promises it will be the birthplace of new toys and tools the rest of us haven’t imagined yet. Ive and Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, talk about the campus as something for the next generation of Apple employees—like parents doing estate planning.
WSJ. Magazine August 2017 issue. Jonathan Ive, Apple’s chief designer, in his own clothes and wearing an Apple Watch Edition. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
With Apple Park, Ive is ensconced as master of the house, which means he has also inherited the burden of proving that Apple’s best days aren’t behind it. Apple hasn’t had a breakthrough product since Jobs died. The iPhone’s sales growth has stalled, and expectations are high that a 10th-anniversary phone will arrive later this year and will be markedly more advanced than previous versions. In other technologies, from digital assistants to driverless vehicles to augmented and virtual reality, Apple seems to lag other tech giants, including Google, Amazon and Tesla. Its new voice-activated speaker, HomePod, unveiled in June, will arrive on the market in December, three years after Amazon’s Echo.
The scattering of thousands of Apple employees across more than 100 sites in Silicon Valley has rendered more difficult the collaboration necessary for innovation. “We didn’t plan our growth, and then when we saw our growth, we were so engrossed in trying to push things forward that we didn’t spend time to really develop the workplace,” says Cook. “We’ve done a really good job of working around it, but it’s not the way we want to be working, nor does it represent our culture well.”
Like other Ive designs, Apple Park seems poised to become an icon. In an acknowledgement that the campus will attract interest beyond its employees, there will be a visitor center and a store selling items unique to Apple Park. Drones manned by aficionados have documented from the air the emergence of the futuristic ring-shaped building and the Steve Jobs Theater, a glass-walled auditorium that seats 1,000.
Ive likes to emphasize how the perception of the 2.8-million- square-foot ring is less imposing and powerful from the ground. As one looks out from inside the ring to the west, the opposite side of the building seems to set the stage for the Santa Cruz Mountains beyond. “When you’re in the parkland,” he says, referring to the 30-acre landscaped area that will form the center of the ring, “it’s not dominated by built structure at all.”
‘ ‘Jony works tirelessly at the detail, evolving, improving, refining. For me, that makes him a poet.’ ’ —Norman Foster.
Carrying Apple forward has weighed on Ive’s shoulders. After Jobs’s death, Ive’s role was broadened to oversee all hardware and user experience—all the essential ways people interact with Apple devices—but the increased workload led to exhaustion, colleagues say. Two years ago, he shed some managerial responsibilities when his title changed from senior vice president of design to chief design officer.
Ive joined Apple half a lifetime ago, in his mid-20s, when the company was at the brink of death. One of his early designs, the candy-colored iMac, was rejected by executives. Ive stashed it away until Jobs returned to the company in 1997, after a 12-year hiatus; it became an instant point of connection between the two men and was put into production soon thereafter. Ive is now revered in the design world and the technology industry for having made every Apple product since—iPod, iPhone, iPad and on and on. He has received honorary degrees from the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, and in July became chancellor of the Royal College of Art in London.
Ive’s friend Bono, writing in an email, says he’s “restless and relentless in pursuit of perfection,” while Norman Foster, whose architecture firm was hired by Apple to build the headquarters at a reported cost of $5 billion, calls him “a poet.” Other designers are “amazing essayists, but the difference between an essay and a poem is that you really have to work harder at the poem. It’s much more distilled, it’s much more the essence,” Foster says. “He works tirelessly at the detail, evolving, improving, refining. For me, that makes him a poet.”
GLASS CASTLE | Hallways around the perimeter of the main building are set up to encourage casual meetings. The chairs are by Poul Kjærholm. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
BUT IVE, as a boy growing up in London, struggled with words, so his father encouraged him to express himself through drawings. He learned to manipulate material objects at a young age from his grandfather and his father, who taught silversmithing.
During Ive’s first permanent job after college, with a London design firm called Tangerine, he developed a laptop for one of the firm’s clients: Apple. After the client poached him in 1992, Ive quickly became involved in everything from product design to manufacturing, visiting the company’s factories in Japan.
Ive’s personal style telegraphs humility. During our tour of Apple Park, he wears white canvas pants and tan Clarks Wallabees with a blue T-shirt, an outfit he appears in so frequently that it could be called his signature look. But unlike Jobs’s black turtlenecks, his attire is more a uniform than a fashion statement. (Ive’s suits are custom-made by a tailor in the north of England, Thomas Mahon, but he rarely dresses up.) There are unexpected splashes of color for a man who helped make white and brushed silver a new standard among handheld devices: orange socks and a red iPhone 7, the special edition Ive created for Bono’s AIDS charity. His Apple Watch flashes his pulse: 88 beats per minute.
Ive is tuned into the look and feel of things wherever he goes. “Oh, I’ve got the Faber-Castell pen,” he interjects, as I use one to take notes. He is also precise—mixing unsweetened cranberry juice with tonic water just so, to get the right amount of acidity—and intense, chasing his drink with two double espressos.
When J.J. Abrams was working on Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Ive mentioned that he “would love to see a lightsaber that is rougher, spitting sparks,” Abrams says. The director, who says he and Ive were already fans of each other’s work when they met at a dinner four years ago, applied Ive’s suggestion to character Kylo Ren’s weapon. “His lightsaber was as imperfect and unpredictable as the character,” says Abrams. (The inspiration is mutual: Ive told Abrams that he had the look of the original Stormtroopers in mind when he designed Apple’s earbuds.)
OPEN SEASON | A view across one of the building’s air shafts. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
For much of the past decade, a plot of land in Northern California’s suburban sprawl has been the focus of Ive’s imagination. Walking in London’s Hyde Park in 2004, Jobs fantasized with Ive about building a campus centered around a quad, like Stanford University, with plenty of parkland for meandering and meeting, Ive says. At the time, the first iPhone was in the works, and Apple’s revival, thanks to the iPod and iMac, meant the company had outgrown its digs in Cupertino, California, capable of housing 3,000 people in the six buildings that make up Infinite Loop. Apple slowly began plotting for a new space, buying 175 acres of a former Hewlett-Packard site that Ive described as “acres of parking,” one freeway exit south of Apple’s existing headquarters.
In the early days of planning, Ive and Jobs shared “drawings, books, and created expressions of feelings,” says Powell Jobs, who often witnessed the longtime partners collaborating. Some principles were a given, such as the belief that natural light and fresh air make workers happier and more productive. The prototyping prerequisite made for a logical match with Foster + Partners, which also practices modeling and prototyping. Norman Foster visited Ive in his top-secret design studio during one of their early meetings. It emerged that the two design gurus have other interests in common, including a love of the work of English painter Bridget Riley, whose graphic black-and-white art plays tricks on the mind.
From the beginning, Ive had an “absolute obsession with the idea that it was built like a product, not like a piece of architecture,” says industrial designer Marc Newson, one of Ive’s oldest friends, who has contributed to Apple designs in recent years.
Ive takes a subtly British dig at other tech campuses sprouting across Silicon Valley. “A lot of the buildings that are being built at the moment are products of software-only cultures,” says Ive. “Because we understand making, we’ll build [a prototype] and try it and use it, and see what works and what doesn’t.” Facebook commissioned Frank Gehry to make its headquarters, with unfinished plywood walls and cables and cords that dangle from the ceiling. Bjarke Ingels’s and Thomas Heatherwick’s plan for Google’s new campus calls for a giant metal roof canopy.
Ive was used to taking on projects in new domains—such as music players and smartphones—so designing a campus didn’t feel like a leap. In fact, Ive thinks the line separating product design from architecture shouldn’t be so rigid. Architecture is “a sort of product design; you can talk about it in terms of scale and function and materials, material types,” he says. “I think the delineation is a much, much softer set of boundaries that mark our expertise.”
Desks in the open-plan workspaces can be raised to standing level at the push of a button. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
Ive puts aesthetics on the same footing as technology in his designs, says Nicholas Serota, who recently stepped down as director of the Tate. “By example, he has managed to persuade the tech industry that beautiful design has a function but also has an appeal to consumers,” says Serota.
“We always joked that one of the greatest sources of our inspiration was the fact that there was just so much stuff out there that we didn’t like,” says Newson. “The negativity sort of became a positive source of inspiration.” Newson says that Ive’s hand could improve a plethora of badly designed products beyond technology, such as cars—though he says he has no idea if Apple is working on a car. (Ive is particular about the three cars he owns, a vintage Bentley, a Range Rover and a 1964 Aston Martin.) Ive, who Foster says defines the current age of design, as legendary German industrial designer Dieter Rams did for an earlier generation, has more than 5,000 patents to his name. “Ive is like an actor who is limitless in his ability to bring any character to life,” says Abrams.
A white oak table in a common area. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
The desire for light and air, crossed with the need for enough density to house 12,000 employees, gave shape to Apple Park’s main building. Ive, tracing an infinity sign in the air, says they considered complex forms, including a trilobal design, a sort of giant fidget spinner. Ultimately they decided that only a ring shape could give the feeling of being close to the elements.
The design called for four stories of office space, more than Ive had hoped, but few enough that “it means that you don’t need to use elevators, you can walk to visit people, you can walk for meetings,” he says. Blueprints and photos capturing the designs wallpaper a building across the street from the campus that serves as a headquarters for the construction project. (At the height of activity in February, 6,200 construction workers were on-site daily.) A diagram lays out where the different divisions will be located in the main building: The fourth floor will be home to the executive suites (including Ive’s design studio), the watch team and part of the group working on Siri, which will also occupy a fraction of the third floor. The Mac and iPad divisions will be interspersed with software teams on the middle levels.
Having settled on an overall shape, the team then broke it down into smaller parts. “One of the advantages of this ring is the repetition of a number of segments,” says Ive. “We could put enormous care and attention to detail into what is essentially a slice that is then repeated. So there’s tremendous pragmatism in the building.” The ring would be made up of pods—units of workspace—built around a central area, like a spoke pointing toward the center of the ring, and a row of customizable seating within each site: 80 pods per floor, 320 in total, but only one to prototype and get right.
The first prototype was ready in the summer of 2010, with pictures of trees on either end of the central area to evoke the landscaping and proximity to the outdoors. Jobs himself set the precise dimensions of the openings from one end of the central area to the other. The team quickly discovered that early versions of the small offices on each side of the central area were noisy—sound bounced off the flat wood walls. Foster’s architects suggested perforating the walls with millions of tiny holes and lining them with an absorbent material. In the completed section of workspace, Ive snaps his fingers to demonstrate the warm sound it creates.
While Apple Park was in development, Ive worked on his own architectural project on the side: a red brick mansion he bought in 2012 in San Francisco’s Pacific Heights neighborhood, for which he hired Foster to help implement his designs. Ive lives there with his wife, Heather, whom he married in 1987, and their twin 13-year-old sons, Charlie and Harry. “It’s a wonderful mixture of something quite old and historically significant and something that is very modern and very rigorous,” says Newson. “The thing about that level of perfectionism and that level of simplicity is it really belies the complexity.”
ustom furniture designed by Naoto Fukasawa in another common area. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
“The materiality of it is inspiring,” says Powell Jobs. “The quality of the wood, the quality of the stone, the quality of the light—that’s what makes it so beautiful.”
The same attributes accent Apple Park, though the materials are deceptively humble. Most of the ring is made of glass and concrete, Ive points out—though the concrete on the ceilings that run the inner and outer circumferences has been polished to mimic the terrazzo floor in the staircases, down to the same flecks of rock.
The main cafeteria, where Ive began his tour of the recent progress on campus, is a four-level atrium with massive 440,000-pound glass doors that open on both sides to let air pass through. Giant columns clad in blasted steel resemble the aluminum used on Apple’s phones and computers. (Apple built a prototype of the cafeteria near its old headquarters, where it has been testing meal service for three years.) Ive imagines it as a central meeting point—the kitchen will serve 14,000 lunches a day—leading to the kinds of serendipitous encounters that could give birth to new ideas. Apple employees will pay for the food served here, but at a somewhat subsidized rate. “Steve’s philosophy was that when people have skin in the game, they appreciate it more,” says Dan Whisenhunt, Apple’s head of real estate and development.
Employees will have many other opportunities to gather. The central parkland will be the venue for Apple’s famous “beer bashes,” Friday afternoon parties, often with featured entertainment. The Steve Jobs Theater, whose primary use will be for product-launch events, will also host seminar talks, small concerts and meetings with Cook or Ive that will be simulcast to every pod on campus.
Ive and Cook place great importance on employees being physically together at work—ironic for a company that has created devices that enable people to work from a distance. Face-to-face communication is essential during the beginning of a project, when an idea is sprouting, they say. Once a model emerges from a series of conversations, it draws people in and gives focus. “For all of the beauty of technology and all the things we’ve helped facilitate over the years, nothing yet replaces human interaction,” says Cook, “and I don’t think it will ever happen.”
The circular glass canopies reflect more of the surrounding greenery than Ive had anticipated. Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
THE THOUSANDS OF employees at Apple Park will need to bend slightly to Ive’s vision of the workplace. Many will be seated in open space, not the small offices they’re used to. Coders and programmers are concerned that their work surroundings will be too noisy and distracting. Whiteboards—synonymous with Silicon Valley brainstorming—are built into floor-to-ceiling sliding doors in the central area of each pod, but “some of the engineers are freaking out” that it isn’t enough, says Whisenhunt. iPhones will be the primary mode of communication for everyone, though individuals can also lobby for a desk phone, if they feel they have a need for one.
Ive wants movement to be at the core of the work environment—something that seems unavoidable with such a large campus. There will be 2,000 custom bikes made by Public Bikes and painted “Apple gray.” Some employees talk about bringing a change of shoes for the quarter-mile hike from the parking structures at the edge of the campus to the main building, but there will also be electric golf carts and a commuter shuttle between the parking structures and the ring. To help employees find their way around, the campus will be mapped on Apple Maps.
The temperature in the building will stay within a 10-degree range (68 to 77 degrees Fahrenheit), thanks to a cutting-edge ventilation system that streams outside air in through gaps in the glass walls and cools it with chilled water, while simultaneously evacuating warm air through shafts that open skyward. The building will draw approximately 80 percent of its power from solar panels on the roof and from fuel cells (and the remaining 20 percent from other sources of renewable energy); recycled wood has been used for much of the interior. Such environmental innovations receive praise from former Vice President Al Gore, an Apple board member. “I’m a fan of the Churchill saying,” Gore says. “ ‘We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us.’ ”
Ive takes offense at the idea that he hasn’t already thought of every detail during the years of planning Apple Park. He scoffs at an article claiming that Apple contributed to a tree shortage in the Bay Area by buying up so many plants for the campus, “as if we’d got to the end of our project and we thought, Oh, we’d better plant some trees.” Apple began working with an arborist years ago to source trees, including varieties that once made up the bountiful orchards of Silicon Valley; more than 9,000, many of them drought-resistant, will have been planted by the time the campus is finished.
ALL ABOUT IVE | Ive has been the driving force behind Apple’s massive new headquarters, designed in collaboration with architect Norman Foster. “After Steve died,” says Laurene Powell Jobs, Ive “was the one who carried it forward with the same intent.” Photo: Mikael Jansson for WSJ. Magazine.
During Ive’s visit, trees heavy with summer stone fruits were waiting to be planted in the center of the ring to create the parkland. These will be regularly harvested to provide fruit for the campus kitchen.
Some of the greenery has already taken root around the ring, leading to a surprise that Ive hadn’t foreseen in prototyping. The tinted-glass canopies that jut out from each floor like the brim of a hat are so luminous that they reflect what’s above and below, casting a green glow from the trees into the hallways.
In the next few months, Ive will transition from being the creator of Apple Park to one of its thousands of users. His design team is scheduled to be one of the last to move into the new headquarters this fall—around the same time as the event at which Apple has typically unveiled its new iPhone. The next frontier Ive faces, beyond reinventing a greatest hit, is how to further embed technology onto our bodies and into our homes, using devices such as the Apple Watch, AirPods and HomePods as the beachheads for collecting data and tracking ourselves. “Everything we design and make in the future is going to start right here,” he says.
With each new product Apple rolls out, its predecessors seem a little antiquated. But Ive and Jobs built Apple Park to last, and their legacy will be etched into the glass, concrete and trees for decades to come. Just as the ring blurs the boundary between inside and outside, Ive’s personal and professional lives are fluid. As a designer, “you spend so much time living in or living with the solution that doesn’t yet exist,” he says. “I’m just looking forward to going to see an engineer I’m working with on something, to sit there and perhaps walk out and sit outside for a bit with him, to be able to go to the workshop and start to see how we’re building something.”In a recent essay I proposed the existence of a new human subspecies – homo sapiens ephemera — that is smart (thus sapiens) but severely afflicted by attention deficit disorder and long-term memory loss. Thus ephemera may understand, for example, the connection between a burning fuse at his feet and an imminent explosion, but almost immediately forgets it, goes on to something else, and is surprised by the blast. Nowhere is this behavior more evident than in the U.S. oil patch, whose collapse, predicted here and elsewhere for years, is now described by none other than Moody’s Investors Service, quoted in Bloomberg News as “catastrophic” and perhaps “the worst bust of any industry this century.”
Does anybody remember the Savings and Loan debacle? The Enron (“smartest guys in the room”) implosion? The Dot-Com collapse? And the Sub-Prime Mortgages that Ate the World? After each of these episodes, Ephemera slapped his slanted forehead and said, “Boy, that was dumb. But nobody could have seen it coming.” Put on your protective headgear, because it’s happening again.
When they came to you, Ephemera, and asked you to invest gazillions of dollars up front in the New American Oil Revolution, they talked about energy independence! and America, Number One! and everything back the way it was in 1950! But the burning fuse at your feet was about fracking wells that cost ten times that of a conventional oil well and play out nearly ten times faster, about exploding trains and polluted water and earthquakes, in a market that would soon devalue the product by 50%.
Of course you gave them the money. You bought their stock, you bought their bonds, you bought their junk bonds. You lent them money, and when they couldn’t pay it back you lent them more to roll over the debt, which almost immediately became enormous because every one of those expensive wells had to be replaced every three years. You let them convert your secured debt to unsecured debt, or to watered down stock, or to fairy dust. Now, according to Moody’s, there has finally been an explosion. Who could have seen that coming?
Moody’s reports that twice as many oil and gas companies have gone bankrupt so far this year than did so in all of last year. Investors affected by these failures have seen an average 21 percent return. No, that’s not return on their investment, it’s return of their investment; they lost 80 per cent of their money. And those were secured lenders; junk-bond holders got back 6 cents for every dollar they invested.
Yet the fuse burns on. In the Bakken fracking field in North Dakota, for example, where no oil company has made any money, even when oil was priced at over $100 a barrel, where the total accumulated debt of the players is north of $30 billion, where production has been declining for over a year with oil prices below $50 and well below the cost of production — the zombie companies, almost
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of the dramatic social and cultural shifts taking place across antebellum America.”
The biggest fan of the show may be the state of Virginia, where Mercy Street’s first season will have an economic impact of $27 million on the local economy, according to Edmunds of the Virginia Film Office. That estimate is based on the $11.7 million the show’s producers are spending in the state, which gains value as it cycles through the economy, and $1.5 million in ultimate ad value from promotions pre- and post-show.
As part of the Film Office’s arrangement with PBS, the network produced and broadcast a promo for Virginia Tourism at the beginning and end of each show with an estimated value of $300,000, Edmunds said. The website VisitAlexandria.com saw a tripling in visits in the first hour Mercy Street was on air, he said.
PBS was able to finance the full production of Season One with funding from the Anne Ray Charitable Trust and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, along with Virginia tourism agencies. It also sold the international rights to Electric Entertainment, which screened the show at MIPCOM last fall but hasn’t announced any overseas distribution deals yet.
“I don’t see how they could stop it after six episodes,” said Edmunds. “There’s a lot more war.”
Related stories from Current:The March 10 issue of The Facts, the largest of several newspapers serving Seattle’s African American community in 1966, outlined the history of negotiations leading up to the call for a boycott. (Click to read the text) Part of the Seattle Civil Rights Project’s special section, CORE and Central Area Civil Rights Campaigns, 1960-1968 Click the link above to go to the special section, which features streaming video interviews with activists, a histories and reports of Seattle’s civil rights campaigns during the era, documents from numerous civil rights initiatives, and a database of news articles about Seattle’s struggle for open housing. The front page and several inside pages of the March 31 edition of the _Seattle Times_were devoted to coverage of the boycott and the Freedom Schools Boycott pamphlets Click to read leaflets and fact sheets produced by the Central Area Committee for Civil Rights and other groups participating in the boycott campaign. These items are from the Congress of Racial Equality, Seattle Chapter Records (Acc.1563) University of Washington Library. Special Collections. Boycott leaflet Central Area Committee for Civil Rights letter to the Seattle School Board Feb 23, 1966. “No Other Choice” leaflet distributed by the Central Area Committee for Civil Rights. Fact sheet on Seattle schools prepared by the Central Area Committee for Civil Rights. Freedom School Letters Children attending one of the Freedom Schools wrote letters to the Seattle School Board explaining what integrated education would mean to them and why they joined the boycott. Eight letters follow. Click to see them in larger readable versions. (Congress of Racial Equality. Seattle Chapter Records [Acc.1563] University of Washington Library. Special Collections). Parent Letters Below are letters from parents discussing their views on the school boycott (Congress of Racial Equality. Seattle Chapter Records (Acc.1563) University of Washington Library. Special Collections.)
What do we want? Integration. When do we want it? Now! This familiar chant from the civil rights movement reflected the desires of Seattle parents of school age children in 1966. That year, for two days, K-12 students poured out of Seattle ’s public schools and attended “freedom schools” to protest racial segregation in the Seattleschool system. Excitement was in the air as the students learned about African America history that was not taught in the public school system. All organizers and participants were striving for an end to segregation, and for two days, the students attended integrated schools, and used an innovative kind of direct action to turn their schoolwork into activism for social change. This essay tells the story of that boycott—from its origins to its effect on Seattle’s students and politicians.
IDENTIFYING THE PROBLEM
The problem of segregation in Seattle was very easy to identify, as it was across the entire country. But the solution was very complex. De facto segregation—in which public spaces were supposedly integrated but housing and employment discrimination still confined African Americans to certain poor neighborhoods—was the problem in the north. This kind of segregation—different from the explicit prohibitions in the South— proved difficult for supposedly liberal Seattleites to acknowledge or take action to remedy. When interviewed by the Seattle Times, one black Seattle resident commented that, “The biggest fault most Negroes find with the Seattle white-power structure is that it doesn’t seem to recognize the problem even exists.”1
In Seattle, as in other major cities, blacks were concentrated in one area. The Central District—also called the Central Area—was home to a majority of blacks and thus resulted in many schools being mainly black. According to Seattle ’s major civil rights groups, this concentration had a negative impact on the quality of African Americans’ public education.
In a flyer put out by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), and the Central Area Civil Rights Committee (CACRC), they state that Seattle had thirteen predominately “black” schools and over 100 “white” schools. In the Seattle schools, blacks accounted for 9.1 percent of total enrollment. However, the black students were heavily concentrated in a small number of schools. In elementary schools, black students made up 95 percent of Horace Mann; 89 percent of Leschi; 83 percent of Harrison ; 80 percent of TT Minor; 79 percent of Madrona; 76 percent of Colman, and 45 percent of Stevens. About 80 percent of all black students attended two junior high schools, which made Washington 66 percent black and Meany 49 percent. Garfield High School was home to 75 percent of all black high school students, who made up 52 percent of the entire school’s student body…2
Segregated schooling was part of a much larger cycle of segregation, and it perpetuated segregation in employment, housing, and every day of these students’ daily lives. These schools had less funding, less parent involvement, less experienced teachers, lower test scores, and lower graduation rates.
But African American parents were not passive. They fought both to improve the quality of their schools while challenging the system that concentrated African Americans disproportionately in a few under-funded schools. The problem they had was getting residents and officials in the city of Seattle to take their concerns seriously.
UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS AT DESEGREGATING THE SEATTLE PUBLIC SCHOOLS
Throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s, various civil rights groups in Seattle unsuccessfully tried to persuade a predominately white school board to address the issues of desegregation of the Seattle Public Schools. The school district’s representatives argued that the neighborhood school was the best, and that all children should be able to live near and walk to their school.
Dr. Ronald J. Rousseve, Associate Professor of Education at Seattle University, explained why he and much of the civil rights movement disagreed with the school board’s response. For him, the “neighborhood school concept” served an unacceptable status quo. The de facto segregated schools were perpetuated through residential stratification and adherence to the neighborhood school concept. He argued that “Stereotypes, racial epithets, unconscious prejudices, and both subtle and overt discrimination are still so pervasive in our society (and this includes the Pacific Northwest), that children from different social backgrounds cannot possibly learn to relate to one another as individuals if they are kept separated most of their childhood years.”.3
Civil rights groups in Seattle tried for years to open up the Seattle school system. They were in constant communication with the School Board; the NAACP submitted suggestions and letters; CORE submitted a 23 page analysis of school segregation which included a plan to eliminate it.4 And in May, 1965, the Urban League submitted a different plan-the Triad Plan— which came to dominate early school desegregation battles.
The Triad Plan would have desegregated all tiers of the school system by matching white schools with those that were predominately black. 5 The elementary schools would be divided into two year institutions and the city would be divided intozones. The students from neighborhoods that fell within the paired zones would go to one school for grades 1-2, another for grades 3-4, and yet another for grades 5-6. Each one of these schools would be located in a different area, which would provide multiethnic education for all students.6 The basic philosophy was “the need to provide every child, especially the disadvantaged child, with an enriched, expanded community with which to identify.”7 There were many who supported this proposal as a solution to the problem of segregation, but those supporters did not include the school board.
PLANNING FOR THE BOYCOTT
Cold response to the Triad Plan, along with years of fruitless negotiations, began to convince Seattle’s civil rights leaders that more dramatic actions were necessary to push the Seattle School Board to take action to remedy the effects of de facto segregation in Seattle’s schools.
One observer summarized the School Board’s stand in 1965 by commenting that “compensatory education would be offered in the Central Area, that the voluntary transfer program would be maintained, and that the schools weren’t all that bad anyway—that everyone had equal access to education.”8 But this did not satisfy Seattle ’s civil rights leaders. Rev. John Adams of First AME Church remarked that “I consider the whole compensatory education program a deception and a fraud. The very name defeats its purpose. It says to the Negro children that they have learned less than they should. They accept it, believe it, and do as little as possible.”9 An article in Seattle CORE’s newsletter, The Corelator, added that “compensatory education is like rain on sand. It leaves a mark for a while, but soon disappears.10
As early as 1965, the president of the Seattle NAACP, E. June Smith, warned that “if the Seattle School Board does not devise a long-range school integration program and begin implementing it next fall, we will have to dramatize our concern.”11 She went on to state that the action would be direct and might include a boycott, sit-in, or other methods of direct action. She concluded that the voluntary transfer program was only a minor concession and had not been successful in any other city that it had been tried out.
The President of the School Board, Phillip B. Swain, responded to Smith by saying that “the only person ultimately hurt [by a boycott] is the child himself, who is deprived of educational experience.”12 He claimed that school board policy stated explicitly that “it has a responsibility to promote racial understanding within the broad application to promote racial understanding within its broad obligation to provide high-quality education programs for all pupils.”13He also noted that “forced racial segregation was contrary to the basic principles of our society; that equal educational opportunity must be provided for all children with special programs to assure that cultural deficiencies are overcome”; that each child “must be accepted and treated by every member of the school staff without prejudice or bias.”14
In early February of 1966, the rest of Seattle ’s civil rights leaders came to a similar conclusion as Smith. Walter Hundley, chair of CORE and member of the CACRC, got together some fellow CACRC members; John H. Adams, Minister of First A.M.E church, Edwin Pratt, Executive Director of the Seattle Urban League and Charles V. Johnson from the NAACP for lunch to lay out the need for action in the schools from his CORE perspective and suggested that a boycott was necessary. Hundley recalled:
I told them, you know the schools…the CORE committee wasn’t able to get anywhere with the School District —there were just a lot of games being played. I said, “We’ve got to do something…we’ve really got to move this thing—and its got to be dramatic.” And I suggested that we have a school boycott, but that we must do it in the most responsible manner possible… it’s going to be a lot of work for everybody. The organizational logistical kind of thing would…be tremendous—but I think we could pull it off.” And we kicked it around—and Adams said, “You’re right! Right on!” And then the others fell in line.15
On February 23, 1966, the NAACP, CORE, and CACRC, released their letter to the superintendent to the press which spelled out their intention to launch a boycott of the Seattle public schools. They requested that all parents in Seattle keep their children out of school for two days. They had given up hope that any serious plan to integrate the schools would be considered. This was why they felt so driven to protest and vowed to continue their protest until the Seattle Public Schools met two conditions:
Develop and publish a comprehensive plan to integrate the schools within a reasonable period of time… Begin immediately a program of compulsory in-service training for all school personnel in human relations with an emphasis on the understanding and acceptance of racial minorities in previously all-white schools.16
This decision to boycott was not made on a whim; there had been years of fruitless discussion with school officials.
Their goal was not to protest indefinitely, and they were “ready to discuss…at any time means to accomplish the goals of desegregation of the schools.”17 John Cornethan, Chairman of CORE, said that “This boycott is not necessary; it is the last thing we want to do…But the school board has not been at all receptive to our suggestions.”18 He thought the boycott should never have had to happen, but nothing else was working. Rabbi Levine said, “This is the real reason for the threatened boycott. It is not to intimidate the school authorities and force them to action. It is rather an act of desperation on the part of the civil rights leaders to shock the community into an awareness of the problem and acceptance of our responsibilities.”19E. June Smith of the NAACP said she thought the boycott would be called off if there was something done, but a plan would need to be spelled out. A promise that something would be done would be unacceptable, and would be willing to meet with official at any time but never heard from them.
The Superintendent thought the boycott was unnecessary since they already knew about the situation. He thought it would have little or no effect on the plans to end segregation and that “there are certainly more constructive ways for these people to accomplish their ends,…[the boycott] would have no adverse effect on any desegregation plans…[nor] affect the board’s desire and ability to move ahead…[but] the board will not and cannot operate under pressure.’”20
The boycott was publicized through city-wide and leafleting, but the biggest planning problem was what to do with the children who were participating in the boycott. The organizers didn’t want to take students out of school entirely and saw the need for some type of substitute program which would stress the importance of school during the two days of protest. This concern led to the formation of a “freedom school” planning committee within the general leadership group.
The term “freedom school” was first used during Freedom Summer in 1964, during which CORE established 30 freedom schools throughout Mississippi to dramatize the racial inequalities in the state’s educational system. These schools were staffed by white college students who tried to overcome poor funding and outdated textbooks by teaching them black history and leadership skills.21
On March 6, Rev. John Adams announced the Seattle freedom school plans to the public. There would be a committee of educators arranging for a staff to teach the students participating in the boycott black history, life and culture. He reassured that the boycott was not “meant to be a holiday; it would be an educational experience as well as a protest of the…failure to end racial segregation in the schools here.”22 And he stressed that a “substantial number of white people…[would join the] protest and participate in operating the freedom schools.”23
The eight freedom schools were to be staffed by 100 teachers with two principals at each site. The sites for elementary schools were planned for First A.M.E. Church, Madrona Presbyterian Church, East Madison YMCA, Goodwill Baptist Church, St. Peter Claver Center, and Cherry Hill Baptist Church. The junior high centers were planned for Mt. Zion Baptist Church, and Tabernacle Baptist Church, while the senior high school sites consisted of Prince Hall Masonic Temple, East Side YMCA, and Woodland Park Presbyterian Church.24 Volunteers served as doctors on call, resource people and general assistants. The schools’ main focus was black history and civil rights. One of the principle planners, Nancy Norton, said they wanted to use “’good solid material that all children can do well together,” and their aim was “’to promote a good integrated experience for the children who came to the schools.’”25 There was much speculation about how many students would participate in the freedom schools and boycott. John Adams was sure that the freedom schools could handle as many as 5,000 students, while others felt that 500-700 in attendance would be a success.
SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION FOR THE BOYCOTT
The decision by parents, churches and organizations to either support or oppose the boycott was often complex. The boycott highlighted tensions within the community: some were neutral, some were vehemently opposed, and some were all for it. And much of the debate was centered on whether a boycott was legal, and what kind of citizenship students would learn through freedom schools.
Many organizations issued their full support for the boycott and freedom schools. The New Conference of Women’s Auxiliaries of the International Longshoremen’s Union endorsed it as well as the Seattle Local 200 American Federation of Teachers. Local AFT president Jim Sullivan said, “We think it is unfortunate to have to us such things as boycotts, but historically the Negro has not achieved any breakthrough without some form of direct action.” The Madrona PTA would not state whether or not they would support the boycott. Churches provided a major source of both support and opposition. Father John Lynch was very involved in CORE planning movements which was an early indicator of Catholic support for the boycott. The executive board of the Catholic Interracial Council issued a statement in March which supported the boycott.26 The Archbishop of Seattle, the Most Reverend Thomas A. Connolly, was also a firm backer of the protest. Unitarians for Social Justice also passed a resolution supporting the boycott. The Reverend Peter Raible, minister of the UniversityUnitarian Church, supported the boycott and was scheduled to be involved in the freedom schools.
The Presbytery of Seattle supported the freedom schools but did not endorse the boycott. The Seattle Association of Evangelicals opposed the boycott as an illegal action. They felt that the students were the ones who would suffer and the end result was not justified by the means. Rev. Dr. Robert B. Munger of University Presbyterian Church argued that “dramatic steps” must be taken to awaken the community to growing segregation, but he disagreed that “the ends justified the means.”27 One clergyman stated, “I support the cause wholeheartedly, but not the method.”28
The local mainstream newspapers did not endorse the upcoming boycott. The P-I labeled it as a “crisis of conscience.” The Seattle Times called the boycott “ill-advised” and said the schools’ “primary function is education, not social reform.” It added that “no major public agency in the state has shown more concern about racial problems than the Seattle Public Schools.” The Times worried that the boycott would teach children to defy public authority. It supported the school board in “refusing to be stampeded into making concessions”, and hoped “that the boycott will find mighty few participants.”
ACLU attorney Michael Rosen countered such arguments by saying that it was the school board, and not protesting students, who were violating the law. Since the Supreme Court ruled segregation illegal, and the schools in Seattle are overwhelmingly segregated, he reasoned that “ Washington compulsory educational law is unconstitutional and the boycott should not be considered illegal.”29
Dr. Earl Miller added to this argument when he claimed that rather than suffer because of the boycott, students would receive “leadership training to [become] a new generation of civil rights leaders.” He thought the efforts that the board had taken to date could be classified as tokenism, and that the boycott was just the beginning of a long term struggle with the school board. Rev. Adams also stated that the boycott was only the beginning.30
The school board, however, continued to virtually ignore the threats of boycott, and the Superintendent’s final word was that the boycott was an “illegal thing:” students participating would receive no disciplinary action but would be given unexcused absences, and “teachers also will be expected to fulfill their teaching contracts on the boycott days.”31 Opposition didn’t end there; Governor Dan Evans did not support the boycott because he saw it offering no solution: “I’d much rather see the talents of civil rights leaders and of the community as a whole working out a solution, rather than protesting a problem.”32 Grace Meur, a citizen of Seattle who submitted her opinion to a Catholic newspaper, took this kind of thinking further by framing her opposition to the boycott as a fear of the kind of direct action that had made southern segregationists so infamous: “The intelligent approach is through the courts. No people like to be ruled by mob-rule, neither here nor in the South.”33
The movement moved to the next step on March 18 when the NAACP filed a suit on behalf of thirty black students. Even though the school board had partially recognized the issue of segregation in the schools, the main issue was whether or not the board had done enough to eradicate it. The suit sought to obtain a court order which would require the school district to submit a plan for the elimination of racial segregation in the schools and specifically asked that Washington Junior High and Mann Junior High—along with. Leschi, Harrison, Colman, and Minor elementary schools— be closed. The suit also sought to put an end to the alleged practices of the districts of drawing school boundaries that caused racial segregation, assigned black teachers on the basis of race, and failed to promote qualified black and other non-white teachers to become principals.34 Earl Miller, NAACP Education Chairman, stated that the boycott could have been avoided if the school board had been receptive to any of the four suggestions they had made: “The only thing we wanted was some tangible proof that the school board was sincerely interested in eliminating segregation in the school system.”35 Miller justified the coming boycott by saying that “We cannot afford to allow the school board to succeed in its policy of containment and isolation of the Negro children on a residential school reservation outside the mainstream of American education.”36
THE BOYCOTT
The school boycott was held on March 31 and extended to April 1, 1966. The chairman of the Boycott Committee, Rev. Dr. John Adams, estimated that 3,000 students participated in the freedom schools that were held in lieu of attending regularly scheduled class. The students attending these freedom schools put in a full day from 8am to 3pm; once they were there, they were not allowed to leave.
The overall rates of city-wide school absence were at 10.2 percent. The previous day, the rate was around 6.3 percent. On March 30, the day before the boycott there had been 824 students from school. On March 31, the first day of the boycott there were 3,185 students absent from school. On April 1, there were 3, 918 absent from school. The rates of central area schools were as high as fifty percent. Overall, the increases in the absentee rate over the two days were 58.5 percent.37
Dr. Adams stated that around 30 percent of the students attending the freedom schools were white. This number shows that there were a substantial number of whites who were sympathetic to the plight of blacks in Seattle. For some white students that attended the freedom schools, it was the first time they had gone to schools with blacks.
The teacher absence rates were the lowest they had been since February 14th of that year. Only three district certified teachers participated in the boycott due in part to the district policy on contractual obligations. Dick Warner, a history and economics teacher at Ballard H.S., was one of the three who chose to teach at the MountZion freedom school. He said: “One cannot be an active and responsible citizen without taking action—that’s what I teach my pupils in school. I strongly believe in integrated schools. It is my duty to participate.”38 Participation in the boycott had been much higher than anyone expected.
The turnout at the freedom schools was so overwhelming that crowding became a problem. When a site filled up, the children were sent to another location nearby. Reverend Samuel McKinney of MountZion Baptist Church accommodated 500 children, and noted that “All the facilities we utilized were taxed to capacity. We had to find some auxiliary sites.”39 New freedom schools were needed due to overcrowding and were opened at Temple de Hirsch and St. Clements Episcopal Church. When dropping off their children at the freedom schools, some parents ended up staying because the sites were so crowded. A prime example is Carol Richman, who stayed at the freedom school at Madrona Presbyterian School which was 320 children above capacity.40 As Walter Hundley said, they wanted the entire operation to be carried out “in a manner that really seemed responsible so that the public…would understand that we are serious, and that we are responsible;…and that we were willing to pay our dues for a better system.”41
The students in Seattle had strong opinions regarding the boycott. Barbara Crocker, a sophomore at Garfield, said that “the only way for anything to be done is for us kids to take action.” Kevin Castle, said that “it doesn’t seem like the best plan—this boycott. But it’s the best step taken so far.” Tom Torrance, an eighth grader at Meany J.H. said “We see the problems at school with our colored classmates, probably even more and better than our parents do.” Wendy Peterson, 17, who attended the freedom school because she couldn’t live with herself if she hadn’t, said “I’ve always thought and said I am for integration. I felt if I couldn’t come I couldn’t say I’m unprejudiced.”42
A source that can shed light onto what drove young students to participate in the freedom schools were some letters written by students to members of the school board. There were a limited number of letters, so they are not in any way representative of the feelings of all students who participated. But they do provide a unique lens to look at the experience. One student, Teresa Banks, wrote that she wanted integrated schools because “you have to grow up with other races to be able to work well with them, you can’t just grow up with your own race and then go into a world that has mixed races and do good work.” Deborah Tate wrote that “the only way to prove that the people want it is to keep the children out of school for two days. We can’t learn with an all Negro school because when your get with a Caucasian group they won’t know how to act.” Robin Russell wrote: “Why shouldn’t we have integrated schools? Only our color is different. Underneath we are all the same. Everybody has a mind, legs, heart and everything.” Claudia Chotzen wrote: “The freedom schools and boycott are a good idea. I feel, because we are making the city aware of the problem. In this way we are also showing that people care. About integration and want to receive equal education as that we may grow up to be worthwhile citizens.” Emily Hanson wrote, “It’s about time somebody did something about this. Well, we are doing something about it. We are staying away from school to make you sit up and listen. And make you do something!” Clearly, these students not only expressed their desire to attend integrated schools. They showed the power of certain kinds of protest to engage youth in civil rights movement organizing and even leadership.
THE AFTERMATH
All the sponsors of the boycott considered it a huge success. The School District, in denial, stated that the increase in absenteeism was attributed to the next week’s spring vacation. They maintained that the boycott was not a success and that, based on its total effect on the school system, the response to the event was moderate.
The civil rights leaders thought this was the administration’s attempt to neutralize the effects of the boycott and knew for themselves that it had been “a clear cut success.”43At a news conference on April 1, John Adams called the boycott a “solid success,” and observed that it had “generated the first full-scale discussion of de facto segregation in our community.” He connected the widespread participation in areas inside as well as outside the central area as being large support for integration. Looking back at the initial goal of the boycott, Adams said “…we are now hopeful that the Seattle School Board will develop a master plan to integrate the schools within a reasonable time, perhaps over the course of several years. This has been our objective from the start.”44 A realistic evaluation raises the point that there were practical problems beyond the School Board’s power to overcome. The underlying message in the boycott was for everyone to think about, not just those on the board.
In an unpublished CORE paper, the author of Impressions from a Vice-Principal of one of the freedom schools recounted a phone call from a mother whose children had attended the freedom school. She told him over the phone how overjoyed she was because after coming home her children had a “new sense of pride in being Negro and a new knowledge of the part that Negroes have played in America—obviously something happened that neither she nor her children would ever forget.”45 These African American children experienced something that was truly life changing: they began to understand the important role that African Americans have played in America and learned about their culture. Mineo Katagiri, the Methodist pastor who would later found the Asian Coalition for Equality (ACE), was the parent of one of the freedom school students, and felt the boycott would be a turning point after which the School Board would have to take the civil rights leader’s demands seriously.46
Others did not see the boycott as such a success. Some critics thought that most whites were left unaffected by the boycott and that there was token support from some white families who participated in the freedom schools. Hundley, who had been pleased with the immediate success of the boycott, thought that “the long run result of it wasn’t productive because despite that huge effort, the District really still let us down.”47
But the boycott was not the end of the fight for integration of Seattle ’s public schools. The NAACP’s Dr. Miller announced that several events were planned to follow the boycott. The NAACP tentatively scheduled another boycott for May; planned to file charges with the State Board against Discrimination alleging discrimination in hiring of Seattle school personnel, and asked “to have supervision of the Federal Head Start program given to some other agency because the school has failed to integrate the program.”48 Though the second boycott never took place, the struggle continued.
CONCLUSION
The Seattle Boycott shows the complex and diverse nature of the civil rights movement as a whole. Juan Williams asserted that over ten years, the civil rights movement had transformed that nation as well as a race. After 300 years of oppression, blacks were now given a sense of dignity, power, and citizenship. Whites were changed as well, instead of accepting a segregated society; many began to question how they treated blacks with whom they came into contact with. It would take more than legislation to change the hearts and minds of whites. “After the Selma march, the assassination of Malcolm X, and the signing of the Voting Rights Act, a new sense of injustice began to burn in northern cities.”49 This injustice is what fueled the necessity for a boycott to secure equal education for the children in Seattle. This boycott in Seattle came after those in the South. But it was the fight in these Southern cities that made this boycott in the North possible.
This event highlights the determination and strength of people in Seattle who believed in justice and equality of education. The civil rights movement which had been brewing in places like Selma, and Memphis gave strength and hope to the civil rights leaders in Washington. Their children’s access to a brighter future, without having to be treated as second class citizens, was their ultimate goal. The immense effort in time and planning that went into the boycott was enormous. There should be no question of whether the boycott was successful or not. To organize over three thousand children, in ten freedom schools without a glitch was a success in and of itself. The legacy it has left for the city has been invaluable. It has empowered future generations to strive for change and realize the agency available to them to realize that change. All it takes is the desire and the need to recognize that change is necessary. When Walter Hundley called that meeting in early February of 1966, he was uneasy about the reaction he would receive. But in his heart, he knew something drastic and peaceful needed to be done to bring everyone attention to the gross inequality that was taking place. The boycott could not have been accomplished without the help of the hundred of planners, teachers, acting principals, parents, and students involved. The whole community really pulled together to make it happen.
The boycott that took place in Seattle was much like the boycotts that have taken place in other parts of the country and around the world. Segregation and unequal treatment have not only affected African Americans. This paper has focused on the unique history of African Americans in this country, but people of color and immigrants have been subject to second class treatment since before this nation even was called America. The hope for equal education still has yet to be realized, as integration rates today are decreasing and segregation is becoming more common. The gains that blacks made as a result of the civil rights movement are slowly being taken away. We are seeing a quiet, slow reversal of the Brown v. Board Supreme Court ruling. The end of mandatory bussing and the attacks from the right wing on voluntary affirmative action programs in some states have been big setbacks in the quest for achieving equal educational opportunity for blacks comparable to their white cohorts. Looking into the past should give this and future generations the hope and the desire to see change come to pass. The Seattle Public School boycott is just one example of a method of direct action to make the people in power listen and act accordingly.
**© Brooke Clark 2005
**HSTAA 498 Fall 2004
This paper won the UW History Department’s York-Mason prize in 2005. It was republished in the Feburary, 2006 issue of ColorsNW Magazine.
1 Seattle Times, August 15, 1965
2 “Fact Sheets on the Schools,” CORE papers
3 STA NEWS February 1966 p. 5
4 UW CORE. “ Seattle Civil Rights Groups Feel Boycott Only Way to End Segregation”
5 The Urban League, A Proposal for Reorganizing the Elementary Division of the Seattle Public Schools. Autumn, 1964, p.1 Mimeographed pamphlet, Seattle Urban League as quoted in Larry S. Richardson, “Civil Rights in Seattle : A Rhetorical Analysis of a Social Movement” Ph.D dissertation, Washington State University, 1975) p.158
6 Jeffrey Gregory Zane, “ America, Only Less So? Seattle ’s Central Area, 1968-1996” (Ph.D dissertation, April 2001) p. 90
7 Richardson, “Civil Rights in Seattle,”p. 159
8 Seattle Times, May 13, 1965 p. 53
9 “Freedom Schools Planned for the Boycott” by Lane Smith, newspaper unknown
10 The Corelator February 20, 1966 p1
11 Seattle Times, May 5, 1965, p. 19
12 Seattle Times, May 5, 1965, p. 19
13 Seattle Times, May 6, 1965, p. 41
14 Seattle Times, March 18, 1966
15 Hundley interview, February 13, 1975 as quoted in Pieroth, Dorothy Hinson. Desegregating the Public Schools Seattle, Washington 1954-1968. UW PhD Dissertation-History, 1979. p. 252
16 UW. Copy of Letter to Seattle Public School Officials Concerning Civil Rights groups School Boycott March 31 and April 1, February 23, 1996
17 UW. CSCC 7-Seattle Public Schools: “Copy of Letter to Seattle Public School Officials Concerning Civil Rights Groups’ Boycott March 31 and April 1,” February 23, 1966 as quoted in Pieroth p. 254
18 Seattle P-I, February 23, 1966, p. 25
19 Seattle Times, March 25, 1966
20 Seattle P-I, February 23, 1966, p. 25
21 http://www.core-online.org/history/freedom_summer.htm
22 “Freedom Schools Planned for Boycott” by Lane Smith
23 UW CORE; 2 Minutes, 1963-66: Minutes of general meeting, March 24, 1966 as quoted in Pieroth
p. 256, Seattle Times, March 6, 1966.
24 Seattle Times, March 25, 1966.
25 Seattle P-I, March 27, 1966 p. B
26 Seattle Times, May 5, 1965, p. 19
27 Seattle Times, March 20, 1966
28 Seattle P-I, March 27, 1966
29 Seattle Times, March 31, 1966
30 Seattle Times, March 30, 1966
31 Seattle Times, March 30, 1966 p. 8
32 Unknown newspaper March 22, 1966
33 _The Progress,_ March 25, 1966 p5
34 Seattle P-I, March 19, 1966 p. 4
35 Seattle Times, March 2, 1966 p. 8
36 Seattle Times, March 31, 1966, p. 1
37 The Facts, April 7-14, 1966 p. 4
38 Seattle Times, April 1, 1966
39 The Facts, April 7-14, 1966 p. 4
40 The Facts, April 7, 1966, p.6
41 Hundley interview, February 8, 1978 as quoted in Pieroth p.276
42 Seattle Times, April 1, 1966 p. 1
43 Seattle P-I, April 1, 1966, p. 1
44 Seattle P-I, April 3, 1966, p. A
45 UW CSCC: CORE papers-Unpublished
46 Katagiri interview, June 19, 1973
47 Christian Science Monitor, April 18, 1966. p13
48 Seattle P-I, April 1, 1966 p. A
49 Juan Williams, Eyes on the Prize: America ’s Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965( New York, 1987) p. 2870
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a partnership that would later also score the films The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) and The Road (2009).[5][30]
Grinderman; Harvey's departure (2006–2012) [ edit ]
After operating for several years as a touring backing band for Cave's solo work, Bad Seeds members Ellis, Sclavunos and Casey formed a new side-project Grinderman with Cave in 2006. The band, featuring Cave playing guitar for the first time, played garage rock-influenced music that still retained much of The Bad Seeds' aura and released a self-titled debut album in 2007.[31] In October 2007 Cave was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame and, in his acceptance speech, also inducted the members of The Bad Seeds and The Birthday Party, after explaining, "I cannot really accept this until we get a few things straight. What I can't figure out is why I am up here and The Bad Seeds aren't?"[32]
Grinderman marked a return to a raw sound, as well as Cave's debut on guitar.
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds released their 14th studio album Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! in 2008 and received a high level of critical acclaim.[citation needed] Inspired by the biblical story of the resurrection of Lazarus of Bethany by Jesus Christ,[33][34] the album continued the punk and garage rock-inspired arrangements that were explored on the debut Grinderman album, resulting in what NME termed a "gothic psycho-sexual apocalypse".[35] The group then embarked on a North American and European tour is support of the album, with a seven-piece lineup that did not include Johnston, who had left the group after the album's completion.[36]
Cave and the band curated Australia's first edition of the All Tomorrow's Parties music festival that was held in various Australian locations during January 2009. On 22 January, after the festival's completion, Harvey announced his departure from the band after 25 years, citing "a variety of personal and professional reasons". Harvey concluded his public statement by stating, "I shall continue working on the Bad Seeds back catalogue re-issues project over the coming year and look forward to the new opportunities I shall be able to accommodate as a result of my changed circumstances."[6] Harvey's departure was the end of a 36-year-long musical collaboration between Cave and Harvey, and Cave was left as the group's only original member.[31] The band enlisted guitarist Ed Kuepper, formerly of the Australian bands the Saints and the Laughing Clowns, as a touring member to complete the 2009 summer festival dates that were scheduled.[37] Also in 2009, Cave published his second novel The Death of Bunny Munro,[38] and Mute Records commenced work on a series of remastered versions of the Bad Seeds' back catalogue (some of the remastered albums included documentary footage from Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard).[citation needed]
Following this string of activity, the Bad Seeds became dormant while Grinderman reactivated and released Grinderman 2 in 2011.[31] The group also attracted further attention when their song "O Children" appeared in the 2010 film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1. In December 2011, Grinderman disbanded immediately following an Australian tour. Their final performance was at the Meredith Music Festival in rural Victoria.[31][39]
Push the Sky Away and Skeleton Tree (2013–present) [ edit ]
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' 15th studio album Push the Sky Away was released in mid-February 2013.[40] During the album's recording, former member Barry Adamson rejoined the band as a bassist, then assumed a multi-instrumentalist (percussion, keyboards, vocals) role on subsequent tours. Kuepper briefly returned as the band's touring guitarist,[37] but was replaced by George Vjestica for the European leg of the tour; Vjestica's 12-string guitar-playing was featured on several Push The Sky Away tracks.[41][42]
During the Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds summer US tour in 2013 a smaller incarnation of the band recorded Live from KCRW (Cave, Ellis, Casey, Sclavunos and Adamson). In 2014 Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds toured North America with Ellis, Adamson, Sclavunos, Casey plus Conway Savage and George Vjestica. Cave embarked on solo tours in Australia and New Zealand in late 2014 and Europe in 2015 with Adamson on keyboards and percussion, joined by the rhythm section of Wydler and Casey, and with Ellis as the featured multi-instrumentalist. In May 2015, Toby Dammit replaced Adamson as a guest touring member; Adamson has not returned since, and Dammit did not participate in sessions for the subsequent Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds album.
On 2 June 2016, the official Nick Cave website announced a documentary film titled One More Time With Feeling (directed by Andrew Dominik) which was screened on 8 September 2016. It accompanies the band's 16th album titled Skeleton Tree (released 9 September 2016). In 2017, Cave had already begun writing songs for the upcoming 17th Bad Seeds record, which is set to complete a musical trilogy the band began with Push the Sky Away.[43]
Members [ edit ]
Current members
Discography [ edit ]
Studio albums
Awards [ edit ]
Independent Music Awards
Year Nominee / work Award Result 2013 Push the Sky Away Independent Album of the Year Nominated
NME Awards
Year Nominee / work Award Result 2013 Themselves Best International Band Nominated
Q Awards
Year Nominee / work Award Result 1999 Themselves Best Live Act Nominated 2008 Nominated Dig, Lazarus, Dig Best Album Nominated
World Music Awards
Year Nominee / work Award Result 2014 Themselves World's Best Group Nominated World's Best Live Act Nominated Push the Sky Away World's Best Album Nominated
References [ edit ]Vallejo police shoot suspect in Martinez Copyright by KRON - All rights reserved Video
VALLEJO (KRON) -- A Vallejo man sought by police for several days was hospitalized after he suffered multiple gunshot wounds in an officer-involved shooting Wednesday night in unincorporated Contra Costa County, police said.
According to Vallejo police, on May 25 officers were involved in a vehicle pursuit with someone who was driving recklessly. The driver was identified as 20-year-old Kevin DeCarlo of Vallejo, police said.
The pursuit was terminated and officers later secured an arrest warrant for DeCarlo for felony evading with a bail amount of $100,000.
On May 27, police located DeCarlo in Vallejo. DeCarlo allegedly fled the area in a vehicle and purposely crashed it into a patrol vehicle. DeCarlo escaped and allegedly fled the scene on foot, police said.
On Wednesday, Vallejo police learned that DeCarlo was at a home in the 4000 block of Ellis Road near Martinez.
According to police, at 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, officers surrounded the home. DeCarlo allegedly attempted to escape by ramming his vehicle into an officer's vehicle.
Other officers on foot witnessed this and perceived it as a deadly threat and fired multiple shots at the suspect, police said.
DeCarlo suffered multiple gunshot wounds and was taken to a hospital with serious injuries. A Vallejo police officer sustained minor injuries and was also taken to a hospital where he was treated and released, police said.
This case is being investigated by the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department, the Contra Costa County District Attorney's Office and the Vallejo Police Department.Ukraine's energy minister said on Monday Russia had suspended coal supplies to Ukraine, a blow to domestic energy suppliers who are struggling with a severe lack of raw fuel for power plants due to a separatist conflict in the industrial east.
On November 12 Prodan said Ukraine would have to rely on Russian coal to get through the winter after the war in the east disrupted supplies to thermal power plants (TPP), which provide around 40 percent of the country's electricity, and left reserves critically low ahead of the cold season.
“According to information received from DTEK and [state-run] Tsentrenergo, coal supplies from Russia have been suspended,” an energy ministry spokesman quoted Prodan as saying.
Ukraine's biggest private energy company DTEK said the suspension of supplies was unexpected.
“The company received no official notification about the delay in shipments. Now we are trying to find out the reasons and circumstances of the current situation,” DTEK said in a statement.
DTEK, part of the business empire of Ukrainian tycoon Rinat Akhmetov, said it had imported a total of 1.3 million tons of coal from Russia since August.
Ukraine, which needs to import around 1 million tons of coal per month to meet its electricity needs, signed a supply deal with South Africa to boost reserves, but earlier this month the supplier discontinued shipments, citing concerns about political instability.
Ukraine's reliance on Russian coal is a serious setback to the country's efforts to lessen energy dependence on its powerful neighbor.
Kyiv's relations with the Kremlin are at an all-time low following Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimea peninsula and its involvement in the eastern conflict in which over 4,300 have been killed.Summer is all about festivals: There's no better way to get away for a day without ever leaving town. International fests take you to faraway places right in your own back yard, others celebrate ethnic cultures, urban enthusiasms, arts-and-crafts, the joy of eating or just being yourself in a judgmental world. Following is our list of ten tried-and-true festival recommendations, listed in chronological order.
See also: - Best New Festival - 2013: Make Music Denver - Best Annual Festival - 2013: Denver County Fair - Best New Music Festival - 2013: Blacktop Festival
Denver Greek Festival June 14-16, free (small cover after 8 p.m.) The Assumption of the Theotokos Greek Orthodox Metropolis Cathedral of Denver Now in its 48th year, the Greek Festival is one of Denver's longest-running cultural events, and there's a reason that it's been around so long. Actually, several reasons: The mood is joyful, the food authentic and delicious, and the music and dancing folksy and participatory. Other highlights include cathedral tours featuring murals of religious icons painted around the church's main dome; after dark, thick Greek coffee, Greek beer and shots of ouzo fire up the night. And it all ends with a concert by Ethos Elias and its national lineup of musicians. Juneteenth Music Festival June 15, free Welton Street, Historic Five Points Denver's annual celebration of African-American freedom and achievement is one of the largest in the nation. This year's edition kicks off at 10 a.m. with a colorful parade from Fuller Park, at 29th Avenue and Williams Street, to Welton Street in the heart of Five Points, where the fun continues with food and craft vendors, cultural activities, an art walk and plenty of live music, with everything from blues to hip-hop. New this year at the fest is the first annual Juneteenth Car Show. Let the dancing in the streets begin! Denver PrideFest June 15-16, free Civic Center Park PrideFest might be Denver's most exuberant outdoor celebration: The two-day homage to LGBT culture and heritage is famous nationwide, drawing national acts to its stages and one of the most colorful audiences you're likely to see this summer. PrideFest's ongoing slate of entertainment includes everything from drag queens and go-go girls to gay square dancers and '80s pop stars (diva Taylor Dayne and Weather Girl Martha Wash are this year's name guests); Sunday's traditional parade up Colfax Avenue from Cheesman Park to Civic Center is the very definition of spectacle, with floats, costumes and Dykes on Bikes leading the way. Continue reading for more festivals. Cherry Blossom Festival June 22-23, free Sakura Square This annual paean to the culture of Japan is a community effort from start to finish, with whole families pitching in to serve homemade food in the social hall of the Tri-State Denver Buddhist Temple. Outdoors, vendors hawk arts both traditional and pop-cultural, while nonstop entertainment includes traditional dance, martial-arts demonstrations and music, as well as athletic, thunderous -- and crowd-pleasing -- taiko drumming. Indoors, visitors can tour the temple sanctuary and check out elegant bonsai and ikebana displays. Cherry Creek Arts Festival July 5-7, free Cherry Creek North Denver's biggest and best-known arts event, the Cherry Creek Arts Festival spreads out along Third Avenue from Josephine to Steele streets, attracting more than 350,000 visitors to browse outstanding artworks by 260 juried artists. The annual festival is up-close and personal, with opportunities to learn more about the artists and their work. And on the side, strolling art-lovers can sample fine cuisine from vendors lining the street, take part in hands-on art activities, and enjoy performers of every stripe. After a hot day of viewing hot art, the fest cools off on Friday and Saturday nights with a beer garden that pours from 6 to 10 p.m. Colorado Black Arts Festival July 12-14, free City Park West There's no better place to immerse yourself in Denver's African-American and pan-African culture than at this annual fest in City Park. There's something for everyone here, beginning with the authentic Watu Sokoni People's Marketplace; radiating out from there, you'll find ethnic cuisine in the food court, a children's pavilion with activities focusing this year on the Ndebele people of southern Africa, and a stage featuring African dancers and drummers, jazz bands, hip-hop groups and gospel singers. Looking for something different? Take part in the new "Amateur Night at the Apollo" scavenger hunt, or Saturday morning's Boogaloo Celebration Parade. Continue reading for more festivals. Biennial of the Americas: Denver 2013 July 16-19, free McNichols Building (and other locations citywide) After a three-year hiatus, Denver's Biennial is back, with a clearer vision and big plans for its four-day run. Partly a meeting of minds and community members and partly a citywide arts festival, the Biennial brings together thinkers, politicos and curators from Canada and the frozen north to the southernmost tip of South America for symposia, workshops and cultural events celebrating intercontinental similarities and differences. The biennial's sub-theme, "Draft Urbanism," will cleverly address both the future of modern art and architecture and Denver's own preoccupation with beer and brewing. Colorado Dragon Boat Festival July 27-28, free Sloan's Lake Park Explore all things Asian at the Colorado Dragon Boat Festival, one of the city's fastest-growing cultural festivals since its inception in 2001. It's focused on the ancient Chinese sport of dragon-boat racing, and there are competitions on the lake throughout the two-day fest, with teams from local Asian organizations and sponsoring companies facing off on the long, brightly painted boats. But the CDBF also offers visitors a full palate of pan-Asian foods, as well as a full palette of pan-Asian crafts at one of the best festival markets of the summer; there are also traditional performances from every corner of the East. Get your race on. Denver County Fair August 9-11, ticket price TBD National Western Complex Entering its third year, the Denver County Fair is kind of like cotton candy with bacon on top: the perfect blend of old-fashioned, agrarian fun and edgy, Denver-centric urban enthusiasm. Enter a cherry pie to win a blue ribbon and take in a doggie agility show or go for the drag-queen beauty pageants and speed-texting competitions. The fair offers everything Denver-ific, from food-truck fare and Andrew Novick's Extreme Pancake Breakfast to daily themed activities and this year's brand-new History Pavilion. Into fashion? Geekery? Art? Sewing? Backyard chickens? Unicorn rides? You'll find all that -- and more -- at the Denver County Fair. A Taste of Colorado August 30-September 2, free (tasting tickets purchased separately) Civic Center Park Denver's traditional last hurrah of summer, A Taste of Colorado is both an eat-fest of major proportions and a fun-fest for the whole family. More than 500,000 hungry people visit the Taste during its four-day run, which features arts-and-crafts vendors, seven stages with national headliners and, most important, food from more than fifty area restaurants, including the requisite turkey legs and roasted corn on the cob.The Toronto Blue Jays have expressed interest in Mike Rizzo, the Washington Nationals president of baseball operations and general manager, as a candidate to replace Paul Beeston as team president and CEO, two industry sources told ESPN.com.
Rizzo joins Baltimore's Dan Duquette, Minnesota's Terry Ryan and Kenny Williams of the Chicago White Sox as the latest baseball executive to be mentioned as a possibility to succeed Beeston, whose future with the Toronto organization has been shrouded in mystery of late.
Rizzo could not be reached for comment Saturday.
ESPN.com's Buster Olney reported last week that the Blue Jays are actively seeking a replacement for Beeston, and said their search has progressed to the point where they have begun reaching out to other clubs for permission to interview potential candidates.
The Toronto Sun subsequently reported that Rogers Communications plans to bring back Beeston in his current role in 2015. But no announcement has been made, and there has been speculation that Beeston might retire at the end of this year.
Sources told Olney that Toronto ownership was not pleased with some of Beeston's actions during the search for a replacement for commissioner Bud Selig.
All three executives previously mentioned in conjunction with the Toronto job have either bowed out or been denied permission to interview with the Blue Jays.
Orioles principal owner Peter Angelos told The Baltimore Sun that he is "very pleased with" the job Duquette has done as the team's executive vice president of baseball operations and expects him to remain with the club through the end of his contract in 2018.
"We signed him," Angelos told the Sun. "He has a commitment for four more years, and he has done quite a job for us. We are very pleased with his performance, and we expect him to satisfy his contract. We not only want him to, but we expect him to.''
Ryan said he has no interest in leaving his job as general manager in Minnesota, and Williams will stay in his role as White Sox executive vice president after the team declined to give the Blue Jays permission to speak to him.
"This is not the right time for the White Sox to even consider granting permission like this, as our focus is on putting our team together for 2015," White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement last week.
Rizzo, who turns 54 Sunday, is in his 32nd year of professional baseball. He joined the Washington organization from the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2006 and took over as the Nationals GM in 2009.LOWELL -- The city will review police policies on granting licenses to carry firearms after a group of residents complained to the City Council Tuesday that the policies are too strict.
The Police Department grants licenses to those in law enforcement, business owners, and those who are the victims of violent crimes, resident Bettina Romberg said -- but not general law-abiding citizens.
"This is a huge injustice," said Romberg, the first of nine residents to express frustration with current policies, who were joined by several dozen supporters. "Why do I have to be the victim of a violent crime to be allowed to carry a concealed firearm to protect my loved ones?"
Another resident, Arthur Perkins, called it telling that Lowell police allow violent-crime victims to carry a gun, but not many others. "So they recognize that a firearm is a legitimate form of defense," he said.
The City Council voted unanimously to review the city's policies and standards on firearm licenses. Mayor Rodney Elliott was absent from the meeting.
"We should at least be fair," Councilor Rita Mercier said.
Bill Samaras said he saw both the right to bear arms and concerns about instances like school shootings. "At this point, I'm not really ready to make any kind of judgment," he said.
Police Superintendent William Taylor, who decides whether to grant a resident a firearm license, was at the meeting but did not speak.
In 2012, Lowell issued more than 1,700 Class A licenses to carry firearms, an increase of 36 percent in a five-year period.
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Taylor became the head of the department in 2013.
In other action Tuesday, the council approved the following actions:
n Borrowing $6.6 million to repair the Leo A. Roy and Lower Locks parking garages, which are both more than 30 years old and in need of repairs to deteriorating concrete, poor drainage and other issues. Renovation of the garages, both more than 30 years old, is expected to take place over a 14- to 16-month period starting this summer, with small sections of the garages closed off at a time to allow crews to make the repairs.
Money being borrowed to pay for the repairs will be repaid with the city's parking enterprise fund, which earns revenue from parking fees.
n Requesting that the city appeal to the state for help paying for the Feb. 8-9 snowstorm that dumped 18 inches of snow on Lowell. The city would not normally be eligible for reimbursement because the storm was not a declared state of emergency.
Councilor Ed Kennedy suggested the city petition for special relief from the state to help pay for winter storm costs that this winter have hit about $3.8 million.
Follow Grant Welker on Twitter and Tout @SunGrantWelker.COLOGNE (Reuters) - Donald Trump would be “highly unlikely” to be able to renegotiate the global accord on climate change if elected U.S. president, the U.N.’s climate chief said on Wednesday, as doing so would require the agreement of 195 countries.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump addresses members of the National Rifle Association during their NRA-ILA Leadership Forum during at their annual meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, May 20, 2016. REUTERS/John Sommers II
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, told Reuters earlier this month he was “not a big fan” of the climate accord and would seek to renegotiate elements of the deal.
“As we all know, Donald Trump relishes making very dramatic statements on many issues, so it is not surprising, but it is highly unlikely that that would be possible,” Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, told journalists at the Carbon Expo event in Cologne.
The accord, struck in Paris last December, saw countries agree to cut greenhouse gas emissions from 2020 with the aim of limiting the rise in the global average temperature to less than 2 degrees Celsius.
“An agreement that has been adopted by 195 countries would require 195 countries to agree to any new negotiation,” she said.
She added the current U.S. administration was a strong supporter of the deal because it benefits the country.
Many of the accord’s backers say it is in U.S. interests to limit greenhouse gas emissions, partly because cuts in the use of fossil fuels would also mean less air pollution, a big cause of disease.
Trump has said in the past he believes global warming is a concept that was invented by China to hurt the competitiveness of U.S. business.
The Paris Agreement will formally enter into force when 55 nations representing at least 55 percent of world greenhouse gas emissions have ratified it. China and the United States, representing 38 percent, say they will join this year.
Figueres said if this happens the agreement could come into force as early as 2017. It would then be even harder for the U.S. to pull out, as rules state any nation wanting to leave has to wait four years from the date of the agreement’s entry into force - the length of a U.S. presidential term.The Hydropothecary Corporation today announced a voluntary stop-sale and stop-shipment on all products due to detection of myclobutanil, a fungicide not approved for use on cannabis in Canada. The company emphasizes this is not a recall of product, as the fungicide was found on plants, not finished cannabis products.
The company says the source of the myclobutanil is unknown and that they have been doing their own third party testing since February that were negative for pesticides at a level of 0.05 ppm. This is the first result from new random testing being conducted by Health Canada in response to recent recalls of cannabis products related to the use of unauthorized pesticides. The regulator has been collecting dozens of random samples from different producers since February of this year.
The Hydropothecary posted an announcement on their website today noting they had contacted all registered patients to inform them of the announcement.
Health Canada categorizes all recalls of any products under their review in one of three types, from "seriously adverse health consequences," to products that "may cause temporary adverse health consequences, or where the probability of serious adverse health consequences is remote," to products that are "not likely to cause adverse health consequences." Earlier this year, Health Canada began listing recalls of cannabis of all kinds, regardless of any risk to public health.
OrganiGram and Mettrum had to issue recalls of several batches of product over detected myclobutanil “and/or” bifenazate in the recent past. Aurora also issued a recall based on products they had purchased from OrganiGram and resold to their patients.
More on recalls of medical cannabis in Canada here. More information from Lift on the subject soon.
See Press Release Below:
This action was taken as a precautionary measure immediately following a Health Canada notification at 6:07 pm (EDT) on May 1, 2017, that test results of cannabis leaf samples taken on March 8, 2017, indicated the presence of myclobutanil, a general use fungicide registered for use on a wide range of food crops but which is not approved for use on cannabis The results indicate levels of 0.023 parts per million (ppm) and 0.012 ppm.
Hydropothecary notes that it has been conducting voluntary pesticide testing on all lotted products since February 2, 2017, through a certified third party laboratory. All such pesticide test results have been negative for pesticides at a level of 0.05 ppm. THCX’s testing program was developed on industry advice from Health Canada and industry norms. The source of the myclobutanil is unknown and the Company is conducting a review to determine the source of the pesticide. The Company has not received any serious adverse reaction reports related to its products.
“Health Canada’s testing results indicate the levels of myclobutanil found are at exceptionally low levels. This likely presents a low or zero health risk. This risk level is consistent with Health Canada’s recent memo on the matter. Hydropothecary is currently carrying out an in depth investigation into this serious matter with a broad range of testing underway. Our stopsale is a precautionary measure intended to provide the utmost transparency to all involved and to ensure our patients are completely confident in the safety of our products and production system.” said Dr. Shane Morris, VP Quality Assurance & Scientific Affairs. “This is an evolving matter and we are working closely with Health Canada to determine the next steps.”
“THCX intends to release test results of all pesticide testing since February 2, 2017, within the next 24 hours, to provide reassurance to its clients and the public. We also intend to keep our clients fully informed as this matter progresses and provide daily updates on Hydropothecary’s website (starting May 2, 2017). As always, Hydropothecary’s first priority is to protect the health and safety of our patients.”London’s Untitled Motorcycles have made a name for themselves with raw and functional customs designed to blast around congested city streets. So this board track-inspired Triumph T100 SS is something of a departure—but a intriguing one at that.
There’s an explanation for the sudden swerve of direction. A few months ago Andy Carol, the bike’s owner, went on a boys’ weekend to the Veterama Oldtimer Autojumble in Mannheim, Germany. While walking up and down the many aisles, he came across this Triumph—half-finished and part-assembled.
“I’d been getting more interested in board track racing and was beginning to harbor a desire to create something reminiscent of that era, but also useable and a bit unusual,” he recalls. “This bike hit the spot!”
The frame had been modified and adapted from an original T100 SS ‘bitza’ by a chap called Carl Frith from Bath, in the west of England. “Carl had started the project but was moving it on, because he’d sourced an early Indian board tracker,” says Andy.
The frame had been modified and welded but was missing foot pegs amongst many other details, and most of the brackets were only tack-welded. It was very much a work in progress, but the stance was already there—and the original Harley ’45 springer forks worked really well with the skinny Avon tyres and Indian board track tank.
Andy struck a deal and returned the Triumph to Untitled Motorcycles’ premises in Camden, London. Adam, Anita and Rex stripped the bike down and refreshed the motor. New bars and pegs were installed and the frame was prepped for powder coating in gunmetal grey. The rims were powder coated off white to add a little contrast and period style.
“We didn’t want to produce an immaculate show queen,” Adam notes, “and we liked the grey primer on the tank. But we became rather obsessed with having various parts brass plated. I sourced inverted brass levers from India and slowly the bike came to fruition. I have a vintage pushbike with wooden mudguards and that gave me the inspiration to find some wooden mudguards—eventually sourced from Woody’s Fenders in California.” Woody made a set in Peruvian Walnut, and also a small wooden chainguard (yet to be fitted.) An old brass car horn was chopped down to create a carburetor intake.
“She’s been primed and fired up and sounds amazing,” says Adam. “All that remains is to put some miles on her, roaring over the hills of Hampstead and Highgate. And of course to the Ace Café for the obligatory fry up!”
Check out the Untitled Motorcycles website here and follow their news via the Untitled Facebook page. Images courtesy of Andre Silva.Across the country this month, high school seniors are donning robes and cords, putting on graduation caps, and walking across stages to accept their diplomas and begin the next phase of their lives.
Courtesy Melissa DeStefano Read the story of Aidan DeStefano, celebrating graduation from his Pennsylvania high school with his mother, below.
In many ways, high schools have been a central battleground of the movement to secure LGBT non-discrimination protections this year, with transgender young people in many states seeing their dignity and very existence debated by adult decision-makers. School boards implemented discriminatory policies restricting equal treatment for transgender students. Elected officials came dangerously close to passing shameful legislation targeting transgender young people, from restroom restrictions to bills seeking to deny students the opportunity to engage in athletics. And most prominently, President Donald Trump and his administration rescinded life-saving guidance for public schools, sending a signal that the federal government no longer has transgender students' backs, even when it comes to something as basic as proper pronoun use and access to the restroom.
At the center of each of these fights have been courageous, young transgender people speaking out, sharing their stories, and inviting the public into their lives. It's not fair that these young people have had to fight for their right to simply exist in public spaces or share so openly their struggles when they should be focused on their education. But we are grateful and awed by their work, thankful for the parents, friends and family members who have stood by their side, and certain that they all have important experiences ahead of them.
As these students graduate, Freedom for All Americans – and the LGBT movement from coast to coast – thanks them for their leadership, for speaking out against injustice, and for paving the way toward a brighter future in which transgender students are not burdened by discrimination simply because of who they are. The lessons they have helped the American people learn have been invaluable, and their poise in the face of adversity has been truly commendable, signaling maturity well beyond their years.
Happy Graduation to every transgender student who has worked against discrimination – and thank you for leading the fight. Check out the stories of seven teenagers who took their cases to court this year, in partnership with the LGBT movement's indispensable legal organizations – and help us wish them congratulations on their graduations!
Gavin Grimm • Gloucester, Virginia
18-year-old Gavin Grimm has been a portrait of bravery for so much of his high school experience, leading a case all the way to the United States Supreme Court, in a case litigated by the American Civil Liberties Union.
© ACLU
For seven months following his transition Gavin was permitted by his school to use the boys’ restroom – until the Gloucester County School Board stepped in and reversed the policy, requiring him to use a separate restroom and stigmatizing him as 'other' at school. After securing a key victory at the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, the U.S. Supreme Court granted review of his case. When the Trump Administration rescinded guidance that formed a significant foundation of the 4th Circuit's decision, the case was remanded back to the lower court.
Before that happened, however, thousands of voices weighed in supporting Gavin Grimm and basic dignity for transgender students. Nearly 2,000 faith leaders, members of the U.S. Congress, dozens of educational administrators, law enforcement officers, and business leaders expressed their support for Gavin and other transgender students.
Throughout this year, Gavin has been applauded by Laverne Cox at the Grammys, celebrated as part of the TIME 100, and championed by dozens of influential publications. As his case continues in court, he will continue to fight and be supported by millions nationwide.
Judge Andre Davis of the 4th Circuit perhaps wrote about Gavin's legacy best when earlier this summer he thanked Gavin for his advocacy and contextualized his legal struggle in a legal opinion. He wrote:
“Our country has a long and ignominious history of discriminating against our most vulnerable and powerless. We have an equally long history, however, of brave individuals—Dred Scott, Fred Korematsu, Linda Brown, Mildred and Richard Loving, Edie Windsor, and Jim Obergefell, to name just a few—who refused to accept quietly the injustices that were perpetuated against them. It is unsurprising, of course, that the burden of confronting and remedying injustice falls on the shoulders of the oppressed. These individuals looked to the federal courts to vindicate their claims to human dignity, but as the names listed above make clear, the judiciary’s response has been decidedly mixed. Today, G.G. adds his name to the list of plaintiffs whose struggle for justice has been delayed and rebuffed; as Dr. King reminded us, however, ‘the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.’ G.G.’s journey is delayed but not finished.”
Gavin's mother Dierdre, featured in the below video for the American Civil Liberties Union, penned a beautiful op-ed in The Washington Post about her son's graduation. Check it out here.
Ash Whitaker • Kenosha, Wisconsin
On Tuesday, May 30 Ash Whitaker, his mother, and his legal team at the National Center for Transgender Equality, got amazing news: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit issued a landmark decision in his legal case, becoming the first federal appellate court in history to find that discrimination based on gender identity violates Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (which prohibits discrimination based on sex) and the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Courtesy Transgender Law Center
It was a huge day for transgender equality – but for Ash, he had to get back to work studying for finals. The senior, who last spring was permitted to run for Prom King, graduated four days later from high school.
Ash's story is remarkably similar to Gavin's. For many months, he used the boys’ restroom until the school board stepped in, restricting his access to a separate room, many minutes and hallways away from his classes. The 7th Circuit judges had no patience for the school district's justifications of why it was choosing to discriminate against Ash, with Chief Judge Dianne Wood saying during the hearing, "I don’t see who’s complaining, and where’s the evidence? During the 7 months, for example, that he used the boys’ room, who complained? Where’s the evidence in the record? Did you get affidavits from people? Did you get evidence in the record? Evidence. There’s a lot of evidence that this has been deeply harmful to Ashton Whitaker himself – that there’s been psychological harm, there’s been suicidal ideation, there’s the scholastic harm of wasting time from running to and from this one bathroom he can use instead of sitting in class."
When the 7th Circuit issued its ruling, Ash issued a statement. He said:
“I am thrilled that the Seventh Circuit recognized my right to be treated as the boy that I am at school. After facing daily humiliation at school last year from being threatened with discipline and being constantly monitored by school staff just to use the bathroom, the district court’s injunction in September allowed me to be a typical senior in high school and to focus on my classes, after-school activities, applying to college, and building lasting friendships. … As I look forward to college next year, I hope my case will help other transgender students in Kenosha and elsewhere to just be treated the same as everyone else without facing discrimination and harassment from school administrators.”
Juliet Evancho & Elissa Ridenour & A.S. • Gibsonia, Pennsylvania
Just days after President Trump rescinded guidance protecting transgender students, a federal judge ruled in a key legal case out of Pennsylvania. The ruling in the case, led by Lambda Legal, found that a school district's policy restricting restroom access for transgender students should be halted. A final decision is pending.
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are Juliet Evancho (pictured, left), Elissa Ridenour (pictured, right), and A.S., an anonymous transgender boy.
© Lambda Legal
“This is wonderful news and a tremendous relief that we can now use the bathroom without feeling isolated and humiliated,” Elissa said after the federal judge ruled in favor of her and her co-plaintiffs. “The past months have been incredibly stressful, and
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't do There's a knock at the front door, and 6-year-old Fast Track hides around the corner in the dining room. "Who are you hiding from?" a voice floats in through the doorway, and Fast Track giggles, giving away his location. Nytro throws her long blond ponytail over her shoulder and crouches down in the entry, arms open. Fast Track hugs her around her neck, where a black industrial filigree tattoo disappears down her shirt. Nytro and the boy in her arms met in August for the first time with an initiation like Rhythm's. Nytro and Rock, 47, a sculptor who works in stone - thus his road name - are his primaries. "You're our little brother, huh?" Nytro asks Fast Track. He nods vigorously: "I'm in the family!" Fast Track's father died when he was a baby. He told his uncle and grandparents that he was abused by his mom's boyfriend. The little boy lives with his grandparents, who now are his legal guardians. "He was scared, and he was scared for us because he was told that if he ever told anyone what happened, they would get hurt, too," his grandmother said. "We'd do anything to keep him safe, but he doesn't know that," his grandfather adds. He nods toward the bikers. "They make him feel safe, and they make him feel like we are safe." Fast Track's grandfather says he learned more from Pipes and Sassy about such things as how to navigate the child-welfare system and how to file for a restraining order and guardianship than he had from the boy's state child-welfare caseworker. "Until we got involved with BACA, we just 100 percent felt lost and alone," he says. "It's just such a relief that there's someone else on his side." Fast Track is not paying attention to what his grandparents are saying. He wants to hear Nytro whistle. She puts two fingers in her mouth and blows, sharp and loud. "That's really good," Fast Track tells her. He tries it, but no noise comes out. Nytro repositions his fingers and reassures him that she couldn't do it right until she was in eighth grade. "I just kept practicing and practicing until I got really good," she says, and then asks, "So how's school going?" Fast Track takes his fingers out of his mouth. "I took the day off," he says. His grandmother says he is scared to go out on the playground at recess in case his abuser shows up there. Nytro will have none of that: "If he needs us, we will go to school and be there at recess, so he can play. We will do whatever it takes." DeAnna Wahlheim is a licensed family therapist in Phoenix. Fast Track is the second child she has referred to BACA after hearing founder John Paul Lilly speak at a conference here a few years ago. "There are things I can't do as a therapist," Wahlheim says. She can call Child Protective Services or the police, but there isn't always enough evidence to put away an abuser. And although she can help young victims recover mentally, she can't protect them physically. "Just by connecting them with BACA, I know they have a support system in place that will be there forever," she says. "When kids are coming from a situation where they are terrorized, they need to have people say, 'We have your back, we're going to keep you safe,'" Wahlheim says. She allowed Fast Track's primary bikers and Pipes to be in her office in February while she had Fast Track participate in a therapeutic role-playing activity. The boy took a rubber sword to an inflatable punching bag, a stand-in for his abuser. "You're never going to hurt me no more," Fast Track yelled. "You're never going to call me stupid again," the boy said between strikes, his chest heaving. "You don't scare me anymore." Pipes, a father of two, grandfather of three, admits that he teared up on his motorcycle on the way home from Wahlheim's office: "Fast Track is finding his own strength now." Somebody has his back Fast Track's other primary, Rock, roars around the corner toward the little boy's home. "What's going on, little brother?" Rock says, easing off his bike and bending low so he can hug the boy. Despite Rock's size - he's 6 feet 2, bearded and bulky - kids aren't afraid of him. In fact, his size is why Rock makes Fast Track feel so safe, his grandmother says. Rock has two daughters, ages 12 and 18. He says he joined BACA three years ago because he wanted the camaraderie of riding in a group but with a positive purpose. Rock calls Fast Track every week and has a special ringtone on his cellphone that alerts him when the boy calls him. "I want him to know that we're around. We're always going to be around if he needs us. I think just that presence will help him understand that he has someone who has his back," Rock says. Fast Track stands on the top of Rock's foot, holding on around his leg. He wants to show Rock pictures from his last go-kart race. Rock went to watch Fast Track's first race in January. When Fast Track spotted the biker, he ran to hug him. But a chain-link fence separated the track from the parking lot. Rock crouched down and intertwined his thick fingers with Fast Track's small ones through the metal links. They pressed their foreheads together, Rock's do-rag against Fast Track's new helmet, and then Rock shooed the boy back to his go-kart. As Fast Track pulled away from the starting line, he took one hand off the steering wheel to give Rock a thumbs-up. "It was pretty cool," the big biker of few words says, with a grin. "It was pretty cool." Next: How it started
Group's beginnings Bikers Against Child Abuse is an international non-profit with an annual budget of $200,000 and more than 160 chapters in 36 states and five countries. But it started with just one frightened 8-year-old boy in a therapist's office in Utah. John Paul Lilly is a licensed clinical social worker and play therapist and a professor at Brigham Young University. In 1995, he was working with that 8-year-old boy, who was so afraid that he wouldn't leave his house, even though it was July and the other neighborhood kids were outside playing. The boy would do well in therapy, but then his abusers would show up at his house at night, or leave a note on his bike, warning him that they were watching. The boy stayed terrified, and Lilly stayed frustrated. Lilly knew how the boy felt. He also had been abused when he was young. When he was 8, living in a tough Los Angeles neighborhood, he was befriended by some bikers who gave him a road name: Chief. "They became my family," Lilly says. "I just never felt more secure than when I was with them." So it was instinctual, years later, for Lilly the therapist to turn to bikers he knew in the area for help with his small, scared patient. "Bikers have a soft spot for kids," says Lilly, 54, who has been riding since he was a teenager. "I couldn't quote you a figure, but I know that a lot of bikers had been abused as kids. "When they see a chance to step in and release some of their own demons, they have no problem standing up for a child. It was just such a natural fit." Twenty-seven motorcycles carrying about 40 bikers lined up for that first ride. By that afternoon, the boy was outside riding his bike, wearing a vest with a Harley-Davidson patch on it. In Utah over the past 16 years, bikers have helped about 1,200 children. BACA's work has been cited in numerous academic and scholarly journals, including Play Therapy. Lilly does speaking gigs at child-welfare conferences across the country and is speaking at the International Play Therapy Conference in Cleveland this October. He even got an invitation to the White House in 2005 from first lady Laura Bush as part of the "Helping America's Youth" initiative. (The first lady allowed him to wear his biker vest, T-shirt, Levi's and boots instead of a suit and tie.) Here in Arizona, Pipes started the Maricopa County chapter of BACA in 2006 and received an official charter in 2007. The Pima County chapter got its start in 2010. Together, about 30 members juggle about 25 active cases, with about 100 children on their rolls. The bikers must be tough, not only to protect the kids but to be able to stomach knowing what their young charges may have been through. An 8-year-old beaten by Mom; a 6-year-old molested by his mother's boyfriend. A girl, 10, raped. They are trained by a licensed mental-health professional affiliated with the chapter. Each biker must be fingerprinted and undergo a thorough criminal-background check, the same one required for state child-welfare workers and law-enforcement officers, before they can join the group. They are bikers, not Boy Scouts, so if the background check turns up an arrest or a stint behind bars, they can still be in the group. The crime just can't involve children, domestic violence or something comparable. They visit children only with permission and only in pairs, so no one is ever alone with a child. Lilly says BACA has been watched closely for a long time, both by law enforcement, who want to make sure they stay on the right side of the law, and by motorcycle clubs, who want to make sure they don't become extensions of the police in biker circles. Indeed, BACA members walk in two worlds. They all have jobs - in this group are an architect, a social worker, a college student, a law-enforcement officer, a paralegal, mechanics, business owners, parents and grandparents. They go only by their road names in their BACA lives; if you were to ask one what another's actual name is, he or she likely wouldn't have any idea. Road names are part of biker culture, but they serve a different purpose here: By never using a biker's or child's given name, it is less likely that an abuser could attack a biker in retribution or follow a biker to find a victim who has moved. (The Republic and azcentral.com have chosen to abide by the BACA rule.) "We don't hide our intentions. We're straight up out there. We're very clear that if you come against this child, and you get hurt in that process, that's your problem," Lilly says. Because BACA's members go by their road names and operate across the world, it is impossible to know whether there have been any physical confrontations between them and abusers, or any mishaps on motorcycles, though Lilly says there haven't been. "We don't hunt anybody down. We're just who we are. We don't become somebody else." But anyone who wants to get to one of their kids has to get through them first. Next: Protection, 24 hours a day
Called into action Rembrandt's phone rang at 3:15p.m. on a Saturday. He was on his way home from his grandson's karate tournament, about 5 miles from his Mesa home. It was Sassy. A BACA kid was in trouble. Her road name is Music, and she's 10. She belonged to a BACA chapter in another state but is now living in Arizona with her grandmother. That makes her Sassy's and Rembrandt's kid now. Her abuser is in jail, but his family members had tracked the girl down in Arizona and were banging on the grandmother's front door, demanding that she turn the girl over to them, shouting up at the second-floor window where the child was huddled in her bedroom. Her grandmother called BACA and then dialed 911. The bikers know the drill well. Rembrandt called those who live closest to him - Rock, Uno and Fat Daddy. He stopped to change out of his grandpa clothes - shorts, T-shirt and sandals - and put on his biker garb - jeans, boots, leather vest, holster and handgun. The bikers carry weapons on stakeouts only when there is a threat against a child and they feel that as citizens they also could be threatened. Otherwise, Rembrandt says, they do not wear weapons around children. He says most of the bikers are licensed to carry concealed weapons. Rembrandt stuffed water bottles into his saddle bags and jumped on his 2000 purple-and-orange Indian Chief. By 3:40 p.m., the four men were on their way to Music, the rumble of their bikes announcing their arrival. Music's grandmother rushed outside when she heard them, hugging Rembrandt and giving him a piece of notebook paper with a description of the people and their license-plate number. Sheriff's deputies had been there, she said, and had escorted the people out of the neighborhood. But it is a public street, and law-enforcement officers just don't have the manpower to stay for long. She feared that once the deputies left, the people would be back. She was right. But when they did return later that evening, they saw something different: four big bikers, all wearing shades even in the dimming light, their motorcycles backed into the mouth of the driveway. Rock had something resembling a cannon strapped to his leg; Rembrandt wore his gun on his hip. To someone trying to mess with a little girl, a group of large, strong bikers sends a certain message, Rembrandt says. "It just has a different feel than a cop," he says. More unpredictable, maybe. "Cops are actually handcuffed by specific rules and laws that we are not. A cop has to work within a framework," Rembrandt says. "You can flip off a cop. You don't want to flip off Rock." Just knowing that a biker doesn't have to follow rules or honor boundaries can intimidate a person trying to make trouble. That night, Music's grandmother pitched a small tent in her granddaughter's bedroom, right under the window, so the little girl could look out the window whenever she wanted to see the bikers at the end of the driveway. Bikers guarded the house in shifts for the next 2 1/2 days. Some rode two hours from Tucson, kept watch for eight hours and then rode home again. They talked in low voices, and once Music was asleep, the red embers of their cigarettes glowed in the dark. Rembrandt got involved with BACA four years ago, dragged into it, really, by his wife, Nytro. "She's the kid lover. I'm not a real kumbaya kind of guy. It's just not in my personality," Rembrandt says. But Nytro wanted to get involved, and Rembrandt was her ride. If he was going to be around, he had to undergo a background check anyway - "I still had no intention of joining" - but then he went on a ride to bring a child into the group. He watched a scared little girl transform before his eyes. She came out from behind her mother, raised her eyes to look at the bikers and, eventually, gave a smile. "That's it. I was done," he says. "You can't experience that and not get involved." Yeah, yeah, he knows. It's a little kumbaya. He's now vice president of the local chapter and is the primary for two children in addition to Music. The next day, the family members who were after Music came back again, but in a different car. They looked but didn't stop. "Overall, it was fairly uneventful," Rembrandt says. "The people were all full of muster when it was a grandmother and a child. They changed their minds when they saw us there." "I would have loved to have been able to introduce ourselves," he adds in mock disappointment. The bikers aren't looking for trouble. They are there so the kids don't feel so alone, or so powerless. Pipes recalls going to court with an 8-year-old boy, and how tiny he looked on the witness stand, his feet dangling a foot off the floor. "It's scary enough for an adult to go to court," he says. "We're not going to let one of our little wounded kids go alone." In court that day, the judge asked the boy, "Are you afraid?" No, the boy said. Pipes says the judge seemed surprised, and asked, "Why not?" The boy glanced at Pipes and the other bikers sitting in the front row, two more standing on each side of the courtroom door, and told the judge, "Because my friends are scarier than he is." Next: Keeping it going
Funding their mission Although the biker image is good for intimidating the kind of people who hurt kids, it can be off-putting for potential donors. The group is a 501(c)(3) non-profit and relies on donations and grants - including one for $5,000 from The Arizona Republic and 12 News' Season for Sharing campaign - for its annual budget, which ranges from about $5,000 to $12,000 a year, depending on the kids' needs. Since each biker pays for his or her own gas, maintenance and food or drink, and since there is no rented office space or cubicles or receptionist, one might think that money would go a long way. The expenses they do have, however, add up quickly: $2.75 to $5.50 for T-shirts they give the kids, $20 each for BACA blankets, $4 for a do-rag printed with BACA's logo. To cover a child's denim vest with patches that cost $6.50 to $12 each can easily total $50. And there are bigger expenses, too. The bikers also pay for different things that help kids heal, such as therapy, karate lessons, horse-riding camp and punching bags. Sometimes they end up spending their own money, like the time five of them each kicked in $100 to take a teenage girl who had been sexually abused to get some new clothes and to have her hair and nails done. So Pipes speaks to anyone who will listen - church groups, social-service agencies, rotary clubs. And BACA bikers go to events like festivals and art walks, handing out brochures and answering questions. At a recent Saturday morning meeting of the men's club at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Mesa, a dozen bikers sat in the metal folding chairs scattered among the tables set with paper place mats. At the microphone, Pipes begins, "I know you were all hoping for a good-looking speaker, but I'm afraid you got me," and gets a laugh. He explains what BACA does and how children are referred to them by child-welfare agencies, therapists and police. He explains, "Our mission is very narrowly focused; we empower children not to be afraid of the world in which they live. "... We don't apologize for being bikers. We are bikers first," Pipes says, though they are not affiliated with any motorcycle clubs. "We ride a lot of the same streets they ride, but we have a different path." The kids become part of their biker family, and Pipes explains: "When you're a part of our family, we don't run, and we don't hide." It's tough talk. But then Pipes' words shift to talk about the kids, and even a tough, aging biker can't hide how he feels. "To see the life that was beaten out of them return is amazing. To see that transformation, to give them a chance at a normal childhood again..." he pauses, swallows hard, and then says, "It's why we do this." There is silence, and then applause. "This is wonderful, just wonderful," says Rita Belle, pulling her checkbook out of her purse. Ed Tynan has his checkbook out, too: "I never in a million years would have guessed you guys existed." Another man grasps Pipes' arm with one hand and hands him a $20 bill with the other and says simply, "God bless you." That's the kind of reaction the bikers garner, for the most part. Michelle Morley, a judge in the 5th Judicial Circuit in Sumter County, Florida, has been involved in four cases with BACA in four years. "You see kids who are so withdrawn and depressed and no sense of self-esteem, and then BACA gets involved, and they come back to life," Morley says. "You have to think that every time they hear motorcycles, they think of their friends in BACA, even if it isn't them. They must think, 'I have these guys and gals looking out for me.'" She tells of a case in a neighboring county where prosecutors were worried that the 8-year-old victim would be too afraid to testify against her abuser. But on the stand, the girl, nicknamed "Cheetah" by the bikers, sat on the lap of a BACA member, a woman whose road name is Lamb Chop, pointed at that man charged with molesting her, and said, "That's him." In one case, the defense attorney did protest that the child victim likely would not have testified without the bikers there, Morley says, and that probably was true. Often children are too young or too afraid to testify and without other witnesses, cases can be dismissed. By the way, Morley adds, the defendant was convicted in that case. Last month, Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery met with Pipes and Sassy and was impressed with their work. He says he plans to look for opportunities to use the group to help young victims. One of his attorneys, Michelle Arino, successfully prosecuted a child-abuse case in 2009, in which the bikers escorted the 5-year-old victim, Sporty, and his 9-year-old brother, Skater Boy, to court twice. "(Sporty) was a different kid when the bikers were around," Arino says. "He was much more happy, he was much more confident." Sporty testified holding a stuffed bear wearing a tiny BACA shirt, a handful of bikers sitting where he could see them. "They were there so he could have his voice heard," Arino says, "and he did." Next: "I'm in the family."THIS newspaper has long advocated a carbon tax as the best way to deal with a warming climate. This month we asked Cambridge Econometrics, an economic-modelling firm, to assess the impact of a carbon tax on the economy. To keep things simple and allow for gradual adjustment, we proposed that it should raise revenues equal to 1% of GDP by 2020, and that other policies with similar objectives (fuel duty, subsidies for renewable energy, Britain's membership of the European emissions-trading scheme—the ETS—and so forth) would be abolished or cut back.
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The results are surprising. A frequent worry about carbon taxes is that they will hurt business and the economy. But in our simulation Britain's economic performance would improve. Despite raising an extra £11 billion in net revenue by 2015 and £18 billion by 2020, our carbon tax (£31 a tonne in 2015) would help economic performance, not hamper it. Output would be 1.2% higher by 2020 than under the current arrangements.
Philip Summerton, of Cambridge Econometrics, explains that, with a general carbon tax replacing specific, expensive subsidies for renewable energy, more gas-fired power stations would be built. Since gas power is cheaper than wind power, for example, that would lower the cost of electricity. That, in turn, would boost production: manufacturing would grow by an extra 2.5% by 2020.
Admittedly, not all the news is good. Britain already depends on gas for around 40% of its electricity, and it is running out of the stuff. The tax would do nothing for security and diversity of supply. Although electricity bills would fall, the price of gas (the most popular home-heating fuel) would rise. Average domestic fuel bills would climb by around 0.5% between 2010 and 2020. And Britain is in fact unlikely to withdraw from the ETS, so the relationship between the ETS price for carbon and the one set by the British taxman (in our test, higher) needs some thought.
Confining the revenues from our tax to 1% of GDP led to greenhouse-gas emissions of 568m tonnes in 2020, around 6% more than they would otherwise have been. This was a bit of a blow. But a higher tax rate could drive emissions down, says Mr Summerton, and, in return for slightly more emissions, Britain gains a significantly bigger economy and a useful revenue stream. This suggests that a carbon tax would be more efficient than the current hotchpotch of policies.
A carbon tax has many more general advantages as a fiscal tool, too. It would be simpler and more predictable than the current jumble of tax breaks, trading schemes and purchasing obligations. The principle—that polluters pay for the damage they cause—is easily grasped, and it is politically attractive to tax “bads” such as pollution instead of “goods” such as work and entrepreneurship. And, by establishing a reliable price for carbon, it could give businessmen the certainty they need to invest in greener technologies. But the effect of that is likely to show up only after 2020.
Note: for more thoughts on a carbon tax, see hereEarlier I wrote about some fundamental principles that I believe apply to any form of automation, whether it’s network automation, or even building a virtual factory.
One of the most important concepts in mature automation is autonomy; that is, a system that is more or less self-sufficent. Instead of relying on human beings for input, always try to provide that input with yet another automated piece of the system. There are several benefits to this approach:
Humans Make Mistakes - This is also a benefit of automation in general, but autonomy also means mistakes are lessened on the input as well as the output of an automation component.
- This is also a benefit of automation in general, but autonomy also means mistakes are lessened on the input as well as the output of an automation component. Humans Are Slow - we have lives outside of work, and it’s important to be able to have a system that reacts quickly, instead of waiting for us to get to work. We need a system that is “programmed” by us, and is able to do work on our behalf.
- we have lives outside of work, and it’s important to be able to have a system that reacts quickly, instead of waiting for us to get to work. We need a system that is “programmed” by us, and is able to do work on our behalf. Signal To Noise - Sometimes humans just don’t need to be involved. We’ve all been there - an inbox full of noisy alerts that don’t really mean much. Instead, configure specific triggers that act on your behalf when certain conditions are met
The reality is that we as operations teams are already event-driven by nature, we’re just doing it in our brains. Every operations shop works this way; there is a monitoring tool in place, and the ops folks watch for alerts and respond in some sort of planned way. This sort of event-driven activity is happening all the time without us thinking about it. As you explore the concepts below, note that the main focus here is to simply reproduce those reactions in an automated way with StackStorm.
These are all concepts I’ve been seriously pondering for the past 2 years, and have spoken about at several conferences like Interop. Recently, when I saw what the team at StackStorm was building, and how well it aligned with my beliefs about mature automation practices, I had to get involved.
StackStorm is event-driven automation. As opposed to alternative approaches (which have their own unique benefits) that rely on human input, StackStorm works on the premise that a human being will instead configure the system to watch for certain events and react autonomously on their behalf.
I recently attended NFD12 as a delegate, and was witness to a presentation by the excellent and articulate Dmitri Zimine (shameless brown nosing, he’s my boss now):
Infrastructure as Code
Before I get into the details of StackStorm concepts, it’s also important to remember one of the key fundamentals of next-generation operations, which is the fantastic buzzword “Infrastructure as Code”. Yes it’s a buzzword but there’s some good stuff there. There is real value in being able to describe your infrastructure using straightforward, version-controlled text files, and being able to use these files to provision new infrastructure with ease.
Every concept in StackStorm can be described using simple YAML, or languages like Python. This is done for a reason: to enable infrastructure-as-code and event-driven automation to work in harmony. Just like any programming language, or automation tool, this domain-specific language (DSL) that StackStorm uses will take some time to learn, but it’s all aimed at promoting infrastructure-as-code concepts. The DSL is the single source of truth, treat it as such. For instance, use mature Continuous Integration practices (including automated testing and code peer review) when making changes to it. Perform automated tests and checks when changes are made. This will make your operations much more stable.
Note that while you should always treat these YAML files as the single source of truth, there are also some tools in StackStorm that allow you to generate this syntax using a friendly GUI.
StackStorm Concepts
Now, let’s explore some Stackstorm concepts.
Packs
One of the biggest strengths of StackStorm is its ecosystem. StackStorm’s recent 2.1 release included a new Exchange which provides a new home for the over 450 integrations that already exist as part of the StackStorm ecosystem. These integrations allow StackStorm to interact with 3rd party systems.
In StackStorm, we call these integrations with “Packs”. Packs are the atomic unit of deployment for integrations and extensions to StackStorm. This means that regardless of what you’re trying to implement, whether it’s a new Action, Sensor, Rule, or Sensor, it’s done with Packs.
As of StackStorm 2.1, pack management has also been re-vamped and improved (we’ll explore packs and pack management in detail in a future post). Installing a new integration is a one-line command. Want to allow StackStorm to run Ansible playbooks? Just run:
st2 pack install ansible
Now that we’ve covered packs, let’s talk about some of the components you will likely find in a pack.
Actions
Though it’s important to understand that StackStorm is all about event-driven automation, it’s also useful to spend some time talking about what StackStorm can do. Being able to watch for all the events in the world isn’t very useful if you can’t do anything about what you see. In StackStorm, we can accomplish such things through “Actions”. Some examples include:
Push a new router configuration
Restart a service on a server
Create a virtual machine
Acknowledge a Nagios / PagerDuty alert
Bounce a switchport
Send a message to Slack
Start a Docker container
There are many others - and the list is growing all the time in the StackStorm Exchange.
One of things that attracted me to the StackStorm project is the fact that Actions are designed very generically, meaning they can be written in any language. This is similar to what I’ve done with testlets in ToDD, and what Ansible has done with their modules. This generic interface allows you to take scripts you already have and are using in your environment, and begin using them as event-driven actions, with only a bit of additional logic. As long as that script conforms to this standard, they can be used as an Action.
There are several actions bundled with StackStorm (truncated for easy display):
[email protected]:~$ st2 action list +---------------------------------+---------+------------------------------------------------- | ref | pack | description +---------------------------------+---------+------------------------------------------------- | chatops.format_execution_result | chatops | Format an execution result for chatops | chatops.post_message | chatops | Post a message to stream for chatops | chatops.post_result | chatops | Post an execution result to stream for chatops | core.announcement | core | Action that broadcasts the announcement to all s | | | consumers. | core.http | core | Action that performs an http request. | core.local | core | Action that executes an arbitrary Linux command | | | localhost.
It’s important to consider these since they may provide you with the functionality you need out of the gate. For instance, lots of systems these days come with REST APIs, and “core.http”, which allows you to send an HTTP request, may be all the Action functionality you need. Even if the predefined Actions don’t suit you, check the Exchange for a pack that may include an Action that gives you the functionality you’re looking for.
Nevertheless, it may sometimes be necessary to create your own Actions.. We’ll go through this in a future blog post, but for now, understand that actions are defined by two files:
A metadata file, usually in YAML, that describes the action to StackStorm
A script file (i.e. Python) that implements the Action logic
Actions may depend on certain environmental factors to run. StackStorm makes this possible through “Action Runners”. For instance, you may have a Python script you wish to use as an Action; in this case, you’d leverage the “python-script” runner. Alternatively, you may just want to run an existing Linux command as your Action. In this case you would want to use the “local-shell-cmd” runner. There are many other published runners, with more on the way.
Sensors and Triggers
For event-driven automation to work, information about the world needs to be brought in to the system so that we can act upon it. In StackStorm, this is done through Sensors. Sensors, like your own sense of sight or smell, allow StackStorm to observe the world around it, so that actions can eventually be taken on that information.
StackStorm was not designed to be a monitoring tool, so you’ll still want to use whatever monitoring you already have in place. Sensors can/should be used to get data out of a monitoring system and take action accordingly.
Sensors can be active or passive. An example of an “active” sensor would be something that actively polls an external entity, like Twitter’s API, for instance. Alternatively, sensors can also be passive; an example of this would be a sensor that subscribes to a message queue, or a streaming API, and simply sits quietly until a message is received.
Both sensor types bring data into StackStorm, but the data is somewhat raw. In order to make sense of the data brought in by sensors, and to allow StackStorm to take action on that data, Sensors can also define “Triggers”. These help StackStorm identify incoming “events” from the raw telemetry brought in by Sensors. Triggers are useful primarily when creating a Rule, which is explained in the next section.
Similarly to Actions, Sensors are defined using two files:
A YAML metadata file describing the sensor to StackStorm
A Python script that implements the sensor logic
An example YAML metadata file might look like this:
--- class_name: "SampleSensor" entry_point: "sample_sensor.py" description: "Sample sensor that emits triggers." trigger_types: - name: "event" description: "An example trigger." payload_schema: type: "object" properties: executed_at: type: "string" format: "date-time" default: "2014-07-30 05:04:24.578325"
The particular implementation of the Sensor will determine if it is a “passive” or “active sensor”; there are two Python classes that you can inherit from to determine which Sensor type you’re creating.
Rules
“Rules” bring the two concepts of Sensors and Actions together. A Rule is a definition that, in English, says “when this happens, do this other thing”. You may remember that Sensors bring data into StackStorm, and Triggers allow StackStorm to get a handle on when certain things happen with that data. Rules make event-driven automation possible by watching these Triggers, and kicking off an Action (or a Workflow, as we’ll see in the next section).
Rules are primarily composed of three components:
Trigger : “What trigger should I watch?””
: “What trigger should I watch?”” Criteria : “How do I know when that trigger indicates I should do something?””
: “How do I know when that trigger indicates I should do something?”” Action: “What should I do?””
This is a straightforward concept if you look at a sample YAML definition for a Rule:
--- name: "rule_name" # required pack: "examples" # optional description: "Rule description." # optional enabled: true # required trigger: # required type: "trigger_type_ref" criteria: # optional trigger.payload_parameter_name1: type: "regex" pattern : "^value$" trigger.payload_parameter_name2: type: "iequals" pattern : "watchevent" action: # required ref: "action_ref" parameters: # optional foo: "bar" baz: "{{trigger.payload_parameter_1}}"
Think of “Rules” as the foundation of event-driven automation. They really are the core of what makes “If ___ then ___” possible.
Stackstorm’s architecture keeps everything very logically separate. Sensors sense. Actions act. Then, rules tie them together and allow you to have a truly autonomous system as a result.
Workflows
Even simple actions rarely take place in isolation. For instance, when you detect that an application node has shut down, there could be ten or more discrete things you need to do in order to properly decommission that node in related systems. So, event-driven automation isn’t always just about kicking off a single action, but rather a “Workflow” of actions.
In StackStorm, we use OpenStack Mistral to define workflows. Mistral is a service that’s part of the OpenStack project, and we bundle it with StackStorm. Mistral also defines a YAML-based Domain-Specific Language (DSL) that’s used to define the logic and flow of the workflow.
In the following simple example, we define a Mistral workflow that accepts an arbitrary linux command as input, runs it, and prints the result to stdout:
--- version: '2.0' examples.mistral-basic: description: A basic workflow that runs an arbitrary linux command. type: direct input: - cmd output: stdout: <% $.stdout %> tasks: task1: action: core.local cmd=<% $.cmd %> publish: stdout:
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herkhepshef (son of Ramesses IX). This small tomb is simply a converted, unfinished corridor, but the decoration is extensive. The tomb has been newly restored and opened for visitors.[86][87]
Twenty-first Dynasty and the decline of the necropolis [ edit ]
By the end of the New Kingdom, Egypt had entered a long period of political and economic decline. The priests at Thebes grew more powerful, and they effectively administered Upper Egypt, while kings ruling from Tanis controlled Lower Egypt. Some attempt at using the open tombs was made at the start of the Twenty-first Dynasty, with the High Priest of Amun, Pinedjem I, adding his cartouche to KV4.[88] The Valley began to be heavily plundered, so during the Twenty-first Dynasty the priests of Amun opened most of the tombs and moved the mummies into three tombs in order to better protect them. They removed most of the treasure in order to further protect the bodies from robbers. Most of these were later moved to a single cache near Deir el-Bari (known as TT320). Located in the cliffs overlooking Hatshepsut's famous temple, this mass reburial contained a large number of royal mummies.[35][89] They were found in a great state of disorder, many placed in other's coffins, and several are still unidentified. Other mummies were moved to the tomb of Amenhotep II, where over a dozen mummies, many of them royal, were later relocated.[90]
During the later Third Intermediate Period and later periods, intrusive burials were introduced into many of the open tombs. In Coptic times, some of the tombs were used as churches, stables, and even houses.[18]
Minor tombs in the Valley of the Kings [ edit ]
The majority of the 65 numbered tombs in the Valley of the Kings can be considered as minor tombs, either because at present they have yielded little information or because the results of their investigations were only poorly recorded by their explorers. Some have received very little attention or were only cursorily noted. Most of these tombs are small, often consisting of only a single burial chamber accessed by a shaft or staircase with a corridor or a series of corridors leading to the chamber. But some are larger, multiple-chambered tombs. These minor tombs served various purposes: some were intended for burials of lesser royalty or private burials, some contained animal burials, and others apparently never received a primary burial. In many cases these tombs also served secondary functions, and later intrusive material has been found related to these secondary activities. While some of these tombs have been open since antiquity, the majority were discovered in the 19th and early 20th centuries during the height of exploration in the valley.
Tomb robbers [ edit ]
Almost all of the tombs have been ransacked.[91] Several papyri have been found that describe the trials of tomb robbers. These date mostly from the late Twentieth Dynasty. One of these, Papyrus Mayer B, describes the robbery of the tomb of Ramesses VI and was probably written in Year Nine of Ramesses IX:
The foreigner Nesamun took us up and showed us the tomb of King Ramesses VI... And I spent four days breaking into it, we being present all five. We opened the tomb and entered it.... We found a cauldron of bronze, three wash bowls of bronze...[92]
The valley also seems to have suffered an official plundering during the virtual civil war, which started during the reign of Ramesses XI. The tombs were opened, all the valuables were removed, and the mummies were collected into two large caches. One in the tomb of Amenhotep II, contained sixteen, and others were hidden within Amenhotep I's tomb. A few years later most of them were moved to the Deir el-Bahri cache, containing no fewer than forty royal mummies and their coffins.[93] Only tombs whose locations were lost (KV62, KV63 and KV46, although both KV62 and KV46 were robbed soon after their actual closure[94]) were undisturbed during this period.
Tourism [ edit ]
Most of the tombs are not open to the public (18 of the tombs can be opened, but they are rarely open at the same time), and officials occasionally close those that are open for restoration work.[95] The number of visitors to KV62 has led to a separate charge for entry into the tomb. The West Valley has only one open tomb—that of Ay—and a separate ticket is needed to visit this tomb.[48][96] The tour guides are no longer allowed to lecture inside the tombs, and visitors are expected to proceed quietly and in single file through the tombs. This is to minimize time in the tombs and prevent the crowds from damaging the surfaces of the decoration.[97]
In 1997, 58 tourists and four Egyptians were massacred at nearby Deir el-Bahri by Islamist militants from Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya. This led to an overall drop in tourism in the area.[98]
On most days of the week an average of 4,000 to 5,000 tourists visit the main valley. The West Valley is much less visited, as there is only one tomb that is open to the public.[48]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Citations
Sources [ edit ]
Ambros, Eva (2001). Egypt: an up-to-date travel guide with 145 color photos and 21 maps. Hunter Publishing. ISBN 3-88618-140-5.
Baines, John; Jaromir Malik (2000). Cultural Atlas of Ancient Egypt. New York: Facts on file. ISBN 0-8160-4036-2.
Baillet, Jules (1920–1926). Inscriptions grecques et latines des tombeaux des rois ou Syringes à Thèbes. Cairo: Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale du Caire, Mémoires publiés par les membres.
M. L. Bierbrier (1993). The Tomb-Builders of the Pharaohs. Cairo: American Univ in Cairo Press. ISBN 977-424-210-6.
Cross, Stephen W. (1993). "The Hydrology of the Valley of the Kings". JEA. 94 : 303–310.
Davis, Theodore M. (2001). The Tomb of Siphtah with The Tomb of Queen Tiyi. London: Gerald Duckworth & Co Ltd. ISBN 0-7156-3073-3.
Davis, Theodore M. (2001). The Tombs of Harmhabi and Touatânkhamanou. London: Duckworth Publishing. ISBN 0-7156-3072-5.
Dodson, Aidan (1991). Egyptian Rock-cut Tombs. Buckinghamshire: Shire Publications Ltd. ISBN 0-7478-0128-2.
El Mahdy, Christine (2001). Tutankhamen: The Life and Death of the Boy-King. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-28064-5.
Maspero, Gaston (1913). Manual of Egyptian Archaeology, Sixth English Edition. H. Grevel and Co. ISBN 1-4219-4169-4.
Reeves, Nicholas (1990). Valley of the Kings: The Decline of a Royal Necropolis. Keegan Paul. ISBN 0-7103-0368-8.
Reeves, Nicholas; Richard H. Wilkinson (1996). The Complete Valley of the Kings. Thames and Hudson. ISBN 0-500-05080-5. – Details of all the major tombs, their discovery, art and architecture
– Details of all the major tombs, their discovery, art and architecture Romer, John (1981). Valley of the Kings. Henry Holt. ISBN 0-8050-0993-0. – Covers the history of the exploration of the Valley in chronological order
– Covers the history of the exploration of the Valley in chronological order Rossi, Corinna (2001). "Dimensions and Slope in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Dynasty Royal Tombs". The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology. The Egyptian Exploration Society. 87 : 73–80. doi:10.2307/3822372. ISSN 0307-5133. JSTOR 3822372.
Sampsell, Bonnie M. (2003). A Traveler's Guide to the Geology of Egypt. Cairo: American University Press. ISBN 977-424-785-X.
Siliotti, Alberto (1997). Guide to the Valley of the Kings. Barnes and Noble. ISBN 88-8095-496-2. – A good introduction to the valley and surroundings
– A good introduction to the valley and surroundings Strudwick, Nigel; Helen Strudwick (1999). Thebes in Egypt. Cornell University. ISBN 0-8014-8616-5.
Weeks, Kent R. (2001). Valley of the Kings. Friedman/Fairfax. ISBN 88-8095-712-0. – Spectacular photography of the best tombs
– Spectacular photography of the best tombs Weeks, Kent R. (2000). KV 5: A Preliminary Report on the Excavation of the Tomb of the Sons of Ramesses II in the Valley of the Kings. Cairo: American University Press. ISBN 977-424-574-1.
Weigall, Arthur (1910). A Guide to the Antiquities of Upper Egypt. London: Mentheun & Co. ISBN 1-4253-3806-2.
Wilkinson, Richard H. (1994). Valley of the Sun Kings: New Explorations in the Tombs of the Pharaohs. Tucson: University of Arizona Egyptian Expedition. ISBN 0-9649958-0-8. – chapters by archaeologists working in the valley from an international conference on the Valley of the Kings
– chapters by archaeologists working in the valley from an international conference on the Valley of the Kings Wilkinson, Richard H. (1993). "The paths of Re: Symbolism in the royal tombs of Wadi Biban El Moluk". KMT. 4 (3).
Further reading [ edit ]As Danny Shea, Sam Stein, and others are well documenting, Keith Olbermann's suspension is getting a ton of attention. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee is organizing the public to do something about it. In just a few hours, 50,000, 75,000, 100,000, 200,000 MSNBC viewers signed our petition saying:
"Keith Olbermann made your network a success. If you want your viewers to keep tuning in to MSNBC, put Keith back on TV now!" Sign here - keep the momentum going!
Literally thousands of people have shared the petition on Facebook and Twitter, including Michael Moore who Tweeted, "Sign this emergency petition to @msnbc to put @KeithOlbermann back on the air." The petition's now on Reddit too.
In our email to PCCC members announcing the petition, we pointed out the irony of this move -- given this week's election:
The Democratic Party sadly saw this week what happens when you alienate your base. Tell MSNBC that if they want to keep their viewers, they must put Keith back on the air NOW!I am glad we got a chance to spend time with Willow. I feel that since starting these 80’s sword and sorcery reviews, the genre has started to become much more defined in my mind. Perhaps I can get a small honorary degree from some mid level university. I do not need any ceremony. Just a luncheon. Let us continue from Lucas’ Industrial Light and Magic and travel back a few years before the great turning point of Conan the Barbarian. We are in 1981 and this is Dragonslayer.
Dragonslayer stands at an interesting crossroads in the land of cultural history. The film was a partnership between Walt Disney Pictures and Paramount Pictures and offered a dark and slightly mature fantasy film for families. Dragonslayer was notable for its visual effects and use of puppets, which was pioneered only one year earlier in The Empire Strikes Back. The film was so revered for its visual effects that it was nominated for a slew of awards but would end up losing against some other movie named Raiders of the Lost Ark. Dragonslayer could have been a crucial fantasy film for the 80’s but a series of unforeseen events kept it relatively obscure. At least for a little bit.
Dragonslayer sports a painfully cliche beginning. A magician is sought to help destroy a dragon who eats tasty virgins. Remember, family film. The dragon/maiden relationship is played on as a bargain between the cave dwelling monster and the kingdom it terrorizes in the sum of one fresh virgin, every season, picked by lottery. In return, the dragon will not set the village asunder in the engulfing hellfire of unholy wrath. How or when this draconic council took place and these details were reached no one will ever know. What is known now is that a group of villagers seek an ailing wizard who can slay the dragon. This would have worked if he didn’t die within the first 10 minutes.
No, Dragonslayer is not about some powerful wizard overcoming adversity. Rather, it is about his shithead apprentice who possess zero ability and zero charisma. The apprentice, who I’ll loving refer to as Shithead Mcfuckface, is aided by a heroine disguised as a boy and a group of world weary villagers. If things are starting to get a little too complex for you turn back now, for it should be mentioned that it is only halfway through the film when this group of characters reaches the monster’s lair and accidentally causes a landslide that traps the beast within its cave. The end? What started as a normal dragon movie then turns on its head and transforms into a dense narrative of anti-heroism, lore versus faith, king versus kingdom, social status versus danger, and the many dimensions of a reality based fantasy. Fuck, this is actually good and I even hate the main character.
Dragonslayer, despite its innocuous exterior, is a grey world caught between legend, history, and religion. According to the film’s writer, “..our film has no knights in shining armour, no pennants streaming in the breeze, no delicate ladies with diaphanous veils waving from turreted castles, no courtly love, no holy grail.” This grey fantasy motif is now popular due to the blockbuster success of George RR Martin’s Song of Ice And Fire. But to roll the dice with a family film on basically the same premise 30 years earlier must have caused some 80’s executive collars to tighten. Oh shit, the princess is getting her limbs eaten off by dragon babies!
Even though the film has a strange start with an unsure direction, Dragonslayer ends strong with the weak and petulant king being named dragonslayer after the apprentice and virgin in drag thwart the mighty beast with the help of the dead wizard. The sour closure casts a further conceptual net by alluding to the motto that the powerful control the flow of history and social class will always determine the ones remembered. By the end of Dragonslayer, one is left with a resonating feeling of general thoughtfulness, something that a movie classified under “fantasy film from the 80’s” usually never does.
Dragonslayer is often cited by a host of writers and directors as being a shining example of a true fantasy film. Take this and compare it to its failed box office performance and one has a forgotten relic steeped in cult-like status. Even today the film does not retain the legacy and name recognition Conan, Willow, or maybe even Red Sonja have. I see it though, as a martyr for story based fantasy. There is no way this film could have made it. It is all a part of an anti-heroic allegory where the legend of Saint George and the dragon is inverted and everyone likes the dragon more in the end.
DRAGONSLAYER
Released: June 26, 1981
Directed By: Matthew Robbins
Starring: Peter MacNicol, Caitlin Clarke
Website: IMDB
Score: 7/9 HammersIf you had told me a month ago that I would be writing about Minnesota playing meaningful games at Thanksgiving, I would have patiently explained that I cover college football, not hockey. Yet here we are, on November 23, with a ranked Gopher squad taking on a ranked Wisconsin team, in what figures to be a fun game to watch. Go figure.
When Minnesota Has The Ball
Sophomore Philip Nelson has taken over the reins at quarterback, after splitting duties with Mitch Leidner earlier in the season. Nelson’s numbers are respectable, but not eye-popping; he’s thrown for 1,128 yards, nine TDs and four INTs, with a completion percentage of 57.2. Since the team’s loss to Iowa on September 28, Nelson has thrown seven TDs and rushed for three more, without any picks. Unfortunately for the Gophers, leading receiver Derrick Engel suffered a knee injury against Penn State two weeks ago and it doesn’t sound likely that he’ll play this weekend. Freshman tight end Maxx Williams is the team’s second-leading receiver, and he’s had some impressive catches this season, but the loss of Engel would definitely be felt. However, Minnesota has been successful on the ground this year as well. Junior David Cobb has emerged as the lead back, with seven TDs, and is just 58 yards away from becoming the Gophers’ first 1,000-yard rusher since first-round draft pick Laurence Maroney in 2006. Cobb is averaging 94.6 yards per game on the season, and well over 100 yards per game since the Gophers’ last loss. If Donnell Kirkwood, who was injured in the opener, is healthy enough to contribute more- and keep in mind the Gophers had a bye last week- it could help tremendously. Don’t overlook the quarterbacks, either- they’ve combined for over 700 yards and 13 TDs.
Wisconsin has a rugged, experienced defense made up of nearly all upperclassmen. One guy to keep an eye on will be senior linebacker Chris Borland, who was named to the Butkus Award (most outstanding linebacker) and Bronko Nagurski Trophy (most outstanding defensive player) watch lists. The Badgers rank seventh in the country in run defense, allowing just 98.8 yards per game. If they’re able to shut down Cobb early, we could see some designed runs for the quarterback. The offensive line has been excellent, both at protecting Nelson and opening holes for the running backs, but they haven’t faced a defense near Wisconsin’s caliber yet (the closest was 13th-ranked Michigan, and the Gophers lost that game badly). The Badgers’ pass offense is currently ranked 11th, allowing 189 yards per game. Look for tight end Maxx Williams to see quite a few balls thrown his way, since at 6’4″ he has a height advantage over most defensive backs. It will be interesting to see if Wisconsin’s defense can bait a relatively inexperienced Nelson into some poor decisions or bad throws.
When Wisconsin Has The Ball
The ground game is where it’s at for the Badgers, who are averaging over 300 rushing yards a game, and have TWO 1,000 rushers already. Melvin Gordon and James White have combined for 2,462 yards and 24 TDs, and even number three back Corey Clement has 515 yards and seven TDs. Quarterback Joel Stave isn’t a runner, but he’s a pretty decent passer who will likely hit the 2,000-yard mark this weekend. Stave has passed for 16 TDs, but has also thrown eight INTs. He can spread the ball around- the Badgers have seven different players with at least one receiving TD this season- but his main target is senior Jared Abbrederis, with 849 yards and six TDs. The team’s third leading receiver is RB James White, so the Gophers will have to be aware of his potential to not only take handoffs, but to catch the ball out of the backfield.
The main task for Minnesota, however, will be to contain the two-headed monster that is the Badgers’ running attack. Senior defensive tackle and likely first-round draft pick Ra’Shede Hageman will have to have a big game. Obviously, Abbrederis is the guy requiring the tightest coverage from the secondary. If Minnesota can bottle up White and Gordon, and force the Badgers into a lot of third-and-long situations, they have a chance. Stave has two nice weapons in the passing game in Abbrederis and Jacob Pedersen, but eight picks tells me there’s potential for some errant throws and for Minnesota to do well in the turnover battle. Senior linebacker Aaron Hill is another Gopher defender to watch for.
Prediction:
What Minnesota has done this season is truly remarkable. If I had a vote for the Coach Of The Year award, I wouldn’t even have to think about it- Jerry Kill and Tracy Claeys would have my vote, hands down. That said, this is still a fairly young team, and as much as I would like to pick the Gophers to win the game, I just can’t quite do it. Wisconsin’s defense is too experienced and too stingy. Wisconsin 35, Minnesota 21
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Football fans…check out our two partnered NFL podcasts – Thursday Night Tailgate Radio and Overtime Ireland. Both shows bring you interesting commentary, critical analysis and fantastic guests including former and current NFL players, coaches and personalities.This article summarizes parts of Relevant Search. Use discount code turnbullmu to get 38% off!
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Solr vs Elasticsearch! There’s been a TON of posts. But has anyone ever compared them when it comes to traditional – you know – controlling regular ole search results!?
In my work, I spend a lot of time helping people improve the relevance of their Solr/Elasticsearch search results (I’m writing a book on the subject!). In this first in a series of articles, I want to help you see the forest for the trees when it comes to deciding between these two technologies for traditional search problems. Problems where you’re likely to need to tune the relevance of the results for your needs. Frankly, you probably need to do this, even if you don’t think you do. Everyone’s headed for that search bar, is your search going to “get” them or just return a random set of 10 results?
Anyway, evaluating Solr vs Elasticsearch with regards to relevance comes down to comparing them across three criteria:
Ability to control matching – what results can be said to match/not match the search? Ability to control ranking – within the set of matched results, what results are most relevant? Ability to create plugins – how deeply can you manipulate the matching/ranking of results beyond APIs?
In this blog article, I’m going to begin with item 1: comparing how these search engines let you manipulate matching.
More Alike Then Different
Before we begin to dive in, it’s important to note that Solr and Elasticsearch are in many ways more alike than different. Both search engines give you a tremendous amount of ability to manipulate search relevance at a very fundamental level. Being open source search engines based on Lucene, they sit apart from black-box commercial offerings that limit how much relevance tuning you can do. They both support an extremely wide array of use cases from traditional document based search, to geo-aware, graph search, to well you name it. Both provide rich query DSLs and text analysis DSLs that let you tightly control the matching and ranking process. This is why you can almost entirely apply our book Relevant Search to either search engine just fine!
That being said, while the core features are the same, the ergonomics and the APIs can make your search solution easy or hard! Let’s dive into matching, to see how one search engine makes controlling matching rather straight forward, while another one requires deeper thinking and engineering work.
Solr vs Elasticsearch Controlling Matching
Controlling matching comes down to fine tuning how text transforms into individual tokens. The search engine treats tokens as the fundamental, atomic entity that must compare exactly for a “match” to be declared. You need a normalization process to get tokens from a search to match tokens from a document. For example, a search for all uppercase “CAT” will not match an all lowercase “cat” without the proper text manipulation steps to lowercase both sides. A less silly example is deciding whether you should treat “kitty” as a synonym for “cat.” Should a “kitty” search term be normalized to “cat”? When you think of all the many forms of english words (run, running, ran?) you can see how important this normalization process is for deciding exactly when to match and when not to match.
This normalization task is controlled by you via a feature known as analysis (as we’ve discussed). Analysis controls the process for manipulating text from documents/searches are transformed into tokens. The art of search relevance often boils down to controlling this process to carefully discriminate between matches/non matches.
Both Solr and Elasticsearch support the underlying library of Lucene analyzers. The ergonomics of creating an analyzer differ only superficially. Solr (until recently) encourages you to work in an XML configuration file (schema.xml) to control this process. Elasticsearch, on the other hand, give you a RESTful JSON API for doing the same work.
Both search engines give you the same ingredients to work with to build analyzers. You manipulate the original character stream through several character filters. You break up the character stream into tokens using a tokenizer. Finally you apply a configurable sequence of token filters to trim, slice, delete, generate, and otherwise manipulate the tokens.
To tightly control this process, in addition to analyzing the content placed in the search engine, both Solr and Elasticsearch let you specify a seperate query analyzer. Recall the query analyzers transforms the search string to tokens to control how they’ll match against tokens generated from text placed in the index. This is great, for example, if you wanted to expand your search out to include a list of extra synonyms to search for in addition to the original search query.
Solr, however, comes with two serious deficiencies with query analysis. The biggest source of heartache is the so-called sea biscuit problem. To make a long story short, Solr’s default query parser breaks up text by whitespace before passing it to a query time analyzer. So if you have a synonym rule that maps the phrase “sea biscuit” to a single word seabiscuit, it doesn’t work!
The reason is that each whitespace delimited query term is analyzed entirely separately, oblivious of the remaining text in the query string. The query-time analyzer takes as input the single word [sea]. The synonym filter does not see the token [biscuit] following. The problem isn’t just limited to synonyms, it impacts any process that needs to manipulate more than one token at a time. This can be rather limiting and surprising when trying to control the matching process. Queue sad trombone.
This problem is constantly the source of surprise, relevance bugs, and user group discussion. Even moderately skilled Solr users are surprised by this behavior. The situation is not entirely hopeless. There exist numerous Solr plugins for this issue. Solr also gives you a lot of power to write just about any plugin to deeply control this yourself. Not everyone though wants to figure out someone else’s plugin or deal with writing Java.
Solr’s other problem is that it only lets you control the query side analyzer in a field’s configuration. Elasticsearch lets you control the analyzer to use at just any level, including passing the analyzer to use when running a query itself! Elasticsearch’s options are quite broad.
At search time, the sequence is slightly different: * The analyzer defined in the query itself, else * The analyzer defined in the field mapping, else * The default analyzer for the type, which defaults to * The analyzer named default in the index settings, which defaults to * The analyzer named default at node level, which defaults to * The standard analyzer
This comes in very handy. Say for example, you’d like to query one field sometimes by using synonyms and another way without synonyms. Elasticsearch lets you query the same field different ways simply by passing an analyzer argument with the query. Sometimes you’d pass in the synonym analyzer, other times you might simply use the default. Solr, on the other hand, would have you duplicate content to another field to pick up a different query analyzer.
In conclusion, Elasticsearch is the clear winner when it comes to matching. Elasticsearch gives you the least amount of surprise and most depth of configurability when it comes to manipulating matching. You can do quite a lot without resorting to writing plugins.
Winner:
Next Time! Ranking!
Next time, we’ll discuss how Solr and Elasticsearch’s query APIs match up. Will Elasticsearch be dominant here as well? To complete the trilogy we’ll also compare how plugable each search engine is. Which search engine will win? :)
And of course if you need help with a tough search problem, don’t hesitate to contact us!"...in the U.S. a deafening silence has descended on (his book). Nobody wants to touch it." Excerpt of interview with author Norman G. Finkelstein: Q: Your "J'Accuse" -- or rant, depending on your viewpoint -- doesn't only target "corrupt" Jewish organizations like the World Jewish Congress and its leaders, such as billionaire Edgar Bronfman and real estate tycoon Israel Singer. You also attack Elie Wiesel. Why? A: Elie Wiesel is such a ridiculous character. In private Elie Wiesel is the subject of much ridicule. The expression "There's no business like Shoah-business" is literally coined for him. So it's not as if I'm the first one to call the emperor naked, but in public -- yes. Q: Isn't it a cheap shot to attack him on his lecture fee of "$25,000, plus limousine"? A: Why is that a cheap shot? He's turned it into a business, where he casts himself as a person who's doing all this from anguish and pain and personal sacrifice, while he has made a fortune out of it. If it were a cheap shot, he wouldn't invest so much in denying it... "Thanks to Elie Wiesel we have a distorted and disfigured and frankly meaningless version of the Nazi Holocaust and we only know about those genocides that serve the interest of the U.S. and Israel, and we forget the ones that don't." "The only way we can learn from the Holocaust is by restoring it as a rational object of historical inquiry, and the only way we can do that is by putting the Holocaust industry out of business." More of the interview here: http://www.salon.com/books/int/2000/08/30/finkelstein/index.html?CP=YA H&DN=110 comment to Brasscheck: I've heard Finkelstein interviewed on KPFA. I'm amazed he is still alive, but I suppose that ignoring his book is the same as killing him. Brasscheck response: As John Stockwell said when asked why he thought he was being allowed carry on his work of exposing corruption in the CIA: "They don't have to kill me. They're winning." I think like everything else it all boils down to bureaucratic expediency. Assassination is expensive and truth tellers only get killed if they offend someone with enough budget to order one. However, Finkelstein has received death threats for his work. He certainly has been the victim of character assassination. For those too busy to follow up the link with the Finkelstein interview, more excerpts of the work of this son of an Auschwitz survivor follow. It might make interesting reading as the Middle East sits on the precipice of war. "Thanks to Elie Wiesel we have a distorted and disfigured and frankly meaningless version of the Nazi Holocaust and we only know about those genocides that serve the interest of the U.S. and Israel, and we forget the ones that don't." "By the way, nobody noticed one of the most interesting revelations in the book: that banks in the U.S. also sit on dormant Jewish accounts from the war." Q: Your parents are Holocaust survivors. Doesn't that make you a second-generation survivor? A: I think such a concept is repulsive. That's simply an effort to milk the Holocaust for another generation. If I had ever said that to my mother, she would have given me a good smack in the face! And rightfully so! Q: You suggest but never state explicitly that only camp survivors are real Holocaust survivors. What about Jews who fled to the Soviet Union, came back and had nothing -- why not call them "Holocaust survivors" as well? A: Fine, then we should call Palestinians "Holocaust survivors." If you make the definition so elastic, so flexible that it includes refugees, then you should count them all. Q: "Your family is from Poland. You could get some money back after all. A: "No! It never occurred to us. We don't want the money. My mother's father owned a little tobacco store, my father's father owned a little lumber mill. Jewish organizations are claiming back my grandparents' property without asking our permission. We never gave our sanction! It's grave robbery!...(we) don't need to evict Polish peasants from their land, Polish tenants from their homes and Polish sick from the hospitals." "I lay out my argument really simply, in three parts. The first concerns the question of why the Holocaust came to the U.S. only after the Six Day War in 1967. If you agree that the Holocaust served as an ideological weapon in the Palestinian conflict, the next question is how. I mean, the Holocaust could also be used for other reasons. For instance, my parents used it to defend certain Palestinian rights." "All the survivors I talk to -- the Finkelstein residence quickly became known as CCBC, Claims Conference Buster Central -- say the same thing: We want the money that was distributed by the German government; we don't want the money given to the Jewish organizations. I think that is one of the most devastating insights on the Holocaust industry -- that the victims of Nazi persecution trust the German government more than they do the Jewish organizations." "The only way we can learn from the Holocaust is by restoring it as a rational object of historical inquiry, and the only way we can do that is by putting the Holocaust industry out of business." The Salon summary: "Finkelstein's main and most devastating charge is that "American Jewish elites" and organizations are extorting billions of dollars from European countries and corporations in the name of "needy Holocaust survivors" in order to fund Holocaust programs, Holocaust memorials, Holocaust studies, Holocaust literature and, in general, "the Jewish community." Together they form not just a cottage industry but a full-fledged "Holocaust industry" sustained by a persistent ideology of "Holocaust correctness" that serves "certain class and political interests." Instead of helping the Jewish cause, Finkelstein goes on to argue, the Holocaust industry has become "the main fomenter of anti-Semitism in Europe" by spreading an image of greedy Jews." link MainPage
http://www.rense.com
This Site Served by TheHostProsYou’re going to love this one. Thanks to Steven Hayward at Powerline, I ran across only the most satisfying story I’ve read in years. A few readers may remember a study published in 2012 that proclaimed conservatives were more inclined towards “psychoticism,” including authoritarianism. Liberals, by contrast, were more inclined towards “neuroticism” and “social desirability.”
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To be clear, I think the vast majority of studies that purport to describe the competing psychological profiles of conservatives and liberals are just so much junk. But when it comes to science, junk always gets a hearing if it pushes preferred narratives, so I distinctly remember the crowing from certain quarters about the now-proven deficiency of the conservative mind.
Except, well, oops. Check out this stunning statement from an Erratum published in the January 2016 edition of the American Journal of Political Science:
The authors regret that there is an error in the published version of “Correlation not Causation: The Relationship between Personality Traits and Political Ideologies” American Journal of Political Science 56 (1), 34–51. The interpretation of the coding of the political attitude items in the descriptive and preliminary analyses portion of the manuscript was exactly reversed. Thus, where we indicated that higher scores in Table 1 (page 40) reflect a more conservative response, they actually reflect a more liberal response. Specifically, in the original manuscript, the descriptive analyses report that those higher in Eysenck’s psychoticism are more conservative, but they are actually more liberal; and where the original manuscript reports those higher in neuroticism and social desirability are more liberal, they are, in fact, more conservative.
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In plain language, they exactly reversed the results. According to the actual results of the study, Liberals are more authoritarian. Conservatives were inclined towards “social desirability.”
The practical result is that the whole thing will now likely disappear down the memory hole. Everyone knows conservatives are the real authoritarians, so this wrong study has to be wrong. Or was the wrong study right? It’s hard to keep up when the “science” keeps shifting.BATON ROUGE, La. — A religious objections bill similar to laws that have ignited a political firestorm in Arkansas and Indiana ran into a roadblock with the Louisiana Legislature on Monday, the first day of the legislative session.
Though it is supported by Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, the “Marriage and Conscience Act” is opposed by Senate President John Alario, who said “it puts Louisiana in a light of hatred and bigotry and discrimination.”
And as lawmakers gaveled in the spring session, the bill wasn’t sent to a House committee, stalling the measure, at least temporarily, from getting a public hearing or legislative vote. In fact, of the hundreds of bills introduced Monday, the proposal sponsored by Rep. Mike Johnson, R-Bossier City, was the only bill that was not sent to committee.
The measure was bottled up after a legislator tried to take action on the bill while Johnson wasn’t present, said Rep. Walt Leger, the No. 2 ranking lawmaker who was presiding at the time. Leger, D-New Orleans, an opponent of the legislation, wouldn
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olerant lager yeasts that also turn more sugar into alcohol, giving a dryer beer.
Conditioning
In the first stage of fermentation the yeast cells use up most of the easily fermentable sugars. After this the second stage begins. Fermentation slows and the yeast starts to work on the heavier sugars such as maltotriose. This is referred to as conditioning.
Conditioning can take place in different situations depending on the type of beer. The traditional beer style of Britain, real ale, is simply "racked" (poured) into the cask. This "cask-conditioned" beer leaves the brewery in an unfinished state because final conditioning takes place in the pub cellar where yeast in the cask continues to turn the remaining sugars into alcohol.
As the beer matures it gains not only a small amount of additional strength but also develops round and fruity flavours. Conditioning can take from two to four weeks, sometimes longer depending on the type of beer.
Lagers are usually aged in large tanks in the brewery at near freezing temperatures (just like those in the Bavarian caves) for one to six months depending on style. This cold ageing serves to reduce sulphur compounds produced by the yeast, helps clear the beer, and produces a cleaner tasting final product with fewer fruity esters.
Lagers are usually pasteurised prior to delivery. This means that unlike cask-conditioned ale, lagers (and cream flow ales) are biologically dead when they arrive at the pub.
Drinking
For me beer isn't just meant to be drunk on its own. Beer and food make great table fellows. I love to match the citrus/grapefruit style of a hoppy Indian pale ale, or a good hoppy lager, to the spice of a curry; or make use of a well-roasted dark malt stout to complement a rich chocolate dessert.
Wherever you are drinking your beer, though, make time for an appreciative pause. Take up your glass and salute the work of those who turn the sugarless, aroma-less, dry grains into the wonderful, multifaceted liquid we see before us. Drink deeply and enjoy.The Denver Sheriff Department is giving a heroin antidote to high-risk inmates when they leave the city’s two jails.
Inmates who have been addicted to heroin and other opiates are being trained on how to use naloxone nasal spray before they are released, the sheriff’s department said Friday in a news release.
Previously, addicted inmates received a prescription for the drug, which revives people who have overdosed. But those prescriptions were not getting filled, the department said.
The Colorado Office of Behavioral Health spent about $12,000 to buy 500 kits that will be given to jails across the state, the sheriff’s department said.
Every month, the Denver Sheriff Department books dozens of inmates who are addicted to heroin or other opiates. In December, 60 inmates were placed on an opioid withdrawal protocol, the department said.[Haskell-cafe] Need machine for DPH benchmarking
Hi all, we, the DPH team, are at the moment in the very unfortunate situation of not having a proper machine for running our benchmarks on. Could a kind soul maybe give us (i.e., me) access to a quadcore or 2xquadcore x86 Linux or OS X machine? I only need to build ghc on it and run small benchmarks which never take more than a couple of minutes, maybe once every couple of days or so. We do need to use all cores, though, so no other CPU-intensive processes can be running during benchmarking. This is only for a week or two, until we get our own machine. We would be eternally grateful and won't forget you when DPH takes over the world. RomanHillary Clinton’s campaign manager Robby Mook took shots at former Democratic National Committee interim chair Donna Brazile over her claims that Clinton had special control over the DNC.
WATCH:
Brazile wrote in POLITICO last week that, in exchange for fundraising efforts, Clinton could control the DNC’s finances and strategy during the 2016 Democratic primary. She later walked back those claims, but a contract signed with the DNC shows that the Clinton campaign did get to sign off on hiring and other strategic decisions prior to the general election.
Mook had a hard time remaining diplomatic about the whole scandal during a Monday CNN interview, and knocked Brazile for putting her book out around the same time as some key elections.
“I’m sure Donna was under a lot of pressure from her publisher to put her book out on this election week when we have critical elections going on around the country, but I wish she had just put her foot down and said no,” Mook said.
Clearly trying to stir the pot, CNN anchor Alisyn Camerota said Mook was giving Brazile “a pass.”
“Me and a number of my colleagues…we don’t recognize the campaign she describes and we also don’t recall some of the events that she said happened,” Mook responded, stopping short of calling Brazile a liar.
Follow Amber on TwitterThe amount of money Canadians have parked in three top offshore tax havens has more than doubled since 2005, showing the scale of tax avoidance in Canada is "getting larger every year," says lobby group Canadians for Tax Fairness.
The advocacy group, which is pressuring the government to do more to crack down on the flow of money to tax havens, says Canadians now have $59-billion invested in Barbados, $30-billion in the Cayman Islands and $20-billion in Luxembourg -- the three biggest offshore tax haven destinations for Canadian funds.
The $109-billion total is a 150-per-cent increase from $43-billion in 2005, according to new Statistics Canada data on foreign direct investment released this week. While some of the money may represent active business investments in those countries, Canadians for Tax Fairness argues much of the money is simply being put into offshore bank accounts in tax haven countries to avoid taxation or detection.
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"The scale of the problem gets larger every year," says Dennis Howlett, executive director of Canadians for Tax Fairness. "Ten per cent of Canada's $1.8-trillion GDP is sitting offshore while we struggle with questionable austerity measures."
Mr. Howlett said the sums are so large that they would stimulate economic growth in Canada if they were invested domestically instead of being "socked away" in tax havens.
"That is $109-billion hidden away, untaxed, while the rest of us pay our share on every cent we earn," he said.
Mr. Howlett said if Canada had a 1-per-cent withholding tax on money held in tax havens, it would generate $1.7-billion a year. His organization argues federal and provincial governments in Canada lose at least $7.8-billion in revenue annually because of tax havens -- enough to make a major dent in annual budget deficits.
One of the biggest areas of growth for Canadian funds offshore is Luxembourg, where $19.7-billion was invested at the end of 2012, up from just $305-million in 2005. In the same period, Statistics Canada data shows investments in Switzerland have fallen steadily to $3.8-billion from their recent high of $7.6-billion in 2006. Since 2009, Swiss banks have provided more information to other countries investigating money laundering and tax evasion.Ken Langone: Tax reform will unleash good economic forces for many people 8:13 AM ET Mon, 4 Dec 2017 | 03:21
The Republican effort to overhaul the nation's tax code would "unleash economic forces" and undermine any doomsday predictions from Democrats, Ken Langone told CNBC on Monday.
"I listen to [Senate Democratic leader] Chuck Schumer, and the end of the world is coming with this tax bill," the billionaire GOP businessman said in a "Squawk Box" interview.
"My guess is [it's] the end of the world for the Democratic Party because if this tax bill, in my opinion, passes it's going to unleash economic forces all to the good for a lot of people," contended the co-founder of Home Depot.
Langone was referring to criticism levied by Schumer ahead of the early Saturday passage of the Senate's version of a bill that aims to cut taxes on working Americans and U.S. corporations. "Historians will mark this day as one of the darkest black-letter days in the long history of this Senate," Schumer said as he tried to delay the vote.
The House approved its tax overhaul package last month.
Lawmakers must now craft and pass a compromise bill before President Donald Trump would get a change to sign it into law.
"My taxes are going to go up. And I think that's wonderful," Langone said. "Nothing is going to change in my life if I pay more taxes."
Langone — founder and chief of investment bank Invemed Associates, specializing in health-care companies — certainly believes tax cuts would jump-start the economy, but he warned the U.S. must cut federal debt and the budget deficit in order to really get its financial house in order.
He argued it's worth risking a "very significant recession" and even a "big hit" to the stock market to address the escalating red ink.
Schumer's office did not respond to a request for comment.Inferno is one of the most popular maps in the game, and has been in every game in the CS franchise. Recently, there seems to have been a lot of people struggling with this map, so we will be doing a blog series that will teach you how to play this map as well as possible.
As always, if you want more blog posts like these, feel free to follow us on Twitter and/or like us on Facebook. To rent a free CS:GO server, go here.
First of all, it’s important that you know what all the different places of the map are called, so that you can easily communicate with your team mates and let them know where the enemies are at, and where you are going.
Now that you know what everything is called, below is a great video that will give you a crash course on how to play de_inferno competitively.
The previous video gets a bit into the concept of a “support player”. This is an important part of playing B, and below video with none other than GeT_RiGhT from NiP goes more into detail on how to play this role:
This is another helpful video that gives you a very basic understanding of this map, without having to go into a game and die a lot of times.
AdvertisementsIcelandic parliamentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir, who has been a target of the United States’ government’s wide investigation into WikiLeaks, visited the US to show her support for Pfc. Bradley Manning.
She was involved in the release of the “Collateral Murder” video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad, Iraq, that was released just over three years ago. During her visit, she participated in multiple speaking events and spoke with US media interested in speaking with her.
Jonsdottir was here for five days. I participate in a panel event with her and others in New York City on Friday, April 5 (that can be viewed here).
I interviewed her while she was here. Part 1 of our interview was already published. Here is Part 2.
*
KEVIN GOSZTOLA: In being here in the United States and following how the Bradley Manning case is covered and taking notice of how the US population reacts to his case, what do you think about that in comparison to how people have reacted in Iceland or other countries?
BIRGITTA JONSDOTTIR, Icelandic MP: Many people say he’s a traitor and he should be killed and hung. I read it and it is very disturbing because it’s sort of a reflection of a mentality that I don’t think it is normal. It’s a very weird mentality—solution to a problem is to go and kill people or torture them or to waterboard them. It’s Middle Ages. It’s unacceptable in modern societies.
The only thing I have to say to people that claim this is that I understand that the government went into panic when the leaks were coming because they probably had no idea if it came from higher. They should have known, because according to what I have heard, he did not leak that was the highest classified stuff.
GOSZTOLA: Not top secret.
JONSDOTTIR: Right, it was Daniel Ellsberg who leaked that stuff. It is Ellsberg who is the hero and he was fortunate to not be in the military yet he was leaking to the general public stuff that people really needed to know about the government’s behavior in order to keep the government honest. I don’t see any difference except what Bradley Manning has been accused of doing is a lot less serious and people are saying he should die because of this.
I can understand that he might get some sentence. I understand that, but he’s served in prison for like more than a 1000 days and he’s been tortured. Isn’t that enough? Haven’t they gotten enough revenge? Do they want to pull out his teeth? Or put him in the electric chair? What sort of barbaric society thinks like this? And I don’t know anybody in the United States who thinks like this so I don’t really know where these people come from.
GOSZTOLA: This zeal, this wanting of death—it’s not in these countries that you’ve talked about?
JONSDOTTIR: In Iceland, we have much less prison sentences. We don’t use prisons to keep people, to forget about them. Or, we don’t use prisons—Even if you possess a little bit of drugs for your own use, you’re not really put in prison for that. We recognize that this war on drugs can never be won. And, we recognize that a prison should not be a storage place for problems. The biggest aim for someone to go to prison is get the person to get some sentence but the other thing is how to help that person assimilate back into society because it’s really expensive for society to have completely dysfunctional people coming out of prisons and these really long sentences here—This is not really traditional European. It’s more like Iran.
The way the prison sentences here are really high like what we’re seeing with Jeremy Hammond. Forty-five years in prison?
GOSZTOLA: And they want Barrett Brown to go to prison for 105 years.
What do you think about the idea that if Bradley Manning was not in the military there would not be so many calls for him to be put to death?
JONSDOTTIR: Do these people that request this—that the state becomes the executor—do they find it acceptable how many people have died in meaningless wars? What was the reason why the US went into Iraq? Oh, weapons of mass destruction. And like has the guy who lied to the UN actually been held accountable? Have the people we have seen with our own eyes committing war crimes, have they been held accountable? Or their superiors? Or the people pissing on dead people held accountable? Or raping children? Have they been held accountable?
The pride of military—You can be proud of your country, but you have to be proud for the right things. I used to look at the United States and was fascinated by many aspects of your society but they’re almost all gone. And now the world looks at the United States as similar to China.
I’d just encourage people to do everything in their power to turn it around and I know you can because you have so many brilliant, brilliant people in this country.
GOSZTOLA: In Iceland, if you had someone like Manning and there was this need to hold someone accountable for violations, would there be a zeal against that person similar to what exists in this country? There seems to be such lawlessness in this country. Is there a problem of rampant lawlessness in Iceland?
JONSDOTTIR: I have live most of my life in Iceland but I have also lived in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden and the UK. So, I have a fairly good perspective of how things are and I think the stronger the military establishment, the worst off the civic society will be.
In Iceland, we’re fortunate that we don’t have a military so we don’t ever have to teach our children how to kill a person. And, it makes a huge difference.
I’ve studied another society like this, the Tibetans. It’s just an entirely different mentality if you don’t have to indoctrine your children that it’s okay to kill people, that you have to have this absolute rigid loyalty to something you might feel to be wrong in your heart and I think it does something really bad to nations.
If Bradley Manning would have leaked this stuff in Iceland—Since we don’t have a military, if he would have leaked other sensitive state secrets that should have been in the public domain, like videos from police interrogations, he would be a hero.
GOSZTOLA: You would like people participate in the organization of actions during his trial. What can you say about your vision to have mass action in the US?
JONSDOTTIR: I would like to encourage anybody who has any time to spare to organize in his hometown an event that would be around the time or on the date when the trial starts. So, I would like people to show the “Collateral Murder” video or show it in halls or their homes. They can do guerrilla video. They can take photos if they see stencils, like “Blowing a Whistle is Not a Crime.” They can host readings, re-read his statement. They can show different documentaries but would need to upload to similar website like the Global Voices website.
I want to have larger events in three cities like New York, Washington, LA or San Francisco and then people upload that they’ve done an event on Tumblr or Twitter and we collect information on these events. We can send a strong message to Bradley Manning that we’ve not forgotten and we appreciate what he’s done. We are not going to accept that he will rot in jail for the rest of his life. Enough is enough.
Photo by G20NWD released under Creative Commons LicenseImage copyright Dr Mike Pienkowski Image caption The Grand Cayman blue iguana is just one of the endangered species living on a British overseas territory
Wildlife and the environment in far-flung British territories are under threat, says a report.
Environment ministers from Britain's overseas territories say the government has cut funds and been distracted by Brexit.
They say there is huge confusion among government departments about responsibility for the territories.
The government calls the criticism unfair and points to its creation of large marine protection areas.
The UK holds jurisdiction over 19 British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies - parts of the British Empire that have not been granted independence or have voted to remain British territories.
Their lands hold an extraordinary wealth of rare species: 94% of the UK's endemic species - found nowhere else in the world - are in outposts of the former empire.
Among the endangered creatures are a giant frog called the Montserrat mountain chicken; the Spiky yellow woodlouse, existing only land the size of a tennis court on St Helena; and the Grand Cayman blue iguana.
Image copyright Dr Mike Pienkowski Image caption The Montserrat mountain chicken is one of the endangered species.
Representatives of 14 of the territories - ranging from Bermuda to Pitcairn and Gibraltar - joined the meeting of the UK Overseas Territories Conservation Forum on the Channel island of Alderney.
The islands are highly vulnerable to climate change, but ministers complained that the government had almost halved Foreign Office spending on the climate.
They also said cuts had eroded the capacity of the experts in the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), who used to offer conservation advice.
The delegates in Alderney said other decisions on funding were going against them and that civil servants who had previously provided support are distracted by Brexit.
Who's in charge?
Confusion reigns over responsibility for supporting the islands, the ministers said.
The Foreign Office has the policy lead but it delegates biodiversity issues to the environment department, Defra.
The lead for the Crown Dependencies of the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey (which includes Alderney) is with yet another department: the Ministry of Justice.
Claude Hogan from Montserrat said: "There is confusion in policy. We don't know the best person to approach and we end up going round in circles between different ministries.
"To protect the island and adapt to climate change we need to put in sea defences - but we only get enough money to go from one consultancy to the next."
The territories had previously received support for environment-focused programmes from the aid department DFID. But they said that ministers have now switched interest towards traditional job creation - even though the islanders said their economic future depends on a healthy environment.
Image copyright Dr Mike Pienkowski Image caption The Millennium Forest in St Helena is a reforestation attempt for the island
Brexit is a major concern, as many of the territories have received substantial funding from the EU.
The minister from from Pitcairn, Michelle Christian, said: "We can apply for EU funding for environmental issues such as soil erosion, waste management and water, so we are concerned about the future."
Gibraltar's minister John Cortes, a professional ecologist, said he was nervous at the possibility of Spanish encroachment on protected marine zones after the UK has left the EU.
A Foreign Office spokeswoman said the government was already working to improve cross-departmental policies on the territories.
She pointed to the internationally-acclaimed programme of marine protection around some key territories. The zone around Pitcain, for instance, will protect an area of ocean three and a half times the size of Britain.
The spokeswoman added: "Climate change and energy work is a network-wide priority. The Foreign Office works closely in partnership with departments across Whitehall on the international climate change agenda."
'Critical environmental issues'
The government's delegate had been forced to withdraw from the meeting in Alderney because of the election.
The meeting's organisers said the government had declined to foot the bill for the meeting, which was funded by Alderney in conjunction with voluntary groups.
They applauded the government's marine programme, but said many of the most critical environmental issues were on land.
Their best hope is that when Brexit is settled, the UK will devote more of its time and energy to them, rather than less.
Follow Roger on Twitter.While most of the news on Russia this week has been focused on the country’s ongoing financial collapse, it is important to highlight a report released by Human Rights Watch on Monday documenting the rise of anti-LGBT violence in Russia along with the ways the government, which recently passed new laws curbing LGBT rights, has ensured virtual impunity for the perpetrators of such attacks. Following the report’s release, Russia added a LGBT legal aid group to a list of NGOs that must register as “foreign agents.”
The uptick in violence against LGBT Russians certainly won’t discourage Religious Right activists from supporting Putin, many of whom also seem more than willing to ignore his deadly incursion into Ukraine, support for laws curbing the freedoms of Russian evangelical Christians and other human rights abuses.
Nothing, it seems, can dissuade many of Putin’s American supporters, several of whom recently attended an anti-LGBT conference at the Kremlin, from believing that the U.S. should adopt anti-gay laws modeled on Russia’s, such as a ban on gay “propaganda” and adoption by same-sex parents.
In fact, many Religious Right activists in the U.S. believe that Putin is on a mission from God to save Russia, and the world, from the LGBT community.
Crush on Putin
It is no secret that many conservatives have fallen under Putin’s spell.
Matt Drudge has called Putin the “leader of the free world.” Sarah Palin has fawned over the Russian leader’s wrestling abilities. Franklin Graham has hailed Putin for “protecting children from any homosexual agenda or propaganda” and having “taken a stand to protect his nation’s children from the damaging effects of any gay and lesbian agenda.” Larry Jacobs of the World Congress of Families, the group that helped organize the Kremlin meeting, praised Putin last year for “preventing [gay people] from corrupting children.”
Religious Right leader and Iowa GOP kingmaker Bob Vander Plaats has upheld Putin as a world leader in morality. Josh Craddock, who represents Personhood USA at the United Nations, came back from the Kremlin conference cheering on Russia as a “light to the world.” Liberty Counsel chairman Mat Staver expressed offense last year that Obama would dare criticize Putin.One Fox News host wished that Putin could be president of the United States, even for just 48 hours.
Any violence against Russian gays, one Religious Right group explained, is probably “provoked by homosexual activists.” Massachusetts-based pastor Scott Lively, who has taken credit for inspiring Russia’s “propaganda” law, dismissed anti-LGBT violence in Russia as a “hoax” and told right-wing radio show host Linda Harvey that if violent anti-gay incidents occur, other gay people were likely the perpetrators.
God Will Favor Russia Instead Of America, Thanks Obama
Anti-gay activists think that God has decided to bless Russia, thanks to Putin’s leadership, while punishing the U.S. for passing rebellious gay rights laws. Pat Buchanan clearly articulated this mindset in a column in April titled “Is God Now On Russia’s Side?,” in which he likened the U.S. and Western Europe to Sodom and Gomorrah and cheerfully proclaimed that “Putin is planting Russia’s flag firmly on the side of traditional Christianity.”
In a February column, Don Feder of the World Congress of Families gushed that Putin had become the new Ronald Reagan: “As my friend and Russian pro-family leader Alexey Komov likes to say: ‘Under Reagan, America helped to save us from communism. We’d like to return the favor.’”
Lively made the case last year that Putin is “the only world leader capable of standing up to the West” and could “inspire all the morally conservative countries of the world to adopt a similar law that he just adopted.” In the same interview, Lively called Obama the Antichrist.
“The country that’s acting like it’s part of the kingdom of the Antichrist is the United States of America, and Russia is standing against homosexual marriage, they’re standing for traditional family values,” Religious Right radio host Rick Wiles said in September. “The United States is exporting its wickedness, we’re using our power and might to force nations to change their laws to accept abortion, to accept homosexual marriage and homosexual rights, so which country is part of the Antichrist system and which is not?”
Wiles even predicted that the U.S. would soon go to war against Russia “with an atheistic, Jesus-hating, pro-homosexual, pro-lesbian, pro-transgender military and we’re going to go up against another military carrying a Christian cross.”
Bring Anti-Gay Laws To The U.S.
Anti-gay activist Matt Barber said earlier this year that it was “encouraging” to see more anti-gay measures coming out of Russia, adding that he would like to see laws that “stop this homosexual activist propaganda from corrupting children in our nation and we need to see that right here in the United States.”
Peter LaBarbera called Russia’s “propaganda” law an “acceptable” and necessary way to stop companies like Disney from “promoting lesbianism to kids,” while American Family Association governmental affairs director Sandy Rios said the speech-inhibiting law was just “common sense.”
One of Putin’s most vocal cheerleaders, American Family Association spokesman Bryan Fischer, has called him a “lion of Christianity” and repeatedly demanded that the U.S. enact similar bans on gay “propaganda.”
Since the U.S. hasn’t embrace such an anti-gay crackdown, Religious Right activist William Murray writes, Americans are now “fleeing” to Russia in order to avoid LGBT equality at home.As a leader in the incubation of digital currencies, Bittrex is proud to operate in our growing ecosystem and recognize that it still has a great deal of uncertainty. We’ve long held a high bar for adding new tokens to our exchange which balances the desire to foster innovation against our belief in adhering to the legal and the regulatory guidelines of the jurisdictions which we live and operate in.
Initial Token Offerings are a way for entrepreneurs, who may not otherwise have access to capital, to fund innovative businesses. Often times, for these businesses to be successful, wide distribution of their tokens, which underpin the business, is a must. Our goal is to lead the market with a secure, performant, and compliant platform for the trading and distribution of these tokens.
We are based in the United States and have a global customer base that trades digital tokens. We closely adhere to SEC and CFTC related laws and regulation and we partner with top quality legal, compliance, government relations and regulatory professionals through our relationships with Perkins Coie, Delta Strategy Group and others. We also serve on the Executive Committee of the Chamber of Digital Commerce and meet with regulators and legislators to educate them about this exciting industry.
We applaud the SEC in issuing its Digital Asset Investigative Report. In the report, the Commission notes that whether a particular investment transaction involves the offer or sale of a security will depend on the facts and circumstances, including the economic realities of the transaction. Prior to listing any new token, Bittrex performs this facts and circumstance analysis and considers if a token might be deemed a security under the Howey Test, prior to listing. We strive to only list “use” tokens or tokens which represent a good or service. We conduct a thorough compliance review to avoid listing tokens that may be deemed a security. We believe this is industry best practice and we are pleased that the SEC Report reaches a similar conclusion.
For further reading:
SEC's report on the DAO: https://www.sec.gov/litigation/investreport/34-81207.pdf
SEC's investor guidance about ICOs: https://www.investor.gov/additional-resources/news-alerts/alerts-bulletins/investor-bulletin-initial-coin-offeringsAlexis Sanchez will be jetting in London shortly (Picture: AP)
Barcelona winger Alexis Sanchez is reportedly flying to London to complete his transfer to Arsenal after rejecting moves to Juventus and AC Milan.
The Gunners are reported to have agreed a £32million fee to sign Sanchez following days of speculation and the switch is now edging closer to completion.
According to the Italian press, the Chilean, who turned down Liverpool last week, received late offers from Juventus and Milan yesterday – both of whom were offering huge salaries.
However, he has rejected both clubs and is now heading for England to finalise his switch to the Emirates Stadium.
Sanchez has rejected a host of other offers (Picture: Getty)
Arsenal are happy to give Sanchez a huge rise on his current £75,000-a-week salary and other personal terms are expected to be a formality.
Barca are already planning for life after Sanchez by giving away his number nine shirt to incoming Liverpool hitman Luis Suarez.
MORE: Does this picture show Sanchez to Arsenal is getting closerThe Houston Texans were gashed by the Kansas City Chiefs dynamic young tight end Travis Kelce in Week 1. Up next is savvy veteran tight end Greg Olsen and the Carolina Panthers. Mark Schofield breaks down some of the likely ways the Panthers will copy the Chiefs approach, and success.
The Kansas City Chiefs received a big day from Travis Kelce in their 27-20 victory over the Houston Texans. The big tight end caught 6 passes for 106 yards and two touchdowns. This weekend Houston faces another talented pass catching tight end, Greg Olsen from the Carolina Panthers. While the Carolina TE only caught one pass for 11 yards in Week 1 against Jacksonville, he figures to be more involved against the Texans, because of the schemes that both Kansas City and Carolina use to get their tight ends open.
Isolate A Corner
On Kelce’s first touchdown of the 2015 season, the offense comes out in 13 offensive personnel with quarterback Alex Smith under center. Three tight ends line up on the right edge of the offense: Demetrius Harris (#84) on the line of scrimmage, James O’Shaugnessy (#80) and Kelce (#87) in wing alignments right outside Harris:
Houston has their base 3-4 defense in the game, showing Cover 4 in the secondary. The Chiefs throw the ball on this play, with Jeremy Maclin (#19) running a fade route at the bottom of the screen. The TEs all run in-cuts at various depths, with Harris and Kelce running post routes and O’Shaugnessy dragging underneath: Because of the base personnel, pre-snap alignment and route scheme, Kelce is isolated on cornerback Kareem Jackson (#25). The CB is listed at 5’10”, 188 pounds. Kelce is listed as 6’5”, 260. So, when the TE runs right at Jackson off the snap, and then turns inside, he is able to use his big frame against the defender:
The throw is high ‒ but it is placed well on this play, as Kelce is able to go up and get the football. Either the TE is coming down with the pass, or the throw sails out of bounds. Kelce secures the catch, and the Chiefs have six points.
Here is how Carolina used personnel and formation to isolate Olsen on a defensive back. Facing 3rd and 10 on the Jacksonville 16-yard line, quarterback Cam Newton is in the shotgun with 11 offensive personnel on the field, in a 3X1 alignment. Three wide receivers bunch on the left. Olsen lines up as the only receiver to the right, using a split from the right tackle:
The Jaguars have their 4-2-5 nickel defense in the game, showing Cover 1 in the secondary. They walk linebacker Telvin Smith (#50) over Olsen prior to the snap, but with fellow LB Paul Posluszny blitzing on this play, Smith is actually responsible for the running back.
Leaving safety Sergio Brown in man coverage on the TE:
Olsen runs an out route, and is able to shield the defender away from the football on the catch, picking up a first down.
Tight Ends Doing Slot Receiver Things
Both Houston and Carolina successfully line up their tight ends in non-traditional spots on the field, particularly in the area often occupied by a slot receiver. On this play, the Chiefs have the football on their own 40-yard line and face a 2nd and 11. Smith lines up under center and Kansas City has 13 personnel in the game, and the defense has their base 3-4 on the field showing Cover 4:
The offense starts this play with the 3 TEs on the left, but prior to the snap Kelce motions across the formation, and settles into the left slot, where he will run an out route:
In Cover 4 when Maclin uses a vertical release, the cornerback turns to run with him. This means the slot-side safety is now responsible for the #2 receiver ‒ Kelce. If the TE runs a quick route to the flat or a shallow underneath route, the safety must pass coverage of Kelce to underneath defenders, and help the CB on the vertical route by the #1 receiver. But if the #2 receiver releases vertically, then the safety must pick him up in man coverage:
The outside vertical route occupies the cornerback, creating space along the sideline for Kelce to operate. The safety’s multiple responsibilities gave Kelce room to operate from the slot, where the big TE shows his route running abilities.
Finally, here is Olsen from Week 1, starting as a Z receiver in tight to the formation, with TE Ed Dickson (#84) on the line of scrimmage:
The Jaguars have their base 4-3 defense in the game using Cover 1. At the snap Olson releases to the outside, drawing cornerback Davon House (#31) in man coverage. Dickson runs a wheel route to the outside:
With man coverage, the wheel route moves the play-side linebacker, and after selling House on a deeper route to the outside the TE breaks back to his QB on a curl route, occupying the area vacated by LB reacting to the wheel route:
Newton hits his tight end for a nice completion ‒ which is called back because an offensive lineman drifted downfield prior to the pass. But the concept is the same: Get a big tight end in a non-traditional alignment and let him work against a defensive back. Given what the tape from Week 1 showed, Olsen will likely put up some better numbers this weekend against the Texans.
Follow Mark on Twitter @MarkSchofield.
All video and images courtesy NFL Game Pass and/or Game Rewind.
About the author
Mark Schofield Mark is a reformed lawyer who is excited to work on something more important than two insurance companies fighting over money: Football. He graduated from Wesleyan University where he was a four-year letter winner as a quarterback and situational wide receiver. He lives in Maryland with his wife and two children.“Our city is progressive and aggressive in implementing sustainable solutions to environmental and economic challenges.”
–David Robinson, director of Facilities and Fleet, City of Hillsboro, Oregon
Hillsboro, Oregon, the 5th largest city in the state and known as “Silicon Forest” is joining the growing electric community with the announcement that it will be the first in the state to install public ChargePoint Networked Charging Stations for both plug-in hybrids and all-electric vehicles. The city will install 16 charging stations downtown, one as part of its “green” intermodal transit facility due to be constructed this year.
It’s not surprising that this announcement comes from the environmentally progressive Northwest. Robinson noted that the community has a, “large forward-thinking population ready to embrace electric vehicle technology,” and that the City is committed to providing the facilities that its community needs.
The technology is manufactured by Coulomb Technologies, Inc. who currently have ChargePoint Networked Charging Stations in San Francisco and Walnut Creek, California, Wisconsin and Amsterdam. The charging stations can be used for municipalities, utilities, green office buildings, and parking garages, all ideal locations for consumers with cars that can re-charged.
So how does it work? A consumer with a plug-in hybrid or all-electric car subscribes to the ChargePoint Network and receives a ChargePoint Smart Card that allows him to charge his car at any charging station around the world. This is the same concept as a person who has a Shell gasoline credit card. She can use the credit card at any station throughout the world to fill up.
Also, to continue the analogy to a traditional gas station which provides the driver other benefits besides gas such as car washes, food, beverages, and lottery tickets, and provides the owner with revenue (more on food and beverages than gas) the ChargePoint Network charging stations also provide benefits to both the owner (such as the city of Hillsboro) as well as to the consumer.
Owner benefits include:
Revenue stream to pay for electricity, capital equipment and maintenance.
Authenticated access to eliminate energy theft.
Authorized energizing for safety.
Remote monitoring and diagnostics.
Smart Grid integration for utility load management with future V2G capabilities.
Consumer benefits include:
Ability to charge at any ChargePoint charging station around the world.
Ability to locate ChargePoint charging stations at www.mychargepoint.net.
The ability
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spiritual lesson that can be derived from a strong solar plexus chakra is to accept one's place in the life stream and to emanate self-love.
The heart chakra is associated with green or pink colors. It is the center of love in our physical and emotional bodies. As the name implies, the heart chakra is located at the center of the chest by the heart organ.
Heart conditions, issues with the lungs, breast cancer and upper back problems may be symptoms of a wounded heart chakra. Breads, flax seed, dairy products, mints and turmeric are a few of the foods that can help balance a heart chakra.
Connected with the color sky blue, the throat chakra is the center of will and truth. Being open and honestly expressing oneself can ensure a healthy a throat chakra. On the other hand, being dishonest or false infects the energy flow of the throat chakra. When the throat chakra shuts down, one loses his or her authenticity. A strong throat chakra can teach one to take responsibility for his or her own needs.
The brow chakra, also called the third-eye, is linked to the color indigo. Wearing indigo colored clothing can remind the subconscious to be more aware of and strengthen the brow chakra. Located at the center of the forehead, the brow chakra is a center of wisdom and the ability to learn. While this chakra prompts dreaming, it also allows one to separate reality from fantasy.
The brow chakra influences the brain, neurological system, eyes, ears, nose and pituitary of the physical body. Berries, red grapes, lavender, poppy seed, mugwort and red wine are foods that nourish the third-eye.
The crown chakra is associated with the color violet or white. It is the center of spiritual connection and the chakra that ignites spiritual awakening. Often represented in art as a lotus flower, the crown chakra is located at the top and center of the head.Two Months In and 2015 Is Record Warm
We may only be two months into 2015, but already the year is burning up the charts, setting up the possibility that it could topple 2014’s newly minted record for hottest year.
Together, January and February were the warmest such period on record, according to global data released Wednesday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. With an El Niño (albeit a weak one) in place, there’s potential for that warmth to stick around and elevate temperatures for more of the year.
How much temperatures around the globe differed from average during the first two months of 2015.
Credit: NOAA NCDC
Of course, two months is only a small portion of the year, and it’s impossible to say for sure how the remainder will turn out. But regardless of its final ranking, 2015 will almost certainly be much warmer than most years in the records (which stretch back to 1880), thanks to the steady rise in global temperatures fueled by the unabated release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
January 2015 was the second warmest in NOAA records, as was February as the month checked in at about 1.5°F warmer than the 20th century average for the month. Combined, the first two months of the year were 1.42°F above average and nearly half a degree above the same point last year. February 2014 ranked only as the 21st warmest for the month.
“So we are much warmer for the year to date this year compared with last,” Jessica Blunden, a climate scientist with ERT, Inc., at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, said in an email.
(NASA’s temperature rankings put February in the No. 2 spot and January tied for fourth. The rankings differ because each agency uses slightly different methods to process data.)
As was the case for much of last year, the eastern U.S. was the only very cold spot on the planet this winter, with many more areas of abnormal warmth. In particular, the western half of the U.S. was a hot spot, as was a large swath of Russia and parts of Scandinavia.
This pattern was a shift from much of last year, when the most sweltering spots were over parts of the oceans, particularly in the Pacific and Indian basins.
“The ocean heat does appear to be tapering off a bit overall compared with summer/fall last year, but we're still seeing record-warm temperatures in many regions, including, of course, the eastern North Pacific, which appears to have had a big influence over our weather in the US,” Blunden said.
Ocean water has a long “memory” for heat, as more energy must be absorbed or released to change its temperature than is the case for air. That ocean heat helped propel 2014 to the top of the standings and will continue to play a role in 2015. Of the past 12 months, nine of them have been the warmest or second warmest for that particular month, NOAA said in its latest data release.
The El Niño that NOAA has declared to have started in February could also keep temperatures elevated, as historically the climate state is associated with higher global temperatures.
“So if El Niño holds, and especially if it strengthens, we could very well be looking at another record warm year,” Blunden said.
Regardless of whether 2015 bests 2014 or comes up short, it is part of the larger, decades-long warming trend fueled by growth of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases released by human activity. Nine of the 10 warmest years in the books have occurred in the 21st century, and no record cold year has been set since 1911.
Watch out 2014, as 2015 may be coming for your crown.
Editor's note: This story was updated to reflect February 2014 was the 21st warmest, and not 44th.
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And: New Year, new social media presence! Grizzly Bear finally have a fancy Tumblr page of their own, where they've posted a bunch of teaser.GIFs for their upcoming video for "Gun Shy" (see one above), as well as the remix of "Gun Shy" by Lindstrøm. Watch the video for "Yet Again" after the dates.
Grizzly Bear:
01-26 Mar del Plata, Argentina - Mute Club de Mar
01-29 Buenos Aires, Argentina - La Trastienda
01-31 Mexico City, Mexico - Auditorio Blackberry
02-03 São Paulo, Brazil - Cine Joia
02-05 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - Circo Voador
03-01 Taipei, Taiwan - Neo Studio
03-02 Kaohsiung, Taiwan - Megaport Festival
03-05 Tokyo, Japan - Liquidroom
03-06 Osaka, Japan - Akaso
03-09 Singapore - Esplanade Theatre
03-30 Pittsburgh, PA - Carnegie Music Hall Oakland *
04-01 Louisville, KY - Brown Theatre *
04-02 Milwaukee, WI - The Pabst Theater *
04-04 Iowa City, IA - Mission Creek Festival at Englert Theatre *
04-06 Dallas, TX - Palladium *
04-08 Austin, TX - Stubb’s *
04-09 Houston, TX - House of Blues *
04-11 El Paso, TX - Tricky Falls *
04-15 Big Sur, CA - Henry Miller Library *
04-16 Big Sur, CA - Henry Miller Library *
05-25 Paris, France - L’Olympia
05-28 Milan, Italy - Alcatraz
05-29 München, Denmark - Dachau Summer of Music
06-09 New York, NY - The Governors Ball Music FestivalA few weeks ago I set out to create a new multipart/form-data parser for node.js. We need this parser for the new version of transloadit that we have been working on since our setback last month.
The result is a new library called formidable, which, on a high level, makes receiving file uploads with node.js as easy as:
var formidable = require ( 'formidable' )
, http = require ( 'http' )
, sys = require ('sys' ) ;
http. createServer ( function ( req, res ) {
if ( req. url == '/upload' && req. method. toLowerCase ( ) == 'post' ) {
// parse a file upload
var form = new formidable. IncomingForm ( ) ;
form. parse ( req, function ( fields, files ) {
res. writeHead ( 200, { 'content-type' : 'text/plain' } ) ;
res. write ('received upload:
' ) ;
res. end ( sys. inspect ( { fields: fields, files: files } ) ) ;
} ) ;
return ;
}
// show a file upload form
res. writeHead ( 200, { 'content-type' : 'text/html' } ) ;
res. end
( '<form action="/upload" enctype="multipart/form-data" method="post">'
+ '<input type="text" name="title"><br>'
+ '<input type="file" name="upload" multiple="multiple"><br>'
+ '<input type="submit" value="Upload">'
+ '</form>'
) ;
} ) ;
Essentially this works similar to other platforms where file uploads are saved to disk before your script is invoked with a path to the uploaded file.
What's nice about this however, is that you can hook into the whole thing on a lower level:
form. parse ( req ) ;
form. addListener ( 'file', function ( field, file ) {
// file looks like this:
// {path: '...', filename: '...', mime: '...'}
} ) ;
We use that interface for processing HTML5 multi-file uploads as they come in, rather than waiting for the entire upload to finish.
You could even overwrite the onPart handler, which gives you direct access to the raw data stream:
form. onPart = function ( part ) {
part. addListener ( 'data', function ( chunk ) {
// do cool stuff, like streaming incoming files somewhere else
} ) ;
} ;
All of this is possible thanks to the underlaying multipart parser which makes heavy use of node.js buffers.
Buffers in node are basically just (efficient) arrays of raw memory that you can access byte by byte. The parser works by looping over each incoming buffer chunk, while maintaining as little state as possible to do its work:
// simplified excerpt from MultipartParser.write
// chunk = Buffer of incoming data
for ( var i = 0 ; i < chunk. length ; i++ ) {
var character = chunk [ i ] ;
switch ( this. state ) {
case 'BOUNDARY-BEGIN' :
if ( character!= this. boundary [ i ] ) {
// unexpected character, abort parsing
return 0 ;
}
if ( i == this. boundary. length ) {
// emit event, advance to next state
this. onPartHeaderBegin ( ) ;
this. state = 'HEADER-BEGIN' ;
}
break ;
case 'HEADER-BEGIN' :
//...
break ;
}
}
But, as you can imagine, this approach turned out to be somewhat limited in speed. I was only able to get about 16-20 mb/s out of this. My goal however was to get somewhere around 125 mb/s, enough to saturate a 1 gbit network connection.
So I started to look for ways to optimize. The data I was parsing looks like this:
--AaB03x content-disposition: form-data; name="title" A picture of me on my unicycle! --AaB03x content-disposition: form-data; name="pic"; filename="unicycle.jpg" Content-Type: image/jpeg... binary data... --AaB03x--
The sequence here being:
Series of boundary characters (--AaB03x), announcing the beginning of a new part Headers for that part \r
\r
Data for this part Series of boundary characters, announcing the end of the part or end of the stream
What stands out is the fact that there is no parsing needed for step #4. All the data of a part itself is a plain octet stream. So after talking to Ryan about it, he recommended me to look into the Boyer-Moore algorithm to speed things up.
The algorithm is usually the fastest method to find a sub string within a string of text. It basically works by analyzing the needle string and building a lookup table of its characters to efficiently skip over parts of the haystack.
But implementing it, was not exactly easy. The algorithm is not trivial, and many of the example implementations I found were wrong. That however was not the problem. The real challenge was that I was working with a stream of data, rather than a big string I had full access to.
This meant keeping lots of additional state in the parser, as well as creating a very complicated piece of code. I like challenges, but I also like efficiently using my time, so I started looking for a shortcut.
And then it hit me. Most of the boyer-moore algorithm is designed to improve the performance of the worst-case scenario. The worst-case scenario for this problem is the case where you hit a character in your haystack that is also a character in the needle string. Boyer-moore deals with this case by knowing the offset of each character in the needle string, so it can maximize the number of characters to skip in any case.
But file uploads rarely cause these worst-case scenarios! With human text, character repetition is pretty high. But file uploads are binary data, so most bytes are likely to fall outside the ASCII range of characters usually used for the boundary.
That made the solution much simpler. All I had to do was generating a list of all characters in the boundary, and whenever I hit a character that was not in that list, I knew I could safely skip the full length of the boundary:
while ( i + boundary. length <= chunk. length ) {
if ( chunk [ i + boundary. length - 1 ] in boundaryChars ) {
// worst case, go back to byte by byte parsing until a non-matching char occurs
break ;
}
i += boundary. length ;
}
This resulted in an incredible speed up, allowing to parse uploads at 500 mb/sec. The parsing can be even faster if a longer boundary sequence is used. Short boundaries and hitting the worst-case scenario frequently will slow things down.
The benchmark I created is using an actual boundary created by Mozilla Firefox. Your milage may vary slightly.
The whole thing could still be optimized further, but at this point I believe it is fast enough to make other parts of the system more likely to become the bottleneck.
Formidable is licensed under the MIT license. Questions & suggestions regarding the library, node.js or the parser would be most welcome.
--fgU.S. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2014. Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg
In his six years as president, Barack Obama has had to break out the veto stamp fewer times than any president since James Garfield (who died in 1881 after just a few months in office), according to data maintained by the Senate. By contrast, George W. Bush vetoed 12 bills (overridden 4 times) and Clinton vetoed 37 (overridden twice).
FDR holds the record for the most vetoes, however: in his 12 years in office he vetoed 635 bills, and was overridden only 9 times.
Obama's two vetoes took place during his first term, and dealt with a bill about foreclosures and a continuing resolution that had been rendered moot by other legislation. There was relatively little drama attached to either measure, but could this change starting in 2015? Probably, although not by much. The Republicans still don't have a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, and it's likely that Harry Reid will wield the filibuster just as enthusiastically as Mitch McConnell has before him. This means that it will be hard to get any bill past Congress without at least some measure of Democratic support.
Republican leaders have already signaled their intent to send several measures with bipartisan support to Obama's desk, including the Keystone Oil pipeline, a repeal of the medical device tax, and a handful of international trade agreements. Obama will have to choose whether to veto these bills over the support of members of his own party, or save the stamp for another fight.Google's Street View car was spotted Thursday snapping pictures of Staten Island homes devastated by Hurricane Sandy for updated imagery on Google Maps.
The car's presence, first reported by the New York Post, triggered an outcry among some residents who don't want their wrecked homes on the Internet for all to see. Residents' complaints about the maps ranged from privacy issues to concerns about property value.
However, at least one Staten Island local told the Post that Google's maps might generate more awareness and support. And Google will be making repeat visits as recovery continues — New York City Mayor's Office Deputy Press Secretary Julie Wood said in a statement that Google is "...committed to documenting these same neighborhoods again soon to show the recovery we are confident will be made."
A Google spokesperson said that the company hopes the updated maps will help with the ongoing recovery efforts.
"As part of our ongoing work to provide useful information in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, the Street View team is currently re-driving affected areas of New York," said the spokesperson. "We hope this accurate, updated imagery will help people around the world better understand the extent of the damage and the importance of coming together as a community to aid in the recovery efforts."
SEE ALSO: Google Launches Crisis Map for Hurricane Sandy
Up-to-the-second maps are often considered a blessing by recovery organizations and local governments in the aftermath of geography-changing catastrophes. Google used its mapping capabilities in a similar fashion following Hurricane Katrina, flooding in Pakistan, an earthquake in Turkey and other natural disasters.
Google, however, has been criticized for being slow to update maps and Street View imagery following successful recovery efforts, particularly in post-Katrina New Orleans.
The debate over Google's post-Sandy mapping comes after a similar argument which also pitched open data against homeowner privacy after a newspaper published maps of gun permit applicants.
Is Google right to map post-Sandy damage to Staten Island? Should Google make the maps public? Share your thoughts in the comments.
Photo via Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty ImagesToday, President Trump signed an executive order to reinstate the National Space Council, an executive agency that will be tasked with guiding US space policy during the administration. The council, typically chaired by the vice president, is one that the US has seen before; it was first in operation during the ‘60s and ‘70s and then again under the George H.W. Bush administration, before being dissolved in 1993. Now, it’s back again, and this time with Vice President Mike Pence at the helm.
“This will be Pence’s eyes and ears into our government’s actions in space.”
Other notable members of the executive branch will serve on the council as well, according to a draft of the order obtained by The Verge. Those include the secretary of state and the secretary of defense, as well as NASA’s administrator — though that positioned has yet to be filled permanently. The executive order lays out the main functions of the council, too, which revolve around making recommendations of space policy for the president and how to implement that guidance. It also calls for the creation of an advisory group, comprised of non-government workers and those in the industry to provide advice.
The council’s purview includes NASA, as well as the US Air Force and intelligence community, which rely heavily on satellites for national defense. “Basically this will be Pence’s eyes and ears into our government’s actions in space, whether it’s NASA or the Pentagon,” Phil Larson, a former space policy advisor for the Obama administration, tells The Verge.
I’m honored and frankly enthusiastic about the role @POTUS has asked me to play in renewing our nation’s commitment to space. pic.twitter.com/deAukbZzh7 — Vice President Pence (@VP) June 30, 2017
The council's resurrection has been in the works since the campaign, when one of Trump's space advisor’s advocated for it. Pence confirmed in March he'd head the council, and a draft of the executive order to reinstate the group has been around since May, according to a report by Space News.
It's not yet clear what policy the council will implement. Two factions appear to have formed within the space community: "old space" and "new space." The "old space" group prefers the traditional way NASA has done business: the agency gives pricey contracts to government contractors, to develop vehicles that are ultimately overseen and operated by NASA. It’s how the agency is making its next monster rocket, the Space Launch System, which is meant to take astronauts into deep space and onto Mars.
As for what type of policy the council will implement, that’s still up for debate
“New space” advocates prefer a more hands-off approach, leaning on public-private partnerships. Under this model, NASA tells the private sector what service it wants and companies make pitches. This is the basic formula for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which tasks SpaceX and Boeing with building spacecraft to take astronauts to and from the International Space Station. These types of contracts are usually fixed-price and are often hailed for being more cost-effective ways of doing business. But NASA doesn't own the vehicles and has less oversight in development.
It's unclear which faction will win on the counsel. Pence and his team seem to support public-private partnerships, Larson says. But the attendees at today’s briefing about the council indicate old space may have an edge. The room was filled with legislators from Alabama, the state where the SLS is being developed. And representatives from most of the major private space companies were noticeably absent.
Of course, the council may just be an additional layer of bureaucracy that slows the making process — it just depends on how it’ll be used. “It could help break some of the log jams we’ve seen, instead of muddling through space policy right now,” says Larson. “But it will only work that way if space is a high priority for Pence.”Before he was Broadway’s hottest star, Lin-Manuel Miranda was just another kid in New York chasing a dream—to create a smash-hit musical in which Aaron Burr commits murder. He eventually found critical acclaim with ‘Hamilton,’ a musical that tells the story of Aaron Burr shooting someone in the face. But if you think Miranda was an overnight success, think again: Here are seven other musicals he wrote about Aaron Burr assassinating people, before finally landing on ‘Hamilton.’
1. Goodnight, Father (2007)
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s initial concept had many of the Hamilton characters we know and love today, but with a completely different plot line that left audiences in tears. Goodnight, Father tells the story of Aaron Burr killing each of America’s Founding Fathers one by one with a baseball bat to prove that he is the strongest of them all. In the show’s gut-wrenching finale, Burr sings, “America, forgive me for my heinous crime / But I hereby declare this our nation’s pastime.” He then clubs George Washington, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton to death with his wooden bat. The show debuted to rave reviews in New York, but Miranda ultimately decided to end its run so he could workshop the idea further.
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2. To Burr And Back (2008)
To Burr And Back tells the story of Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton in the earliest days of their career, as an inseparable pair of best friends rising up through the ranks of 1790s American politics. When Aaron has a vision that someday he and Hamilton will engage in a duel, he decides to build a time machine, transport himself back 40 years to 1756, and kill his younger self to keep Hamilton out of harm’s way. By the final number, “The Baby That Is Me,” there wasn’t a dry eye in the house. But Miranda—ever the perfectionist—still wasn’t satisfied.
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3. The Swamps Of Eden (2009)
Lin-Manuel’s next few revisions did away with the Hamilton character entirely, to focus more on Aaron Burr and his capacity to kill. The Swamps Of Eden was a hip-hop retelling of the story of Adam and Eve, with a brand-new ending that had audiences leaping to their feet with applause. After Eve tastes the forbidden fruit, God enters the stage and raps, “I just had a vision / To make a man named Aaron Burr / And since Eve wouldn’t listen / He’s allowed to kill her.” Aaron Burr then appears in a cloud of smoke, draws his gun, and riddles Adam and Eve with bullets, and the play abruptly ends. Despite receiving standing ovations every single night of its two-week run, Miranda went back to the drawing board.
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4. Mama Burr’s Got Moves (2010)
Miranda’s fourth rewrite transported the entire Burr family to 1950s Nashville, where single mother Mama Burr has entered a local dance competition for a chance to win $500. When Li’l Aaron learns that his mother will be competing against Dale Huxby, the only man in town who can do a backflip, Aaron faces the toughest choice of his life: Either teach his mother how to do an equally impressive trick, or garrote Dale Huxby with an ox collar on the family farm. Li’l Aaron chooses the latter, and his mother takes home the grand prize by default. The play was later adapted into 2013’s Pacific Rim.
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5. Stayin’ Alive! (2011)
The show’s next incarnation was Stayin’ Alive!, a jukebox musical that used The Bee Gees’ greatest hits to tell the story of Aaron Burr trying to kill everyone at a discotheque. The Bee Gees immediately sued, and Miranda later told The New York Times that he was glad the project was canned, as it helped him realize that he needed to bring the project back to its roots—a show committed to telling important stories from American history.
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6. The Nine Fabulous Lives Of Pussywillow (2013)
Vice President Aaron Burr has it all: a loving wife, a beautiful home, and the second-highest job in American government. Enter Pussywillow, a back-talking tomcat with a fondness for sleeping on Burr’s prized petunias. The resulting two-hour musical romp follows the back-and-forth hijinks of the pair, as Burr repeatedly nabs Pussywillow and slits his throat with a hunting knife, only to have the cat reincarnate himself into Alexander Hamilton right on the White House lawn. Miranda reportedly turned down three separate offers to take Pussywillow to Broadway, as he still felt the script needed a final revision.
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7. The Duel (2014)
The Duel was virtually identical to today’s version of Hamilton, save for the final face-off between Hamilton and Burr. Burr fires his pistol—but instead of killing his opponent, the bullet just barely grazes Hamilton’s ear before ricocheting off the Liberty Bell and coming back to strike Burr himself straight through the head. The ensemble then slowly gathers around Burr’s corpse for a heartbreaking final number, “There’s A Crack In The Bell.” The show won two Drama Desk Awards and an Obie, and after a few final tweaks to the ending, Hamilton was ready to take Broadway by storm. The rest is history.Gary Sprake made his Wales debut as a 18-year-old against Scotland in November 1963
Former Leeds United, Birmingham City and Wales goalkeeper Gary Sprake has died at the age of 71.
Swansea-born Sprake made more than 500 appearances during 11 years at Leeds United, and was a First Division title winner in 1969.
He also won a second division winner's medal in addition to the League Cup in 1968 and two Inter-Cities Fairs Cups.
Sprake, who won 37 caps during a 12-year career with Wales, joined Birmingham City in 1973.
Leeds United sent its "condolences and support to the Sprake family at this difficult time".
Sprake's former Leeds and Wales team-mate Terry Yorath said "football had lost a good man."
"He was such a character both on and off the field," Yorath told BBC Radio Wales Sport.
"He was the most natural goalkeeper I ever played with but he never practiced, that was the amazing thing about him.
"He didn't really work at his game and if he'd had worked at his game he would have been even better."IANS
In a significant find, a team of scientists from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) has found novel ways to detect a bare or naked "singularity" - the most extreme object in the universe. When the fuel of a very massive star is spent, it collapses owing to its own gravitational pull and eventually becomes a very small region of arbitrarily high matter density, that is a "Singularity" where the usual laws of physics may breakdown.
If this "singularity" is hidden within an event horizon, which is an invisible closed surface from which nothing, not even light, can escape, then we call this object a black hole. In such a case, we cannot see the "singularity" and we do not need to bother about its effects. But what if the event horizon does not form?
To address this, Dr Chandrachur Chakraborty, Prashant Kocherlakota and Professor Sudip Bhattacharyya and Professor Pankaj Joshi -- in collaboration with a Polish team comprising Dr Mandar Patil and Professor Andrzej Krolak -- have shown that the precession frequency of a gyroscope orbiting a black hole or a naked "singularity" is sensitive to the presence of an event horizon. The TIFR team has recently argued that the rate at which a gyroscope precesses (the precession frequency), when placed around a rotating black hole or a naked "singularity", could be used to identify this rotating object.
A gyroscope circling and approaching the event horizon of a black hole from any direction behaves increasingly 'wildly,' that is, it precesses increasingly faster, without a bound. But, in the case of a naked "singularity", the precession frequency becomes arbitrarily large only in the equatorial plane, but being regular in all other planes. The TIFR team has also found that the precession of orbits of matter falling into a rotating black hole or a naked "singularity" can be used to distinguish these exotic objects.
"This is because the orbital plane precession frequency increases as the matter approaches a rotating black hole, but this frequency can decrease and even become zero for a rotating naked singularity," the team noted in a paper appeared in the journal Physical Review D. The finding could be used to distinguish a naked "singularity" from a black hole in reality, because the precession frequencies could be measured in X-ray wavelengths, as the infalling matter radiates X-rays.
Tech2 is now on WhatsApp. For all the buzz on the latest tech and science, sign up for our WhatsApp services. Just go to Tech2.com/Whatsapp and hit the Subscribe button.Bernie Sanders keeps refusing to run the way that the pundits think he should -- that's what makes this primary so interesting and perhaps a turning point in American politics.
You could see it last night in the Democratic town hall. Before they let, you know, sensible people ask questions, there was CNN moderator Chris Cuomo. Cuomo, of course, wanted to know if Bernie Sanders was going to "bring back the era of big government." This is exactly the kind of frame that pundits have been trying to put on American politics for about as long as I can remember, which is at least back to the Carter era.
This question is supposed to be a kind of kryptonite that causes Democratic politicians to sweat and turn pallid and immediately explain that no, they're for efficient government or some such. It's the kind of question that turned Bill Clinton into a triangulating centrist who cut welfare to the bone and elevated corporate power with a series of disastrous trade agreements. Everyone in Washington knows that "big government" is always bad.
"Bernie wasted no time in saying that he was going to bring back the era when government helped care for people."
But Bernie wasted no time in saying that he was going to bring back the era when government helped care for people. He thinks government should help people go to college and pay for their medical care, which is what big government does in every other industrialized country in the world. He even -- in an ad released earlier in the day -- dared to advocate that people who have spent their lives working might deserve the chance to relax and be grandparents at the end of the day.
This kind of stuff makes the keepers of our political order crazy. In the last few days, we've seen folks such as Paul Krugman in the New York Times and Paul Starr in Politico patiently explain that Bernie is too far to the left to be president. It's like they're dumping water on the Wicked Witch of the West and waiting for her to shriek, "I'm melting!" But actually, he's just shrugging it off, like a duck. As Cuomo tried to get him to confess to his socialism, his team just tweeted out a list of "socialist" accomplishments: Social Security, the minimum wage, Medicare, the 40-hour workweek.
'Socialist' programs from FDR and LBJ: ✅ Social Security ✅ Minimum Wage ✅ Medicare and Medicaid ✅ 40-hour work week #DemTownHall — Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) January 26, 2016
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The Beltway polls don't quite get how much America has changed -- how unequal and desperate it's become. Sanders has spent his career on the back roads of Vermont, which is America's second-most rural state. That means he's met a lot of poor people and a lot of desperate people -- a lot of people like the woman who started crying at his event in Iowa earlier in the day. The Washington Post reporter described it as "a remarkably moving thing," which it was. But since Post political reporters only meet actual people during those rare moments in a four-year cycle when they happen to intersect with presidential candidates, he perhaps imagined it as rare. This is what life is like.
Which is probably why actual people are also less worried about the other half of the "serious people" test imposed by pundits. Cuomo's next question for Sanders was about if Hillary's experience trumps his. This was pretty much the same question Hillary herself posed to Barack Obama with her infamous "3 a.m." ad eight years ago. In the D.C. world, "experience" is crucial. It doesn't matter what you believe -- it matters how much power you've exercised. Do your time, and you're in the club.
But again Bernie refused to melt. Yes, he said, she's very experienced -- an obvious concession made with the graciousness that's marked his campaign. ("People are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails.") But, hey, experience isn't everything. If it was, we'd elect Dick Cheney to every possible office, because he's had the most experience of all. Instead, as Bernie pointed out, judgment is really more important.
"A leader is someone who figures out where the future is going, not someone who joins the party once it's underway."
That is why, he added, it is relevant that he opposed the Iraq War when she supported it. And he opposed the Keystone pipeline when she supported it. He could have gone on for a long time with that list: why did she set up a wing of the State Department to spread fracking around the planet, for instance? Why was she against gay marriage for years? But the point is clear. A leader is someone who figures out where the future is going, not someone who joins the party once it's underway. A canny politician, by contrast, is precisely someone who waits until it's safe and then runs up to lead the parade.
If it was a year for canny politicians, then Hillary would be a shoo-in. She's spent decades perfecting that approach.
But it's not, perhaps, a year for canny politicians. Our Earth is becoming hopelessly unequal (a report last week showed that 62 people owned more assets than the poorest 3.5 billion on the planet) and hopelessly hot. It's a year, perhaps, for people who insist on telling the truth, even if it's in a Brooklyn accent.A drone weighing about 2 pounds struck a woman during Seattle's Pride parade.
Update at 2:55 p.m. Tuesday: Seattle police say the drone’s pilot has come forward and contacted police.
Detectives continue to investigate the case.
Original post: A woman was knocked unconscious Sunday when she was struck by a small drone during the Pride parade in downtown Seattle.
The 25-year-old woman was standing near Fourth Avenue and Madison Street when the 18-inch-by-18-inch drone crashed into a building and fell into the crowd, striking the woman in the head, according to Seattle police. The woman’s boyfriend caught her as she fell to the ground.
An off-duty firefighter helped treat the woman and called for police.
One of the victim’s friends turned over the damaged drone to police. The friend also gave police photographs of a man who may have been piloting the aircraft.
The drone aircraft retails for about $1,200 and weighs about 2 pounds, police said.Early biography Edit
Business career Edit
Howard Hughes Medical Institute Edit
Main article: Howard Hughes Medical Institute In 1953, Hughes launched the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Miami, Florida (currently located in Chevy Chase, Maryland) with the expressed goal of basic biomedical research, including trying to understand, in Hughes' words, the "genesis of life itself," due to his lifelong interest in science and technology. Hughes' first will, which he signed in 1925 at the age of 19, stipulated that a portion of his estate should be used to create a medical institute bearing his name.[76] When a major battle with the IRS loomed ahead, Hughes gave all his stock in the Hughes Aircraft Company to the institute, thereby turning the aerospace and defense contractor into a for-profit entity of a fully tax-exempt charity. Hughes' internist, Verne Mason, who treated Hughes after his 1946 aircraft crash, was chairman of the institute's medical advisory committee.[77] The Howard Hughes Medical Institute's new board of trustees sold Hughes Aircraft in 1985 to General Motors for $5
|
My own experiment was a failure, Draco. There's something called the Interdict of Merlin -" Draco hit himself on the forehead, realizing. "- which stops anyone from getting knowledge of powerful spells out of books, even if you find and read a powerful wizard's notes they won't make sense to you, it has to go from one living mind to another. I couldn't find any powerful spells that we had the instructions for but couldn't cast. But if you can't get them out of old books, why would anyone bother passing them on by word of mouth after they stopped working? Did you get the data on the Squib couples?"
Chapter 25:
Harry had asked Hermione about that earlier - on the train to Hogwarts, after hearing Draco say it - and so far as she knew, nothing more was known than the word itself. It might have been pure legend. But it was also plausible enough that a civilization of magic-users, especially one from before the Interdict of Merlin, would have managed to blow itself up. The line of reasoning continued: Atlantis had been an isolated civilization that had somehow brought into being the Source of Magic, and told it to serve only people with the Atlantean genetic marker, the blood of Atlantis.
and Chapter 80:
This is the Hall of the Wizengamot; there are older places, but they are hidden. Legend holds that the walls of dark stone were conjured, created, willed into existence by Merlin, when he gathered the most powerful wizards left in the world and awed them into accepting him as their chief. And when (the legend continues) the Seers continued to foretell that not enough had yet been done to prevent the end of the world and its magic, then (the story goes) Merlin sacrificed his life, and his wizardry, and his time, to lay in force the Interdict of Merlin. It was not an act without cost, for a place like this one could not be raised again by any power still known to wizardkind. Nor yet destroyed, for those walls of dark stone would pass unharmed, and perhaps unwarmed, through the heart of a nuclear explosion. It is a pity that nobody knows how to make them anymore.
Is there any mention at all of the Interdict of Merlin in Harry Potter canon (anything written, spoken of or referred to by J. K. Rowling), or was this simply a plot device added by Eliezer Yudkowsky?Following complaints from copyright holders, Italian ISPs are required to block hundreds of websites, a list that continues to expand. During the past week a handful of new sites were added including Flashx and RARBG, with streaming site 123movies being next in line. The question remains, however, how effective these measures are.
Website blockades are becoming more common throughout Europe, but with a flurry of recent orders Italy takes the crown.
In recent months hundreds of domain names have been added to the nation’s pirate blocklist, based on complaints from a wide range of copyright holders.
An overview of most of the key cases available on the website of local telecoms watchdog AGCOM lists 300 blocked urls alone.
Over the past week several new domain names were added once again, including ddlhqfilm.com, flashx.tv, games.torrentsnack.com, mega-wii.com, musicplayon.com and rarbg.to.
The applications came from a variety of rightsholder groups and companies, listing several examples of copyright infringements. For Mega-Wii, for example, Digital Content Protection listed several pirated games belonging to EA, Nintendo and Warner Bros. Entertainment.
Based on the information provided, AGCOM ordered local ISPs to block access to the site within two days, as required by law.
TorrentFreak spoke to a site operator whose domain name was blocked recently. He says that in absolute terms, the effect is fairly obvious. Italian traffic to the site tanked soon after Internet providers processed the order, as can be seen below.
Traffic drop following blockade
Still, whether this means that these visitors will stop pirating is less clear. The operator, who prefers not to have his site named, points out that people will simply find ways arount the restrictions.
“These blockades definitely have major effects on site users. Users learn to circumvent them, realizing how stupid their governments are,” the operator informs TorrentFreak.
The effectiveness of the blockades is also put in doubt by academic research. University of Padua professor Giorgio Clemente previously ran a comprehensive analysis, comparing traffic data before and after the Italian blocking measures were implemented.
This research used the same methodology as an earlier MPAA-commissioned study which examined UK blockades. However, instead of merely looking at the blocked domains, Professor Clemente also took domain name changes into account because site operators commonly switch domains to bypass censorship efforts.
With this more complete set of datapoints, he found that Government-sanctioned blockades actually increased traffic to the targeted sites.
“The most important conclusion is that blocking access to websites increases their popularity. In particular, AGCOM helps to advertise pirated works, creating the classic and well-known Streisand effect,” Professor Clemente told TF at the time.
Still, AGCOM and rightsholders are convinced that their actions help people to stay away from pirate sites. In addition to the domains mentioned above, there’s also an application pending against the popular streaming site 123movies, which is the next target to be blocked.Recording air condition sound effects in the United States!
The sound that I have for you today is a pretty amazing one!
As you may know, I worked on the film project with Sean Duran (latest post with the Polaroid) and in his house was this old Air Conditioner. It is maybe from the 90s or early 2000 and creates this amazing unique sound! When you start the Air Con it has this rumbling sound you feel like Darth Vader is breathing and after minute 1:10 the machine started to really turn on what gives the sound an up swinging effect!
I let it run for about 2:40 min and turn it off and the machine slowly but constantly shot down.
By the time I have the remote controller and press the buttons so that you have some beeping noise effects within the recordings!
Very cool sound and if you make experimental music or you are a creative sound designer I guess you open a new world of sound with this one!
I made a little bit more research and found this model on the Daewoo Website and it looks pretty similar to the one that I recorded.
It could be a Daewoo 8.000 BTU Automatic Window Air Conditioner and I found some more facts!
Model: DWC-0820FRL
Power: / CAPA. (V / Hz) 115 / 60, 8000 BTU
Control Remote
Unit Dimension: (W x D x H) (inches) 18.6 x 15.5 x 12.6
Packing Dimension: (W x D x H) (inches) 23 x 18.1 x 15
Net / Gross Weight: 50.7 / 59.5 lbs
Stuffing: Q’ty 40HQ 700 sets
Performance Certification: AHAM, EEV
Safety Approval: cUL
Tone is always such an important thing, and that’s achieved through a multitude of people. It comes through the writing, it comes through the way it’s shot, and it comes through the production design and the sound design. Harry Treadaway
Download Air Condition Sound Effects Rode NTG4+ MONO Download File Zoom H6 Stereo Download File
Air Condition Sound Effects was last modified: by
RelatedUK's New 'Digital Economy' Law Somehow Now Gives Police The Power To Remotely Kill Phone Service
from the sidestepping-debate-with-last-minute-additions dept
The UK's long-gestating Digital Economy Act has finally gone into force. The law is mainly interested in porn and pirates -- two issues most of the UK public is far less interested in having subjected to intrusive regulation.
But just keeping an eye on who is or isn't availing themselves of porn/torrents isn't the only intrusive aspect of the Act. As Joseph Cox of Motherboard points out, an amendment to the law grants some pretty scary new powers to UK law enforcement, allowing them to kill citizens' means of communication.
[L]aw enforcement agencies can remotely disable or restrict a mobile phone if it is suspected of being used for drug dealing or related to it, and in some cases regardless of whether a crime has actually been committed, according to legal commentators.
Law enforcement isn't being given a kill switch. But it's being given the next best thing. With a court order, police can approach service providers and have them restrict or cut off service. The only thing law enforcement will have to provide is a vague theory the targeted phones may be involved in criminal activity.
Orders can apply if the user is "facilitating the commission by the user or another person of a drug dealing offense," or "conduct of the user that is likely to facilitate the commission by the user or another person of a drug dealing offence (whether or not an offence is committed)."
Nice touch there, with the "whether or not an offence is committed." A person may not know someone they communicate with is involved in criminal activity, but they're at risk of having their phone service interrupted (possibly indefinitely) nonetheless.
The only way this part of the Act [PDF] could be considered "narrowed" or "tailored" is its limitation to alleged drug-related crimes. That narrowness is immediately removed once you realize how things like buying gardening supplies or driving around with too many air fresheners is considered evidence of drug trafficking.
So, UK police will be doing even more "pre-crime" work, robbing people of their ability to converse with others or keep up with the world around them using nothing more than a target being in the same social circle as criminal suspects currently under investigation.
Filed Under: crimes, digital economy, kill switch, mobile phones, ukIn today's connected world, it is paramount that applications support languages, writing systems, and representation customs from around the globe. Yet until now there has been no easy way to add localized resource access to a Java program, similar to how SLF4J standardizes logging calls across different implementations. Rincl, the Resource I18n Concern Library, aims to fill the resource internationalization gap by providing a unifying API for resource lookup across frameworks, with plug-and-play implementations for your favorite resource storage. Rincl can be found at http://rincl.io/.
Resource Internationalization
Internationalization (or simply I18n ) is the broad term for the process of making your application aware of differences in its users around the world, from the language used in the user interface to the customs for displaying numbers; the number 123,456.789 as represented in the United States would be represented as 123.456,789 in Brazil, as just one example. One of the primary i18n tasks is to separate resources such a user-oriented messages into bundles that can be localized for independent access based regional user expectations.
Regional expectations in Java are grouped and identified by locale, or what the the Internet Engineering Task Force ( IETF ) refers to as a language tag in BCP 47. In most common use, a language tag specifies a "language" and an optional "region", so that pt would specify the Portuguese language in general, while pt-BR would specify the specific Portuguese dialects as spoken in Brazil. The class java.util.Locale represents the language tag identifier, although the Java implementation prefers to use an underscore; for example pt_BR.
ResourceBundle
For sure Java has provided the java.util.ResourceBundle class from the very early days. ResourceBundle in fact provides functionality that is invaluable, primarily in the elegant way in which storage files are named and discovered. Resource are stored in.properties files with an ending specifying a particular locale. Thus a hierarchy of resource bundles may be provided, overriding specific strings only when needed. For example a call to ResourceBundle.getBundle("app-resources", new Locale("pt", "BR")) would create a ResourceBundle instance that provided access to strings stored in the following files, in order of priority:
app-resources _pt_BR.properties Words and phrases specific to Brazilian Portuguese. app-resources _pt.properties Applications messages in the Portuguese language. app-resources.properties Default application resources.
app-resources _pt_BR.properties teacup=xícara
For example while app-resources_pt.properties might define the resource key teacup as "chávena", the app-resources_pt_BR.properties file might override the teacup key with the preferred Brazilian word, as shown in the figure.
Nevertheless, adding localized access to resources in Java is not as simple as popping in a ResourceBundle. A real-life application has to deal with class hierarchies and modularization through a network of dependencies, neither of which ResourceBundle on its own addresses. Plain resource bundles have several shortcomings:
ResourceBundle.getBundle(…) does not resolve up class and interface hierarchies.
does not resolve up class and interface hierarchies. ResourceBundle does not support properties files stored in anything but ISO-8859-1.
does not support properties files stored in anything but ISO-8859-1. ResourceBundle does recognize XML-based properties files.
does recognize XML-based properties files. The ResourceBundle API is limited; it has no support for retrieving integer values, for example.
API is limited; it has no support for retrieving integer values, for example. The ResourceBundle API does not provide for formatting message patterns.
API does not provide for formatting message patterns. Java provides no mechanism for multiple, compartmentalized locales on a single JVM (such as needed on a web server).
Rincl addresses all of these deficiencies while still working with the locale and resource bundle paradigm you're familiar with.
Class Hierarchies
BaseUserSettingsPage.properties user-label=Settings for user {0}.
The first shortcoming of ResourceBundle is that most modern applications are object-oriented. There is a need to specify resources for a base class and let subclasses inherit those resources, override them, and/or add to them as necessary. Take, for example, a user interface that has several pages for user settings. The UserProfilePage and UserAddressPage may both extend from BaseUserSettingsPage so that certain functionality can be consolidated. It would be desirable for the UserSettingsPage to provide resources common to all subclasses, such as a label for the user name in the figure.
The Apache Wicket Internet application framework, which is based around hierarchical user interface components, has base class resource resolution built in. A call to UserProfilePage.getString("user-label") in the above scenario automatically load resources from the correct UserProfilePage.properties file (based upon the session locale), using the resource in the BaseUserSettingsPage.properties as a default. (See Internationalization with Wicket - Reference Documentation.) The now defunct JSR 296: Swing Application Framework had a similar resource resolution mechanism. (See Using the Swing Application Framework.) Unfortunately when using plain ResourceBundle there is no simple way for UserProfilePage to use resources defined in UserProfilePage.properties, falling back to UserProfilePage.properties by default.
Unified API
Once a ResourceBundle instance is obtained, its interface for accessing resources leaves much to be desired. Resources of only two types are recognized: "strings" and "objects". Furthermore ResourceBundle.getString(String key) makes no allowance for using the resulting string as a formatting template, such as the pattern "Settings for user {0}" in the example above.
The Swing Application Framework provided a rich set of resource access methods such as ResourceMap.getInteger(String key) to accommodate types of resources other than strings. The Apache Wicket API provides ways to provide arguments for formatting strings that are stored in resources. But none of this helps the developer who isn't using one of these frameworks.
The developer who is attempting to create a library that could be used by one of these frameworks encounters a more perplexing dilemma: What resource access API should be used to allow the library to provide its own resources in a way compatible with other frameworks, yet allow its resources to be overridden in a standardized way? Existing frameworks do not provide a rich, unified i18n resource access API that can be used across dependencies.
Rincl Your Application
Rincl attempts to rectify all of these shortcomings by 1) providing a rich, unifying internationalization API via io.rincl.Resources, and 2) providing pluggable resource storage implementations that make internationalization as easy as including a dependency. Similar to SLF4J, Rincl is distributed in two components: the main module io.rincl:rincl:x.x.x comprising the main API and core logic; and a separate module that indicates the resource storage mechanism, such as io.rincl:rincl-resourcebundle:x.x.x for accessing resources stored in resource bundles. Usually merely including the preferred implementation module will transitively include the main rincl module, as well as automatically register the implementation module to handle Rincl requests.
The following example shows the few steps needed to add Rincl to your own application, accessing resources stores in resource bundles.
1. Include Rincl Dependency
pom.xml <project> … <dependencies> … <dependency> <groupId>io.rincl</groupId> <artifactId>rincl-resourcebundle</artifactId> <version>x.x.x</version> </dependency> </dependencies> </project>
The first step is to include the appropriate Rincl dependency. To support resource bundles, simply add io.rincl:rincl-resourcebundle: x. x. x to your Maven POM. Check the Maven Central Repository for the the latest io.rincl version.
2. Provide Resource Properties Files
Provide localized resources using properties files as you normally would for resource bundles. Feel free to consolidate resources into properties associated with base classes, such as with BaseUserSettingsPage continued from the example in the previous section.
BaseUserSettingsPage.properties user-label=Settings for user {0}.
BaseUserSettingsPage _pt.properties user-label=Definições para usuário {0}.
3. Implement Rincled
This step is optional, but it is the quickest and easiest way to resource access with Rincl. For each class which uses localized resources, simply implement the io.rincl.Rincled interface. The following code continues the UserProfilePage example from the sections above.
UserProfilePage.java public class UserProfilePage extends BaseSettingsPage implements Rincled { …
4. Access Resources via the Rincl API
Implementing Rincled allows easy acquisition of the central io.rincl.Resources interface for requesting resources. A wide variety of resource types may be retrieved, including Resources.getString(String key), Resources.getInteger(String key), and Resources.getUri(String key). String pattern substitution using MessageFormat is built into Rincl, as shown in the following example.
UserProfilePage.java public class UserProfilePage extends BaseSettingsPage implements Rincled { … final String userName = "Jane Doe"; //Retrieve the formatted user label based upon the current locale. //en-US: "Settings for user Jane Doe." //pt-BR: "Definições para usuário Jane Doe." String userLabel = getResources().getString("user-label", userName); …
Configuring Rincl With Csar
The power of Rincl's unified Resources lookup mechanism is evident in the flexibility it provides when used across dependencies. The main coordinator is io.rincl.Rincl ; the Rincled interface is but a convenience mixin to retrieve Resources via the the Rincl.getResources(Class<?> contextClass) method. Under the covers Rincl uses a small library named Csar (pronounced /zɑːr/) for making configurations accessible throughout the codebase without the need for global static singletons. When resources are needed, Rincl asks Csar for the registered io.rincl.ResourceI18nConcern, which in turn produces the actual Resources.
Rincled Resources Across Dependencies
The result is that for all libraries requesting Resources either directly through Rincl or indirectly through Csar, resource configuration can be performed independently of the dependencies themselves. Consider a report generation library Reporter (in the com.example.reporter package) that by default includes the word "Report" at the top of generated documents. This default title is stored in the library distribution Jar in a.properties file under the resource key report-default-title. To change this title, an application could provide a custom properties file in the com.example.reporter package, in a location in the classpath that takes priority over the one in the Reporter distribution Jar. The Reporter library contents would not need to be changed.
Alternatively, Rincl provides the application the option of bypassing Reporter's.properties files altogether. The application could create its own custom implementation of Resources (e.g. AppDbResources ) that would look up resources such as report-default-title from another source altogether, such as the application database. To effect the switch, the application would install a custom ResourceI18nConcern (e.g. AppDbResourceI18nConcern ) as the application-wide default:
Setting the application-wide default ResourceI18nConcern. Rincl.setDefaultResourceI18nConcern(new AppDbResourceI18nConcern());
All resources retrieved through Rincl, whether in the application or in dependencies, would now be retrieved from the application database.
Compartmentalized Internationalization
Another benefit of using Csar is that it allows for compartmentalized configurations for different code contexts on the same JVM. Imagine that the application's user, for whatever reason, has decided that all reports should be generated in French, even though the main application's user interface is set to English. Traditionally the report generation library would use one of the Locale.getDefault() methods that retrieves the JVM-wide default locale. If the library were instead to use Rincl for resource access, however, the hosting application could use Csar to provide a specially configured ResourceI18nConcern just for report-generation.
In the example below, the Csar.run(Concern concern, Runnable runnable) method is used to run Reporter.generateReport() in a separate thread but in the context of a ResourceBundleResourceI18nConcern configured to provide French resources. The java.lang.Thread.join() invocation is optional, and provides a way to wait until the reporting operation has finished before continuing.
Using Csar to configure a specialized ResourceI18nConcern for a single thread. ResourceBundleResourceI18nConcern reportI18n = new ResourceBundleResourceI18nConcern(); reportI18n.setLocale(Locale.FRENCH); Csar.run(resortI18n, Reporter::generateReport).join();
The Initial Rincl
Until now there has been no unifying API for resource access. While the resource bundle mechanism provided by Java has innovative features, by itself it is inadequate for modern, highly modularized applications. Rincl straightens out the shortcomings of resource bundles. It even addresses the irony that Java's native file format for internationalization was restricted to ISO-8859-1: Rincl supports additional properties file charsets UTF-8, UTF-16, and UTF-32. With the addition of pluggable resource storage implementations and a flexible configuration approach based on Csar, using Rincl means that internationalizing an application should feel natural. Perhaps now that the mechanism of internationalization is no longer a hardship, you'll come to enjoy adding an extra internationalization Rincl to your application.Why Snapchat’s Design is Deliberately Confusing
Benjamin Brandall Blocked Unblock Follow Following Dec 8, 2016
I’m 23, have written for major tech publications, and will freely admit that I find Snapchat’s design confusing. It took me ages to figure it out.
The thing is, the interface is not confusing because it’s illogical or random. It’s not badly designed at all. The weird thing is that it makes total sense. It’s just that we’ve grown to expect UIs to behave in a certain way.
We think in a hierarchical way thanks to every OS we’ve ever used: windows within windows, x’ing down the layers.
And that’s not how Snapchat works:
Its main menu is flat, like a deconstructed cardboard cube. Swipe up, down, right, and left to navigate the grid menu UI.
It’s like nothing we’re used to in this age of predictable, civilized UIs.
Will Oremus, the senior tech writer at Slate thinks the same:
“I was overcome by the conviction that I was on the verge of accidentally pressing the wrong button and snapping someone a picture of my crotch. I hastily tapped what appeared to be an “x” button on the top left of the screen. Nothing happened. Fairly panicking now, I seized upon a different button at the top right and mashed it ferociously. To my horror, the iPhone switched to its front-facing camera and I found myself staring into my own haunted eyes. I am not sure what button got pressed next, because it was at this point that I dropped the phone unceremoniously onto my brown-corduroy-clad lap.”
Is this on purpose?
Is it hard to use as part of its minimalistic, parent-excluding brand aesthetic?
While the app was Snap‘s only offering for a number of years, we now have something new to look at:
The Spectacles design language
The launch of Snap’s new physical product, Spectacles, was what made me realize that the Snapchat app’s unlabeled press-it-and-see-what-happens UI is no mistake.
Just look at the vending machine:
A credit card reader and three buttons: hit one of those massive glowing pads to get a pair of Spectacles of that color. Like the Snapchat app, the machine has no text, no obvious instructions, no clarity. The machine assumes itself is a big enough deal that it’s your fault if you don’t know.
Same with the banner:
Snap pulled a Cloverfield on us for the Spectacles launch, teasing the Snapchat ghost with eyes on billboards around the US without being explicit with exactly what’s going on.
Tying this back to design, and the choices Snap’s making for its brand identify, it makes more sense the more you think about it.
Because Snapchat’s the anti-Facebook
Positioned as a rare place where your content is totally hidden from the public, the reasons for Snapchat’s arcane, exclusive design are clear.
It’s not a social media platform in the same way that Facebook is, and that’s mainly because of its total lack of discovery.
What I mean by that is there is no way to find users without knowing their phone number or their handle: two pretty private pieces of information. And if/when your grandma does try to add you, you’ll still need to accept the request. Not that she will add you, because she’s not figured out how to get into the bloody thing.
Like the days of pre-social media, where activity wasn’t logged forever online for anyone with an internet connection to see (either by the platform or someone with a screenshot tool), your activity on Snapchat is temporary. Ephemeral. Ghostly. Hidden.
And of course that’s what their design looks and feels like. Imagine if it had these off-the-wall features and looked like a fucking ancient Microsoft app. While its alien UI is confusing, it’s less confusing than that.
Forget design, Snapchat is about transience
With Facebook’s stubbornness about making it difficult to mass-delete your old posts, there needed to be a platform for people to go if they want to share a messy photo and forget about it the next day. Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel thinks Facebook’s hunger for knowledge and omnipresence is creepy, which gives us some clues as to his vision.
The all-seeing eye of the internet drives anxious introverts (and their polar opposites) to the safe place of Snapchat.
Even sponsored, branded content (which, by the way, isn’t curated by an algorithm), disappears in 24 hours.
Instead of understanding that the transitory nature of Snapchat’s feed is what defines it, Facebook have tried to clone it as part of Instagram Stories. In fact, Facebook tried to buy Snapchat for $3b in 2013, then launched its own failed attempt.
Instagram — basically just Facebook for photos — keeps everything forever. It’s the same deal as Facebook: tag your friends, comment, share, slap on a hashtag. Shoehorning a rip-off into an existing, clashing app like that won’t cut it.
Because Snapchat isn’t just a ton of features slapped together amid a confusing interface. It’s an entirely different way to communicate, and one that is symptomatic of a growing cynicism towards the harsh transparency of the digital age.
…That said, perhaps I’m over-analyzing a platform that’s probably used mostly to transmit images of genitalia.
💛 Enjoy this post? Head over to Secret Cave to read more obsessive analysis on society, culture, and entertainment.
Originally published at secretcave.co on December 9, 2016.Four planets will huddle close together, visible to the naked eye, in the predawn sky next week, according to the editors of StarDate magazine.
"The best view is from the southern states because the path the planets follow across the sky (the ecliptic) stands at a little higher angle relative to the horizon," the magazine's editors said.
"Peak streak" time arrives for meteor showers
Venus and Jupiter will be easy to spot hanging low in the east as dawn brightens on May 10. They are the brightest objects in the night sky after the Moon. Venus, the brighter of the two, will be to the right of Jupiter.
Mercury will be visible to the lower right of Venus, about the same distance from Venus to Jupiter. It won't be as bright but its proximity to Venus will help you find it. To the lower left of Jupiter you'll find Mars, which may be too low and faint to see without the aid of binoculars.
StarDate magazine is a bi-monthly publication of The University of Texas at Austin McDonald Observatory, which houses many telescopes responsible for a wide range of astronomical research. McDonald Observatory is also pioneering the next generation of astronomical research as a founding partner of the Giant Magellan Telescope.A prisoner suffering from poor health has lost his attempt to enforce the smoking ban in English and Welsh jails after the supreme court ruled that crown premises are effectively exempt from the enforcement of health regulations.
The unanimous judgment from the UK’s highest court will prevent the inmate, Paul Black, from calling the NHS’s smoke-free compliance line to report breaches of the ban.
Lady Hale, the president of the supreme court, said she was driven with “considerable reluctance” to conclude that when parliament passed the 2006 Health Act, prohibiting smoking in offices, bars and enclosed areas, it did not mean to extend it to government or crown sites.
The standard practice is that a statutory provision does not bind the crown unless legislation adopts words explicitly stating so or by what is known as “necessary implication”.
“Had parliament intended part 1 of chapter 1 of the 2006 act to bind the crown, nothing would have been easier than to insert such a provision,” Hale explained.
“The report of the health committee [at the time] does indicate that parliament was alive to the question of whether the smoking ban would bind the crown and aware of the case for further exemptions if the act were to do so.
“It might well be thought desirable, especially by and for civil servants and others working in or visiting government departments, if the smoking ban did bind the crown,” she added. “But the legislation is quite workable without doing so.”
Black, a non-smoker, is serving an indeterminate sentence of imprisonment at HMP Wymott. He has a number of health problems that are exacerbated by tobacco smoke and complained that the smoking ban was not being properly enforced in the common parts of the prison.
He issued proceedings for judicial review of the secretary of state’s refusal to provide confidential and anonymous access to the NHS smoke-free compliance line to prisoners. This would have enabled prisoners to report breaches of the smoking ban to the local authority charged with enforcing it.
Black won his claim in the high court but lost at the court of appeal. The Ministry of Justice has so far phased in smoking bans in more than half of the 120 prisons in England and Wales.
“I am disappointed with the judgment,” he said. “Throughout this case, I simply wished non-smoking prisoners and prison staff to have the same level of protection from the risks of second hand cigarette smoke as non-smokers living in the wider community.”
Sean Humber, head of the prison law team at the law firm Leigh Day who represented Black, said: “Why shouldn’t those living, working or visiting government properties be subject to the same laws, and indeed benefit from the same legal protections, as the rest of us?
“This judgment has far wider implications than simply the issue of smoking in prisons. It confirms that thousands of government properties, including, for example, courts and jobcentres, are not covered by the provisions of the Health Act prohibiting smoking in enclosed places. While many of these buildings even have signs saying it is against the law to smoke in them, these turn out to be incorrect.”Buy any car today, regardless of make, model, or cost, and they’ll all have one thing in common: windshield wipers. They are a necessity, both by law and the fact you need them to be able to drive safely when it is raining. But if McLaren has its way, we could soon see cars that no longer require them.
McLaren is best known for its Formula One racing team, but it also produces performance sports cars. Having the odd novel feature does nothing to hurt sales, and it looks like in the next couple of years one of those features could be a lack of windshield wipers.
Frank Stephenson is McLaren’s chief designer and has hinted at a new system to replace the wipers. It is thought to involve using ultrasound to send 30kHz waves across the windshield, which would keep it clear of any debris, even those really horrible insect remains that can build up and obstruct your view.
How does it stop such debris? By creating a force field that stops rain, snow, or insects ever reaching the windshield. If they can’t touch it, then the glass will remain clean and clear.
A lack of wipers brings with it multiple benefits to the driver. For one, no wipers means less things to break, so no more regular wiper changes. You also aren’t scraping rubber across glass repeatedly so the driver will always have a better view and the glass will require less cleaning. There’s also thought to be a fuel saving, however small, due to the lack of wiper apparatus interfering with airflow over the vehicle. And the final benefit: total confusion for anyone trying to clamp a flyer underneath one of your wiper blades.
If the sound wave force field works as well as described, expect multiple car manufacturers to be licensing the tech from McLaren ASAP. It’s a great feature with which to market a new vehicle, and one that will surely be offered with a hefty premium attached to the price.We Moved!
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On the field they’re the future of the Manly Sea Eagles.
Jake is the best young front-rower in the game and is enjoying a breakout season and getting better with each passing week.
Tom is a sporting prodigy who was wanted by not just most NRL clubs, but rugby union and AFL — he was desperately pursued by the Sydney Swans, whose talent scouts said they’d never seen athleticism like it.
media_camera Jake Trbojevic celebrates a try scored by his brother Tom Trbojevic (19) against the Broncos.
In all my life in rugby league, I’ve never seen anyone with the freakish ability to score tries like Tom Trbojevic.
LATE MAIL: Bennett promotes Oates
BIG LOSS: Best player your club turfed
PREPARATIONS: Barrett eyes Cheik book
But these two young men aren’t just terrific rugby league, they are outstanding young men.
THE FAMILY
The Trbojevic family are well known on the Northern Beaches, particularly when it comes to sport. Few give more of their time to junior sport than the Trbojevics.
“Big John” Trbojevic is a local legend. If you’re reading this in Moree, Kurri Kurri or Coffs Harbour you’ll know what Big John’s about, because every town has one.
He’s the bloke who gives 10 times as much as he takes. If there’s a side that needs coaching, a raffle that needs running, a BBQ that needs cooking or a kid who needs pulling into line, Big John’s the man.
Big John, like so many old footballers, walks with a limp from two dodgy knees caused by playing on too many hard, dodgy ovals back in the day.
If you go down to Newport Oval every Saturday morning, you’re certain to see the entire Trbojevic clan down there.
They are the great champions of the Mona Vale Raiders Junior Rugby League club.
Every Saturday morning Big John is down there, limping around, doing whatever needs
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blending", Float ) = 0.5 _maskSize ( "Mask Size", Float ) = 1 } SubShader { Pass { CGPROGRAM #pragma vertex vert_img #pragma fragment frag #include "UnityCG.cginc" uniform sampler2D _MainTex ; uniform sampler2D _MaskTex ; fixed _maskBlend ; fixed _maskSize ; fixed4 frag ( v2f _ img i ) : COLOR { fixed4 mask = tex2D ( _MaskTex, i. uv * _maskSize ) ; fixed4 base = tex2D ( _MainTex, i. uv ) ; return lerp ( base, mask, _maskBlend ) ; } ENDCG } } }
The scanlines are sampled from a texture, which has be imported in the inspector with Wrap Mode: Repeat. This will repeat the texture over the entire screen. Thanks to the variable _maskSize it is possible to decide how big the texture will be.
Fianlly, the script:
using UnityEngine; using System.Collections; [ExecuteInEditMode] public class CRTEffect : MonoBehaviour { public Material material; // Postprocess the image void OnRenderImage(RenderTexture source, RenderTexture destination) { Graphics.Blit(source, destination, material); } } 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 using UnityEngine ; using System. Collections ; [ ExecuteInEditMode ] public class CRTEffect : MonoBehaviour { public Material material ; // Postprocess the image void OnRenderImage ( RenderTexture source, RenderTexture destination ) { Graphics. Blit ( source, destination, material ) ; } }
You should notice that if you are planning to use this effect on multiple cameras, you should make a copy of the material in the Awake method. This will ensure every script has its own instance and you can tweak them individually without any problem.
Distortion
The distortion on CRT monitors is due to the curvature of the glass where the image is projected. To replicate the effect we’ll need an extra texture called _DisplacementTex. It’s red and green channels will indicate how to displace pixels on the X and Y axes, respectively. Since colours in an image go from 0 to 1, we’ll rescale them to -1 to +1.
float4 frag(v2f_img i) : COLOR { half2 n = tex2D(_DisplacementTex, i.uv); half2 d = n * 2 -1; i.uv += d * _Strength; i.uv = saturate(i.uv); float4 c = tex2D(_MainTex, i.uv); return c; } 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 float4 frag ( v2f _ img i ) : COLOR { half2 n = tex2D ( _DisplacementTex, i. uv ) ; half2 d = n * 2 - 1 ; i. uv += d * _Strength ; i. uv = saturate ( i. uv ) ; float4 c = tex2D ( _MainTex, i. uv ) ; return c ; }
The quality of the CRT distortion heavily depends on the displacement texture which is provided. A very bad possible one is, for instance:
Conclusion
This post shows how vertex and fragment shaders can be used to create post processing effects in Unity3D.
This post concludes the basic tutorial about shaders. More posts will follow, with more advanced techniques such as fur shading, heatmaps, water shading and volumetric explosions. Many of these posts are already available on Patreon.When he bought a house in Ditmas Park a decade ago, Tom Parker didn’t realize he was about to enter the entertainment business.
But shortly after he and his wife Elisabeth moved in, location scouts came calling, slipping inquiries under the front door of their turn-of-the-century Victorian. The couple—he’s an art dealer at Hirshl & Adler and she is head of the rugs and carpet department at Christie’s, put their heads together to discuss.
“We got this letter, and we thought, ‘Well, that’s sort of funny,'” Mr. Parker recalled. “‘Let’s give them a call.'”
And so a star (the house, not the Parkers) was born. Over the last ten years, their home has hosted shoots for productions including Girls, The Good Wife, Smash, and a reboot of the classic 1970s children’s show The Electric Company. Perhaps most notably, it recently stood in for the family home of Cold War lawyer James Donovan (played by Tom Hanks) in Steven Spielberg’s 2015 film Bridge of Spies.
According to numbers from the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, there are currently around 100 television shows or feature films under production in New York. Add to those the ever-present raft of advertising shoots, and you’ve got a city basically bristling with camera crews. They’ve got to do their work somewhere, and if you’ve got a home with just the right look, that somewhere could be your living room.
“If I have clients that are buying brownstones or townhouses, I always mention it to them as a possible extra source of income,” said Terumi Matthews, an agent with TripleMint. “It’s pretty much a no-brainer.”
Ms. Matthews speaks from experience. An actor prior to taking up real estate, she and her husband rent out their Red Hook brownstone for shoots, something she said has become increasingly common in the neighborhood.
“It’s great,” she said. “It can be great money. It’s easy. Once you get the job, the [crews] pretty much prep everything. They come in and put down paper on the floors, move your furniture around. They kind of take care of all of it.”
The hard part, Ms. Matthew said, is actually booking the shoot. “You get a lot of scouts [coming by], and then maybe only a couple of jobs,” she said.
Though, even when things don’t work out, they can still kind of work out. Ms. Matthew’s Montauk house was recently up for the role of main character Alison Bailey’s home in the Showtime series The Affair. Ultimately, the show went with another location. Ms. Matthews ended up renting her home to house the production team, instead.
Stribling agent Janice Silver had a similar near-miss years ago. A location agent for the Nicolas Cage movie The Family Man called her and asked if she had any listings that might work for the film.
“They were looking for a prewar apartment with high ceilings and a fireplace,” she recalled, a description she noted, that matched her own place perfectly. “I described my apartment, and they said, ‘Yes, that’s just what we’re looking for. Can we send somebody over?'”
“Then they said [the movie was starring] Nicolas Cage and Tea Leoni,” she said. “And I thought it sounded like so much fun. I’d get to meet Nicolas Cage, my apartment could be in a movie, and they would pay me. What a great idea.”
After learning a little more about the process, though, Ms. Silver started to cool on the notion.
“First of all, they came to me and said, well, you’ll have 60 people in your apartment,” she said. “Wait a minute, 60 people? I’m picturing like, oh, you know, Nicolas Cage would be in my apartment along with like three other people.”
Next, Ms. Silver recalled, “they came in and said, okay, we’ll probably take all your furniture out and repaint the walls, but we’ll put it all back. I said, ‘What? Put it back?’ I just spent a lot of effort and money redoing my apartment. How can they put it back?”
The final straw was when she learned she would have to move out for the duration of the shoot. “I said, ‘Well, you know, I have cats. Where am I going with these cats?'” she said. “The whole thing was just like, okay, this is never working out.”
Since then, Ms. Silver has embarked on a side-career as an actor, giving her a perspective that only confirms her decision to put the kibosh on the Nic Cage shoot.
“I see what goes on at location shoots and in peoples’ homes,” she said. “Everyone is careful. They’re not ruining things on purpose. But there are huge cameras and wires and things. In one house the lighting people accidentally melted somebody’s ceiling. So I see what goes on.”
In some cases, though, a shoot can change your home for the better, noted Jos Mansell, an agent with Mdrn. Residential. Mr. Mansell worked in advertised before getting into real estate, and, he said, in several productions he worked on, homeowners walked away with some fairly substantial upgrades.
“There were people who got gorgeous backyard landscaping done, people who had a hot tub installed, which then became theirs,” he said. “A kitchen was gut renovated and filled with Wolf ranges and Sub-Zero fridges, brand new Baccarat fixtures and lighting, a complete redo of the cabinetry. There are definitely perks that I think people don’t realize.”
More commonly, the perk is money. Depending on the size and budget of a shoot, homeowners can typically earn between $3,000 and $15,000 per day, said Michele Howell, co-owner of location and production firm Proper Production. And if you’re renting out your home for 14 day or less per year, you don’t have to pay federal income tax on any of it.
Corcoran broker Bruce Robertson has worked to turn his coop building at 800 Riverside Blvd. into something of a regular character in city shoots, bringing in productions including the TV shows 666 Park Avenue, Pan Am, and Elementary. Decades ago, the building was used for the John Cassavetes film Gloria.
“We go back a long way with being film friendly,” he said. “It’s revenue producing, and it goes to the bottom line of our operating budget. So we try to promote it as much as we can.”
On occasion that has led to grumbling among some residents, Mr. Robertson acknowledged.
“Some people love it, and some people complain,” he said. “You’ve got to deal with the politics. Some people, especially [those] with kids, get disturbed by the noise or the lights, so we work around that. We try to accommodate them.”
A recent film shoot, he said, tried assuaging disgruntled locals by bringing in waffle trucks to dish up free waffles. Ms. Matthews said she typically makes nice with her Red Hook neighbors with a bottle of wine.
She noted, though, that the stream of scouts has slowed in recent years. “I feel like three and a half years ago everyone wanted to shoot in a brownstone,” she said. “But maybe now that’s fading out. I don’t know. We haven’t gotten as many calls as we used to.”
For advertising work, “white, open, and modern” is currently the rage, said Debbie Regan of Debbie Regan Locations. “That Pottery Barn or West Elm look, that’s what I get asked for the most.”
Nice stairways are also always in demand, said Dennis Galante, an agent with Bond New York who previously worked on advertising shoots as a commercial photographer. “Family going up the stairs, family coming down the stairs.”
Movie and television demands are often more idiosyncratic, which is one reason Mr. Parker’s Ditmas Park home and the neighborhood more generally have become so popular with film crews.
“We all have wrap-around porches and front lawns and so on, so that is part of the appeal of the neighborhood,” he said. “These companies are already filming in New York, and they don’t want to go out to the suburbs, but they need a house [that provides a suburban feel.]”
In fact, in Girls, Mr. Parker’s home stood in for Iowa City during Lena Dunham’s character Hannah Horvath’s brief sojourn at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. (Though, Mr. Parker noted, if you watch these scenes carefully, you can catch a yellow cab passing in the background.)
Douglas Elliman broker Jessica Cohen several years ago represented an Upper East Side townhouse at 7 East 84th St. that likewise had a certain star quality. In six weeks on the market, it drew cold calls from four location scouts.
The owners declined to participate, in large part out of concern for the property’s art and furnishings, Ms. Cohen said. The townhouse was on the market for $30 million, a price point that suggests the owners probably didn’t need whatever extra cash a movie shoot might bring.
In any case, the inquiries likely made Ms. Cohen feel right at home. Her parents were formerly owners of Mr. Parker’s Ditmas Park Victorian. Growing up, she said, “I remember it being a very normal occurrence that a location scout would knock on our front door.”
Much like her Upper East Side clients, her father, Ed Cohen, consistently turned down their requests.
“We were approached several times to have movies made at our house, but we never actually went through with doing it,” Mr. Cohen said. “Mainly because they can really change everything in the house they want, and my house was very old and had all the original detail. They claim that they’ll put it back together again if you don’t like what they did, but, you know…”
Mr. Cohen, who now lives in Manhattan near Lincoln Center, did have a brush with the movie business during his days in Ditmas Park. An architect, he designed a loft building on Prospect Park West that was used as the bank in Dog Day Afternoon.
“They took what was an old warehouse, and they made it into a bank,” he said. “You would never know. It’s amazing what they could do.”"In total, illegal armed groups violated the ceasefire 23 times in the past 24 hours. Two Ukrainian soldiers were killed in action, four were wounded in action. The ATO forces fired back 14 times, using mainly small arms and large-caliber machine guns," the ATO HQ said in an update based on information as of 06:00 on July 19.
Read alsoATO HQ: Ukrainian troops in Donbas forced to fire back 10 times in past dayThe two Ukrainian servicemen were killed in mortar and grenade attacks on the villages of Zaitseve and Nevelske.
If the number of enemy attacks decreased in the first half of the day, the situation in the ATO zone aggravated in the evening, the ATO HQ said.
Read alsoEU says Zakharchenko's "Malorossiya" against Minsk peace accordsThe Donetsk sector saw most of violations of the ceasefire by Russia's hybrid military forces. Starting from 17:50 local time and almost until 22:00, enemy units stationed in the occupied town of Yasynuvata and the village of Yakovlevka used 120mm and 82mm mortars, grenade launchers, large-caliber machine guns and small arms to shell Ukrainian troops near Avdiyivka.
In the latter half of the day, Russian proxies also shelled Avdiyivka's residential areas twice. Two civilians were wounded in an 82mm mortar shell explosion.
At about 21:00, enemy tanks attacked Ukrainian strongholds in the town of Krasnohorivka twice.
The Luhansk sector saw violations of the ceasefire near the villages of Donets and Stanytsia Luhanska where small arms were used.
"In the evening and at night, militants once again showed that they do not want de-escalation. Their provocations have caused casualties among servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and civilians in Donbas," the ATO HQ said.NSW Council for Civil Liberties spokesman Stephen Blanks said that there was "probably more than 100 agencies that have law enforcement powers" to request access to Opal records, including local councils and even animal protection agencies. Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione has defended access to Opal card data by police. Credit:Jonathan Carroll Transport for NSW said it would take requests from state, territory and federal police, the NSW Crime Commission, Australian Crime Commission, the Office of the Sheriff of NSW and other state and federal agencies. However, the NSW Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act potentially allows the list to grow even further if other entities applied to become law enforcement agencies under the act. To date, no law enforcement agency has asked for data from the operation of the Opal card, which is still being rolled out.
Commissioner Scipione said accessing Opal records without a warrant for legitimate and lawful purposes was acceptable if a crime was prevented or a criminal caught, adding that police used many other databases for their work. "I make no apologies for actually saying we would access lawfully anything that we could get that would assist my force and this organisation from either stopping a crime from happening, catching somebody that's committed a crime or looking at adding to the safety and security of a community," he said. “For the NSW Police force to go to the point where we seek information in regards to travel movements we would only do it if it was for a legitimate, law enforcement purpose, no other reason." Whether police would access records of potential witnesses to crime, like in Queensland, where more than 10,000 data requests have been made, remained unanswered. On Tuesday morning, NSW Greens MP and justice spokesman David Shoebridge lodged a formal complaint with the NSW Information and Privacy Commissioner over the sharing of Opal card information.
He said urgent intervention was required "to prevent people across NSW being forced to choose between travelling on public transport and preserving their privacy". Despite "anonymous" Opal cards becoming available in coming months as some paper tickets are phased out, Mr Shoebridge said the cards would not really be anonymous as the Opal privacy policy states law enforcement could use other methods, such as surveillance cameras, to match up unregistered cards to identities. "The Opal card sign-up process requires the giving of what is called a 'bundled consent', which commits users of the card to the broad disclosure of their information under the Opal privacy policy," Mr Shoebridge said. “Given the Opal card is increasingly the only practical public transport ticketing option, and there is no ability to opt-out of this privacy requirement, this consent can’t be seen as voluntary.” Mr Shoebridge said making Opal information available without a warrant was “an unacceptable infringement of the privacy of members of the community”. Because of this, he said he was hoping the Opal policy would be amended to allow people to opt out of having their information shared.
Commissioner Scipione said he could understand people’s concerns about privacy but said it was important to look at the context of why the records would be accessed in the first place. NSW Privacy Commissioner Dr Elizabeth Coomb said Mr Shoebridge's complaint would be assessed impartially and independently like any other complaint. She added that NSW police and Transport for NSW were in discussion "about the governance arrangements that will be established" for access to users' Opal data. Transport for NSW also defended sharing of data on Tuesday, releasing a statement saying that it had "a responsibility" to share data with authorities in some situations. Information would only be disclosed "under certain strict rules", a Transport for NSW spokesperson said.
"This is consistent with other electronic ticketing systems." NSW Police Association President Scott Weber said he didn’t see what the fuss was all about. “Probably the best way to chase someone up these days is through social media,” Mr Weber said. “I think you can get more information off Google or Facebook than you’ll get off the Opal passes.” Access to public transport smartcards in other states:Firing Up the Shuttle: 25 Years Since the Last Flight Readiness Firing (Part 1)
“T-minus 31 seconds…Endeavour’s four redundant computers have primary control of critical vehicle functions for the remainder of the count…”
Twenty-five years ago, Space Shuttle Endeavour—built in the aftermath of the Challenger disaster to replace her fallen sister—sat on Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida, only weeks ahead of her maiden voyage into orbit. In time, Endeavour would cement her credentials by flying 25 missions, including history’s only three-person Extravehicular Activity (EVA), the critical first servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and launching the initial components of the International Space Station (ISS). Yet on the morning of 6 April 1992, three weeks after rolling out to Pad 39B, Endeavour’s trio of Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) were test-fired in what wound up as the seventh and last Flight Readiness Firing (FRF) in the 30-year shuttle program.
“T-20 seconds. Sound suppression water will be released on the launch platform.”
The FRF was performed before each shuttle’s maiden voyage—and twice by Challenger and Discovery—and sought to impose launch conditions on the engines, as well as testing the suite of Auxiliary Power Units (APUs) in high-speed mode. Visibly and acoustically, it was perhaps the clearest example, other than a launch itself, of the orbiters straining against their shackles and yearning to fly. The Ground Launch Sequencer (GLS) had handed over primary control of the countdown to the shuttle’s on-board General Purpose Computers (GPCs) and the Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) Hydraulic Power Units (HPUs) had been activated shortly thereafter. At T-18 seconds, the SRB nozzle positions were verified and the quartet of giant “rainbirds” around the base of the launch pad were activated, ushering a flood of water to reduce the reflected energy, ahead of Main Engine Start.
“T-minus 12, 11, ten, nine…we have a Go for Engine Start…”
In a manner which had become instantly familiar over the preceding decade, a flurry of hydrogen burn igniters produced a shower of sparks, after which the three SSME bells at the extremity of Endeavour’s aft fuselage suddenly spouted a sheet of translucent orange flame. This was quickly replaced by a striking trio of dancing Mach-diamonds, as the shuttle’s on-board General Purpose Computers (GPCs) commanded the engines to full power.
“Six, five…we have Main Engine Start…two, one, zero…engines are now at 100 percent of rated power…”
And so they were. However, as Endeavour flexed against the struts which held her against her rust-colored External Tank (ET) and twin Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs), the key difference was that on 6 April 1992 she was not yet ready to head into space. Part of the FRF protocol was to demonstrate her systems performance under rigorous test conditions, and under the closest possible conditions to actual flight, with her engines fired for 20 seconds. All control elements of Endeavour’s Main Propulsion System (MPS) were required to hold pressure in the engines and the ET and the flight control instrumentation was expected to provide proper throttling and gimbaling functions, thereby validating the integrated performance of the shuttle stack and the compatibility of the on-board GPCs with ground-based computers.
“Five, plus six, plus seven, plus ten, plus 11, plus 14…and we have an abort…”
As vast clouds of steam billowed from the pad, and after 15 seconds of stable thrusts, shutdown commands were issued to all three SSMEs.
“Engines 1, 2 and 3 are now showing post-shutdown standby,” called GLS, “and we are Go for orbiter APU shutdown.”
In total, the FRF lasted 22 seconds and was a great success, but for a couple of technical issues. High vibration levels were detected in one of the engines’ high-pressure liquid oxygen turbopumps, whilst another exhibited a loud “popping” noise shortly after shutdown, indicative of hydrogen ingestion into the fuel injector. Prudently, on 8 April 1992 NASA decided to replace all three SSMEs with a set previously earmarked for her sister ship Atlantis’ STS-46 mission in July, although a second flight readiness firing for Endeavour was not considered necessary.
As well as being the first and only FRF to occur on Pad 39B, this was also the final flight readiness firing of the Space Shuttle Program. The first FRF had taken place more than a decade earlier, on 20 February 1981, in the weeks preceding the launch of Columbia on STS-1, the first shuttle mission. Formally known as the “Wet Countdown Demonstration Test (WCDT)/Flight Readiness Firing (FRF)”, it was designed to test the complete shuttle stack—Columbia, her ET and her twin SRBs—“in a real-time launch countdown which will culminate in a firing of the orbiter’s three main engines and a simulated launch to ensure their proper integration prior to the STS-1 flight”.
Fundamentally, the FRF sought to “verify the capability of the launch facility to provide propellants to the shuttle under launch conditions,” with the ET and SRB stack “exposed to the same thermal environment they will experience during STS-1 launch preparations”. All MPS control elements were “required to maintain pressure in the External Tank and in the main engines during the test firing as they would during an actual launch”, whilst the ability of the APUs, hydraulic systems and flight controls were verified as being able to throttle the three SSMEs at between 94 and 100 percent, as well as gimbaling them to effect steering.”
When 20 February 1981 came around, the six-day WCDT was nearing its conclusion and would culminate in the FRF. In readiness for the test firing, launch controllers started the countdown clock at T-53 hours, when they powered up the SRBs, the Ground Support Equipment (GSE) and the shuttle’s on-board systems. Four seconds prior to the simulated liftoff, Columbia’s SSMEs roared to life at 120-millisecond intervals, reaching 90 percent of rated performance within three seconds and hitting 100 percent precisely at T-0. Three seconds later, engineers simulated the retraction of the ET umbilical and the SRBs’ hold-down posts; and after 15 seconds of stable thrust from the SSMEs, shutdown commands were issued to the engines. The test was a great success and cleared another critical milestone, ahead of the STS-1 launch.
One significant aspect of the FRF was to evaluate and measure the effect of the “twang”—the amount of movement in the orbiter, against the rest of the stack, during the SSME ignition sequence—and in the case of Columbia this induced a forward shift by about 25.5 inches (64.7 cm), which was somewhat greater than the 19 inches (48.2 cm) predicted. However, the twang remained within anticipated structural limits. Also, the spark-like hydrogen burn igniters were started at the same time as SSME ignition, but post-FRF analysis led to a decision to initiate this sequence at T-4.4 seconds ahead of Main Engine Start on STS-1 and all subsequent missions.
With Columbia’s FRF successfully concluded, the flagship of the Space Shuttle fleet went on to record her first five orbital missions over the course of the next 19 months. It was then the turn of her sister ship, Challenger, to enter final preparations for her maiden voyage. And as shall be explored in tomorrow’s AmericaSpace history article, Challenger’s career began with not one FRF, but two.
The second part of this article will appear tomorrow.
Be sure to “LIKE” AmericaSpace on Facebook and follow us on Instagram & Twitter!How bad was MSNBC's coverage of Republican Governor Scott Walker winning his recall election in Wisconsin Tuesday?
Well, the Daily Show's Jon Stewart on Wednesday renamed the network "MSNB-Sad" saying that it "passed through all the stages of grief last night" (video follows with transcript and commentary, serious vulgarity warning):
JON STEWART, HOST: If Fox was high, MSNBC must be MSNB-Sad.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ED SCHULTZ, MSNBC: To say that I'm shocked and stunned is pretty much an understatement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
STEWART: “Shocked and stunned is an understatement. No, it feels tonight more like my heart was f—ked by the devil.
(Laughter) No, wait, that's an overstatement. Tonight I feel somewhere between shocked, stunned and devil heart f--ked. (Laughter) This is Ed Schultz.”
Indeed, MSNBC passed through all the stages of grief last night. Stage one, denial.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCHULTZ: You know, NBC is calling it for Walker. Okay, I think it's awful close and there's a lot of absentee ballots yet that are still out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
STEWART: Yeah, no. (Laughter) Stage two, denial.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN NICHOLS, NATION MAGAZINE: This will not be a massive win for Scott Walker.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
STEWART: Yeah. (Laughter) Finally, stage three, just really massive amounts of industrial-grade denial.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAWRENCE O’DONNELL, MSNBC: Tonight, the really big winner of the Wisconsin recall election is President Obama.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(Laughter)
STEWART: Yep, just like Obama drew it up on the chalk board. “Hey, guys, I got an idea. What if we could figure out a way to have the core of what we believe soundly rejected by voters in a swing state just five months before the national election? It might just be the boost we need.”
Actually, in this instance, there were four stages of grief with the last one being not understanding that if the exit polls were wrong in predicting who won the recall, they would likewise be off in how Wisconsinites view the upcoming presidential election.
Unfortunately, MSNBC anchors and commentators despite the obvious flaws in Tuesday's exit polls continued to cite them to claim President Obama has a seven point lead over Mitt Romney in Wisconsin.
Maybe Stewart will spoof that hysterical stupidity Thursday.
Stay tuned.Paris Las Vegas Hotel dims Eiffel Tower to honor attack victims
Courtesy of Evan Posocco
The Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino's replica of the Eiffel Tower will go dark for a second night as a tribute to victims of terrorist attacks in France.
The resort said on its Facebook page Saturday that the lights on its Eiffel Tower would be dimmed.
The hotel tower went dark Friday night after news of the deadly attacks in Paris spread.
Other tributes on the Las Vegas Strip included one on the High Roller, billed as the world's tallest observation wheel.
The 550-foot-tall attraction was lit up in the colors of France's flag — red, white and blue.
Authorities say extremists carried out coordinated gun-and-suicide bombing attacks across Paris on Friday that left 129 people dead and more than 350 injured.Artist Ellen Sebastian Chang satirically suggested in an interview: "Let's just kill and taxidermy all of the artists, people of color, and low-income people, and make the whole Bay Area into a diorama where people can come and feel safe." She was commenting on a recent guided tour of Market Hall in Oakland's Rockridge neighborhood and reflecting on the plethora of similar tours throughout the East Bay, where she has lived since 1970. "I call it the Motel 6-ing of culture," she said. At a Motel 6, no matter where you are, you'll never be surprised, because each location is exactly the same — and that's the intention.
Chang had been in Rockridge with collaborator Maya Gurantz (who has also lived in Oakland for many years) to install a public art piece called A Hole in Space (Oakland Redux), which created a video chat-like portal between Cole Hardware on College Avenue in Rockridge and Youth Employment Partnership in East Oakland by projecting a screen onto the street-front windows of each and installing mics and speakers. Unlike the minds behind Motel 6, their intention was to intervene in the expected environments of each location by collapsing the distance between them.
The installation, which went live every night from January 19 through 25, was a reiteration of Kit Galloway and Sherrie Rabinowitz's famous 1980 piece, A Hole in Space. The artists used satellite technology to set up a life-sized video chat between two sites on busy streets in Los Angeles and New York City — at a time when even cellphones were uncommon. Upon encountering their counterparts on the opposite coast, pedestrians were bursting with awe and excitement. Loved ones who hadn't seen each other in years were planning meetings at the digital site. After three hours, spread out over three nights, the crowd grew so large that the piece was shut down.
Reflecting on the work in the audio guide for the 2008 SFMOMA exhibit The Art of Participation: 1950 to Now, Galloway explains that their intention was to democratize communication streams for a moment in order to inspire people to creatively reclaim technology from "the tyranny of broadcast and traditional media." Confronted with the wonder of the piece, participants "would then become, in their imaginations, the architect of a new future, they might begin to define what they want as an information environment rather than be consumers of it."
In Chang and Gurantz's rendition of the piece, the premise was turned on its head. Rather than connecting sites across the continent, they chose to connect two neighborhoods that are just a short drive away from each other, yet worlds apart in another sense. Harkening back to the technological utopianism of the 1980s, their reinterpretation asks: Where have we arrived? The implied answer is that we've come to a point where we regularly interact with people across the globe, but frequently ignore those who are right around us, buffered by increasing racial and economic segregation that allows for erasure of difference. It has happened all over, but especially in Oakland.
Gurantz and Chang argue that the common contemporary American lifestyle is hyper-curated and hyper-informed, leaving no room for variance or surprise. Yelp helps us avoid restaurants at which we don't want to eat, and Tinder helps us easily screen out people we aren't attracted to. We're able to filter everything we don't already know we like, and most people have fallen into the comfort of that artificial homogeny.
The initial 1980 installation was such a sensation in part because the artists provided no announcement or explanation, and Chang and Gurantz hoped to do the same. But soon after installing it, they found complaints on both sides of the portal. Cranky Rockridge residents were bothered by the unexplained noise, and pedestrians in East Oakland were wary of the increased surveillance (an issue that the artists identify with, and pre-emptively struggled with when planning the piece). It was clear that the technological optimism of the 1980s was gone, and had been replaced — for varying reasons — by a fear of the unknown. The artists anticipated that many would be pushed out of their comfort zones through their interactions with the piece, and that was all part of the plan. (They both have rich backgrounds in immersive theater). But by the second day, they caved in and posted an artist statement at each site to calm audience's anxieties.
They also printed simple cards for workers at each location to give to those curious enough to inquire within. "This is not surveillance," "See without judgment," and, "Say hello to your neighbor," are some of the brief explanations that they offered, along with an email address. They hoped these nudges would help participants acknowledge others who share their city. Their higher goal is to "re-inscribe civic sharing," and remind people to take responsibility for one another. But on a basic level, they simply hope to connect strangers who are avoiding each other, perhaps unknowingly.
As I stood at night on the East Oakland side, watching the passersby in Rockridge, a young Caucasian girl stopped, pulling her father's hand as she turned to the screen. I waved at her as she investigated the scene, wide-eyed and bewildered. She waved back. I doubt she's ever been to East Oakland.
As for the rest of the interactions that took place through the portal, diners at FuseBOX in West Oakland (which Chang co-owns) may have seen them through a live, side-by-side feed that played in the restaurant throughout the week. The artists also plan to go through the footage and edit it into a reel of highlights that will be projected on The Great Wall of Oakland — the side of a building on West Grand Avenue and Valley Street that sometimes serves as a public video-art work venue — and likely elsewhere. The date has not been set.
But the resulting film will only serve as documentation of the ephemeral artwork. Gurantz asserted that the true site of the piece was within the interactions of those who encountered each other through it. As Chang put it, "The piece will be successful to me if one person in Rockridge has one real conversation with one person in East Oakland and it's done out of a place of curiosity and respect and a sense of real wonder."Chapter Text
We separated Grak from Fallatehr, putting both of them one hundred feet away in opposite directions. Fallatehr was downright cheery about it, either because he was legitimately amused by the paranoia we were displaying, or because he knew that what we were doing didn’t make a bit of difference, or possibly as a bluff.
“I agree with sequestration,” said Grak. “If I have been altered, we don’t know how long it would take to wear off, if it will at all. We should think of a long term solution. My wards are untrustworthy to you now.”
“You’re being very good about this,” I said to Grak.
“It’s the standard we need to have,” said Grak with a sniff from his wide nostrils. “It needs to work without trust.”
“Or rather, trust, but verify,” I said with a nod.
Grak frowned at that formulation of it, since apparently that wasn’t an expression here, but nodded.
“Tell me what happened,” said Amaryllis, as soon as he was far enough away that he couldn’t hear us. All the principal players were some distance apart from each other now, aside from Amaryllis and I, who stood beside each other. She took off her helmet while waiting for my response, and I could see the fatigue on her face.
“Fallatehr gave me a good enough description of soul magic that I was able to access my soul,” I said. “There’s apparently a compulsive effect associated with it -- like a siren song, if that’s an expression here.”
“We have sirens on Aerb, yes,” said Amaryllis.
“Fallatehr didn’t tell me about the effect ahead of time, so I got sort of … in the zone, I guess, wrapped up in exploration. I guess I would
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.07 am: Voting begins for 89 seats in the first phase of Gujarat election 2017
08.05 am: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani took to Twitter, saying, “My Dear Citizens, Your vote is crucial. Please exercise your franchise and affirm your right of nation building.”
07.55 am:
Voting for first phase of #GujaratElection2017 to begin shortly. Visuals from polling booth no 62 in Rajkot pic.twitter.com/ju40GxFM1d — ANI (@ANI) December 9, 2017
07.45 am: Last night taking a jibe at the campaigning in Gujarat, senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha took to Twitter saying, “The style of campaigning in Gujarat elections marks a new low in our politics.”
07.30 am: Maximum candidates contesting on a seat are 27 from Jamnagar Rural and minimum are 3 from Jhagadia and Gandevi (ANI)
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07.20 am: Voting for first phase of Gujarat Election 2017 to begin shortly
Voting for first phase of #GujaratElection2017 to begin shortly. Visuals from Piraman village polling booth no.171 in Bharuch’s Ankleshwar pic.twitter.com/QmjaAaFl13 — ANI (@ANI) December 9, 2017
07.00 am: Prime Minister Narendra Modi takes to Twitter, says, “Phase 1 of Gujarat polls begin. Urging all those voting today to turnout in record numbers and vote. I particularly call upon youngsters to exercise their franchise.”Venezuelan troops in different fatigues and carrying various weapons attend a press conference given by Defence Minister general Vladimir Padrino Lopez in Caracas on August 14, 2017
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Caracas (AFP)
Venezuela kicks off two days of military drills on Saturday in response to US President Donald Trump's threat of military action and newly announced sanctions on the crisis-stricken nation.
Trump warned on August 11 that the United States was mulling a range of options against Venezuela, "including a possible military option if necessary."
His Vice President Mike Pence later played down the threat, insisting that Washington was prioritizing a diplomatic solution and economic sanctions.
National security advisor HR McMaster followed suit, saying "no military actions are anticipated in the near future."
But tension only surged again when the White House made good on the sanctions threat on Friday, unveiling its first-ever sanctions to target Venezuela as a whole, rather than just Maduro and his inner circle.
The measures ban trade in new bonds issued by the Venezuelan government or its cash-cow oil company, PDVSA.
That could choke off access to New York debt markets and substantially raise the likelihood of Venezuela being forced into default.
Venezuela called the measures the "worst aggression" yet.
"We will protect our people and the people of the republic, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, are going to stand up," said Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza.
Trump's threat of military force has bolstered Maduro's oft-repeated claim that Washington is plotting to topple him and wants to grab control of Venezuela's oil -- the largest proven reserves in the world.
Maduro is under international pressure over his handling of an economic and political crisis.
The socialist president is resisting opposition calls for early elections to replace him.
The center right-led opposition and international powers including the US say he is turning Venezuela into a dictatorship.
Maduro's opponents accuse military police and pro-Maduro militia of beating and killing anti-government protesters.
Protest clashes have left 125 people dead so far this year, according to prosecutors.
Maduro says the violence and the economic crisis are a US-backed conspiracy.
- Military loyalty -
Maduro, the political heir to the late Hugo Chavez, has managed to hang onto power through it all, despite food shortages and social upheaval.
His grip is largely thanks to the support of the military, which holds vast powers in his government, including over food distribution.
The opposition has repeatedly called on the army to abandon Maduro -- so far to no avail.
He has only faced low-level dissent, such as from the two rebel officers who staged a raid on an army base this month.
On Thursday, the president issued a stern warning to the armed forces not to break ranks.
"We must be clear, especially for the youth in the military, that we must close ranks within the homeland -- that this is no time for any fissures and that those with doubts should leave the armed forces immediately," he said in a speech to the top military brass.
"You are with Trump and the imperialists, or you are with the Bolivarian national armed forces and the homeland," he added. "Never before has Venezuela been threatened in such a way."
Maduro's critics accuse him of coopting the military with top cabinet posts, as well as hijacking state institutions, such as by installing a new constituent assembly packed with loyalists.
© 2017 AFPAre you sick of always failing to convince us scientific skeptics that GM crops kill people, that homeopathy cures cancer or that climate change is a socialist myth? Do you feel frustrated by being asked to provide peer-reviewed scientific papers to support your position? If this matches your experience and you still do not know why, see how many of the following statements match your behavior to see if you qualify as a pseudoscientific crank.
You denigrate the knowledge of scientific experts, but compare yourself with Galileo and Einstein.
Just because you are criticized by knowledgeable people who provide scientific evidence to back up their arguments does not mean that you are an oppressed genius. Sometimes, you are just a rebel trying to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. In the end, the flawed notion that criticism means that you are actually right is a pathetic defense mechanism to avoid responding to objections or backing up your claims with evidence.
You are not Galileo or Einstein. They convinced their peers with evidence. You have no evidence whatsoever.
You claim mainstream medical treatments are unsafe and ineffective, while promoting quack treatments that are dangerous and untested.
There is a lot of hate towards modern medicine by proponents of quack treatments. This may be based on envy from quacks who never got into or failed medical school or because of postmodern belief that everyone is an expert. This is yet another example of confirmation bias and selective thinking.
You oppose multinational pharmaceutical companies while failing to understand that companies producing quack treatments are also multinational and predatory.
For instance, NBTY (formally known as Nature’s Bounty) has a revenue of 3 billion USD produces a lot of alternative medicine, such as products containing Echinacea.
You rant about unspecified “toxins” in vaccines, but you smoke a pack of cigarettes per day and ignore real toxins, such as heavy metals, in Ayurveda.
This is a curious combination of excessive anxiety about vaccines (that do not contain toxins) coupled with complete ignorance about the harmful effects of smoking or heavy metals. It is like walking against red over a heavily trafficked road, but being highly concerned about accidentally using “who” instead of “whom”. It is difficult to find more messed up priorities.
You claim that there is no consensus on evolution, yet refer to the “consensus” of alleged creationist “experts” that have done no real evolutionary research and instead just signed a petition.
Because, apparently, you believe that relevant scientific training makes you less qualified to discuss scientific research. Just because you make a big deal about a couple of hundred non-biologists does not mean that you can ignore hundreds of thousands of qualified scientists.
You assert that scientific consensus is just an argument from popularity at the same time as believing that alternative medicine must work since it is so popular.
Scientific consensus is not an appeal to popularity because it is a proxy for the position currently best supported by the evidence. Scientific consensus can sometimes be wrong, but cranks are wrong far more often.
You think that scientists are biased by their beliefs, yet you use your “mommy instinct” to back up your claims.
Scientists are trained to not let their personal beliefs or wishful thinking get in the way of their work. Sure, scientists are humans, but cranks do not have adequate training to avoid e. g. confirmation bias.
You fearmonger about GMOs for not being “natural”, yet you have no problem eating vegetables that have been genetically modified for 10 000 years.
The only difference between using traditional breeding and biotechnology is that the latter is faster, safer, more precise and can use genes from organism that are more distantly related. In traditional breeding, you shuffle thousands of genes into combinations that you do not test for safety. Using biotech, you can make extremely small changes that you have intimate knowledge of and do ten years worth of ecological and toxicological tests.
You support physical punishment of your children, yet you would never do the same to a misbehaving adult.
You punish your children physically? Would you ever do the same to an adult or an older person? Of course not! You think that there is no other way? That is just your own ignorance about child-rearing. Also, no, this is not a correlational fallacy as they have controlled for aggressive behavior at baseline.
You believe that just because someone has a medical degree does not make them an expert in medicine, but your PhD in English literature makes you qualified to deliver medical diagnoses on the Internet.
Just because you have a non-relevant degree does not mean that you are an expert in medicine. Just because you know how to Google does not mean you have the scientific or medical expertise to evaluate research papers with complex methodologies and statistical analyses.
You consider homebirth safer than giving birth at a hospital, yet your low-risk birth supervised by an unqualified and untrained crank gave you a dead baby.
You are completely deluded. You need to break out of your isolated bubble before you end up having another dead baby.
You firmly hold that HIV is just a harmless passenger virus and does not cause AIDS, but you would never allow yourself to be injected with HIV.
Research have shown that infecting tissues removed from patients or animals leads to a decline in CD4+ T cells. This effectively disproves the flawed notion that HIV is not a harmless passenger virus. If you still believe this, go ahead and inject yourself with it.Looking for news you can trust?
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This morning, a Connecticut judge denied a motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought against the manufacturers of the Bushmaster assault rifle by several families of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre. Bridgeport Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis’ decision comes as a surprise since similar suits have been thrown out under the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), a federal law that grants arms manufacturers broad immunity from liability claims.
The Sandy Hook families allege that the companies that made the AR-15-style Bushmaster rifle used in the attack “know that civilians are unfit to operate AR-15s, and yet continue selling the Bushmaster XM15-E2S to the civilian market, disregarding the unreasonable risks that the weapon poses.” The plaintiffs further allege that Bushmaster Firearms, Remington Arms, and the Freedom Group should have known that selling these rifles to the civilians would pose “an unreasonable and egregious risk” of injury or death and created the possibility of a mass shooting with high casualties.
Last December, Remington filed a motion to dismiss the case, citing its immunity under the PLCAA. In her decision today, Judge Bellis stated that the federal protection of gun companies does not invalidate the “legal sufficiency” of the complaint against them. She also rejected their claim that the PLCAA nullifies her court’s jurisdiction. Gun control advocates and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton have slammed the law for shielding gun companies from responsibility for the misuse of their products.
The case’s plaintiffs include the family members of several victims, including the mother of Victoria Soto, a young teacher killed while protecting her students, as well as the Barden and Hockley families, who have traveled the country urging stricter gun control legislation. Clinton hailed today’s ruling in an email statement, praising “these families, who are bravely fighting to hold irresponsible gunmakers accountable for their actions.”In this Japanese name, the family name is Tokugawa.
Yoshitomo Tokugawa (徳川 慶朝, Tokugawa Yoshitomo, February 1, 1950 – September 25, 2017)[1] was the 4th-generation head of the Tokugawa Yoshinobu-ke, the branch of the Tokugawa line started by the last Shōgun Tokugawa Yoshinobu.
Biography [ edit ]
Born in Sena, in Shizuoka Prefecture, he went to school in Tokyo, later engaging in a career in photography[2] (incidentally, the hobby of his great-grandfather) and graphic design with Honda. Later a freelance author, he spent his time writing about the history of his family after the Meiji Restoration. He also sold coffee under the brand name Tokugawa Shōgun Kōhī.
Through his mother's side of the family, Yoshitomo is also a descendant of Matsudaira Katamori.[citation needed]
Death [ edit ]
Yoshitomo died on September 25, 2017 in a hospital in Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture at the age of 67.
Principal works [ edit ]
Tokugawa Yoshinobu-ke ni Youkoso. Tokyo: Bungei-shunju, 2003.
. Tokyo: Bungei-shunju, 2003. Tokugawa Yoshinobu-ke no Shokutaku. Tokyo: Bungei-shunju, 2005.
Ancestry [ edit ]
Patrilineal descent [ edit ]
Notes [ edit ]
References [ edit ]An Australian porn star is looking to accept Dogecoin, a new virtual currency, on her website.
Angela White posted a plea on the social sharing website Reddit for help setting up a payment system on her "not safe for work" site that would allow viewers to pay in Dogecoin. Dogecoin is a virtual currency similar to Bitcoin, but with a more light-hearted attitude (the mascot is a Shiba Inu, inspired by the popular meme).
"I was never really interested in cryptocurrencies until Dogecoin made it much fun and so community," White wrote.
[youtube avbNnxYNTtU]
Dogecoin Foundation member Ben Doernberg spoke to Fox News' Ashley Dvorkin about what makes the virtual currency unique.
"I think there are over 100,000 people who are using it. The Dogecoin subreddit is almost at 70,000 people now," Doernberg said. "It’s been amazing to watch, but I think the fact that it started as a light-hearted, welcoming community has been what’s made it so successful."
Redditors recently raised funds to send the Jamaican bobsled team to the Winter Olympics in Sochi.
When asked about White's request to accept Dogecoin as payment for porn, Doernberg said it was an "interesting" proposal.
"Our subreddit really prides itself on being open and welcoming to everybody," Doernberg said. "We feel like, it's a currency - the way some people spend their dollars at church, others spend it in less savory places and ultimately, it's not up to us to decide."
Click the video above for the full interview with Ben Doernberg.Burundi’s government has provided “no substantial answers” to the UN Committee against Torture over concerns about summary executions, political assassinations, arbitrary arrests and torture. The committee is carrying out a special review of Burundi following a crisis in the country sparked by the controversial third term of President Pierre Nkurunziza.
“Actually at the moment the progress is very limited,” Alessio Bruni, one of the committee’s 10 independent experts, told RFI on Friday.
Burundi’s government engaged with the committee at the end of July, according to Bruni, but “decided to interrupt its engagement”. The independent expert said that after attending one session on 28 July the government did not show up the following day for another scheduled meeting.
The UN Committee against Torture is trying to establish what the government of Burundi has done to investigate concerns and how it intends to prevent the same things from happening in the future.
“On these points, practically, they’ve submitted nothing, their special report is just a list of legislative measures that they have in the country,” said Bruni, a human rights expert. “Just some vague reference to some public officials punished, without giving any details about it - and that’s it, there’s nothing else,” he added, speaking from Geneva.
The committee’s observations have taken into account reports from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as well as international human rights groups and Burundian civil society groups. For example, it notes 348 killings carried out by security forces between April 2015 and April 2016.
None of the recommendations or requests for investigation have been followed-up, according to Bruni. “All the questions raised by the committee were practically not answered,” he said.
In its observations the committee had urged the Burundian authorities to “exercise rigorous control of security forces, besides other people, to prevent extrajudicial executions”. On this question, Bruni said there was one paragraph provided by the government that referred to “some members of the intelligence services, who have been punished and put in jail”. However, as evidence of this the government said, “the committee can trust us - that we apply the law”, Bruni said.
It was the same for other recommendations, such as assuring the families of victims that they could have autopsies carried out on the bodies of their loved ones and if “reasonably possible” obtain the body after the end of any inquiry. When asked about whether the government had provided any detail on this matter, Bruni said they had not given any answer.
Other recommendations concern reported mass graves, disappearance of political opponents and violence perpetrated by the Imbonerakure, the youth wing of the ruling party.
“We will follow up the situation, the government will receive our concerns and recommendations, and there is a follow-up procedure,” said Bruni.The United States is blocking Russia's proposal to include the Islamic State on the UN Security Council's sanctions list as an independent organization, head of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Department for New Challenges and Threats Ilya Rogachev said Thursday.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The Russian Foreign Ministry's official said that ISIL is outlined in the UN Security Council's sanctions list as one of the names of al-Qaeda in Iraq, while it is no secret that the Islamic State is an independent structure acting as a rival of al-Qaeda.
"It is no secret that the Islamic State is an independent structure, acting, to a certain extent, as a rival of al-Qaeda. Meanwhile, it is outlined in the UN Security Council's sanctions list as one of the names of al-Qaeda in Iraq. We have proposed to include the Islamic State as an independent organization, but our proposals are being blocked by Western members of the Security Council, especially the United States, under various pretexts," Rogachev told RIA Novosti.
Rogachev argued the United States and its allies had placed ISIL as part of al-Qaeda in Iraq in the list to conceal the "sloppy cultivation" of opposition groups to the Syrian government by the West that led to the rise of the Islamic State.
"It is a clearly politically calculated position that has almost nothing to do with combatting terrorism. That is why we persistently raise this question and will continue raising it," he stressed.
© REUTERS / Mike Stone Trump: US Should Let Russia Fight ISIL
First established under a 1999 resolution, the so-called Al-Qaida Sanctions Committee is mandated to regularly update its list with the help of corresponding member states, its monitoring team, Interpol and other regional and international organizations.
ISIL originated as Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad in 1999, and renamed itself al-Qaeda in Iraq after allying itself with Osama bin Laden in 2004. After a long power struggle, al-Qaeda cut all ties with the Islamic State in early 2014.
The Islamic State has taken over large areas of Syria and Iraq, maintaining practices seen as more fundamentalist than al-Qaeda. Its murders, beheadings, mistreatment of minorities and desecration of historic monuments over the past years have largely overshadowed al-Qaeda in the media landscape.
Russia is currently discussing individual aspects in proposals with its foreign partners to create a greater coalition in the fight against the radical Islamic State that should use force under permission from the UN Security Council and the government of the country that is affected, Rogachev said.
"We are naturally ‘digesting’ individual aspects of our proposals with our foreign partners. A coalition’s activities must act on the UN Security Council’s permission to use military force, as well as permission from the governments of those countries that are affected by these activities. An anti-terrorist coalition must integrate all of the interested governments in order to be effective," Ilya Rogachev said.Brains behind Xperia Z Ultra talk about its conception
The Sony Xperia Z Ultra is certainly a unique handset in the Sony Xperia range. Putting its 6.44-inch display to one side, it is the first model to adopt a unique touch input system allowing either pencil or stylus to act as an input mechanism. It is also the first to have a “Triluminos Display powered by X-Reality for mobile.” Having a cutting edge SoC such as the Snapdragon 800 doesn’t hurt either.
If you’re interested in hearing some of thought processes that Sony’s engineers and designers took when making the Xperia Z Ultra then it’s well worth checking out an extensive interview over on the official Sony Mobile Blog. We’ve included some key excerpts below from four key people including Toshiyuki Ichino (Product Planner), Naeo Kaneta (Designer), Saki Kaneda (Colour, Material & Finish designer) and Junichi Kosaka (X-Reality for Mobile developer). A very interesting read indeed, be sure to check out the full interview at the source link below.
Brains behind Xperia Z Ultra talk about its conception
On the 6.44-inch display
Ichino: We were searching for a size that would fit well in one’s pocket and feel right when held in one’s hand. However, it’s hard to create a design which is comfortable when you hold it in your hand, or fits well in a pocket or a bag. We adopted a display size of “6.44 inches” for Xperia Z Ultra because we believe that it is an easy-to-carry size.
On the waterproof and dust-resistant chassis
Ichino: To be honest, in the beginning, we were not quite sure if waterproof and dust resistant features would be appreciated in other markets like they are in Japan. On the other hand, we were confident that, once customers tried it, we could give them a sense of security by assuring them that waterproof features will protect their phone on rainy days or near water.
On the Xperia Z Ultra Z’s OmniBalance design
Kaneta: Xperia Z Ultra was designed to appear as a “slate.” In order to achieve this effect, we used aluminum on the sides of the phone and glass on the front (including the LCD) as well as the back. These aluminum side plates increased the phone’s sturdiness and allowed us to achieve a comfortable width and premium, slim design. We aimed for a design that focuses the user’s attention on the content being shown on the phone’s large screen.
Kaneda: I would also like to point out that every detail, including the texture of aluminum plates and aluminum power button, was designed to enhance the high-quality look and feel of Xperia Z Ultra. We used two separate finishes, a sandblasted finish and a hairline finish, to maximize the impact of the Xperia Z Ultra side panels. The soft, rounded feel of the sandblasted finish is contrasted with the sharpness and solidity of the hairline finish, adding a sense of contrast to the phone’s design. The two finishes also scatter light in different ways, providing the edges with an impressive sheen and enhancing the slim look of Xperia Z Ultra.
On the Xperia Z Ultra colours (black, white and purple)
Kaneda: The pure black colour of the glass is expressing the quietness of midnight. We designed the aluminum side panels with a tinted bluish black imagining the surface of the sea, lit up by moonlight.
This soft and gentle white represents the colour of snow in the sunshine. The shining silver aluminum frame adds a sense of tension as well as harmony.
Purple, is the color of twilight. The sky dresses up elegantly at this time. It is a magical hour. The colour of the side panel is bit shinier creating a contrast to enhance the colour’s elegance.
On “X-Reality for mobile”
Kosaka: X-Reality™ for mobile analyzes videos one frame at a time, estimating and complementing any lost information. The algorithms reproduces lacking pixels to optimize quality for the sharpest videos. It analyzes elements depending on the scene and adjusts them based on pattern, outline and colour composition. It also enhances colour composition, vividly reproducing hard-to-display natural colours. The adoption of the high-performance Snapdragon 800 has made it possible to perform super resolution processing that had been difficult to do thus far.
It is unrealistic to use the exact same video processing chip found LCD TVs in a smartphone for various reasons such as power consumption. The distance that users view smartphones at also differs significantly from LCD TVs.
On the Xperia Z Ultra’s touch input
Ichino: We achieved this by improving the capacitance touch input technology we used in Xperia Z and other mobile devices. That’s why a pencil or metallic pen can be used as long as it is conductive. We also have enhanced the character recognition functions that work perfectly with pen input. You can, for example, select a portion of a photo with pen input, enter an email address, add text, and send a message without letting go of the pen. If you miswrite a character, you can correct it by writing the correct character over the wrong character, or erase it by whisking over it with the pen tip.
On the Xperia Z Ultra legacy
Kaneda: I want to create designs that customers won’t get tired of no matter how long they look at them, in addition to using colours that make an impact.
Kosaka: I think that one of the joys of using Xperia and other Sony products is that they offer new experiences. In the video field, we have been aiming to offer natural and realistic looking videos for decades. I encourage you to watch a video on the Xperia Z Ultra. I’m sure you will be amazed at the realness of the videos shown on the screen. I’d like to offer the best video experience on a smartphone because it is something that you always have by your side.
Via Sony Mobile Blog.Poverty-stricken North Korea is gearing up to open a multimillion-dollar ski resort that is planned to be equipped with multilevel ski runs, two hotels, cable cars, and even a helipad.
The luxury resort, which is located a four-hour drive from the capital city Pyongyang in Masik Pass, is slated to formally open on October 10, the 68th anniversary of the Workers' Party of Korea.
However, it appears that there is still work to be done in the resort, which has been under construction for the past 10 months. According to a report published by the Associated Press, the main hotel buildings appeared to be little more than shells and potholes filled the main access roads when visited by a reporter in late-September.
The prospect of a weekend on the ski slopes will be far out of reach for the majority of North Korea's 24.7 million population, which earns on average $1,800 per year, according to the CIA World Factbook.
(Read more: In North Korea, will work for Choco Pie)
Kim Tae Yong, the secretary-general of North Korea's ski association estimates there are 5,500 North Korean skiers in the country.
"Entrance fees are expected to be set at around $50. The average person in North Korea couldn't afford to spend that," said Simon Cockerell, general manager of Beijing-based Koryo Tours - a tour company specializing in North Korean travel.
Cockerell, who visited the project site in late-August, said it will be open to foreigners as well.
"In the region, the intensive population with the money to ski lies in South Korea, however they don't have access to the country," he said. "Foreign tourist numbers are still low, there will be about 6,000 Western tourists visiting the country this year."
(Read more: Inside North Korea's not so isolated, free-enterprise economy)
Kelvin Chan, head of country research at Euromonitor said the move is unlikely to drive tourists to visit North Korea, rather, it will be another attraction that tour organizers can add to their itineraries during the winter months.
"Only the adventurous travelers will choose to go to North Korea. After all, there are many ski resorts in neighboring countries such as China, South Korea and Japan," he said.
The ski complex is believed to the pet project of the country's leader Kim Jong-un, who reportedly enjoyed the sport as teenager while studying in Switzerland.4th Annual MHQ Bash Packages
This year’s internal MHQ theme is “All In”, so what better way to apply that than a casino themed MHQ Bash! Last year we had a ton of fun at MHQ Bash 3, but we’re kicking it up a notch for our Four-Of-A-Kind fourth year!
As a refresher, this year’s Bash will take place Friday, September 22nd through Sunday, September 24th in McKinney, TX.
The tentative* schedule is as follows:
Friday, September 22nd
6pm: Registration and Casino Night
Saturday, September 23rd
10am: All-In Eventzee Hunt
5pm: Oktoberfest in Downtown McKinney
Sunday, September 24th
9am: MunzFit 2.0 and Goodbye Event
*Times and locations will be finalized and provided as we get closer to the events.
Packages
There are four packages available for this year’s MHQ Bash: Royal Flush, Full House, Flush, Ace High.
***To guarantee availability of all items in packages, online registration will close on August 11th, 2017 at 15:00 MHQ time. Packages will be available for purchase at the event, but we cannot guarantee all items will be available.***
Each package will include the following:
Royal Flush ($75)
Lanyard/Name Tag and Swag Bag
T-Shirt
Mug/Glass
Dinner/Snacks on Friday Night
Casino Night Tickets/Chips (Prizes: Munzee Store Gift Cards)
Access to a special MHQ Bash only ZeeOp
MHQ Bash 4 Coin
MunzFit 2.0 Finisher Medal
Breakfast on Sunday
Special Edition Collectible/Commemorative Item
New Special Item
10 Blast Caps
Full House ($50)
Lanyard/Name Tag and Swag Bag
T-Shirt
MHQ Bash 4 Coin
MunzFit 2.0 Finisher Medal
Special Edition Collectible/Commemorative Item
New Special Item
Flush ($35)
Lanyard/Name Tag and Swag Bag
T-Shirt
MHQ Bash 4 Coin
Special Edition Collectible/Commemorative Item
New Special Item
Ace High (Free)
Lanyard/Name Tag
***Please purchase only one package per person who will be attending. Everyone must have at least the Ace High package. If you have a joint account, please purchase a package for each person (they do not have to be the same package).***
Packages can be purchased HERE.
We can’t wait to see you at MHQ Bash 4!
Munzee on!Former Visa Senior VP: A Troubled Country May Choose Bitcoin Over Central Banks
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In a recent interview on the Epicenter Bitcoin podcast, Bitnet Co-Founder and CEO John McDonnell was asked a wide range of questions regarding the future of Bitcoin. Although most of the conversation surrounded Bitcoin as a payment system, Epicenter Bitcoin Co-Host Sébastien Couture eventually brought up the topic of bitcoin as a currency. By the end of the discussion, it became clear that McDonnell, who previously worked at Visa and CyberSource, was quite bullish on bitcoin’s long-term prospects as a currency.
Also Read: Educational Credential Fraud Lands Government IT Official A Job Without Proper Degree
Convincing Consumers to Hold Bitcoin
Although Bitnet and other Bitcoin payment processing companies have been able to convince some big-name merchants to accept this new form of digital money, there is still a gigantic issue on the consumer side; not many people are willing to hold bitcoin right now. This is mainly due to the wild price fluctuations that have plagued the cryptocurrency throughout its short history. Having said that, the stability of the bitcoin price has improved over the course of 2015. Bitnet CEO John McDonnell noted this point during the interview when asked directly about his thoughts on bitcoin’s future as a currency:
“I do think it will become a currency. If we look at the last six months, the volatility really has decreased dramatically. The price has been trading within sort of a $200 to $300 [or] $275 band for several months. And I think that’s important for establishing the confidence by consumers to hold bitcoin for some period of time.”
McDonnell also brought up the fact that bitcoin may already look more attractive than local currencies in some economically-troubled countries around the world:
“In some cases, they don’t trust their own, sovereign currency, so it’s a store of value. The volatility of bitcoin might be more attractive than their central-bank-issued sovereign currency.”
Bitcoin has compared favorably with at least one sovereign currency (Venezuelan bolivar), this year, but it still has plenty of work to do when it comes to competing as a unit of account on a global scale.
According to my calculations #Venezuela‘s #inflation rate has been above 800% for the past two days. pic.twitter.com/xYA6QJvQ80 — Prof. Steve Hanke (@steve_hanke) July 27, 2015
People May Choose Bitcoin Over Central Banks
While there are some individuals in places like Argentina and Venezuela who prefer to store bitcoin rather than the local currency, McDonnell took this phenomenon to a completely different level during his interview. Although the idea may seem crazy to the vast majority of the general population right now, it appears that the Bitnet CEO sees bitcoin as a possible alternative to central banking in countries dealing with serious currency issues:
“I do believe that — given situations that we have in a couple countries in South America, for instance Venezuela or Argentina... there could very well be a situation where a central bank... I don’t know a particular example where this might happen, but a populus government takes over through some vote [in] a country and just basically bans the central bank. They say, ‘You know what? We’re on our third currency in twenty years. This is not working. We can’t trust ourselves or our finance ministers anymore to issue a sovereign currency. By default, a lot of these countries use the [US] dollar as a primary reserve currency, but I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibilities that one of these countries is going to turn to bitcoin. I think that would be a very interesting phenomenon in the sense that the rest of the world would then have to accept it as a sovereign currency — because it would be.”
The idea of bitcoin as a global reserve currency has been floated by bitcoin enthusiasts in the past, and there are also plenty of economists and central bankers discussing the idea of a “Fedcoin.” It’s possible that something like Bitcoin will be integrated into fiat currencies eventually, but it’s unclear if bitcoin (the currency) will be part of the equation. The scenario outlined by the former Visa Senior Vice President would require a revolution in a troubled country at the grassroots level. Having said that, there are a few problematic fiat currencies out there that could, perhaps, inspire such an event.
Kyle Torpey is a freelance journalist who has been following Bitcoin since 2011. His work has been featured on VICE Motherboard, Business Insider, RT’s Keiser Report, and many other media outlets. You can follow @kyletorpey on Twitter.by Brett Stevens on March 4, 2016
Meet Bosko Pavlovic. From Serbia, he is accused of being part of a rape gang in Germany. The Daily Mail reports:
A 14-year-old schoolgirl was allegedly raped by a Serbian gang of migrants in Germany who also reportedly filmed the horrific act. The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had been invited back home by another older Serbian girl, 15, who was allegedly part of the group. Instead of helping her, the 15-year-old girl filmed the sickening ordeal for the Serbian gang, whose ages ranged from 14 to 21.
This girl may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but this assault illustrates a fact of life that was once accepted as common sense: other groups, no matter who they are, want to kill you and take your stuff because you are Other to them.
It has zero to do with how nice you are, how much welfare or foreign aid you give them, or your own socioeconomic status. You are Other; that makes you a threat to Us, whoever Us is, and therefore you must be conquered by any means necessary. That includes war, but also crime, politics, corruption, and rape.
Too much of our focus in the West is taken up with Arabs and, in the USA, African-Americans. The reason for this is that people want to believe our diverse internationalist liberal democratic oligarchy (D.I.L.D.O.) is actually a functional system, except for those nasty ghetto-dwellers and Islamic fundamentalists.
The reality is that diversity does not work because every group is threatened by the Other and wants to destroy the Other and take its place. It just seems to work at first when the diversity numbers are low and so each group is not empowered to act as a bloc. But once the minorities are majorities, wow, watch the crisis fly.
If anything, African-Americans show restraint in America because they’ve grown up around friendly white people who help out when they can, and African-Americans share some political identity with other Americans. While ethnic tensions are rising, our liberal media finds it acceptable to cover these in order to cover up the bigger problem which is that there are many minority groups, and to each of them we white Americans are Other.
In addition, to them all other groups are Other, too. In my city, Hispanics and African-Americans war on each other, which is not news; I saw this in California years ago, where the press suppressed it as well. But you can also find Hispanics at war with Indians, Orientals and Arabs. And those groups with each other. In fact, thanks to diversity, every known pairing of ethnic antagonism has played out here, mainly because different groups are
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occur along the East Coast.
Most of the suggestions for improving mileage performance are relatively straightforward, and though there are a more advanced techniques out there, I am not (at least yet) that much of a fanatic that I am likely to be following them all. On the other hand I am going to print the list out, and see how some of them at least work out as we make our trip. And who knows, as the numbers start to creep up on that little monitor every time I shut the engine off, I may become more under its control. We’ll just have to see.
.Bitcoin Exiting The DAO is a 67-Step, 48-Day Ordeal
In light of certain developments regarding Slock.it’s titanic smart contract-driven project, The DAO, many are left with the question of how to cleanly exit. That’s a good question, though pretty contentious among the heavily staked DAO members. You can’t blame the more small time elements in the community for wanting to jump ship though, seeing as that ship has run over its tugboat (Ethereum) coming out of the harbour, and might be any combination of sinking, on fire, or packed to the brim with Africanized bees depending on how the vulnerability and theft are handled, the proposed Soft Fork and winding-down notwithstanding.
Read also: The Verge Is Clueless About Crypto
Exiting The DAO Uses The Same Functions as the “Hack”
The thing is, exiting or “splitting” The DAO didn’t seem to be common knowledge leading up to the attack that removed over 50 million dollars in ETH from the system. There weren’t any easily accessible tutorials or instructions, even from third parties, before the exploit. Granted, their Github has a stub explaining the necessary commands, and DAO wiki has a tutorial buried under loads of other information, but nothing that an average to low-information investor would have an easy time finding. I slogged through the documentation to find the complete process, and I’m here to tell you that cutting ties to The DAO would not have been easy.
It’s a simple, 67-step process; that only takes 48 days to complete in full. (it’s broken into 12 lengthy sections on the DAO wiki, with 5 out of the 12 offering no elaboration outside of their title) I think I see the reason, now, that it wasn’t made common knowledge among The DAO community. Regardless of how you feel the “fix” to The DAO attack and subsequent failure of the smart contract is shaping up, you have to realize that this lack of liquidity is deemed unacceptable in the vast majority of financial products if it isn’t explicitly stated, especially given the way Slock.It characterized The DAO’s nature and utility. I’m no lawyer, so I can’t characterize it as fraud, but it certainly is misleading.
The icing on the cake, though, is that an attacker could use your legitimate attempt at an exit to drain even more ETH from The DAO — as the exploit being used takes advantage in a security hole during the splitting process – and get it frozen by the ever well-meaning Buterin, leaving your money and tokens in perpetual limbo until this whole trash fire of a situation is resolved.
For those of you who invested, got burned, and just want to quit while you’re not too far behind, I’ll see you in 48 days. That is, if you successfully complete the 67 easy steps and your split isn’t exploited and frozen. For everyone else involved, there may be no legal recourse because the “hack” was carried out under the terms of the faulty contract governing The DAO’s behavior. Let’s hope Vitalik’s central intervention isn’t too ruinous for DAO investors, Ethereum, and Cryptocurrency as a whole in the long term.
Closely Following The DAO’s status? Let us know how you feel in the comments!
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NEW YEAR'S EVE has been and gone, but for oilmen, the party continues. On January 2nd, helped across the line by a New York trader eager for bragging rights, the first business day of the year, the price of their product topped $100 a barrel for the first time. Oil is now almost five times more expensive than it was at the beginning of 2002.
It would be natural to assume that ever increasing price reflects ever greater scarcity. And so it does, in a sense. Booming bits of the world, such as China, India and the Middle East have seen demand for oil grow with their economies. Meanwhile, Western oil firms, in particular, are struggling to produce any more of the stuff than they did two or three years ago. That has left little spare production capacity and, in America at least, dwindling stocks. Every time a tempest brews in the Gulf of Mexico or dark clouds appear on the political horizon in the Middle East, jittery markets have pushed prices higher. This week, it was a cold snap in America and turmoil in Nigeria that helped the price reach three figures.
No wonder, then, that the phrase “peak oil” has been gaining ground even faster than the oil price. With each extra dollar, the conviction grows that the planet has been wrung dry and will never be able to satisfy the thirst of a busy world.
Geography, not geology
Yet the fact that not enough oil is coming out of the ground does not mean not enough of it is there. There are many other explanations for the lacklustre response to the glaring price signal. For one thing, oil producers have tied their own hands. During the 1980s and 1990s, when the price was low and so were profits, they pared back hiring and investment to a minimum. Many ancillary firms that built rigs or collected seismic data shut up shop. Now oil firms want to increase their output again, they do not have the staff or equipment they need.
Worse, nowadays, new oil tends to be found in relatively inaccessible spots or in more unwieldy forms. That adds to the cost of extracting oil, because more engineers and more complex machinery are needed to exploit it—but the end of easy oil is a far remove from the jeremiads of peak-oilers. The gooey tar-sands of Canada contain almost as much oil as Saudi Arabia. Eventually, universities will churn out more geologists and shipyards more offshore platforms, though it will take a long time to make up for two decades of underinvestment.
The biggest impediment is political. Governments in almost all oil-rich countries, from Ecuador to Kazakhstan, are trying to win a greater share of the industry's bumper profits. That is natural enough, but they often deter private investment or exclude it altogether. The world's oil supply would increase markedly if Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell had freer access to Russia, Venezuela and Iran. In short, the world is facing not peak oil, but a pinnacle of nationalism.
None of that will help consumers or governments. The economic toll of expensive oil is just as high whether geology or politics is to blame—and the best response is just the same. Policy should encourage energy efficiency and support research into alternative fuels. Governments seeking to shield their citizens with subsidies or price caps should instead expose them to the full cost to foster frugality. All this will be hard and unpopular. But politicians might console themselves with the thought that even the most recalcitrant petro-regime is more malleable than the brute realities of geology.SURPRISE, Ariz. -- Mike Napoli doesn't have seven fingers on his right hand, but he said he had no trouble figuring out seven different signs for Japanese pitcher Yu Darvish on Wednesday.
The 25-year-old threw 35 pitches in a 10-minute session to two nonroster hitters on Wednesday and used all seven of his pitches. Napoli said Darvish's repertoire included: a cutter, slider, curve, split-fingered fastball, changeup, two-seam fastball (sinker) and a four-seam fastball. Napoli said Darvish's curve is more over the top (12-6) and clearly different from the slider.
"I was impressed," Napoli said. "He spins the ball really well. His fastball and his off-speed pitches have tight rotation. The ball came out of his hand pretty good today."
Napoli said before Darvish, the pitcher he's caught with the most pitches was C.J. Wilson, who would throw five different ones in a game. Napoli feels that Darvish has the confidence and ability to throw all seven in game conditions when needed.
"He threw a couple of splits that really dove down," Napoli said. "I like his curveball. It's slower, but it has tight spin and rotation on it. He threw every pitch pretty good."
Darvish continues to build up his arm strength. Napoli said it didn't appear Darvish was overdoing it and the pitcher asked Napoli about his fastball and what it was doing after the outing. Napoli talked to him briefly about what he was seeing and then gave him a high-five.
"I think he was all right with the session he had," Napoli said. "It seems that he likes to be perfect. That's a good thing. He wants to be perfect with every pitch, but that's kind of tough to do in our sport."
The Japanese pitcher will throw the third inning as part of the visiting team in Friday's intrasquad game in Surprise.
"He has great movement," Napoli said. "He was throwing the sinker and it moved and he threw a couple of splits where the bottom just dropped out of it. He knows what he's doing with the ball. He knows how to manipulate the ball."Wednesday, July 15th, 2015
PERRIS, Calif. (KABC) -- A Perris work activity center is helping people with special needs get into the workforce.Exceed employs about 600 people with intellectual and physical disabilities to package, assemble and label a variety of different products."Without programs like these, there's not much left for folks once they complete school, so this gives somebody an opportunity to learn work skills and to progress to their fullest potential," said Andrea Wells, assistant executive director of Exceed.Workers are paid a competitive wage based on productivity."Their wage is based on the number of pieces that they put together, and if they're a real fast worker, they can get paid the same as you and I," Wells said.David Serna, a former Special Olympics athlete, has been working at Exceed for more than 10 years. He's saving for a trip to Hawaii."Earning a paycheck, to you and I, certainly is rewarding. To these folks, it means the world," Wells said. nullThe Indonesian government has the power to arrest those who use “offensive” internet memes, according to recent restrictions against freedom of speech.
After citizens of the country called for the 2008 Electronic Information and Transactions Law to be revoked, more restrictions have allegedly been added, including sanctions against people who post “texts, pictures, videos and memes deemed to incite fear or cause embarrassment.”
“The crime, referred to as cyberbullying, poses a threat to freedom on the internet, as it is common for people to tell jokes and post memes criticizing public officials implicated in graft cases or political dynasty members ahead of a regional or general election,” wrote the Jakarta Post last month. “The House claims that the passed provision not only aims to ‘protect children’ but also the general public from bullying on the internet.”
The Jakarta Post also states that since the Electronic Information and Transactions Law was introduced in 2008, numerous innocent people have been imprisoned or sued, including Prita Mulyasari, who was jailed after complaining about a hospital’s service during an email chain.
Around 200 people have been prosecuted since the law was implemented in 2008 and can receive up to 12 years in prison.
“The government has yet to reach a consensus on the definition of ‘annoying’ [bullying], so why are they moving to regulate charges for it?” said the director of the Institute for Criminal Justice Reform, Supriyadi Eddyono. “This new charge, in addition to the existing defamation one clearly tells us that the revision of the ITE Law poses serious threats to freedom of expression in Indonesia.”
Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook.Frank Lampard is "still playing like he's 18 years old" and driving Manchester City's Premier League title race with former club Chelsea, according to Pablo Zabaleta.
Full-back Zabaleta hailed Lampard's growing influence as the City hierarchy consider whether to seek an extension to the 36-year-old's Etihad Stadium loan deal.
Former Chelsea and England midfielder Lampard fired his 174th Premier League goal in City's 3-0 victory at Southampton on Sunday.
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The ex-West Ham star is scheduled to join New York City FC in January after leaving Chelsea last summer, but Manchester City remain keen to extend his stay in the north west.
Shape Created with Sketch. Manchester City - the latest match pictures Show all 111 left Created with Sketch. right Created with Sketch. Shape Created with Sketch. Manchester City - the latest match pictures 1/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 George Boyd shoots to score the opening, and winning, goal for Burnley GETTY IMAGES 2/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 George Boyd celebrates GETTY IMAGES 3/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 Sergio Aguero in action against Burnley GETTY IMAGES 4/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 Vincent Kompany sits among the subs after being dropped GETTY IMAGES 5/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 David Silva puts Manchester City in the lead GETTY IMAGES 6/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 David Silva celebrates his goal 7/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 Wilfred Bony in action for Manchester City GETTY IMAGES 8/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 James Milner celebrates his goal GETTY IMAGES 9/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Wilfried Bony came on in the victory over Newcastle to make his Man City debut. Getty 10/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 A quick-fire David Silva double put City five goals to the good. Getty 11/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Edin Dzeko tripled Newcastle's misery with a third goal before half-time. Getty 12/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Samir Nasri doubled Manchester City's lead with an emphatic strike. Getty 13/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Sergio Aguero put Manchester City ahead inside two minutes after Vernon Anita gave away an early penalty. Getty 14/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 Samir Nasri celebrates with James Milner after the latter scores the equaliser against Hull Getty Images 15/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 James Milner curls a free-kick in to the back of the net to salvage a 1-1 draw with Hull Getty Images 16/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 Sergio Aguero has a close-range shot stopped by Allan McGregor Getty Images 17/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 David Meylor scores to put Hull into the lead against Manchester City Getty Images 18/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Olivier Giroud heads Arsenal 2-0 in front GETTY IMAGES 19/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Aaron Ramsey misses the target 20/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Olivier Giroud celebrates with Santi Cazorla 21/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Manchester City target Ross Barkley battles with Fernando in midfield Getty Images 22/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Stevan Jovetic has an attempt at the Everton goal Getty Images 23/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Joel Robles steals the feet from Samir Nasri's toes Getty Images 24/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Romelu Lukaku has a shot well saved by England goalkeeper Joe Hart Getty Images 25/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Fernandinho heads the visitors into the lead Getty Images 26/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Sergio Aguero returned from injury but was not able to inspire City to victory Getty Images 27/111 Man City 2 Sheff Wed 1 James Milner scores his team's second goal to take a 2-1 lead Getty Images 28/111 Man City 2 Sheff Wed 1 James Milner celebrates scoring his team's first goal Getty Images 29/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Yaya Toure of Manchester City celebrates the opening goal GETTY IMAGES 30/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Stevan Jovetic scores to put the home side in control GETTY IMAGES 31/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Jack Rodwell of Sunderland heads his goal to make it 2-1 GETTY IMAGES 32/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Adam Johnson made things all square at the Etihad moments later GETTY IMAGES 33/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 However Frank Lampard headed in the winner for Manchester City just after coming off the bench GETTY IMAGES 34/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Lampard celebrates his winning goal GETTY IMAGES 35/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Manchester City's Spanish midfielder David Silva (R) scores the opening goal GETTY IMAGES 36/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Fernandinho of Manchester City scores their second goal to put the champions in total control GETTY IMAGES 37/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 George Boyd of Burnley celebrates after pulling one back GETTY IMAGES 38/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Ashley Barnes scores a stunner for the visitors to bring things level GETTY IMAGES 39/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Scott Arfield celebrates the equaliser for Burnley GETTY IMAGES 40/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 West Brom players bundle the ball over the line for a late consolation with Brown Ideye appearing to get the last touch Getty Images 41/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 David Silva celebrates scoring Manchester City's third goal Getty Images 42/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 David Silva runs through the snow at the Hawthorns Getty Images 43/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Yaya Toure converts a first-half penalty to double City's lead Getty Images 44/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Joleon Lescott brings down David Silva to give away a first-half penalty Getty Images 45/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Ben Foster looks dejected as the snow falls following his error that allowed Fernando to score Getty Images 46/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Yaya Toure celebrates with Fernando after the latter puts City ahead Getty Images 47/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Yaya Toure fires home the third to put the result beyond doubt Getty Images 48/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Manchester City players celebrate after David Silva scores Getty Images 49/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 James McArthur had a headed goal ruled out incorrectly for offside with the score at 2-0 Getty Images 50/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Dacid Silva strokes home his and City's second goal Getty Images 51/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Brede Hangeland and Martin Kelly are unable to prevent David Silva's deflected shot going in to break the deadlock Getty Images 52/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Joe Hart pulls off a fantastic save from Esteban Cambiasso's free-kick Getty Images 53/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Frank Lampard celebrates with Samir Nasri after giving Manchester City the lead Getty Images 54/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Frank Lampard taps the ball past goalkeeper Ben Hamer Getty Images 55/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Leicester fans remain defiant in their support of Nigel Pearson after his clash with a fan last week Getty Images 56/111 Roma 0 Manchester City 2 City players celebrate their victory in Rome Getty Images 57/111 Roma 0 Manchester City 2 Manchester City's Samir Nasri wheels away in celebration Getty Images 58/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Pablo Zabaleta checks on Yaya Toure after the midfielder collapses with a leg injury Getty Images 59/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Yaya Toure scores from the penalty spot what would turn out to be the match-winning goal Getty Images 60/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Phil Jagielka clips his England team-mate James Milner to give away a penalty Getty Images 61/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Sergio Aguero limps off the field after just two minutes with what appeared to be a serious left knee injury Getty Images 62/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Zabaleta prepares to celebrate after scoring GETTY IMAGES 63/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Sergio Aguero is mobbed by his team-mates after scoring his second GETTY IMAGES 64/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Stevan Jovetic celebrates after putting Manchester City ahead in the win over Sunderland Getty Images 65/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Connor Wickham chips the ball over Pablo Zabaleta and beyond Joe Hart's reach to give Sunderland the lead Getty Images 66/111 Southampton 0 Man City 3 Manuel Pellegrini clashes with referee Mike Jones GETTY IMAGES 67/111 Southampton 0 Man City 3 Frank Lamaprd scores City's second GETTY IMAGES 68/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Yaya Toure puts City into the lead Getty Images 69/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Stevan Jovetic taps home from close-range to equalise for City Getty Images 70/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Wilfried Bony celebrates scoring for Swansea as Joe Hart looks on in despair Getty Images 71/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Doumbia’s put CSKA into a quick lead in this Champions League meeting Getty Images 72/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Yaya Toure however brought things level after eight minutes Getty Images 73/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Doumbia was to put the visitors back in front however Getty Images 74/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Then things got worse for City, with Yaya Toure being sent off Getty Images 75/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Fernandinho was also sent off for good measure Getty Images 76/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Chris Smalling picks up a booking for blocking Joe Hart Getty 77/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Later in the first half, Smalling was shown another and then sent off Getty 78/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Kompany tackles Di Maria Getty 79/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Sergio Aguero celebrates the only goal of the game Getty 80/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 Moussa Sissoko celebrates scoring Newcastle's second goal Getty Images 81/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 David Silva was substituted after suffering a knee injury Getty Images 82/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 Rolando Aarons watches as his effort finds the corner of the Manchester City goal to give Newcastle the lead Getty Images 83/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 David Silva and Vincent Kompany celebrate after Silva's stunning effort - but it wasn't enough Getty Images 84/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Diafra Sakho and Enner Valencia celebrate what turned out to be the winning goal Getty Images 85/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Joe Hart of Manchester City fails to stop the header by Diafra Sakho GETTY IMAGES 86/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Sakho heads home his seventh goal in seven matches to put West Ham 2-0 up Getty Images 87/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 City midfielder Fernando tangles with West Ham's Cheikhou Kouyate Getty Images 88/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Morgan Amalfitano gives West Ham the lead in the early part of the match, turning in a cross from Enner Valencia Getty Images 89/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Barcelona loanee Alex Song was an impressive force for the Hammers in midfield Getty Images 90/111 CSKA 2 Manchester City 2 Sergio Aguero and James Milner put City into a two goal lead by half-time in this Champions League group game GETTY IMAGES 91/111 CSKA 2 Manchester City 2 Ferdando was booked for this challenge GETTY IMAGES 92/111 CSKA 2 Manchester City 2 CSKA Moscow pulled one back and then Natcho equalised from the spot for the hosts GETTY IMAGES 93/111 CSKA 2 Manchester City 2 City pushed for a winner in the final few minutes but to no avail GETTY IMAGES 94/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Sergio Aguero completes his hat-trick from the penalty spot to put City 3-1 up GETTY IMAGES 95/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Roberto Soldado reflects on his penalty miss GETTY IMAGES 96/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Sergio Aguero sees City's second penalty of the game saved and then hits the rebound over GETTY IMAGES 97/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 David Silva is fouled to give City their second penalty GETTY IMAGES 98/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Sergio Aguero gets his second of the afternoon from the penalty spot GETTY IMAGES 99/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Frank Lampard is fouled by Erik Lamela to give City a penalty GETTY IMAGES 100/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Christian Eriksen celebrates his equaliser for Spurs GETTY IMAGES 101/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Christian Eriksen equalises for Spurs GETTY IMAGES 102/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Sergio Aguero celebrates his opening goal GETTY IMAGES 103/111 Manchester City 3 Tottenham 1 Sergio Aguero fires City into the lead GETTY IMAGES 104/111 Aston Villa 0 Manchester City 2 Sergio Aguero celebrates his goal GETTY IMAGES 105/111 Aston Villa 0 Manchester City 2 Sergio Aguero makes it two with a smart low finish GETTY IMAGES 106/111 Aston Villa 0 Manchester City 2 Yaya Toure finally breaks the deadlock and puts City in front GETTY IMAGES 107/111 Manchester City 1 Roma 1 Sergio Aguero slots home from the spot early in the Champions League match Getty Images 108/111 Manchester City 1 Roma 1 Joe Hart can't stop Totti bringing the scores level Getty Images 109/111 Manchester City 1 Roma 1 Former Arsenal team-mates Gael Clichy and Gervinho come together Getty Images 110/111 Manchester City 1 Roma 1 Martin Demichelis rises into the air during this game at the Etihad Getty Images 111/111 Hull City 2 Manchester City 4 Substitute Frank Lampard made in four goals in three matches to secure the three points for City at the KC Stadium Getty Images 1/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 George Boyd shoots to score the opening, and winning, goal for Burnley GETTY IMAGES 2/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 George Boyd celebrates GETTY IMAGES 3/111 Burnley 1 Manchester City 0 Sergio Aguero in action against Burnley GETTY IMAGES 4/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 Vincent Kompany sits among the subs after being dropped GETTY IMAGES 5/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 David Silva puts Manchester City in the lead GETTY IMAGES 6/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 David Silva celebrates his goal 7/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 Wilfred Bony in action for Manchester City GETTY IMAGES 8/111 Manchester City 2 Leicester 0 James Milner celebrates his goal GETTY IMAGES 9/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Wilfried Bony came on in the victory over Newcastle to make his Man City debut. Getty 10/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 A quick-fire David Silva double put City five goals to the good. Getty 11/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Edin Dzeko tripled Newcastle's misery with a third goal before half-time. Getty 12/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Samir Nasri doubled Manchester City's lead with an emphatic strike. Getty 13/111 Manchester City 5 Newcastle 0 Sergio Aguero put Manchester City ahead inside two minutes after Vernon Anita gave away an early penalty. Getty 14/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 Samir Nasri celebrates with James Milner after the latter scores the equaliser against Hull Getty Images 15/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 James Milner curls a free-kick in to the back of the net to salvage a 1-1 draw with Hull Getty Images 16/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 Sergio Aguero has a close-range shot stopped by Allan McGregor Getty Images 17/111 Manchester City 1 Hull 1 David Meylor scores to put Hull into the lead against Manchester City Getty Images 18/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Olivier Giroud heads Arsenal 2-0 in front GETTY IMAGES 19/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Aaron Ramsey misses the target 20/111 Manchester City 0 Arsenal 2 Olivier Giroud celebrates with Santi Cazorla 21/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Manchester City target Ross Barkley battles with Fernando in midfield Getty Images 22/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Stevan Jovetic has an attempt at the Everton goal Getty Images 23/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Joel Robles steals the feet from Samir Nasri's toes Getty Images 24/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Romelu Lukaku has a shot well saved by England goalkeeper Joe Hart Getty Images 25/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Fernandinho heads the visitors into the lead Getty Images 26/111 Everton 1 Manchester City 1 Sergio Aguero returned from injury but was not able to inspire City to victory Getty Images 27/111 Man City 2 Sheff Wed 1 James Milner scores his team's second goal to take a 2-1 lead Getty Images 28/111 Man City 2 Sheff Wed 1 James Milner celebrates scoring his team's first goal Getty Images 29/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Yaya Toure of Manchester City celebrates the opening goal GETTY IMAGES 30/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Stevan Jovetic scores to put the home side in control GETTY IMAGES 31/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Jack Rodwell of Sunderland heads his goal to make it 2-1 GETTY IMAGES 32/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Adam Johnson made things all square at the Etihad moments later GETTY IMAGES 33/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 However Frank Lampard headed in the winner for Manchester City just after coming off the bench GETTY IMAGES 34/111 Manchester City 3 Sunderland 2 Lampard celebrates his winning goal GETTY IMAGES 35/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Manchester City's Spanish midfielder David Silva (R) scores the opening goal GETTY IMAGES 36/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Fernandinho of Manchester City scores their second goal to put the champions in total control GETTY IMAGES 37/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 George Boyd of Burnley celebrates after pulling one back GETTY IMAGES 38/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Ashley Barnes scores a stunner for the visitors to bring things level GETTY IMAGES 39/111 Manchester City 2 Burnley 2 Scott Arfield celebrates the equaliser for Burnley GETTY IMAGES 40/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 West Brom players bundle the ball over the line for a late consolation with Brown Ideye appearing to get the last touch Getty Images 41/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 David Silva celebrates scoring Manchester City's third goal Getty Images 42/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 David Silva runs through the snow at the Hawthorns Getty Images 43/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Yaya Toure converts a first-half penalty to double City's lead Getty Images 44/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Joleon Lescott brings down David Silva to give away a first-half penalty Getty Images 45/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Ben Foster looks dejected as the snow falls following his error that allowed Fernando to score Getty Images 46/111 West Brom 1 Manchester City 3 Yaya Toure celebrates with Fernando after the latter puts City ahead Getty Images 47/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Yaya Toure fires home the third to put the result beyond doubt Getty Images 48/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Manchester City players celebrate after David Silva scores Getty Images 49/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 James McArthur had a headed goal ruled out incorrectly for offside with the score at 2-0 Getty Images 50/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Dacid Silva strokes home his and City's second goal Getty Images 51/111 Manchester 3 Crystal Palace 0 Brede Hangeland and Martin Kelly are unable to prevent David Silva's deflected shot going in to break the deadlock Getty Images 52/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Joe Hart pulls off a fantastic save from Esteban Cambiasso's free-kick Getty Images 53/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Frank Lampard celebrates with Samir Nasri after giving Manchester City the lead Getty Images 54/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Frank Lampard taps the ball past goalkeeper Ben Hamer Getty Images 55/111 Leicester 0 Manchester City 1 Leicester fans remain defiant in their support of Nigel Pearson after his clash with a fan last week Getty Images 56/111 Roma 0 Manchester City 2 City players celebrate their victory in Rome Getty Images 57/111 Roma 0 Manchester City 2 Manchester City's Samir Nasri wheels away in celebration Getty Images 58/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Pablo Zabaleta checks on Yaya Toure after the midfielder collapses with a leg injury Getty Images 59/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Yaya Toure scores from the penalty spot what would turn out to be the match-winning goal Getty Images 60/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Phil Jagielka clips his England team-mate James Milner to give away a penalty Getty Images 61/111 Manchester City 1 Everton 0 Sergio Aguero limps off the field after just two minutes with what appeared to be a serious left knee injury Getty Images 62/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Zabaleta prepares to celebrate after scoring GETTY IMAGES 63/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Sergio Aguero is mobbed by his team-mates after scoring his second GETTY IMAGES 64/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Stevan Jovetic celebrates after putting Manchester City ahead in the win over Sunderland Getty Images 65/111 Sunderland 1 Manchester City 4 Connor Wickham chips the ball over Pablo Zabaleta and beyond Joe Hart's reach to give Sunderland the lead Getty Images 66/111 Southampton 0 Man City 3 Manuel Pellegrini clashes with referee Mike Jones GETTY IMAGES 67/111 Southampton 0 Man City 3 Frank Lamaprd scores City's second GETTY IMAGES 68/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Yaya Toure puts City into the lead Getty Images 69/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Stevan Jovetic taps home from close-range to equalise for City Getty Images 70/111 Manchester City 2 Swansea 1 Wilfried Bony celebrates scoring for Swansea as Joe Hart looks on in despair Getty Images 71/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Doumbia’s put CSKA into a quick lead in this Champions League meeting Getty Images 72/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Yaya Toure however brought things level after eight minutes Getty Images 73/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Doumbia was to put the visitors back in front however Getty Images 74/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Then things got worse for City, with Yaya Toure being sent off Getty Images 75/111 Manchester City 1 CSKA Moscow 2 Fernandinho was also sent off for good measure Getty Images 76/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Chris Smalling picks up a booking for blocking Joe Hart Getty 77/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Later in the first half, Smalling was shown another and then sent off Getty 78/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Kompany tackles Di Maria Getty 79/111 Manchester City 1 Manchester United 0 Sergio Aguero celebrates the only goal of the game Getty 80/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 Moussa Sissoko celebrates scoring Newcastle's second goal Getty Images 81/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 David Silva was substituted after suffering a knee injury Getty Images 82/111 Manchester City 0 Newcastle 2 Rolando Aarons watches as his effort finds the corner of the Manchester City goal to give Newcastle the lead Getty Images 83/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 David Silva and Vincent Kompany celebrate after Silva's stunning effort - but it wasn't enough Getty Images 84/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Diafra Sakho and Enner Valencia celebrate what turned out to be the winning goal Getty Images 85/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Joe Hart of Manchester City fails to stop the header by Diafra Sakho GETTY IMAGES 86/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 Sakho heads home his seventh goal in seven matches to put West Ham 2-0 up Getty Images 87/111 West Ham 2 Manchester City 1 City midfielder Fernando tangles with West Ham's Cheikhou Kouyate Getty Images
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immigrants, that easier deportations and this is, you know, what he ran on. It means a criminal prosecution of Hillary Clinton and I think all these things are going to happen because this is the core of what he promised,” agonized Toobin.
With those comments coming in the 6:30 a.m. Eastern half-hour, Toobin was resurrected for the 7:30 a.m. Eastern half-hour and loudly scoffed at the notion that Trump will ever release his tax returns because “this is a guy who just won” and he did “what worked for him.”
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Toobin continued his meltdown for all of liberal judicial activism, whining that:
Why should he feel pressure to do anything? This is a guy who made campaign promises and, like most politicians, he’s going to keep those campaign promises. He’s going to have mass deportations. He’s going to have an investigation and prosecution of Hillary Clinton. This is what he ran on and this is why he won.
Also not a stranger to outbursts against anyone not subscribing to far-left ideologies, Amanpour followed Toobin a few minutes later concerning the reaction to Trump’s victory among international diplomats and foreign leaders.
Amanpour begrudgingly ruled that it’s become so customary for “[e]very single world leader has rolled up and done what they do after every single U.S. election and they’ve congratulated the result of a free and fair democratic election in the United States” but some like French President François Hollande were skeptical of the future with Trump leading the free world.
Just as she and other journalists do whenever there’s a terrorist attack in Europe, Amanpour ran right to berating “far-right” politicians in Europe:
What’s rather troubling is that some of the most eager and jubilant congratulations come from the leaders of far right, nationalist movements in Europe. Geert Wilders, who jumped up and down tweeting that now it’s time for Netherlands to take back their country. For the Dutch, read keep others out and we’ve had Nigel Farage jumping up and down, saying this is fantastic. I hand over the mantle, this what he tweeted to Donald Trump. Two big revolutions in 2016[.]
“Then you’ve had the German Vice-Chancellor who has a put a word of sort of caution out and I’ll read you what he said, that: ‘Trump is the pioneer of a new authoritarian and chauvinist international movement. He is also a warning for us. So, that encapsulates the fear about what’s going on out there,” Amanpour concluded.
The relevant portions of the transcript from CNN’s New Day on November 9 can be found below.Plex is already a mainstay for home-theater diehards who want to scan and catalog their movies, but a host of new features revealed today suggest the app is ready to move into the music world as well. Announced in conjunction with CES, the new features will let Plex identify music as it's uploaded (using the same Gracenote database that powers iTunes' recognition feature), and form automatic playlists based on a song's genre or mood, akin to the "radio" feature in Spotify or Pandora. Plex is also partnering with Vevo to let users stream music videos in HD through the Plex app. Plex already offered music cataloging and other streaming services, but the new features represent a powerful push into the music world for Plex. "We've created a truly seamless music and video platform," said Plex co-founder Scott Olechowski in a statement.
A look at Plex's music interface
The features are particularly important when paired with Plex's existing video features. The service already has apps on nearly every major platform, from gaming consoles like Xbox and Playstation to video-streaming devices like the Roku, Chromecast and Amazon Fire TV. It also reaches mobile devices on Android, iOS, and Windows Phone. That makes it an attractive option for anyone looking to stream music through a home theater system and one of the few independent apps taking on both audio and video at once. It's unclear what Plex will do with its newfound scope, but clearly good news for anyone already using the app to keep track of their movie collection. The upgrades are expected to roll out across platforms in the coming weeks.After conducting a string of interviews for television stations in swing states, President Obama was driven by motorcade to a large Chicago gym at 1 p.m. to play basketball, an Election Day tradition, with friends and staff.
The game, played in a 65,000-square-foot facility that recently was bought at auction, included Education Secretary Arne Duncan; Reggie Love, the president’s former personal assistant; Marty Nesbitt, one of Obama’s closest friends; and former Chicago Bulls players Scottie Pippen and Randy Brown.
The sprawling facility in Chicago’s West Side, formerly called Attack Athletics, has four full-size courts and seating for 1,000 people. The public and reporters were not allowed inside.
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The gym’s developer, Tim Grover, has trained former Chicago Bulls superstar Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers. The facility was bought at foreclosure Oct. 16 and is being donated to the nearby Chicago Hope Academy, a nondenominational Christian high school.Steven Page is back with a brand new solo album on March 11th!
Entitled Heal Thyself Pt. 1: Instinct, the brand new album will be available everywhere digitally on March 11th.
However, fans can whet their appetite today, with Page releasing the first track from the album – “Surprise Surprise” – as a lyric video on Youtube.
Released via Anthem/Olé, pre-orders for Heal Thyself Pt. 1: Instinct also now open via a re-launched stevenpage.com
Heal Thyself Pt. 1: Instinct tracks as follows:
There’s a Melody I
ExplicitThe Work At Hand
Here’s What It Takes
I Can See My House From Here
Manchild
If That’s Your Way
Mama
Surprise Surprise
Hole In the Moonlight
Linda Ronstadt In the 70s
There’s a Melody II
No Song Left To Save Me
Page has again teamed up with long-standing friend and collaborator, Craig Northey (The Odds) on the bulk of songwriting for the record, which is also sprinkled with the musical glitter of Bryden, Jay and Jesse Baird, Kevin Fox and Karen Graves.
To quote Page’s upcoming press kit, “As the music industry continues to evolve, artists such as Steven Page will remain the ones keeping listeners consistently engaged with albums appealing equally to the heart and the head. As he says, ‘The best you can do is make the art you are driven to make, and in the end I know this album sounds like me’.”
Since his first post-BNL solo offering in 2010 (Page One), Steven has busied himself with projects as diverse as a TV show (“The Illegal Eater“), lecturing and campaigning for mental health awareness, and worked extensively on projects with the Art of Time ensemble – most recently singing the songs of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in a string of shows across the US.
Heal Thyself Pt. 1: Instinct is the long-awaited and eagerly-anticipated follow-up full-length release, after fans were teased with “A Different Sort of Solitute” and “Manchild” as standalone releases in 2012.
Much, much more to come tomorrow!
Are you excited for Steven Page’s upcoming solo album? Share your thoughts below – also be sure to follow @stevenpage and @stevenpagefans on Twitter to keep up to date.The majority of the people in my riding are francophones and are proud of their heritage. As a Franco-Ontarian member, I share their pride. I was honoured to serve Canada's francophones as the Parliamentary Secretary for Official Languages during the 39th parliament. Franco-Ontarians are fiercely opposed to Quebec sovereignty. Not only are we proud of our language, but we are also proud of being Canadians. We want a united, undivided Canada.
The people in my riding are against the coalition. In this past week, I have been to all four corners of my riding and the vast majority are not happy with the idea of a coalition for several reasons.
As the stated earlier this week, the great privilege of governing must be earned from the electorate, not taken. A prime minister receives his mandate from the Canadian people and it is unconscionable that the wants to see himself crowned without a mandate from Canadians based on a backroom deal with the NDP and the separatists. The opposition leader and his Liberal coalition absolutely do not want to face the people of Canada. They simply want power with no election.
Canadians understand that the separatist coalition is not about the economic and fiscal update. It is about seizing power without an election. It is not about a budget or about the economy. It is about seizing power without an election. It is not about democracy. It is about seizing power without an election.
The opposition is trying to install a coalition government led by the Liberal Party of Canada, a party that received its lowest level of support since 1867. The opposition is talking about installing the Leader of the Opposition as prime minister, the same leader who was massively rejected by the Canadian voters barely six weeks ago. Now Canadians are learning that the NDP and Bloc were making backroom deals even before the economic update.
It is important to understand that the opposition parties have the right to disagree with our economic update, and they even have the right to vote against it. If the government falls during a confidence vote, it results in an election. Canadians have a right to choose their government. That is how democracy works. Canadians should not suddenly be led by a coalition government simply because that is what the coalition wants.
Not only would Canadians have forced upon them a coalition led by a party that promised a job-killing carbon tax, they would be working hand in hand with a socialist party that has promised to raise business taxes and, worst of all, that would be propped up by a separatist party whose sole purpose is to break up Canada.
In addition, he said on October 10, only seven weeks ago, in the Chronicle-Herald, “I can't govern with somebody who wants to raise the taxes by $50 billion”. The has turned his back on his previous comments and now he is ready to put the interests of our country at stake for a self-serving and highly irresponsible power grab.
This is a desperate move on behalf of the opposition and the result would be disastrous for Canada and for our Canadian economy. Do not take my word on it. The Leader of the Opposition himself said in the September 23 edition of the Toronto Star only 10 weeks ago, “[The leader of the NDP] does not understand the economy. I cannot think that Canadians will give their support to a man who will kill jobs everywhere in the country in raising the corporate tax”.
We are taking action in these uncertain economic times, but as we are focusing on the economy, the opposition is putting its own interests ahead of the interests of Canadians. The Liberal, NDP and Bloc refuse to accept the results of the election we had just six weeks ago. They are now conspiring through secret meetings and backroom deals to seize power and to install an unelected coalition led by a leader that Canadians overwhelmingly rejected on October 14.
While other countries around the world are now scrambling to come up with ways to address the current economic situation, Canada is ahead of the curve, with an ambitious infrastructure plan already in place and more money flowing through our economy, thanks to the tax reductions we have introduced.
It is important to remember that our Conservative government saw this economic situation coming long ago and we have been taking action all along, but particularly since early last year when we tabled our 2008 budget entitled “Responsible Leadership for Uncertain Times”. It is in this budget that we moved ahead with our historic $33 billion infrastructure plan and continued to lower taxes for all Canadian families and businesses.
Since becoming the government, we have consulted with financial experts and a wide variety of stakeholders on how best to protect and grow Canada's economies. We continue to work with these financial experts and stakeholders as we prepare the government's 2009 federal budget, which will build on our strong record of providing responsible and focused spending to address the needs of Canadians and to stimulate our economy.
Let me remind everyone that this fiscal update is about taking certain specific measures and making urgent updates to this year's tax code. The economic and fiscal update is not a budget and it was never intended to be a budget. A budget is a budget and I congratulate our on his initiative to accelerate the tabling of the budget to January 2009. This will be one of the earliest tablings of a federal budget in the history of Canada and we are doing this in order to address the exceptional economic circumstances in which we find ourselves.
We have also taken immediate action to address the concerns of vulnerable Canadians such as our seniors, in light of the current economic situation. These measures include reducing the required minimum withdrawal amounts for their registered retirement income funds by 25% for 2008.
I am proud to stand in the House today in support of our government's economic update, one of the many initiatives our government is taking to protect Canada's future. In our economic and fiscal update, we asked politicians to put the interests of Canadians ahead of their own by making sacrifices in solidarity with the tens of millions of Canadians across this country who are themselves making sacrifices to get through these tough and uncertain economic times.
As the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, I would like my voters to know that I have worked hard to represent them here in the House of Commons over the past three years and I will continue to do so.
Mr. Speaker, as this is the first time I rise in this 40th Parliament, my first words are those of thanks to the people of for having elected me to be their member of Parliament a second time.
[English]
Order, please. I would remind the hon. member not to use proper names but riding names or titles. I thought I heard the proper name of a member of the Bloc Québécois.
[Translation]
I encourage each of my constituents and all Canadians to make their views known on this very important issue. There are many websites, including mine, that will help them make their voices heard. Now is the time to act. Now is the time to stand up for Canada.
However, the Liberal Party and the NDP have crafted a deal with the separatist Bloc party, a party whose main aim is to attack the unity of Canada. They have formed a coalition and are trying to seize power and install the as the prime minister, the same leader who was overwhelmingly rejected by Canadians and by my constituents just seven weeks ago. They want to do all of that without an election.
Given these unprecedented events here on the Hill, I would like to reassure the people of my riding that I am their member of Parliament. They elected me, gave me a strong mandate and that will not change during these challenging times.
We have shown that we are willing to compromise with the opposition parties in order to have our economic statement passed, which would be in the interest of all Canadians. I therefore invite the opposition to show wisdom and patience and to wait for the 2009 budget, which will be tabled in the weeks to come.
Even though we wanted to lead by example by depriving our own party of subsidies, it is now clear that the opposition parties are not willing to put Canadians' interests ahead of their own. We have withdrawn our proposal to eliminate the subsidy for politicians and political parties.
Canadians can see for themselves the threat to our national unity that the separatist coalition poses. The second concern is also with the presuming that he will be the next prime minister. There is a pride here that offends Canadians. Canadians do not like arrogance in politicians and the Leader of the Opposition was soundly defeated by Canadians in the last election and Canadians, Liberal Party members and supporters included, feel strongly that he should not be the prime minister just because he says so.
We also need to remember that former premier Jacques Parizeau wholeheartedly applauded the impressive victory by the Bloc leader and the Bloc Québécois in the recent election. The Bloc is now part and parcel of the proposed coalition government in Ottawa.
[Translation]
I hear a member from Alberta raising an issue that is divisive to the country. We, in this chamber, want unity in this country.
I have a second question. If the support of the Bloc Québécois is so heinous and awful, why did his government rely on that vote 140 times in the last Parliament? Why did they accept the support 140 times for bills they thought were important to move their agenda forward if it is so awful to accept the support of the Bloc Québécois on bills before Parliament?
The first question goes to the issue of arrogance and honesty that he said were so important in a leader. Did the tell the truth when he said that there were no flags behind the table where the three signatories to the coalition entente took place? Did he tell the truth?
Mr. Speaker, I have a great deal of respect for the hon. member, and I know he was a member of the Canadian Forces, but I must ask him two simple questions.
With respect to the separatist Bloc party, if the Bloc party chooses to vote for legislation that the government has put in place, that is fine and well, but we do not and never will have a formal power-sharing agreement through which the government will be ruled with the separatist Bloc. That is the difference, and it is a huge difference. The opposition has given the separatist Bloc veto power over matters that affect Canada.
Mr. Speaker, I am glad my colleague raised the question of the flags. The answer is, categorically, that there were no Canadian flags directly behind the three leaders who were signing that agreement. The Canadians flags were pushed well off to the side and they were not behind the three leaders signing that backroom deal contract. I thank the member for giving me the opportunity to clarify regarding the absence of Canadian flags behind the three leaders during that signing agreement.
[Translation]
I have a slightly more serious question about how the Conservatives are changing their tune, depending on whether they are speaking French or English. It is funny: when I listen to the interpretation provided by the people in the booths, who do an outstanding job, I notice that when the word “separatists” is used in English, it is translated as “séparatistes” in French and that when the word “souverainistes” is used in French, it is translated as “sovereignists” in English. Everyone understand that. Only the Conservatives are using double-talk. In French, so as not to offend Quebeckers, they are using the term “souverainistes”, and in English, to do a little Quebec-bashing, to show their hatred for Quebeckers, they are using the term “separatistssssssss”.
Mr. Speaker, everyone wants to speak this morning. According to the Conservatives' logic, your chair will have to be changed, because the flag to your right will have to be positioned behind you. According to the Conservatives, it is not good to have a flag off to the side. It must be behind people. This is a completely fallacious argument.
[English]
I thank members for giving me the opportunity to clarify our messaging and to point out that it is the Bloc MPs who are the separatists.
We are not talking about Quebec or Quebeckers, Franco-Ontarians, francophones in Quebec or francophones in Canada. We are not talking about francophones. Rather, we are talking about Bloc Québécois members who are separatists or sovereignists. That is the biggest problem.
However, I want to clarify that we are delivering exactly the same message and the Bloc is a separatist party. It admits that. The Bloc leader and Mr. Parizeau admit that. I also want to be clear on our messaging.
Mr. Speaker, I think it is fair to point out, and the member opposite should realize this, that different languages have different terms and different meanings. It is fine to say separatists in English and to say souverainistes en français.
[Translation]
I hope the hon. member will not beat about the bush and give us a bunch of rhetoric. I would like him to answer those two questions.
Meanwhile, putting all that aside, I would like the hon. member to answer the following question. Supposing there is a budget in January, and the Liberals and the NDP vote against it, while the Bloc Québécois—the so-called separatists—vote with the Conservatives, will the say that he cannot accept a vote obtained from the separatists and that he must call an election?
Did the call the three opposition leaders so as to be able to examine the economic problems and come up with a budget? Yes or no?
I will speed things up. During the election, the said that if he obtained a minority government, he would work with the opposition. The day after the election, he also addressed the nation and said that since it had elected a minority government, he would work with the opposition to make Parliament work.
In short, this shows how low people have sunk in this House of Commons. We should instead be focusing on the economy and people who have lost their jobs.
Mr. Speaker, we have reached the point where we have to fight to determine what side the Canadian flag is on. I listened to the's address to the nation last night. The Canadian flag was not behind him; it was on either side of him.
[English]
Speaking about minority governments and wanting to work with the opposition, once again last night the, on national television, asked the opposition parties to submit their ideas and to work with the government. They will not do so and the leader of the NDP had a secret deal with the separatist Bloc from long ago. That is right from the mouth of the leader of the NDP, and that is the problem. Does the NDP really want to work for Canadians and work with the government when it is putting in place, behind the backs of Canadians, a secret deal with the Bloc party. I think not.
As I mentioned, when it comes to a party, if they want to vote in favour of legislation that the government has tabled, that is fine, and the government will not reject that, but to put in place a formal power-sharing agreement with which to govern Canada, that is wrong.
Mr. Speaker, I am surprised how shallow the questions really are. I think the member should be taking things a little more seriously.
Could my hon. colleague comment on the wisdom or folly of getting out ahead of what is happening in the U.S., particularly as it has the most interlinked economy and industries with us, and the wisdom of waiting until January 27 to field a budget that would take account of what the Americans are doing?
Mr. Speaker, I would like to get back to the issue of the economic update and some facts. The fact is that Canada represents about 2% of the world economy. Some people seem to think that we can go it alone without taking account of what the other 98% is doing, and that, of course, is ridiculous.
I ask the opposition to put aside its power grab. Let us work together for the interests of our economy.
I would like to reiterate what the said last night. We are asking the opposition to participate in this process. The has said that the budget will be tabled in January. There is time between now and January for the opposition to participate in this budget and in this very important process for all Canadians.
The auto industry is interconnected between the United States and Canada and it would be imprudent for Canada to charge ahead with our own stimulus package without co-ordinating this with the impact the U.S. package may have in Canada. It is better that we take the time to consult, as I mentioned, with our financial experts, stakeholders and Canadians, keeping an eye on what the Americans are doing, and that we all work together.
In our economic update, we were very clear that stimulating the economy was important and necessary. However, it is also necessary to work with our biggest trading partner, the United States, which is about to have a change of government.
Now is the time for us to stop the rhetoric about how we will do this and who will govern. We are talking about the economic livelihood and vibrancy of Canada. We are asking all members of Parliament to stop the politics and start to put the interests of people ahead of partisan interests.
We can. We can accelerate the infrastructure programs. We can make stimulative investments in certain areas where job losses are anticipated. We can mitigate those job losses, or we can invest in those areas where we know we can quickly get jobs put on the table.
How can we ignore the fact that Canadians will be looking at this and saying, “Can't you mitigate the situation? Can't you do something?”
We have a lot of input from the provinces, the economic forecasters, Canadians and every one of the political parties. They have all called for an economic stimulus. The auto sector, the manufacturing sector, the forestry sector and the health care system have called for it. The OECD has forecasted that we will lose about 250,000 jobs in the near future. That is a lot of pain for a lot of Canadians.
I wonder what Canadians would say if the government immediately announced that Parliament would resume on January 4, not the January 27, and that the would come to this place present a mini-budget, not a full-blown budget, and lay on the table the principal strategies and actions to address the realities of the Canadian economic crisis? Know what? Canadians would say that would be the responsible thing to do. Canadians would look at it carefully and they would seek the assessment of the experts to see if this would be a good thing.
When are we going to change? When are we going to start accepting facts? When are we going to start taking decisive action when action is necessary?
The turnout rate in the last election was very low. I have no proof of the reasons, but I can only speculate that it was because of the nastiness, the games, the lack of credibility, the lack of confidence, that ordinary, law-abiding decent people looked at Parliament and the government and said that they did not want to have anything to do with us.
It is not credible, and the article is all about that. The government has misled Canadians and parliamentarians. On top of that, and I will not go into it, because it would be fun, it threw in some items which would inflame a few people. It had nothing to do with protecting the jobs, savings, mortgages and pensions of Canadians. It had to do with politics. That is why Canadians are so upset.
If we look at this very carefully, this is not a subjective issue. This is a situation where the numbers speak for themselves. We now have the numbers rolling in that show we are already in a recession. They show that we are already incurring deficits. They show that our growth has gone down, not up. Yet the economic statement says that we still will have 0.3% growth.
Mr. Paul Szabo: They must be all wrong and the is the only one who knows.
Why does the Parliamentary Budget Officer not agree with the? The forecasters on whom the finance minister relies for budgeting do not agree with the finance minister. The OECD does not agree with the finance minister. Nobody in the G20 agrees with our finance minister.
We are in a deflationary cycle now. In fact, the growth rate included in the economic statement for the next fiscal year was 0.3%, the highest projected growth rate of any expert who ever opined on such a factor. Most countries are between 0% growth and minus 0.2% growth.
This article from a forecaster, one the has been relying on, says that the finance minister is wrong. We cannot assume that what he did in prior years will continue to have that stimulative effect. It is not there.
If we wait to have perfect information before we do something, we may have missed the boat and we may spend the money and get no return for it because we have buried ourselves so badly we cannot get out.
Anybody who has taken economics 101 or better knows about the concept of economic lags. An economic lag tells us to do something, but it will take three, six, nine months, depending on what it is, before it has any implications.
The says that what the government has done in the past will continue to stimulate the economy by $31 billion a year. That is why he has not taken any additional measures right away in terms of economic stimulus. This is the fundamental fact. The has said time and time again that he wants to wait and see whether we need an economic stimulus. He wants to wait and see whether jobs are lost.
In the fiscal update the argued that his previous tax cuts were stimulating the Canadian economy by about $31 billion. Let me remind the House about the presumption of honesty, integrity, credibility and accountability.
There is an interesting article in the Globe and Mail, which I want to bring to the attention of the House and of Canadians because I think it is useful. The headline reads “[Finance Minister's] plan prolongs the pain”. This opinion is from one of the key forecasters who the federal government depends on to do its budgeting and the update on November 27.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer has said, notwithstanding the protestations of the government, that the government is solely responsible for the economic mess we are in today, and it will get worse.
I am a chartered accountant, and I do not want to give an accounting lesson, but I want members to understand that there are some fundamentals we should not discount or ignore or say that is not the case and summarily dismiss them. They are facts.
Let me give an example. If government employees are working in that building and a decision is made to sell that building and lease it back, rent will have to be paid. If a building is owned, rent is not paid, but there are other costs such as maintenance and capital cost allowances, et cetera. There are some financial implications. Generally speaking, a well managed asset means a better deal could be done than a lease deal because there would be no rate of return built into the leasing costs.
It is important to understand that principles were articulated in the's economic statement of November 27, which included such things as the sale of $10 billion worth of assets. If $10 billion worth of assets are sold, there are $10 billion to spend, once. Those assets were either providing a return or they were eliminating an expense that we would otherwise have had to incur.
For instance, we can sell an asset, get the profit from the sale of that asset and then use that to spend. That is available for one year. Alternatively, we can keep the asset, which will pay dividends or some return, rent or whatever it might be, and that benefit will be there each and every year for as long as we own the asset.
That was included in the budgets that were presented to Parliament. Those are the principles under which budgets were prepared and those are the principles under which, not only did we get the government books in order, but we had 10 years of surplus to pay down debt, restore funding to all of the important programs that Canadians need and deserve, and reduce taxes, but only when they were affordable.
However, there was another principle in there, the prudence principle. The prudence principle said that there has been some discomfort with the government's forecasting of growth rates and interest rates. Even though we rely on the input of various parties, we will build into our budgeting a prudence factor. The prudence factor took the average projected GDP growth rate of the third party experts and reduced it by either a quarter or a half, in fact it was a very conservative estimate of growth. We did not want to overstate it. If anything, I would rather understate growth than overstate it, so we get the worst case scenario in our budgeting.
Included in the budgetary planning and strategy for the Liberal government was a contingency reserve. It is surprising that even the thought it was actually money sitting as a reserve to spend if we needed it. The contingency reserve is not money sitting somewhere. It is a principle. The contingency reserve says that once we get to a position where we only have a $3 billion surplus, we will not spend any more money unless there is a significant unplanned, unanticipated activity, like a SARS crisis, a BSE crisis or 9/11. That is when we can dip into that last $3 billion of the ongoing surplus.
When we were faced with issues, such as the SARS crisis, the BSE crisis, the Mexican peso crisis and even 9/11, those had significant impacts on the financial circumstances of every government involved with those events.
The Conservative government's mechanics of budgeting and spending has changed the way in which budgeting has been approached in the past. In the past, when the Liberals, for instance, took over in 1993 and inherited a $42 billion annual deficit, we had to get our fiscal house in order. It took until 1997 for that to happen but since then we have had surplus budgets. Those budgets were achieved and, in many cases, over. The key is that if we do not pay down some debt in good times, we will never pay it down in bad times. That is important, which is why having a surplus is not a bad thing.
If we look at page 50, we see that the government is, for the next fiscal year, projecting a $6 billion deficit. It inherited a $13 billion annual surplus but that is gone. There is no surplus. It was depleted by the erosion of the tax base and by excessive spending at a time when we should have been prudent.
Let there be no question, from any side of the House, that the numbers in the deficit scenario laid out by the in the economic statement on November 27 reflect what the government expects to see in the absence of doing anything else. It has no budget and no stimulus package. What it is saying is that it should just keep going and do nothing.
A report was released by Mr. Page in which he points out that the Conservative fiscal policy decisions are largely to blame for what is occurring. He states:
He is an appointee of the, someone who is charged with the responsibility of giving the facts. He said clearly that it was due to the erosion of the tax base. It was due to an increase in spending by over $40 billion annually, which put us into a deficit situation.
Therefore, the starting point of this debate should be on what the Parliamentary Budget Officer said on November 20. He is an officer of Parliament and he said that the financial distress that the Government of Canada was presently experiencing had nothing to do with the global financial crisis or the credit crunch. In fact, he went further to say that the problems that we were experiencing from a fiscal standpoint were totally due to the actions or inactions of the current government, the Conservative government.
By providing an independent Parliamentary Budget Officer who has full access to the resources of the finance department, the same as the finance minister, he or she can provide information that Canadians all can rely upon.
In the election of 2006, accountability was the very first issue that Parliament dealt with. Under the Federal Accountability Act, we established the position of Parliamentary Budget Officer. The Parliamentary budget Officer, Mr. Page, was appointed by the because, in the past, members of Parliament in some parties had been expressing their concern about the integrity of the information being provided by the government.
Accountability, to m, means true, full and plain disclosure of the reasons that one did or did not do something so that people will understand. To split hairs, to give a piece of the story without the other part of it tends to lead to a variety of interpretations rather than the truth, and I think that is what frustrates Canadians.
Parliament operates on the basis of confidence. It means that the governing party enjoys the confidence of the House, and it is important to remember that. It also presumes the integrity of the information that is provided outside of this chamber. It also operates on the presumption of honesty. Unfortunately, far too often we have situations where people like to state things in a manner that h is not really accountable.
There is a very important matter before us and it is a matter that will affect the daily lives of virtually every Canadian.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate on the economic update that was delivered on November 27 by the. Unfortunately, the latitude of the debate has been stretched beyond recognition. We have spent far too much time debating politics and other strategic activities.
Mr. Speaker, in light of the events that are taking place as we speak, my question is this. What would Robert Baldwin and Louis-Hippolyte La Fontaine, two fathers of responsible government in Canada, two citizens, one francophone, one anglophone, who reached across the aisle to forge a consensus, two people who, out of the rebellions of Upper and Lower Canada in the 19th century, argued that violence was not the solution, but rather a redefined role for the legislative branch of government, one that would see the legislative branch as central to the political life of a nation, have said about the events that have transpired in the House and outside of the House this week?
They were bright men. That is what they would have done and that is what the government should do.
Mr. Speaker, they would probably tell us to get back to work. They would probably tell us to do our job. They would probably tell us to put the interest of the people before our own interest. They probably would tell us to stop playing politics in Parliament and start making good policy that is going to deliver jobs, that is going to protect older workers, that is going to amend the EI, that is going to deal with immigration policy that is fair and reasonable, that is going to deal with helping young people get the skills training they need and the transitioning things.
Did the three opposition parties have any choice, given the government's disregard for prudent fiscal management and its refusal to stimulate the economy and to provide a plan, but to provide the people of Canada with an alternative to restore trust and confidence in the House and to provide sound fiscal management of the economy?
Mr. Speaker, the member for referred to today'swherein a leading economic think tank, which the Department of Finance depends upon to provide its economic forecasts, stated that the update of the last week would extend the country's recession and exacerbate the threat of deflation. In fact, it said that it would put us into a dangerous deflationary spiral.
The fact is the government has lost the confidence of Parliament and the reason being, in one word, is trust.
It is dangerously wrong because it says that the government is in denial about the financial tsunami that has not even hit Canada yet. We have not even seen it. We are already in deficit and yet this is still coming.
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for has asked a responsible question. I hope Canadians will see that third parties advising the government have expressed their shock and dismay at the
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to section 2 and count 2 referring to section 3. Petitioners were in effect charged with violating all the provisions of each section of the ordinance or any one provision of each section. They were found guilty ‘as charged’ and sentenced ‘on said conviction.’ It cannot therefore be determined from the face of the record whether or not they were found guilty of violating the one valid provision of section 3. The expression ‘and/or’, which made possible a conviction couched in such general terms, has met with widespread condemnation.... It is true that the expression has proved convenient in contracts and other instruments where, by its intentional equivocation, it can anticipate alternative possibilities without the cumbersome itemization of each one.... It lends itself, however, as much to ambiguity as to brevity. Thus it cannot intelligibly be used to fix the occurrence of past events. A purported conclusion that either one or both of two events occurred is a mere restatement of the problem, not a decision as to which event actually occurred. If a person is accused of violating an unconstitutional as well as a constitutional provision of a statute and the verdict by the use of ‘and/or’ declares him guilty of violating either one or both provisions, it is an open question whether he is guilty of any punishable offense. The verdict in effect states that the accused is guilty or innocent of violating the constitutional provision.
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1942: In re Lewis, [1942] Ch 424 at 425, per Farwell J:
The expression “and/or” is unfortunate. I do not think I have met it before in a will, and I hope I shall never meet it again.
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1944: Bonitto v Fuerst Bros, [1944] AC 75 at 82 (HL) per Viscount Simon:
Para. 18 stated the alternative claim in a variety of phrases, separated from one another by the repeated use of the bastard conjunction “and/or” which has, I fear, become the commercial court’s contribution to basic English.
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1948: Gray Coach Lines Ltd v Bell Telephone Co, [1948] OWN 205
Our Courts have more than once expressed dislike of the expression “and/or”.... I cannot see how, if the words ‘and/or’ are construed in this way, so as to give them both a conjunctive and disjunctive mean ing, the pleading is evasive. Pleading in the alternative is not objectionable unless it is in such form as to be embarrassing. It remains to be determined whether in the present case the expression “and/or” is evasive and, consequently, embarrassing..... An order will go striking out of para. 4 either of the words in the expression “and/or” at the option of the plaintiff, with leave to amend the paragraph as advised.
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1950: Looke v Parbury Henty & Co Pty Ltd, [1950] VLR 94 at 98:
“I agree that the expression `and/or’ is commonly an indication that the draftsman is not clear in his own mind about the matters with which he has to deal....”
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1956: Neame v Neame’s Trs, [1956] SLT 57:
But it would be most unfortunate if a confusing expression such as `and/or’ were to become a common feature in Scottish marriage contracts or testamentary settlements (Lord Clyde at 62).
.... I would venture to add that in my judgment the phrase `and/or’ is at best a loose and ambiguous term which would be better not to be used in formal legal writs affecting patrimonial interests (Lord Russell at 64)..... The expression `and/or’ is not a happy one and, if occurring in a simple gift, might give rise to a serious problem of construction (Lord Sorn at 64).
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1957: Shadden v Cowan, 213 Georgia 29, 96 SE 2d 608 at 30-31 (1957):
The petitioners bring this action for injunctive relief, alleging themselves to be ‘patrons of the Cartersville public school system and/or taxpayers of the City of Cartersville.’ The use of the equivocal term ‘and/or’ has been often criticized.... In the instant case, the petitioners do not allege themselves to be patrons of the Cartersville public school system or taxpayers of the City of Cartersville. They do not state in what capacity they seek equitable relief. Before they would be entitled to maintain a cause of action as taxpayers against the defendants, they must allege that they are in fact taxpayers and must allege facts to show that they are entitled to the relief sought. Likewise, to maintain an action as patrons of Cartersville’s public schools, they must positively allege that they are such patrons and as such are entitled to the relief for which they pray. The fact that an action might be maintained by taxpayers or that an action might be maintained by patrons of a public school system, provided sufficient facts are alleged to show that complainants are entitled to the relief sought, will not save the instant petition from dismissal where it fails to allege positively what in fact is the petitioners’ basis for seeking equitable relief. Where, as here, they seek to predicate their right to bring their action as members of a class, they must allege positively that they belong to such a class as would be authorized to maintain the action.
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1965: John G Stein & Co Ltd v O’Hanlon, [1965] AC 890 at 904:
The symbol ‘and/or” is not yet part of the English language.
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1976: Klecan v Schmal, 241 NW 2d 529 at 533 (Neb 1976):
With reference to the use of the phrase ‘and/or,‘ we have stated in connection with the drafting of statutes that the use of the phrase is not to be recommended as it leads to uncertainty, ambiguity, and multiplicity.... Nevertheless the phrase is still frequently, though perhaps not advisedly, used in the preparation of contracts, negotiable instruments, and similar documents. Where so used, the commonly accepted meaning is that ‘and/or’ means either ‘and’ or ‘or,‘ or both.
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1981: Raine v Drasin, 621 SW 2d 895 at 905 (Ky 1981):
[T]he much condemned conjunctive-disjunctive crutch of sloppy thinkers.
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1985: Higgins v Orion Insurance Co (1985), 50 OR (2d) 352 (CA):
The difficulty in ascertaining the precise coverage intended by the policy is reflected by these various interpretations. This is hardly a surprising consequence of the use of the expression “and/or”. That term has often created confusion and ambiguity and for many years has been the subject of frequent criticism. It has been condemned as “a confusing hybrid”, “a grammatical monstrosity”, “a bastard sired by indolence (he by ignorance) out of dubiety”, and “an unfortunate expression which I have not met before and which, I hope, I may never meet again”.... Nonetheless, the expression has enjoyed increased usage in contracts and other legal documents, and when properly used can serve as a convenient abbreviation to avoid clumsy circumlocation. A court’s duty, of course, is to interpret the term so as to best express the true intention of the parties to the transaction. The interpretation to be afforded it must in each instance depend upon the circumstances under which it was used. In the context of a dispute arising out of a policy of insurance, if the term should create an ambiguity then by the familiar rule of interpretation the ambiguity will be construed most favourably to the insured.
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1989: California Trout Inc v State Water Resources Bd, 255 Cal Rpter 184 at 194 (note 8):
“‘And/or’ is taboo” in legislative drafting.
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1998: Moage Limited, [1998] FCA 296, (1998) 153 ALR 711
In my opinion, the expression is particularly unhappy when it is used in a statement of claim, which should express precisely the foundation of the proceeding. In the present case, as has been explained, an almost endless series of additional and alternative allegations would be conveyed by an analysis of the claim made in this way.... The loosely framed drafting of paragraph 215A simply sweeps these problems under the carpet by alleging that Mallesons was aware of facts by Holland and/or Stumbles and/or Humphry and/or Halstead and/or Warnick. But there is a real question whether the knowledge of, say, Holland could affect the question whether Halstead was in breach of fiduciary duty or negligent.
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1998: Sandman v Farmers Ins Exch, 969 P 2d 277 at 281 (Mont 1998):
Aside from observing that the use of this much-maligned and overused conjunctive-disjunctive reflects poor draftsmanship and generally should be avoided, we are, nonetheless, unpersuaded that the use of “and” and “or” with the slash is any more correct or any less confusing than without the slash. According to the legal commentators, when used together with “and,” the word “or” usually includes “and” and the “and/or” phrase means “either or both of.” Inclusion of the “/” would not have corrected any error, ambiguity or confusion already inherent in the use of the “and” “or” conjunctive-disjunctive.
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2007: Philip Services Corp v City of Seattle, 2007 U.S. Dist. Lexis 14906 at para 21 (2 March 2007, SD Tex)
The potentially confusing uses of “and” and “or” has long been noted [by] students of legal writing.
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2010: St Clair v Timtalla Pty Ltd Anor (No 2), [2010] QSC 480 at para 11:
The pleading is replete with the device “and/or” which was accurately described by Viscount Simon... as the “Bastard conjunction” which was the “commercial courts contribution to basic English”. The term has generally been regarded as unacceptable in commercial documents and more so in pleadings.
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I welcome comments or criticisms. I also welcome comments and criticisms.
But I certainly don’t welcome comments and/or criticisms.The Heat have officially acquired Beno Udrih and Jarnell Stokes from the Grizzlies for Mario Chalmers and James Ennis, per Yahoo! Sports/FOX Sports 1 NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski. But how will Stokes and Udrih fit into the Heat, who clearly made this move to shave some tax dollars? Let’s figure that out now:
Beno Udrih
The 33-year-old Udrih has some years on Chalmers, but he makes about half of the former Heat point guard’s salary for this year. That said, Udrih has proven to be a positive backup point guard in the past, even if he plays a different style from Chalmers, who is far more three-point happy.
Article continues below...
While Chalmers is a spacer when he’s playing in his ideal sense (though he hasn’t been all too accurate a shooter in the Post-LeBron Era), Udrih is more of a pick-and-roll facilitator. He’ll pull up off the dribble from inside the three-point line, but he won’t attempt many long balls, even if he is a 35-percent career shooter from beyond the arc. He’s a smart player who tends to make good decisions, but his skill set doesn’t lend him to becoming the most efficient offensive presence, considering he’s most comfortable taking mid-range shots/floaters and doesn’t get to the free-throw line all too often.
Udrih isn’t much of a defender either, but that’s not a huge downgrade on Chalmers, who would struggle when guarding quicker ball guards. In the end, Udrih might actually be a better fit stylistically for Miami. He can run pick-and-roll with Chris Bosh or Hassan Whiteside or Amar’e Stoudemire or Josh McRoberts. And he’s a more competent facilitator than what Miami had at the backup point-guard spot before making the deal, even if he’s not a shooter of Chalmers’ caliber.
Jarnell Stokes
Stokes has only played in 21 games over his first two NBA seasons, but he was a second-round pick of the Grizzlies back in June of 2014. Stokes can rebound and actually has decent hands, but he hasn’t proven to be much of a scorer. His feet, meanwhile, are a little clunky, preventing him from becoming the caliber of defender Memphis needed to see to put him into its rotation.
He doesn’t step away from the rim, which would prevent the power forward from ever playing alongside Whiteside (presumably). Realistically, Stokes isn’t playing all too many minutes anyway. He’ll be behind Bosh, Whiteside, Stoudemire and McRoberts in the big-man rotation for sure. It’s possible he also finds himself behind Udonis Haslem and Chris Andersen, two veterans who have seldom played this year.
Follow Fred Katz on Twitter: @FredKatz.ST. PAUL, Minn. (WCCO) — As the season winds down for the Minnesota Wild, a postseason run seems more and more likely.
With six games left in the regular season, the team has a firm grip on the wildcard spot and that means fans are taking steps to lock in seats to see the playoff action.
When the Minnesota Wild secure wins on the ice, there’s also plenty of success off the ice.
“It’s been crazy busy in here,” Emily Hare, an employee at the Hockey Lodge in the Xcel Energy Center, said.
At the Hockey Lodge, the rush comes from customers who want to wear their team allegiance.
“The team is doing great and people want to support us,” Hare said.
But the real surge is happening in the team’s front office. Since the beginning of March, season ticket sales have reached record-highs for this time of year.
“It’s very exciting this momentum and the home wins, just this past weekend, have been epic for the Wild organization, Jamie Spencer, vice president of new business development with the Minnesota Wild, said.
A sales staff of 30 fills long days with non-stop calls, often ending with a sale.
“We don’t mind putting in our hours, just like our team is,” Spencer said.
Existing ticket-holders want more seats, even in the twilight of the season. Newcomers are locking into next year, all because of the added perk.
“They do it in hopes the team makes the playoffs and they can maximize the number of people going to the games. So, season ticket holders stand the best chance of doing it. They’re jumping on board now hoping the team extends the season,” Spencer said.
Sure, a lot can happen between now and the postseason. But with last 24 of 30 games ending with a win, it’s a sure bet more fans will put their money on the Minnesota Wild.
“People are so quick to call and get playoff seats and re-up for next year. We don’t think this is a one-year run. We think they’re in it for a long time,” Spencer said.
The Wild say season tickets are selling so fast, there may come a point where those who wait to buy next year’s season tickets will go a waiting list. The last time that happened was about 10 years ago.
Another driving force behind the uptick in season ticket sales is the interest in next year’s outdoor game at TCF Bank Stadium where, the Wild will take on the Chicago Blackhawks.Is the food you and your family eat everyday really free from synthetic chemical pesticides? Join us. Challenge yourself to switch to organic food and help promote pesticide-free food for families everywhere. Together, we can fix the broken food system!
To know how organic food actually affects your body, two Japanese families, both with two children who usually eat mostly conventional food, challenged themselves to switch their diet to 100% organic food for 10 days.
These two families decided to switch over to organic food.
“My second daughter was suffering from allergic reactions when she was an infant. I thought her sensitivities to allergies might have been caused by food...” - Ms Hirukawa.
“I don’t think the impact on adults is big but we have children, so I’m worried about the impact on their bodies.” - Ms Naka.
Before and after 10 days, urine samples from these two families were collected and tested to check for different levels of pesticides in their bodies. The study was commissioned by Greenpeace Japan and testing samples were analysed at independent laboratory in Germany (full report here).
We found that pesticides levels in the urine showed a striking decrease after eating organic food, and that there were comparatively higher levels of some pesticides among the four children, compared to the adults.
Before
After
Children can be very susceptible to the effects of toxic chemicals as their organs are still in development. A child’s developing brain is also more susceptible to neurotoxicants, and the dose of pesticides per body weight is likely to be higher in children due to their small size.
The study shows that eating organic food is an effective way to reduce chemical pesticides in the body. But to promote really “chemical pesticides free” life, the solution is to switch diet to ecological food or “eco food”.
So, what is “eco food”?
Eco food and organic food have many things in common. Both are crops or livestock grown without chemical pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, GMOs or antibiotics. But eco food goes a step further in that is also means food that is locally grown, seasonal, nutritious and promotes biodiversity. It is independently produced by innovative farmers, who receive a fair remuneration for their crops.
Will you take the challenge?
It seems the greatest barrier to more families eating more organic food isn’t the lack of benefits for people and the planet, but its availability and affordability. Consumers can make a real difference to this situation by letting the retailers that you shop from know that you want to change how you eat.
Join us. Challenge yourself to switch to organic food and help promote pesticide-free food for families everywhere. Together, we can fix the broken food system!
Kenji Ishihara is a Food Campaigner for Greenpeace JapanIn celebration of this year's St. Patricks Day, all orders of $100 or more placed on March 17th and 18th will automatically receive a FREE Random Capsule Sample Pack with an approximate retail value of $25! Which capsules might ye' receive? Well, that's all up to luck of the draw, but here's what we can tell ya:
Each Random Capsule Sample Pack will include 4 jars of 15 capsules each. No duplicates included. The possible capsule products you may receive are Sensoril Ashwagandha, KSM-66 Ashwagandha, Teacrine (patented Theacrine), Phenylpiracetam, Centrophenoxine, Caffeine/L-Theanine and Oxiracetam.* No requests please. May the luck of the Irish be with you!
For those that choose to chase that always elusive pot'o gold at the end of the rainbow, let us help you out with our Pot o' Gold sale**! All orders of $300 or more placed March 17th and 18th will automatically receive a FREE Random Capsule Sample Pack(full details above), 20% OFF your total order with coupon code LUCKY and a FREE Nootropics Depot logo t-shirt!
Have a happy and safe St. Patty's Day!
-Your Friends at Nootropics Depot
*Order must be placed on 03/17/16 or 3/18/16 for eligibility. Offer valid for 1 random capsule sample pack per person per address. Random capsule sample pack is chosen at random (who would have thought!?). Please no product requests. Order total must be equal to or exceed $100.00 before shipping and after any applicable discounts. Offer may not be applied retroactively to a previous order. Offer does not stack with Pot o' Gold Sale. Random Capsule Sample Pack may not be returned or exchanged. Does not apply to gift certificate purchases. Offer valid while supplies last.TEXAS
Voter-ID law is reinstated for election
A federal appeals court on Tuesday reinstated Texas’s voter-identification law for the November election, which the Justice Department had condemned as the state’s latest means of suppressing minority voter turnout.
The ruling by the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit temporarily blocks last week’s ruling by U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos in Corpus Christi, who said the law was unconstitutional and similar to a poll tax designed to dissuade minorities from voting.
The 5th Circuit did not rule on the merits of the law; instead, it determined it was too late to change the rules for the upcoming election. Early voting starts Oct. 20.
The law remains under appeal. For now, the ruling is a key victory for Republican-backed photo-ID measures that have swept across the United States in recent years. The Texas law, considered the toughest of its kind in the nation, requires an estimated 13.6 million registered voters to have one of seven kinds of photo identification to cast a ballot.
— Associated Press
HEALTH
Faster test created to detect enterovirus 68
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has created a faster test for detecting a strain of enterovirus behind an outbreak of respiratory illnesses affecting hundreds of children in recent months, the agency announced Tuesday.
The CDC said the new test for enterovirus 68 produces a result within a few days, rather than the several weeks needed under the current test.
The faster test will help the CDC track where and when the outbreak of the virus is ending. The CDC expects the rate of new infections to decline as the weather turns colder, and it is seeing evidence of this at some hospitals.
There is no known treatment for the virus beyond managing symptoms.
The virus strain has infected at least 691 people in 46 states and the District of Columbia since mid-August, most of them children, according to CDC data.
— Reuters
WISCONSIN
Judge blocks campaign law
A federal judge on Tuesday blocked enforcement of a Wisconsin election law that is at the center of an investigation into Gov. Scott Walker’s 2012 recall campaign and more than two dozen conservative groups.
U.S. District Judge Rudolph Randa granted the request to block the law from the Milwaukee-based group Citizens for Responsible Government Advocates while the conservative group’s underlying lawsuit challenging the law’s constitutionality goes forward.
The ruling allows candidates to coordinate and work closely with independent groups that don’t explicitly tell people how to vote. Those groups frequently run television ads attacking or praising candidates, without saying whom to vote for.
The group, which backs Walker (R), argued that immediate action was needed because it wants to work with candidates before the Nov. 4 election to create a Web site but fears such coordination could be found to be illegal.
— Associated Press
Former mayor sentenced to four years in prison: Former Charlotte, N.C. mayor Patrick Cannon (D) was sentenced Tuesday to nearly four years in prison after admitting to using public positions in the state’s largest city for personal financial gain, including taking at least $50,000 in bribes. Cannon, 47, who was elected mayor in November, pleaded guilty in June to a corruption charge.
Antiabortion group to display images near Liberty Bell: An antiabortion group has received a permit to project images of bloody, aborted fetuses on a 10- by 12-foot screen next to the Liberty Bell on Philadelphia’s historic Independence Mall. Ohio-based Created Equal said it will show the images on a continuous loop from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday. A public affairs officer for the Independence National Historical Park said the agency doesn’t consider content when it permits assemblies or activities. The group’s national director, Mark Harrington, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that warning signs will be posted so parents can keep their children away from the images.
Teens charged in ‘ice bucket challenge’ prank: Five Ohio teenagers were charged Tuesday with dumping a bucket containing urine, tobacco and spit over the head of a boy with autism who thought he was participating in the ALS “ice bucket challenge,” a county prosecutor said. The five unidentified high school students face disorderly-conduct charges, and three of them were charged with assault in juvenile court for the Aug. 18 incident, Cuyahoga County prosecutor Timothy McGinty said. The group doused the 14-year-old boy with the fouled water in Bay Village, a suburb west of Cleveland, and posted a video of the incident on Instagram, police said.
— From news servicesYou are here: Home
A hybrid tram powered by hydrogen cells and supercapacitors rolled off the assembly line Wednesday in north China's Hebei Province.
A hybrid tram powered by hydrogen cells and supercapacitors rolled off the assembly line Wednesday in north China's Hebei Province. [Photo/Chinanews.com]
According to Tangshan Railway Vehicle Co. Ltd. (TRC), the tram's major developer, the hybrid tram can operate for longer than existing trams and there is no need for an overhead line. Moreover, it has no emissions.
It took the state-owned company and Southwest Jiaotong University four years to develop the pollution-free tram, which can carry 336 passengers. A 15-minute hydrogen refill can power the vehicle for 40 kilometers at speeds as high as 70 km per hour, according to TRC.
Water, which controls the reaction temperature inside the fuel cell so no nitrogen oxide is produced, will be the only discharge from the tram.
It has been heralded as the first tram in the world to use a hybrid power system featuring hydrogen fuel cells and supercapacitors.
Hydrogen fuel cells are a clean energy source, widely used in the automobile industry.
China in 2015 was the first country to utilize hydrogen-powered tram technology with China South Rail Corp.'s (CSR) hydrogen-powered tramcar.
Follow China.org.cn on Twitter and Facebook to join the conversation.Introducing Skull Crushing Ape from Devils Backbone Brewing
LEXINGTON, VA – Devils Backbone Brewing Company has released the second beer in our 2016 Trail Blazer series: Skull Crushing Ape (8% ABV), a Schwarz, Weisen, Dopple Bock. Trail Blazer beers stray from the beaten path into a world of robust and daring beers featuring bigger, bolder flavors for fueling your spirit of adventure. Available through April, Skull Crushing Ape is an amalgamation of three German brewing styles, Schwarz, Weisen, and Dopple Bock, brought together with an American flair.
“Skull Crushing Ape is a fun beer. It blends three great approaches together creating something totally special,” said Brewmaster Jason Oliver. “You get hints of chocolate and banana in a nice complex punch of flavor.”
Skull Crushing Ape embodies the attitude that backs the Trail Blazer series. Each Trail Blazer has a story of adventure that is reflected in the artwork on the bottle and six pack.
The Skull Crushing Ape adventure is:
You stop to wipe your brow and peer up at the peaks of the Bavarian Alps. You’ve been tracking the mythical great ape through these mountains for days. Your mind flickers to the strong black ale in your rucksack, a mixture of three brewing styles from Germany: Schwarz, Weizen, and Dopplebock. You retrieve the bottle and take a pull to steel your nerves as the ape bellows in the distance. The beer rolls over your tongue smooth, with notes of chocolate, and intense punch, and leaving ever the faintest hint of banana on your lips.
Click here for a Skull Crushing Ape video.
Skull Crushing Ape is now available in bottles and on draft throughout the Devils Backbone distribution footprint of Virginia, District of Columbia, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia.
Devils Backbone beers are inspired by the great brewing traditions of Europe and the ingenuity of modern craft brewing. Devils Backbone has earned numerous accolades for its beers, exceling in the art of lager brewing in an ale dominated industry. The brewing team has received medals from the World Beer Cup, Australian International Beer Awards, Virginia Craft Brewers Fest and the Great American Beer Festival® including national titles for GABF 2014 Mid-Sized Brewing Company and Brew Team of the Year, 2013 Small Brewing Company and Small Brewing Company Brewer of the Year and 2012 Small Brewpub and Small Brewpub Brewer of the Year.
Devils Backbone operates two breweries in central Virginia: Basecamp Brewpub & Meadows (200 Mosbys Run, Roseland, VA) the original brewery, restaurant and the Meadows, the new outdoor beer and dining area, located at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in scenic Nelson County; and the Outpost Brewery & Tap Room, a state-of-the-art production brewery and tap room (50 North Wind Lane, Lexington, VA.)
In 2008, founders Steve Crandall and his wife Heidi, inspired by a skiing trip where they had their first taste of German beer, opened the doors to Devils Backbone Brewing Company in the heartland of Virginia. Basecamp Brewpub was an instant regional success and with so many beer lovers asking where they could purchase the brews, they broke ground on the Outpost in 2011. Anticipated to produce 10,000 barrels of beer in the first ten years of operation, the Outpost reached 45,000 barrels in the first three years and recently completed an additional expansion to reach 250,000 barrels.
For more information, please visit.dbbrewingcompany.com. You can also follow along as they Craft an Adventure #CraftAnAdventure on Facebook/devilsbackbonebrewingcompany, Twitter @dbbrewingco and Instagram @devilsbackbonebrewingcompany.KANSAS CITY, Mo. — In the quest for a Super Bowl ring, where does an NFL team begin? Behind closed doors, with no coaches allowed. The Broncos became the harshest film critics in America, ripping the mistakes of teammates and demanding accountability.
“We played all right,” Denver linebacker Von Miller said Sunday, after beating Kansas City 17-9. “But all right won’t cut it down the road.”
You might be happy with a victory that qualified as both homely and hard-earned. The Broncos, however, are difficult to please.
“These past couple weeks we’ve been watching the game film together, just the players. Coaches aren’t in there. It’s the player’s job to speak up on what he did wrong, if there’s a mistake he made and what he could do better,” said quarterback Peyton Manning, who passed for 285 yards, yet saw so many drives stall that the Broncos were unable to shake a mangy-mutt of a foe from nipping at their heels until the final minutes.
On a five-star scale, don’t expect the Broncos to give this performance more than a 2.5 in the video room. When the lights go down, the film will play more like the latest installment of “The Twilight Saga” than “Lincoln.” Players will pan the 4.7 yards per carry surrendered to Chiefs running back Jamaal Charles and offensive ineffiency that put Matt Prater in position to miss too many field goals.
That anger? That lack of contentment with victory? That’s a good thing.
The Broncos no longer are grading on a curve.
Rather than the gimmick of a players-only meeting that’s convened by a losing team, the tough love of the film sessions indicates the Broncos are serious about the difficult business of winning. When they gather to critique, freedom of speech is 100 percent and pulling rank is strictly forbidden.
“Everybody is held accountable, from the top to the bottom. We take our stripes off in the defensive meeting room and we go after each other. That is what allows us to get better,” Broncos linebacker Wesley Woodyard said.
Denver is now measuring itself only against the NFL elite. Every game is a chance to improve. If the Broncos aren’t better come January than they are now, some other team will be fitted for championship rings.
“If we want to win in the playoffs, we’re not even close. We have to get better,” Denver cornerback Champ Bailey said. “We can’t allow a team to run on us like Kansas City did. We didn’t allow a touchdown. But that’s not going to cut it in the playoffs, especially on the road. Every time the home team runs for 5 yards and a first down in the playoffs, you’ve got the crowd yelling. And you don’t want that.”
The AFC West is won. With the certitude of a math professor making squeaky chalk marks on a blackboard, any way you calculate it, the division title and a playoff berth belongs to the Broncos, who won for the sixth consecutive time.
By the method Denver keeps score, however, the Broncos run near the back of a four-team pack. Nothing counts except a trip to the Super Bowl. They are battling Houston, Baltimore and New England for the inside track found only on home turf during the playoffs.
After too many NFL seasons when the Broncos spent the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas trying to stay relevant in the Super Bowl discussion, Denver is relearning how to think like a champion.
After failed coach Josh McDaniels made the error of running the organization as if he invented the game, credit John Fox for turning over responsibility to the grown men who actually do the blocking and tackling. Video work led by players, critiqued by players and owned by players, fosters a no-excuses attitude by players.
“It’s not like all of a sudden you can turn a switch on in the playoffs,” Bailey said.
The Chiefs were victory No. 8 on the ledger. Tampa Bay is next on the schedule. The Broncos insist they see nothing else.
But, trust me, from deep inside this tunnel vision, Denver has its eye on a bigger prize.
Manning going home to New Orleans for the Super Bowl?
That could be a wilder party than Mardi Gras.
Mark Kiszla: 303-954-1053, [email protected] or twitter.com/markkiszlaBUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — The Hungarian government says it will appeal a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights compensating two asylum-seekers from Bangladesh who were deported to Serbia in 2015.
Gyorgy Bakondi, Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s chief security adviser, defended Hungary’s migration policies on Saturday, saying they were legally sound and protected Hungarian and European citizens.
Bakondi also reiterated the government’s prediction that the number of people reaching Hungary through the Balkans would grow as the weather improves and because of the deterioration of Turkey’s deal with the European Union meant to stem the migrant flow.
Bakondi said the construction of a second fence on the border with Serbia was advancing at full speed. Orban has said the new fence will stop “even the largest crowds arriving from Turkey.”An award-winning Spanish matador has died after being gored in the lungs during a bullfight in the small French town of Mont de Marsan.
Professional matador, Ivan Fandino, 36, reportedly tripped on his cloak before being caught by the bull’s horns at the Aire-sur-l'Adour bullfighting festival on Saturday.
The Spaniard reportedly suffered two heart attacks while in an ambulance on the way to the hospital.
The renowned fighter had fought hundreds of bulls over his 12-year career.
Fandino is the second Spaniard to die in the arena in the last year but the first to be killed in France in almost a century.
Compatriot Victor Barrio suffered the same fate after being gored by a bull last July during a live televised event.
Spanish bullfighter gored to death in ring first time in over 20 years https://t.co/pezni5hX96 — RT (@RT_com) July 10, 2016
Barrio was the first fighter to be killed in almost 30 years in the centuries old tradition, which sees a matador face off against a bull in an oft vicious contest that usually results in the death of the animal.
Fandino was seriously injured at least twice before. In 2014, he was knocked unconscious by a bull in France and a year later he was thrown into the air by a bull in Pamplona, Spain.
He had suffered a cut to the ear while fighting his first bull of the day earlier on Saturday before his fatal encounter.
Bullfighting remains popular in Spain, with about 1,800 shows per year watched by some six million spectators.
It was banned in Catalonia by the Catalan nationalist government in 2012 though this was rescinded in 2016.Dean Nicholas
The Tea Party Comes To London
Photo / buckaroo kid The Taxpayers' Alliance has invited a delegate of lobbyists who back the Tea Party movement in America to speak at an event in London.
The European Resource Bank conference begins today at Guildhall, and will be attended by right-wing lobby groups from both the US and the UK. But of most interest will be the attendance of those who back the Tea Party, a loose alignment of right-wing thought that has germinated in the wake of Barack Obama's election win, and stretches from fiscally conservative Republicans to cranks who think the President is a Marxist Muslim hell-bent on America's ruination.
Backed by their wealthy financiers, the group has managed to insert itself into the American body politic. As detailed in The Guardian, many of the lobbyists who have turned the Tea Partiers into a major concern will be at the event today.
Yet will their message of small government, tax breaks, privatisation, and an opposition to Obama's healthcare plan, translate into a message that could work in Britain? Or are they, as Liberal Conspiracy suggest, only over here to visit our free museums?The mafia of the Politicians, Bureaucrats, Paid Media, Human Rights Activists and the Terrorists is ruining the country, but more so the Indian Defense Services. When someone like VK Singh a person who wasn’t a “Yes Man” comes along, he is targeted in every way.
But in the normal course what happens in India when it comes to treatment of the Defense Forces is shocking! Specially, when it comes to fighting insurgency and terrorism. Look at the now famous/infamous “incident” that has been the staple of the Human Rights activists and the groups all over the country. I still remember Facebook being full of this charge everywhere.
During 1990-91, a village called Kushan Pushpora in Kupwara District of J&K was searched during a winter night of continuous snow and rain. More than one unit was involved. Three days after the operation, DC Kupwara (under militant threat, militant sympathy or for money offered by militants) himself lodged an FIR that the army had raped 100 women in that single night including a 60 year old woman. It created a national and international
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Right now, Pretty Little Liars fans are experiencing what showrunner Marlene King describes as a “PLL finale hangover.” As she puts it, “no alcohol was involved, just a lot of high drama.” And as fans of the show know, after last night’s season 4 summer finale, that’s an understatement.
After learning that Ezra could potentially be the leader of the “A” team and Ali could potentially be alive, there were literally hundreds of questions and theories hitting the Internet like a teen-driven tidal wave. Sadly, there’s no way to answer every question (and there’s also no way PLL is going to spoil anything), but here’s what King had to say about 4B, followed by Ian Harding’s thought on Ezra’s big reveal:
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: First of all, this finale has launched a million fan theories, dating all the way back to the pilot.
MARLENE KING: Every frame of footage on our show — the littlest thing of drawing an A behind Ezra on the board or a letter or a map — our fans will screen grab everything, and now they’re putting all of the pieces of that puzzle together today.
Some people are already claiming that Ezra is really good, and that he’s only doing it to protect Aria. So at this point, is Ezra bad? Is he the mastermind behind this?
That I can’t answer, and I don’t want to answer. We knew coming into this because of the Toby reveal and eventually finding out that Toby was working for the greater good, as we call it, that some fans would latch onto that idea for Ezra, and others will latch onto the idea that he is Uber “A,” and that’s what 4B is about; it’s about unraveling that story and giving it more meaning, and eventual closure.
Is Uber “A,” what we should call him?
Well, there is an Uber “A,” I will say that. There is an Uber “A” and one would believe after watching last night’s episode that Ezra is a legitimate candidate for being Uber “A.”
In terms of the hierarchy, we have Uber “A” and then all the other —
Mona was Original “A,” and that is true. Mona was Original “A,” and she explained in whatever episode — I think it was the last finale — that she was Original “A” and when she was at Radley, Uber “A” so to speak offered her a deal — “I’ll help you get in and out of Radley if you let me play your game with you” — and then Uber “A” took the game away from her.
In the last finale, we saw Mona say she’d been reporting up to a person, who at the time we thought was Red Coat, but she didn’t know what that person looked like.
Mona believed that Uber “A” was Red Coat, which is why she refers to Uber “A” as a she. She says, “I don’t know who she is either.”
So Red Coat is a totally different entity from Uber “A?”
Probably. That’s going to be explored in 4B too. 4A has done a great job of launching 4B. I think the Ezra reveal was so huge that a lot of people aren’t talking about what we learned about Alison last night, that Mrs. Grunwald pulled her out of that grave and the last time she saw her, she was very much alive.
Right! And we will definitely find out Ali’s alive-or-dead status in the Halloween episode, correct?
Yes.
But Ali’s experience with “A” predated her summer in Cape May, so at that time, would “A” have been Mona?
Yes.
How long have you all in the writers room known that this Ezra reveal was going to happen?
We started talking about this when we were making the decision to reveal Mona as Original “A.”
So it’s been working for a while.
It’s always been in the back of our minds, even going back to the pilot, because he was such a ripe character. He has always been, interestingly enough, he shows up when the text messages start showing up. Aria was looking at that Ali poster in that bar when he introduced himself to her, and he’s been in interesting places at the right times very often. So lots of fans had the theory early on that Ezra was on the “A” team, so we’ve always been writing with it in the back of our minds.
You mentioned 4B exploring all of this. Is that where we’ll get to find out Ezra’s motivation?
Yes. I’ve seen some fans commenting that it just doesn’t make sense, what would be his motivation for this and we agree completely. The fans deserve to know that answer, and we will give it to them in 4B.
At this point, we don’t know that Ezra was in a relationship with Ali, and we don’t necessarily know that he was the one who buried her, correct?
That is correct.
Does anyone know Ezra is doing this? Because Mona didn’t know the face of the person she’s reporting to. Does anyone?
Well, the answer to that is yes. You will find out who, there’s at least one person who knows it, probably more than one, and you will find out the identity of that person in season 4B.
Uber “A” paying people added a new layer to this in terms of an incentive for people to join or help the “A” team.
We know he’s a Fitzgerald; his family has a lot of dough. People always say,”How can ‘A’ be everywhere?” and we certainly showed how last night.
Are we going to see some more Mama Fitzgerald then?
Oh! Well, we might!
How long until the girls find out what we just found out?
We’re breaking those stories right now and filming those episodes right now, and one of the Liars will start to suspect early on, but it’s a hard thing to prove and no one wants to go to Aria and say, “The love of your life is Uber ‘A,'” so it’s going to be a journey.
That’s the other question out there: Does he really loves Aria? Did he know she was a friend of Ali? Because in the pilot, he asks her about Ali.
He’s at Ali’s funeral, which is interesting because supposedly he didn’t know Ali, but at the funeral he says to Aria, “Was she a friend of yours?” and Aria says, “my best friend.”
But can we assume that when he first met her, he wasn’t plotting?
I wouldn’t assume anything, and I think that there’s a very rich back story to Ezra that the audience hasn’t seen yet, and they will in 4B. I think it’s going to be a lot of fun for people to get to know that side of Ezra.
For you all, is his relationship with Aria genuine?
I think you have to wait and see. I think that’s going to be some of the fun of 4B is answering that question in a dramatic way as opposed for me to tell you in an interview.
NEXT: King talks Red Coat, the N.A.T. Club, and RavenswoodTwo drunk British nationals of Indian-origin were arrested for allegedly harassing a 28-year-old air hostess on an Air India flight from London to New Delhi. After a complaint was registered, the accused, who are real estate agents were arrested in New Delhi but later got bail, police said.
The accused were identified as Jaspal Singh, 35, and Charandeep Khaira, 36, who had come to New Delhi from London to attend a marriage ceremony in Jaipur, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Airport) Sanjay Bhatia.
Their breathalyzer test indicated they were drunk, he said.
On March 29, while they were on the flight, they asked the air hostess to get them some food. When she took some time to respond, they got irritated and started making lewd statements, police said.
Once the plane landed in New Delhi, the crew reported the matter to the security agencies and a case was registered.
In a statement, Air India condemned the incident and said that they will also investigate the matter at their end.
“The AI is also carrying out its probe and the incident is condemned. At the same time we urge our passengers to draw a line of ethics while flying and using our services so that it does not cause inconvenience to either the airline, supporting staff or our valued travelers,” Air India said in its statement.
Read Originally Published Story at : ndtv.com
More from the webNASHVILLE -- Manchester City defender John Stones has spoken to ESPN FC of the "hurt" he felt in his debut season at the club for letting himself and his teammates down following his £47.5 million transfer from Everton.
The 23-year-old, who is now only the third-most expensive defender at City following the summer arrivals of Benjamin Mendy (£52m) and Kyle Walker (£50m), endured a difficult year at the Etihad Stadium, with manager Pep Guardiola dropping him from the team on more than one occasion.
While Stones ended the campaign having overcome his earlier difficulties, he goes into the new season with Guardiola focusing on defensive reinforcements as the priority area strengthening his team.
Stones remains a central figure in Guardiola's plan, but the England centre-half admits that he endured a series of ups-and-downs last season.
Manchester City Manchester City Tottenham Hotspur Tottenham Hotspur 3 0 FT Game Details GameCast
Lineups and Stats
"Definitely," Stones told ESPN FC in an exclusive interview ahead of Saturday's International Champions Cup clash with Tottenham in Nashville. "People do focus on the transfer fee, but that's football.
"It's all part of the game, but I'm just focused on getting into the team, playing well and making sure that the team wins.
"If you are focused and driven as I am, I don't think the outside influences should have an effect.
"I am not saying that it doesn't, though. Every player has been there, or been through a bad patch.
"For me, it's not about what [pressure] comes from the outside, it's about me, knowing that I haven't done my job as well as I should have done.
"It's about making mistakes in games and probably beating myself up more than I should do, really.
"You take it out on yourself because you think that you have let your teammates down and yourself down, and that's what hurts."
Many outside observers saw the lengthy injury absences of City captain Vincent Kompany as a contributing factor in the struggles endured by Stones last season.
And while Stones admits that Kompany's return to fitness will be a huge bonus for him and the defence, he insists that the only person who can ensure he realises his potential is himself. John Stones said that he felt he let his teammates down in a rocky first season at Man City.
"I'm a big enough lad now to know that I should just get over it and do what I have to do, by getting out on the training pitch and correcting the faults," Stones said.
"I think a lot of things can get overlooked and a lot of emphasis is put on the mistakes, rather than the good things.
"Maybe 60 to 70 percent of the season is positive, but that's how football works I guess and it probably happens too much.
"What matters is how I feel and if the manager is happy and my family are happy -- that circle are who I should listen to.
"But you grow more knowledgeable during the time you play in the Premier League. Every new manager, new chapter, has been a learning curve.
"Pep has given me a lot of confidence and tips and pointers, not only him, but the other players as well. These are the guys that have won trophies and that's what I'm aspiring to do."
City go into the new season with Guardiola having added three new full-backs, a new goalkeeper and potentially a new centre-half to his squad.
The City manager has also tinkered with formations on the tour of the United States, with Stones being used in a three-man defence and a back-four. John Stones revealed that England manager Gareth Southgate has toyed with the idea of using him in midfield.
But despite the upheaval of new players and alternate systems, Stones is confident that he can avoid teething problems with the new defence in the early weeks of the season.
"I played with Walks [Kyle Walker] with England, so I know how he plays," Stones said. "You get to see how he plays watching the games on TV, but I also know him on a personal level too.
"It comes down to training and the games I've played with him and the likes of Vinnie and Nico [Otamendi] -- it's easy to get along with them and work out how they play.
"It's basically a building block from last season. Walks has fit in well straightaway and, personally for me, it's exciting to play with such top-class players. "And as for Vinnie, to have to him back as the captain and the leader of the club is great for us."
While Stones is determined to secure his place at the heart of City's defence this season, England manager Gareth Southgate has made it known that he is keen to experiment with the defender as a midfielder on the international level.
Southgate performed a similar positional switch for England as a player, but while Stones is happy to explore the role, he admits it is one that he is unfamiliar with.
"I remember it [playing in midfield] coming up during the last England trip," he said. "It is one of those things that you deal with when it comes.
"I have never played there in a professional game, so it is a difficult question to answer.
"You will play anywhere for your country, but you don't want to be exposed in a position you're not familiar with either.
"There are times when any player will play anywhere, if the manager asks you to, but it is whether it will be a regular thing.
"But if the opportunity comes up and Gareth wants me to play there, we will definitely sit down and talk about it in the camp and go from there."
Mark Ogden is a senior football writer for ESPN FC. Follow him @MarkOgden_The Iowa Caucus is done and over with, but the ramifications of the final results will live long for the national campaign, but also on what happens in Iowa after. Reputations have been made and tarnished during the caucus every cycle, and consequences over who backed who will continue to last into later Iowa elections. Here’s a look at who helped themselves the most over the past year, and who suffered some setbacks:
Winners
State Senator Jack Whitver – No one got more of a boost coming out of Iowa than Marco Rubio thanks to his exceptionally strong 3rd place finish. Ankeny’s Jack Whitver was with Rubio the whole time, often traveling all over the state with him and taking in a few football games together along the way. All the early press about his Iowa campaign being awful must have missed its course correction (and what jerks would have said all that anyway?). There’s a good chance Marco Rubio becomes the Republican’s nominee and our next president. I bet he’ll remember his buddy in Iowa.
Bob Vander Plaats – Score one for the social conservatives once again in Iowa. Despite the polls showing Donald Trump would take Iowa in the end, Ted Cruz pulled it out with a record-shattering 51,666 votes. Much of that was thanks to Vander Plaats and allies’ networks mobilizing the evangelical crowd for Cruz. It puts Vander Plaats in a stronger position going forward in Iowa elections, and will make his choice in the 2018 gubernatorial primary all the more important.
Strong Field Operations – Organize, organize, organize. That’s always been the key to Iowa and it was once again. Those who built strong ground games, like Ted Cruz, won. Those who didn’t, like Donald Trump, lost. All three Democrats had exceptional, innovative and professionally-run operations. Clinton’s pushed her over the finish line in a state that was always difficult for her, and Sanders’ brought him so close to a win that it effectively was one. It’s all good news for the Democrats going forward, as their teams far outpaced anything on the Republican side. The innovative tactics they learned and the battle-tested field staff that will deploy throughout the country later on will benefit the Democrats in a big way in November.
Bernie Sanders’ Iowa Team – Everyone knew Clinton had a strong operation in the state. Many were unsure about Sanders. Turns out he did. If you were watching closely it was obvious to see, even if the tight-lipped Sanders operation didn’t want to let on much about it. But they put together an impressive Iowa Caucus campaign that performed the difficult task of turning out tons of new people to caucus. There’s lots of good lessons to be learned from their success.
Drake University – Was there a week where there wasn’t a big, multi-candidate forum or event at Drake? Students got a front row experience to the most amazing political show in the world. Congrats all around on the staff’s work there.
Ben Carson’s Iowa Team – There’s no reason Ben Carson should have gotten 9.3% of the GOP vote on caucus night, even with Ted Cruz’s dirty tricks. His national campaign completely imploded, his money was spent poorly, and he faced nonstop horrendous news coverage that made him look foolish. His Iowa team dealt with the awful tragedy of a volunteer dying a few weeks ago, but kept it together. Most observers thought his support would completely evaporate, but he came in a decent 4th place. How Carson’s Iowa staff kept so many of his supporters on board through the difficulties is a real organizational feat.
Scenic Route – Every caucus season sees some new coffee shop or restaurant – oh hey, there’s Hillary Clinton – pop up as a frequent destination for candidates and media. The now-closed Baby Boomers from – oh hey, there’s Hillary Clinton – the East Village became a favorite of Barack Obama and his staff in 2008. This time was no different with – oh hey, there’s Hillary Clinton – places like unsuspecting coffee shops becoming major media attractions. Sorry for all the interruptions in this paragraph, it’s just that I’m typing this at Scenic Route in the East Village and Hillary Clinton literally won’t stop swinging by to meet people here.
Losers
The Entire Democratic Party Establishment – Barely anyone endorsed Bernie Sanders. He didn’t need it. Aside from some liberal organizations and a handful of unions, Sanders essentially created his movement here on his own and nearly overtook the whole power establishment in Iowa. Every single person and group who endorsed Hillary Clinton should take a long look in the mirror and reconsider why they’re not as effective in their communities as they once were. It also completely opens up the future of Iowa campaigns. Andy McGuire’s reputation took a hit on caucus night, as did the general sense that the party’s establishment knows what it’s doing. So jump on in, upstart progressive challengers, you’ve got as much a chance of winning in Iowa with a new approach as they do.
Team Branstad – Black eyes all around for Branstad and his allies. For one, the three governors in the race didn’t even get a combined 7%. His preferred choice, Chris Christie, came in an embarrassing 10th place behind John Kasich, who hardly even campaigned here. And Branstad himself took a huge swing at Ted Cruz, only to see him come in first. Branstad’s political network may want to watch their backs for the young guns who signed on with Rubio. They’re starting to look like the future of the Iowa Republican Party now.
Steve King – He might have picked the right horse this caucus, but he sure did pay a price for it. Many conservatives in the state are furious with King, long a big proponent of the state’s ethanol industry, for going so forcefully with ethanol’s public enemy number one in the caucus. His tweet right before the caucus about Ben Carson possibly dropping out further infuriated Republicans. There’s already talks of a primary run against King. He’ll certainly win any such challenge, but he lost a lot of important allies in this caucus, and it’s unclear if he picked up any.
Ambitious Iowans – I never get why more people don’t use the huge national spotlight that shines on Iowa as a chance to break out locally and build their brand. A few did, like Trump’s Iowa co-chair Tana Goertz or Cedar Rapids CBS 2’s Kevin Barry. Many others just stayed in their lanes, content to watch the media circus come in and out. You’d think more elected officials might have used the chance to boost their profile. Oh well.
Super PACs – So much money, so little to show for it. The idea that the future of winning campaigns was through the use of unlimited-money Super PACs hit the wall of reality in Iowa this year, with many candidates with the largest PACs doing the worst. Outsourcing your operations to Super PACs also turned out to be a terrible idea, as it worked very poorly for both Carly Fiorina and Bobby Jindal.
Dave Kochel – The man who turned Joni Ernst into a Republican superstar last cycle should have been set up for great things in 2016. Instead, he got bounced around on the Jeb Bush campaign from the outset, and ended up as a part of the campaign that will go down in history as spending money more ineffectively than perhaps any other. Nothing with Bush ever caught on, and Kochel and his team will have to take responsibility for some of that. Kochel’s rising star this year was badly damaged.
Iowa Democratic Party – For about two hours there on caucus night, the entire national media unloaded on the Democratic caucus process. The outstanding precinct results, the lack of trained volunteers, the overwhelmed locations, etc. Also, how do precincts run out of voter registration forms? Print a lot out beforehand! Way more than you’d ever need! How is that so f-ing hard? Many places ran out in 2008, you’d think we’d have learned a lesson.
Much of the problem came from the closeness of the race, but it exposed many of the problems that have been rumored for months, that the IDP wasn’t prepared enough for caucus night. The Sanders campaign has calmed down its rhetoric recently, but is still pushing for an audit of the results. Had more trust been built up with them beforehand, things may have run smoother. It gives plenty of ammo to those who don’t want to see Andy McGuire run for governor. Hopefully this all gets resolved soon for everyone’s sake, but it’s going to lead to real questions of whether the party staff in charge of organizing the caucus can be trusted to lead Iowa Democrats’ campaigns into November. The Republican Party of Iowa didn’t have these problems.
by Pat Rynard
Posted 2/4/16Recently, the vastly conservative state of Kentucky Senate unanimously voted (38-0) to pass a bill that would legalize the medical use of marijuana oil. The bill was largely supported by the Kentucky state governor, as well as the state police. In its next phase, the bill is likely to pass in the House, which would make this the first stride toward medical legalization of marijuana since it was made strictly forbidden years ago, even for medical use or research.
When passed by the House, whom senators believe will have no opposition, the bill would allow the use of marijuana oil to anyone that is enrolled in a trial approved by the FDA. It would also support the use of the oil when it is recommended for use by a state research hospital.
The Kentucky Harold-Leader reported that state Senator Julie Denton (R-Louisville) said, “This was one of those tingly moments you get when you pass a bill that you really know is good for the commonwealth. It is really going to help people’s lives.
Marijuana oil, also referred to as cannabidiol, is a non-psychoactive compound present in marijuana and hemp. With low amounts of THC, it doesnt produce the same high that is typically associated with marijuana. Scientists believe that when the oil is used, it may be able to calm the electrical and chemical activity in the brain that causes seizures. In the past, where it is legal, marijuana oil has been used to treat children with critical forms of epilepsy, as well as those experiencing severe post-traumatic stress disorder. It is typically administered orally under the tongue or through a dropper.
The Kentucky state government hopes that legalizing the medical use of the oil will prevent families from uprooting their children and moving to Colorado, where use of the oil has already been deemed legal.
Perhaps why lawmakers are hesitant about legalizing the use of cannabis, even in the form of oil, is because doctors are still unsure about the long-term effects it can have on children. All of the studies that have been done on the effects are usually concerning teenagers who use it regularly, and of course, not in the form of oil, but by smoking it in large amounts. Those that are concerned about the long-term effects usually pertain to what happens in the brain when it is used over long periods of time. It has been linked to mental disorders, diminishing IQs, and depression, though it has not necessarily proven that the use of cannabis will in fact cause these problems. The question some parents are asking, as they watch their children suffer from hundreds of grand mal seizures a week, is perhaps, which is the lesser of two evilssuffering from serious brain damage from a seizure disorder, or risking the possible long-term effects of cannabis, which is known to help reduce the seizures altogether? Many parents are willing to take the risk if it means the seizures can finally come to a stop or be significantly reduced.
For assistance with your appeal or more information on medical marijuana cases, click here, or contact our attorneys at 855-776-2773.
*General news ArticleA VETERAN OF more than 350 first-team games in England, former Ireland U21 cap Clifford Byrne says he turned down the chance to stay on in the English scene because he wanted to sign up for a stint in the League of Ireland with Derry City.
Derry manager Roddy Collins has made a couple of interesting additions to his squad for his first season in charge at the Brandywell, with a mixture of old heads (Sligo stalwart Danny Ventre and former SPL regular Mark Stewart) and youth (Enda Curran, an exciting prospect signed from Collins' former side Athlone Town).
Defender Byrne certainly adds experience from his 12-year stint as a first-team footballer across the water, the majority of his 386 competitive games coming in the shirt of Scunthorpe United.
Having left his native Dublin to join Sunderland way back in 1998, Byrne never imagined he would end up in the League of Ireland, but the 31-year-old says it was his choice to try his luck here once his time at League One side Oldham Athletic was up.
"I had a couple of options in England and I could have stayed on over there, but once I spoke to Roddy at Derry City, I knew I wanted to come here," Byrne told the Herald.
"I was speaking to Graham Kavanagh at Carlisle United and I had an offer from another club over there, but the idea of playing in the league back home really appealed to me.
"I never played in the League of Ireland before, but I always kept an eye on it, lads who were teammates of mine, like Mark Rossiter and Gary Dempsey, did well in the league, so I always had an idea of what was going on and now I have a chance to play in the league.
"It's all new to me – Derry's first game of the season is away to Shamrock Rovers, so that should be interesting, me as a Dubliner going to Tallaght to play for Derry. I can't wait," he added.
TRADITION
Derry City have a long-established tradition of bringing in Dublin-born players, back to the treble-winning side of 1989 which was based around players like Mick Neville and Paul Doolin, to the Dubs in the Derry side of 1997, the last City team to win the league (Tony O'Dowd, Richie Purdy, Tommy Dunne) and more recent imports like Clive Delaney, Ken Oman and Simon Madden.
But Byrne insists he is not turning up in Derry just for the wage packet.
"I know I have a lot to prove, I can't come over here and expect to walk into the team and dominate just because I have played a lot in England," he admits.
"This is a fresh challenge for me, I will be playing against teams I am not used to, in grounds that I have not been to before, and I know that the standard here in the league is still very high. I have already seen the standard in training at Derry, so I know it will be demanding."
Byrne began his career with Sunderland but left without making the first team, though he enjoyed success with Scunthorpe, where he spent most of his career bar a recent spell with Oldham.
"We had good times there, we won a couple of promotions and I got to Wembley a few times," says Byrne.
"I have had a successful career so far, but moving to Derry is a real chance for me to win medals as I'd like us to be competitive this season."Bill Nye's hackery is showing again.
Airing on his new Netflix special called Bill Nye Saves The World, the Not A Scientist Guy and hero of the Left, featured the world's most insane, anti-science segment about sexuality and gender performed by a sitcom actress, a profession, of course, filled with people famous for their extensive knowledge of biology.
The performance by Crazy Ex-Girlfriend actress Rachel Bloom was given a glowing endorsement by Nye, who introduced the song(?) as "very special." Within the performance, Bloom suggests that sex and gender are on a "spectrum" and that her "sex junk" is "much more than either or," meaning it's non-binary.
So. Much. Science.
"My vagina has its own voice / Not vocal cords, a metaphorical voice / Sometimes I do a voice for my vagina," she sings. Charming.
Then there are these super-scientific lines: "Versatile love may have some butt stuff / It's evolution, ain't nothing new / There's nothing taboo about a sex stew."
In effect, whatever was left of the manmade climate change zealot's credibility was officially wiped out, unlike our Antarctic ice sheets. Of course, there wasn't too much credibility left to demolish; this is a guy who once suggested climate change dissent be criminalized and said poignantly "many, many, many, many more hundreds of eggs are fertilized than become humans."
There really are no words suitable to describe the unhinged absurdity of the segment, so here's the video with full lyrics for you to witness for yourself. (My sincere apologies for the awfulness in advance.)
Erase everything you ever knew about bill nye the science guy. He is now bill nye the weimar guy pic.twitter.com/NSPHO9lZQo — wyatt (@awyattman88) April 24, 2017
See the full lyrics of the performance below:
This world of ours is full of choice But must I choose between only John or Joyce? Are my options only hard or moist? My vagina has its own voice Not vocal cords, a metaphorical voice Sometimes I do a voice for my vagina Please don't tell me I'm the only one who does that 'Cause my sex junk is so oh, oh, oh Much more than either or, or, or Power bottom or power top Versatile love may have some butt stuff It's evolution, ain't nothing new There's nothing taboo about a sex stew Just add salt or Gerard Depardieu French treasure 'Cause my sex junk is so oh, oh, oh Much more than either or, or, or If they're alive I'll date 'em Channing or Jenna Tatum I'm down for anything Don't box in my box Give someone new a handy Then give yourself props (Male voice: Oh you think you're so smart, did you learn gay in college?) Chill with all of that while I drop some knowledge Sexuality's a spectrum Everyone is on it Even you might like it if you sit up on it Drag queen, drag king, just do what feels right You're tall pansexual, flirty wood sprite Who enjoys a fleshlight in the cold moonlight? (Male voice: With a sad clown Skyping via satellite?) Damn skippy, home slice, Sing it with me all night Sex how you want it, it's your goddamn right 'Cause my sex junk is so oh, oh, oh Much more than either or, or, or Get off your soapbox Get off your soapbox My sex junk's better than bagels with lox With lots of schmear
I know this doesn't have to be said, but stuff like this is why Trump won.
This article has been revised for clarity.Denver Mayor Michael Hancock wants to impose a tax on recreational marijuana to cover the costs of the coming industry that would be roughly akin to the tax burden on a pack of tobacco cigarettes.
But marijuana advocates fear excessive taxes could destroy the whole idea around voter-approved Amendment 64 and keep recreational pot users in the black market.
“If it is too much tax too quickly, it will kill the transition to the legal market,” said Michael Elliott, director of the Medical Marijuana Industry Group.
No tax decisions have been decided yet.
In November, Colorado voters will be asked to approve a 15 percent excise tax plus a 10 percent statewide sales tax on all retail pot purchases.
The Denver City Council has been discussing adding its own tax and also would have to submit the question to voters. The council must approve the question by the end of August to make it onto November’s ballot.
Hancock is recommending a 5 percent tax in the first year but said the city should have the flexibility to increase the tax to up to 10 percent.
“We believe a 5 percent tax on recreational marijuana will fulfill the city’s needs to effectively regulate and enforce this new law while protecting our children and families, supporting public health and ensuring the integrity of our neighborhoods,” Hancock said in a statement.
The city’s finance department analyzed what would be needed to pay for expenses of a new retail pot culture that is expected to achieve $128 million in sales in the first year in Denver alone.
The city expects it will have to spend about $9.4 million on regulation, enforcement and health and education — including adding 26 police officers, buying a so-called Denver Cares van to transport high people to a detox facility and paying for an advertisement campaign to encourage young people to stay away from pot.
The analysis asked each city department for their expected costs with the new industry. Officials want to hire more park rangers to patrol parks, an additional city attorney to deal with increased caseloads, more fire inspectors and additional staff for Denver Health to handle medical and mental health problems.
“We used our best judgment to identify cost areas that if we are going to do this right, this is where the city should put its resources,” said Denver chief financial officer Cary Kennedy, who presented the recommendations to the council on Monday.
A 5 percent tax coupled with state revenue and other fees would generate about $9.2 million a year, Kennedy said
“By starting at 5 percent, it will help us through unforeseen problems, to make sure we are doing this right, protecting neighborhoods and kids,” she said at a meeting Monday with the City Council.
The 5 percent tax along with state and other local taxes would amount to a 25 percent tax for the consumer on each purchase, she said. That is roughly the equivalent of the excise and sales taxes on packages of cigarettes.
The retail tax on cigarettes includes 2.9 percent state sales tax plus 84 cents per pack excise tax. For a low-cost pack of cigarettes of roughly $4, that tax equals about a 23 percent tax rate, said Kennedy, a former state treasurer.
Some on the council want a higher ceiling than 10 percent.
Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz is calling for 15 percent, saying the tax should cover more than just the costs of the impacts from the marijuana businesses.
“They said legalize it, but tax the hell out of it,” Faatz said. “Why limit it to just 10 percent? Why is it not OK to have money left over to cover other services?”
Councilwoman Robin Kniech said she worries the city may be reaching too far.
“Is our goal to cover new costs related to legalization, or is it to cover all marijuana use that has been going on for a long time,” she said. “Every dollar of new revenue is not a new user. How much are we taxing the legal market to cover the black market?”
The council will vote July 29 whether to go ahead with a tax and for how much. Councilman Charlie Brown, who chairs the Amendment 64 committee, said he believes the council will go ahead with a tax.
“Why go through all of this if we don’t get anything out of it?” he asked.
Elliott of the marijuana industry group says the industry is already unfairly burdened because businesses that sell pot legally under state law cannot deduct or use any tax credit on their federal taxes.
His group is supporting the statewide vote on taxes and will campaign for its passage. But he doesn’t want to see local governments piling on.
“The higher legal marijuana costs, the more people are going to stick with the black market,” he said.
Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367, [email protected] or twitter.com/jpmeyerdpostFormed in 1996, Season of Mist is one of metal’s leading record labels. In the start the label only focused on more extreme genres such as black and death metal, but has since expanded to include all forms of metal as well as none metal genres such as punk and goth rock. To this day, they put out some of the best albums the underground has known. Here in no order are their best releases from 2015.
Benighted – Brutalive the Sick
Made as a late celebration of the band’s 15th anniversary, Brutalive the Sick is a sick live album. This CD/DVD combo really shows off the strength of these French deathgrind great’s live performances as they play the Sylak Festival in their home country. This is without a doubt the best way to experience the band.
Rotting Christ – Lucifer over Athens
Speaking of awesome live albums, Greek black metal veterans Rotting Christ have also given fans a take home taste of their live sound. Lucifer Over Athens is a live double album that also celebrates the band’s entire career. With songs ranging from their early demos to some of their most recent stuff, this release works as both a good live album and a best of album.
Weedeater – Golliathan
Coming from the swamps of South Carolina comes a new release from stoner metal blazers Weedeater. This album has many of the same elements of all Weedeater releases including short simple songs, use of non-metal instruments such
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? The answer is yes. NPR author Chana Joffe-Walt explains:Joffe-Walt explains the special plight of kids.In 1996 Bill Clinton signed a welfare reform act, that he proclaimed to be the "End of Welfare As We Know It". It was. People moved off welfare on to even easier to get disability programs.Part of Clinton's welfare reform plan pushed states to get people on welfare into jobs, partly by making states pay a much larger share of welfare costs.The incentive "worked" using the term loosely. Welfare rolls shrank but disability rolls soared.Who is making the case for the other side? Who is defending the government's decision to deny disability?Nobody.And that in a nutshell explains soaring disability roles and massive fraud.Disability fraud also makes a joke out of reported unemployment numbers. If you have a disability, you are no longer in the workforce.I would love to show data pre-recession. Unfortunately, the data only goes back to mid-2008. We can see however, that nearly 23 million Americans are not in the labor force because of "disabilities".I suggest "fraud" is more like it.Here's the curious thing: 14 million collect disability, but the BLS says 22.726 million are not in the labor force (not working), because of disabilities.What are the other 8.726 million doing? Is the BLS inflating disability numbers making the unemployment rate absurdly low, or are states doing that poor a job getting people off welfare and on to federal government disability programs? Some of both?Regardless, we need to stop this madness.One easy way to eliminate some of the fraud would be to put someone in charge of making a case for the other side. No, we do not need new Federal programs. All we need do is "".If states had any incentive to stop disability fraud, we would not have so much of it. Make states responsible for a large portion of disability claims just as they are for welfare, and the number of people collecting disability will collapse.I have written many times about disability fraud, its relation to the unemployment rate, and its relation to expiring unemployment benefits. Inquiring minds may wish to consider some Disability Fraud Examples Mike "Mish" Shedlockhttp://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.comI am hosting an. Proceeds go to the Les Turner ALS Foundation (Lou Gehrig’s Disease).Please see My Wife Joanne Has Passed Away; Stop and Smell the Lilacs for my association with the disease.To learn about the economic conference with world-class speakers includingand other Special Guests, please visit Wine Country Conference April 5, 2013Conservative MP Maxime Bernier was here in Calgary, part of his tour across the country to see how much support he could garner if he were to run in the Conservative Party of Canada leadership race.
The party recently announced that the leadership vote would take place on May 27th, 2017. I caught up with Bernier and Tim Moen, leader of the Libertarian Party. Moen says that Bernier holds many libertarian values and believes that he’s a good candidate to represent libertarians in Parliament.
I asked both Moen and Bernier what needed to happen in order for the CPC to win the next election and why the MP would be a good choice for leader. Moen believes that the conservatives have lost too much ground to the left and that conservatives need to get back to basic principles. Being a country that has only 2 majority conservative governments in place, Bernier believes that a mix of conservative and libertarian values are needed in order for the CPC to evolve.
There is a lot of cross over between libertarian and conservative values. While many of the attendees identify as libertarians, they are CPC members because they are as libertarian leaning as you can get outside of the actual Libertarian Party of Canada. And they are the best chance at governing.
I asked Alex, a federal Conservative Party of Canada supporter who also identifies as a classical liberal, or libertarian what it was about libertarianism that he found attractive. He says that he really likes Tim Moen and “small c” conservative principles and the concept of smaller government. When asked if he would support Maxime Bernier in a leadership bid, he was all in.
But the majority of people were there to meet Maxime Bernier and listen to what he had to say. I also asked Keelan whether he would support the MP as a candidate and he said that he was leaning toward it, but he needed to hear more about policy.
There’s an interesting dynamic happening between conservatism and libertarianism in Canada. One only has to look toward the Wildrose Party here in Alberta, that has gained in popularity over the last years and could be considered to be the most libertarian leaning party in Canada. With the Wildrose Party having a classical liberal following and a leader that self identifies as a libertarian, this makes Alberta a good choice for Maxime Bernier to start a leadership campaign.
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The t-shirt that says it all -- ONLY from TheRebel.media store!In a move sure to be celebrated by opponents of fossil fuel-based energy, the World Bank has just made a huge announcement at the One Planet summit called by French President Emmanuel Macron. The bank, which provides loans to developing countries to foster economic growth, announced on December 12 that it will no longer offer financial support for oil and gas exploration after 2019.
During the summit, the bank released a statement saying it “will no longer finance upstream oil and gas,” citing a need to change in a “rapidly changing world.” In 2015, the bank previously vowed to have 28% of its portfolio dedicated to climate action by 2020. The bank’s latest statement on fossil fuel financing suggests that it is on course to achieve that goal.
This is yet another blow to the fossil fuel energy industry, and a seemingly significant win for environmental advocates. The economics surrounding the energy sector are increasingly making it more attractive for entities to switch to renewable energy. Across the world, it has become cheaper to build new renewable energy installations than to operate and maintain existing coal power plants.
The World Bank’s plan does lay out a caveat for “exceptional circumstances,” saying that they will consider “…financing upstream gas in the poorest countries where there is a clear benefit in terms of energy access for the poor and the project fits within the countries’ Paris Agreement commitments.”Kaboom!!! Finally 2 episode 7 brings you all the drama, excitement, rain and sun of 2010 Downhill Mountainbike World Cup round 5 Val Di Sole, Italy, where Marc Beaumont put in an unstoppable flying run to claim an amazing top step on the box.
Remember we showed you the feature Winter digging: Italian Pumptrack? Check this out. Well, track builder Claudio Calouri has just sent over a gem of a video...
Webisode king Tom Grundy has a new project, “The only way is Kerr” Check it out here! The only way is Kerr follows Bernard Kerr and friends...
Part 2 of the Cape Epic Challenge with World Champion Tracy Moseley and Anka Martin racing the gruelling South African endurance event. Tracy and Anka move...
Happy April Fool’s day everybody. I’m not clever or witty enough to invent a jocular prank or ruse so I’ll just stick to posting some...
Scott Beaumont starts gets his 2011 4x campaign off to a flying start with a solid win at round one of the Schwalbe British 4x...
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Read our full Privacy Policy as well as Terms & Conditions.No Cowboys players kneeled during the National Anthem before Sunday night’s 31-35 loss to the Green Bay Packers. But that didn’t stop Dallas Cowboy’s owner Jerry Jones from confirming what many have long suspected: he has informed his players that taking a knee during the anthem would lead to them being benched immediately, the New York Post reported.
“If there’s anything that is disrespectful to the flag, then we will not play,” Jones told reporters after the game. “Understand? We will not,” he said. “If we are disrespecting the flag, then we will not play. Period…We’re going to respect the flag and I’m going to create the perception of it. And we have.”
Jones then defended Vice President Mike Pence’s decision to walk out of Sunday’s 49ers-Colts game after more than 20 players took a knee during the National Anthem. President Donald Trump later tweeted that he had asked Pence to walk out.
“We cannot in the NFL in any way give the implication that we tolerate disrespecting the flag,” Jones said. “I know the vice president did leave, because in his opinion the teams were. We know that there is a serious debate in this country about those issues, but there is no question in my mind that the National Football League and the Dallas Cowboys are going to stand up for the flag. Just so we’re clear.”
The longtime NFL owner and general manager continued, “I’m saying our vice president, if in his opinion, there’s disrespect of the flag then he should express himself however he wants to say. He’s got rights, too. He felt that not standing for the flag is disrespectful. I do, too. The league in my mind should absolutely take the rules we’ve got on the books and make sure that we do not give the perception that we’re disrespecting the flag.”
As the NYP pointed out, while hundreds of NFL players have taken a knee during the national anthem in recent weeks, no Cowboys had taken part. Defensive lineman David Irving and Damontre Moore did raise fists on Sunday toward the end of the anthem as a gesture of solidarity, but they remained standing.
Jones told the Dallas Morning News that he was unaware of their actions.
“We as a team are very much on the page together,” he said. “We made our expression. I’m very supportive of the team, but under no circumstances will the Dallas Cowboys — I don’t care what happens — under no circumstances will we as an organization, coaches, players, not support and stand and recognize and honor the flag. Period.”
Just days after Trump referred to any player who would kneel during the anthem as a “son of a bitch” during a campaign rally in Alabama, Jones joined his team in taking a knee after the anthem had finished playing as a gesture of solidarity.
Meanwhile, for Jones and the other NFL franchise owners, it’s unclear whether denunciations like these will be enough to soothe angry fans and reverse the dip in game ratings and attendance witnessed since former 49ers QB Colin Kaepernick sat for the anthem for the first time during a pre-season game last year. As one survey recently uncovered, the contentious protests have contributed to making the NFL the most unpopular professional sports league in America.For a guy who had never been traded before in his NHL career, James Reimer's adjustment to a new team has been as smooth as silk.
The 28-year-old netminder lost his first start after coming over to the San Jose Sharks just before the trade deadline, but has since ripped off three straight wins, including two shutouts.
"It feels pretty seamless. The guys here are a bunch of real good guys," Reimer said this week from San Jose. "It's been a lot of fun to just jump in with the group and just start playing. I think it helps that our schedule is so busy and we're playing so many games. At the same time, you don't get to see too much of the area because you're playing every other day. It's been a really good adjustment, though."
It's because of that March schedule -- 16 games in 31 days -- that Sharks general manager Doug Wilson came to the conclusion he needed an upgrade over former backup Alex Stalock. The GM wanted to get someone who could more confidently spell starter Martin Jones, so as not to overplay the youngster and burn him out in his first year as an NHL starter.
It was delicate, because Stalock was so beloved as a teammate, but it should prove to be a wise move. And not just for the month of March, but also as valuable insurance for Jones entering the playoffs.
"Stalock is a great guy, they loved him in the room, but he never found that consistency this season," said former NHL forward Jamie Baker, now a Sharks television analyst. "They were looking for a backup to help out with all the games this month. Reimer has good structure to his game, that's what has impressed me. He doesn't chase the game.
"I also think it pushes Jones a bit. Jones is certainly the No. 1 guy, but you bring in somebody like Reimer, it keeps him on his toes. It's a good competitive situation. You go back to Chicago last year. If Scott Darling doesn't play like he did against Nashville in the first round when Corey Crawford struggled, who knows if the Blackhawks win the Cup or not."
It's the kind of 1-2 punch in goal that has the playoff-bound Sharks feeling better about themselves.
"This team is as confident as I've seen them in a while, and you're not confident unless you have goaltending," Baker said.
There was a time earlier this season when Reimer figured his future might be with the Toronto Maple Leafs. He was having a pretty good season on a rebuilding, last-place team. His agent had contract talks with Leafs management. Then came a trade two days before the deadline.
"I don't think I want to get into all the details, but I had the feeling I would stick around in Toronto," said Reimer, a pending unrestricted free agent. "I didn't get the feeling at all that I'd be going somewhere. So I was a little surprised when it happened. But at the same time, I wasn't shocked. You know the situation Toronto is in. I guess they felt they were building for the future and get some pieces."
The contrast between a young, rebuilding team looking to the future and joining a veteran, win-now club in San Jose is certainly night and day for Reimer.
"It's a lot different, obviously," the Manitoba native said. "You have to take into perspective the two organizations are in two totally different places. With Toronto, I felt that from past years to this year, the Leafs took a lot of good steps in how they played this year. They played the right way, so things are definitely looking up there.
"But it's a different situation here right now -- just a really good, really solid, talented and experienced team. You just go down the list of all-stars on this team. They've won a lot of games here in the past and had a lot of success. Just the leadership and confidence here in terms of heading into any game and knowing there's a good chance to win. It's a different mindset for sure."
Former Maple Leafs teammate Roman Polak, right, is just one of the familiar faces that has made James Reimer's transition to San Jose easier. Andre Ringuette/NHLI via Getty Images
In San Jose, Reimer rejoined former Leafs teammates Roman Polak and Nick Spaling, who were both traded to San Jose five days before him in a separate deal.
"It was kind of funny. I'm thinking I may never see them again, who knows. All of sudden, a couple of days later, here we are," Reimer said, laughing. Sharks assistant coach Steve Spott was also a welcome sight, having coached Reimer last season in Toronto.
"I have a lot of respect for him and got along with him really well last year," Reimer said. "I think he's a really good coach. To have him here and know how he works, that's made it easier."
It could be a short visit in San Jose, with free agency lurking on July 1, but Reimer is only focused on the here and now. He has a chance to be part of something special, and he's dialed in for it.BURNS -- As the armed occupation of a Harney County wildlife refuge drags into its 13th day, protesters are sending mixed signals about their plans.
On one hand, Ammon Bundy and his followers who have taken over the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge planned to announce their exit strategy to the community Friday.
But they've also contacted nearby sheriffs and other officials looking for support. They've accumulated a large stash of food and supplies after making pleas to supporters online.
And at a daily press briefing Thursday, Bundy held forth on the subject of patience, saying he believed the continued presence of the occupiers was giving the county residents courage and hope.
"This hope is building and it's a slow process," Bundy said. "We know it has to happen now. We know this is the place, Harney County, and that these are the people."
He didn't offer an update on his plans, nor on the the planned meeting where he previously said he would announce plans to leave. Bundy and his affiliates are still seeking a place to hold the meeting after the county government said it couldn't be held at the county fairgrounds.
Protesters have indicated they would decamp if county residents wanted them to leave. At past community meetings, many people have been vocal in asking Bundy and the others to go home.
Earlier in the week, three members of Bundy's group met with Grant County Sheriff Glenn Palmer. They asked him to come to the refuge and "take a stand," Palmer told the Blue Mountain Eagle. He declined, saying he wouldn't without Harney County Sheriff Dave Ward's permission.
Ward told Palmer that he was welcome only if he would "shame and humiliate them into giving up," Palmer told the newspaper. Palmer, calling the occupiers "patriots," said he wasn't willing to do that and decided not to come.
Palmer declined comment to The Oregonian/OregonLive.
Bundy said he didn't personally meet with Palmer, but that the two have been "in communication."
"We're reaching out to these sheriffs, and to be frank, most of them have reached out to us," Bundy said.
Palmer has been a critic of perceived federal overreach, railing against gun-control measures in a letter to Vice President Joe Biden and publicly speaking about agencies he believes are imposing rules and regulations without constitutional authority.
Soon after learning of the Palmer meeting, Harney County commissioner Steven Grasty arranged a conference call with officials from other counties about being ready for a takeover similar to the one at the Malheur refuge.
"I'm thinking 'Wow, what if this grows? Should other counties know what our experience here is?'" Grasty said.
In the brief call Wednesday, Grasty asked hypothetical questions such as how the counties would provide for public safety if dozens of militia arrived at their courthouses.
Susan Roberts, a Wallowa County commissioner who was on the call, said she's taking steps to prevent an armed occupation like the one in Harney County. Though she doesn't believe an imminent threat exists, Roberts said she wants to educate her community about avenues in place to express grievances about federal land policies.
"I'm not saying that we don't agree with this group," Roberts said. "But the means of going about fostering an answer to this is different."
Meanwhile, the occupiers at the refuge said they're preparing to bring charges through an extra-legal court system against county and other government officials. The process could end in an attempt to arrest those officials.
A self-appointed judge, Bruce Doucette, arrived at the compound to oversee the proceedings along with a "citizens' grand jury" convened by the group.
Bundy has distributed a laundry list of charges he said could apply, excerpted from the federal criminal and penal code.
"There will be a trial with the redress of grievance. Whatever happens, it's up to the people here in this county," said Michael Emry, an occupier who said he was speaking for Doucette. "You have to have enforcement in a court of law, and that's what this is about."
Bundy has said he is occupying the refuge to protest the prosecutions of Dwight Hammond Jr. and Steven Hammond, local ranchers sentenced to prison for burning federal land. In addition to demanding the Hammonds' release, Bundy has demanded that the federal government hand over control of the wildlife refuge to local control.
The protesters also have seized upon an account of FBI agents scouting the Oregon National Guard armory in Burns as a means to bolster their beefs with federal authorities.
A retired Burns fire chief, Chris Briels, said he confronted two men near the armory because he thought they were from the refuge occupation. When the men refused to identify themselves, Briels called the 911 dispatch center, where he told reporters an operator identified them as undercover FBI agents.
The protesters and their supporters said Briels' story is evidence that federal agents are posing as occupiers to sow discord in the community. But in his remarks to reporters this week, Briels never said the men claimed to be protesters.
Representatives of the law enforcement response to the refuge takeover declined to comment.
Briels is a member of the Harney County Committee of Safety, a group of local residents formed at a community meeting organized by protesters in the week before they started the Jan. 2 occupation.
The occupation continues to affect Burns in big and small ways. Three top administrators at Harney County School District 3 announced their resignations this week. All are leaving after the end of the school year.
They felt the need to explain that their decisions weren't tied to the refuge takeover, but for personal reasons.
-- Elliot Njus and Fedor Zarkhin
[email protected]
503-294-5034
@enjus
503-294-7674
@56% View Feds As Threat to Individual Rights
The United States was founded on a belief that governments are created to protect certain unalienable rights. Today, however, more voters than ever view the federal government as a threat to those rights.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 56% of Likely U.S. Voters now consider the federal government a threat to individual rights rather than a protector of those rights. That’s up 10 points from 46% in December.
While 54% of liberal voters consider the feds to be a protector of individual rights, 78% of conservatives and 49% of moderates see the government as a threat.
Overall, only 30% believe the feds today are a protector of individual rights. Fourteen percent (14%) are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
Scott Rasmussen explained in a recent column that the biggest loser in the current controversies surrounding the Obama administration may be the president’s effort to build faith in the federal government.
Most voters believe the IRS targeting of Tea Party groups and other conservative organizations was politically motivated. Just 20% believe it was done by low level employees in the Cincinnati office. Two out of three believe the orders came from Washington.
Additionally, 60% think it’s likely that other government agencies also targeted Tea Party and other conservative groups.
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(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on June 2-3, 2013 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.
Democrats continue to view the federal government much more favorably than other voters do. While 76% of Republicans and 61% of voters not affiliated with either major party regard the government as a threat to individual rights, a plurality (47%) of voters in President Obama’s party consider it a protector of those rights instead.
Just over half of all voters now consider the Justice Department’s secret seizure of reporters’ phone records and the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative political groups to be serious scandals.
In recent years, roughly half of all voters have described the federal government as a threat to their rights.
Forty-three percent (43%) believe the Justice Department secretly obtaining phone records from Associated Press reporters and Fox News’ James Rosen was primarily an attempt to intimidate the media. Thirty-four percent (34%) believe the department’s actions were primarily out of concern for national security.
Just 25% of all voters think the federal government today has the consent of the governed.
Fifty-one percent (51%) of black voters consider the federal government a protector of individual rights. Sixty-one percent (61%) of whites and 58% of other minority voters view the government as a threat to those rights.
Sixty-eight percent (68%) of the Political Class think the federal government is a protector of rights. Seventy-one percent (71%) of Mainstream voters disagree.
While 49% of voters believe the United States needs stricter gun control laws, 64% think it would be bad for the country if government officials such as police and military personnel were the only ones allowed to have guns.
Lack of voter trust in the federal government is one reason why immigration reform efforts in Congress are running into difficulty. Just 30% think it’s even somewhat likely that the federal government would actually secure the border if the reform plan became law.
Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only.
Please sign up for the Rasmussen Reports daily e-mail update (it’s free) or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. Let us keep you up to date with the latest public opinion news.Tomorrow Comes Today
Tomorrow Comes Today
57.0%
Common 89.35%
Common
Fahrenheit 451
You know how it is: "Burn 'em to ashes, then burn the ashes."
63.4%
Common 92.31%
Common
Logan's Run
Happy Birthday! You are 30 today.
75.2%
Common 92.21%
Common
Jacob's Ladder
If there's a hell in this world, it's down there.
70.3%
Common 91.19%
Common
Hellraiser
Nails, nails, and more nails...
59.9%
Common 90.23%
Common
Westworld
Welcome to the sparkling, wild West.
58.4%
Common 89.95%
Common
God Told Me To
You should follow His signs, God is much smarter than you.
59.0%
Common 89.87%
Common
The Island of Dr. Moreau
The pig is a dog for the rat.
58.3%
Common 89.81%
Common
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Calm down, death is just a change of skin.
64.2%
Common 90.45%
Common
The Dead Zone
As devastated as the wreckage of your memory.
69.6%
Common 90.98%
Common
The Andromeda Strain
Say it loud: I'm ill and proud!
65.6%
Common 90.64%
Common
The Driller Killer
Or "How to Win Making Only Three Holes."
57.6%
Common 89.60%
Common
The Nightmare Before Christmas
A year, already? Time to hang the lights again!
58.3%
Common 89.68%
Common
Peeping Tom
A good model knows how to stand still until the sound of the flash.
58.5%
Common 89.60%
Common
Deep Red
Only red and yellow... everywhere you look.
68.4%
Common 90.85%
Common
Rosemary's Baby
Look at him sleeping. Isn't he cute?
60.6%
Common 90.00%
Common
A Bucket of Blood
A nice souvenir. I visited the New World and I brought you this.
57.8%
Common 89.54%
Common
House
Come in, no need to knock!
68.8%
Common 90.85%
Common
Piranha
Where do good fish go when they die?
57.4%
Common 89.50%
Common
Altered States
No doubt about it: you lost your mind. Take good note of it.
58.8%
Common 89.74%
Common
The Thing
Let's try the Electric Kool-Aid Alien Blood Test!
57.5%
Common 89.50%
Common
La Jetée
Past, present and future. Shaken... and well stirred.
68.0%
Common 90.77%
Common
Stalker
Because our lives are like a train heading nowhere...
67.9%
Common 90.69%
Common1. Gummy worms in Champagne are not only fun to look at, but delicious. Especially the soaked worm at the end of the glass!
2. Scavenger Hunt! Find a 1990’s sitcom star in the form of a talking doll, or find a giant bottle of wine at 4:00am.
3. Mario Kart!!! Sober is fun, but mix it up with the following game:
Mario Kart Drunk Driving Rules
– Must open can of beer during race countdown.
– Players can’t hold the can of beer or the controller at the same time (one must always be on the floor or lap).
– Player must have finished drinking beer before completing the race.
4. Dance PARTY! It does not matter how many people there are, what time it is, or where it is… Just do it!
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First aid convoy arrives in Rojava through new land corridor
Syrian Democratic Forces make new gains in anti-ISIS campaign, capture another district in Raqqa city
ARA News
Brett McGurk, Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, said that Iran cannot be allowed to ‘jeopardize our gains’ amidst increasing tensions between the US and Iran over control of the Syrian-Iraqi border.
“Because ISIS, as it loses territory, recruits, and appeal, will seek to attack Israel. We must do all we can and we will do all we can to ensure we defeat those designs,” he said during a conference in Israel on Friday.
“Nor can we allow Iran to jeopardize our gains and fuel instability in ISIS’s wake, by placing foreign proxies anywhere near the border regions with Jordan and Israel,” he said.
On 20 June, a US aircraft shot down a pro-Syrian regime Iranian Unmanned Aerial Vehicle advancing on Coalition forces in Southern Syria.
Moreover, the US-led coalition shot down a Syrian government jet near Raqqa that was threatening the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.
The US also carried out an air raid against Iranian-backed fighters in Southern Syria last week.
“Our core coalition principle, and its remained consistent throughout, is that local people, Syrians and Iraqis, local to their particular village, town, or city, should be in charge of their areas after ISIS is defeated – not foreigners,” McGurk said.
“All foreign fighters should leave Syria, period, whether fighting with Nusra or ISIS or Hezbollah. Any other formula fuels the conflict, places innocent Syrians between crossfires on their own land, and encourages extremists and spoilers on all sides,” he added.
“So as we go forward, we call on all parties with influence in Syria to prioritize the fight against ISIS while de-escalating the civil war, whether through local agreements or defined de-escalation areas, to set conditions for a political horizon and ultimate settlement,” the coalition envoy said in a message to Iran and the Syrian government.
In the meantime, Syrian Kurdish leader and co-head of the PYD, Salih Muslim, has said that Iran is opposing the rights of Kurds in Syria.
“We have no relations with Iran, and Iran’s policy is no different from that of the Syrian regime on the Kurdish issue, which is hostile to the Kurds’ fundamental rights,” he told the Saudi Riyadh news site.
“They fear that the Kurds will gain their fights in Syria, and the Iranian and Syrian regime have the same position [on the Kurds],” he said.
Reporting by: Wladimir van Wilgenburg | Source: ARA News
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Join our Weekly NewsletterLast week, there were rumblings over the end of the Statistical Abstract, and I suggested that it was just a sign of changing technologies. I thought that Data.gov and similar sites were the natural progression. Here’s the problem with that argument. Congress is planning on shutting down Data.gov and other transparency sites in the next few months.
So not only was I wrong, but now we’re taking steps backward. The budget for these technologies will be cut from $37m to $2m. According to Federal News Radio, USASpending.gov and Apps.gov/now will remain online until July 30 and then go black soon after.
For some reason it costs $4m just to keep USASpending operating for a year. Really?
As for Data.gov, it has always felt rough around the edges since launch and never got off the ground. There’s a lot of data there, but it’s old. Still, it is a sign of progress, and there is so much potential there that it’s a shame to see the efforts that have already been put in go to waste. Plus, when you compare the cuts to the billions of dollars spent elsewhere, it’s sad how little value these sites have.
Or maybe what’s sadder is that $37m wasn’t enough to build something worth keeping. I wonder how Data.gov.uk is doing. Hopefully better.
Do you want to see these sites keep going? Sunlight Foundation has an open letter to Congress seeking signatures.
However, here’s the million dollar question: is Data.gov worth saving?
[Federal News Radio & Sunlight Foundation via ReadWriteWeb]Looks like Northeast India is in a state of celebration like never before!
The region, known as one of football?s biggest hotbeds in the country, got its due with Aizawl FC and Neroca FC being coronated champions in the I-league and second division league respectively.
Renedy Singh, one of the biggest names from the region to don Indian colours, believes that the series of football events this year is a success story not only for the state, but for the country as a whole.
He said,?The contribution of Aizawl FC, Shillong Lajong and Neroca FC will not only amplify the love for Football in Northeast India but also provides hope for other cities and states to develop football and create their own success story. The future of Indian football should stem from having teams from across the country. We need more participation from states like Jammu and Kashmir, Gujarat, Rajasthan or even football centric cities like Siliguri, Thiruvananthapuram and Hyderabad to revolutionise football in India.?
When asked about the dual league and its implications on the players, Renedy said,?It?s too early to talk about the roadmap and we will receive clarity only post the AFC meeting on 7th June where we will be present as well. As the President of the FPAI, I will be more than happy if there were 20 or even 30 teams playing throughout the year in a longer league format and players are provided extended contracts. Longer leagues will only make the Indian football ecosystem sustainable for the clubs as well as the players.?
Adding,?The positive side of having multiple leagues is that we get an opportunity to see an increase in the number of players and the same players don?t juggle between two clubs in a year. More players will be employed, and will get an opportunity to play at a professional level. This system will also help the national team and the overall player development, as we will see 400 to 500 professional players competing at the national level compared to 150 to 200 players we have seen in the past 2 to 3 seasons. That is the only way wherein we can see active participation of players from various states across the country.?
(This article has not been edited by DNA's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)Curiosity takes a selfie. Image: Curiosity/Twitter
Several members of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover team participated in a Reddit AmA today, in celebration of the rover's third "landiversary." Among the surprising answers? The rover has only traveled 11 kilometers in three years of exploration.
But when you think of the necessary thoroughness of the rover's research, and the time it needs to spend recharging, its snail's pace is more understandable. And the rover has unearthed some truly incredible discoveries: namely, there might still be life on Mars, deep below the planet's surface. Deputy project scientist Joy Crisp says "it's a long shot, but someday we might find life deeper on Mars. The environment on the surface of Mars today is quite harsh for life as we know it, but if life exists on Mars, it would be protected from radiation at depth and liquid water could be stable there too."
Mostly, Redditors wanted to know what discoveries team members were most excited about. Team member Fred Calef notes that almost all of the rocks the Curiosity has driven over were "water deposited," and public engagement representative Carolina cites the organic carbon found in Mars rocks as another welcome surprise.
Screencap: Rachel Pick
According to the team, Curiosity has already well surpassed its expected lifespan of one year. The biggest threat to its longevity is simple wear and tear to the wheels. But Curiosity is going to be the blueprint for another rover that will launch in 2020, and engineers and scientists remain hopeful that information gleaned from this expedition will make the next rover stronger.
And what does the rover team think of privatized space exploration? Mission lead Nagin Cox says, "There is so much to be done in solar system exploration that it is great to have commercial companies jumping into the game. They can often address technical problems with a fresh perspective that is great for everyone." What a great attitude.Officials in an asylum home in Germany have raised the alarm after discovering several young asylum seekers have been watching Islamic State propaganda films and may have been radicalised.
Officials at an asylum home for unaccompanied minors in Freising discovered three young migrants in their care had not only watched several Islamic State propaganda videos but had also taken pictures of themselves posing with the symbols of the terror group, Müncher Merkur reports.
Local councillor Josef Hauner said, “We are making sure to look for any hint” of radicalisation and added, “fortunately nothing has happened.” Both the police and local
|
ptocratic authoritarianism over which he presides.
I worked for Clinton. I learned from her and worked with her to write several speeches about human rights. I admire her and respect her, and I think she would have been a terrific president. But my point here is not that she is exceptional, but rather that she recognized and embraced the idea that America has an exceptional role to play in building and defending world order that is governed by rules grounded in human dignity. She saw and forcefully articulated her conviction on this, just as Ronald Reagan, both Bushes, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama each did. Putin wasn’t principally trying to inflict revenge on someone he sees as a personal foe. He was trying to disrupt a longstanding principle in American foreign policy — that the United States stands with the billions of individuals around the world who are still yearning to be free. That is why Putin saw derailing Clinton’s White House bid as a way of tightening his own grip on the Kremlin.
As I stated in testimony for the House Foreign Affairs Committee earlier this month, we need an independent investigation into Russia’s intervention into the U.S. elections so that we can address vulnerabilities and deliver consequences for such actions in the future, and so that American voters have the opportunity to understand how Russia sabotaged their democratic rights. A commission would provide useful detail of the nature and scope of the Russian interference in our democratic process. But we must also guard against the notion that this was chiefly about the two candidates in the last election — one helped and one hindered by Putin.
Clinton’s liberal internationalism would not have been unique among American presidents — her foreign policy views are centrist and generally accord with the mainstream of both Republicans and Democrats — and there will be future candidates who also stand strong for universal principles. We must not let Putin or any other foreign leader have a veto on U.S. values.
Photo credit: ALEXEY NIKOLSKY/AFP/Getty ImagesWhich probably isn't too far from the truth – the button being on a television remote control.
Click.
It's Shaq and the Miami Heat against the Chicago Bulls.
Click.
There's Kobe and the Los Angeles Lakers hosting the Phoenix Suns.
By most accounts, Kim is a totalitarian despot who is hell-bent on developing nuclear weapons to gain diplomatic leverage against the rest of the planet and who may or may not sell that technology to raise cash for his impoverished nation. But he also is an avid basketball fan, experts on North Korea say, so much so that he is said to have regulation courts at most of his palaces plus a video library of practically every game Michael Jordan ever played for the Bulls.
While the rest of the world frets over what Kim might do with his nukes, Kim is sitting in his den, watching pirated satellite television signals from the United States and wondering if Shaquille O'Neal's new shooting technique will improve his woeful free-throw percentage, or if Phil Jackson can get it going again with the Lakers. The NBA season, after all, opens Tuesday night in Miami and Los Angeles.
Kim, 64, is famously nocturnal, often working through the night to run his country, wedged between South Korea and China. Perfect. In North Korea, which is on the other side of the international date line, the games come on in the late morning.
“Kim doesn't want to die,” Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., said a few years ago after one of Kim's missile tests sent waves of fear across the globe. “He wants to watch NBA basketball.”
Adds Tony Ronzone, director of basketball operations for the NBA's Detroit Pistons, who has made three trips to North Korea to conduct coaching clinics: “He's a huge fan. He's addicted to it.”
Gene Schmiel was the deputy director of Korean affairs for the State Department in the early 1990s when he met with some top North Korean officials making a rare visit to the United States. They met during the day, had dinner together and then continued their discussions in a hotel suite, hoping to find common ground with a staunchly communist country – the so-called Hermit Kingdom – that does not allow its 23 million citizens access to cell phones, the Internet, international TV or free press.
Things seemed to be progressing methodically when the most senior North Korean diplomat looked at his watch and, Schmiel said, blurted out: “Stop. No more. Michael and Bulls are on TNT, and I've got to see if Scottie (Pippen) has gotten over his latest injury.”
Wrote Schmiel in an article posted on an American diplomatic Web site: “He then moved to the TV, turned it on, and stared transfixed at the opening jump ball between the Chicago Bulls and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Since I'm from Cleveland, we spent the rest of our time together debating not high policy but high-quality shooting and such arcana as whether the NBA should permit the use of zone defense.
“It was clear from our discussions that he had watched the NBA for many years.”
Schmiel says the North Korean official, who still is one of the country's chief negotiators with the West, knew nicknames of players, history, statistics, NBA minutiae.
“He's obviously one of the favored few,” Schmiel said. “And he got to watch games with the boss.”
The boss being Kim. Or, as he prefers, Dear Leader.
At the time, the White House did not embrace a strategy of engagement with North Korea, which was split from South Korea after World War II and further isolated after the Korean War ended in a cease-fire in 1953. President Clinton's administration began thawing relations in the late 1990s, and in October 2000, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright became the first senior-level U.S. government official to visit Kim in North Korea.
Their talks lasted two days, and before leaving, Albright presented the 5-foot-3 Kim a gift – an authentic NBA basketball autographed by Michael Jordan.
Accompanying Albright on the trip was Bob Carlin, who recently retired after three decades as the chief North Korea analyst for the CIA and State Department.
“We were looking for something that was a little more meaningful than a bottle of scotch or a miniature Statue of Liberty or a Buffalo Bill book – something with more importance to him,” said Carlin, now a visiting scholar at Stanford University. “He may have been initially surprised by it, but you could tell he was pleased. I don't think he expected it. It was a very personal gesture, in a sense.
“It showed him we went through some effort to get the signature. They realized it wasn't just an ordinary ball.”
It now sits in a glass case in the Museum of International Understanding, a hulking complex nestled in Mount Myohyangsan north of the capital, Pyongyang. There are two separate buildings, one each for the Dear Leader (Kim Jong Il) and the Great Leader (his father, Kim Il Sung, who died in 1994), with 200 rooms containing an estimated 50,000 official gifts from about 170 nations.
Visitors are not allowed to bring cameras inside and must wear shoe covers so as not to scuff the meticulously polished marble floors. There is a mother-of-pearl box from the Palestinian Authority's Yasser Arafat, a crocodile handbag from Cuba's Fidel Castro, a stuffed warthog from Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, a hunting rifle from Russian President Vladimir Putin... and a Michael Jordan basketball.
The following year, Jordan's management team was approached about the athlete making a goodwill trip to Pyongyang to meet Kim. The North Korean government, according to documents obtained by The San Diego Union-Tribune, sent a letter authorizing the request, and Samsung, a South Korean electronics company interested in promoting reunification of the Koreas, had offered to underwrite the venture.
Jordan respectfully declined.
In recent weeks, politicians have debated the merits of engaging Kim and North Korea in “basketball diplomacy,” a phrase modified from the “pingpong diplomacy” that helped thaw U.S. relations with China in the 1970s. Carlin, for one, is all for sending a delegation of basketball coaches or players to Pyongyang.
“I think that would be a very useful, positive step,” Carlin said. “If someone wanted to make a serious opening gesture, that would probably not be a bad idea. These things carry only so much diplomatic freight, but they are the little things that begin to open relations.”
You know what they say about a nuclear warhead: It's roughly the size of a basketball.
The first time Tony Ronzone tried to go to North Korea, he never made it.
It was 1998, and Ronzone had been invited to conduct a coaching clinic on behalf of FIBA, basketball's world governing body. The plan was for a North Korean delegation to meet him in China, but no one was there when he arrived, and Chinese authorities detained him for eight hours in the airport before sending him out of the country.
A few months later, Ronzone tried again. This time he got in.
Each morning for a week, he was driven from his deserted tourist hotel in Pyongyang to a 12,000-seat basketball arena for the clinic. There were several hundred coaches bused in from all corners of the country, all wearing suits and ties, all wearing a button with the Dear Leader's likeness on their lapel. In the stands were an additional 10,000 or so people, watching intently.
“I never knew for sure, but I was told that Kim Jong Il was there himself in the audience one day,” Ronzone said. “He supposedly liked my clinic so much he asked the people in the sports ministry to invite me back. I ended up going back two more times.”
Ronzone officially worked for FIBA at the time, but he also was a scout for the Dallas Mavericks. His ulterior motive was to catch a glimpse of Ri Myung Hun, a North Korean center with impeccable fundamentals and a feathery jump shot who, rumor had it, was also 2.35 meters tall.
The rumors were right. Ri was indeed 2.35 meters tall, or 7 feet 8½ inches. Some say he was closer to 7-foot-9.
Kim had kept Ri, then in his late 20s, under close wraps but finally granted his blessing for him to become the first Asian in the NBA. Ri flew to Canada with a coach, a diplomat and a security guard, and about half the NBA teams sent scouts to see him. He decided to Anglicize his name to Michael Ri, in honor of his – and the Dear Leader's – favorite player, Jordan.
“Michael would have been able to play in the NBA,” said Michael Coyne, the Cleveland attorney who served as his U.S. liaison. “I think the North Koreans wanted to use the NBA marketing machine to show that North Koreans are normal people, and it would have worked because Michael was the perfect guy to show that. He had a great attitude, he was a hard worker and he had great charisma.”
There was one roadblock. The State Department ruled that signing Ri would constitute a breach of its Trading With the Enemy Act.
“We did not handle it as wisely as we could have,” said Carlin, the retired State Department expert on North Korea. “This was a time when they were really trying to improve relations with the United States. I think they wanted to show the American people that this enmity and hostility was thawing because one of their Koreans was playing amongst the Americans.”
The State Department reconsidered in 2000 and gave Ri permission to play. By then, Kim apparently was insulted by the previous rebuff and retracted his 7-foot-8½-inch olive branch.
So Ri went home.
“It's my honor to play games in the bosom of the general,” he once told South Korean journalists. “Then why do I need to go somewhere else to play?”
Ri remains one of the oddities of the sport in North Korea, where basketball, with little contact with the outside world, has evolved like the tortoises in the Galapagos Islands. Chinese media have reported that the country even developed its own scoring system, with three points for a dunk, four points for a three-pointer that does not touch the rim and eight points for a basket scored in the final three seconds. Miss a free throw, and it's minus one.
The government has been said to promote basketball as part of a “grow taller” campaign, citing statistics that children who play basketball grow more than those who do not. Kim was quoted in North Korean media as saying, “We should make our youths and workers play a lot of basketball.”
At least two of Kim's sons reportedly are avid basketball players, so much that he had NBA-regulation courts built at all his palaces. His second son, Kim Jong Chul, attended an international school in Switzerland under an assumed name. A Chinese documentary team interviewed his Swiss classmates, who said he played basketball on the school team and dreamed of making the NBA. The documentary shows him wearing – what else? – a Chicago Bulls jersey.
While the average citizen does not have access to Kim's satellite dish or the pristine palace courts, the love for basketball has been passed down in a country devoid of the American staples of democracy and capitalism.
“Seeing people on their (work) break playing a pickup game, that speaks volumes to me,” said Carlin, who has made more than 20 trips to North Korea. “They a) like the sport and b) know how to play it. And they know it's American in a sense, and they still play it. If the word came down that they shouldn't do something so American, people would probably play soccer.
“But the word never comes down to stop playing.”
To prepare for his clinics, Ronzone brought along binders full of basketball information: motion offenses, defensive philosophies, team concepts, inbounds plays, practice plans, shooting drills, even motivational speeches.
“When I was leaving, they told me the sports minister wanted copies of all my literature that I had brought with me so they could have it as a reference,” Ronzone said. “Later my interpreter quietly told me that it really was for Kim Jong Il. He wanted to read through it all.”How to Break Out of a Victim Mentality: 7 Powerful Tips
Image by *Zara (license).
“If it's never our fault, we can't take responsibility for it. If we can't take responsibility for it, we'll always be its victim.”
Richard Bach
“Self-pity is easily the most destructive of the nonpharmaceutical narcotics; it is addictive, gives momentary pleasure and separates the victim from reality.”
John W. Gardner
One big problem a lot of people have is that they slip into thinking of themselves as victims that have little or no control over their lives. In this headspace you feel sorry for yourself, the world seems to be against you and you get stuck. Little to no action is taken and you get lost in a funk of sadness and self-pity.
So how can you move out of that mindset? In this article I’d like to share a few things that have helped me.
1. Know the benefits of a victim mentality.
There are a few benefits of the victim mentality:
Attention and validation. You can always get good feelings from other people as they are concerned about you and try to help you out. On the other hand, it may not last for that long as people get tired of it.
You can always get good feelings from other people as they are concerned about you and try to help you out. On the other hand, it may not last for that long as people get tired of it. You don’t have to take risks. When you feel like a victim you tend to not take action and then you don’t have to risk for example rejection or failure.
When you feel like a victim you tend to not take action and then you don’t have to risk for example rejection or failure. Don’t have to take the sometimes heavy responsibility. Taking responsibility for you own life can be hard work, you have to make difficult decisions and it is just heavy sometimes. In the short term it can feel like the easier choice to not take personal responsibility.
Taking responsibility for you own life can be hard work, you have to make difficult decisions and it is just heavy sometimes. In the short term it can feel like the easier choice to not take personal responsibility. It makes you feel right. When you feel like the victim and like everyone else – or just someone else – is wrong and you are right then that can lead to pleasurable feelings.
In my experience, by just being aware of the benefits I can derive from victim thinking it becomes easier to say no to that and to choose to take a different path.
It also makes it easier to make rational decisions about what to do. Yes, I know that I can avoid risk and the hard work of taking action by feeling like a victim. But I also know that there are even more positive results if I choose to take the other route, if I make the better choice to take a chance and start moving forward.
2. Be OK with not being the victim.
So to break out of that mentality you have to give up the benefits above. You might also experience a sort of emptiness within when you let go of victim thinking. You may have spent hours each week with thinking and talking about how wrong things have gone for you in life. Or how people have wronged you and how you could get some revenge or triumph over them.
Now you have to fill your life with new thinking that may feel uncomfortable because it is not so intimately familiar as the victim thinking your have been engaging in for years.
3. Take responsibility for your life.
Why do people often have self-esteem problems? I’d say that one of the big reasons is that they don’t take responsibility for their lives. Instead someone else is blamed for the bad things that happen and a victim mentality is created and empowered.
This damages many vital parts in your life. Stuff like relationships, ambitions and achievements.
That hurt will not stop until you wise up and take responsibility for your life. There is really no way around it.
And the difference is really remarkable. Just try it out. You feel so much better about yourself even if you only take personal responsibility for your own life for a day.
This is also a way to stop relying on external validation like praise from other people to feel good about yourself. Instead you start building a stability within and a sort of inner spring that fuels your life with positive emotions no matter what other people say or do around you.
4. Gratitude.
When I feel that I am putting myself in victim role I like to ask myself this question:
“Does someone have it worse on the planet?”
The answer may not result in positive thoughts, but it can sure snap you of a somewhat childish “poor, poor me…” attitude pretty quickly. I understand that I have much to be grateful for in my life.
This question changes my perspective from a narrow, self-centred one into a much wider one. It helps me to lighten up about my situation.
After I have changed my perspective I usually ask another question like:
“What is the hidden opportunity within this situation?”
That is very helpful to keep your focus on how to solve a problem or get something good out a current situation. Rather than asking yourself “why?” over and over and thereby focusing on making yourself feel worse and worse.
5. Forgive.
It’s easy to get wrapped up in thinking that forgiveness is just about something you “should do”. But forgiving can in a practical way be extremely beneficial for you.
One of the best reasons to forgive can be found in this quote by Catherine Ponder:
“When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free.”
As long as you don’t forgive someone you are linked to that person. Your thoughts will return to the person who wronged you and what s/he did over and over again. The emotional link between the two of you is so strong and inflicts much suffering in you and – as a result of your inner turmoil – most often in other people around you too.
When you forgive you do not only release the other person. You set yourself free too from all of that agony.
6. Turn your focus outward and help someone out.
The questions in tip #4 are useful. Another question I use when I get into the victim headspace is simply:
“How can I give value right now?”
Asking that question and making that shift in what you focus on really helps, even if you may not feel totally like doing it.
So I figure out how I can give someone else value, how I can help someone out.
And thing is that the way you behave and think towards others seems to have a big, big effect on how you behave towards yourself and think about yourself. For example, judge people more and you tend to judge yourself more. Be more kind to other people and help them and you tend to be more kind and helpful to yourself.
A bit counter intuitive perhaps, but that has been my experience. The more you love other people, the more your love yourself.
7. Give yourself a break.
Getting out of a victim mentality can be hard. Some days you will slip. That’s OK. Be OK with that.
And be nice to yourself. If you have to be perfect then one little slip is made into a big problem and may cause you to spiral down into a very negative place for many days.
It is more helpful to just give yourself a break and use the tips above to move yourself into a positive and empowered headspace once again.If you want something small that packs a punch, then the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray is definitely a very worthy contender for consideration.
It's been a busy old year for Sony Ericsson. As it struggles to regain a foothold in the market it was once sucha major player in, it's been firing out more Android-based Xperia smartphones than long-lost relatives on an episode of Jeremy Kyle. And they're not half bad either.
The Xperia Arc has been the flagship of 2011's bunch. Arriving in the spring, it became the skinny poster girl for the Swedish-Japanese hybrid, showing off its amazing screen presence with the help of the Sony Reality Display (the bit that reproduces colour on the screen and makes it look great) but in the Xperia Ray, Sony Ericsson has gone for a smaller model.
You can check out in moving pictures how the phone looks, with our special video review of the Xperia Ray:
Before we go any further, there is one point we have to make clear: this phone is small. And thin. Think smaller and thinner than you expect, then shave a bit more off your dimensions. That's what you get.
The Xperia Arc (we're going to be making lot of comparisons to the Arc in this review) is 125 x 63mm with a depth of 8.7mm. The Ray slices most of that off and comes in at a remarkable 111 x 53mm. It is slightly fatter, by less than a millimetre, clocking in at 9.4mm deep.
It reminds us very much of the original (and, at the time, revolutionary) HTC Touch Diamond from 2008 – a niche handset that only retro phone geeks are likely to recall.
Indeed, compared to the larger handsets we've become used to using, such as the Samsung Galaxy S2, Apple iPhone 4 and HTC Sensation, this really does feel teeny and we couldn't stop picking it up at first.
But it is no slouch. Under that hood, you'll find a not-too-shabby 8MP camera with HD video recording, Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread, HSUPA/HSDPA and 1GHz processor.
The Ray sits comfortably in the hand, and at 100g, you'll barely even notice it's there. Indeed if ever there was a candidate for a 'going out phone' that would slip unobtrusively into a pair of skinny jeans, this is most definitely it.
The rear has a matt finish that's only broken up by the camera lens and flash, plus a speaker near the bottom, crowned by a Sony Ericsson logo.
Around the side, there's little to comment on. The left has only a micro USB socket for charging/syncing, while the left houses a volume rocker.
Up top, you'll find little of interest other than a (thankfully easy to hit) power/sleep button and the 3.5mm socket for headphones of your choice.
The front is fairly minimalistic, made of a large sheet of glass broken up only by an earpiece and a physical Home button. The other two buttons that serve as Back and Options are both touch-sensitive jobs and, unfortunately, not as sensitive as we'd have liked.
Inside, you'll find 1GB of memory – although only 300MB is available to the user – and a slot for swapping microSD cards. You only get a 4GB card in the box compared to the 8GB the Xperia Arc ships with, which seems a little tight. But considering how cheap memory is these days, we'll not hold it against Sony Ericsson too much.
But here's an issue: the memory isn't hot swappable. Seriously, Sony Ericsson – is that too much to ask in the year 2011?
The handset is available in a number of colours, including gold, black, pink and white, catering for all members of fashion crowd, apparently.
The Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray's screen is the same resolution as the Xperia Arc's amazing display, which means 480 x 854 pixels. But it's a lot smaller, at 3.3 inches, compared to the Xperia Arc's 4.2 inches, which means a much higher density.
Don't underestimate this – when you look at the Xperia Ray's display, you will not believe how clear it is. Put it next to an Apple Retina display and you'll notice there isn't much in it.
Colours on the whole look fantastic, although we were disappointed with the quality of our blue sky wallpapers, which looked a lot more washed out than they did on the Samsung Galaxy S2. Plus the clarity is incredible.
We did find that we often had to tap a button or function again because the first go didn't register. We had the same issue with the soft keys. It wasn't a deal breaker, but it was unresponsive enough for us to notice and get slightly frustrated.
We're shallow enough to admit that one thing we love is the animation when you turn the display off. Hit the Standby button and the screen decreases and disappears into a white line in a deliberate echo of the sequence we'd see in days gone by when turning off an old CRT TV set - first seen on the Google Nexus S.
It's a cosmetic addition that adds no functionality. It's a gimmick. And it's pointless. But man, did we love it. And so did all of our friends we showed it to. Small things, small minds.
As with all modern mobile phones, the glass is apparently toughened. We couldn't see any literature that defined it specifically as Gorilla Glass but whatever it is, it's not great.
Not only is the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray a fingerprint and dust magnet, the screen is also a scratch magnet. In the week that we had it, we noticed scratches appear at the rate of several per day. Don't get us wrong, they weren't huge, and indeed, we had to strain to look for them.
But if you're as OCD as us about keeping your precious looking precious, you won't like it. And putting a screen protector on (providing you can find one that fits exactly) will take away some of the sparkle.
The Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray has just started hitting shelves at a very reasonable £299 SIM-free price. That's £50 cheaper than the Xperia Arc, which is almost identical, save for the size.
If you want to go on contract, it's available free on £25 a month deals (provided you sign 18-24 months of your life away.) On a 12-month contract, you're looking at about £50 for the phone, which is still very reasonable for what you're getting.
Without reinforcing a stereotype, we can't help feeling this is one for either the ladies or the smaller fingered men among us. Those who want a similar Android experience on a larger deviceare likely to plump for a Samsung Galaxy S2, HTC Sensation or, indeed, the Xperia Arc itself.TOTTENHAM are set to be without Danny Rose for the whole of February after the defender injured his knee in Tuesday’s draw with Sunderland.
Rose will undergo a scan on Thursday but Spurs chiefs fear he has suffered medial ligament damage – ruling him out of the crunch clash against Liverpool.
Reuters 5 Danny Rose is set to miss the whole of February with suspected knee ligament damage
The England international has been in superb form this season and his absence will be a huge blow to Mauricio Pochettino’s title hopes.
Keep up to date with ALL the Tottenham news, gossip, transfers and goals on our club page plus fixtures, results and live match commentary
It means Rose will miss the upcoming trip to Anfield as well as this weekend’s gameagainst Middlesbrough.
The 26-year-old could also be absent for both legs of the Europa League match against Gent and the FA Cup battle against London rivals Fulham.
Getty Images 5 Rose was forced off the field during the 0-0 draw with Sunderland on Tuesday
Getty Images 5 Rose is set to miss the Liverpool match as well as FA Cup and Europa League clashes
Spurs have been hit by a number of defensive problems this season, with Jan Vertonghen still out for a number of weeks with ankle ligament damage
Toby Alderweireld missed two months earlier in the campaign with a knee setback and Pochettino will now be forced to turn to Ben Davies as Rose’s short-term replacement.
Getty Images 5 Mousa Dembele also picked up a knock at the Stadium of Light
Getty Images 5 Hugo Lloris should be back to face Middlesbrough as he recovers from illness
But there could yet be further problems for the Argentine, with key midfielder Mousa Dembele also picking up a knock against the Black Cats.
However, captain Hugo Lloris could be back to face Boro after missing the Stadium of Light stalemate through illness.Image caption Violence against hostages by their pirate captors remains high
The number of hostages killed or injured by Somali pirates increased significantly last year, according to a report by maritime officials.
The International Maritime Bureau says 35 people who were held hostage by Somali pirates died in 2011.
Levels of violence against seafarers in coastal waters around east Africa and the Gulf of Aden also remained high.
While the number of successful hijackings decreased, hostages are being held for longer, the report said.
Most of the hostages who died were killed while trying to escape during rescue operations.
The other deaths were directly at the hands of the pirates or due to malnutrition or disease during captivity.
Brutality
While figures for hostages killed in previous years are patchy, the report says the 2011 figure does reflect a significant increase, and accounts for 3% of the total number of hostages taken.
BBC Africa analyst Mary Harper says it used to be rare for hostages to die in captivity since their value while alive has enabled pirates in the past to successfully obtain large ransom payments.
Hostages held by Somali pirates in 2011 3,863 seafarers fired upon by pirates
1,206 hostages held captive
35 died, most while trying to escape during rescues
Average length of captivity increased by 50%
Levels of violence remained high Source: 'Human cost of Somali piracy', International Maritime Bureau
The report also outlined some of the violence faced by seafarers and those taken hostage.
Last year nearly 4,000 seafarers were fired upon by Somali pirates, the report said
Of that number, 968 seafarers faced armed pirates who managed to board their vessels, while some 413 of those seafarers were rescued from secured rooms on their vessels by naval forces.
At least 1,206 hostages were held by Somali pirates in 2011, including 555 seafarers attacked and taken hostage during the year, and 645 captured in 2010 who remained in pirate hands.
Half of those held were subjected to punching and slapping and 10% suffered violent abuse such as being locked in freezers, burned with cigarettes and having their fingernails pulled out with pliers.
The average length of captivity also increased by 50% over the last year, up to an average length of more than eight months.
Some have been kept for more than two years, such as the crew of the Panama-flagged MV Iceberg who have been held hostage since March 2010.
The report says the ship's owner has gone out of business so there is nobody to negotiate the crew's release.He was consigned to be a relic before his time had come. Henry Pu Yi started out life as an anachronism, a boy emperor of a fading dynasty. He died as a forgotten footnote, a stooped gardener assigned to the Beijing Botanical Gardens where he tilled the earth that had supported his Qing Dynasty predecessors for nearly 300 years. Aisin-Gioro Pu Yi, the 10th ruler of the Manchu Dynasty, was born to the gilded splendor of the Forbidden City and ascended to the throne in 1908. Just three years later, a nationalist putsch ended the infant's reign. At the tender age of six, the Son of Heaven was out of a job. Twelve years later, in 1924, Pu Yi was ejected from his prison palace by an ambitious warlord. He fled to Tianjin, where he cavorted as an exiled and extravagant playboy, full of imperious airs but no imperial mandate. That mandate, however forced, was reinstated in 1932, when invading Japan set up the puppet regime of Manchukuo in northeastern China. Tapping the disgruntled ex-Emperor as figurehead ruler, the Japanese promised him a kingdom to match his royal breeding. In 1934, Pu Yi slipped into silken robes emblazoned with dragons and formally ascended to the throne of Japanese-occupied Manchukuo, fueled by hopes of a revived Qing Dynasty. Pu Yi proved a brittle ruler who lashed out at cowering servants to compensate for his sense of powerlessness. With the Japanese surrender in 1945, his dreams of empire were dashed, and the chastened Emperor was trundled off by advancing Soviet troops to the Russian Far East, where he spent five years dreading his return to the country he had betrayed. On releasing him into Chinese hands in July 1950, the Soviets heightened the ex-monarch's fears, assuring him that he would be executed by a wrathful populace. Moscow was wrong. By not killing Pu Yi, the Chinese communists avoided making him into a martyr like Nicholas II in Russia or Louis XVI in France. Instead, he was to be fashioned into a Maoist role model, proof that even the most pampered royal could be reformed. Pu Yi spent a decade in jail, where he underwent relentless thought reform. In addition to admitting his complicity in Japanese barbarity in Manchuria and professing communist zealotry, Pu Yi also learned more practical things like how to brush his teeth, wash his feet and tie his shoelaces. On Dec. 4, 1959, Comrade Pu Yi, a 54-year-old who could now dress and groom himself, was issued a special pardon and entered life as a private citizen.In 1960, Pu Yi was sent to the Beijing Botanical Gardens to begin work as a gardener and handyman. The preserve was not far from Pu Yi's old Forbidden City haunts, but it was worlds away from the splendor of imperial China. He lived with his fifth wife in a dilapidated courtyard house, shuffling occasionally to the library to conduct historical research on his defanged and unloved dynasty. Just hours before he died, unmourned, of cancer at a Beijing hospital in 1967, the medical staff reportedly had to link arms to keep the Red Guards from storming the ailing Manchu's ward. Nearly three decades later Pu Yi and his clan finally enjoyed a reprieve. In 1995, his widow was allowed to transfer his ashes from a public columbarium to the Western Qing Tombs, where five of the 10 Manchu rulers are interred. Just a few years before, a sanitized Qing revival had begun. Manchu-style banquets became the rage in Beijing, and state-published recipe books illustrated the proper ways of preparing, for example, a tasty sheep's ear. Cashing in on the hype surrounding Bernardo Bertolucci's 1988 film The Last Emperor, the Chinese tourist bureau even began offering tours of landmark places in Pu Yi's life, including his spartan prison cell in Fushun. The Botanical Gardens, where the deposed Emperor spent many of his final days, were not part of the itinerary. Curious tourists had to make do with official photographs of Pu Yi tending his plants. Those graying portraits evoke a bittersweet Chinese Gothic, a diminutive, bespectacled man standing solemnly with his gardening tools. The one-time Emperor nurtured the earth lovingly, professing himself content with watering his patch of the motherland. In 1960, armed with his first voter's card, Pu Yi voiced the hopes of the great Chinese agrarian revolution: I, along with my 650 million compatriots, was now the owner of our 9,600,000 sq km of land. Perhaps he had forgotten that he had once been responsible for more than just a little plot of flowers. Indeed, as a very little boy, Henry Pu Yi had once owned it all.An Ontario woman and her American boyfriend are still missing in Belize five days after their disappearance, friends of the couple told Global News.
Francesca Matus, 52, and U.S. national Drew De Voursney, 36, were last seen driving home from a bar in the town of Corozal around 11 p.m. Tuesday night, according to their friend Nancy Rifenbark, who lives in Corozal.
Matus was having a drink with friends and saying goodbye as she was due to catch a WestJet flight to Toronto the next day, Rifenbark said. But when her friend Joe Milholen showed up at her house the next morning to give her a ride to the airport, he found her gate locked and her vehicle missing.
READ MORE: Anton Pilipa, missing Canadian found near Amazon rainforest, comes home to Toronto
Milholen told Global News that after trying unsuccessfully to reach Matus on her cellphone, he called friends of the couple and checked with the local police station and hospital, to no avail.
Belizean authorities and volunteers have since conducted air and ground searches of the area, but no clues have been unearthed so far.
“The possibilities (of what happened) are endless,” Milholen said.
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that are intended to examine the composition of the comet, both at its surface and internally. There's also a small drill that will obtain samples up to 30 cm deep at the landing site. All that comes from a power budget that averages eight Watts when the sun is shining on it.
The weight budget for the Rosetta mission, however, didn't allow for any engines or guidance systems. Instead, Philae will simply be released by the orbiter and left to drift to the comet's surface, driven by the initial momentum of the separation and pulled by the body's weak gravity. Once in motion, no course corrections will be possible during the seven hours it will take to reach the comet's surface.
Initial maneuvers will see Rosetta, which is currently orbiting at 30 km, shift direction to move toward the comet's surface. Separation will occur around 3:30am tomorrow (8:30 GMT) with landing expected around 11:00am if all goes well. We'll have updates as warranted, or you can tune in to the ESA's livestream.— Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s administration tried — and failed — to reverse a House of Delegates vote killing a bill that opponents say would have shrouded state-sponsored executions in unprecedented secrecy, lawmakers said.
Several members of the House of Delegates said officials from the state Department of Corrections lobbied them to see if they would change their earlier votes. Those lawmakers asked House Speaker William J. Howell (R-Stafford) to hold a second vote on the bill Wednesday.
The aggressive lobbying by McAuliffe’s agency to keep drugs used for lethal injection flowing into the state put him at odds with many in his party who oppose capital punishment. Lawmakers from both parties opposed the measure because it would have removed transparency from state-sponsored executions.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections did not return several messages. Brian Moran, the governor’s secretary of public safety and homeland security, who oversees corrections, did not return phone calls.
Brian Coy, a spokesman for McAuliffe (D), declined to comment on the agency’s efforts to flip lawmakers’ votes and referred to his earlier statements on the issue. Coy has said the governor does not support capital punishment but it is his responsibility to uphold the law.
“He is a Catholic,” Coy has said, “so there is a moral component to his position on the issue, but he’s governor, and he will enforce the law.”
The bill would have prevented the public from scrutinizing almost everything having to do with the death penalty in Virginia by exempting from the state’s open-records law the names of the manufacturers of the drugs and how they are made.
The measure comes as some states experiment with new chemical combinations that have been blamed for several high-profile botched executions.
Some states say they were left scrambling for a way to carry out executions after foreign companies stopped selling lethal-injection drugs because of pressure from their governments.
Del. C. Matthew Fariss (R-Campbell) said he told Department of Corrections officials that he would have changed his vote.
“They just told me it was important to them to have this bill... pass to make their process of obtaining these lethal drugs more efficient,” he said.
Opponents said the bill would have forced lawmakers to make decisions with no access to data on lethal injection in Virginia, which has no executions scheduled this year.
“Legislators do not want to be making policy judgments about matters like the death penalty with a bag over our heads, which is what they’re asking us to do,” said Del. Scott A. Surovell (D-Fairfax).
“I am baffled by why the governor would support this bill. In fact, I have wondered if he got bad advice somewhere along the way and just didn’t know what he was getting into,” said Corinna Lain, a death-penalty expert and law professor at the University of Richmond.
She called the bill “special-interest legislation, pure and simple.”
On Tuesday, all Democrats and many Republicans in the House formed an unlikely coalition and defeated the bill. Senate Minority Leader Richard L. Saslaw (D-Fairfax) carried the bill at the request of the McAuliffe administration.
Not long after the bill died by a vote of 56 to 42, Department of Corrections officials visited at least three lawmakers they considered sympathetic to their cause.
Howell directed the House clerk not to communicate the bill to the Senate — a procedural move that indicates the chamber may reconsider the vote.
But by about noon on Wednesday it became clear McAuliffe didn’t have the votes.
In addition to Fariss, Dels. James W. Morefield (R-Tazewell) and T. Montgomery Mason (D-Williamsburg) said they were visited by corrections officials.
Mason, who supported the bill at the committee level but voted no on the floor, said he would not have reversed his final vote.
“We’ve got to figure out how to solve the problem. It’s a big deal,” he said.
Morefield said: “I did indicate that I would consider reconsidering my vote. I was never provided with that opportunity.”
Fariss said he could have supported a bill that gave the state Board of Pharmacy or the governor oversight authority.
Others were adamant in their support of the original bill.
“This really puts the death penalty in peril in Virginia as a means of sentencing the worst of the worst.... For those of us who strongly believe in the death penalty as both a deterrent and a just punishment, this is a troubling time,” said Del. C. Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah), a criminal defense lawyer and former prosecutor who voted for the bill.
Opponents include the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, the Virginia Catholic Conference, Virginians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty and the Virginia Press Association.
Inmates sentenced to the death penalty have a choice between the electric chair and lethal injection, but drugs are the default method of execution.
The state Supreme Court is considering a case brought by Surovell over an open-records request for documents related to lethal-injection drugs, execution protocols and other issues. The U.S. Supreme Court is also reviewing protocols in executions in Oklahoma.Graduate student received $825,000 in settlement finalized this week
A photo of David Barnett, a University of Colorado associate professor, is seen Thursday on the wall of the philosophy department in the Hellems building on the Boulder campus. CU officials have moved to fire Barnett for allegedly retaliating against a woman who reported she was sexually assaulted by a fellow student. ( David R. Jennings / Daily Camera )
The University of Colorado is moving to fire a tenured faculty member after the Boulder campus paid $825,000 this week to settle a graduate student's allegations that the philosophy professor retaliated against her for reporting she was sexually assaulted by a fellow student.
Chancellor Phil DiStefano recently issued a notice of intent to dismiss associate professor David Barnett, campus spokesman Ryan Huff confirmed to the Daily Camera.
If fired, Barnett would be only the fourth tenured professor ever dismissed by the university in its 138-year history.
University of Colorado associate philosophy professor David Barnett (University of Colorado)
Barnett is accused of compiling a 38-page report painting the victim as "sexually promiscuous" and alleging she falsified the report of the assault, according to a notice of intent to sue CU filed by the victim last month.
The move to fire Barnett, who has taught in the philosophy department since 2005, comes as CU already was under federal investigation for possible violations of Title IX, the federal gender-equity law. It also comes six months after a scathing report detailed sexual harassment, bullying and other unprofessional conduct within the philosophy department.
Barnett, 44, declined to comment for this story.
But Brian Moore, Barnett's Denver-based attorney, said that in its treatment of Barnett, CU is "holding up his scalp" to show the rest of the philosophy department the university's tough stance on behaviors described in the January report by the American Philosophical Association Committee on the Status of Women Site Visit Program.
Barnett will fight his firing under claims the university violated his First Amendment right to free speech and the Colorado statute that protects whistleblowers, Moore said.
"Every male member of the CU philosophy department already has had his reputation damaged as a result of the administration's selective release of information," Moore said. "Now, even though professor Barnett is not accused of harassing anyone, the administration is attempting to make him the scapegoat."
CU's Huff said the American Philosophical Association report was commissioned because of "longstanding problems" within the philosophy department, and separately from the events that led to Barnett's dismissal.
"While the events underlying the settlement did not precipitate the APA site visit, they are examples of the behavior that we are working to eradicate from the philosophy department and elsewhere on campus," Huff said.
CU harassment investigation
According to the notice of claim obtained by the Daily Camera, a female graduate student described being sexually assaulted by a male philosophy doctoral student at an off-campus party in August 2012.
Such notices of claim must be filed in advance of suing Colorado public institutions. In this case, CU settled before any lawsuit was filed.
The Camera is neither identifying the woman, because she is the victim of sexual assault, nor the alleged assailant, because he wasn't arrested.
While the case was referred by CU to Boulder police, it was closed without any arrests, according to a police report.
At some point after the alleged sexual assault, the male doctoral student, who is in his mid-30s, finished his studies and was hired by the university as an instructor. The university was not aware of the alleged incident at the time he was hired, Huff said.
In late October 2012, the victim, who is in her late 20s, reported the assault to CU's Office of Discrimination and Harassment.
While such proceedings and their results are confidential, the victim's notice of claim and a Boulder Police Department report show that the investigation found the male student violated the university's sexual harassment policy.
He was suspended from his position as an instructor during the course of the investigation, according to the police report. The university later decided not to renew his instructor contract, Huff said.
After the Office of Discrimination and Harassment concluded its case, Barnett launched his own investigation into the woman's reported sexual assault, according to the victim's notice of claim, which was filed with the Colorado Attorney General's Office on July 3.
According to the notice of claim, Barnett had discussions with university faculty members and students about the victim's sexual history, marital relationship and her sexual behavior on the night of the alleged sexual assault.
The document also said that Barnett told faculty members, university administrators and students that the victim was "sexually promiscuous" and that she falsified the report of the assault. Barnett, the document alleged, wrote that the victim fabricated the sexual assault to cover up the fact that she was cheating on her boyfriend.
Barnett wrote a 38-page report about the victim and sent it to the university, according to the notice of claim.
After receiving that report, the university hired Denver attorney David Fine to conduct an independent investigation into the matter, Huff said. The university will pay Fine $148,589.15 for that work, Huff said.
CU declined to provide the Camera with the results of Fine's investigation, citing confidentiality around matters involving sexual harassment. For the same reason, the university also refused the Camera's request for the 38-page report written by Barnett.
The victim, who declined to speak with the Camera, filed the complaint because Barnett "smeared her reputation" and she wanted to prevent something similar from happening to future victims who report sexual misconduct, her attorney, Debra Katz, said.
"She felt it was very important to bring that issue to the attention of the appropriate parties within the university and not only protect her own rights, but to ensure that other people who come forward and report serious Title IX violations are not retaliated against," Katz said.
Katz said that if the university tolerated retaliation, it would have a "chilling effect" on anyone wishing to come forward to report a violation.
She added that while her client did not ask for Barnett to be dismissed, the decision sends a "very strong message" that the university is serious about disciplining people who violate Title IX.
While not speaking about the allegations against Barnett specifically, Huff said it's important for investigations into possible university policy violations to be conducted by professionals.
"We have established mechanisms with trained professionals who are in charge of conducting investigations," he said. "Having non-trained, non-professional people conducting unauthorized investigations is not appropriate."
'Cloak of secrecy'
Barnett, however, said through his attorney that he never investigated the victim or her sexual assault, but rather wanted to look into the Office of Discrimination and Harassment's handling of the case.
In his report, which Barnett sent only to DiStefano and CU President Bruce Benson, according to his attorney, Barnett described how the Office of Discrimination and Harassment's investigation mischaracterized or excluded information from witnesses.
Moore, Barnett's lawyer, said his client included sworn statements by nearly all of the third-party witnesses cited in the Office of Discrimination and Harassment investigation.
"In speaking with these witnesses and hearing their concerns about the way their testimony had been summarized by ODH, professor Barnett became convinced that ODH had intentionally and systematically manipulated the evidence in order to support a finding of guilt," Moore said.
"Because ODH operates under a cloak of secrecy and without due process, professor Barnett was concerned that this likely was not an isolated incident and felt ethically obligated to do what he could to stop this abuse of authority, and hopefully in the process correct what he views as a miscarriage of justice against his former student."
Huff, CU's spokesman, defended the Office of Discrimination and Harassment and the university, saying that at every juncture, the campus has been fair and has followed policy and procedure.
"At all points, ODH has acted appropriately," Huff said. "An independent review by attorney David Fine supports this."
Moore said Barnett was an unofficial mentor to the accused male instructor, and someone the instructor went to for advice about the profession. Moore added that Barnett took care not to harm the female graduate student's reputation in the course of his probe.
Moore acknowledged that rumors about the victim were circulating in the department, but said those rumors were not started by his client.
Barnett's decision to inform the university of what he saw as an "abuse of power by ODH" and his defense of a student are protected by his constitutional right to free speech and by Colorado whistleblower laws. Moore said.
"We understand the importance of protecting the rights of students and others who come forward to report sexual harassment, regardless of whether or not their allegations are ultimately substantiated," Moore said. "However, it is no violation of those rights to urge that the accused not be convicted of a serious offense in the absence of sufficient evidence."
'A commitment to enforcing the law'
Though she did not go through with a lawsuit, the victim's lawyers wrote that damages caused by Barnett's behavior such as emotional pain and suffering, depression, anxiety and suicidal ideation, damage to educational career and reputational harm, among others, would total $2 million.
The university's settlement of $825,000 with the victim was finalized Tuesday.
Of that money, the victim received $520,000 and her attorneys at Washington, D.C.-based firm Katz, Marshall and Banks received $305,000. The settlement does not constitute an admission of liability or fault on the part of the university.
In the settlement document, the victim alleges that Barnett "unlawfully retaliated" against her in violation of Title IX, the federal gender equity law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex.
Under the law, which also protects students from retaliation, gender discrimination includes sexual assault and sexual harassment.
This most recent payout follows a $32,500 settlement CU reached with Sarah Gilchriese — who has agreed to be identified publicly — in May.
Gilchriese sparked a federal investigation of CU last year after filing a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education alleging the university violated Title IX in its handling of her sexual assault.
In 2007, the university settled a Title IX lawsuit and paid $2.5 million to Lisa Simpson and $350,000 to Anne Gilmore, who alleged that they were raped at a party attended by CU football players. The Camera has named Simpson and Gilmore because they sued the university.
In the current case, the victim has been admitted to CU's philosophy doctoral program and intends to remain on the Boulder campus, DiStefano said.
In a statement about the settlement, DiStefano wrote that he's "very pleased" the victim chose to stay at CU.
"We must honor her trust by ensuring not only that she has every opportunity to succeed, but also by taking the steps that will enable every student to thrive in a community free from discrimination and harassment," he wrote. "This settlement is part of our ongoing, intense effort to combat gender discrimination and sexual harassment across the campus."
Though the federal investigation is ongoing, DiStefano also commissioned an independent review of the university's Title IX policies and procedures. That review found the university to be compliant with federal law, and recommended that the campus hire an additional Title IX coordinator for campus-wide oversight.
CU announced in June that it had hired Valerie Simons, a former federal civil rights attorney, for that post. She began work at CU on July 22.
'Responsible leadership' at CU
As colleges and universities across the country grapple with how to make their campuses as safe and welcoming as possible, CU has said it wants to be a leader among its peers in addressing sexual harassment and gender discrimination.
The victim's attorneys applauded CU's hiring of Simons in a statement, and wrote that CU demonstrated "responsible leadership" in the settlement and other "corrective" actions.
"We would not have recommended to our client that she continue her studies at CU-Boulder unless we believed that the university's commitment was both sincere and meaningful," attorneys Lisa Banks and Debra Katz wrote.
In an interview with the Camera, Katz said she was particularly impressed by the university's hiring of Simon, who has a "great reputation" in the civil rights community.
She said it's unusual for a university to handle a situation involving Title IX violations so swiftly and so thoroughly. She pointed to the White House's recent recommendations for handling and preventing sexual assault and sexual harassment on college campuses. The U.S. Department of Education also made public this year the list of campuses being investigated by its office for potential Title IX violations, a list that included CU's Boulder and Denver campuses.
"Fortunately, we're starting to see the universities heed that warning and we think there's been a significant change, and certainly that's what the University of Colorado's actions reflect here," Katz said. "It's not only a commitment to enforcing the law, but to be better."
Contact Camera Staff Writer Sarah Kuta at 303-473-1106, [email protected] or twitter.com/sarahkuta.The classes this fall will be offered one day per week, for six hours a day, for 16 or 17 weeks.
Gwich’in classes will start in Old Crow in October using a course partly developed by Sophia Flather. (James Munson/Yukon News)
By Rhiannon Russell
For 13 years, Sophia Flather studied French in an immersion program in Whitehorse.
“I did love learning it, but I always felt a little bit resentful that I couldn’t learn my own language,” says Flather, a member of the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation. “It’s just not accessible to study your own language with the same rigour as you can French or English.”
Her parents both spoke a few Gwich’in words at home, but Flather wanted to learn more. So in high school, she took Gwich’in classes at F. H. Collins Secondary School.
“I wouldn’t say that those courses were expected to get me fluent or anything,” she says. “They were more just to have some language and some culture.”
So when Flather heard about a new method of language instruction, called direct acquisition, being used to teach Tlingit, a language spoken in Carcross, Teslin, Atlin, B.C., and Alaska, she was intrigued.
The method was developed at the Salish School of Spokane in Washington to teach Nsyilxcn, an Indigenous language.
K’èdukà Jack, a member of the Taku River Tlingit First Nation, along with Nsyilxcn speaker and language teacher Michele K. Johnson, received funding from the federal Aboriginal Languages Initiative to develop the program in Tlingit.
Flather’s sister, who was working at the Council of Yukon First Nations at the time, took Jack’s course and afterwards, knew more Tlingit than she did Gwich’in.
Flather says her sister talked to the Vuntut Gwitchin’s heritage resources branch about the model, and the First Nation decided to fund such instruction in Gwich’in. Classes are scheduled to begin in October, and are open to any Gwich’in adults.
Flather, who is working as the project’s language coordinator, reached out to Jack for mentorship and training.
“The differences between this method and other methods … is that learners are empowered right away to become teachers, are given the tools (i.e. lesson plans, teaching manuals, and teacher training) to learn while teaching,” Johnson writes in a 2016 paper published in the journal Language Documentation and Conservation.
It’s an intensive immersion program, involving a lot of repetition. A unique part of the model is that teachers don’t need to be fluent.
“Many critically endangered language revitalization efforts need techniques which support learners to learn while they themselves are teaching,” writes Johnson.
In 2011, there were just 370 mother-tongue Gwich’in speakers, according to Statistics Canada. Flather, who moved to Old Crow three years ago, says many people there know a few words in Gwich’in, but it’s mainly the elders who are fluent.
“When you’re working with your elders and you understand that our languages are dying, essentially, it can be really stressful,” says Jack. “There really has to be one young, passionate individual in each community who’s willing to take that (revitalization) on. It’s a big commitment.”
It’s her dream that this happens in First Nations communities across the territory—“Sophia is literally my dream,” Jack says.
Over the past several months, Flather has been preparing materials for the classroom: translating English words and sentences from the method’s six textbooks into Gwich’in, working with elders who review and edit her work, and pouring over a noun dictionary put together by the Gwich’in Cultural Society.
There’s one textbook per module, each one building upon the last.
“We record all the words and the sentences in the textbook so if you’re not fully confident in the language yet, you can still teach it in the classroom,” Flather says. The recordings — of local elders saying various words — serve as a reference for pronunciation.
Flather, for instance, isn’t fluent, but she’ll be one of the teachers in the fall. She hopes to recruit other teachers in the community as well.
Children study Gwich’in for 40 minutes each day in school, but there haven’t been classes for adults in Old Crow for a few years, Flather says. The classes this fall will be offered one day per week, for six hours a day, for 16 or 17 weeks.
Adults are the target demographic for a reason. As Johnson puts it in her paper: “Many Indigenous languages are critically endangered and faced with the urgent need to create parent-aged advanced speakers.”
Ideally, parents in Old Crow will take the class, then be able to raise their children with the language.
“A lot of people think we’re going to start with kids and youth, but just focusing on youth, I think, doesn’t often work because then they need someone to speak to in different environments other than school,” says Flather. “The home is the biggest thing, I think, and also working environments.”
The first textbook, which will be taught in the fall, focuses on vocabulary and expanding students’ knowledge to 500 words. For example, they’ll learn the terms for various types of food, like pemmican, dried meat, and carrots—ch’itsùh, nilii gaii, and gwanzhih. They’ll also learn basic sentence construction. For instance, “Ch’itsùh ih’aa” means “I am eating pemmican.”
“A big part of this is to create a really safe environment, so just making sure we’re supporting each other, we’re not correcting each other, we’re not laughing at how people pronounce things,” Flather says.
Her goal is to see the program grow over time. She hopes people in the community will get excited about the opportunity to learn Gwich’in, like she does.
“I love learning and I love language,” she says. “Any speaker created is amazing to me.”
Jack adds that many First Nations in the Yukon have language funding. “I’m really hoping that the different First Nations are willing to take this on and that this is going to become a movement that’ll just get stronger and stronger.”
She says she’s willing to help any other First Nations people in the territory who are interested in learning more about the model and language revitalization.
Contact Yukon News at [email protected] bike to your favorite coffee shop a few times a week, and the last few times you’ve been there, a bike frame has been locked up. It doesn’t have wheels. It doesn’t have a seat. It’s just taking up space where you could lock your bike.
What do you do to get rid of it so people can park there again?
In the City of Los Angeles, the Bureau of Street Services is in charge of maintaining bicycle parking. There is an online form you can use to request service.
To report an abandoned bicycle that needs to be removed:
1) Go to http://bss.lacity.org/request.htm
2) Input your name, address, phone number, and email address.
3) Scroll down to “Others” and click the circle button to its left.
4) In the “Enter Problem Description” box below “Others”, write that there is an abandoned bicycle you would like removed.
5) Below that in the next box, write the location of the rack or pole the abandoned bike is on. Be as specific as possible.
6) Enter any additional comments you have below that, and press the “Submit” button
7) You should receive a confirmation email from the Bureau of Street Services letting you know they have received your request.
It’s as easy as that. Removing abandoned bikes increases the supply of bicycle parking available to all of us. If you see one, take a moment to report it. You can also used the same procedure to report bikeways that need to be cleaned.
AdvertisementsSan Francisco’s Mission District is home to many things: a still-surviving Latino community, Google buses and plenty of Ellis Act evictions. But, sadly, it soon won’t be home to the area’s iconic gay Latino bar Esta Noche, which announced this week that it’s shutting its doors after an inspired Indiegogo campaign failed to drum up the necessary support to help keep them open.
Emmanuel Hapsis wrote at KQED about what the closing means:
Something about this news feels personal. A bar dedicated to the gay Latino community in what used to be a predominantly Latino neighborhood is wiped away for a vaguely pornographic-sounding cocktail lounge for fancy straight people who like house music. It’s a slap in the face, like when they replaced Cafe Gratitude, the beloved meeting place for vegans, with the American Grilled Cheese Kitchen. More and more, it’s starting to feel like whoever is holding the San Francisco marionette strings is trolling us all. Why is the closing of Esta Noche so personal? I grew up as a first-generation closeted gay kid stuck in an all-white Catholic school. When I first discovered Selena, I became obsessed with herjoie de vivre and her dedication to being exactly who she was. She was proud of her heritage, a feeling I hadn’t come to yet. I kept all of this secret from the kids at school; their mocking me for not taking the same communion was enough. The idea that there was a place where you could be exactly who you are and jam out to Selena was inconceivable to me.
Hapsis also posted this video of the bar’s popular Selena drag night:RUTLAND, Vermont - This too shall pass.
Vermont State Police announced that an inmate at the Marble Valley Regional Correctional Center was charged with transporting a regulated drug into a place of detention.
The inmate, Mark Badie, 28, of Rutland, was suspected of attempting to smuggle drugs into the prison after correctional officers observed him swallowing something unusual, according to police.
Corrections staff placed Badie in an observation cell and then waited.
After two days, according to police, "a stool sample was collected and contraband was collected by correctional staff. Inmate Badie had consumed a small plastic bag containing marijuana."
Badie was issued a citation and is scheduled to appear in Rutland Criminal Court on June 15.
Police did not specify where or how Badie came into contact with the contraband, or information about his original prison sentence.
A 2013 piece by Vermont Public Radio included Badie as an inmate who commonly worked outside the prison as part of work crews.screenshot/CNBC (Reuters) - A computer malfunction that forced the New York Stock Exchange to suspend trading for more than three hours on Wednesday probably stemmed from a software update that went awry, Bloomberg reported, citing two people briefed on a preliminary review.
The New York Stock Exchange, a unit of Intercontinental Exchange Inc, reopened at 3:10 p.m. EDT (1910 GMT) after being halted shortly after 11:30 a.m. EDT. NYSE said the outage was due to an internal technical issue and not the result of a cyberattack. Other exchanges were trading normally.
The NYSE must now verify the cause and report its conclusions to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which will use those findings to investigate whether any violation of rules occurred, Bloomberg reported.
Reuters could not immediately reach the NYSE and the SEC for comment outside regular U.S. business hours.William Gibson fanfic just took a very interesting turn.
Using the Twitter handle @AuthenticWmGibs, some bright Gibson-ite has been spieling out some lines that sound uncannily like those of the cyberpunk author. Riffing on Gibson’s attention to detail, political leanings and complex sci-fi plots, the tweeter has been composing fascinatingly good 140-character mini-narratives since early November.
Much like other spoof accounts — everything from Pimp Bill Clinton to Fake Sarah Palin — the Twitter feed gets its LoLs out of smart takes on the Neuromancer writer’s pop culture persona. “Synopses for William Gibson novels that are definitely 100% real,” the Twitter account‘s bio reads. “But only in a timeline with greater authenticity than this one.”
Check out some of the best one (or two) liners from “Authentic Wm. Gibson” so far in the Storify below.
[via i09, New York Daily News]Available
$75
Track List:
Side One
1. Misunderstood
2. Far, Far Away
3. Monday
4. Outtasite (Outta Mind)
5. Forget The Flowers
Side Two
1. Red-Eyed And Blue
2. I Got You (At The End Of The Century)
3. What’s The World Got In Store
4. Hotel Arizona
5. Say You Miss Me
Side Three
1. Sunken Treasure
2. Someday Soon
3. Outta Mind (Outta Sight)
4. Someone Else’s Song
Side Four
1. (Was I) In Your Dreams
2. Why Would You Wanna Live
3. The Lonely 1
4. Dreamer In My Dreams
Side Five
1. Late Blooming Son
2. I Got You – Dobro Mix Warzone
3. Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind – Alternate
4. Far Far Away (Dark Side Of The Room)
5. Dynamite My Soul
6. Losing Interest
Side Six
1. Why Would You Wanna Live – Alternate
2. Sun’s A Star
3. Capitol City
4. Better When I’m Gone
5. Dreamer In My Dreams – Alternate Rough Take
Side Seven
1. Say You Miss Me – Alternate
2. I Got You – Alternate
3. Monday – Party Horn Version
4. I Can’t Keep From Talking
Side Eight
1. Sunken Treasure
2. Red-Eyed And Blue
3. Far, Far Away
4. Will You Love Me TomorrowSo this week's art journal is based around the theme of 'Outside My Window'. It's been super windy outside this week and the leaves are all over the ground. One of my professors had us draw some of these fallen leaves from observation and I used one of my sketches as an element for this art journal page.
Supplies:
Watercolor Pencils
Derwent Crimson Lake #20
Derwent Middle Chrome #8
Derwent Gold #3
Derwent Deep Cadmium #6
Derwent Geranium Lake #15
China Marker- Black
Colored Pencil
Prismacolor Apple Green #912
Dual Tipped Calligraphy Marker in Forest Green
Prismacolor Marker Pen in Sepia.05
Gel Pen- Black
Archival Glue Stick
Brushes (I got new brushes at the campus bookstore the other day!- See image below)
I felt like this page really needed a green tone to tie it back into the whole nature theme, so I used a Prismacolor colored pencil in Apple Green to go around the leaf and also along the top of the page fading in towards my border. Since the leaf drawing was a cutout from another sheet of paper, it was hard to get the colored pencil to look cohesive, but I did the best I could. I also used my Prismacolor marker pen to draw in some sepia colored leaves. As you can see, these were done really quickly and don't look all too great.
I also have a problem with knowing when to put down my pen and declare something finished. I used a dual tipped calligraphy marker (the thinner side) to write some words that had to do with my page in some areas where not much was going on. I'm still practicing my calligraphy, so these are about the quality level as those sepia leaves you saw earlier. But, these imperfections are what really makes the page yours! And at that, my page is finished!
I hope you all enjoyed this week's journal page and really want to see yours if you completed a page with the theme 'Outside My Window'. You can check out my 'Contact Me' tab for information on where to send your journal page images and they could be featured in next week's post. You can also tag me in your Instagram pictures of your journal pages by either using my username, @ConstantlyKatelyn15 or the hashtag #CKLetsArtJournal
I begin my page by using my Derwent watercolor pencil in Crimson Lake to create a border of swirls on the left side of the page. I used a combination of highly pigmented brush strokes and more watery strokes to create some variance in tones.Next, I used my Derwent Middle Chrome to section that border off from the rest of my page. This took quite a few brushstrokes to make it the desired thickness. Looking back on this, I wish I had used a thicker brush to make a single brushstroke instead of a small brush that made multiple.I use my Derwent Gold to add strokes off of the orange border. As you can see, I'm swatching my colors on the right side of the page like I did last week. This is super helpful for me when I need to go back into areas that need a color I used previously; it eliminates the guess work!I decided that the yellow strokes were looking a little bare, so I went back in closer to my orange border with a second tone of yellow. In retrospect, I wish I had added this effect to the right side of the page below my swatches.Next, I used a darker tone of red to darken the corners of my swirled border. I also used this tone to go in between the wire binding of the pages to make the page look less like it had a distinct edge. After I added the darker red, I used a brush of water to spread the paint over the area and give it a better faded effect.I took a sketch of a leaf that I had done and cut it out roughly with scissors. I also had the actual leaf, but I couldn't figure out a way to attach it cleanly to the page. The leaf would also make the page a little too bulky, so I ended up deciding against it.Next, I use a china marker to draw some tree silhouettes along the edge of the page. After completing the top of the page, I decide to draw some more on the bottom to even it out. This step could also be done with a black colored pencil to achieve the same effect. I alternated between pine trees and stereotypical oak trees: the two main varieties of trees that we have on campus. I don't know what kind of tree the leaf came from, but I didn't have time to research it for the sake of tree silhouettes.Then, I use my Prismacolor sepia marker pen in.05 to complete the journaling aspect of the page. I wish that I had opted for a black Prismacolor pen to coordinate with the drawing of the leaf, but I didn't have one on hand at the moment. I also outline my color swatches to separate them from my final journal page. Another thing that I love about these color swatches is that when you do them on all of your pages, it looks really cool to flip through the journal in the end because all the edges are matching and pretty.Feyenoord have taken a giant step towards their first Eredivisie title in 18 years after challengers Ajax lost to PSV Eindhoven at the weekend.
The Amsterdammers had cut the gap at the top of the table to a single point going into the weekend, but went down 1-0 in Eindhoven courtesy of a Jürgen Locadia free-kick in the first half.
The result leaves Ajax four points behind Feyenoord, who beat Vitesse Arnhem 2-0 away from home, with just two games of the season left to play. PSV are three points behind Ajax in third place.
Coach Peter Bosz acknowledged that Ajax’s gruelling Europa League tie on Thursday night, when they needed extra time to overcome German side Schalke 04, could have been a factor. ‘I don’t want to use that as an excuse,’ he told NOS. ‘In the first half I don’t think we played well, we defended too deep and were forced back, which meant we
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basis, but that’s no problem when it has lines like the following:
“I understand you’re upset. Maybe you’d feel better after we had some dirty sex.”
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[To frat boys.] “Now you go back to doing something latently homoerotic.”
“That’s a picture of you and my mom having sex. Why would you show me that?”
“Back then, we didn’t have fancy birth-control methods, like pulling out.”
“If someone was taking bets on your father’s bout with death, I’d put everything I own on death. It’s a good bet. The odds are he’ll probably die.”
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“Are you telling me you bet on the fight in Rocky III and you bet against Rocky?”
“I’ve never seen so many dead hookers in all my life.”
“It’s either from sleeping the wrong way, or bookmakers throwing me out of a car.”
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“You know how I feel about the homeless. They’re human beings and they have no homes.”
“Good Lord, I’m in whore heaven.”
But my favorite line in the film approaches slacker profundity: “Note to self: no matter how bad life gets, there’s always beer.” That line alone is enough to bump this half-genius, half-moronic comedy from Secret Failuress to Secret Success.
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Failure, Fiasco or Secret Success: Secret SuccessTrump blames 'both sides' for Virginia violence as many Republicans balk
By Amanda Becker and Jeff Mason
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump inflamed tension after a deadly rally by white nationalists in Virginia by insisting that counter protesters were also to blame, drawing condemnation from some Republican leaders and praise from white supremacists.
In a combative news conference, Trump backed off from his Monday statements explicitly denouncing the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and white supremacists for the violence that erupted at a "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, and reverted to his weekend contention that "many sides" were to blame.
"You had a group on one side that was bad," Trump said on Tuesday. "And you had a group on the other side that was also very violent. And nobody wants to say that. But I'll say it right now."
Trump later said, "I think there is blame on both sides and I have no doubt about it," adding that there were "very fine people" on both sides.
At the weekend rally against the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee, commander of the pro-slavery Confederate army during the U.S. Civil War, many participants were seen carrying firearms, sticks, shields, and lit torches. Some wore helmets.
Counter-protesters came equipped with sticks, helmets and shields.
James Fields, a 20-year-old Ohio man who is said to have harbored Nazi sympathies, was charged with murder after the car he was driving plowed into a crowd of counter protesters, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer on Saturday and injuring 19.
A memorial service for Heyer is planned in Charlottesville on Wednesday.
Trump's remarks drew swift criticism from many Republican leaders.
"No, not the same," former Massachusetts governor and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney wrote on Twitter. "One side is racist, bigoted, Nazi. The other opposes racism and bigotry. Morally different universes."
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, who vied with Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, also responded in a series of Twitter posts.
"The organizers of events which inspired and led to #charlottesvilleterroristattack are 100 percent to blame for a number of reasons," Rubio began.
"Mr. President, you can't allow #WhiteSupremacists to share only part of the blame. They support idea which cost nation and world so much pain … the #WhiteSupremacy groups will see being assigned only 50 percent of the blame as a win," Rubio added.
Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke applauded Trump for his "honesty & courage" on Twitter. Richard Spencer, the head of a white nationalist group, wrote on Twitter that he was "proud of him for speaking the truth."
Richard Trumka, the president of the AFL-CIO labor federation representing 12.5 million workers, resigned from Trump's American Manufacturing Council, joining a series of chief executives in doing so.
White House officials hoping to put the controversy behind them, worried the conference would revive and intensify the controversy. Asked about next steps, one official said: "I think next steps are just to stop talking."
Hours later, the White House sent its regular "evening communications briefing" of talking points on the "news of the day" to Republican lawmakers, copies obtained by multiple news organizations, including CNN and the Atlantic, showed.
The first summary point read: "The President was entirely correct – both sides of the violence in Charlottesville acted inappropriately, and bear some responsibility."
(Additional reporting by Scott Malone in Charlottesville; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)Blog Archive February 2019 (1) January 2019 (2) December 2018 (1) November 2018 (5) October 2018 (7) September 2018 (6) August 2018 (5) July 2018 (2) June 2018 (5) May 2018 (4) April 2018 (3) March 2018 (5) February 2018 (6) January 2018 (9) December 2017 (7) November 2017 (5) October 2017 (7) September 2017 (9) August 2017 (6) July 2017 (9) June 2017 (6) May 2017 (8) April 2017 (8) March 2017 (12) February 2017 (8) January 2017 (12) December 2016 (10) November 2016 (8) October 2016 (4) September 2016 (2) August 2016 (5) July 2016 (6) June 2016 (4) May 2016 (5) April 2016 (3) March 2016 (9) February 2016 (5) January 2016 (7) December 2015 (8) November 2015 (5) October 2015 (6) September 2015 (4) August 2015 (7) July 2015 (3) June 2015 (5) May 2015 (9) April 2015 (5) March 2015 (5) February 2015 (8) January 2015 (7) December 2014 (8) November 2014 (9) October 2014 (13) September 2014 (10) August 2014 (7) July 2014 (10) June 2014 (10) May 2014 (12) April 2014 (10) March 2014 (14) February 2014 (10) January 2014 (14) December 2013 (14) November 2013 (9) October 2013 (17) September 2013 (14) August 2013 (23) July 2013 (19) June 2013 (16) May 2013 (23) April 2013 (23) March 2013 (29) February 2013 (31) January 2013 (32) December 2012 (31) November 2012 (49) October 2012 (60) September 2012 (48) August 2012 (40) July 2012 (20) June 2012 (32) May 2012 (18) April 2012 (47) March 2012 (61) February 2012 (59) January 2012 (44) December 2011 (57) November 2011 (58) October 2011 (54) September 2011 (51) August 2011 (53) July 2011 (57) June 2011 (46) May 2011 (34) April 2011 (36) March 2011 (43) February 2011 (48) January 2011 (36) December 2010 (23) November 2010 (32) October 2010 (30) September 2010 (29) August 2010 (20) July 2010 (24) June 2010 (21) May 2010 (23) April 2010 (38) March 2010 (39) February 2010 (35) January 2010 (40) December 2009 (29) November 2009 (33) October 2009 (33) September 2009 (43) August 2009 (49) July 2009 (34) June 2009 (29) May 2009 (33) April 2009 (48) March 2009 (32) February 2009 (25) January 2009 (37) December 2008 (19) November 2008 (35) October 2008 (90) September 2008 (77) August 2008 (67) July 2008 (37) June 2008 (36) May 2008 (33) April 2008 (28) March 2008 (34) February 2008 (33) January 2008 (31) December 2007 (18) November 2007 (23) October 2007 (23) September 2007 (23) August 2007 (26) July 2007 (29) June 2007 (26) May 2007 (30) April 2007 (30) March 2007 (25) February 2007 (20) January 2007 (14) December 2006 (20) November 2006 (18) October 2006 (20) September 2006 (20) November 2005 (1)The Islamists controlling northern Mali on Tuesday destroyed two tombs at the ancient Djingareyber mosque in fabled Timbuktu, vowing to destroy all World Heritage sites in the region.
Armed with hoes, pick-axes and chisels, members of Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith) hammered away at the two earthen tombs until they were completely destroyed, witnesses told AFP.
"Currently the Islamists are busy destroying two tombs of Timbuktu's great Djingareyber mosque. They are shooting in the air to chase away the crowd, to scare them," one witness said earlier as the rampage began.
"The two mausolea are adjacent to the western wall of the great mosque and the Islamists have hoes, chisels, they are hitting the mausolea which are made out of packed earth," said a source close to the mosque's imam.
"They say they will destroy everything."
Another witness reported that the Islamists had cried "Allahu Akbar" (God Is Great) as they hammered away at the mosque, one of the most important in Timbuktu.
He added that the Islamists had blocked off two main roads leading to the mosque, which was one of the fabled city's main tourist attractions before the region became a no-go area for Westerners.
The same witness reported that the Islamists had asked a television crew from the Qatar-based news channel Al-Jazeera to film their actions.
The fighters from Ansar Dine began their destruction of the city's cultural treasures on July 1, shortly after UNESCO placed them on a list of endangered World Heritage sites.
Declaring the ancient Muslim shrines "haram", or forbidden in Islam, Ansar Dine set about destroying seven of Timbuktu's 16 mausolea of ancient Muslim saints.
They also destroyed the sacred door of the 15th-century Sidi Yahya mosque.
Along with Sidi Yahya, Djingareyber and the Sankore mosque bear witness to Timbuktu's golden age as an intellectual and spiritual capital which was crucial in the spread of Islam throughout Africa.
According to the UNESCO website, the Djingareyber mosque -- the oldest of the three -- was built by the sultan Kankan Moussa after his return in 1325 from a pilgrimage to Mecca.
It was this pilgrimage which formed the legend of Timbuktu, as Moussa had travelled via Cairo with 60,000 porters, each carrying three kilogrammes of pure gold which he said came from Timbuktu.
This amount of gold caused the Egyptian currency to lose its value, according to UNESCO, and put Timbuktu on the map as a mysterious African city of gold.
On Tuesday a source in Ansar Dine told AFP that "from now on, as soon as foreigners speak of Timbuktu" they would attack anything referred to as a World Heritage site.
"There is no world heritage, it doesn't exist. The infidels must not get involved in our business," said a Tunisian jihadist who gave his name only as Ahmed and said he was part of Ansar Dine's "media committee."
"We will destroy everything, even if the mausolea are inside the mosques, and afterwards we will destroy the mausolea in the region of Timbuktu," he said.
More ancient tombs are situated in the towns of Araouane and Gassra-Cheick in the greater Timbuktu region.
A March 22 coup in Mali eased the way for Tuareg separatist rebels to seize a vast area in the north that they consider their homeland.
However, the previously unknown Ansar Dine group seized the upper hand while fighting on their flanks. Openly allied with the north African group Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, they have since pushed the Tuareg rebels from all positions of power.
The international community fears the desert region, which is larger than France, will become a new haven for terrorist activity, and the Islamists have threatened any country that joins a possible military intervention force in Mali.
West African mediators have ordered Mali's embattled interim government to form a unity government by July 31 that will be better able to deal with the northern occupation.
Short link:A feature of Romanian culture is the special relationship between folklore and the learned culture, determined by two factors. First, the rural character of the Romanian communities resulted in an exceptionally vital and creative traditional culture. Folk creations (the best known is the ballad Miorița) were the main literary genre until the 18th century. They were both a source of inspiration for cultivated creators and a structural model. Second, for a long time learned culture was governed by official and social commands and developed around courts of princes and boyars, as well as in monasteries.
Overview [ edit ]
Creation of the world [ edit ]
Stories suggest God made the earth with the help of animals, while Satan was trying to thwart his plans.[1]:11–12[2] In the majority of versions, before the earth existed, a boundless ocean called Apa Sâmbetei was the abode of God and the Devil, seen as master and servant rather than equals. In these stories the Devil goes by the name "Nefartatul" and is the somewhat foolish brother of God in folk versions of stories. These stories appear not only in Romanian folklore, but also in those of Aromanian, Slavic Macedonian and Bulgarian folklore. Upon deciding to create the earth, God sent the Devil to bring a handful of clay from the ground of the World Ocean in his holy name. The Devil set forth and tried to bring it to the surface in his name instead, but could not succeed until he brought it up in the name of God. As this piece of clay grew into the earth, God laid himself down to sleep.[2] The Devil tried to push him over the side, but the ever-expanding earth would hinder that. After trying to throw God off the earth in every one of the four cardinal directions, he shied away from the cross he drew in the ground himself.
Origin of evil [ edit ]
Other accounts, closer to the biblical one, suggest that the Devil and his demons were once angels of God. The Devil, however, tried to rebel, and, in response, God opened up the heavens so that he might fall to the earth. Fearing that Heaven might be voided, the archangel Michael re-sealed it, thus freezing the demons that had not yet fallen to hell in place. This is related to the concept of soul customs, where every soul is intercepted on its way to heaven by these demons, who force it into hell. It has also given rise to the Romanian saying până ajungi la Dumnezeu, te mănâncă sfinţii ("before you reach God, the saints will eat you").[1]:13–14
Origin of God [ edit ]
Another question commonly addressed is that of the origin of God, which is explained in a Russian doll-type fashion; before every God there was another God that created him. Thus explaining the many names the Bible used for God, the Oltenians believed the first God was called Sabaoth, followed by Amon, Apollo, the Creator God of the Bible and, finally, Jesus Christ.[1]:12
Origin of race [ edit ]
This is identified as the source of the expression a se îngălbeni de frică (to go yellow with fear), which can also be found in various forms in the folklore of other peoples.[1]:49
The Earth [ edit ]
Even after Christian imagery and symbolism became part of Romanian culture, Mother Earth is identified as the consort of God, the heavenly Father.[1]:55
The origin of mountains is explained in a number of ways by the cultures of the different regions of Romania. One account is that mountains formed as a response to God demanding the Earth to nurture all life, to which the earth shuddered and brought forth mountains. Another version suggests the Earth was too large to fit under the firmament, and so God attempted to shrink it, thus raising mountains. Often, these accounts are accompanied by the imagery of one or several World Pillars, which sustain the earth from below and are usually placed beneath mountains. Earthquakes are frequently attributed to the earth slipping due to the Devil's constant gnawing at these pillars, which are rebuilt by God and his angels in times of fasting.[1]:38–42
The myth of the Blajini [ edit ]
The etymology of the word blajin (adj.) is the Slavonian blažĕnŭ meaning kind, well-minding person.[3] According to Christian calendar, Romanians from Banat, Transilvania, Bucovina and Maramureș counties celebrate Easter of Blajini on first Monday after St. Thomas Sunday. Easter of Blajini is called also Easter of Deaths or Mighty Easter. Romanians generally perceived the earth as a disc, and they imagined what existed on the other side. This other earth is imagined as a mirror image of our own, and as a home to creatures called Blajini [blaˈʒinʲ] ("gentle/kind-hearted ones"), sometimes given the name Rohmani [ˈroh.manʲ] in Bucovina. They are described as anthropomorphic and short, sometimes having the head of a rat. They are either described as malicious or as having great respect for God and leading a sinless life. They are considered to fast the year through, and thus doing humans a great service.[1]:33
The Romanian holiday Paştele Blajinilor (Easter of Blajini) is a way to repay them for the benefits they bring. Since they live in isolation, they have no way of knowing when Easter comes. It is for this reason that Romanians eat dyed eggs and let the shells flow downstream, from there they believe they will get to the Apa Sâmbetei, and from there to the Blajini.[1]:37 Blajini are invisible connectors between Inner and Hollow Earth.
Blajin also means a dead child who did not receive the benediction of Holy Spirit. The ethnograph Marian Simion Florea wrote : Blajini are fictitious beings, incarnations of dead children not baptized who live at the end of Earth, nearby The Holy water (of Saturday).[4] Some explain them as the descendants of Adam's son Seth. Others think that they used to live alongside humans on the earth, but Moses, seeing his people oppressed by them, split the waters and, after he and his people had retreated to safety, poured the waters back onto them, sending them to their current abode.[1]:34
For celebrating the souls of dead relatives or friends, Romanians from above mentioned counties prepare festive meals and offer them, in the cemetery, nearby the tombs, after the religious mass and benediction, to all who wished to commemorate and pay their respects to the dead. They cheer up in memory of the deceased.
Eschatology [ edit ]
The most prominent symbol associated with the End Times is that of the earthquake. Waters overflowing and mountains collapsing are both linked to these earthquakes, which are mainly caused by lack of faith, which accelerates the crumbling of the World Pillars. Others attribute the earthquakes to the earth (which is alive, and can therefore feel) realising the wicked ways of humans, and trembling in fright. Other rare natural phenomena such as Eclipses or Comets were seen as a sign of impending doom.[1]:61
If these warnings should fail, God will initiate the End of the World. Such imagery as a darkened sun, a bleeding moon and falling stars are associated with the beginning of the End Times. Three saints (usually in the persons of Enoch, John and Elijah) are said to come to earth to unveil the Devil's attempts to destroy the world, whereupon they shall be killed by decapitation. The sky and the earth will be set alight and the earth will be purged, so that its Creator may descend upon it. The 12 winds are said to sweep up the ashes of people and gather them in the valley of Safed, where the Last Judgement shall be done.[1]:67–68
Sources form Moldova and Bucovina also speak of a great army led by the emperor Constantine, which will conquer all the world's states, and kill everyone save for a few pure ones, which will then repopulate the earth. In another instance, should this army not come, God shall burn the earth as described and bring the Blajini to live there. In another version, true to the succession of Gods mentioned earlier (s. here), Jesus Christ is said to come and create a new world like his father before him. A not-so-widespread belief is that of a definitive destruction of the earth, whereupon God and the Devil shall divide the souls of the dead among themselves and retire to the moon, who is considered to have been made in the image of the earth to serve a place of retreat after the destructuon of the earth.[1]:69–71
Characteristics [ edit ]
Strong folk traditions have survived to this day due to the rural character of the Romanian communities, which has resulted in an exceptionally vital and creative traditional culture. Romania's rich folk traditions have been nourished by many sources, some of which predate the Roman occupation. Traditional folk arts include wood carving, ceramics, weaving and embroidery of costumes, household decorations, dance, and richly varied folk music. Ethnographers have tried to collect in the last two centuries as many elements as possible: the Museum of the Romanian Peasant and the Romanian Academy are currently the main institutions which systematically organise the data and continue the research.
Wood used to be the main construction material, and heavily ornamented wooden objects were common in old houses. In Maramureș, wood was used to create impressive structures such as churches or gates; in Dobruja, windmills were made of wood, and in mountainous regions hardwood was used even for covering the roof. To preserve traditional houses, many village museums have been created in the last century throughout Romania,[5] such as the Village Museum in Bucharest, the Traditional Popular Civilisation ASTRA Museum in Sibiu or the Oltenian Village Museum in Râmnicu Vâlcea.
Linen was the most common material for clothing, combined with wool during the winter or colder periods. These are embroidered with traditional motifs that vary from region to region. Black is the most common colour used, but red and blue are predominant in certain areas. Traditionally, men wore a white shirt and pants (if made of wool they are called iţari) with a wide leather belt, usually over the shirt, and a vest sometimes made of leather and embroidered. They wore either boots or a simple shoe made of leather and tied around the foot called opincă and they wore a hat which differs in design from region to region. Women also wore a white skirt and a shirt with a vest. They wore an apron called şorţ or cătrinţă which is also embroidered and a headscarf called basma;on special occasions they wore more elaborate outfits.
Music and dance represent a lively part of the Romanian folklore and there are a great variety of musical genres and dances. Party music is very lively and shows both Balkan and Hungarian influences. Sentimental music, however, is the most valued, and Romanians consider their doina (a sad song either about one's home or about love, composed like an epic ballad) unique in the world. Maria Tănase is considered to be one of the greatest Romanian folk singers and today Grigore Leşe and Taraful Haiducilor are two of the most famous musicians. The dances are lively and are practiced throughout Romania by a large number of professional and amateur groups, thus keeping the tradition alive; Hora is one of the most famous group dances but men's folk dances such as căluşari are extremely complex and have been declared by UNESCO to be "Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritages of Humanity".
Romanians have had, from time immemorial, a myriad of customs, tales and poems about love, faith, kings, princesses, and witches. Ethnologists, poets, writers and historians have tried in recent centuries to collect and to preserve tales, poems, ballads and have tried to describe as well as possible the customs and habits related to different events and times of year. Customs related to certain times of year are the colinde - Romanian Christmas carols, sorcova on New Year's Eve or the Mărţişor custom on the 1st of March marking the spring. Other customs are presumably of pre-Christian pagan origin, like the Paparuda rain enchanting custom in the summer, or the masked folk theatre or Ursul (the bear) and Capra (the goat) in winter.
Perhaps the most successful collector of folk tales was the novelist and storyteller Ion Creangă, who, in very picturesque language, shaped into their now-classic form stories like Harap Alb (roughly, "The White Moor´´) or Fata babei şi fata moşului ("The old woman's daughter and the old man's daughter"). Also, the poet Vasile Alecsandri published the most successful version of the ballad Mioriţa (The Little Ewe), a sad, philosophical poem, centered on a simple action: the plot by two shepherds to kill a third shepherd because they envied his wealth. Another prolific editor of folk tales was Petre Ispirescu, who, in the 19th century published an impressive number of volumes containing a large number of short novels and tales from popular mythology. They are centered on popular characters like the prince Făt-Frumos (the Romanian "Prince Charming"), the princess Ileana Cosânzeana, the villain or monster Zmeu or Căpcăun, the dragon Balaur or fantastic superbeings like the good Zână and the evil Muma Pădurii.
Places [ edit ]
Folk tales [ edit ]
Romanian myths part of international culture [ edit ]
Vampire - See strigoi and moroi, which are more phantom- or wizard-like creatures.
Werewolf (vârcolac)
Şobolan - A giant rat similar to the South American capybara. Rural Romanian folklore tends to attribute the şobolan human characteristics.
Solomonar - See Hultan and Solomonari, who were a group of nobles and wizards, made famous more by their families' high social status, than for their deeds. However, this is mainly due to the massive crusades of Christianity and the attempt to destroy all the historic tradition of these Wizards. Some of these are Dracula Vlad, Solomon, Despina the Impure, Ty'ere, Ventruszch, Brohmyr, Izhain and Vohc.
Most of these names can be found in the Romanian Lore in reference to Vampires and Dragons.
Rituals [ edit ]
Fairy tales [ edit ]
Characters in folk literature [ edit ]
Heroes [ edit ]
List of folk dances [ edit ]
Banat plain [ edit ]
Sorocul de la Beregsaul Mare
Sorocul de la Jebel
Pe loc ca la Murava
Pe loc a lui lefta Lupu
Intoarsa
Banat mountain [ edit ]
Briu Batrin
Ardeleana de la Rugi
Ardeleana Baba Peleaga
Ardeleana ca pe Valea Almajului
Doiul roata de la Glimboca
De doi ca la Caransebes
Moldavia [ edit ]
Oltenia [ edit ]
Bihor [ edit ]
Nasaud [ edit ]
De-a lungul
Barbuncul
Invirtita (a Romanian-style square dance, done mainly throughout the Romanian Transylvania region, which also includes Nasaud.)
Transylvania [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
a b c d e f g h i j k l Cosmogonia poporului român (The Cosma, Aurel.(The Cosmogony of the Romanian People) (1942). Bucharest: Tipografia Ziarului "Universul". a b Leeming, David Adams. Creation Myths of the World: An Encyclopedia. ABC-CLIO, 2010. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 17 Sept. 2012. ^ DEX, Romanian Academy Publishing House, Bucharest, 1998, ^ Marian Simion Florea, Cultural Romanian Foundation Publishing House, Bucharest 1994 ^ Michael Hitchcock (1998): Tourism, Tam An Mini, and national identity, Indonesia and the Malay World, 26:75, 124-135: 129Astronomers Discover Fifth Moon Orbiting Pluto
We now know that Pluto, the dwarf planet formerly known as a planet, has one more moon orbiting it. Using the Hubble Space telescope, astronomers have discovered Pluto's fifth moon.
NPR's Joe Palca filed this report for our Newscast unit:
"The new moon is tiny, something between 6 and 15 miles across. It showed up in nine separate images the space telescope made in the last month. The latest image came earlier this week. "In 1978, astronomers found the first and largest of Pluto's moons. It's called Charon. Once the Hubble Space Telescope went into operation, astrononomers used it to find three other small moons of Pluto — Nix and Hydra in 2006 and one last year that the hasn't gotten a fancy name yet. It's just called P4. The new moon will be P5 — for now. "Astronomers no longer consider Pluto a planet in our solar system. Instead, it's now referred to as a dwarf planet. But Pluto still draws astronomers' attention and a NASA probe will arrive at Pluto in 2015."
NASA says the discovery will help the New Horizons spacecraft navigate its way to the planet.
"Moving past the dwarf planet at a speed of 30,000 miles per hour, New Horizons could be destroyed in a collision with even a BB-shot-size piece of orbital debris," NASA said in a press release.Judging by early critical response to Suicide Squad, it's looking possible — if not likely — that it'll end up following the lead of the studio's earlier Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice with a successful opening weekend fueled by fan excitement and curiosity, followed by a quick drop-off as word of mouth spreads.
To put things mildly, that's not a good look for Warner Bros.' attempt to use the DC Entertainment properties to build its own version of Marvel Studios. When 2013's Man of Steel is factored in, it will mark three successive movies that ended up defeating their own pre-release buzz through bad reviews and a divisive product. (And the less said about 2010's Green Lantern, the better.)
Instead of demonstrating a viable filmmaker-centric alternative to Marvel's top-down style of movie production, the initial releases from what's become known as the DC Extended Universe have perhaps done exactly the opposite, making audiences long for the cookie-cutter comfort of seeing Robert Downey Jr. charm his way through his seventh appearance as Tony Stark. At least with Marvel, you know what you're getting when you put your money down.
It's clear that Warners and DC are aware of the problem — Geoff Johns and Jon Berg taking the reins for future projects and the behind-the-scenes drama of Suicide Squad are two indicators that the studio knows that something isn't right — but less so that there's a solution on the horizon. Sure, the trailers for Wonder Woman and Justice League look good — but trailers can be deceptive, according to those disappointed in Suicide Squad.
That said, the fact that there even is a Wonder Woman or Justice League on the horizon could be taken as a victory of sorts; what other franchise could have such publicly stalled starts and manage to get five movies in without delay or a pause for retooling? The accelerated rate of release for superhero projects — another way in which Warners is attempting to match the Marvel model — has pushed the studio into a space where work on the fifth movie in the series was underway before the second was even released, ensuring a series of movies that, under more traditional means, may not even exist.
The question becomes how sustainable the current model is. To some degree, Suicide Squad was seen by fans to be a chance for Warner Bros. to redeem the DC movies following Batman v. Superman; will Wonder Woman become something similar in light of the reception for Suicide Squad? And if that movie doesn't satisfy the fanbase, will attention shift to Justice League, and then whatever movie follows Justice League if that, too, should disappoint fans? Can the endless expectation of what's next maintain enough of a level of excitement to continue to greenlight future projects if every single WB/DC movie underwhelms?
At some point, surely, one of two things has to happen: Either Warners refines its formula for projects already in the works and finds something that pleases the mass superhero audience out there, making a movie that pleases critics and audiences alike, or else, eventually, the studio has to pull the plug on the DC superhero universe as it currently stands and attempt to do something else with the properties. In either case, the unknown factor is time: how long before the studio arrives at either of these destinations?
For now, those fans who enjoy Suicide Squad and Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and the distinctly odd, off-kilter appeal of the DC Extended Universe as is should enjoy it while it lasts. Unless there are better-than-expected long-term box-office results for Suicide Squad, things aren't going to stay like this forever.Getty Image
Amy Schumer enraged Donald Trump supporters during a comedy show in Florida Sunday night after she referred to the Republican candidate as an “orange, sexual-assaulting, fake-college-starting monster.” Booing started about halfway though the show from a reported “vocal, but small minority” of attendees at Tampa’s Amalie Arena, when Schumer steered the topic into territory such as gun control and the upcoming presidential election. All told, about 200 people eventually walked out.
It’s unclear what the crowd was expecting, as Schumer has been an ardent Hillary Clinton supporter as well as a vocal advocate for gun control — a cause she has publicly championed and even featured on her Comedy Central show. It seemed to be the slamming of Trump, however, that the crowd took the most umbrage with.
She made it clear she doesn’t understand how people can support Trump. At one point, she asked for a Trump supporter – preferably one with sleeves, she told security personnel – to join her up on stage to explain their enthusiasm for Trump. One fellow did, but he said he was voting for Trump mainly because he doesn’t trust Clinton. When some audience members booed, the actor/comedian invited them to leave and also asked security to remove anyone booing. “I don’t want to hear that. We wanted to have a good night without distractions with the politics,” said Bryon Nfinger. “It’s a bit much,” echoed his wife, Chrissy Nfinger. They both said everybody has a right to their opinion but thought Schumer went on too long. “The show became political. I definitely didn’t come to hear this,” said Ryan Atwood.
It’s understandable that the crowd would want to attend a comedy show to get a respite from current events, but at the same time at just three weeks out, the election is hard to ignore.
Many took to Twitter to thank Schumer for the evening’s performance, particularly when she invited victims of sexual assault in the audience to stand up, referencing the allegations against Trump.In a recent television interview, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor boldly predicted that Republicans in his chamber would unite to pass Speaker John Boehner’s plan to lift the nation’s debt ceiling.
Cantor, R-7th, said House Republicans were concluding that Boehner’s plan is their best option to cut federal spending while ensuring, at least temporarily, that the U.S. continues to pay back its loans.
Cantor dismissed as "unacceptable" the option of not increasing the $14.3 trillion debt limit by Aug. 2, when the nation will start running short of funds to pay its obligations. He was scornful of a proposal by Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to raise the debt limit.
"Harry Reid’s plan is basically giving the president a blank check, giving him what he wants, a blind increase of the debt ceiling to spend the money the way he wants," Cantor said during a July 26 interview on Fox News.
We wondered whether Reid’s plan really would present President Barack Obama a blank check -- a claim repeatedly made by Cantor and Boehner.
First, a little background. Reid’s proposal would raise the debt ceiling by $2.7 trillion, enough to last until 2013. Boehner’s two-step plan would allow the limit to increase by $900 billion now and force Obama to seek a second hike before next year’s elections.
Both proposals claim to cut spending by $1.2 trillion
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. Two of them (Duke and Louisville) were in the Top 10.
Just FYI: There are only nine players in the country shooting better than 90 percent on free throws according to the latest NCAA stats. The leader is Riley Grabau from Wyoming at 94.1 percent, followed by Jarekious Bradley at Southeast Missouri State (who began his career at Kent State) at 93.1 percent.
What to do: If coaches want a rule change, try this. Eliminate the 3-seconds call. Mandate, the final 25 seconds of the shot-clock, there must be an offensive player inside the paint at all times. He can still set screens, and step out for jump shots, but there must be a 'post' player in the paint at all time.
This would also open the perimeter for more freedom of movement and might also encourage more true inside scoring, which could lead to more points overall.
Only one left: The Kentucky Wildcats (21-0, 8-0) are now the only team in the country that is undefeated after Virginia fell last week to Duke (when Duke shot 53.8 percent from the line). If you're curious, Feb. 10 at LSU and Feb. 28 vs. Arkansas look to the prime opportunities for the Wildcats to get their first loss, if at all.
Just so you know, the Wildcats -- consensus No. 1 in the nation and favored to win the national championship -- are shooting 69.0 percent from the line this season.
At the other end of the spectrum there are just two winless teams remaining -- Florida A&M (0-21) and Central Arkansas (0-18). Savannah State (5-16), in the last game of the season, looks to be FAMU's best hope for a win; Feb. 7, vs. New Orleans (6-11) might be it for Central Arkansas.
Coming to Cleveland: Conference-USA has a lot of bottom feeders dragging that conference down, with nine of the 14 teams in the league sitting.500 or worse overall. But at the top is Louisiana Tech (17-5, 8-1), ahead of Western Kentucky (15-6, 8-1), a team it has already defeated, and No. 3 UAB, (11-11, 7-2), another team it has defeated.
While the computers rank C-USA No. 4 Old Dominion (17-4, 6-3) a lofty No. 40 in the nation, the Monarchs have a lot of work to do to catch up to the No. 98 Bulldogs, who are in the NCAA Top 100 teams in scoring per game (74.3 points), field-goal percentage (45.4 percent), blocked shots (5.7) and steals (8.3).
Louisiana Tech will likely be an 11-12-13 seed at best, but that's where NCAA Tournament teams capable of upsets normally reside, which could see them land in Cleveland for the NCAA Tournament Midwest Regional in March.
Inside the Top 25: A whopping 13 teams in the AP Top 25 lost at least one game last week and the range went from top to bottom. Look for several Big Ten teams to move around this week in the poll, with Ohio State likely to make a return to the AP list.
Key games this week:
Monday - Virginia at North Carolina, 7 p.m., ESPN.
Monday - Iowa State at Kansas, 9 p.m., ESPN.
Wednesday - Creighton at Xavier, 9 p.m., Fox Sports I.
Thursday - Gonzaga at Santa Clara, 11 p.m., ESPNU.
Saturday - Baylor at West Virginia, noon, ESPNU.
Top 25 poll vote: Here's how I voted this week in the AP Top 25 poll.
1. Kentucky
2. Gonzaga
3. Wisconsin
4. Duke
5. Virginia
6. Arizona
7. Villanova
8. Kansas
9. Louisville
10 Notre Dame
11. Iowa State
12. West Virginia
13. Northern Iowa
14. Utah
15. Wichita State
16. North Carolina
17. VCU
18. Maryland
19. Oklahoma
20. Butler
21. Baylor
22. Texas A&M
23. Ohio State
24. Indiana
25 TulsaWe’ve seen plenty of movies, books and documentaries on serial killers, but not so many on those who are so efficient and deadly that they can murder dozens of people in a single day. Murder sprees seem to have become more prominent over time – notably the tragedy in Norway, which is as recent as July 2011. This evil act will no doubt happen again thousands of times in the future. What I have presented in this list is no more than the proverbial tip of the iceberg.
10 George Hennard 23 dead, 20 injured
On October 16th, 1991, George Hennard, of Bell County Texas, drove his pick-up truck through the window of a Luby’s Cafeteria. The carnage that followed later became known as the Luby’s Massacre. Hennard crawled out of the vehicle and screamed at the top of his voice: “This is what Bell County has done to me!” before shooting the man closest to him, who had come to assist with the crash. He then ordered everyone not to move, before systematically targeting and stalking women (against whom he was bitterly prejudiced) and shooting them at point blank range with his Glock pistol.
Throughout the massacre, the patrons of the cafeteria could do no more than hide underneath tables. Nobody dared to make a dash for the door, even when Hennard stopped to reload. One man made an attempt to tackle Hennard so his family could escape, but Hennard simply gunned him down and carried on. The rampage lasted for 10 minutes before police arrived and the situation turned into a stand-off. Hennard was cornered in the restroom area and shot four times by police before he turned the pistol on himself and put an end to the madness. Hennard’s motivation for the massacre was apparently his hatred for women in general, whom he was constantly being rejected by.
Get inside the heads of history’s most depraved humans with Serial Killers: The Method and Madness of Monsters at Amazon.com!
9 Baruch Goldstein 29 dead, 125 injured
Baruch Goldstein was an American-born Israeli settler who perpetrated the notorious Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, in 1994. As a member of the militant Jewish Defense League, Goldstein heavily discriminated against Arabs throughout his life before the massacre. He worked as a physician in the Israeli Defense force, though he refused to treat wounded Arabs at all. After his close friend Rabbi Kahane was assassinated by Arab Extremists, Goldstein swore to take revenge. On February 25th, 1994, Goldstein entered the Cave of the Patriarchs, where 800 Palestinian Muslims were praying. He wore a military uniform in order to appear inconspicuous and blend in with the guards. Goldstein positioned himself at the back of the mosque, strategically covering the only exit. After waiting for a significant amount of time, he opened fire on the crowd with a Galil Assault Rifle.
In an incredibly short amount of time, Goldstein managed to shoot 29 people to death and wound over a hundred more. According to witnesses, he stood rigid, without moving from his original spot, and tried his hardest to injure as many people as possible by spraying bullets in all directions. The massacre came to an end when someone in the crowd smashed a fire extinguisher over Goldstein’s head, and proceeded to beat him to death with the help of many others present. Goldstein has since been described as a martyr by Jewish extremists, though his actions have been condemned by the Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin.
8 Toi Mutsuo 30 dead, 3 injured
In May 1938, 21-year-old Toi Mutsuo was severely depressed and suffered from tuberculosis, which at the time was an incurable and terminal illness. He lived in the small village of Kaio, on the outskirts of Okayama in Japan. Mutsuo’s parents died when he was very young, forcing him to be brought up by his grandmother. His depression began when local women started to reject his advances because of his suffering of tuberculosis. Before the massacre, Mutsuo wrote suicide notes that implied the reason for his actions was the pain of rejection by his peers.
In the early hours of May 21st, 1938, Mutsuo used an axe to kill his grandmother via decapitation. He then proceeded to cut the electricity line to the village and strapped two torches to his head, before systematically moving from house to house and killing anyone he found inside. He used a shotgun for most of the killings, though he also made use of the axe and a katana. Before the sun came up, he committed suicide by shooting himself in the chest with the shotgun, but not before he’d taken the lives of 30 innocent people. At this point in history, the massacre perpetrated by Mutsuo was the worst ever to be committed by an individual.
7 Campo Elias Delgado 30 dead, 15 injured
Campo Elias Delgado was a Colombian English teacher and Vietnam War veteran, who embarked on a horrific killing spree in a luxurious Pozzetto restaurant. Leading up to the massacre, Delgado had become increasingly lonely and his experiences in Vietnam had embittered him against society. He blamed his mother for most of his problems and worked up a sincere hatred for her over time. The murders began on the evening of December 4th, 1986, when Delgado followed one of his female students from school to her apartment, and subsequently killed her and her mother with a hunting knife. He then returned to his mother’s apartment and executed her with a single stab to the back of the neck. Delgado proceeded to wrap her body up in paper and set it on fire. When the fire alarm sounded, many of the other residents fled into the main hallway where Delgado was waiting for them. He stabbed one man to death before shooting five more with a.32 Caliber Revolver.
In the aftermath of this attack, he walked over to the Pozzetto restaurant with a briefcase that held five rounds of ammunition for his revolver. Once there, he ordered an expensive meal of Spaghetti alla Bolognese and ate for one hour, before walking over to the nearest diner and shooting her in the face at point blank range. Delgado subsequently killed 21 people in the restaurant by cornering his victims and shooting them in the forehead, before moving on to the next person. After 10 minutes of carnage the police arrived and engaged in a gunfight with Delgado, during which he was fatally shot in the temple.
6 Cho Seing-hui 32 dead, 17 injured
Cho Seung-hui is infamous for murdering 32 pupils and teachers, during a school shooting known as the Virginia Tech Massacre in 2007. Cho suffered from mental problems and severe anxiety during his college years, especially after he was reprimanded for stalking two female students. He began to plan out his attack meticulously, by practicing his shooting technique at a local firing range. He also video-taped himself confessing to the massacre and indicating that he was angry at the world for treating him so badly. In his tapes he also expressed admiration for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold; the perpetrators of the Columbine massacre. These tapes can be viewed on the internet, though most of Cho’s speech is just nonsensical ranting.
Cho began the attack on April 6th, 2007, by using a Walther semi-automatic pistol to murder two fellow students at a high-rise dormitory of Virginia Tech. He then returned to his room and mailed his video footage to NBC news, before re-arming himself with a Glock pistol. The second part of the massacre had been carefully planned. Cho entered Norris Hall and chained every single exit shut, to prevent people escaping. He even placed notes on the door that said that if anyone attempted to force them open, a bomb would explode. Cho then moved from classroom to classroom, shooting anyone he found inside. He worked hard to kill every single person in each classroom he targeted, and often shot students more than once in a double-tap fashion. Once students heard shots they attempted to barricade classrooms, which stopped Cho from entering on numerous occasions, although he did shoot and kill more than one student through a door. After approximately 9 minutes of Cho’s murderous rampage, the police arrived and forced their way through the chained-up doors. When Cho heard this, he shot himself directly in the face rather than face punishment.
5 Ahmed Ibragimov 34 dead, 20 injured (approx)
Ahmed Ibragimov was a Chechen bus driver who killed 34 Russians in the village of Mikenskaya, in 1999. The motive for Ibragimov’s rampage remains unknown and little information exists on the internet regarding the massacre. What is known is that, prior to the murders, Ibragimov had created a list of Russian targets, and had included information about where these individuals lived. He knew most of this information as he had previously worked as a postman. On October 8th, he went from house to house tracking down and systematically killing the people listed. His method was to call the victim outside under false pretenses, before shooting them dead with a rifle. He even murdered the 10 year-old child of one of his victims. In the aftermath of the massacre, Ibragimov went on the run for two days before being captured by rebels and delivered to the families of his victims, who proceeded to beat him to death with iron rods and leave his body in the street.
4 Martin Bryant 35 dead, 21 injured
In 1996, Martin Bryant had been described as an immature yet harmless man by his neighbors. He was loved by the local children, for whom he often bought expensive gifts. However, Bryant had become lonely, as he didn’t work and lived off a $1.5 million inheritance. He had also told his psychiatrist that he wanted to go around shooting people. His loneliness culminated in Australia’s deadliest spree killing in history, the Port Arthur massacre.
On April 28th, 1996, Bryant walked into Port Arthur’s Broad Arrow cafe with a large black bag, and ordered a meal. He sat down and conversed with other patrons of the cafe and made comments that there were a lot of wasps around as it was a hot day. He then returned his empty tray and opened up his bag which contained an AR-15 assault rifle with 30 rounds attached. The cafe was full of people and was remarkably small, with tables packed tightly together. Within 15 seconds, Bryant fired 13 shots at close range, killing 12 people instantly. Bryant chased down and killed another 8 people in the gift shop area of the site, before moving outside to the car park. Many coaches were parked in this area, with lines of people waiting outside them. When these people realized what was going on, they scattered, but Bryant managed to chase down and murder several more people, before changing his weapon to an FN FAL.
Bryant hijacked a car at the toll booth area of the site, but not before shooting dead the driver and his 3 passengers. He then took a hostage in the boot of this car and drove down to a local B&B known as Seascape. When police arrived at Seascape an 18-hour standoff ensued, during which Bryant communicated with police with a telephone. Bryant claimed he knew nothing about the previous massacre at Port Arthur and that everyone inside was in perfect health, even though it was later proved that Bryant had already shot dead the two owners of the B&B and his hostage, who was handcuffed to the banister. Eventually, Bryant deliberately set fire to Seascape for some unknown reason, and ran out with his clothes on fire, surrendering to police.
After his arrest, Bryant was reportedly obsessed with knowing the number of people he had killed, and wanted to know if he had “beaten” Thomas Hamilton, who had perpetrated the Dunblane massacre just weeks beforehand. Bryant received a sentence of over 1000 years of imprisonment, without parole, for the massacre, and is currently serving his time in the psychiatric wing of Risdon Prison, in Hobart, Australia. Recently, a Police training video has been leaked on the internet that contains photographs of the victims after being shot and a clip that shows Martin Bryant running near the buses in the Port Arthur car park. The video also plays a recording of the phone call between Bryant and police during the standoff at Seascape, in which Bryant claims to have made a cup of tea for his hostage.
3 William Unek 57 dead, 30 injured
The case involving William Unek is unique, in that Unek perpetrated not one, but two deadly massacres that occurred three years apart. Despite the incredibly large death count, both massacres received surprisingly little media coverage. What is known is that, in 1954, Unek worked as a police constable in the Belgian Congo. During this period he embarked on a brutal killing spree and murdered at least 21 people with an axe, while injuring many more. The motive for this massacre remains unknown. He then apparently escaped to Tanganyika, where he assumed a false identity and started his life over.
Unek found work again, though it isn’t clear what profession he chose, before repeating history and going on another murderous rampage on February 11th, 1957. This time his chosen weapon was a stolen rifle. He stormed through a local village, invading people’s homes and shooting anyone he found inside. At some point he torched a house and the blaze killed a further three people. He also hacked several people to death with the axe and strangled a young woman. During this massacre he managed to kill 36 villagers before fleeing. This time police sent out dogs and a helicopter to hunt Unek down, and eventually he was discovered at a house just two miles away from the scene of the massacre. The house owner conversed with Unek until police arrived, at which point Unek was fatally injured while trying to evade capture.
2 Woo Bum-Kon 57 dead, 37 injured
Woo Bum-Kon is responsible for the deadliest shooting spree in South Korea’s history. According to his relatives and close friends, before the massacre Woo was severely depressed and had anxiety issues, as well as an inferiority complex. Prior to the rampage in 1982, he had served in the military and worked as a police officer in the province of Gyeongsangnam-do. His motive was apparently blind rage; on the night of the massacre Woo got into a fight with his girlfriend after she woke him up by swatting a fly on his chest. He assaulted her and wrecked his house in a tantrum before going out drinking. He then went to the police station and somehow managed to gather an arsenal of weapons without anyone noticing. This arsenal consisted of two rifles with hundreds of rounds of ammunition and seven hand grenades.
At around 9:30pm, Woo visited a local village, where he positioned himself behind some bushes and began firing upon passers-by with an M1 Carbine. His girlfriend, who had gone out looking for him, happened to walk by at this moment and he shot her in the upper thigh, wounding but not killing her. Later that night Woo visited a local post office and shot three people dead, before cutting the phone lines of the entire village in order to prevent anyone from calling the emergency services. He then began to target houses at random, using his position as a police officer to trick people into letting him inside, before pulling out his rifle and murdering everyone. Using this method, Woo managed to kill a total of 42 people in five different villages.
He broke the trend on numerous occasions, for example one time he took a family hostage in their home and ordered a teenage boy living there to go and buy him a drink from the local grocery store. The boy complied, but when he returned Woo simply killed him and all of his family. On another occasion Woo was unable to gain entry to a house, so he used a grenade to kill everyone inside. The massacre lasted for eight hours – culminating in Woo killing himself with two grenades in a suicide attack that claimed four lives. In the aftermath, many police officials involved in the manhunt for Woo resigned, as much blame was placed on them for not ending the rampage sooner. Police were very quick to be informed of the shootings but were sluggish in their attempts to track down the perpetrator.
1 Anders Behring Breivik 77 dead, 96 injured
Sadly, the deadliest spree killing in history is also the most recent. Anders Behring Brievik is a right-wing extremist who murdered 69 teenagers aged 14-19, at the Norwegian island of Utoya. On July 22nd, 2011, before the shooting began, Breivik detonated a massive car bomb in Oslo which killed 8 people. He then boarded a ferry to the island of Utoya were 600 teenagers were attending a youth summer camp. Brievik wore a police uniform and used a forged police ID badge to pass through security without incident. He then approached the campers and falsely informed them that he was a police officer who had come to perform a routine check after the bombing in Oslo. He announced that everyone should gather around him while he did a head count, before pulling out a rifle and indiscriminately firing into the crowd.
Survivors later described the horrors that occurred on the island; many of whom said that Breivik targeted individuals after the initial spray of bullets, and laughed as he murdered those who begged for their lives. Many people tried to play dead in order to survive, but Breivik came back and shot the bodies twice. Some campers desperately jumped into the water and attempted to swim to shore, but many drowned and only a few were able to be rescued by boaters who came to help. Breivik also shot many people in the water, causing otherwise non-fatal injuries that incapacitated victims and caused them to drown. Some of the teenagers hid in underground lavatories and used cell phones to communicate with each other via text messages. After 90 minutes of carnage, police arrived, and Breivik surrendered peacefully.
The massacre had been planned by Breivik since 2009, at the very least. He created a diary of the planning process that he allegedly shared with terrorist organizations over the internet. The diary shows that his motive was to use the influence of the attacks to start an uprising against the Norwegian government. The diary also reveals that he made an unsuccessful attempt to purchase firearms in Prague in 2009, and that he founded a farming company called Breivik Geofarm, as a cover for his bomb making experiments. Breivik has been observed to be completely sane by court psychiatrists, but he is described as having strong narcissistic tendencies in his personality. He hasn’t received a prison sentence yet, though it is certain that he will live the rest of his life behind bars.COLUMBUS, Ohio -- There's no wrong decision as long as there is a decision. Seven days removed from the start of the defense of their national championship, Ohio State's coaches are claiming no quarterback choice has been made.
That's a bit of a surprise, if you believe it.
But here's the bigger surprise - talk that there won't be a choice.
That the answer as Ohio State's quarterback won't be J.T. Barrett or Cardale Jones, but both.
Ohio State's depth chart will be released on Tuesday and while it shouldn't list five potential starters at quarterback, like Alabama did on Monday, it won't tell us anything. Urban Meyer reiterated again Monday that he'll announce the starter by sending someone onto the field after 8 p.m. in Blacksburg, Virginia on Labor Day.
But he said he wants to make the choice by Wednesday, when the Buckeyes will start their game prep in earnest.
Yet during the dodging and ducking Monday (we see the smiles behind your evasions, guys), the idea of a two-quarterback system kept popping up -- the system that both Jones and Barrett have said they don't favor.
"I don't think it would be best," Barrett said two weeks ago. "I think that would be kind of tough. It would be weird if we switched like every quarter."
It's the Buckeyes' choice to not give away their secret. But why bring in this scenario? Are they merely muddying the water with thoughts of a shared role? Or is Meyer being honest?
Because picking both is the only way he could go wrong. Tough choices are part of the job. Making one here would help the Buckeyes. And that may be what Meyer does. But for now...
"There is a chance they'll both play," Meyer said as part of his first answer to the first question posed to him Monday.
Meyer all along has said the human element will be the most difficult part of this process, and how the guy who isn't starting handles the news is the most intriguing part of the story. But he's called this battle refreshing because of the genuine friendship between the competitors. So the outlook of the loser emerged as less of a concern. Refreshing means the choice isn't so hard.
If you make a choice.
"I don't think it's going to be hard, because they handle it," Meyer said. "I've had a couple conversations with them already. I think it's going to be matter of fact. If you're not going to play early, get ready, because I'd like to see both guys involved."
How? Playing both every game as part of a plan? Looking for a hot hand and sticking with it? Maybe the best way to explain Meyer's thinking on this is to give the exchange from Monday as I tried to gauge where he stands on this.
This isn't meant to bore you, and you can watch the video of my exchange with Meyer at the top of this post. But Meyer admitted he hasn't done this before. This isn't like playing both veteran Chris Leak and freshman change-of-pace Tim Tebow at Florida in 2006, because Meyer keeps insisting Jones and Barrett are similar players.
Here are his answers to my questions.
Q. Are you open to the idea of playing two quarterbacks more than you were a couple months ago?
"I'm not sure yet. We're still debating that."
Q. Is the only thing what gives this team the best chance to win or is there something in there of guys deserving a chance to play, earning a chance to play...
"No, at this point it's at that moment who can -- because they both won. I don't know J.T.'s record, but it's pretty good. Cardale, I believe, is 3-0. So who gives us at that moment a chance to win."
Q. If the skill sets are similar, right, what would it be about giving both a chance?
"Performance at practice, accuracy, leadership, toughness, all the things that you look for in the quarterback."
Q. Would that change within a game though?
"Sure, absolutely."
Q. A guy's not looking so sharp, let's put somebody else in?
"Absolutely, it could be weekly too. If he had a bad Tuesday practice and Tuesday's our first of normal, and third down is on Wednesday, and they have a bad Wednesday, absolutely. That's not uncommon. That is the same with the other positions as well. You have to show up every day and compete."
Q. Is there any part of that, doing that at quarterback that could be not a great thing for the team? Or do you think that would just push it?
"Oh, you mean about naming the quarterback?"
Q. Do you want -- people talk about if someone's looking over their shoulder and they have a bad start to a game or a tough day at practice?
"Those are all things that we have to hit on. I'm not very experienced in this. If you look, check the annals of college football history, I'm not sure that's happened. So I think I have to do what's best for the team at that moment. That is you have two very good players that are very invested. What is the best chance of moving this team down the field and putting them in the endzone? That is kind of the mindset I've had right now.
"But I think those things I'm constantly thinking about because I don't want players -- and we try not to do that here. That's why we talk about 4 to 6, A to B, don't worry about mistakes, go as hard as you can, and we'll fix it. Mistakes are fixed by great effort."
So playing both might be easy. It might be what both have earned. When I asked offensive coordinator Ed Warinner the benefit of playing two quarterbacks, his search for an answer landed on that.
"The number one benefit is they're both great people that work extremely hard and have led this team to big wins and played very hard for us," Warinner said. "The benefit would be that they both... get some reward because the reward for our guys is they work 12 months a year to go play 12 games."
But there are plenty of players who work hard and don't play. What's best for the team is what makes that choice. Why would that change at quarterback? The only rationale for two quarterbacks is some explanation that two options would make life harder on opposing defenses and easier for the Ohio State offense.
Not that it might make two players happy.
"It would be nice. Maybe on the inside one wouldn't be as crushed as he would be if he didn't get any playing time at all," said Tyvis Powell, Jones' roommate and Barrett's friend as well.
There's certainly a chance none of this is true. The players have continued to share first-team snaps, but no one knows the plan in Meyer's head. There's every reason to trust Meyer to make this call.
The Buckeyes can win, and big, with either Jones or Barrett. With a chance to start in the future (Barrett) or a big NFL check waiting for him (Jones), either should be able to handle news that they aren't the guy.
But not making a choice? That's hard to imagine. Why offer the chance to create an ongoing issue when there's no reason for there to be one?
Ohio State can win playing either quarterback. Maybe they can win playing both. But that's a risk they don't have to take.ABSTRACT In May 2003, the University of Wisconsin - Madison found that it was the recipient of a continuous large scale flood of inbound Internet traffic destined for one of the campus' public Network Time Protocol (NTP) servers. The flood traffic rate was hundreds-of-thousands of packets-per-second, and hundreds of megabits-per-second. Subsequently, we have determined the sources of this flooding to be literally hundreds of thousands of real Internet hosts throughout the world. However, rather than having originated as a malicious distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, the root cause is actually a serious flaw in the design of hundreds of thousands of one vendor's low-cost Internet products targeted for residential use. The unexpected behavior of these products presents a significant operational problem for UW-Madison for years to come. This document includes the initial public disclosure of details of these products' serious design flaw. Furthermore, it discusses our ongoing, multifaceted approach toward the solution which involves the University, the products' manufacturer, the relevant Internet standards (RFCs), and the public Internet service and user communities.
Table of Contents
Figure 1 is a graph of inbound traffic to our campus over a 48 hour period, tuesday through thursday, May 13-15, 2003.
The first half of the graph shows typical traffic levels for our campus, with peak inbound packet rates of about 40,000 packets-per-second. However, as you can see, our inbound packet-per-second rate increased dramatically starting May 14 at about 8AM localtime, primarily from our commodity Internet Service Provider, WiscNet. At about 9:40AM this additional traffic began to cause problems with our measurement infrastructure and some of our legacy intra-campus routers. By 11AM we had identified the inbound flood traffic by protocol and port numbers. It was destined for our public time server and we blocked the incoming traffic upstream, at WiscNet's border routers, which alleviated the problem for the time being. This is a typical action for network operators to take in reaction to malicious Denial-of-Service flood attacks, of which we assumed this was one.
The traffic in question appeared to be Network Time Protocol (NTP) queries in that they consisted of 76-byte IP packets destined for UDP port number 123 (NTP). However, these packets had an unusual characteristic: although they appeared to come from many sources, they all had the same source port number: 23457. Therefore, it was possible to configure our routers to block just a subset of inbound queries to our NTP server, and continue to service the other legitimate requests normally. We just blocked all UDP traffic sourced from port 23457 and destined for port 123 (NTP) of the NTP server in question. (Note that the number 23457 seems hand-picked, as the number subsequent to 23456.) At this point we simply chalked it up to naivete on the part of the "attacker", which we presumed was forging many random source addresses, and left it at that, presuming that the flood would subside within hours as "script kiddie"-launched flood attacks often do.
Paraphrased from RFC2030 by Dave Mills:
The Simple Network Time Protocol (SNTP) is an adaptation of the Network Time Protocol (NTP) used to synchronize computer clocks in the Internet. It is a simple, stateless remote-procedure call (RPC) system with accuracy and reliability expectations similar to the UDP/TIME protocol described in RFC-868. SNTP can be used when the ultimate performance of the full NTP implementation is not necessary.
Note that SNTP uses the same packet format as NTP. In this way, SNTP clients can utilize NTP servers, even though they do not implement the complexities of the full peer-to-peer NTP protocol.
SNTP conversations typically follow these steps:
A client that would like to know the time sends a UDP packet containing the SNTP request to the well-known NTP port number 123 of an NTP server, and awaits a reply. Figure 2. A SNTP Request Packet +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ |LI | VN |Mode | Stratum | Poll | Precision | | =0|= 1-4|= 3 | = 0 | = 0 | = 0 | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Root Delay | | = 0 | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Root Dispersion | | = 0 | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Reference Identifier | | = 0 | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Reference Timestamp (64 bits) | | = 0 | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Originate Timestamp (64 bits) | | = 0 | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Receive Timestamp (64 bits) | | = 0 | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Transmit Timestamp (64 bits) | | = n | | (some number: zero, or the time of request sent by client) | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ The server responds with a UDP packet containing the SNTP reply from the well-known NTP port number 123 to the SNTP client. Figure 3. A Unicast SNTP Reply Packet +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ |LI=| VN |Mode | Stratum | Poll | Precision | |0-2|=req.|= 4 | = 1 - 14 | (ignore) | (ignore) | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Root Delay | | (ignore) | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Root Dispersion | | (ignore) | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | Reference Identifier | | (ignore) | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Reference Timestamp (64 bits) | | (ignore) | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Originate Timestamp (64 bits) | | (copied from request Transmit Timestamp) | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Receive Timestamp (64 bits) | | (time request was received by server) | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ | | | Transmit Timestamp (64 bits) | | (time of reply sent by server) | | = n | | | +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ Upon receiving the response, the client optionally uses the Originate Timestamp from the reply to validate the response, attempting to assure that it is indeed a response to this client's request. (If the reply were spoofed from another source, it would be unlikely to contain the correct value as the Originate Timestamp). Then it plucks the value from the "Transmit Timestamp", perhaps modifying it slightly to account for the estimated one-way end-to-end delay, and uses the result as the current time to set its local clock.
Now, back to our story...
One month later, we discovered that the flood of inbound NTP traffic persisted at an even more incredibly high rate, as evidenced by Figure 4 which plots our router's discarded packet rates beginning in early June 2003, for the traffic in question.
In Figure 4, note that: (1) there are slight daily fluctuations in rate (perhaps due to diurnal user behavior), (2) generally, the rate stays at a value over 250,000 packets-per-second (and over 150 megabits-per-second), and (3) that the traffic rate increases throughout the time shown. The sharp drops in traffic rate in this figure are not due to the flood subsiding but rather were due to network maintenance and a temporary block upstream from the observation point.
Once we found that this flood was continuing and was still increasing in rate, we investigated further. By carefully removing the block on some ingress interfaces, we allowed a trickle of traffic through to the server and captured the packets including their payload. We learned that these packets appeared to be legitimate, well-formed Simple Network Time Protocol (SNTP) version 1 queries, albeit at an inexplicably high rate from each client host. For instance, during one trace, many clients produced about one query per second. This would be highly unusual for a properly constructed SNTP client, since an application which uses SNTP is merely interested in setting its own clock relatively accurately so that its host has some reasonable notion of the current time. One query per second is ridiculous, and is far from best practice for NTP client behavior.
Also, we discovered that many of the IP addresses could be resolved to DNS names and furthermore that the IP addresses all appeared to be valid sources for the given ingress interface from which we removed the block. This indicated that it was quite possible that the source addresses were not
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this blog post if not a hundred other ways.
But even this lifestyle is far from utopian. In the next post, I want to show how the first-world lifestyle also contains dystopian seeds.
Slightly screwed up notes
[a] For example, Popper argues that “ ‘capitalism,’ in the sense in which Marx used the term, never existed anywhere on the surface of our beautiful planet Earth – no more than Dante’s hell.” Karl Popper, After the Open Society, p. 398.
[i] “The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much. What redeems it is the idea only. An idea at the back of it; not a sentimental pretense but an idea; and an unselfish belief in the idea—something you can set up, and bow down before, and offer a sacrifice to…” Conrad, Heart of Darkness,
[ii] “I’ve seen the devil of violence, and the devil of greed, and the devil of hot desire; but, by all the stars! these were strong, lusty, red-eyed devils, that swayed and drove men—men, I tell you. But as I stood on this hillside, I foresaw that in the blinding sunshine of that land I would become acquainted with a flabby, pretending, weak-eyed devil of a rapacious and pitiless folly.” (Conrad, Heart of Darkness)
[iv] See Marx, Capital Vol 1, “The Fetishism of Commodities
and the Secret thereof” https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm
[v] For a history of this see, http://www.amazon.com/Ivorys-Ghosts-White-History-Elephants/dp/0802144527
[vi] Conrad, Heart of Darkness, page?.Dragon Quest series creator Yuji Horii and Square Enix producer Ryota Aomi are doing the rounds in Asia promoting the June 4 release of Dragon Quest Heroes in the region. And during an interview with Korean website Ruliweb (Japanese translation via Hachima Kikou), Horii suggests there will be a new PlayStation-related Dragon Quest announcement soon.
Get the interview tidbits below.
Did you put in the characters you personally wanted?
Horii: “If we had the time and money for it, we would’ve put every character in. For Dragon Quest Heroes II, I want to add an even greater diversity of characters.”
Aomi: “For the older fans of Dragon Quest III and IV, the younger fans of VII and VIII, and so on, the characters I wanted to put in are different depending on the generation.”
Will the voice actors from Dragon Quest Heroes continue to pitch for future Dragon Quest games?
Horii: “For Dragon Quest Heroes II, of course I want the voice actors to stay the same. And for the 3DS version of Dragon Quest VIII, Jessica and Yangus are also the same [as their Dragon Quest Heroes voice actors].”
Since Dragon Quest Heroes II is in development, does that mean there will be no further updates for the first game?
Aomi: “Not at the moment. We intend to reflect upon the feedback we receive from the Hangul (Korean) release in our output going forward.”
Regarding PlayStation platforms, it’s been 10 years since the release of Dragon Quest VIII, but are there other Dragon Quest series games [planned for PlayStation]?
Horii: “I can’t say anything right now, but something might be announced before long.”Facepunch looking into a new game project
Garry's Mod, the thing that let's you do all the weird things to Source games like Half-Life 2, has earned about $22 million since it was released over seven years ago. Creator Garry Newman of Facepunch revealed the figure when asked by a fan, but he also added that a lot of the profits have gone to taxes.
"Over 7 years GMod has made about 22 million dollars," Garry shared. "We get less than half of that though. Then the tax man gets a bunch of that. Then when we take money out of the company the tax man gets a bunch of that too."
A lot of Garry's Mod success has been through word of mouth, and the regular features update it gets. Plus, it's only $10. Facepunch is currently working on a Linux version of Garry's Mod, and they're considering a move to Valve's SteamPipe system as well.
Additionally, the team is looking to into creating a new PC game. It's a game Garry has wanted to start on "for ages," and they're trying to get a team together in the office to start work.
Mailbag [Garry's blofg, via PCGamesN]
You are logged out. Login | Sign upFILE PHOTO: Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud arrives on the tarmac to welcome U.S. President Donald Trump as he arrives aboard Air Force One at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia May 20, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo
RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia’s King Salman left on Wednesday for an official trip to Russia where he is set to meet President Vladimir Putin for talks on oil production and regional policy, state television said.
Several investment deals, including on a liquefied natural gas project and petrochemical plants, could also be signed during the trip and plans for a $1-billion fund to invest in energy projects are likely to be finalised.
The king appointed his son, 32-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to manage the kingdom’s affairs in his absence.Many Clinton voters expect that there is a good chance that recounts will change the election result, but few Trump voters agree
Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s recount request gets public support in the latest YouGov Poll —although there are differing points of view of their value, depending on which side you are on.
Some Democrats and Clinton voters hold on to the hope that the recounts will show that Democrat Hillary Clinton really carried the states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, three close states that gave Republican Donald Trump a majority in the Electoral College. Republicans and Trump voters overwhelmingly disagree. But Republicans do believe that the recounts can help convince people that Trump really did win the election; Democrats are more likely to disagree with that.
Both groups are less sure the recounts can demonstrate that foreign governments didn’t tamper directly with the election, although Trump supporters are more hopeful that they will.
There is one area of agreement. While the recounts have been requested by Jill Stein, and Clinton campaign lawyers will participate in the recounts, both Clinton and Trump voters think that if the shoe were on the other foot, and Trump had won the popular vote but not the Electoral College, he would have been doing the same thing, asking for recounts in closely contested states. Although more Clinton voters that Trump voters believe this, a plurality of Trump voters admit this would have likely happened.
Donald Trump did claim that millions of votes were cast illegally and that without them hew would have won the popular, too (as of now, Clinton leads in the national popular vote totals by more than 2 million votes). Trump later criticized CNN when it asked him for evidence. While more Americans don’t believe Trump’s claim than believe it, it does resonate with Trump’s own voters. Nearly half say, yes, millions of illegal votes were cast.
In addition, 82% of those Trump voters who believe there were millions of illegal votes agree with their candidate and say that without those “illegal” votes, Trump would have won the popular vote, too.
But was the election “rigged?” In the weeks before November 8, Trump claimed it would be. Afterwards, by nearly two to one, Americans doubt it was. That’s particularly true for Trump voters, 70% of whom say it wasn’t rigged. Clinton voters are less sure, though by a narrow margin, they agree it was not.
As for the Electoral College, polls throughout the years have suggested that Americans of all political points of views would like to get rid of it and elect presidents by the national popular vote. But that’s only true when there isn’t a split decision as there was this year. After the 2000 election, when Democrat Al Gore held a half a million vote lead nationwide but lost Florida, and with it the election, to George W. Bush, Democrats wanted to abolish the Electoral College while Republicans did not. The same is true this year, three weeks after the election. 71% of Clinton’s voters would abolish the Electoral College, while 65% of Trump’s voters want to keep it.
The recounts wouldn’t have happened without Stein’s efforts and her successful crowdfunding. But Stein efforts aren’t helping her own image. 43% have an unfavorable opinion of Stein, more than twice as many as are favorable towards her. This is not much different from what voters thought before the election. However, unfavorable opinions of Stein among Trump supporters have jumped 30 points, from 46% then to 76% now. Clinton’s voters were negative then, now they are evenly divided
See here for full results.Ayn Rand publicly recommended the works of Mises but not of Hayek. Today, when Hayek is much better known than Mises, it’s worth seeing why.
I came to the full realization of what’s wrong with Hayek’s approach while re-reading Atlas Shrugged. No, not in Galt’s speech, but surprisingly in the section describing the Minnesota harvest disaster, when trains were diverted to harvest the (spoiled) soybean crop of Kip’s Ma.
There was not much that remained in her mind of the last twenty hours, only disconnected bits, held together by the single constant that had made them possible—by the soft, loose faces of men who fought to hide from themselves that they knew the answers to the questions she asked.
... Then came the faces of the assistants in the Car Service Department, who would neither confirm the report nor deny it, but kept showing her papers, orders, forms, file cards that bore words in the English language, but no connection to intelligible facts. “Were the freight cars sent to Minnesota?” “Form 357W is filled out in every particular, as required by the office of the Co-ordinator in conformance with the instructions of the comptroller and by Directive 11-493. “Were the freight cars sent to Minnesota?” “The entries for the months of August and September have been processed by—“ “Were the freight cars sent to Minnesota?” “My files indicate the locations of freight cars by state, date, classification and—“ “Do you know whether the cars were sent to Minnesota?” “As to the interstate motion of freight cars I would have to refer you to the files of Mr. Benson and of—“
This is the answer to Hayek’s basic argument in defense of capitalism. (I should say that I know of Hayek’s arguments only from the comments of writers who agree with him, but I’m pretty sure I’ve got it right; if not, I hope someone will correct me.)
Hayek’s argument, as I understand it, is that no government planners can substitute for the knowledge embodied in market prices. The price-system, he correctly observes, sums up the evaluative judgments of all the millions of people buying, selling, and refraining from doing so, on the market. Freely arrived at prices contain information; the planners’s knowledge cannot remotely equal that.
In a way, this is an argument from ignorance: the planners can’t know enough to issue the right decrees. In its simpler form, it’s the argument that you can’t force a person to do what’s best for him because only he can know what’s best for him, which is an argument one often hears from conservatives.
The Objectivist argument is quite different: you can’t achieve anyone’s good by force, because values are objective—which means they exist as values only if they are rationally judged by the acting party to be beneficial to him. And no one can be forced to make a rational judgment. The only effect of the force is the destruction of the alleged beneficiary (and everyone else).
A value which one is forced to accept at the price of surrendering one’s mind, is not a value to anyone; the forcibly mindless can neither judge nor choose nor value. An attempt to achieve the good by force is like an attempt to provide a man with a picture gallery at the price of cutting out his eyes. Values cannot exist (cannot be valued) outside the full context of a man’s life, needs, goals, and knowledge. (“What Is Capitalism?” in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal)
The Objectivist politics rests on Ayn Rand’s identifications: 1. Man’s mind is his basic means of survival, and 2. Force is anti-mind. Conclusion: force is anti-life. (Individual rights are the principle that recognizes and implements this.)
This is light-years away from (and deeper than) Hayek’s argument from ignorance. He holds, in effect, that the few can’t know as much as the many. But, in fact, they often do. The history of man is replete with examples of one man who was right against the mob. Just read the beginning of Roark’s speech. I realize that Hayek is speaking of economic knowledge, knowledge of how to coordinate production and exchange under a vast division of labor, which is indeed something no single mind or small set of minds can deal with. But his argument stems from a wider, skeptical outlook. And, at any rate, it is completely on the wrong track.
Back to Atlas Shrugged. The point is that the statist system, under Directive 10-289, produces “men who fought to hide from themselves that they knew the answers.” The substitution of force for market freedom produces not ignorance but evasion. The issue, then, doesn’t concern anyone’s quantity of knowledge but whether thinking, problem-solving, decisive action are rewarded or punished. It’s all about preserving the connection of the mind to life: a system either lets rationality reap its rewards or penalizes rationality.
I have written about the “economic selection” (like natural selection) that operates under capitalism: success creates the means of its own enlargement and failure is self-eliminating. That is what underlies the “social objectivity,” as Ayn Rand called it, of market phenomena. The reign of force sabotages this economic selection and turns it into its opposite, an unnatural selection in which success is punished and failure bailed-out.
Under capitalism, it pays men to think; under statism, it pays men to fight against knowledge and to concentrate on avoiding blame.
Interestingly, there is a lot of material in Part III of Atlas about the distinction between the metaphysically given and the man-made. Avoiding blame means trying to guess a potential blamer’s emotions not working to identify the facts of an independent reality. For instance, in the same sequence about Minnesota, there’s this:
The men in Washington were last to be reached by the panic. They watched, not the news from Minnesota, but the precarious balance of their friendships and commitments; they weighed, not the fate of the harvest, but the unknowable result of unpredictable emotions in unthinking men of unlimited power.
And, a little earlier:
“You could save us now, you could find a way to make things work—if you wanted to!”
She burst out laughing.
There, she thought, was the ultimate goal of all that loose academic prattle which businessmen had ignored for years, the goal of all the slipshod definitions, the sloppy generalities, the soupy abstractions, all claiming that obedience to objective reality is the same as obedience to the State, that there is no difference between a law of nature and a bureaucrat’s directive, that a hungry man is not free, that man must be released from the tyranny of food, shelter and clothing—all of it, for years, that the day might come when Nat Taggart, the realist, would be asked to consider the will of Cuffy Meigs as a fact of nature, irrevocable and absolute like steel, rails and gravitation, to accept the Meigs-made world as an objective, unchangeable reality—then to continue producing abundance in that world.
Ayn Rand’s thought moves on a plane never even glimpsed by most of those who consider themselves intellectuals—including, unfortunately, some who are taken to be the strongest advocates of capitalism.It’s a record likely to be shattered by summer: The average sale price of a detached home in the City of Toronto hit $965,670 in April.
Active listings were down 8.4 per cent, a persistent problem which has been driving significant price growth. This home on Dupont St. (at Ossington), with a unique coach house in back, sold for $1 million in April 2014.
That number is expected to exceed $1 million over the coming weeks as the GTA continues to feel the effects of a shortage of new listings that helped drive up the average price of detached homes in the 416 region by 13.2 per cent from April of 2013. The average sale price of home in the GTA — taking into account everything from detached homes to semis, townhouses and condos — hit $577,898 last month, according to figures released Tuesday by the Toronto Real Estate Board. Sales were up just 1.8 per cent, year over year.
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Leading the real estate pack in terms of price growth were semi-detached houses. The average sale price across the GTA was up 11.6 per cent over April 2013. The 18 per cent jump in prices just in the City of Toronto sent the average sale price of a semi to $702,332, according to the TREB figures. Next in line were detached homes, where prices were up 11.3 per cent across the GTA — 9.6 per cent in the 905, where the average sale price was $645,179 in April. Active listings, however, even for the first month of peak spring market, were down 8.4 per cent, a persistent problem that has been driving intense competition and significant price growth, largely in 416 neighbourhoods close to the core and transit lines. TREB president Dianne Usher blamed Toronto’s double land transfer tax for the fact that more folks are choosing to stay put and renovate rather than sell. As well, “above-trend home sales in the years leading up to the recession have meant that many households who purchased during this period simply aren’t ready to move again.”
But also skewing the numbers is the desperation of buyers, frantic to get into the Toronto market before prices shoot further out of sight. One house, in North Toronto, reached a ludicrous new level in late April when 72 people — double the previous record for a bidding war for a house in the 416 region — registered offers on a Glencairn Ave. fixer-upper.
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Read more Lawrence Park fixer-upper gets 72 offers It sold for $1.366 million, almost double the $699,000 list price, though the realtor acknowledged he deliberately underpriced by at least $400,000 “mainly to create buzz.” A decade ago, the average detached house in the 416 region sold for just $486,489. The April number pushes Toronto further into the stratosphere of Canada’s priciest real estate market, Vancouver. There, the average detached sold for close to $1.2 million in April, a drop from the record $1.36 million it recorded in February. “Until we see a marked and sustained increase in listings, we should expect to see the annual rate of price growth above the long-term norm,” Jason Mercer, TREB’s senior manager of market analysis, said in a statement Tuesday. Sales of detached homes were up just 2.5 per cent across the GTA, with sale prices averaging $730,328 — an average of $645,179 in the 905 region. Semi-detached homes across the GTA were down 5.4 per cent in April, year over year, but prices were up 18 per cent in the City of Toronto, to an average of $702,332. The average price of a 905 semi was up 8 per cent to $443,318. Townhouse sales were down 8.3 per cent GTA-wide, but prices were up 14.7 per cent in Toronto to an average of $498,083. The 905 average sale price for a townhouse was $410,270, up 9.6 per cent. Condo sales were up 3.2 per cent. That saw the average sale price in the 416 region come in just 1.8 per cent over last April, at $384,758. Resale condo prices in the 905 regions, however, were up 8.1 per cent to $296,078. The MLS benchmark house price was up 7 per cent year over year. That indicator strips out fluctuations due to the sale of, say, more high-end homes in a month that could skew the sales figures. MORE ON THESTAR.COM: San Francisco housing crisis a warning for Toronto Toronto home sales expected to be brisk this summer Canadian real estate and housing boom may be ending, Scotiabank warns GTA house prices hit new record in MarchCLOSE Patriot fans give their game predictions. Clark Wade / The Star
Buy Photo Colts fans left their best wishes on a giant banner at Bankers Life Fieldhouse before the Colts take on the Patriots in the AFC Championship game this Sunday. (Photo: Matt Detrich / The Star)Buy Photo Story Highlights Colts at Patriots, 6:40 p.m. Sunday, CBS
FOXBOROUGH, Mass.
– They think it will be a blowout. A rout. They think, here in cold and crowded New England, that the Patriots will beat the Indianapolis Colts so badly in the AFC Championship Game on Sunday that this matchup, this very game, is a joke.
They're laughing at the Colts as a franchise, at Indianapolis as a city, at you as fans.
If it weren't sincere, the stuff these people in New England are saying and even doing this week, you'd swear it was a lampoon of the area's haughty, arrogant stereotype. One goof from Boston, a radio barker and former Patriots tight end named Christian Fauria, called into the Dan Dakich show this week pretending to be some random Patriots fan – which he is – and dismissing the Colts' chances in this game. Fauria ended up stuck between Dakich's teeth before the WFNI-1070 AM host spit him out and moved on.
That little stunt sums up the mood in New England. At the very least, it sums up the mood among the Patriots media. And when all of a team's media are this aligned, it usually reflects the feelings of the fans.
This is not me being the Indy media homer. Scan this story closely and find where I say, "I know the Colts are going to win!" I won't say it. Because I don't know it. But in New England, they're saying the Patriots are not just going to win, but win big. They're claiming to know it. And before I show you that, let me tell you this: Friday night on Twitter, I put out a request to fans of both cities for a prediction, with a score.
Average score among 150-plus Colts fans: A toss-up.
Average score among 50-plus Patriots fans: Patriots 38, Colts 22.
They see this game as a joke. And in their defense, the past three games between these teams have been a joke. The Patriots won the past five meetings, and the past three were New England blowouts: 59-24, 43-22, 42-20.
The 43-22 rout was in the playoffs last season. The 42-20 debacle was earlier this season, and it was at Indianapolis, no less. So there is recent history, postseason and even this season, that says the Patriots are three touchdowns better than the Colts. And if life were as simple as that, if it were linear and predictable, then what happened last time will happen this time. Bingo, bango, Patriots by three touchdowns.
Life isn't simple. Sports isn't predictable. Not at this level, not when you get to the conference championship game. A team doesn't get here by fluke, not the Patriots and not the Colts. Once upon a time New England was 2-2 and being roasted nationally. Tom Brady was old. Bill Belichick was out of touch. The Patriots won their next seven games, and 10 of their next 12. They lost only at NFC finalist Green Bay and in the regular-season finale against Buffalo, when Tom Brady was pulled at halftime. The Patriots are formidable, and favored by a touchdown for a reason.
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But the Colts are no joke. Beating the Bengals in the AFC wild-card round wasn't an eyebrow-raising result, but manhandling the Broncos in Denver was. That was a definitive statement that the Colts can go on the road and not just beat a team, but dominate a team – a team that had dominated them earlier this season. Any team that can go to Denver and do what the Colts did last week can go to New England and compete, even win.
That last sentence is not execrable nonsense. But what's coming out of New England this week is, starting with this predictable piece in the Boston Globe titled, "Face the facts: Colts are no match for the Patriots." Written by the same guy who wrote before the Texans-Patriots playoff game in January 2013 a story titled, "No offense, but the Texans simply can't win." The same guy who wrote before the Colts-Patriots playoff game in January 2014 a story titled, "Colts won't be a challenge for the Patriots." He was right the first two times, and he could well be right this time, but a dismissive superiority complex is dislikable every single time.
That guy doesn't speak for New England, or the media, or the fan base. But when it's a lot more than him, it makes you wonder. The Dennis and Callahan show on Boston radio station WEEI called me this week to laugh at the Colts and to tell me, "I need help here, Gregg. I need a way to think this is a game. I think this a blowout here. Don't you?"
No, I don't. But the Patriots beat writers for the Boston Globe believe it, one of whom told me Wednesday on video, "I'm not giving them much of a chance. I don't think most of America is giving them a chance to win this game." The other one predicts in the Globe a 34-17 Patriots rout.
"I think this a blowout here," Gerry Callahan had told me on WEEI. "Don't you?"
No. But this dude from Comcast Sports New England does. He told me on Thursday, "The Colts don't have a snowball's chance in hell. The Colts are not winning this game. There is no way the Colts are winning this game. I mean it's not going to happen." At which point I dissolved into laughter, because this stuff isn't insulting. It's funny.
The prank call to Dakich, the dismissive TV and radio and print media in Boston, the predictions of a blowout on Twitter? Hilarious. Let me say this, in all my Indianapolis glory, as someone who loves my town and my people and is amused by the noise coming this week out of theirs:
It would be hilarious for the Colts to win this game. It would be instructive for New England, inspirational for Indianapolis, interesting for the rest of America. And while it is tempting to paint the entire New England landscape with a broad brush and dismiss all of them as delusional and dismissive, let's call the Boston media this week what it is: not the whole body of New England, not even the tail wagging the dog, but a symptom of Boston's arrogance. The Boston media have behaved like a cavity inside one of Boston's teeth, and so I offer this:
Take Indianapolis' name out of your mouth. May you have an entire offseason to reconsider your behavior. And may your offseason begin Sunday night.
Find Star columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/gregg.doyel
Download IndyStar Colts app, enter to win a Colts fan packLocal bloggers, Emma Chapman and Elsie Larson - authors of A Beautiful Mess, helped the Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau develop an itinerary showcasing the city to potential visitors. The CVB then invited top-tier bloggers to visit Springfield June 2-5 to experience the city and all it has to offer.
The bloggers shared photos and stories about their experiences in the city and continue to post about the trip on their blogs and social channels. Follow the conversation at #OneJetJaunts on Twitter and Instagram and on their individual blogs.
Chelsea Goodson from Phoenix, Arizona
Kathy Cano-Murillo from Phoenix, Arizona
Stefanie Fauquet from Tampa, Florida
Stephanie Drenka from Dallas, Texas
Jasmine Crockett from Atlanta, Georgia
The itinerary for the trip is now available for future visitors to enjoy.
The Ultimate Springfield Experience
by Emma Chapman & Elsie Larson of A Beautiful Mess.
DAY 1
12 p.m. - Arrive in Springfield and Explore Downtown Springfield for Lunch
Explore downtown Springfield where you’ll find more than 40 chef-owned restaurants along with galleries, shops, pubs and more. Lunch suggestions include the following:
Black Sheep Burgers and Shakes - 209 E. Walnut St. - Choose from a “boozy” shake and a dozen burgers, including Cowboy Carl, a behemoth topped with brisket, pickles, candied bacon, white cheddar and a mountain of spicy fried onions.
Druff’s - 331 Park Central East Suite 101 - Check out one of the city’s newest restaurants serving gourmet grilled cheese, hot soup and cold beer.
Maria’s Mexican Restaurant - 406 South Ave. - If you like Mexican, you’ll love Maria’s in downtown Springfield. Dishes made fresh daily with recipes handed down include fried tacos, fajitas, carne asada, carnitas, seafood enchiladas and guacamole.
Big Whiskey’s American Bar & Grill - 311 Park Central East - Good food and drinks in a fun and comfortable atmosphere right off Park Central Square.
Civil Kitchen & Tap - 107 and 222 Park Central East - Located in the heart of downtown Springfield with a great view of Park Central Square. Enjoy made-from-scratch Midwestern classics with a modern twist.
Cherry Picker Package x Fare - 601 S. Pickwick Ave. - Located in charming Pickwick Place, Cherry Picker offers gourmet coffee, soups, sandwiches, wine and cocktails.
Springfield Brewing Company - 305 S Market Ave. - Springfield Brewing Company is dedicated to creating fresh, one-of-a-kind dishes for every occasion. Whether it be a night out on the town, a family reunion, or a Sunday Funday with your best friends, they've the good eats you crave.
2 p.m. - Zen3 Spa and Bodyworks - 619 S. Pickwick Ave.
Enjoy a lemongrass foot treatment at Zen3, a peaceful retreat to heal the body, soothe the mind and nurture the spirit.
3:15 p.m. - Check in to Hotel
Check in and refresh at your hotel
6 p.m. - Millsap Farms Pizza Club - 6593 Emu Ln.
Delicious wood-fired pizza topped with seasonal produce harvested from the farm, local meats, cheeses and sauces. While there, tour the farm where everything is grown organically, the way nature intended.
DAY 2
8:30 a.m. - Breakfast at Gailey’s Breakfast Cafe - 220 E. Walnut St.
The former drug store in the historic Hotel Seville offers a variety of breakfast options including sweet potato hashbrowns, a local favorite! For those longing for yesteryear, the old drug store portion of the restaurant has walls adorned with original decor and old-time counter and stools.
10 a.m. - Explore C-Street
Commercial Street, dubbed C-Street by locals, is an eclectic collection of boutiques, restaurants and shops. Smell the spices at Chabom, enjoy coffee or a smoothie at Big Momma’s or explore the unique shops along the street. There’s plenty to explore!
10:30 a.m. - Creative Escape Glass - 219 W. Commercial St. #104
Under the direction of artist Rebekah Santiago, make a unique souvenir using pieces of glass that are then fused in a kiln. Your souvenir will be one-of-a kind and you’ll have fun! Not an artist? That’s OK. Anyone can do it!
11:45 a.m. - Lunch at Ms. Gilmore’s Vintage Suitcase and Tea Room - 211 E. Commercial St.
You might feel as though you have just fallen down the rabbit hole when you enter the front door of Ms. Gilmore’s and enjoy the wonderment of it all. The boutique is filled with merriment and the food is delicious.
1 p.m. - Askinosie Chocolate - 514 E. Commercial St.
Taste samples at internationally renowned Askinosie Chocolate and learn about the owner, Shawn Askinosie, who left a lucrative career as an attorney to become a chocolatier and philanthropist.
2 p.m. - Tour Bass Pro Shops and Wonders of Wildlife - 1935 S. Campbell Ave.
Since 2007, WOW has been undergoing renovations to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Explore the complex to get a preview of what people will see when it opens this fall. You’ll also get a chance to explore Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World, the first and largest Bass Pro store in the world.
5 p.m. - Hotel Vandivort Bathroom Selfies - 305 E. Walnut St.
Hotel Vandivort is city’s first and only boutique hotel. With historic beginnings as a century-old Masonic Temple, the repurposed building features unique room spaces and state-of-the-art amenities while the decor accentuates the history of the building. Nearly 1,000 Instagram selfies have been taken in the public restrooms at Hotel Vandivort. The lighting is perfect and many of them look like professional portraits! Try it yourself and be sure to tag #hotelvandivortbathroomselfies. It’s a Springfield thing!
6:00 p.m. - Mother’s Brewing Co. - 215 S. Grant Ave.
Sample the beers that make life’s everyday moments anything but at one of the fastest growing craft breweries in the country.
7:10 p.m. - Attend a Springfield Cardinals baseball game at the beautiful Hammons Field. - 955 E Trafficway St. (April-October) Hammons Field is home to the Double-A affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals. Catch a Springfield Cardinals game and see baseball’s future stars, today!
Evening - First Friday Art Walk (First Friday of every month)
Enjoy a stroll downtown to experience a variety of art in downtown shops and galleries along with food and drink options galore.
9:00 p.m. - Trolley Bike
Experience nightlife in downtown Springfield on a bicycle built for 14! Riders work together to casually pedal The Trolley Bike around a designated route and stop whenever a thirst needs quenching.
DAY 3
8:40 a.m. - Elle’s Patisserie - 1454 E. Cherry St.
Pick up treats for the afternoon at Elle’s Patisserie and enjoy a light breakfast. Elle’s offers gourmet chocolate truffles, French pastries, French pressed coffee, handmade ice cream, marshmallows and treats. You’ll feel as if you’ve visited a small village in the French Alps.
9:30 a.m. - Explore Farmers Park - 2144 E. Republic Rd.
Offering premium alternatives to the mass-produced food and goods so commonly sold today. Explore the Farmers’ Market where you’ll find all sorts of local goods and the shops where you’ll find high-end clothing at Staxx and Jelly Beans. Don’t miss 5# Apparel, the store where everything sold gives back in a civic-minded way.
12:30 p.m. - Lunch at Leong’s Asian Diner - 1540 W. Republic Rd.
This is where you’ll find the city’s signature dish - Springfield-Style Cashew Chicken - made by the family that invented it in 1963. Meet the owner, Wing Leong, and get ready for a full tummy!
3:30 p.m. - Fantastic Caverns Tour - 4872 N. Farm Rd. 125
Explore underground wonders from the comfort of a Jeep-drawn tram while a knowledgeable guide explains how the cave and its formations were formed, how the cave was discovered, its history as a speakeasy and more.
5 p.m. - Dessert at Andy’s (5 locations in Springfield)
Oh, we’re goin’ to Andy’s! You’ll fall in love with the frozen custard at this local favorite. It’s creamy, smooth and beyond delicious!
5:45 p.m. - Return to Hotel to refresh for the evening
7:30 p.m. - Dinner at Golden Girl Rum Club - 137 Park Central Square
It’s trendy. It’s hip. It’s Golden Girl Rum Club! Sip on tropical-inspired cocktails and nibble on a variety of delectable dishes at this unique restaurant co-owned by the authors of A Beautiful Mess.
DAY 4
8 a.m. - Enjoy breakfast before you depart at one of these great downtown options.
The Order - 305 E. Walnut St. - The Order features upscale cuisine in a sophisticated yet approachable atmosphere. Located on the lobby level of the Hotel Vandivort, the space was designed to create a lively social experience. The food’s pretty darned good, too!
Aviary Cafe & Creperie - 400 E. Walnut St. #100 - This quaint cafe has a menu offering hearty, made-from-scratch dishes created from premium ingredients, local farm-fresh seasonal vegetables and baked goods.
After Breakfast - Coffee Anyone?
For those with time before departures, stroll down to MudHouse, Coffee Ethic or Kingdom Coffee for some wonderful coffee and do a downtown walkabout.
*This itinerary is not meant to be a complete list of all of the wonderful attractions, restaurant, retailers and experiences guests can have on a visit to Springfield. For a more thorough list, visit our homepage at springfieldmo.org to begin planning your own Ultimate Springfield Experience.Interested in purchasing this item? Check out the Customer Reviews to help you
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addition to being a drink, Chinese tea is used in traditional Chinese medicine and cuisine. According to popular legend, tea was discovered by Chinese Emperor Shennong when a leaf from a nearby shrub fell into water the emperor was boiling.
14. Egypt
foodienarium
Egyptians are well-known for being big tea drinkers. Their national Egyptian drink is called Karkadeh tea, which is a sweet-sour drink of bright red color, made of dried Sudanese rose flower bracts. You can drink it both hot and cold.
15. Mongolia
wikipedia
Mongolian tea is not at all similar to other fine teas. The Mongolian variation is prepared with salt, and may include solid food like rice or noodles. What makes it unique is that it uses the more coarse parts of the plant. The savoury drink is served in a shallow metal bowl alongside most meals.
16. Kenya
joannahaas
Kenyan tea has been the leading major foreign exchange earner for the country. Most of the tea produced is black tea. Professional blenders love Kenyan tea for its bright copper colour and “brisk” flavour, as well as its characteristic perky liveliness.
17. South Africa
fitbody
The Rooibos plant produces a bright red tea, and is found exclusively in South Africa. It is common to prepare rooibos tea in the same manner as black tea and add milk and sugar to taste. Other methods include a slice of lemon and using honey instead of sugar to sweeten.
18. Qatar
foxnomad
In Qatar, strong milky tea called karak chai is a nationwide favourite. Karak is tea with milk, but prepared by boiling the tea leaves twice to make the flavor stronger.
19. Mauritania
globaltableadventure
Mauritanian Tea comes with a specific serving ritual. As a guest you are served three times. Each glass that is served is prepared from scratch, i.e. fresh tea, water, mint and lots of sugar, increasing the sweetness of every new cup. The objective is to start bitter and end sweet.
20. Malaysia
templeofthai
Teh tarik (literally “pulled tea”), is a hot milk tea beverage that holds a special place in the hearts of Southeast Asians. Its name is derived from the pouring process of “pulling” the drink during preparation. It is made from black tea, condensed milk and/or evaporated milk. It is also considered as the national drink of Malaysia.
21. Argentina
trip
Yerba mate (pronounced mah-tay) is a vitamin-packed green tea grown and drank throughout South America. It has a signature earthy, smoky flavour and is served in a neat little container and shared around groups, making it a very social experience (even if you don’t really like the taste).
22. USA
foodess (h/t: buzzfeed)
Iced tea from the American South is usually prepared from bagged tea. In addition to tea bags and loose tea, powdered “instant iced tea mix” is available in stores. The consumption of sweet tea with many meals leads to it sometimes called the “table wine of the South.”Image caption Fertilisers enhance the ability of some bacteria to consume methane
Scientists say that there has been a mysterious decline in the growth of methane in the atmosphere in the last decades of the 20th Century.
Researchers writing in the journal Nature have come up with two widely differing theories as to the cause.
One suggests the decline was caused by greater commercial use of natural gas, the other that increased use in Asia of artificial fertiliser was responsible.
Both studies agree that human activities are the key element.
And there are suggestions that methane levels are now on the rise again.
Methane is regarded as one of the most potent greenhouse gases, trapping over 20 times more atmospheric heat than carbon dioxide.
Since the start of the industrial revolution, levels of methane in the atmosphere have more than doubled from a wide variety of sources, including energy production, the burning of forests, and increased numbers of cattle and sheep.
But between 1980 and the turn of the millennium, the growth rate reduced substantially, leaving scientists puzzled as to the cause.
Now, two teams of researchers have arrived at two very different conclusions for the decline. The first study was led by Dr Murat Aydin from the University of California, Irvine.
"We went after ethane - it's another hydrocarbon similar to methane, it has common sources, but is easier to trace. We determined what ethane did during the second half of the 20th century using ancient air that we collected at polar ice sheets.
"We think the trend we see in methane is best explained by dramatic changes in emissions linked to fossil fuel production and use which seem to have declined in the 1980s and 1990s.
Efficiency drive
Dr Murat is at pains to emphasise that economic efficiency played a critical part.
"Methane became economically valuable only during the second half of the 20th Century. We think this had a role in it. We're not suggesting we used less fossil fuel, but because we were more careful about capturing the natural gas and using it as an energy resource, emissions of these gases into the atmosphere declined at the end of the 20th Century."
However another team of researchers from the same department in the same university came to different conclusions using a different method of measuring methane.
The second team looked at different chemical signals of methane from both fossil fuels and from microbes active in wetlands and rice paddies.
Traditionally rice farmers have used organic manure which contains high levels of methane. By using artificial fertilisers, the farmers have considerably reduced this amount.
"Approximately half of the decrease in methane can be explained by reduced emissions from rice agriculture in Asia associated with increases in fertiliser application and reductions in water use," says the lead author Dr Fuu Ming Kai.
Fertilisers are believed to enhance the ability of some bacteria to consume methane that originates in the soils.
One or the other?
However, the second team found no evidence that the decline was caused by more efficient use of fossil fuels.
This has puzzled Dr Paul Fraser, an expert in methane emissions with the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research. He says both papers are plausible. But he is concerned that the second team may have been too quick to dismiss the idea that increased use of natural gas may have played a part.
"The authors may be correct but from the data shown it is not unequivocal that there could not also be a fossil methane contribution to the declining methane sources," he said.
However he says he would not be surprised if in the long term both explanations are significant in explaining the decline.
Climate sceptics who think that natural factors and not human activities play a more important role in temperature rise might take comfort from the lack of certainty in these papers - but according to Dr Murat Aydin this would be a mistake.
"I think both studies are actually suggesting that human activities are playing a very important role in determining the methane levels in the atmosphere," he explained.
As we use more and more fossil fuels, you can be sure it will start creeping up again slowly, I think it demonstrates pretty clearly that human activities have direct and pretty profound impacts on the levels of these gases in the atmosphere."Update 2011-12-02: When is it OK to use == in JavaScript?
There are two operators for comparing values in JavaScript: strict equality === and “normal” (or lenient) equality ==. Many style guides (correctly) tell programmers to avoid lenient equality and always use strict equality. This post explains why.
Where appropriate, related sections in the ECMAScript 5 language specification [1] are mentioned in square brackets.
Two ways of comparing
The strict equality operator === only considers values equal that have the same type.
only considers values equal that have the same type. The lenient equality operator == tries to convert values of different types, before comparing like strict equality.
The conversion rules are counter-intuitive and do things you might not expect.
As the operator is so forgiving, type errors can remain hidden longer.
Strict equals ===
undefined === undefined
null === null
Two (primitive) numbers: NaN!== _ // any value including NaN x === x +0 === -0 for any number x. Thus equality is not reflexive in JavaScript, because NaN is not equal to itself.
for any number. Thus equality is not reflexive in JavaScript, because is not equal to itself. Two booleans, two strings (primitive): obvious results
Two objects (including arrays and functions): x === y only if x and y are the same object(!). That is, if you want to compare different objects, you have to do it manually.
> var a = NaN; > a === a false > var b = {}, c = {}; > b === c false > b === b true > "abc" === new String("abc") false // different types (left: primitive, right: object)
Equals ==
===
undefined == null One number, one string: convert the string to a number A boolean and a non-boolean: convert the boolean to a number and then perform the comparison. Comparing a string or a number to an object: try to convert the object to a primitive and then make the comparison.
if
> 0 == false true > 1 == true true > 2 == true false > 2? true : false true // because 2!== 0
> "" == 0 true > "123" == 123 true > "" == false true > "1" == true true > "2" == true false > "true" == true false > "2"? true : false true // because string is non-empty > "abc" == new String("abc") true // right side converted to primitive
Related reading
Lenient equality causes two problems:[ES5 11.9.6] Comparing two values. Values with different types are never equal. If both values have the same type then the following assertions hold.Examples:[ES5 11.9.3] Comparing two values. If both values have the same type: compare with. Otherwise:(3) leads to a weird idiosyncrasy where numbers greater than 1 are true instatements, but not equal to true:Equality and strings:If you follow the tech news, you must have noticed that the “internet of things India vs. China scene” is buzzing with news and changes.
For example, last month, India’s Prime Minister Modi inaugurated an international marketing campaign branded “Make in India“. The idea behind is to attract investment and make the country a hub for tech manufacturing.
At the same time, we see China’s launch of its own “Innovative with China” program. Sounds similar but if you only compare the names of the two programs alone, you’ll grasp the difference.
India Is The New China
China transitioned from a low-cost, low-quality type of manufacturing to a fast-prototyping and quality hardware. Both mottos reveal how the two giants of Asia (and the world) see themselves. With 9.9 per cent average growth between 2000 and 2010, China is no more the home of cheap production.
China is getting richer, and smarter. India is plugging its straggle here. Jobs that China can’t afford anymore to make by moving upwards are well received in India.
India is the new China. India is prone to succeed where China failed. From all the reasons three of them stand out:
Overall economic growth of the country
Government involvement in the Internet of Things India
An explosion of Internet Of Things India Startups
Overall Economic Growth of the Country
Conform to IMF, China was the fastest growing economy in 2014 with a growth of just 0.1 percent, above India’s 7.3 percent.
But, in 2015, India’s growth reached 7.5 percent, higher than China’s 6.8 percent. Not only that but FMI forecasts a growth rate of 7.5 percent for India in 2016 and a drop for China at just 6.3 percent.
Make no mistake; India is on the path to higher growth. Other indicators barring historic GDP estimates are bright.
With a slowdown in China, as it transitions into a service based economy currently in progress, India become the fastest growing major economy in the world.
Government Involvement In The Internet of Things India
“India is expecting a share of 5-8 percent in the $300 billion global Internet of things (IoT) industry in the next five years. The new policy will lead to IoT becoming a centrepiece of a “Digital India” structure.” Said JS Deepak, the secretary of the Department of Electronics and Information Technology.
The Indian government, in collaboration with India’s IT and ITES industry body Nasscom, are going to launch five Internet of Things (IoT) startup incubation centres across the country.
A similar initiative to the Catapult centres opened in the U.K. by the British government.
Similar Read: Internet Of Things: 10 Most Innovative Companies
These five IoT incubation centres would help in reducing Research and Development (R&D) costs, manage and coordinate different types of Internet of Things India related research, projects and startups.
The idea behind these centres is to build talent, entrepreneurial ecosystem for Internet of Things India and also provide an ecosystem for innovation.
Internet of things India Startups Explosion
The last factor is the constant growth of IoT startups in the India landscape. Earlier this year, we caught up with some of the movers and shakers from the Internet of Things India startup space.
A lot more startups are taking the rewards-based crowd funding route for validating their market, receiving product pre-orders, helping plan their inventory and, in the process, raising funds without the need to give up equity.
Not only startups but also accelerator program and angel investment firm are pushing Internet of Things India forward.This simple Cuban sauce goes well with just about everything, and I put it in sandwiches, on meats, vegetables, and it appears often in my dreams.
Ingredients
1/3 cup olive oil
8 cloves garlic, minced
2/3 cup sour orange juice
1/2 tsp ground cumin
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
N.B. if you cannot find sour orange juice, combine equal parts lemon, lime, and regular orange juice.
Directions
1. Add the olive oil to a pan and set to a medium heat. Add garlic and cook until soft, but not brown (30 seconds or so).
2. Add the juice, salt, pepper, and cumin if you desire it and raise the heat to high, allowing the mixture to boil for a few minutes.
Cool before serving. It is best served immediately, but should keep for a few days if refrigerated.
Some recipes call for cilantro to be added, which is good if you are someone who likes cilantro (not everyone does) but cilantro is not a classic Cuban addition to a mojo sauce. When cilantro is used the sauce is referred to as “Mojo Verde” and appears less often in my dreams.It’s often said that all Muslims read their holy book, The Koran, literally.
If this were true, that would put all Muslims in a theological camp similar to Christian fundamentalists, who read the Bible literally, as historical and divine fact. They are the kinds of Christians who reject evolutionary theory and believe in such things as a six-day creation, based on the Book of Genesis.
But — similar to the way that many Christians “take the Bible seriously but not literally” — it turns out that significant minorities of Muslims around the world also don’t read the Koran literally. Many see it pages as open to legitimate disagreement.
The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has surveyed more than 35,000 Muslims in scores of countries and discovered the vast majority of Muslims believe the Koran is “the word of God.”
Yet, even though many read the Koran literally, a surprising number do not.
For instance, just one in two Muslims in the United States read the Koran literally.
And 46 per cent Muslims in the Congo do not read the Koran literally.
Another one out of four Muslims in Mozambique, Uganda, Chad and Kenya do not read the Koran literally.
RELATED: How non-Muslims can appreciate the Koran
What is “orthodox” Christianity? Courtroom conflict
Christians persecuted most; Muslims second: Study
It’s perhaps more interesting that a strong minority of Muslims around the planet believe there is more than one way to interpret the teachings of Islam.
In other words, Muslims have differing views on what is “orthodox,” just as Christians, Jews and others agree on their own traditions’ teachings. Maybe there is more pluralism within Islam that outsiders think.
The Pew Forum said:
“The survey asked Muslims whether they believe there is only one true way to understand Islam’s teachings or if multiple interpretations are possible. In 32 of the 39 countries surveyed, half or more Muslims say there is only one correct way to understand the teachings of Islam.”
Put more positively (for liberals of the West), this means many other Muslims didn’t think there is one correct way. It’s intriguing multiple interpretations of the faith’s key book were welcomed by Muslims in quite a few countries.
This openness to pluralism was particularly the case in the Middle East and North Africa, which are most often associated in the Western public’s mind with Muslim extremism and terrorism.
Diverse interpretations of Islam were accepted among more than 40 per cent of Muslims in Middle Eastern countries such as Iraq, Lebanon, Tunisia, Morocco and the Palestinian Territories, the latter of which turns out to be among the most “liberal” Muslim enclaves in the world, even while often linked with violent extremism.
In Africa, meanwhile, religious diversity seemed also to be widely accepted in the countries of Chad, Senegal and Mozambique.
It was the Muslims in East Asian countries, such as Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia, who were among the most adamant about so-called orthodoxy — with fewer than 20 per cent agreeing there is more than one way to interpret Islam.
By contrast, 57 per cent of American Muslims support multiple ways of understanding the faith founded by Mohammed.
{Feature photo by Luigig}TAMPA — Hey, Steve Yzerman, your Tampa Bay Lightning is playing for the Stanley Cup. How does that sound?
"It sounds okay,'' Yzerman said.
Understated, humble, all business. That's the Lightning general manager. What else would you expect?
Never a braggart as a player, Yzerman has carried that over to his role as the general manager. He also has brought something else with him from his playing days: Overwhelming success.
After winning three Stanley Cups as a player and another as an executive with the Red Wings, the Hockey Hall of Famer and one of the greatest players of all-time could put his name on the Cup for a fifth time. But this one is different. This time it's largely his doing. He built this team.
Hard to believe it has been five years since Yzerman was hired by owner Jeff Vinik to resurrect the Lightning. Taking over a franchise foundering near the bottom of the league, Yzerman came in and made sweeping changes. He hired Guy Boucher as coach and made several shrewd moves that helped Tampa Bay reach the Eastern Conference final in 2011.
But that was lightning in a bottle. Yzerman eventually fired Boucher, brought in Jon Cooper and laid the foundation for a team that made the playoffs last season. Yzerman managed the Lightning to the postseason despite losing star Steven Stamkos for half the season with a broken leg, then being forced to trade an unhappy Marty St. Louis for Ryan Callahan in a deal that has tilted heavily in Tampa Bay's favor.
"We made the playoffs last year and I think we were better than the 4-0 sweep to the Canadiens,'' Yzerman said. "I thought we had a competitive team.''
Competitive, but flawed. It was long on youth and short on grit. He addressed both deficiencies by bringing in veterans such as Anton Stralman, Brian Boyle, Brenden Morrow, Jason Garrison and Braydon Coburn. Those moves, along with stocking the team with solid young players such as Tyler Johnson and goalie Ben Bishop, have Yzerman being considered one of the best general managers in hockey. In fact, he is up for the NHL's GM of the year award, an award he should be favored to win.
This is a franchise that appears set to be a contender for years and he is the architect. But not a prognosticator.
"To say that I knew we were going to get all the way to the finals, well, I wasn't prepared to say that,'' Yzerman said. "I thought we had a competitive team. We were young and we tried to address some of the needs that we had and we were able to do that, but I wasn't guaranteeing the Stanley Cup final last July.''
Yzerman wasn't even sure the Lightning was going to get there as he nervously watched the minutes tick down in Friday's Game 7 2-0 victory against the Rangers.
"As the clock was still winding down, they pull their goalie with three minutes left,'' Yzerman said. "If they get one, they're going to pull that goalie again. So we really couldn't relax. I think we got the puck into the neutral zone with 20 seconds or so left, I felt comfortable at that point that we could hold on to a 2-0 lead.''
Now his Lightning, the team he put together, is four wins from winning the Stanley Cup. Not that Yzerman is ready to make any predictions. He only knows one thing for sure.
"It gets harder,'' Yzerman said. "It doesn't get easier at this stage.''
What else would you expect him to say?In the United States, 6,868 cases of legionellosis were reported to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2009–2010. Of these reports, it is estimated that 84% are caused by the microorganism Legionella pneumophila Serogroup (Sg) 1. Legionella spp. have been isolated and recovered from a variety of natural freshwater environments. Human exposure to L. pneumophila Sg1 may occur from aerosolization and subsequent inhalation of household and facility water. In this study, two primer/probe sets (one able to detect L. pneumophila and the other L. pneumophila Sg1) were determined to be highly sensitive and selective for their respective targets. Over 272 water samples, collected in 2009 and 2010 from 68 public and private water taps across the United States, were analyzed using the two qPCR assays to evaluate the incidence of L. pneumophila Sg1. Nearly half of the taps showed the presence of L. pneumophila Sg1 in one sampling event, and 16% of taps were positive in more than one sampling event. This study is the first United States survey to document the occurrence and colonization of L. pneumophila Sg1 in cold water delivered from point of use taps.Image copyright AP Image caption Grassi described the accusations against him were as a cross he had to carry
A prominent Roman Catholic priest in Argentina has been jailed, four years after being convicted of sexually abusing a teenage boy.
A court in Buenos Aires province rejected an appeal by Father Julio Cesar Grassi, who has been sentenced to 15 years in jail, to remain under house arrest.
He was convicted in 2009 of abusing the boy at his "Happy Children" foundation.
He insists he is innocent and says the case is based on false evidence.
I am in peace, I believe in God Father Julio Cesar Grassi
"In my life, all I have done was to help the children in need," he said at the criminal court in the city of Moron.
"The prosecutors have lied and set up a case against me."
'Out of control'
Prosecutor Alejandro Varela argued that there was a risk that the priest would escape if he was not detained.
Three courts in Argentina had already confirmed his 2009 conviction, before the Supreme Court of Buenos Aires province ratified the 15-year prison sentence last week.
"To leave Grassi free is almost like colluding with his crime," said Mr Varela.
After a hearing which ended with an emotional plea by Father Grassi, the criminal court in Moron unanimously ordered his "immediate detention".
He was taken to a nearby jail.
"I am in peace, I believe in God," Father Grassi said.
A lawyer for the prosecution, Juan Pablo Gallego, described him as "a convicted paedophile, who is out of control".Loading... Loading...
Make no mistake, what’s currently being see on the US political stage, are factions within the US government at war with one another. From the threats made by the Intelligence Community toward Donald Trump, to the overt measures being taken by globalists such as George Soros, the manner in which this “opposition” has manifested, would have been labeled as treason in very recent history. That should not be taken as an advocation for charging these individuals with treason, as it remains to be seen who is on what side(and whether either is on the side of the people), and whether or not Donald Trump is indeed the man his follower almost evangelically believe him to be, which is eerily reminiscent of the Obama era.
Yet, it should be noted, not only how unprecedented this is, but how truly indicative such internal rebellion is of the current facade of democracy that is so often used to justify actions that would otherwise be opposed; such as “defending ourselves” from those who “hate our freedom,” as another way of excusing the current US imperialistic foreign policy that Trump appears to be continuing. It is clear however, that they no longer care about maintaining such appearances, as this has become an all-out war over control of the American war machine.
Currently, both the Trump administration and the FBI have stated that the actions of Mr. Flynn were neither illegal nor improper, yet that has not stopped the Deep State-run corporate media from doing all within its power to manipulate the situation, and do what seems to now be its primary objective: to confuse and misdirect the American people.
The reality is that politics in this country have become nothing more than a stepping stone for the rising elites. Politicians who might have once feigned concern for the people–while still back-dealing and manipulating–now rarely align their goals and proposed policy with the actual needs of their constituents(you know, the people who “got them elected“). And those who dare speak out about governmental wrong-doing or misappropriation, either get ignored, or worse, ostracized and defamed.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ryrnEFVt2c
Help Us Be The Change We Wish To See In The World.Hillary Clinton senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan ripped Donald Trump in response to his praise for Saddam Hussein during his speech at a Raleigh rally on Tuesday.
“Donald Trump’s praise for brutal strongmen seemingly knows no bounds. He has applauded the strength China showed in the Tiananmen Square massacre, offered admiration for Kim Jong Un’s murderous consolidation of power in North Korea, and consistently lavished praise on Vladimir Putin. Tonight, Trump yet again lauded Saddam Hussein as a great killer of terrorists, noting with approval that he never bothered to read anyone their rights. In reality, Hussein’s regime was a sponsor of terrorism – one that paid families of suicide bombers who attacked Israelis, among other crimes. Trump’s cavalier compliments for brutal dictators, and the twisted lessons he seems to have learned from their history, again demonstrate how dangerous he would be as Commander-in-Chief and how unworthy he is of the office he seeks.”
In case you missed it, watch Donald Trump praise Saddam Hussein, who paid the families of suicide bombers to kill Israelis:Understanding Tassin
– or –
Perhaps God Is Smarter Than U.S. Nephrologists
by Gary Peterson, 3/24/2015
(Last edited: (3/25, 5:35 AM ET)
Those wishing to comment can post on the by Gary Peterson, 3/24/2015(Last edited: (3/25, 5:35 AM ET)Those wishing to comment can post on the FixDialysis blog.
Everyone involved in dialysis care should be required to look at Tassin, France (1999 and 2006 articles). Patients lived exceptionally long lives with normal blood pressures without medications. All this occurred in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s. What did they do back then that was so successful? Nephrology has not yet cracked this mystery. One must be willing to think outside the internal medicine box in order to try to understand what is happening there.
They gave patients long nocturnal dialysis, three times a week. Patients enjoyed superior middle and large molecule clearances, no internal organ stunning, and essentially non-iatrogenic treatments. Tassin nephrologists never bought into the small molecule Kt/V theory that defines U.S. dialysis care today. Success did not require every-other-day dialysis. Long treatment times gave them a “reservoir of dialysance” that could easily tolerate the three-day dialysis weekend.
With longer treatment times, patients enjoyed mostly unrestricted diets. They did not have to be bombarded with educational material and restrictions. There was no need for becoming an “expert patient.”
Studies reproduced the long treatment times in other clinics, but were been unable to produce the same outcomes. So, what else did Tassin nephrologists do? Consider this.
Instead of just focusing on internal medicine and interventions, Tassin nephrologists also created an environment in which patients could thrive and live as normal lives as possible. The burden of dialysis care was minimized by requiring patients to give up only a few late evening hours of their normal lives three times a week. Adding dialysis time, especially during the business day, often proves to be psychosocially damaging and counterproductive.
Patients also shared group meals with wine and beer. (Ethnic, cultural, and religious diversity in the U.S. could make this difficult.) The environment not only sustained the meaning and purpose of patients’ lives, but also provided unique peer-to-peer educational and psychosocial support. They seem to have tapped into the power of a collective “joie de vivre” or “will/reason to live.” No one understands dialysis patients like other patients. The patients’ normal social circles (outside dialysis) can judge them harshly, often giving them bad advice/solutions that leave them feeling misunderstood, unsupported and discouraged. Tassin’s environment supported a collective psychosocial well-being that also allowed patients to reach their own truths and wisdom about life and dialysis care.
For those willing to think even further outside the internal medicine box, this environment also supports a human being’s innate ability to adapt and survive. Such an environment can help manifest beneficial adaptions and effects that are not recognized by traditional nephrology. When a patient’s body and/or psychosocial well-being are NOT being repeatedly harmed by dialysis treatments, patients seem to be able adjust – successfully and relatively easily -- to major organ replacement therapy with physiological, immune, epigenetic, and psychological adaptations that we do not yet fully understand. So, here’s a shocker for U.S. nephrologists to contemplate: Perhaps God is smarter than U.S. nephrologists.
New Directions for U.S. Nephrology
For the last 30 years, due largely to misaligned financial incentives, U.S. nephrologists have been using their internal medicine toolboxes to try and justify fast, cheap dialysis and the use of profit-making drugs.
Shame on nearly all of you for forgetting what they taught you on the first day of medical school. Stop harming patients.
Listen to patients. According to U.S. patient focus groups (1) (2), the patients’ biggest complaints are that they are not respected as human beings and that their individual needs and concerns are ignored by their caregivers. Quit being factory-line workers for guys like Kent Thiry and Rice Powell and their quality incentive programs (which appear now to be rife with fraud).
Instead, use your skills and internal medicine toolkit to complement the natural adaptative power of the body and mind. Stop trying to force interventions, especially short-time dialysis, that work against the power of nature and biology (or is it God you’re fighting?).
Be a physician that treats the whole patient. Try to move each patient as high up Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as possible through multiple pathways. Help your patients express their collective “joie de vivre” or “will/reason to live” that is appropriate for their community. (Unlike France, the U.S. is blessed/cursed with the Puritan work ethic as a basis of its cultural identity... and our food is too often 'fast food.')
Home dialysis obviously has many benefits. It can improve the patient’s environment and make increasing their dialysis time easier to bear. Perhaps with social media it can tap the power of the patient collective. Some patients do, however, find home dialysis socially isolating and it can create additional burdens on home and family life.
So much of dialysis care becomes easier when you give patients a lot of dialysis and support their individual and collective psychosocial health. Be excellent nephrologists and wise physicians… and change the U.S. financial incentives and leaders that (almost always) steer medicine wrong.
Those wishing to comment can post on the FixDialysis blog.Image copyright AP Image caption Older versions of Android are vulnerable to being infected by the Hummingbad malware
Up to 10 million Android smartphones have been infected by malware that generates fake clicks for adverts, say security researchers.
The software is also surreptitiously installing apps and spying on the browsing habits of victims.
The malware is currently making about $300,000 (£232,000) a month for its creators, suggests research.
The majority of phones that have been compromised by the malicious software are in China.
Remote control
A spike in the number of phones infected by the malware was noticed separately by security companies Checkpoint and Lookout. The malware family is called Shedun by Lookout but Hummingbad by Checkpoint
In a blogpost, Checkpoint said it had obtained access to the command-and-control servers that oversee infected phones which revealed that Hummingbad was now on about 10 million devices. China, India, the Philippines and Indonesia top the list of nations with most phones infected by the software.
Hummingbad is a type of malware known as a rootkit that inserts itself deep inside a phone's operating system to help it avoid detection and to give its controllers total control over the handset.
The ability to control phones remotely has been used to click on ads to make them seem more popular than they actually are. The access has also been used to install fake versions of popular apps or spread programs the gang has been paid to promote.
"It can remain persistent even if the user performs a factory reset," wrote Kristy Edwards from Lookout in a blogpost. "It uses its root privileges to install additional apps on to the device, further increasing ad revenue for the authors and defeating uninstall attempts."
Ms Edwards said the recent spike in infections could be driven by the gang behind the malware adding more functions or using their access to phones for different purposes.
The malware gets installed on handsets by exploiting loopholes in older versions of the Android operating system known as KitKat and JellyBean. The latest version of Android is known as Marshmallow.
In a statement, Google said: ""We've long been aware of this evolving family of malware and we're constantly improving our systems that detect it. We actively block installations of infected apps to keep users and their information safe."
Google released the latest security update for Android this month and it tackled more than 108 separate vulnerabilities in the operating system. So far this year, security updates for Android have closed more than 270 bugs.Quick Access
Review / Favorite Track / For Fans Of / Atmosphere Levels / Links (Music & Social)
Retro Hard-Rock Done Right!
The three-piece retro rockers from Texas that go by the name of Crypt Trip released a three song EP that is a worthy follow-up of their full-length debut that was released in 2014. On this EP you’ll hear the very talented members of the trio, Sam (Bass), Cam (Drums) and Ryan (Guitar, Vocals) play an equally important role to create that groovy, retro hard-rock sound you’ll love.
How is the sound?
Up-tempo distorted bass lines, a groovy drum track and retro guitar riffs soaked in wah set the scene in the first track ‘Natural Chylde‘. The song goes through a few cycles of funky wah chord progressions before the clean, bluesy vocals complete the sound. Although vocals of Ryan are strong and unquestionably have common ground with 70’s bands like Sabbath and Deep Purple, you won’t get to enjoy them for long. The rest of the track mostly consists of a long and excellent jam where Ryan doesn’t take the time to focus on his microphone again. Instead, the listener is treated with a strong groove executed by the rhythm section over which the guitarist can concentrate on producing a steady and virtuous stream of guitar licks. Every Heavy-Psych lover won’t find this a reason to complain and will happily surrender to the psychedelic jam.
After Ryan has had plenty of time to show off his mentionable guitar skills, Cam has the floor in the intro of the second song ‘Tears of Gaia‘ and starts with an epic drum solo. They continue the trail they set out in the first song but with a more high-energy stoner riff. You’ll get introduced with the vocals again that are of much more importance in this song. The lyrics have a mystical, occult theme that fits wonderfully in the retro vibe.
In “Mabon Song“, the last track of the album, they present an entirely different sound. A fragile acoustic guitar plays a calming finger-picking pattern with a heavily altered electric guitar overlay. The short, beautifully played, hypnotizing track shows the other side of the band and is a welcome change. Overall, Mabon Songs is a solid EP of which the short length is the biggest negative remark I can think of.
Why is this album worth listening to?
These guys know what their doing. You can hear Mabon Songs is the work of three virtuous musicians.
It takes you back to the great years of the 60’s and 70’s hard-rock scene, but with a modern twist.
In what situation you should listen to this album?
Road tripping a van across the globe.
Something particular to note?
Definitely excited to hear another full-length album of this band. Mabon Songs is a treat, but our appetite for new Crypt Trip material isn’t appeased yet.Red Bull Global Rallycross is pleased to announce the addition of Colby Rodriguez to its Executive Management Team.
Rodriguez, who brings over 12 years of motorsport marketing experience from his most recent role at Red Bull North America, will work conjointly with CEO Colin Dyne on day-to-day management of the series, as well as on long and short term strategic goals.
“I am extremely
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SG, you cannot deny him the spot on the floor that he wants. Ultimately, his mass benefits him on the defensive end the most, but it also unlocks a offensive toolbox that most guards on any level don’t possess.
Defensively, Brogdon has a motor that doesn’t stop, and with four years in the Bennett family packline defense, his instincts rarely fail him. Brogdon has quick feet and his instincts are icing on the cake. Like Bembry, Brodgon does a great job of playing defense with his hands and uses his 6’10.5″ wingspan to bother all kinds of shot attempts. This is also a very bright individual who will not be outworked in the film room (or on the floor), and that’s an underrated aspect of the ’15-’16 ACC Defensive Player of Year’ game. He knows his opponents strengths and tendencies, and doesn’t waste much time at taking that away.
Brogdon was also the ACC Player of the Year last season, on top of his defensive honors. He averaged 18.2 PPG and shot 39% 3FG. Don’t let the outside shooting numbers fool you, because Brogdon doesn’t project as an above-average shooter from behind the arc on the next level. He is obviously plenty capable, but there are some mechanical issues that I’ll touch on more in a minute.
He will excel in the league by using his strength to overpower smaller defenders, finding his spots closer to the rim. It’s a fold of Brogdon’s game that you saw some at UVA, as Tony Bennett did his best to get Brogdon off the ball as much as possible, but because of the scoring load he had to carry in Charlottesville, his post game is likely still evolving. Brogdon also knows how to play off of screens. In UVA’s blocker-mover offense, he learned how to effectively read his defender, curling when lock-and-trailed, and fading when the defender tried to go under. This is a useful skill that will translate, but the next step for Brogdon will be to learn how to make the defense pay quicker with the correct pass.
As a ball-handler, Brogdon has the ability to bring the ball up the floor and initiate an offense. Although the dribble game is strong, his pick-and-roll game isn’t as dynamic as a guy like Bembry. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but Brogdon is simply more prone to be robotic with his decision making – as to say that he will make the simple pass first. His ball-handling comes more in handy with beating his defender in a isolation situation – Brogdon has an explosive first step and can finish through contact.
What I Don’t Like: Brogdon’s game isn’t very flashy and he’s not an elite athlete. He’s a glue guy, and is ready to play on day-one, but his upside is limited. What you see today is the player you might see five seasons from now.
Defensively, Brogdon will make an impact for a long time, but how much better can he become offensively, if at all?
Let me circle back to the topic surrounding his jump-shot. 39% from deep is really solid, but there are some issues with the mechanics that make it unclear whether or not this will translate. Brogdon has a flat release and doesn’t get great lift, so the arc on his jumper lacks. Push him back to the NBA three-point line and this now becomes even more of an issue. My simple diagnosis would be working on getting more lift on his shot, which would help cover up the low release from deeper on the floor. Remains to be seen, but it’s a very important metric to Brogdon’s growth as a player from this point forward.
Fit For Hornets? I think so, and so do they:
Brogdon on meeting with @hornets : "They seemed very intrigued and I’m very intrigued. I love how they’re building their organization." — Rick Bonnell (@rick_bonnell) May 13, 2016
We’ll see how this relationship unfolds in the next month, but there’s clearly mutual interest. I guarantee that Clifford is a fan, and Brogdon will fill a depth need on the wing, but does the front-office believe he can continue to develop? At age 23, there’s no time to waste.
Malik Beasley (Florida State – Draft Express Profile): 6’5, 190 lbs. – Shooting-Guard
What I Like: Beasley is a dynamic athlete and one of the most athletic wings in this class. If he elects to stay in the draft ahead of the May 25th deadline then it’s going to be difficult to project exactly where he’ll be selected. Beasley does not lack skill and has plenty of room to develop. He’s a prospect that is a good balance of potential in the present and room for development moving forward at 19-years old.
Offensively, Beasley can score the ball in numerous ways. He has a polished jump-shot that he can use from all over the floor in catch-and-shoot situations, and as a solid pull-up jump-shooter. Beasley shot 38.7% 3FG last season at FSU and also posted some scoring efficiency numbers that put him in ACC rare-air. According to DraftExpress.com, Beasley was one of two guards since 1992 to have averaged more than 17 PPG while posting a true-shooting percentage over 60%: Kyrie Irving and Malik Beasley. Not bad. His dribble game isn’t a strength at this point, but he can get into the lane and finish with a floater.
This is all without mentioning that Beasley loves living above the rim:
Again, this kid is a dynamic athlete, and with some polish as a ball-handler, could develop into a starting guard in the NBA as a secondary offensive option. His closest comparison currently would probably be Terrence Ross.
Beasley has a motor that keeps him in every play defensively. He has a tendency to gamble in passing lanes, but most elite athletes tend to have that in common. Beasley moves his feet well and plays defense with his hands, but his effort is what gives him the potential to drastically improve as an on-ball defender on the next level even though he lacks elite size or length (6’5″, with 6’7″ wingspan).
What I Don’t Like: Limited ball-handler and limited physical tools could eventually lower his ceiling.
Beasley’s dribble game, especially in the pick-and-roll, is limited. He struggles to keep him dribble alive and basically has no left hand yet. In a straight line, he’s a problem, but having to navigate an extra defender or an angle is not something that he can hang his hat on. At an undersized 6’5, Beasley will have to develop this aspect of his game if he wants to even become a rotational player in the league. As a secondary guard at the highest level of basketball, you must be able to create for teammates – Beasley has a really long way to go in this area.
Defensively, he’s athletic enough to keep the ball in front and also create turnovers. What’s missing are the physical tools that compliment the athleticism. The 6’7 wingspan limit his ability to create problems on the ball and around the rim when contesting shots.
Fit For Hornets? I like Beasley a lot, and I do believe he can develop his game into being more of a creator. At age 19, there’s no reason to believe he won’t get better, so this kid would be a good pick for Charlotte at 22nd. The Hornets did meet with Beasley at the combine in Chicago last week.
If Beasley was the pick, fans would have to understand that he’s not ready to play yet and would likely spend some time in Greensboro playing for Swarm.
Check Diallo (Kansas – Draft Express Profile): 6’9, 219 lbs. – Power-Forward / Center
What I Like: Diallo was probably the most impressive player at the combine last week. He validated the assumption that he is an elite rebounder and rim-protector with his 7’4.5″ wingspan, but the surprise came on the offensive end. Diallo still appears raw to the naked eye with the ball in his hands, but he displayed some soft touch around the basket and pulled the trigger from mid-range with little hesitancy. Point being, Diallo gave many scouts reason to believe that he’s not as far away as most believed after he sat the bench during his freshman season at Kansas.
Diallo runs like a deer and has a motor that is difficult to match for a man of his size. His ability to run and move side-to-side will make him a versatile pick-and-roll defender down the road. Right now, his IQ and court awareness aren’t his greatest asset, but at his age (19), that’s just fine. Diallo reminds me some of Bismack Biyombo as a prospect, and he’s definitely more polished offensively than Biz was at age 19. Whether or not he can be the defensive force Biz has become is unknown, as Diallo is rail thin.
Today, Diallo could be ready to rebound and protect the rim at an NBA level. His offensive learning curve is steep, but maybe easier to stomach for teams after last week. A lot will happen in the next month, and since Diallo participated in all activities during the combine, it’s a safe assumption that he’ll compete against other bigs in team pre-draft workouts. If he wins those battles then it’s possible he climbs into the late-lottery.
What I Don’t Like: Without shoes, Diallo is slightly above 6’7, so that highlights the fact that he will be undersized if center ends up being his position in the league. Maybe. This league keeps getting smaller-and-smaller.
Diallo lacks a role on the offensive end of the floor. It’s likely the reason he forces the issue on this end and also what likely found him buried on the bench in Lawrence for Kansas team that was trying to win a National Championship. He’s just not a high IQ player offensively and needs to humble himself in order to start re-tooling the arsenal. The ability is definitely there, but as of now there are far too many moving parts to develop anything that resembles consistency.
Fit For Hornets? This would fit into the category of development project that the Hornets would have to plant in Greensboro. But now that the farm system is there for Charlotte, it’s time to start using it.
Diallo would be a smart risk, but the team has to decide how important it is to draft a player that can help immediately. That would not be Diallo, as he is at least a year away.
Honorable Mention Joel Bolomboy (Weber State – Center), Damion Jones (Vanderbilt – Center), Ivica Zubac (Croatia – Center), Ante Zizic (Croatia – Center), Patrick McCaw (UNLV – Shooting-Guard), Diamond Stone (Maryland – Center), Malachi Richardson (Syracuse – Shooting-Guard)
** Draft Profiles coming for all of the honorable mentions **Garrett Swasey, 44, the University of Colorado Colorado Springs police officer who was shot and killed while responding to a shooting at a Planned Parenthood office, was described by his fellow church members and friends as a courageous man and loving father who drew strength and inspiration from his Christian faith.
He was married, with two young children, and had been on the campus police force for six years. He also spent seven years as a co-pastor at Hope Chapel in Colorado Springs. “Here’s a guy who worked full time as a police officer, and then gave a great amount of time to his local church and didn’t get a dime for it,” said Scott Dontanville, a co-pastor who knew Officer Swasey for 15 years. “He did it because it was the thing that he felt he needed to do.”
Kurt Aichele, a co-pastor at the church and a close friend, said Officer Swasey was once a nationally ranked figure skater and ice dancer and moved to Colorado Springs years ago to train.Rising tensions between India and Pakistan and a subsequent ban on Pakistani talent working in India has led a member of an Indian film association to resign.
On Thursday, the Indian Motion Picture Producers Association (IMPPA) passed a resolution during the annual general meeting of the association that "till the situation is OK between the Pakistani and Indian governments, we will not hire any Pakistani artist, technician or singer."
In light of this, Rahul Aggarwal, a member of the Indian film association, posted a letter of resignation on Facebook stating "fundamental terrorism" between the two countries as the root cause. He cited that "art is above politics and as the custodians of this art; it is our responsibility to bring people together rather than divide them."
Furthermore, he added that the two countries need to come together to promote peace and not war as we are "one and alike".
He wrote, "Banning one another is not the solution, rather bringing everyone together and showing the world that terrorism cannot divide these two great nations can become a beacon for acceptance and hope, two characteristics that are the complete opposites of the fundamentalists that want us to go to war with one another."
In the end he noted that since the governing body did not recognise his voice he felt it as a "personal failure" and thus "useless" to the association.
Read the full letter here:
Of late, India and Pakistan have been on a banning spree. As India boycotts Pakistani talent across the border, Pakistani, too, has returned the favour by banning all Indian films in local cinemas. Celebrities on both sides of the border, however, are divided over the issue.New Delhi: It's a massive setback to Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi in connection with defamation case against him in which he had blamed RSS for assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
Flaying Rahul Gandhi, the Supreme Court on Tuesday asked him to apologise or face trial for blaming RSS for assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
"We have held it may be historically correct but the fact or the statement has to meet the test of public good. You can't make collective denunciation," a bench comprising Justices Dipak Misra and RF Nariman said, posting the matter for further hearing on July 27.
The bench was hearing an appeal filed by Rahul seeking quashing of a criminal defamation case ordered by a magisterial court in Bhiwandi in Maharashtra for a public speech in which he had linked the RSS to Gandhi's killing.
"Freedom is not crippled or curbed. What is curbed is defamatory speech. What the writers, politicians, critics or antagonists say, you must have great magnitude to swallow," it said.
Wondering why he made a speech quoting "wrong historical fact", the court observed, "What we have to see is whether the petitioner's allegations come under Section 499 (defamation) of IPC or not. Judgement is already there. You have to face trial, if you don't express regret."
Rahul had earlier also refused to accept the apex court's suggestion to express regret over his statement blaming RSS for Mahatma Gandhi's killing to close the defamation case against him but he decided to contest it.
In his reaction, RSS' communications department Head Manmohan Vaidya said the "Congress had been consistently trying to spread lies and baseless allegations about RSS. Today's Supreme Court ruling has exposed the Congress."
"They (Rahul Gandhi and other Congress leaders) are avoiding the trial and are repeating the same false allegations against RSS. It seems he does not have faith in India's legal system and respect for it," he told PTI.
Meanwhile, reacting to the court's observations, the Congress today said that Gandhi will not tender an apology and will instead substantiate them with historical facts and evidence before the court to support his claim.
"On a suggestion of Shri Rahul Gandhi expressing regret or apology, the question does not arise. Such a suggestion has been made in the past and not accepted by Rahul Gandhi. Mr Gandhi is a mature politician with intimate knowledge of historical facts. Congress Party and Mr Gandhi will defend these remarks at appropriate forum," Congress' chief spokesman Randeep Surjewala said.
He added that since the matter is pending adjudication, "we will not like to comment further on the issue".
(With PTI inputs)For updated list keep follow my BLOG A Blog From a Human-engineer-being - Eren Golge's Blog
Please suggest links to add!!I. Introduction to Machine Learning(cal tech class)II. Linear Regression
III) Linear Algebraonline text- seefor usage rightsV) Linear Regression with Multiple Variables- Gradient Descent
(discusses above wiki article)
- OptimizationIV) Octave TutorialVI) Logistic Regression (LR)
(refers to LR as a classifier)VII) Regularizationoverview using advanced mathVIII and IX) Neural Networks
- backpropagation
XI) Machine Learning System DesignPrecision, recall, accuracy, …XII) Support Vector Machines
maXIII) Clustering
XIV) Dimensionality Reduction
XV) Anomaly Detection- Google Analytics- anomaly detection with Google Analytics (example)
Must purchase this article (I did not purchase but appears to be good)- Gaussian distribution
(no math)XVI) Recommender Systems(using Python)- Collaborative Filteringfiltering-tutorial.pptXVII) Large Scale Machine Learning(introduction to class)(lectures)- stochastic gradient descent
(visualization)- parallelized stochastic gradient descent- recursive partitioning:- Different perspectives of NNs with theoretical view as well- And the Father of DL- General sense NN FAQ- INRIA Deep Learning Notes tutorial- very detailed examples on real datasetsPretty basic stuff but it is a nice quick reference.list of symbols with LaTex code!!, very useful.Credits go toI added some of my places to that list as well.The homeless went to the gathering seeking food. But the people who served offered something more – hope, love, a way out.
All they had to do was choose.
Some would. Most would not.
Still, the gifts were not wasted. The people who served also turned out to be people who were changed.
Charity on Wheels is a small Orange County nonprofit established three years ago to get the homeless off the street and onto a path of productive life. It is a long, agonizing, frustrating process.
The group was started by Zach Southall, a Juilliard-hopeful classical guitarist turned grind-core band member (think heavy metal on steroids) turned mortgage financing company president turned marketing CEO. Throw in husband, father of four, director of worship arts at Salem Lutheran Church in Orange, a solemn pact with God and you get a glimpse of his almost manic drive to help what he calls his homeless brothers and sisters.
Orange County’s 2015 annual estimate of homeless men, women and children was 15,291. Start looking and you will see encampments all along the Santa Ana riverbed, clearly visible from the I-5 or roads like Chapman Avenue where it passes over the river.
Or stroll through La Palma Park in Anaheim to see clusters of people spread across the grass, their possessions scattered about them. This is the population Charity on Wheels attempts to help.
Southall has walked through the park many times, talking with the homeless, building relationships.
“I can’t do it for you,” the 44-year-old says, explaining his mission. “I can’t carry you all the way there. But if you start walking a little bit, I will get the wheelbarrow and scoop you up, and we’ll go fast.”
Southall knows about adversity. He was rich, and then he was poor.
He was in the mortgage business, and business was booming. He started acquiring: a bigger share of his company’s business – leveraging himself and buying out shareholders – a big house, a $115,000 Brabus Mercedes-Benz, even a motor yacht that he took out less than a half-dozen times.
Then the housing market bubble exploded and took his business with it.
“We wound up losing everything,” he said. “We lost our money, our house, our cars – everything. It was very humbling.”
Looking back, he sees things differently. “It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Losing everything. It saved my life.”
He remembers a picture of himself taken at the time. “I looked haggard, gray. I was fat. My priorities were all messed up.”
That’s when he and his wife, Michelle, rediscovered their faith. They joined Salem Lutheran Church in Orange.
The church helped in his time of need. He had been sick. The bank foreclosed on his home, and the recovering Southall was sitting on his porch in tears. The moving trucks were coming, and no one was there to help. Then the church showed up. “All these people came,” he said. They helped the family move. “Then they were taking my kids to school, bringing dinner every night.”
That’s when Southall made his covenant with God. “I said, ‘OK, I’m your guy. You totally helped me out here. Wherever you send me, I’ll go. I’ll never say no. Whatever you tell me, I’ll do it.’
“He put this thought in my head that I needed to go out and take care of his children. Homeless, hungry, lost people. Go find them. Take care of them.”
That Saturday he told his wife that he was going to take his sons, buy some stuff and go feed the homeless.
He did that for several weeks. It made him feel good, but he started feeling like he wasn’t having an impact.
That’s when he heard about Mickey Jordan of the Salvation Army. Jordan had started a homeless program but was having trouble with turnout.
“I got you covered,” Southall remembers telling Jordan when they met. “I will bring you volunteers. I will bring you all the food. I will pay for all the shower passes. And I’ll do the worship every week.”
A partnership was born.
Jordan, 33, is a wiry, intense man who thinks deeply about his religion and homeless ministry. He began about 10 years ago by volunteering to travel to the Ukraine for the Rock Harbor Church. He went there to feed and clothe street children.
This was a place, he said, where there was no government money to help children on the street. “Being homeless meant you had nothing,” he said. “You die on the street.”
Jordan spent four years in Ukraine, bringing back a process he later shared with Southall.
It is simple and almost self-evident. It is based on trust, relationships and community.
“No one cares what you know,” Jordan said, “unless they know you care.”
The Jordan-Southall collaboration works this way: You recruit and train willing, caring volunteers. You do outreach within the homeless community, talking and listening. You invite them to a gathering with the promise of food and song. You serve first-rate meals, sit down, eat and talk with them. You listen more than you talk. You invite them back again next week. You repeat the cycle, deepening the relationship. You finally find the right moment when they want change and you help find them a job, a place to stay. You keep on doing this until more people recover their lives.
You also prepare yourself for frustration and failure. In battling the intractable homelessness trifecta – addiction, mental health, joblessness – people often take baby steps forward only to stumble and retreat.
It’s not a one-way street.
“I believe in what’s called libertarian free will,” says Jordan. “We are free to choose.
“The only reason you are homeless is that you are choosing to be homeless. This is very, very, very hard for people who are new to this ministry. This goes against the victim mentality that a lot of people buy into.”
To help the homeless make the choice to change, “People need to be acknowledged,” he said. “We need community. We need to be loved. We need to be known.”
Could it be that simple? It is, at least for the two to four people Charity on Wheels and the Salvation Army collaboration say they get off the street each month.
Ed Carman, 61, lived in La Palma Park and then in his car for months. These days he’s working at a 99 Cents Only store in San Bernardino.
“This guy,” Carman said, pointing at Southall, “helped me find a place to stay, fed me, helped me to make money. Helped me get on my feet. Sometimes people need that.
“It would be just like if I’m on the side of the freeway with my car’s hood up, and I’m waving my battery cables and everybody’s passing. These brothers,” he said, referring to Charity on Wheels, “came by and gave me a boost and got me back on the road. They had the grace of God in them and the other people didn’t. That’s the difference.”
It is not just the homeless who are helped by the program. The volunteers benefit as well.
Jaclyn Kivelin was a volunteer almost from the start three years ago until she left Orange County to get married. She lives with her husband, a Marine, in Twentynine Palms. She returns to the gatherings whenever she can.
She knew Southall from Salem Lutheran. He kept telling her about the Wednesday night gatherings. She went once, loved it and kept coming back.
“I had been a part of other homeless organizations in the past,” Kivelin said. “This one felt more genuine. It wasn’t just about feeding people and staying away from them or offering something and not getting involved in any way. It was about getting involved in people’s lives. Not giving what you wanted to give, but seeing what somebody else actually needed.
“I think Zach has the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met,” she said. “He wants to see people succeed and wants to do anything he possibly can. He shows that through his life.”
Kivelin and her husband have a long-term goal of using what she learned from Southall and Charity on Wheels to start a similar organization on the East Coast, where her husband’s family lives.
Listening. Caring. Building trust. Sustaining a relationship.
Paul Moffitt, 48, also has been with Charity on Wheels almost from the start. Southall talked him into coming. Once there, he, too, got hooked.
“It gives you a better understanding of how good you really have it even when times are really bad,” Moffitt said. “And I’ve gone through a lot of personal things in the last couple years with a divorce after 23 years of being married, having to go bankrupt, having to sell my house. You look back and say, ‘This is nothing compared to what these people are going through.’
“I borderline feel like it’s a selfish act. It more is a blessing to me than it is to them.”
Like Kivelin and many of the other volunteers, Moffit is amazed at Southall’s love, devotion and dedication to the mission. He tells this story:
“I watched him one night when we had a clothes night, and a guy was sitting on a little concrete planter. His head was down, and Zach went over to him and said, ‘Hey man what’s going on?’ The guy said, ‘I was hoping you had a pair of shoes because my shoes have holes in them.’
“Zach said, ‘What size are you looking for?’ The guy said ‘12 or 13,’ and Zach immediately takes his shoes off and gives them to the guy.
“Zach walked around in his socks the rest of the night. He played music in socks. He went home in his socks.”
A dozen or more volunteers are in the Salvation Army Church hall in Anaheim every Wednesday night from 5 to 8:30 p.m. They rarely miss. Southall’s mom, Kathleen, provides table centerpieces with candles and fresh flowers. Michelle Southall’s brother, Ruben, is in the kitchen cooking.
With the family, friendships and ongoing relationships, the hall feels like a coffeehouse. Fifty or sixty homeless people are greeted and welcomed. Food is served. People are free to leave whenever they choose. No food-for-religion barter here.
Out in the courtyard, Lauren Scholle, another volunteer, has a line of people waiting for a haircut. A longtime stylist, she stopped cutting hair professionally when her daughter was born. She is now using her gifts to put people at ease and dramatically transform their appearance.
Inside, Southall and others get ready to play and sing.
There is talk, laughter. The volume grows. Someone is chosen to offer a lesson or testimony. There is prayer. The organization passes out toiletries and shower passes that allow people to go to a Salvation Army facility to clean up.
Then it’s time to go.
“Watch over our friends as they venture out into the darkness,” Southall says in prayer.
Then he raises his head, smiles and says: “We love you all so much. Please come back.”
The volunteers clean up the room. Stack the chairs, put away the tables and mop the floor. They form a circle and tell one another what they’ve heard. Who among the homeless has made progress, who has faltered and needs helps. Assignments go out to be followed up during the week.
Southall talks a little about his plans to start another gathering along the riverbed near the Chapman Avenue overpass. And another at the Friends Church in the Orange Plaza traffic circle. He wants this work to spread, grow and flourish. He wants others to benefit from what he has learned.
The group joins hands, prays, and they too go out into the darkness. For them an inner light guides the way.With the upcoming price increase to PlayStation Plus wallets are going to be a little lighter in the coming months, but there are plenty of games to play on the PlayStation Network without spending a penny. Whilst many of them do have the option to buy in-game items many, such a Star Trek Online and DC Universe Online, have tens, if not hundreds of hours worth of playtime available totally free, especially as free to play games do not require PlayStation Plus in order to get online.
Below you will find a list of all the free to play games on PS4 with links over to the UK PlayStation store so you can queue them up. Have fun!
Free To Play
UPDATE: There are a number of other games available in other regions, such as America’s Army: Proving Grounds and Figureheads, the above list is for the UK.The reader’s process of alienation and reorientation lets us examine the purpose and methods of cultural translation. We asked writers and translators working today to share their thoughts and experiences of literary and cultural translation as a space that is perhaps simultaneously “old” and “new” for both the writer and the reader.
What’s new in literary translation?
I’d say how similar urban literature is now—at least among writers living in cities where the cafés have free Wi-Fi. Thirty years ago, writers in Santiago or Buenos Aires were living in dictatorships. Their access to innovative literature from the rest of the world was stymied in a million ways. That kind of government control of literature is increasingly impossible with the Internet. In Chile and Argentina now, writers can get hold of any book they want. They find them on their iPads while sitting in a café, just as I do here in Brooklyn. As a result, new urban fiction and poetry coming out of Latin American countries often hinge on the same sort of domestic concerns or quirky fantasies that contemporary American writers explore. Look at Cesar Aira’s Ghosts, which takes place in a half-finished luxury apartment building in Buenos Aires, or Andrea Maturana’s short story collection No decir (To Not Say It), about how secrets play out in upper middle-class Chilean families.
Even in countries that aren’t democracies, the Internet has rapidly and dramatically changed the literary landscape. Writers can set up e-mail accounts on servers beyond government control and use them to communicate with potential translators or publishers of their work abroad. Although she is under extralegal house arrest, the Chinese poet Liu Xia, wife of Nobel Prize winning writer and dissident Liu Xiabo, managed to communicate with PEN American Center and publish some of her recent poems on its website.
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Online publishing has allowed far more living writers to make their work known in English than would have been possible otherwise. And many of these authors are women. Trade publishers in the United States are infamous for their resistance to publishing translated writers, but within that problem exists another old problem: We don’t hear much from the women of the world. In a groundbreaking essay about this issue written last year for Words without Borders, Alison Anderson wrote, “For every Clarice Lispector, there is a Roberto Bolaño, Gabriel García Marques or Javier Marías; for every Christa Wolf a Günther Grass, Daniel Kehlman or Peter Stamm.”
Gender disparity continues to be a problem not only among writers publishing in English, but also among writers publishing throughout Latin America and just about everywhere else. The organization VIDA now releases an annual report showcasing how women writers fare each year in literary publications in the U.S. The VIDA count doesn’t look specifically at women in translation, but an awareness of gender disparity in American literary journals benefits everyone. I sent the link for the VIDA report to several women writers in Chile, and we mused about what the numbers would look like there. Would they look worse, or far worse? And who knows, maybe the availability of the VIDA count online will lead to a similar count in another country. Or maybe it will lead to a discussion in some café in Santiago, which might, in time, lead to more awareness of male writers dominating mainstream book review coverage in Chile, which might then spread next door into Argentina, until gradually this small discussion grows into a greater one about what can be done about this disparity there.
Though I appreciate all the possibilities for enrichment that the Internet provides, I am often annoyed with myself for being online instead of finishing the many fantastic, half-read books on my desk. I’ve established a new tradition of turning off all devices by 10 p.m. Before then, however, I let myself enjoy my various i-devices, the thrill of being in touch via e-mail in a matter of seconds with a Bengali poet I met a few years ago, then clicking on Facebook to read the posts from a friend in Venezuela about the massive protests happening in Caracas.
When Goethe coined the term Weltliteratur in 1827, he declared: “The epoch of world literature is at hand, and everyone must strive to hasten its approach.” Almost two-hundred years later, we are nearly there.A teenager who was riding on a zip line in Las Vegas Wednesday urinated on people visiting the Fremont Street Experience below, a spokesperson said.
The 15-year-old boy was on the slot machine-inspired Slotzilla zip line attraction when he showered the people below with his urine, local television station KVVU reported.
“Like a lot of liquid coming from above us, just showering from head to toe our back and top of the head dripping down, and we thought it was some sort of water, maybe some drinks or beer,” Cazimere Ferguson, who was visiting from Honolulu, told the station.
Fremont Street’s marketing director said the teen’s parents later apologized for the incident, KVVU reported.
It was unclear whether the teen urinated on people as part of a mid-ride prank or if it was an unintentional accident.You are here: Home
A bullet train runs through a bridge on the Lanzhou-Xinjiang high-speed railway, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, on Nov. 3, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]
The top economic planner issued China's latest national railway plan Wednesday, with the target to operate a 175,000 km rail network by 2025.
China expects to have 38,000 km of high speed railway (HSR) by 2025, according to the plan issued by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
By 2020, China will have a 150,000 km railway network, of which about 30,000 km will be HSR, covering over 80 percent of major cities nationwide, said the NDRC.
By 2030, the inter-city rail network will have been improved, reducing the travel time between neighboring major and medium-sized cities.
The new plan also emphasized boosting rail construction in central and western areas to achieve a more balanced development among regions.
NDRC statistics show that China had an operating rail length of 121,000 km by 2015, of which 19,000 km was high-speed rail.The list of coders interviewed includes some geek household names like Donald Knuth and jwz, but also some not so well-known ones such as Bernie Cosell (one of the programmers behind the ARPANET IMP, the first Internet router) and Fran Allen (compiler pioneer). The full list of people interviewed is available on the book's website. The eras embodied by the interviewees range from the very beginnings of software as we know it today, to the heyday of the Internet boom, when people like Brad Fitzpatrick made their mark.Seibel himself is a coder and author (having the well-received Practical Common Lisp under his belt). It is then no surprise that the interviews are packed with technical details, which (with one exception, explained below) restricts the intended audience of the book to those already familiar with programming.Coders at Work manages to communicate the wisdom of programmers of bygone eras, while simultaneously being heavily colored by very contemporary issues. JavaScript, its consequences and its discontents, is a topic recurring throughout the book. More than just a recounting of history, Coders at Work should inspire readers to learn about the wider context of their craft and stop the reinvention of the proverbial wheel decried by several of the interviewees in its pages.Given the related subject matter, the people interviewed in Coders at Work who played a role in creating major programming languages (Armstrong, Eich, and Steele), and close publication dates of the two books, inevitable comparisons will be drawn between Coders at Work and Federico Biancuzzi and Shane Warden's Masterminds of Programming (I previously reviewed Masterminds of Programming on my blog). There is a lot of common ground between the two books in terms of technical areas covered, but Coders at Work clearly comes out on top.Part of the reason has to do with the fact that Seibel's choice of interviewees is stellar. Masterminds of Programming's niche focus on programming language designers meant that its authors had a tougher job than Seibel, but details like the omission of Alan Kay (creator of Smalltalk and one of the most influential programming language designers in the field's history) from Masterminds are nothing short of dumbfounding.Just as important to making Coders at Work a good book is the fact that Seibel is a great interviewer. Seibel's questions felt more open-ended than
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one family's grueling cleanup.
CARRIE FEIBEL, BYLINE: Rebecca and Roy Sillitoe live in a four-bedroom ranch home in Houston's Meyerland neighborhood.
ROY SILLITOE: Welcome to our devastation.
FEIBEL: The house faces Brays Bayou. Early Tuesday, the river rose over its banks and crossed the dark street. As their two kids slept, the Sillitoes watched water spill under the doors. At first, they were in denial.
REBECCA SILLITOE: We thought we could stop it with towels and blankets, and we were doing our best. He had buckets and was trying to fill up the tubs. But all of a sudden, just the water came in fast.
FEIBEL: Rebecca started grabbing photos and artwork and other family treasures.
REBECCA SILLITOE: And I just went into super save-our-stuff mode and our kids' stuff. I just thought, if we weren't going to be living here anymore or if it would be a long time, I wanted our kids to have their toys and their stuffed animals and their books. So I just started putting everything up as high as I could.
FEIBEL: The water came up about two feet and stayed there until dawn. The family left. Roy said when they came back home, they weren't sure what exactly to do.
ROY SILLITOE: I guess dry it out. To be honest, I'm really not sure. We grew up in Canada, and floods is not really a thing in Western Canada.
FEIBEL: Roy is a neuroscientist who loves the outdoors. He was using his camping knife to rip up the soggy living room carpet.
FEIBEL: Rebecca was walking around in rubber boots, balancing an open laptop on her arm. They're lucky. They had flood insurance through FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
REBECCA SILLITOE: The FEMA program is very bare-bones. We have to fill out a full spreadsheet with make, model, year we bought the piece, what the replacement cost would be for every single item. I've been doing that all morning.
FEIBEL: Friends began arriving with suitcases and boxes. Rebecca showed them what was dry and needed to be taken away before it got moldy.
REBECCA SILLITOE: Oh, these are saved. Again, more pillows that can be saved.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: OK, I can go get garbage bags.
FEIBEL: The worst part was losing family heirlooms. Rebecca pointed to a wooden cabinet in the living room, its bottom half swollen and buckled.
REBECCA SILLITOE: I - unfortunately, I think I lost my grandparent's cabinet, which is - we don't have much of value, like monetary value. But I couldn't save that, and that's an emotional piece.
FEIBEL: Could it be fixed? Rebecca just didn't know. There's no road map for a natural disaster, no app that tells you what to do first, then what to do next. Rebecca said it was hard to feel organized when she had no answers. She wasn't even sure when she would get answers.
REBECCA SILLITOE: Is FEMA going to pay for us to paint that drywall or do we then have to hire painters? And how long is all that going to take? And the house dried out and restored to move back in? I don't know. Is that, like, two weeks, six weeks, three months?
FEIBEL: Roy believes eventually, the family will be fine. His kids had lots of questions about the flood, but he said witnessing all this is good for them.
ROY SILLITOE: They can see how we respond to it and stay positive and be with friends. This is good for them, I think, in the end. It'll happen to them in their lifetime, sometime they'll have to suffer something tough. So this is good.
FEIBEL: The Sillitoes, one family of thousands here, sorting out what recovery really means and what's next. For NPR News, I'm Carrie Feibel in Houston.
Copyright © 2015 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.By Alex Tarrant
Emirates Team New Zealand’s America’s Cup win has certainly fired up the Auckland infrastructure debate (as if it needed more fuel). Every interested party is now reviewing their wish list trying to figure out whether their pet project could be completed in four years. Rail, roads, houses and water pipes.
The 2021 event (Auckland will also hold the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit that year) might be a Godsend for getting even more Auckland infrastructure work on the move (if we can find the labourers needed – don’t mention foreigners!).
But the multiple Mexican stand-offs between the Government, Auckland Council and other parties like Auckland Airport and Watercare need to be resolved. The key in each dispute is who pays for what, when, why and how.
This (rather long) column focuses on two of those stand-offs. Rail to Auckland Airport from the CBD, and cheaper, faster provision of water services for new housing in Auckland – including boosting incentives for cheaper densification. On Rail, there is a simple answer to get things moving if the project would indeed lead to benefits. On water, revised legislation debated in Parliament last week provides some hope.
Rail to the airport
Politicians were quick to jump on the success of ETNZ earlier this week and the expected economic benefits to Auckland from holding the Cup in 2021. The Green Party used the occasion to question the Transport Minister on whether Auckland would have capacity to host the event.
“Will the government start building rail to the airport sooner, if Auckland hosts the next America’s Cup regatta, or will Aucklanders still have to wait 30 years?” Julie Anne Genter asked Simon Bridges.
Bridges’ answers focussed on the current plan of protecting a sole purpose route that will originally be marked out for a busway to the Airport. This showed the government was prioritising the project, he claimed, being careful to add it was difficult to explain what the timeframe could be for progressing to rail. This would be driven by demand and usage numbers, Bridges said.
So why not just kick-start the project of rail to the airport? If central government were to lead on funding, couldn’t others like the Council be given time to come up with their share? The reason this National-led government isn’t making any firm commitments like this is down to the principle of, whoever benefits should pay.
Steven Joyce, Simon Bridges and other Ministers have in recent months been talking more about the use of value uplift taxes to help fund new projects – rates will be higher in areas that profit from increased transportation links, for example. These could be residential rates paid by homeowners in areas with improved access to the CBD from a new road, which would have boosted the value of their property. They could also be imposed on commercial businesses that benefit from more foot-traffic due to being closer to, say, a new train station.
The government openly admits that a value uplift tax would have been a perfect fit for Auckland’s inner-city rail loop. But, because the loop was announced before Ministers could start spraying the idea around, they feel it would be a bit rude (think a vote-loser) to suddenly turn around and clamp such a tax on business owners close to where the new stations would be, regardless of the economics.
They have to find a project that hasn’t yet started, and which would clearly benefit the areas linked by the project. Penlink has been talked about. I also give you the Airport-City rail link.
However, Bridges and Joyce are engaged in a stand-off with Auckland Airport. ‘If you come to the table, then we will too.’
Auckland Airport would clearly benefit from any rail link with the city. So, Bridges et al are waiting for them to come to the party. If we’re talking light rail – trams – then Dominion Road businesses and residential properties should also benefit in value uplift.
It’s a stand-off though. If the airport argues against paying more because the benefits won’t be that great, then the government can turn around and say, ‘ok well that’s a good argument for not needing to build the new connection’. If the government just starts funding the link itself, then it runs the risk of no-one else coming to the party. They also don't want to be seen starting the project with inclusion of value-uplift taxes that no-one agrees on - that's not the way this government wants to work.
In effect, the sticking point is a matter of principle. It’s a principled Mexican stand-off. Or a prisoners’ dilemma in a low-security prison.
Water pipe dream
The next stand-off is a key component in Auckland’s housing debate. Water pipes. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how the National Cabinet would love to take a swipe at the monopolistic, not-for-profit Watercare in Auckland. They’re getting nearer to it.
The Local Government Amendment Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 2) was introduced last year by former Local Government Minister Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga. And boy was it popular. The Local Government Select Committee heard nearly 200 submissions on the Bill. They’ve now reported back with amendments. The Bill received a second reading last week.
The stand-off between local and central government on water pipes can best be summed up by a conversation between media and Local Government New Zealand a few weeks back. A lot of New Zealand’s water pipe infrastructure was put in in the 1960s, we were told. Those pipes had an expected lifetime of 60 years, so we’re heading towards an exponential renewals curve over the next 15 years for assets worth over $100 billion.
A couple of the journalists (including this correspondent) were a tad miffed by this. Did local councils know there was only a 60-year life span? “Yeah, they did,” was the reply. ““The renewals curve is not a surprise. But it’s here, now.”
So why haven’t councils planned over those 60 years to put replacement funds aside? The problem, we were told, was that in the 1960s a lot of the pipes were paid for by central government. Now, technically only local government is on the hook. “Under our current funding model, it’s rates and debt [to pay for it]. The issue becomes, is that a sustainable position? Our view is it is not.”
That’s why local government is calling on central government to agree to a co-funding model for the replacement of water pipes nationwide that are coming to the end of their working life (even though this was all known about for 60 years).
I asked Local Government New Zealand chairman Lawrence Yule whether they’d had any indications from central government that this could be done. He said central government had always indicated a willingness to look at it “but only once you’ve made sure what you’re doing currently is being done as efficiently as it can be.”
It’s a stand-off. Local government is refusing to consider how to fund replacement pipes until central government agrees to a co-funding model. Central government won’t agree to a co-funding model until local government gets its own house in order and ensures water services operations are as efficient as possible.
The issue got to a point where central government decided to try and take the initiative. This is where the Local Government Local Government Act Amendment Bill (No 2) comes in. Central government clearly believes things aren’t being done as efficiently as possible.
The Bill will allow various councils to band together to create Transport and Water Council Controlled Organisations (CCOs) to provide services across several local authorities. Scale. It will also give greater scope for re-organisation of CCOs. As now-Local Government Minister Anne Tolley put it in Thursday’s second reading, it provides “an opportunity for the sector to show their local strategic leadership, which may require hard decisions about difficult options in order to secure a positive future for their communities.”
Let’s take Watercare. In its submission on the Bill (co-submitted with Auckland Council), it argued that since its first fully operational year in 2011/12, it has reduced the cost of water delivery to Aucklanders compared the rag-tag pricing run previously by individual councils pre-Super City.
That’s true. The $1.30 per thousand litres was below the range of $1.31-$3.50 encompassing Rodney, North Shore, Waitakere, Auckland, Manukau and Franklin. Job well done. Scale worked. But since then, that cost has risen each year to $1.44 per thousand litres in 2016/17. That’s not what central government (or Auckland residents) wanted to see.
A 2015 Cabinet paper introducing the Amendment Bill reveals what some Cabinet Ministers really wanted to do. The Local Government Minister at the time highlighted the potential benefits of requiring Watercare to have to pay a dividend (“distribute surpluses”) to the Council. This could encourage more efficient pricing of water services and allow it better access to finance.
However, due to the prospect of the move not being supported by “the community,” the idea was not included. Indeed, when the Local Government Select Committee reported the Bill back to the House in June, Section 70 was there prohibiting the distribution of surpluses by water services CCOs.
A pity. There is some exciting stuff in there, though. Central government is aiming to be imposing a number of requirements that I’m told are aimed at drastically changing the way Watercare operates.
The Productivity Commission’s 2016 report, Using Land for Housing, helped. Looking at Watercare from a housing supply lens, the Commission raised a number of concerns and recommendations which will partly be tackled by the Bill.
Firstly, Watercare’s Infrastructure Growth Charges (IGCs) do not recover the full costs of growth (new pipes for new housing), the Commission pointed out. Although initially this could produce benefits for new home buyers not paying the full cost for water infrastructure, deficits will need to be recovered from somewhere. Recovery from existing residents will reduce community acceptance of growth, limiting the supply of infrastructure-enabled land, therefore contributing to higher house prices.
Watercare needed to change how it calculates charges to better reflect the underlying economic costs of supply in different locations and for different types of dwelling, the Commission said. This linked in with criticisms of Watercare’s model of charging flat fees.
“To the extent that certain types of development result in lower infrastructure costs than others, a flat charge will result in a cross-subsidy between different types of dwelling. This might result in a situation in which smaller and more affordable dwellings are cross-subsidising larger standalone dwellings.”
The Bill requires Watercare to shift away from the IGC model to a development contribution model. It has until 30 June 2018 at the latest to figure out how to best make the switch.
Meanwhile, the Commission urged Watercare to consider development agreements, which would enable private developers to take responsibility for building trunk infrastructure. It referenced research that developers may be able to provide infrastructure solutions at lower costs than Watercare, particularly due to ‘over specification’ required by Watercare.
“Watercare notes that development agreements have a range of advantages (eg, they provide a mechanism for bringing in private capital into the provision of public infrastructure) and disadvantages (eg, the time required to prepare and finalise the agreements, especially if more than one developer/landowner is involved). The obligation to consider requests from a developer to enter into development agreements and provide the developer with a written response would not compel Watercare and other CCOs to enter agreements where there are good reasons not to. But a requirement to set out in writing why a development agreement may not proceed would provide clarity and transparency about the reasons for the decision.”
The Bill doesn’t appear to go as far as the Commission would have hoped, but it does provide legislation for Watercare to be able to enter into development agreements.
Finally, the Commission appeared horrified that for both Auckland Transport and Watercare, “supply of infrastructure to support growth is not reflected in either organisation’s performance measures.”
“While the primary accountability documents for Watercare and Auckland Transport (the Statements of Intents) are broadly aligned with the Auckland Plan vision, they do not give effect to the specific objective in the Auckland Plan to increase the city’s supply of new dwellings,” it said.
“Auckland Transport and Watercare’s SOIs should be amended to include performance measures relating to the efficient roll-out of new infrastructure to support an increased supply of new dwellings.
“The regulatory and institutional framework around the water sector can be improved. Discipline and transparency around the pricing of water services, and better performance monitoring, would improve the ability of the water sector to support urban growth,” the Commission said.
The Bill includes provision for Council input on CCO statements of intent and for performance monitoring. Each CCO – ie Watercare – must provide its shareholders the opportunity to influence the direction of the organisation, and must provide a basis for the accountability of the directors to their shareholders for the performance of the organisation.
And that performance monitoring? A local authority must undertake regular performance monitoring to evaluate a CCO’s contribution to the achievement of the authority’s objectives for the organisation, the desired results set out in its SOI and the overall aims and outcomes of the local authority.
What’s yet to be seen, however, is whether the changes would have such an effect as to fix the pending funding crisis for water pipe replacement and extension. I would think not. But with this Bill, central and local government will both be able to tap the argument that councils and their organisations have reached, or will soon reach efficiency limits.
And that’s the trigger for central government coming to the funding party.This Greek inspired Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki has all the flavors that you would expect from Greek cuisine in a portable sandwich form. It is quick and easy to make.
I love using chickpeas in sandwiches. They have such a mild flavor that you can add sweet or savory ingredients.
My first recipe using chickpeas in a sandwich was my Cranberry Apple Chickpea Salad Sandwich which had sweet and tart ingredients. This Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki has all savory ingredients.
I have been on a major Greek cuisine roll recently. Aside from my Vegan Tzatziki, I made a Greek Salad with Tofu Feta, and a couple of pizzas (so expect more Greek recipes in the near future).
This vegan sandwich is like a Greek salad in sandwich form, but with Vegan Tzatziki instead of a salad dressing. I love anything with cucumbers, red pepper, and olives.
The red onion, cucumber, and red pepper add freshness and crunch, while the tzatziki adds some brightness from the lemon juice and dill. Then I added in some peperoncini for a little kick. Leave it out if you don’t like spicy food.
Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki
If you like Greek food, I think you’ll love this Greek inspired chickpea salad sandwich! Perfect for lunch or a quick and easy dinner.
*Don’t forget to come back and leave your feedback and star rating.
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*Update since writing this: Thanks to a reader, the bread below is my new favorite bread. It is soft and fluffy like white bread.
It is Northern Bakehouse millet chia bread. I highly recommend it.
5 from 1 vote Print Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki This Greek inspired Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki has all the flavors that you would expect from Greek cuisine in a portable sandwich form. It is quick and easy to make.
Prep Time 5 minutes Total Time 5 minutes Servings 5 Calories 389 kcal Author Willow Moon Ingredients 15 oz. chickpeas garbanzo beans
1/4 cup Vegan Tzatziki + more for spreading on sandwiches
1/4 cup finely chopped English cucumber
3 tablespoons finely chopped red onion
2 tablespoons finely chopped Kalamata olives
1/4 cup finely chopped red pepper
1 tablespoon finely chopped Greek peperoncini
Salt and pepper
Spinach or other greens
Gluten free bread - I used brown rice US Customary - Metric Instructions Mash half the chickpeas. Add vegan tzatziki, the rest of chickpeas, chopped cucumber, red onion, olives, red pepper, peperoncini, salt and pepper. Mix well. Toast bread. Spread some vegan tzatziki sauce on bread. Add spinach and chickpea salad. Top with toasted bread. Serve. Nutrition Facts Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Vegan Tzatziki Amount Per Serving Calories 389 Calories from Fat 90 % Daily Value* Total Fat 10g 15% Saturated Fat 0g 0% Cholesterol 12mg 4% Sodium 389mg 16% Potassium 313mg 9% Total Carbohydrates 59g 20% Dietary Fiber 8g 32% Sugars 10g Protein 11g 22% Vitamin A 11.8% Vitamin C 24.6% Calcium 14.9% Iron 15.7% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
*Note: Nutrition information should be considered an estimate only. Different nutrition calculators give you different results.Sorted Books October 13, 2010
Posted by Jarrah H in Random Tags: nina katchadourian
Last month my roommate and I hit up the Time-Based Art Festival in Portland, OR. One of the highlights was an installation by Nina Katchadourian called Sorted Books. Katchadourian sorts books in both private and public libraries so the titles tell stories and sometimes express something about their owners. Here’s the one that was on the poster for the exhibition, taken from the library of the New York editors of the journal Shark :
My roommate and I decided to have a little fun pooling and sorting our own books and below are our homages to Katchadourian. They’re not nearly as good but they were really fun to make. Hope you enjoy!
-Jarrah
AdvertisementsWhen leafing through the pages of the recently ratified JSR-375, the new Java EE Security API, it's amusing how quickly the reading of the spec turns into an exercise of uttering to yourself, "Seriously, have they not standardized this stuff yet?"
Historically, implementing various aspects of Java EE security was a responsibility shouldered primarily by the application server vendor, and hooking into those proprietary systems was always a headache. Any software architect who has gone through the process of setting up a WebSphere cluster, configuring a WebLogic server or doing a Liferay installation has inevitably wasted time jumping through the odious hoops that were required to connect to a proprietary user attribute registry or third-party authentication store. For those unlucky enough not to have a simple LDAP server that provided this functionality, a custom user registry might have to be developed, which meant coding against a vendor-specific API and hooking that into the application server's runtime.
These little Java EE security nuisances were never show stoppers. There have always been workarounds or third-party frameworks that would help an organization achieve their security goals. The problem was that these various approaches weren't standardized. And while there are many aspects of Java EE security that are documented within specifications, much of which can be found in the often overlooked Java Authentication Service Provider Interface for Containers (JASPIC) specification. Unfortunately, JASPIC isn't fun to work with. Furthermore, it isn't annotation-based and it doesn't leverage container-based dependency injection. JSR-375, the Java EE Security API, is an attempt to address these security-related issues.
Containers, microservices and Java EE security "It's an important specification because it bridges some of the gaps that existed in previous Java EE versions," said Java Champion Ivar Grimstad, who is hosting a JavaOne 2017 session entitled, "New Security APIs for Java EE." "Now it's there, and that's a good thing. It's a good foundation on which to build upon so if you want OAUTH or support for microservices, you have a good foundation to build upon." This first version of the Java EE Security API does a good job at standardizing security and addressing many of the shortcomings of the existing Java EE and JASPIC APIs. But perhaps the most significant aspect of the JSR-375 API is the fact that it allows for all of the security information to be defined within the application, and not configured externally. "You do it all in the application," Grimstad said. "You don't need to configure it from the outside." That's a significant improvement in managing the lifecycle of an application, especially in a world of Docker-hosted microservices that are distributed in containers. "With annotations, you can easily add security and you don't have to do any vendo- specific configuration to get it working." The annotation based approach to security isn't insignificant. One of the nice things about JSR-375 is the fact that it doesn't try to boil the ocean on its first run around the block. The enterprise security specification can be broken down into three key parts.
1. The authentication mechanism Web-based authentication isn't anything new. Every Servlet engine supports basic, digest, form and certificate authentication. But existing APIs don't provide many hooks allowing developers to interact with the process. Doing something as simple as ensuring the authentication happens against a specific user registry isn't possible without digging into non-standard APIs. Furthermore, there is no support for authentication mechanisms other than the aforementioned four. And mechanisms for doing things like firing off callbacks to the application after a user is authenticated don't exist. Many of these issues are addressed by JASPIC, but JASPIC demands a great deal of coding effort while lacking any declarative support that software developers have come to expect after the release of Java 5. The Java EE Security API's HttpAuthenticationMechanism interface, built in JavaBeans containing sensible defaults and annotations such as @RememberMe and @LoginToContinue, greatly simplifies the act of programmatically interacting with authentication services.
2. The Java EE security identity store The identity store is a central part of any Java EE security implementation, but a simple and standard mechanism for interacting with it has always been lacking. To simplify and standardize the process, the Java EE Security API defines an IdentityStore interface and a CredentialValidationResult object, both of which work together to perform the simple tasks of validating a user, providing the caller's unique identifier, and the various groups to which a user belongs. Interfaces for interacting with an LDAP-based identity store or a relational database as an identity store are also defined.A holiday Monday at Hamilton's premier tourist attraction put to the test new arrangements meant to control crowds and congestion and prevent problems for nearby residents.
Thousands came to Spencer Gorge to view Webster and Tews Falls on Victoria Day and many were confused and unaware that the only access to the falls is now via shuttle bus from a nearby store.
Many visitors drove and circled around the neighbourhood before eventually making their way to the Mizener's Antiques and Flea Market, five kilometres away, for the shuttle.
'I thought it would be a just park anywhere kind of deal. It was a little confusing.' - Joshua Yang
Joshua Yang, 26 was one of them.
He decided to make the trip from Toronto when we saw a picture of Dundas Peak on Instagram, last fall.
Getting to the conservation area wasn't as easy as Yang originally thought it would be.
After driving around the falls area, failing to find a place to park, he then discovered the shuttle service that would take him.
"I thought it would be a just park anywhere kind of deal," said Yang, atanding at Webster Falls with his phone out.
"It was a little confusing, a little more people than what I expected."
Shuttle service created to ease local traffic
Due to the growing popularity of Spencer Gorge and Webster Falls, the Hamilton Conservation Authority (HCA) is running a mandatory weekend shuttle service to the area.
Neighbours have been complaining of parked cars overflowing onto their streets and people showing little concern for their properties as they traipse around the areas.
Visitors now have to park at the flea market, at a cost of $10 per car to park and $5 per person to visit.
Joshua Yang from Toronto came to visit Spencer Gorge after seeing a photo on Instagram last fall, to take some pictures for himself. (Laura Clementson )
Kevin Beagle, one of the owners of Think Greensville, the company operating the shuttle service, figured about 2,000 people would have visited the falls on Monday.
This is the second weekend of the shuttle service operation—Beagle thinks it ran smoother than expected, but says there are still too many people driving directly down to waterfalls, having to be redirected up the designated parking area.
I think it's great for individuals to be able to take in the scenery. - Michelle Carey, London resident
"As soon as we can 100 percent prevent cars from dipping down into the Greensville precincts and happy to be redirected up here, I think things will be running as smoothly as anybody could expect," said Beagle.
For Michelle Carey of London, who came to visit for the day, this has been her first time using the shuttle since starting to visit the area for hikes, a couple of years ago.
A mandatory shuttle bus now takes people to Spencer Gorge. Visitors have to park at Mizener’s Antiques and Flea Market, five kilometres away, at a cost of $10 per car to park and $5 per person to visit. (Laura Clementson )
She says this year feels different with the larger amount of people.
"I think it's great for individuals to be able to take in the scenery and what not, but again, it takes away from the actual hiking itself," said Carey.
She thinks that social media may have played a role in the larger numbers.
I think it's only going to get worse so they need to come up with a long-term solution. - Colin De France, local resident
Local concerns
Colin De France has been living on one of the streets people walk down to get to Webster Falls for a year now.
For him and his wife, car traffic on his narrow street was one of their biggest concerns last year due to safety. He's pleased this has been eliminated with the shuttle, but still feels that there could be better ways for people to access the falls.
De France loves seeing all of the smiling faces of the people walking past his property, but admits that it does take away from the tranquility he sought out when moving there.
"It's wonderful to have people visit the falls, at the same time, you still do want some privacy," said De France.
He hasn't had any major issues with visitors, only a few walking onto his property to take a picture, but says some of his neighbours have.
Michelle Carey from London takes her son Declan to Spencer Gorge and Webster Falls for the first time. She saw more people there today than during her previous visits. (Laura Clementson )
"I think it's only going to get worse so they need to come up with a long-term solution that provides people access, but at the same time ensures some safety for the neighbourhood, for the people visiting, and for the protection of the park itself," said De France.
According to Gordon Costie, HCA Director of Conservation Area Services, this past weekend has been a good start to the season.
"For the May long weekend, it's been a marked difference for no cars in the streets, for safety, and for the congestion, and that's what we were trying to do," said Costie.
He says the local residents he's heard from so far have been pleased with the way things have run this weekend.
"This is only the second weekend so there's more we can do and we're going to learn from this experience."JOHN McCAIN spent half of last week in California and it looks like he wasn't just fundraising. The state legislature has just passed a measure allowing for the proportional allotment of electoral votes in the presidential election. There were burblings about this back in the autumn—state Republicans were agitating for a ballot initiative to that effect. But it was thought that Democrats would have no trouble blocking it; Democratic presidential candidates need to win all of California's 55 electoral votes to counter the Republicans' hold on the south and middle America.
Did Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has endorsed Mr McCain, twist some arms? Or was California tired of being overlooked in the general as the candidates lavish their love on Florida and Ohio and Missouri? Either way, this is very bad news for the Democrats. With California going proportional, it is likely that Mr McCain will win anywhere from 15 to 20 electoral votes in the state. That's the equivalent of winning Ohio.
As expected, Mr McCain has called it a "fair move" for a state that is "increasingly shading red." Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, are fuming; they've actually forgotten to fight each other today, although Mr Obama will soon realise that this makes Mrs Clinton's primary victory in California seem rather less important. Also a bit, uh, discomfited is the Democratic National Committee, which issued the following scathing press release.NASHVILLE, Tenn.- A legal debate over whether one member of a same-sex couple has spousal privilege that would shield her from testifying against her partner is at the heart of a capital murder case in politically conservative Kentucky.
NASHVILLE, Tenn.� A legal debate over whether one member of a same-sex couple has spousal privilege that would shield her from testifying against her partner is at the heart of a capital murder case in politically conservative Kentucky.
Geneva Case, 49, does not want to testify in a Louisville court against her partner, Bobbie Jo Clary, 37, who is accused of beating George Murphy, 64, to death with a hammer in 2011 and then stealing his van.
Prosecutors say Case must testify because of her value as a witness, since she heard Clary admit to the slaying and also saw blood on the interior of the victim�s van after the killing.
Clary says Murphy used a hammer to sexually assault her, and she defended herself by hitting him over the head.
Clary is also charged with tampering with evidence to cover up the crime. If convicted, Clary could face the death penalty.
Under Kentucky law, a person cannot be called to testify against his or her spouse. Most states have a similar type of law.
But Kentucky is not among the 13 states that have legalized gay marriage. In 2004, it amended the state Constitution to define marriage as being a union between a man and a woman.
Susan Sommer, an attorney for Lambda Legal, a national legal organization for the protection of gay rights, said she was not familiar with the details of the Kentucky case, but Lambda believes gay couples should have the same legal protections as other married people.
�Spousal privilege is one part of the tremendous bundle of protections for a committed couple that come automatically with marriage,� Sommer said.
Case and Clary were joined in a civil union in 2004 in Vermont. Vermont first allowed civil unions in 2000 but did not legalize same-sex marriage until 2009.
�Kentucky�s marital privilege law does not give Ms. Case the right not to testify in a murder trial,� said Stacy Greive, assistant commonwealth attorney for Jefferson County. �And the reason marital privilege does not apply to Ms. Case in her relationship with the defendant is because it is our opinion and our belief that they do not have a marriage that is recognized under Kentucky law.�
Greive argues that not only is the union not recognized in Kentucky, but the couple has not presented proof they have a valid marriage under Vermont law. �They have a civil union, if you look at Vermont�s statutes, they distinguish between civil unions and marriage,� she said.
Both Clary�s attorney, Angela Elleman, and Case�s attorney, Bryan Gatewood, said the Kentucky marriage amendment is unconstitutional and the pair should be treated like any other married couple.
The attorneys also say they are cautiously optimistic that this case will lead to the amendment being held as unconstitutional, setting a precedent nationwide.Government finance at all levels seems to be unraveling. The city of Stockton, California, declared bankruptcy. North Las Vegas, Nevada, would be in the same boat if the state of Nevada allowed for it. Michigan’s state government has taken over the management of four cities, and the state’s largest city — Detroit — has a $200 million deficit and has made a deal with the governor for the state to have a hand in fixing the city’s financial problems.
On the federal level, the bond rating agencies — S&P and Moody’s — have dared to downgrade the government’s debt.
On the other side of the pond, Greece is an accident that keeps on crashing. Spain’s government is propping up its banks with European Union help, so that these banks can keep prop up the government by buying the government’s bonds — the equivalent of two drunks holding each other up. And the sad fact is Italy, Portugal and possibly France are not far behind.
In a recent interview, Hans-Hermann Hoppe — the author of the forthcoming The Great Fiction: Property, Economy, Society and the Politics of Decline, which can be yours free, along with so much more, if you become a member of the Laissez Faire Club — explained:
“… it is democracy that is causally responsible for the fatal conditions afflicting us now. The number of productive people is constantly decreasing, and the number of people parasitically consuming the income and wealth of this dwindling number of productive people is increasing steadily. This can’t work in the long run.”
Democracy is just a wealth-distribution (and ultimately wealth-destruction) scheme that pits the taxpayers vs. the tax eaters. In the case of Europe, Germany and the Netherlands produce and save, while Greece, Spain, Portugal and the rest consume. Eventually, a bankruptcy will bring to light the truth about democracy, which, Hoppe explains:
“… is nothing more than an especially insidious form of communism, and that the politicians who have wrought this immoral and economic madness and who have thereby enriched themselves personally (never, of course, being liable for the damages they have caused!), are nothing more than a despicable bunch of communist crooks.”
Over here, the day of reckoning for the U.S. may not be far off. Alan Hall, writing for the May edition of The Socionomist, writes that the era of big entitlement spending in America is over. Since the Great Depression, government entitlements have exploded, up 17-fold, as a percentage of total personal income. Hall uses Elliott Wave nomenclature to describe the phenomenon:
“advance in
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promotional poster.
These packs also include prizes for participants, including exclusive Kings of War Art Prints featuring the legendary necromancer Mortibris leading an Undead and Abyssal horde into battle for every player.
And the big one even includes a Golden Blaine Trophy!
Winter’s Flood Campaign Pack
‘With the sudden ending of the Winter’s Age of Ice, the northern plains of Mantica have been flooded, creating islands that the various races must fight for, to ensure their own survival.’
You’ll see Mortibris leading our campaign supplement book Destiny of Kings in February next year, but as part of our organized play programme we’ve also devised a map-based system called Winter’s Flood.
You can download the rules pack from the organized play home page, or get a printed version along with a printed map of the islands, plus certificates, promotional posters and prize support in our Kings of War Campaign Pack.
Playing games is such an important part of our hobby, and retailers are the lifeblood of Mantic Games. With these kits we hope that you can keep playing great games!
Look out for Dungeon Saga in-store and gaming club support coming very soon.
Please let us know what you’d like to see as part of the organised play programme in the comments.
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Tumblr“Imagine if the advent of the atomic era occurred during today’s information age,” writes photographer Clay Lipsky in the introduction to his series, Atomic Overlook. “Tourists would gather to view bomb tests, at the ‘safe’ distances used in the 1950s, and share the resulting cell phone photos online. Broadcast media would regurgitate such visual fodder ad nauseam, bringing new levels of desensitization.” The fact that he’s entirely correct — and that, as he mentions, the atomic threat isn’t as remote in 2012 as many of us seem to believe — gives the humor of the photos, in which we watch stereotypical tourists as they watch and photographic mushroom clouds, a dark, political edge. Click through to see some of our favorite pieces from Atomic Overlook, which we discovered via Faith is Torment, and visit Lipsky’s website for more of his work.
Photo credit: Clay LipskyThis article is over 1 year old
Exclusive: Photographs of burned houses corroborates Guardian report on destruction of homes by the army
New satellite images taken above the Myanmar village of Tula Toli have revealed the charred remains of the settlement, confirming a Guardian report earlier this month that detailed its demolition based on eyewitness accounts.
More than a dozen Rohingya from Tula Toli described a blood-soaked operation by Myanmar’s armed forces on 30 August that killed scores of civilians, emptied the village and set their wood-built homes ablaze.
Aung San Suu Kyi breaks silence over Myanmar's Rohingya crisis: 'We too are concerned' Read more
High-resolution photos, taken on Saturday when monsoon rain clouds briefly cleared for the first time in weeks, show significant destruction to the village, according to an analysis by Amnesty International, which has tracked the conflict from space.
“The destruction visible in the imagery is consistent with recent burning, most clearly characterised by damage to surrounding vegetation,” Amnesty said of Tula Toli, officially known in Myanmar by its Burmese name, Min Gyi.
The United Nations’ top human rights official has referred to the violence against the minority Muslim Rohingya as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”. The conflict is steeped in Islamophobic hatred that has become widespread in Myanmar.
Satellite images show that only the south-west corner of Tula Toli appears intact. When shown a map earlier this month, Rohingya refugees told the Guardian this part of the village was inhabited by ethnic Rakhine people, who, like most in Myanmar, are Buddhists.
Before and after: satellite images of Tula Toli Before and after: satellite images of Tula Toli
Residents told the Guardian that soldiers and local Rakhine Buddhist mobs stole valuables from Rohingya days before the attack. They said an early-morning campaign by the army killed dozens. One man, Petam Ali, said his elderly grandmother was decapitated and burned. Others said soldiers drowned babies and toddlers in the river that surrounds the village.
Massacre at Tula Toli: Rohingya recall horror of Myanmar army attack Read more
“These pictures are further damning evidence of the horror that the Rohingya are enduring at the hands of the Myanmar military,” said Kate Allen, Director of Amnesty International UK.
“Aung Sun Suu Kyi cannot continue to ignore the brutal truth that people are being indiscriminately slaughtered and their homes destroyed by the security forces.”
Journalists have not been permitted access to the area and the government has not responded to requests for comment.
The Rohingya have been systematically persecuted for decades by the government, which, contrary to historical evidence, regards them as illegal “Bengali” migrants from Bangladesh.
The latest wave of bloodshed, which is the deadliest so far, ramped up after the army launched a huge counteroffensive in retribution for guerrilla-style ambushes on 25 August by an emergent Rohingya militant group.
Nearly 400,000 people – just less than half of Rakhine’s Rohingya population – have poured into Bangladesh, fleeing what Amnesty describes as a mass-scale scorched-earth campaign across the north of the state.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Satellite image of fire damage in Tula Toli Photograph: Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe 2017, NextView License
Many Rohingya had already escaped. Communal clashes with Buddhists in Rakhine prompted 140,000 to leave their homes in 2012. Thousands have since died either at sea or in brutal jungle camps run by people smugglers.
Buddhist nationalists, led by firebrand monks, have operated a long campaign calling for Rohingya to be pushed out of the country. The government already restricts their citizenship rights and access to services.
The fighting has displaced a further 30,000 ethnic Rakhine Buddhists as well as Hindus, while armed Rohingya, called the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), have been accused of equally cruel sectarian attacks.
The New-York based advocacy group, Human Rights Watch, said on Tuesday that satellite imagery showed the near total destruction of 214 villages in Rakhine state since operations began.
Amnesty has detected at least 80 large-scale fires in inhabited areas across northern Rakhine.
“A review of the surrounding area reveals that the fire damage is not confined to Min Gyi,” it said. “Multiple villages in the area show the same destruction observable as in Min Gyi.”Not to be confused with Fornication
Formication Specialty Psychiatry
Formication is the sensation that resembles that of small insects crawling on (or under) the skin. It is one specific form of a set of sensations known as paresthesias, which also include the more common prickling, tingling sensation known as "pins and needles". Formication is a well documented symptom, which has numerous possible causes. The word is derived from formica, the Latin word for ant.
Formication may sometimes be experienced as feelings of itchiness, tingling, pins and needles, burning, or even pain. When formication is perceived as itchiness, it may trigger the scratch reflex, and because of this, some people who experience the sensation are at risk of causing skin damage through excessive scratching.
In some instances, static electricity can attract particulates to the skin and can also cause body hair to move, giving a sensation like insects crawling over the skin.[1] However, in many cases no external trigger creates the sensation.
In rare cases, individuals become convinced that the sensation is due to the presence of real insects on or under the skin. In these cases, patients have what is known as delusional parasitosis. They believe that their skin is inhabited by, or under attack by, small insects or similar parasites, despite repeated reassurances from physicians, pest control experts, and entomologists.[2]
Causes [ edit ]
Causes of formication include normal states such as onset of menopause (i.e. hormone withdrawal). Other causes are medical conditions such as pesticide exposure,[3] mercury poisoning, diabetic neuropathy, skin cancer, syphilis, Lyme disease or herpes zoster (shingles).[2] Formication can be a result of stimulant intoxication (e.g. methamphetamines, cocaine)[4] or alcohol withdrawal in alcoholics (i.e. delirium tremens), and is often accompanied by visual hallucinations of insects (formicanopia).[2] It can also occur as a symptom of benzodiazepine withdrawal, withdrawal from medication such as SSRI/SNRI antidepressants and tramadol; and as a side effect of opioid analgesics.
History [ edit ]
Formication is etymologically derived from the Latin word formica, meaning "ant", precisely because of this similarity in sensation to that of crawling insects. The term has been in use for several hundred years. In the 1797 edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica, a description of the condition raphania includes the symptom:
...a formication, or sensation as of ants or other small insects creeping on the parts. [5]
Described again in an instructional text from 1890:
A variety of itching, often encountered in the eczema of elderly people, is formication; this is described as exactly like the crawling of myriads of animals over the skin. It is probably due to the successive irritation of nerve fibrils in the skin. At times patients who suffer from it will scarcely be persuaded that it is not due to insects. Yielding to the temptation to scratch invariably makes the disease worse.[6]
See also [ edit ]On December 28, 2009, the members of the band Avenged Sevenfold found out about Jimmy “The REV” Sullivans death several hours prior to the rest of the world. The thing that is most important for any one to understand about Jimmy’s loss is not that Jimmy was simply the drummer for Avenged Sevenfold. He was not just their friend either he was their brother. Most of the band had known him almost all of their lives and he definitely played a major roll in their lives as well. For them at that moment not only did time stop their world stopped too. The band and music in general didn’t even exist to them anymore. It’s importance lost entirely to the mind numbling pain they now were enduring. We can only imagine the depths of their shock and grief. “When something like that happens, you can’t think straight. You stop caring about music, you stop caring about all that. It wasn’t just like loosing a band member; it was like loosing a brother, it was like loosing a best friend, and like loosing your fucking spouse, and like loosing your dream; all that in the same moment. Just really the most absolute definition of devastation.” -Zacky Vengeance-
Avenged Sevenfold’s waking nightmare began actually the night previous. The bands close friend and merchandise dealer, Matt Berry, whom had gotten married on Christmas Day and was now enjoying his reception with family and friends from past and present. It of course was a celebratory event. The reception was held at a park not to far from M. Shadows house as I understand it. As time and the night passed someone brought a couple of kegs to the event. Someone mentioned taking them to M. Shadows house as was customary it appears but he had to decline because he had a 6 a.m golf date the next day and had to drive a couple of hours away from his home. He knew driving that distance with a hangover wasn’t what he should do. The rest of the guys really wasn’t into hanging out either that night. So after everything was discussed M. Shadows decided it was time to leave as did the rest of the guys with the exception of The REV who loved to party and was thoroughly enjoying himself which was nothing unusual for him to do. The last the guys saw of him he was happily enjoying himself with friends. “Jimmy was having a great time, playing piano, singing, like people are sitting there and just watching him, and he’s getting crazy, big beard and just playing with five drinks around him ‘cause that’s how he rolled. And, like, six hours later he’s dead.–M. Shadows–
Prior to Jimmy’s death the band had been working on their fifth album. To begin with they had decided they would write a concept album based on the problems with the world and how it effect todays teens. Jimmy had tackled the album with extreme excitement. "Jimmy was writing more on this record than he had ever written. His mind was just flowing. He had all these ideas.He was just on fire.” -Zacky Vengeance-
According to M. Shadows by mid December the album and demos were complete with the exception of the lyrics which weren’t finished yet. The guys planned on going into the studio to start the recording process following the holidays. “Jimmy completed the most amazing music, finished the fucking record, and he left so many amazing lyrics saying goodbye to the world.” -Synyster Gates-
In retrospect, the band members have a feeling Jimmy on some kind of congnitive level knew his time was limited. Maybe not a conscious knowledge of it but somethings stand out in his actions prior to his death that gives the guys pause. For instance, just three days prior to his death Jimmy gave M. Shadows the demo for “Death’ which later become "Fiction”. When he handed it to him he told him he thought he had put all he had left in him into that song. His unrelenting drive for this album also stands out to them as being a little beyond the norm. He obviously had a gift for the world that he wanted finished and shared. But even prior to that date Zacky Vengeance was having a cocktail party around his birthday at his home. He said Jimmy didn’t even drink anything that night an almost unheard of thing for him to do. It appears Jimmy knew Zacky wanted him to slow down on his drinking and maybe as a sort of gift to him stayed sober for him that particular night, however that’s not his only possible gift that night. Just a few seconds after Jimmy left Zacks that night Jimmy called back to tell Zack he had left his jacket hanging in his house. It was raining so Zack asked him to turn around and come back and get it. Instead Jimmy told him naw man and when Zack told him he would bring it to him tomorrow he again refused. “It’s like he knew, cause I always loved that jacket and he knew that I always loved it. And there his favorite jacket is sitting on my coat rack right now. I haven’t touched it.” -Zacky Vengeance-
As far as predicting his lifes end it appears Jimmy had done it even further in advance than anyone could have imagined. According to Synyster Gates Jimmy had communicated to Syns dad when Jimmy was only 15 yrs old that he would be in a famous rock band and he would die before he was 30. “Yeah he fucking planned it all, that crazy fuck, Knew he was gonna be gone before 30. He told my dad that he was fucking out. Jimmy told him I know two things. I’m gonna be in a famous rock band and I’m gonna die before I’m 30. He told my dad that at 15.” -Synyster Gates-
Obviously, Jimmy had hopes and plans for the future just like we all do. Excellent proof of that is according to Zacky, Jimmy had literally just a week prior to his passing undergone LASIK surgery. He was greatly enjoying looking at the world for the first time with his own beautiful blue eyes. “Jimmy was so excited because he had just had LASIK surgery. He could finally see instead of having to wear contacts or glasses. And it was weird seeing him without glasses, all bright-eyed and stoked that he could see.” -M. Shadows-
Now that Jimmy could see with his new eyes according to M. Shadows Jimmy even gave him a somewhat awkward but amusing compliment just the same. “He came to me, like, "You know, Matt. I haven’t seen you in quite a few years.” And then he said. “You’re a really good-looking guy.” I’m like Dude are you fucking kidding me?“
-M.Shadows-
According to an early interview (One of the first interviews after the band broke their silence) M. Shadows commented that at about 1 pm the next day he was just finishing his golf game when he received the news from Valary (His wife) about Jimmy’s death. He went on to explain how he was crying, talking to Jimmy’s mom Barbara whom was also crying, while he was trying to get home. He said he literally cried the entire 2 hour trip home and when he finally arrived home there was probably 75 people there and he understandably wasn’t up for company.
Also, going by what M. Shadows has said it appears that early on he started feeling guilty about not just bringing the kegs over to his house and partying. When the band did the July Kerrang interview (6 months after Jimmy’s passing) this is what M. Shadows had to say about his feelings. "If the keg had come to my house Jimmy wouldn’t have been elsewhere doing whatever he was doing. He’d have been with me and all of our friends and we’d have been able to help him if anything happened. But I was like I’m to tired and then no-one wanted to hang out, and he went off on his own did his own thing without any of our close freinds and then…what happened. It was just insane to me…insane.” -M. Shadows-
Although I can’t find any references in any publication or taped interviews on how Synyster Gates or Zacky Vengeance found out about Jimmy’s passing I do know M. Shadows called Johnny Christ that afternoon to break the news. Johnny expressed how he was in shock in the all A7X Revolver edition. He said he grabbed his shit and headed over to M. Shadows house as fast as he could go. This was the beginning of the guys coming together and staying together for at least 2 straight weeks. “I grabbed my shit and just headed over to his house and that was the first day of all of us coming together and crying on each other’s shoulders. For two, maybe three straight weeks, it was just very surreal. We didn’t want to leave the house and we didn’t want to leave each other. We were inconsoleable.” -Johnny Christ-
This is what Synyster Gates had to say bout those very dark early days: “For fucking days we camped out in each others houses. We basically gutted the living rooms and camped out literally brought mattresses down and just camped out with, like 20 or 30 people. Some people who weren’t staying the night came in the morning and hung out for the afternoon. Jimmy’s family came over and shit.”-Synyster Gates-
Interestingly, it was Jimmy whom helped the guys to lift the crushing weight of sorrow off them just enough to catch their breath again and begin the healing process. “Somebody–I don’t remember who–we were sitting around a table, and somebody had the balls to tell a Jimmy story. One of the thousands upon thousands. We all kind of laughed a little bit. -Johnny Christ-
"After his death, nobody told the same story twice and nobody stopped telling funny stories of this guy for days. the fucking stories just never ended. The healing process was just so expedited because everybody just fucking laughed the whole time. We would never want to ever show anybody that time, because when we were together we were just guiltily laughing the whole time, celebrating his life.” -Synyster Gates-
On New Years Eve the guys were really having a hard time seeing people celebrating the New Year. After all they were only 3 days out from Jimmy’s loss. M. Shadows discribes how he came to realize the need for the band to at least finish the album for Jimmy. “So we go outside and it’s the first blue moon we had in 10 years and it looked like an eye looking down on us and I was like, Fuck man, Dude, We need to finish the record for Jimmy, and everyone’s like, Dude, we don’t want to talk about it and I was like Dude we have to finish the record. Come on. We have to.” -M. Shadows-
“As we started to talk about it, we started to realize that we have a full record and a lot of these songs–I mean, Jimmy’s had a part in every song, and a lot of the songs are 100 percent his. He probably wrote about 60% of this record himself.” -Johnny Christ-
“We just talked and were like, "Do you want to finish this record?” We had been hanging out with Jimmy’s family and they were like, “Please you just have to put this out.” We were getting all of this feedback from everybody and putting it into perspective. If it was one of us would we want the others to carry on?“ And the answer was "Fuck yes.” -Synyster Gates-
I think once we could think straight and once we could realize, This album’s written, Jimmy wrote every fucking day–more than he’s ever written because he wanted people to hear this. And Jimmy’s not playing on the album but he wouldn’t care–he wanted people to hear what he had written, the music that he’d written. The actual perfoming, he couldn’t give a shit about that his entire life. He just wanted people to hear him as an artist. He left us a gift, he left the whole fucking world with a gift, and it was basically up to us to show the world what were made of.“ -Zacky Vengeance-
After the decision was made to complete the album in Jimmy’s honor and to further his legacy, the guys adopted the matra baby steps which basically meant one day at a time and one decision at a time. Nothing rushed. At this point, their only focus was the album every other aspect was pushed back as far as touring and even at that time if the band would continue after the album was complete.
Jimmy’s family gave the guys a huge push in finishing the album as well. They totally endorsed its completion. They wanted everyone to hear what their son and brother had created for the world. It was Jimmy’s sister Katie who suggested the guys get all of Jimmy’s favorite drummers to play on the album. But the guys knew how much of a musical genious Jimmy was on the drums and that not all of his favorite drummers could attempt his style and technique. They really wanted whoever did the recording to duplicate Jimmy’s sound as close as humanly possible. Since Mike Portnoy of then Dream Theatre had sent his condolences to Jimmy’s family as well as to the guys he was the first person they thought of. Jimmy’s style is as close to Mikes as any other drummer that they could think of. Mike had been someone who Jimmy had looked up to since he was a kid and Mike had largely influenced Jimmy’s style.
So the guys set up a secret meeting with Mike at NAMM. They kept it secret simply to keep the rumor mill from turning. They all went to dinner together, had a discussion about the album, gave him some demo’s, and the next day he called M. Shadows all excited about doing the album. "He called me the next day flipping on the demos. He’s like "Dude, this is going to be unbelievable.” -M. Shadows-
“I think having his idol play on his stead….I mean, hopefully, he’s up there seeing Mike portnoy’s approach to his music. I think that would just be an incredible gift for him.” -Synyster Gates-
“Mike was very humble to work with. He was very awesome. He basically came up and said. "This is your guys album. This is Jimmy’s record. I’ll play it. I’m your puppet.” He’s a huge hero in our book.“ -Johnny Christ-
"This album is not, like, the new Avenged Sevenfold without Jimmy. It feels like he played on it. Drumming-wise, Jimmy had written all the drum parts. And Portnoy did a really good job of channeling what Jimmy was doing. So this feels like our last record with Jimmy, even though he didn’t have to do any of the hard work in the studio.” -Zacky Vengeance-
Several weeks prior to Jimmy’s passing the band had decided on a producer. They had talked to many different ones and they for one reason or another just didn’t fit. When they met the “Hip Hop” producer, Mike Elizondo, they were impressed. He knew more about metal than the metal producers did. They were impressed with his muscianship, knowledge about tones, and he could play pretty much any instrument. He was a song writer all be it writing with more of a country flair but even better he was a fan of the band. He greatly appealed to them because he was out of the box so to speak just like Avenged Sevenfold had always been. The band had been working with him about 8 weeks prior to Jimmy’s passing and by then he felt like family to them so it made it a little easier going into the studio to do the record with him because he had an understanding of the gravity and pain of Jimmy’s loss. On a somewhat comical note, Mike Elizondo waited until the record was complete to tell A7X that this was his first full length record he had ever done. Prior to doing “Nightmare” he had only produced singles. “The Hip Hop producer knew more about metal and about like old school thrash and like old Megadeth records and tearing apart Metallica records and Iron Maiden records and us than these Rock producers did. So to us it was like this guys out side of the box which is what our bands always done anyways. We felt like he could really give us a focus on this album.” -M. Shadows- Fuse TV Interview August 2010
When Winston Churchill was asked would history be kind to him he said; “It will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.” The day before Jimmy’s death he quoted that very famous line. Now his friends/bandmates were determined to make that happen for Jimmy through the album he was so proudly writing before his death. While Jimmy had written by Johnny Christ’ estimate somewhere in the neighborhood of 60% of the music and quite a bit of the lyrics there was still alot of writing to do especially now that the band had changed the theme of the album to reflect Jimmy. They had written “Nightmare” and “Danger line” before his death so they kept them because Jimmy really liked “Nightmare”.
Synyster with a little help from M. Shadows wrote “So Far Away” which is something he started when his grandfather died. Syn says he actually has a recording of him and Jimmy singing the chorus at 3 am totally drunk one morning.
“Fiction” was originally called “Death” by Jimmy, and was started by Jimmy and Syn (Syn wrote the piano part and Jimmy wrote some of the lyrics and melody), as a Pinkly Smooth song that they never finished. M. Shadows had to finish the lyrics which would be perfectly fine with Jimmy because he often had the band finish his songs after he had written the skeleton for them. “I always felt comfortable stepping all over his stuff, 'cause that’s what he wanted. He’d take me aside all the time, like, "Oh, I’ve got all these ideas, but I just can’t….You guys Avenged Sevenfoldify it.” So I felt comfortable doing that.“ -M. Shadows-
The chorus on the song "Fiction” is Jimmy’s actual vocals recorded as a demo scratch.
“When fiction came to fruition in the studio as a duet between Jimmy and M. Shadows we were more than thirilled. It’s a very special and magical moment on the record.” -Synyster Gates-
“I mean like when does that ever happen in history? A guy dies, pretty much pedicts his death in a song, and says goodbye in the song, and the song gets released with his vocal on it and sings a lyric that’s supposed to be a demo scratch.” -M. Shadows-
The days preceeding Jimmy’s death he did alot of screaming and his voice was scratchy because of it. He had also been nursing a pretty bad hangover most of the time but this particular day for some reason his voice was good and came out as you hear it on the version of “Fiction” recorded on the album. “But that one day, it was really fucking cool. Just the way he sings it is so eerie and not monotone but just not phonetic. It’s just kind of mumbly and really droney. It’s pretty fucking cool. So definitely when we revisited it, it was like, this guys a fucking nutcase. I can’t believe we have this and we gotta keep it.” -Synyster Gates-
For a further breakdown of the meaning behind other songs on “Nightmare” as well as how they may relate to Jimmy click here.
M. Shadows says when they decided to go through and complete the remains of the album Jimmy had left behind he wrote and rewrote and rewrote some more. He just didn’t feel there were enough words to express how much Jimmy meant to them and the level of pain his loss had caused them all. He also said he would literally take himself back to the day he found out and sit and look at pictures of Jimmy to help in his writing process. “I just wanted it to be perfect. Nothing seemed to satisfy what I wanted to get across. You just can’t find enough words. You don’t want to sound chiche.” -M. Shadows-
Going into the studiio wasn’t any easier. “The recording process was the hardest thing the band had ever done. We still felt numb, traumatized, fragile, overwhelmed. There were tears and breakdowns and outbursts of anger, at times each of us wondered whether we could get through the process.” -Zacky Vengeance-
They chose not to film or allow filming of their experiences in the studio because they really felt strongly that they wanted and needed their privacy. They knew their every move was being looked at in fine detail. If they felt like laughing they could feel at ease doing so and if they wanted to cry they had that freedom. “When we were making the album we didn’t want any photographs documenting the recording. We didn’t want fans to see us happy, we didn’t want fans to see us sad, we didn’t want anybody to be able to judge us when we had to do something that we needed to do to carry on a legacy. It was too much shit for us to deal with, but we finished the mother fucker for him. We did it for you, Jimmy.” -Synyster Gates-
The band really didn’t want to have their promotion photo’s done because it depicted them as just the 4 of them now and that was very painful to see and it basically made it official they were now a quartet. They really didn’t originally want to even have a music video done for “Nightmare”. But Larry Jacobson/managment had other ideas. He contacted Wayne Isham and explained the situation. Wayne had done other video’s with A7X most notably would probably be the “Seize the Day” video. The guys felt at ease with Wayne and considered him a member of the A7X family.
“We never wanted to make a video: The director, Wayne Isham, talked us into it. He was a good friend of Jimmy’s and ours and he came up with the concept. It was strange when he made the pitch as Jacob’s ladder was probably Jimmy’s favorite film.” -M. Shadows-
“We weren’t too into the idea of doing a video. It was one of those tough days where we were like, "Well, we’re officially a four-member band on tape. It’s on record now….”-Synyster Gates-
Wayne contacted M. Shadows in Mexico while M. Shadows and the rest of the guys were down there attending Synyster Gates marriage to Michelle. Wayne pitched his idea to him over the phone. His idea being to make a Jacob’s Ladderesque video. Which basically consist of a mental hospital and its horrors. When Wayne mentioned Jacob’s Ladder to M. Shadows he realized it was the perfect idea since that was probably Jimmy’s favorite movie of all time. After conversating with the rest of the band they decided to move ahead with the idea and filmed the video in Los Angeles at the Linda Vista hospital which had been abandoned for many years and is considered to have paranormal activity in it by paranormal researchers. They decided to add references to Jimmy all the way through the video. “I didn’t want people to think we were just doing a music video and carrying on as normal. I wanted to remind everyone that we’re still going through the hardest fucking time of our lives and to do that we threw the drum set in their faces, this is fucking real. Jimmy’s not with us, we’re not just moving on, it’s not business as usual. It’s very real reality. I saw people in tears when it hit them, because it’s so creepy. And then, Oh Shit! There’s Jimmy’s drums….” -ZackyV.-
With the album complete and ready to go the guys came to realize how much they needed to get out there on the road and present this album to the fans. They wanted more than anything for all the fans to hear Jimmy’s work. So a tour schedule was created with the first few dates kind of looked at as a test to see if they really could handle being up there without Jimmy. The band had been asked to headline the inaugural Uproar Festival and they agreed to it because they were friends of the band. The lineup also was with other bands they considered friends which they felt helped them to feel more at ease. But first the guys had to take that giant leap out on the stage again. They took it in Montreal Canada July 25, 2010 just 2 days before the album was to be released. With the strongest love and well wishing vibes that any fanbase can offer a band whether they were present at the concert or not, Avenged Sevenfold along with Mike Portnoy preformed that night to a welcoming crowd. As a fanbase there was a collective sigh of relief and grief all at the same time. For the band there was nerves and just the “lets get this over with” type feelings. Originally M. Shadows had this to say about the prospect of touring in the May 22, 2010
Kerrang:
“I really don’t know what I’m going to do at this point. It’s really up in the air as to whether I’m even going to be able to walk onstage at this point. We’ve got a few shows booked and I’m really hoping that over the next few months, I can overcome what I think it’s going to be like on stage. Right now it doesn’t seem like a very pleasant thing. But we decided as a band that we’re going to tour this record because we want to give people a chance to learn abput it and to understand a little of Jimmy through it. We’re purely touring on that mindset, we’re not thinking, "Oh, we’ve got a new record so we should tour.” I’m clearly not emotionally ready for that, We’re a long way from going out there and saying “Let’s go dominate.” Because right now that just doesn’t seem important to us. I couldn’t do it right now if I had a show tomorrow. I’d cancel it. By July, we’ll do some rehearsals that will hopefully mean we’ll feel ready to step on the stage. I think if we didn’t do that, this would just get worse and worse. So we’re going to force ourselves to do some things we hope might help.“
And in hindsight he had this to say in the October 2010 Hammer:
"20,000 People in Montreal. It was very nerve-wracking for all of us. What happened was that when "Nightmare” started it was so loud from the kids that we all felt a lot better. They all knew it was our first show back, there were signs. there were kids chanting “Rev” So it was like, OK. It made us feel better because they weren’t expecting greatness, they had context for that first show back, let’s just get this over with. And it was emotional and it was rough. you have all these nerves and you’re thinking about all these things on the first night, you know. What are we doing?“
JIMMY STORIES
The subway hand stand:
M. Shadows told this story on Octane Radio during one of the bands first interviews at the beginning of the promotion of their new album "Nightmare”. He chose this one because he was in New York during the interview and the story occured in New York as well.
One of the first times the band was in New York M. Shadows, Val and Jimmy decided to take a ride on the subway because they don’t have subways in Huntington Beach, California where they grew up. They wanted to experience riding on one just to see what it was all about. Pretty much as soon as they got on the subway car Jimmy said he wanted to do a hand stand. M. Shadows told him not to because there was to many people on there and he would hit somebody. Jimmy insisted he would do it quickly and nothing would happen it would all be okay. They kind of argued back and forth about it a couple of times but Jimmy’s mind was made up. Well there happened to be a dude riding the subway with them who was loaded down with grocery bags. When Jimmy proceeded to do his hand stand he hit the dude with the groceries ending up with a bag of groceries hooked to his foot. So here was Jimmy in the middle of the subway car standing oh his hands with a grocery bag hanging from the bottom of his shoe. The rest of the groceries flew all around. M. Shadows and Val began picking up groceries helping the dude get them all back appologizing profusely.
The Superman Punch:
M. Shadows told this one on another interview.
While the guys were overseas in couple of years ago there was this dude who seemed to have issues with M. Shadows. He followed him into the bathroom giving him shit. M. Shadows told him to get out of his face and he headed out back of the bar where Val and Jimmy were. The dude followed him out back and started running his mouth to Val and being rude to her. Well Jimmy obviously had enough because he literally flew over top of Val and hit the dude in the face with a superman punch. The cops showed up and chased Jimmy for a long time around in circles before they finally caught him and he was arrested.
All Choked up:
On stage recently M. Shadows shared this little tidbit. He said there was only one time he could remember Jimmy to miss a beat in a song. He said this one time all the sudden Jimmy quit playing and when he looked around to see what was up Jimmy was passed out cold on his kit. It seems the guy who controlled the smoke machine had gotten a little over zealous with its thickness and Jimmy had passed out because he couldn’t breath.
The Homeless Guy:
M. Shadows again shared this story.
In October
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pointed out that the one reason people go for illegal adoption is because legal agencies “trouble them a lot”.
Criticising CARA for not taking proactive steps, she said “I get two to three complaints every day about CARA and in many cases you have not interacted, especially in Jharkhand. You do not interact with your judges, or bureaucrats. You just sit there”.
The minister also accused some agencies of not preferring foreign over Indian parents.
“Many of you won’t give (the child) to Indians, you wait for a foreigner. I have zero tolerance for anybody who denies adoption. In our new act, CARA will have a lot of power. One of its powers is to remove SARA (State Adoption Resource Authority), to remove adoption agencies, to completely ban them,” he said.
The minister also said that a foster care scheme will be launched for orphan children under which families will be paid by the government to keep them.
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“Foster care means those children whom people don’t want to adopt but they don’t mind keeping them in their houses. Government should pay the money and orphanages check them with the parents and there would be proper training when the scheme starts,” she said.A 12-year-old girl who was bashed online for posting pictures of her big game kills is speaking out to defend her love of hunting.
Aryanna Gourdin sparked outrage last week when she posted pictures of the animals she killed on African safari with her dad, including a giraffe, a zebra and a wildebeest.
Those pictures quickly incited a firestorm online between commenters who called the girl a'murderer' and those who defended the girl's right to hunt.
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Aryanna Gourdin, 12 (left), and her dad Eli (right) are speaking out to defend hunting after the girl was critiqued online for posting pictures of her big game kills
The outrage started last week, after Aryanna started posting pictures from her hunting trip to South Africa with her father
Mr Gourdin said that the giraffe his daughter killed was actually a 'problem' animal area, 'eating up valuable resources other giraffes need to survive'.
In an interview with Good Morning America on Wednesday, Aryanna said she's not bothered by the backlash, and that no one's opinion could ever drive her to give up the hobby she loves.'
It's something I cherish and enjoy and I want other people to see what I experienced,' the teen said.
'I would never back down from hunting. I am a hunter and no matter what people say to me, I'm never going to stop,' she added.
Aryanna's dad Eli also appeared on the show and said that the girafft his daughter killed was actually a 'problem' animal in the area, 'eating up valuable resources other giraffes need to survive'.
He added that the meat from the animals they killed will now go to feeding 800 orphans in the local village.
The Cato, Utah teen received a mix response from the tens of thousands who commented on her pictures, ranging from death threats to words of support from fellow hunters
The pre-teen called the trip to South Africa 'one of my dream hunts for sure'
As for the haters, Mr Gourdin said they should mind their own business.
'I don't tell anybody else how to raise their children,' he said.
He added: 'We're proud to be hunters and we'll never apologize for being a hunter.'
The father and daughter have been going on hunts together since Aryanna was just seven years old.
She called the trip to South Africa last week 'one of my dream hunts for sure'.
Aryanna received death threats when she started posting pictures from the hunt online.
An image with a giraffe earned the most aggressive comments, including: 'literally hope someone skins you';'makes me wanna kill her'; 'do the world a favor and kill yourself already before someone else makes you disappear'.
The meet killed during their hunt will go to feet 800 orphans in the local area, Mr Gourdin said
'I would never back down from hunting. I am a hunter and no matter what people say to me, I'm never going to stop,' Aryanna said
Mr Gourdin said the haters should mind their own business. 'I don't tell anybody else how to raise their children,' he said
Those who champion the young girl say she is helping with conservation efforts as well as donating the meat from the kills to local orphanages in Africa
Aryanna's prey also includes animals native to North America including deer and bears
In this photo Aryanna poses with a black bear she appears to have shot near her home in Utah
Others have said the girl is heartless and hope that she will become infamous for the hobby.
'Thanks for reminding me that stupid people still exist.. Please consider using that thing in your head next time, that what we call A BRAIN,' one person wrote.
Another wrote: 'Another piece of s***. Everybody make her famous.'Features: When the headset connect with your pc computer, we suggest that using 3.5mm jack cable(1 to 2). Earmuffs use new generation PU leather, more skin-intimacy; reduce sweat and heat, more suitable for long time wearing. Nickel plated plugs: It can not only ensure the better signal transmission and reduce the loss of signal, and also achieve antioxidant, increase the electromagnetic ring, can effectively reduce the radiation and avoid the interference of the electromagnetic wave. Specifications: Loudhailer diameter: 40mm(NdFeB) Frequency range: 20-20.000HZ Sensitivity: 112±3Db at 1 kHz Impedance: 24 Ohm at 1KHz Max Input power: 30Mw Mic Sensitivity:-54dB+/-3dB Mic Frequency Range: 50-10KHz Mic Impedance: =2.2KO at 1 kHz Cable length: Approx1.0m Approximate Weight: 200g Use Sades SA921 3.5mm headset with your PC computer has Dual Mic/Audio 3.5mm jacks. This Free headset Splitter Adapter Compatible with various laptops/notebook that have a seperate mic and audio ports Package included: 1 * headset SA921 with retail packing box 1 * 3.5mm jack cable 1 to 2 1 * Xbox360 converntor NOTE: SADES SA921 GAMING HEADSET IS COMPATIBLE WITH PS4,PC,NOTEBOOK,PHONES SA921 gaming headset only supports New Version XBOX One controller which has a headset audio 3.5mm jack for connect.If your xbox one controller is not the newest one which doesn't have a headset 3.5mm jack, it will need another XBOX ONE adaptor or will not work.1.When connecting to Xbox 360 controller with the included xbox 360 converntor, the headset is for talking with teammates in the Game Battle,cannot hear the game background sound. 2.If you want to hear the sound from the game,you need to have an additional audio adapter or connect it to TV(if your TV has headphones output).Your 401(k) may soon read “Made in Germany.”
The Germans are about to buy the symbol of American capitalism — the New York Stock Exchange — in a spectacular deal that could end Wall Street’s claim to being the financial center of the world.
The Big Board’s parent company, NYSE Euronext, announced yesterday it is in advanced talks to be bought by Deutsche Boerse, the owner of the German stock exchange, based in Frankfurt.
The combined megamarket would be the stock-trading home to companies worldwide worth about $15 trillion.
But what that means to New York — and to investors concerned about higher trading fees — remains unclear.
The basic outlines of the deal were hammered out in recent days and were to be announced next Tuesday, before rumors about it forced NYSE Euronet’s hand yesterday.
Among key points of the deal:
* Deutsche Boerse would own 59 to 60 percent of the company.
* It would maintain headquarters in both New York and Frankfurt.
* The chief executive of NYSE Euronet, Duncan Niederauer, would be its CEO with Deutsche Boerse chief executive Reto Francioni its chairman.
But other details — even the name of the new company and whether it will retain the iconic NYSE trading floor — have yet to be worked out or revealed.
Officials said that by combining forces, the new company would save $400 million annually. It would also be able to compete with the CME Group, which runs the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
“The real motivation here is really about competing with the CME Group,” said Larry Tabb, CEO of the Tabb Group.
The deal would have to be approved by stockholders and pass regulatory muster.
It faces a challenge in Washington, where members of Congress are likely to object to foreign ownership of a company with so much influence over the US economy. “It’s going to get interesting,” Tabb said.
NYSE Euronet cautioned that it wasn’t a done deal but also hailed it as a history-making event.
“This transaction creates a group that is both a world leader in derivatives and risk management and the premier global venue for capital raising,” it said.
Deutsche Boerse tried twice before in the last three years to buy the NYSE but negotiations collapsed, reportedly over issues like where the new company would be headquartered.
The Germans are believed to have renewed talks late last year as the world’s financial markets recovered from the 2008 financial meltdown and as rumors of rival exchange mergers spread.
Yesterday’s announcement came just hours after disclosure of another megadeal: The London Stock Exchange Group, which has a market value of nearly $4 billion, said it was buying Canada’s TMX Group, worth $3 billion. TMX Group owns the Toronto and Montreal stock exchanges.
Curiously, both of the new mega-firms are claiming to be the world’s biggest exchanges.
NYSE Euronet said its new venture would be “the world’s largest exchange operator” in terms of “revenues and profits.” The London-TMX would be the largest in terms of the number of companies traded on it, more than 6,700.
[email protected], the other day, after picking my son up from school, I stopped in at the local hardware store to pick up something or other, maybe a sack of nuts few screws. The nuts screws would have been cheaper at Lowe’s or Home Depot, but I try to shop local when I can. That is, I am happy to pay a higher price for the satisfaction of feeling like I’m supporting the local economy rather than a big corporation, for a sense that the employees are well paid and well treated (whether true or not), and with the idea that sometimes it’s really convenient to have a local hardware store, and it would be a shame if it went out of business and I had to drive over to Lowe’s or Home Depot every time my nut sack screw drawer was empty.
Now, as often happens when you run an errand after picking your son up at school, we were in the middle of shopping when he announced that he needed to use the bathroom. So, I found one of the very nice employees there and asked if he could, you know, use the bathroom.
He said no. More specifically, he said that normally he would let us use it, but the assistant manager was in the store that day, and he was worried that the assistant manager would tell the owner, who had a policy that customers could not use the bathroom. He apologized, and recommended that we go across the street to Dunkin’ Donuts, where they have nice, clean bathrooms, and they don’t give you a hard time, even if you come in to use them without buying anything.
Okay, so what the hell?
The standard story that we tell each other and ourselves when we are bemoaning the loss of little mom-and-pop stores is that these big chain stores are run by heartless corporations, that local business owners know and care about their customers, that they see them as people, rather than just sources of revenue. Why then do Lowe’s and Home Depot have open, well marked bathrooms, while my local hardware store has frightened employees who steer me towards Dunkin’ Donuts?
Of course, this isn’t really about bathrooms. Let me tell you another story.
A couple of days ago, I found a cool looking coffee shop that seemed to emphasize ethical sourcing of its beans, and was staffed by a bunch of people with various tattoos, piercings, and hair dyes. My initial thought was, “Hey, this is cool. I could work here instead of Starbucks, and I could encourage people I know to come here, too.”
As you probably know, the way wifi works at Starbucks is that you click a button in your web browser, agreeing to terms of use, and that’s it.
At this place, they had access to a paid wifi service. Now, they offered free access as well, but I had to go back up to the counter, wait in line again, and ask for the password, which was handed to me on a small card, and gave me access for two hours.
This, like the bathroom, is not a big thing. It’s a little thing, but it’s an annoying little thing. I can’t even tell you how much I paid for my coffee, or whether it was more or less than I would have paid at Starbucks. AND, given the choice, I would favor the smaller business on general principles, but this little thing left me soured on the experience.
My point is not to argue that Lowe’s, Home Depot, and Dunkin’ Donuts are offering public bathrooms as part of a philanthropic effort to prevent public urination and bladder infections. I’m sure that these corporations are just as calculating and heartless as we all imagine them to be. There is only one reason for these corporations to provide nice, clean public bathrooms: the costs (in space, supplies, and cleaning) are outweighed by the benefits (in customer satisfaction and loyalty).
Remember a few years ago Starbucks did not have free and open wifi. For a while they put time limits on it, or required that you use a Starbucks card to access it. So why did they make it so easy now? Well, presumably for the exact same reason that Dunkin’ Donuts lets you use their bathroom: because it makes financial sense.
Sure, there are downsides to having free, unlimited wifi at your coffee shop. Sometimes you’re going to get a customer who milks a single cup of coffee for six hours, taking up a table and an outlet. It has to be hard not to look at that customer and get resentful, to feel like they are ripping you off, getting away with something. But here’s the thing. Whatever that customer is costing you, you are more than earning back from the people who came to your coffee shop because you have free, unlimited wifi. Maybe you even earn it back from that same customer, who uses your table all day on Monday, and then picks up his coffee to go on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
The problem is that the guy who is sitting there using the wifi all day is cognitively salient. After all, he’s sitting right there! All day! It is easy to sit there and brood about how he is cheating the system, getting away with something. The extra customers you get are less salient, because it is easy to imagine that they would have come in anyway. If someone is on the wifi for only half an hour, why would it matter if you have a two-hour limit?
I suspect the difference is that open, unlimited, easy-to-access wifi makes you feel welcome, while limited, closed wifi makes you feel at best like a supplicant and at worst like a would-be criminal who is being scolded in advance.
Why am I so sure that free, open, unlimited wifi is the financially smarter move? Because big corporations like Starbucks and Panera, with lots of data and people who are trying to maximize profits, deliberately switched to the unlimited system.
What puzzles me is why small business owners don’t look at this and say, “You know what? If I am going to compete with these big stores, I should set up free wifi and a nice bathroom. I should try to make my customers feel as welcome and comfortable as I can.”
I suspect that there are two problems here. The first, which I have already alluded to, is one of cognitive biases. It is true in a wide range of contexts that negative events impact us more strongly than positive events: it is emotionally more painful to lose five dollars than it is emotionally gratifying to gain five dollars. So the guy who is freeloading on your wifi is more emotionally salient than all of the people who come for the wifi, spend money, and then leave again before you get mad.
This is a place where the cold, calculating nature of the disembodied corporation has an advantage. It can actually crunch those numbers and discover that this is one of those circumstances where you can cast your wifi upon the waters, for you will find customers after many days.
This may be the difference between the owner and the employee as well. If we use the bathroom, maybe the owner perceives that cost in a direct, emotional way that the employee does not, despite the fact that the employee is more likely to be the one who has to clean the bathroom.
The second problem, I think, is the moral language that we often use when discussing shopping locally, where it is presented as a moral duty to support local businesses. I think that there might be some good, rational reasons to shop locally when possible, but I think that the moral framing causes more harm than good. Small-business owners will often use this as a sort of crutch: “If you’re not shopping local, it’s because you’re a bad person, not because I provide an inferior product at a higher price.” It seems to me that if you’re going to start an independent coffee shop, you need to ask yourself, “What can I do to provide the most satisfying experience for my customers? How can I use my local knowledge and connections to create something wonderful that Starbucks could never pull off?” Every now and then you find something like that. When I lived in Santa Fe, there were a few different places that successfully did this, and I would rotate around, working in various locations, and spending way too much money on coffee.
Of course, the moral argument — this vague sense that small businesses are somehow better than big ones — is one that I buy to an extent. It is one of the reason why I’m willing to pay a little bit more to re-nut my sack. But when the moral argument takes center stage, it eliminates the incentive on small businesses to think creatively about what they’re doing — or at least to copy uncreatively the best practices of their most successful competitors.Thank You, Nine
– No. 9 was worn for the final time on Saturday. The illustrious 41-year career of head coachcame to an end in Regional play at Sunken Diamond. No. 8 seed Stanford fell, 4-2, to Cal State Fullerton.Marquess, who is colloquially known by his jersey number "Nine", announced his impending retirement prior to the start of the season. The No. 9 jersey was officially retired in a ceremony after his final home game on May 21 – the first retired number in program history.Marquess slipped the jersey on for two final games on Saturday. The Cardinal defeated BYU, 9-1, to reach the Regional final against the Titans, but the nightcap proved to be the 2,512th and final game for the fourth-winningest coach in Division I history.You can leave a personal message to Nine here: bit.ly/NineNote came to the plate as the tying run with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. The senior leader was one of Stanford's hottest hitters at the Regional and hit the go-ahead home run in the afternoon game. But a ground ball to second ended the season and sparked an emotional goodbye.Stanford fans and players gave a long ovation to Coach Marquess. Titans fans and players joined as well. Well afterward, Stanford players remained in the dugout and waited for Coach Marquess to pack up his briefcase one last time.It was nearly a storybook comeback. Stanford trailed by three entering the bottom of the ninth. Juniorlaced one down the right field line for a leadoff triple. Then some controversy struck. Freshmangrounded to short and the throw was off line. The first baseman's foot appeared to be off the bag, but Bakst was called out. Coach Marquess asked for an appeal and after a long umpire conference, the call was reversed.That brought the tying run to the plate.hit a rope, but directly at the left fielder. Then sophomoregave it a ride with a deep fly ball that reached the warning track in dead center. It was just feet from tying the game. The groundout sent the Titans to the Super Regional.It was a tight, intense matchup throughout. The Titans opened the scoring with back-to-back two out hits in the first inning. After a single, Timmy Richards doubled off the top of the wall. The Cardinal relay nearly got the runner at the plate, but a close call went to the Titans.Cal State Fullerton (37-21) got two more two-out runs in the second on a home run from Scott Hurst.Stanford got one back in odd fashion. Kinamon singled off the first base bag. He then stole second and the throw bounced into centerfield. Kinamon continued to third where the throw from center bounced past third and into the Fullerton dugout, allowing Kinamon to trot home and make it 3-1.Titans ace Colton Eastman retired the next 13 batters. Meanwhile, freshman starterretired 10 of 11 Titans to keep Stanford within two. Fellow freshmancame on in relief and pitched a scoreless sixth and seventh. He also retired the first two hitters in the eighth before handing the ball to junior closer. Fullerton added an insurance run with a home run in the ninth.Miller (5-2) finished 5.0 innings, allowed four hits, three runs and struck out two. Matthiessen gave up just two hits and struck out two in 2.2 innings, and Hock recorded the final four outs. Stanford was out-hit, 7-3. Hoerner and Brodey each went 1-for-4, while Kinamon was 1-for-3.Stanford's 42 wins were the most since a 46-win season in 2004... Stanford's 21 conference wins were the most since 1998... Stanford's 13 wins in the months of April and May were the most since a winning 15 games in May of 2003...has reached base in 29 consecutive game, extending his career high and the longest streak for a Cardinal since Alex Blandino reached in 31 straight in 2014... Hock finished the season with a school record 16 saves... Winaker played in the last 126 consecutive games... Brodey started the last 122 games dating back to May 5, 2015... A lefty started the last 46 games for the Cardinal... Stanford finished 39-0 when tied or leading after seven innings.Stanford enters its first head coaching search in 41 years.For the latest updates, you can follow Cardinal baseball on instagram, twitter and snapchat (@StanfordBSB).
A Tribute to Coach Marquess
Retired Number
» For the first time in program history, Stanford baseball retired a number. No one will wear No. 9 again.. The official announcment was made following Marquess' final home game on May 21—Stanford won that day with a walk off single in the 10th inning.
No one else will ever wear No. 9 again
We've made it official. The program's first and only retired number#FinalSeas9n #GoStanford pic.twitter.com/x0mJ2vKWgi — Stanford Baseball (@StanfordBSB) May 22, 2017
Marquess Reaches 1,600
» Only five NCAA coaches have reached 1,600 career wins, only four have been Division I coaches, and only three have done it at one school. Coach Marquess is a member of each of those exclusive clubs after an 8-4 win over arch rival Cal at Sunken Diamond on April 4. Augie Garrido (1,975 wins at five schools), Mike Martin (1,938 wins and counting at Florida State), Gordie Gillespie (1,893 wins in Division III) and Gene Stephenson (1,768 wins at Wichita State) are the only coaches to reach the milestone.
Nine Accolades
» Became fourth Division I head coach (fifth ever) to win 1,600 games (4/4/17 vs. Cal).
» Coached 2,500th game at Cal on May 14—fifth ever to sign that many lineup cards.
» Most wins in Pac-12 history, fourth-most wins in Division I history.
» Two national championships (1987, 1988), 30 NCAA Tournament berths and 14 CWS.
» Stanford finished.500 or better in 39 of his 41 seasons.
» Nine-time conference Coach of the Year, three-time national Coach of the Year.
» Six 50-win campaigns, 21 years with 40 wins and 37 campaigns with 30 wins.
Other "9" Notables
» All his student-athletes get at least one quarter ahead academically by their junior year.
» Handwrites all his practice schedules.
» Carries his signature briefcase to the dugout for each game.
» Baseball student-athletes are responsible for Sunken Diamond groundskeeping.
Honoring 9
Colloquially known by his jersey number "9", here are some ways the University and team have honored Coach Marquess in his final season:
» Served as football's honorary captain for the weekend and game against Rice (Nov. 26)
» More than 100 alumni returned to Sunken Diamond for a pregame ceremony to honor Coach Marquess on Feb. 25.
» A "9" flag was raised on Feb. 25 and will fly at Sunken Diamond all season.
» All season ticket prices end in 9, and Two for Tuesday ticket deals went to $9 (was $12).
» May 9 had 1977 theme and ticket prices based on his first season as head coach.
» Majority of first pitches this season were thrown by Marquess friends and family.
» Concessions unveiled the Commemorative Coach Marquess cup, available all season.
» Concessions featured several Coach Marquess combos for $9.99 all season.
» Final season logo was created as well as #FinalSeas9n hashtag.
» Bobblehead and trading card giveaway son May 20.
» Framed jersey after his last home game, and giant "9" signed by players, co-workers, fans.
» A video tribute can be seen at bit.ly/NineTributeVideo
» Personal messages can be sent to Coach Marquess at this link: bit.ly/NineNote
Several opposing teams also recognized Coach Marquess during Stanford road games.
» Video tribute at Arizona State and lineup exchange with Athletics Director Ray Anderson, who played under Marquess while he was an assistant coach at Stanford.
» Oregon's George Horton gifted a personalized bat signed by the Ducks coaching staff.
» San Jose State gifted a framed Spartans No. 9 jersey.
» Washington State gifted local signature wine and Cougar Gold Cheese.
» Santa Clara presented a gift card to Omaha Stakes.
» Pregame recognition at CalChurchill had little science education but was fascinated with the subject, particularly how it might be harnessed to benefit society. While serving in India he ordered numerous scientific works, including Darwin’s ‘On the Origin of Species’, which he studied in detail.
He was the first Prime Minister to insist on a scientific advisor, and under his leadership, scientists were given unprecedented access to the government and funding.
During his tenure, he fostered an environment where the brightest scientists in the country could build ground-breaking machines - such as the Bernard Lovell telescope - and make world-changing discoveries in molecular genetics, radio astronomy, nuclear power, nerve and brain function and robotics.
Churchill owed much of his vision to science fiction rather than science. He was a close friend of the author HG Wells, and said that The Time Machine was ‘one of the books I would like to take with me to Purgatory.’
He wrote articles about death rays, while also coming up with elaborate battlefield contraptions which he dubbed ‘funnies.’
Most of his ‘funnies’ never made it into production. A project to design ‘aerial mines’ had to be abandoned as did his rocket propelled wheel dubbed The Great Panjandrum’ which was scrapped after regularly running amok.
Likewise Project Habbakuk aimed to build a floating air-craft carrier from an ice-berg and scientists were established at Smithfield meat market in London to test out different combinations of sawdust and ice. The scheme was eventually deemed ‘impractical because of the enormous production resources required and technical difficulties involved.’
But he was also responsible for many revolutionary ideas. It is likely that Wells showed Churchill the possibility of tanks, which the author described in the title of his 1903 short story ‘The Land IronClads.’
Churchill became the ‘godfather’ of tanks, and as First Lord of the Admiralty saw their benefits long before the Army caught up. It is why the first examples were known as ‘Her Majesty’s land ships.’
He was also instrumental in setting up Britain’s nuclear project alongside his scientific advisor Frederick Lindemann whom Churchill dubbed ‘The Prof’. However the US would eventually win the atomic race with the Manhattan Project.
In later years Churchill went on to found Churchill College at Cambridge to further science and technology in Britain.
The discovery of new essay was published in the journal Nature.Facebook has moved to HTML5 by default in all browsers for web videos that appears on its News Feed, Pages and the embedded Facebook video player.
Setting Adobe's Flash aside for video marks a significant change for the company, which built its first HTML5 video player five years ago. Back then it only supported iPhones and iPads, but retained Flash for other mobile browsers due to it outperforming HTML5.
Despite seeing promise in HTML5 for video, Facebook has outlined the numerous challenges that have kept it from making a complete switch from Flash across all platforms.
"In theory, most browsers in use support HTML5 video. However, in practice we noticed that a lot of the older browsers would simply perform worse using the HTML5 player than they had with the old Flash player. We saw more errors, longer loading times, and a generally worse experience," Facebook engineer Daiel Baulig wrote in a blog post last week.
"That's why we waited until recently to ship the HTML5 player to all browsers by default, with the exception of a small set of them," he added. The social media giant will continue to use Flash in games.
Adobe has also announced its transition away from Flash Player and that it's working on a new HTML5 video player. That came a few months after Facebook's chief security officer called upon Adobe to set an "end-of-life" for Flash.
Other issues that have kept Facebook from making video HTML5 by default included slower load times, more difficulty acquiring accurate user metrics, and browser bugs.
Baulig noted that on average it took "slightly longer" for Facebook to load when it shipped the HTML5 player but said: "By fixing several small performance regressions and making multiple micro-optimizations, we finally reached a level we felt happy with shipping."
A bug in Chrome's implementation of the SPDY protocol stopped videos loading in Facebook's News Feed until Facebook worked out the problem was triggered by loading too many videos concurrently, so it reduced the number of videos it loads at the same time.Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has long relied on technology to help him connect with the outside world despite the degenerative motor neuron disease he has battled for the past 50 years. Whereas Hawking’s condition has deteriorated over time, a highly respected computer scientist indicated at last week’s International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that he and his team may be close to a breakthrough that could boost the rate at which the physicist communicates, which has fallen to a mere one word per minute in recent years.
For the past decade Hawking has used a voluntary twitch of his cheek muscle to compose words and sentences one letter at a time that are expressed through a speech-generation device connected to his computer. Each tweak stops a cursor that continuously scans text on a screen facing the scientist.
At CES, Intel chief technology officer Justin Rattner noted that Hawking can actually make a number of other facial expressions as well that might also be used to speed up the rate at which the physicist conveys his thoughts. Even providing Hawking with two inputs would give him the ability to communicate using Morse code, “which would be a great improvement,” said Rattner, who is also director of Intel Labs.
Intel has since the late 1990s supplied Hawking with technology to help the scientist express himself. The latest chapter in their work together began in late 2011 when Hawking reached out to Gordon Moore, informing the Intel co-founder and father of Moore’s law that the physicist’s ability to compose text was slowing and inquiring whether Intel could help.
Rattner met with Hawking early last year around the time of the latter’s 70th birthday celebration in Cambridge, where the Intel CTO was one of the speakers. After meeting with Hawking, Rattner said he wondered whether his company’s processor technology could restore the scientist’s ability to communicate at five words per minute, or even increase that rate to 10. “Up to now, these technologies didn't work well enough to satisfy someone like Stephen, who wants to produce a lot of information,” Rattner said.
Intel is now working on a system that can use Hawking’s cheek twitch as well as mouth and eyebrow movements to provide signals to his computer. “We've built a new, character-driven interface in modern terms that includes a better word predictor,” Rattner said. The company is also exploring the use of facial-recognition software to create a new user interface for Hawking that would be quicker than selecting individual letters or words.
Hawking’s current setup includes a tablet PC with a forward-facing Webcam that he can use to place Skype calls. A black box beneath his wheelchair contains an audio amplifier, voltage regulators and a USB hardware key that receives the input from an infrared sensor on Hawking’s eyeglasses, which detects changes in light as he twitches his cheek. A hardware voice synthesizer sits in another black box on the back of the chair and receives commands from the computer via a USB-based serial port.
Intel’s work with Hawking is part of the company’s broader research into smart gadgets as well as assistive technologies for the elderly. The key to advancing smart devices—which have been at a plateau over the past five or six years—is context awareness, Rattner said. Devices will really get to know us the way a friend would, understanding how our facial expressions reflect our mood, he added.
Intel’s plan for identifying personal context requires a combination of hardware sensors—camera, accelerometer, microphone, thermometer and others—with software that can check one’s personal calendar, social networks and Internet browsing habits, to name a few. “We use this [information] to reason your current context and what's important at any given time [and deliver] pervasive assistance,” Rattner said. One approach to “pervasive assistance” is the Magic Carpet, a rug that Intel and GE developed with embedded sensors and accelerometers that can record a person’s normal routine and even their gait, sounding an alert when deviations are detected.
Such assistance will anticipate our needs, letting us know when we are supposed to be at an appointment and even reminding us to carry enough cash when running certain errands, according to Rattner, who added, “We’ll be emotionally connected with our devices in a few years.”Happy New Years Guys! We hit 1 Million views on Youtube!
This is a grand day for us – a huge milestone. Not to mention it’s all because of your guys! We are trying to build a world on the internet where your music gets the most exposure ever!
We premiered USER ACCOUNTS Click the tab at the top and sign up! It gives you the ability to control the videos you make. You can upload em, delete em, rebuild them:
More features coming soon – like putting your own logo on your videos and more!
We also added a LIKE button to the videos, so you can like and collect the videos you love.
There are some other changes too that sped up the code base of half a million lines of code and of course, more filters and fonts coming really soon!
Dont Forget to subscribe to youtube!: https://www.youtube.com/c/MusicVideoGenerator channel and spread the word.
Also subscribe to our new reddit channel too!: https://www.reddit.com/r/mvgen/Finding bipartisan support for anything in Congress can seem a minor miracle these days, but Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) may have hit on something -- empty symbols of patriotic fervor. Together with Republican Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts and one Democratic and one Republican representative from Pennsylvania, Lieberman has proposed a law that would strip Americans of their citizenship if they provide "material support" to terrorist organizations. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have expressed their support in principle. Yet the bill is so flawed it can be explained only as pure political grandstanding.
Lieberman argued while introducing the bill that "those who join such groups [as al-Qaeda and the Taliban] join our enemy and should be deprived of the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship." But this legislation is not limited to those who "join" the enemy. It would apply to any provision of "material support" to any group we have designated as "terrorist." In a pending Supreme Court case, Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, the government has taken the position that the "material support" ban -- already a part of our criminal law but not a basis for expatriation -- is so broad that it makes it a crime to file an amicus brief in the Supreme Court, to lobby Congress, to teach human rights or to write an op-ed piece, so long as it is done with or for a designated group. Should we be expatriating people for engaging in political speech simply because we don't approve of those with or for whom they are speaking?
In fact, the bill does not expatriate those who join al-Qaeda or provide it with "material support" -- because it cannot. U.S. law once made the commission of certain acts -- such as taking citizenship in another country or joining another nation's military -- automatic grounds for losing one's citizenship. But the Supreme Court ruled in Afroyim v. Rusk in 1967 and Vance v. Terraz
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scale and in terms of model sophistication. This is a very exciting time and I’m looking forward to it. If all goes well, this will raise the bar also in academia.
I wanted to say thanks to everyone who’s helped us along on this journey. First off, an absolutely outstanding cast of PhD students I’ve had the pleasure of working with. Mu, Manzil, Zichao, Fish, Yu-Xiang, Seth, Alex, Ziqi, Wei, Yining, Chao-Yuan, Sashank, you guys rock! And yes, most of you are smarter than me, and this has been utterly delightful. Second, I wanted to thank to thank the terrific CMU faculty. I learned a lot and the past 4 years have been a wonderful experience. Many thanks, in particular to Dave, Andy, Andrew, Tom, Geoff, Nina, Christos, Ryan, Barnabas, Larry, Jaime and Kayvon. Many thanks for your advice, help, insight, and collaboration. What we achieved in the past 4 years would not have been possible without a great team. And thanks to Mallory and Diane to keep the ship running no matter what, and thanks to Russ for keeping the accounting in good shape and for putting up with last minute updates.
Apologies if I forgot someone on this list (I probably have). It has been wonderful to work with you and I dearly love CMU. So why the change?
Here’s the reasoning that went into deciding to go to Amazon: Our goal as machine learning researchers is to solve deep problems (not just in deep learning) and to ensure that this leads to algorithms that are actually used. At scale. At sophistication. In applications. The number of people I could possibly influence personally through papers and teaching might be 10,000. In Amazon we have 1 million developers using AWS. Likewise, the NSF thinks that a project of 3 engineers is a big grant (and it is very choosy in awarding these grants). At Amazon we will be investing an order of magnitude more resources towards this problem. With data and computers to match this. This is significant leverage. Hence the change.
We will try to give back to the academic community, to contribute back, e.g. through open source. And the goal is to engage it more deeply. I cannot give more specifics yet but good things will happen. Stay tuned.
Technically I will be on leave of absence until August 2017. This is mostly to ensure that the students are taken care of and that grants are in good shape. I’ll be reaching out to many of you directly (the reason why I haven’t done this to all of you yet is that I’m in the middle of moving).
Let’s stay in touch. And, obviously, if you’re interested in joining me on this journey (or have students who would like to come along), please let me know.
Best, Alex
PS: I’m posting this letter (which was intended for my team at CMU and my colleagues there) after screenshots of parts of it seem to have gone live on Weibo.Much has been made recently about electric vehicle charging stations and attendant public infrastructure–but what about all of our power-hungry gadgets? Sure, we won’t be stranded if they run out of juice, but the results could be just as distressing for today’s hyper-connected individual. Why not create a network of public solar chargers that double as park benches?
That’s the idea behind the Strawberry Tree, a prototype design that was recently nominated for the European Commission’s prestigious Sustainable Energy Europe Award 2011. According to Ecofriend, the Strawberry Tree is the brainchild of a group of Serbian student-entrepreneurs known as Strawberry Energy–a booth, essentially, that integrates solar panels at an optimum angle on its roof to provide juice for a number of outlets accessible via a single pillar that features built-in benches for lounging and chatting while waiting for your phone to power up.
The booth can power mobile phones, cameras and even MP3 players, and does so even on overcast days and at night, thanks to its centralized battery system. Strawberry Energy plans to build on this design by including Wi-Fi features, as well as by manufacturing portable versions of the Strawberry Tree that will be suitable for large public gatherings.
We hope you are enjoying the green technology news and insight provided by our dedicated editorial staff. If you do, please take a moment to help us spread the word by voting for us as Best Environmental Sci-Tech blog in the annual Best of Green 2011 TreeHugger awards. Voting ends on April 1, 2011. Thank you!Escape from Hungary: Three Dark, Cold Days in 1956
by Joseph Nagyvary
Neuer Kurier, Austrian daily newspaper, November 23, 1956
"The hunting down of people by the Soviet forces in the Hungarian border region goes on. Last night alone, which marked the arrival of the 60,000th refugee, more than twenty men and women lost their lives. Hundreds of people were arrested by the Soviet patrols, often just a few steps from reaching safety. These unfortunate people were herded into temporary camps for later deportation to the east".
Prologue. Budapest, November 21, 1956
The only shooting war of the Cold War period against the Soviets was fought in Hungary, beginning on October 23, 1956, by civilians who appeared to be victorious by October 28. Initially, the Soviet tanks stationed in Hungary were no match for the courage and the Molotov cocktails of the freedom fighters. However, several international events — including the U.S. presidential elections and the Suez crisis —interfered with and damaged the Hungarians’ cause. Though Radio Free Europe and The Voice of America fanned the embers of hope for direct military assistance, the freedom fighters did not receive the expected help from the Western democracies and ran out of ammunition.
By the third week of November the Soviet control of rebellious Hungary was almost complete, and new Hungarian stooges led by Janos Kadar had set up a government, poised to exact a terrible revenge for their previous humiliation. Their henchmen, the AVO (State Defense Division) began to hunt down everybody involved in the fighting. The AVO was in Hungary what the Gestapo was in Nazi Germany, but much worse since its torture methods exceeded even those of the Spanish Inquisition. The Iron Curtain was lifted only for a short period of time, perhaps two weeks, and this enabled the safe exodus of the most opportunistic. Thousands of Hungarians, among them the most exposed student leaders who initiated the revolution were already safely in Vienna and well taken care of, while the real fighters and desperados were still firing their last bullets. But it was time for them to leave too, and join the tens of thousands of other desperate Hungarians who were trying to escape as the Iron Curtain was about to close again.
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In the glorious days of late October and early November, I experienced a personal epiphany: a new consciousness of my dignity as a human being. This awakening was a gift of freedom, which is as vital source of human dignity as religion can be. Unfortunately, our revolution was crushed, and my new and transformed self was poised to face dangerous confrontations with the Soviet occupying forces and their Hungarian communist stooges. It became urgent to come to the right decision between two choices that would determine my future and survival. On the one hand, I was clinging to my Hungarian identity that would require compromises and humiliations; on the other hand, I also desired to live in freedom with my dignity intact. The latter choice meant nothing else but escaping from the country, and it had been the choice of many thousands of people who had already fled to Austria. This was not an easy choice for patriotic Hungarians who tended to look down on emigrants with the contempt befitting the deserters of the fatherland. After a week of seclusion at home with my family in Kaposvar, I was still undecided.
I returned to Budapest on November 20 to get my friends' take on the situation. When I arrived I found the men's dormitory in ruins. The men had moved to the women's dormitory at 5 Rakoczi Street both for their own safety and to provide some security for the girls. Here I connected with my most trusted friend Bandi Andrasi and several classmates who had nothing but bad. Apparently, the new régime of Janos Kadar was determined to exact a terrible revenge for the uprising, and the agents of the AVO were already looking for perpetrators of the "contra-revolution". We had a lengthy debate after dinner about the advisability of leaving the country at least for a while. It was a proposition I advocated and everyone else rejected. They had already decided to stay and tough it out. They felt it extremely unwise to give up our studies two months before graduating.
I didn't sleep much that night, just lay in bed restlessly, my mind racing with foreboding thoughts about being arrested or losing my friendships and budding romantic interest in Marta. Unlike the others, I was involved in the shooting war, albeit to a limited extent. I had to keep that a secret even from my best friends since they would be interrogated about our activities during the uprising. Finally, I got up at 5:30. Since it was windy and freezing outside I dressed in my warmest clothing—the 1925 vintage ski boots recently acquired from my father, and my pufajka, Russian army thermal uniform pants. Thus attired I was prepared to spend the entire day on the streets. At 6:15 it was not too early to drop in on my friends down the hallway.
The girls' dormitory was half empty, and the men elected to occupy a cluster of rooms at the back of the building facing the center of campus. I knocked on the door of Bandi Andrasi and Tibor Zanati, and looked in. They were up and listening to the news on Radio Free Europe., which reported that 60,000 refugees were already in Austria. The coffee water was near boiling. As we waited for the coffee, I again raised the prospect of temporarily leaving Hungary.
“I can't go back to the same humiliating way of life we had¾paying obeisance to idiotic communist party chiefs; keeping my religion secret; practicing the Stalinistic ritual of public self-criticism. I have a huge chip of contempt on my shoulder.” I pleaded my case.
Bandi responded gloomily: “It won't be easy. Personally, I have no choice. I have a sister and a brother to take care of. The AVO may beat me up, but I don't fear for my life. I didn't fire a gun and hurt no one.” I turned to Tibor who was the top student in our class. "Do you see a future for yourself as a scientist in a police state?”
“Being a Hungarian, however poor and miserable, is important to me. It defines me. I refuse to be chased out of my homeland by the agents of the Soviet occupiers. I'll suck it up and give to Caesar his due and nothing more.” This was something to think about: the loyalty we owe to our country.
We were quietly drinking our coffee when suddenly someone was running through the hallway whispering urgently, "There are two AVO men going through the ground floor looking for Joseph Nagyvary! Their submachine guns are leveled and ready to fire."
Mention of AVO never failed to strike terror in the heart of the bravest Hungarian man. Their first victims of the most terrifying torture—a glass tube in the penis hammered to shards—had been liberated a few weeks ago along with Cardinal Mindszenty, and similar brutalities could be anticipated in the future.
Bandi opened the door and pulled the messenger in. It was Ferenc Szili, my high school classmate from Kaposvar. He looked me in the eye with a grave expression on his face and just blurted out, "Joska, run, you have only seconds to get away!"
I dropped my cup, but then I collected myself and with a surprising calm put on my overcoat.
"Where are they now?"
"Going from room to room with one of them staying outside. They may be halfway here by now. Your best bet may be running across the front hall while they're at the far end."
I did not like that idea, and the expressions of my colleagues showed they agreed. My loaded pistol was in a nearby room, and the vision of a daring shootout crossed my mind, but the prospect of my one pistol against two submachine guns was not promising. The only remaining escape route was through the window, and Bandi had already opened it. I looked down to the back entrance of the building. There were a few students on the narrow path leading to the small plaza between three science buildings, with no AVO or military among them. How do I get down? Jumping 15 feet onto a hard surface would mean almost certain injury. To my relief, I discovered a drainpipe running from the roof to the ground. I could grab it if I swung out to my right and my grip was tight. If I miscalculated the move and the distance, I would fall sideways.
I hesitated only a few seconds then stepped up onto the window sill and lunged for the drainpipe—after all I had been a good gymnast on the high bar. I held firm with both hands as my feet swung beyond the vertical, and then loosened my grip to slide down. I hit the ground hardly buckling my knees. I looked up and saw Bandi tossing down my cap. “Call Marta, please!”was my last request as I waved good-bye to my friends. Then I turned and walked quietly toward the group of students at an entrance to the Organic Chemistry Department. I had to avoid looking suspicious and tried to blend in but my heart was beating so hard I felt my pulse in my head. At the center of the gathering was the popular physics professor, Dr. Istvan Cornides. I stepped near and listened, as he sounded a patriotic chord.
"There is no compelling reason for you to flee the country. You joined the National Guard only to safeguard our institutions and surrendered your weapons when ordered to do so. Our country needs you. Let us all be good Hungarians and tough it out no matter what happens." That was his advice, and I had no time to waste arguing. I glanced furtively towards the dormitory building and saw nothing unusual. As I reached the end of the path, I looked again and saw the back door opening as I stepped out of view.
I turned the corner and ran at full speed passing the two buildings of chemistry and mineralogy and then out of the campus gate to Museum Street, where I tried to look like the others walking toward the National Museum. I passed the Russian tanks at the Calvin Plaza, whose soldiers scrutinized nervously every passer-by. I crossed the Freedom Bridge, where I was undoubtedly the most exposed to danger, and turned my face away whenever a car passed by, ready to jump into the Danube if necessary. I hurried along the main gate of the Technical University that was besieged by military men and hardware. Further up on Bela Bartok Street, I turned into the entrance hall of an apartment building and sat down on the stairway. I forced myself to breathe slowly, but I felt dizzy. "Is this really happening to me?" Yes, obviously. I was on the run, a wanted man. I had to think and analyze the situation.
I had gotten away by sheer luck simply because I awakened earlier than usual. I could have been caught still sleeping in bed at quarter to seven when the AVO came for me, in my own room where there were no window escapes. The optimist in me said this was my lucky day. I was still free, had money in my wallet, and I was suitably dressed for the cold days.
But the negatives were overwhelming and scary. There was the realization that I was on the AVO hit list, and obviously high enough to be captured in the first phase of mass arrests. Being a prisoner of the AVO meant torture, more dreaded than death itself, or deportation to the Soviet Far East, or even execution at the notorious 60 Andrassy Street.
Some people had disappeared without any trace like my friend Istvan Fuzeki, who had called the Russian commander who arrested him a fascist. But why me? My public role in the revolutionary guard was relatively minor, and our University as a whole did very little beyond demonstrating solidarity. My forays into military action, like firing at tanks with small arms and fumbling with Molotov cocktails, were not exactly heroic deeds to boast about, and I tried to keep them secret. Was I betrayed by someone close to me? Of course, I did sign my name to a document when I and a couple of guys from the dormitory borrowed a truck from a state printing company for the legitimate purpose of procuring food from the villages. For whatever reason, my name could well be on the national list of "counter-revolutionaries" and therefore I would need to avoid any checkpoints where identifications would be required.
Now the die had been cast and the decision made for me by the AVO. I had no choice but to escape from Hungary to survive. I had no maps. My knowledge of the geography of Western Hungary was abysmal. I knew that the western-most city, Sopron, was about 110 miles away ¾a very long walk¾and all the roads would have Russian and AVO checkpoints. Four to five days of walking through fields with no food seemed a tough proposition, but I was confident in my will and endurance.
I had left the apartment building and headed toward the Moricz Circuit Plaza when I found a working phone. I dialed Marta's number, but there was no answer. There was nothing I could do but give up. She would be shocked when she got the news from Bandi. I hoped she would understand that I had no choice but to flee. In that moment, I felt desolate like never before. I was losing a best friend, a potential mate for life. This feeling was to haunt me for a long time, but the instinct for survival forced me to concentrate on practical matters. As I turned back, I saw familiar faces looking at me across the street. They were Laszlo (Laci) Puskas from our dormitory and his girlfriend, Lenke.
"We just came from the dormitory where the AVO was still checking the beds of every girl and gathering information on you. Your getaway was fantastic, I heard. What will you do now?"
"Laci, I'm in trouble and unprepared. I have to get some information about the best route to Austria. I need to get some bread, at least. Perhaps I could get help in a catholic church, or at least I could do a quick confession. What are you guys doing?"
"'We're going to my hometown, Szombathely. Budapest isn't a safe place for us either. We hoped we would run into you because there is some important news: the radio announced this morning that today trains will resume limited operations from Budapest-Kelenfold to the western cities, all the way to Szombathely. The last 50 miles or so, the train runs near the Austrian border zone. The first train is scheduled for 10 a.m., just about two hours from now."
What a fantastic news! With this train I would escape from the clutches of the local AVO, plus I would save three days of walking. It was an incredible coincidence that Puskas came upon me on this street, when it would have been a better choice for me to turn to north towards the Moscow Plaza. This coincidence seemed almost miraculous.
"What would I say when asked for the purpose of my travel, defecting to the West?"
Puskas already had some ideas. "First of all, there are not enough hard-core AVO guys to man the stations. So let's say you're going to be the boyfriend of my sister and you're traveling to Szombathely to get engaged. What about that? We could use this ruse if we get checked out here at the Budapest station, or at any other checkpoint. By the way, my girlfriend, Lenke, is coming with me for the very same reason. We really are getting engaged!"
"Then congratulations to both of you! I like your idea. Going with you guys would improve on my chances. I also appreciate the offer to join your family. The most important thing is first to get on that train. Then we can improvise. Play it by ear."
We had to hurry because the route to Kelenfold led through a major war zone at the Moricz Zsigmond Plaza, which was teeming with Russian troops, and we had to go around them. With the tall Puskas leading the slow Lenke and me in his trail, jogging occasionally, we reached the station about 9:30 a.m.
Without bothering to buy tickets, we proceeded through the crowded halls out to the platform where pandemonium had broken out like I hadn't seen since World War II! The eight train cars were full, and there were hundreds of people milling around the train. I caught a glimpse of some guards trying to keep order and check identifications, but their task was impossible. We bypassed them in the middle of the mass of bodies, moving towards the cars that seemed to have the lowest density of passengers, and ended up at the third wagon from the end.
There was absolutely no way to get in through the door since there were already people standing on the steps outside. However, the windows were open. As in my best gymnastic days, I pulled myself up and fell in while someone inside mercifully held my head up. For a while my body was suspended sideways, but eventually I managed to get nearly vertical with one foot on the ground. Before long Lenke also wriggled through the same window, pushed along by Laszlo and pulled by me. She remained in an undignified position pleading for space and help to right herself. Laszlo had little problem muscling in through the next window, and so we were able to talk to one another.
Since I was completely demobilized, I couldn't help feeling captive. Could there be government agents among us? Of course, there was no way of knowing from the looks and casual remarks. Conversation among strangers was guarded, but the information one could glean was encouraging. The majority of these people appeared to have the same aim as I did: to get anywhere close to the Austrian border. Like me, most of them had no ticket for the ride. We felt secure within our impenetrable mass, and so we gladly put up with the inconvenience. What was bad for our creature comfort was good for our peace of mind. The few complaining ticketed passengers were hushed down.
To our collective relief, the train pulled out on time. The word came around that the conductor and three men in pufajka uniforms — possibly AVO — were in the first car behind the locomotive. The train made its first stop at Tatabanya, less than an hour after departure, but apparently few passengers got off — at least there was only a minor relief in the pressure against my body. I managed to get closer to Lenke, who by now was standing on her own feet. One of her bags rested on her shoulder and sometimes on her head, which made her look like the farm-girls carrying their baskets to the marketplace. We spoke only about neutral, non-political topics, like their finding love during a revolution and the upcoming engagement. There were periods of long silence with tension in the rank air. The last half an hour before arrival in Gyor was made memorable by a passenger getting sick and having to throw up. This turned into a chain reaction, but luckily I was able to suppress the urge to follow suit.
One of my neighbors told his friend in a quiet voice, "If we want to play it safe, we should get off in Gyor. We'll be there shortly." The other responded, "We have to decide depending on the circumstances. Gyor is still two full days of marching from the border. It would be good to get closer."
The arrival in Gyor generated a lot of excitement and commotion. Many people got off, and although new passengers also came in, the intense crowding became more tolerable. We saw the AVO security men and the conductor entering the second car. They were still far from us but they could now move forward. I moved closer to Laszlo and Lenke, who suggested I stay at least until the next stop. One of the young guys who had stepped out briefly came back with useful news. I heard him say that there might be reinforced guard units at every station from here on, and they could intercept those who were not local to the area. But he seemed to have a plan.
"Just to be sure, I paid the engineer and asked him to slow down at a small village before Csorna, the next scheduled stop, so that we can jump off the train."
"I doubt he'll do it, but we'll see within half an hour," his companion responded.
After ten minutes in Gyor, the train moved out. Ready for anything, I said goodbye to my friends. Lenke put two slices of bread and two hard-boiled eggs in my coat pocket, saying: "You may need this more than we do, Joska." Indeed, I might have been the only person there without some provisions. As I was pushing forward towards the door, it occurred to me that this could be a set-up— I could jump into the arms and guns of the Soviets. Suddenly the train reduced its speed, with no town, no people in sight, just wide-open land. Our engineer was a decent man after all. God bless him, he kept his word.
People from other cars began to jump off. The speed at 5-10 miles per hour was safe enough, and I negotiated my jump with no complications. In a minute the train was gone, and we were left alone, perhaps twenty of us, my age, or even younger. To our left we could see the farmhouses of a village.
We quickly spread out in the general direction of north/northwest like molecules of a diffusing gas, keeping a good distance from one another, some moving faster, others slower. In our surroundings, I saw cultivated fields alternating with marshland and cow pastures. There were no roads and plenty of hiding places. There could be no surprise attack on us, and I felt relieved and relatively safe, for the time being at least.
It was around 2 p.m. and I was in no hurry. Cold wind blew into my face from the north, and there was a dark cloud cover over the entire sky. I was dressed adequately for the expected freezing temperatures, but not for rain. Fortunately, there were only a few drops, which turned into sleet later in the day. For hours I did my best impersonation of the military march in our summer army camps, taking long and deliberate steps and breathing evenly. The motions were robotic and left my mind free to reflect on the situation.
I realized now fully: I was progressing on an irreversible course. If I were successful, I would break off my chains, leave the AVO's sphere of power, would never have to humiliate myself, violate my principles; I will never again have to march in May 1 celebrations and practice self-criticism in public meetings. I can practice my religion. However, all this would come at a very high price. I might never see again my mother, my father, my sister and my brother. How could I endure this separation? Thinking of them had always been a source of warm feelings throughout my life; from now on it would be coupled with pain and guilt. The long-distance contacts with friends and Marta may fizzle out. Would I be able to form intimate friendships and a loving relationship in a foreign land?
The possibility that I could be shot and killed could not be discounted. The thought of not making it alive sent my mind racing and churning through past memories in rapid succession. I went back to the years of a happy childhood, the lucky survival during World War II, the high school years and the college years in fast-forward mode, and then lingered on some good memories. Then came the time of self-evaluation. I approved and disapproved some of my past actions, and strangely enough it was my righteous moral decisions which caused me regrets. Perhaps I shouldn't have resisted the advances of the two married women who wanted to initiate me in the art of love. They had come on to me like the wife of the ancient Egyptian Putifar to the biblical Joseph, and I remained blameless. But I was not Joseph in Egypt with a mission. Now I was also wondering if God had anything special planned for me, if I had a mission or would be soon terminated. Anguish and danger can facilitate our approach to God, and I prayed often that day.
A few hours after darkness fell and covered us with the first true sense of safety, I came upon a paved road leading north. Roads would be where government and Soviet troops could pass and be deployed, so I became more apprehensive. To the south I could see the faint lights of a city. Two shadows appeared on the road from that direction, and I crouched in a ditch. Visibility was less than 50 feet, and they might not see me on the ground. There was no reason to worry, however; the uncertain, staggering footfalls I heard was not the cadence of soldiers. I approached them with caution.
A young man carried his four-year old son on his shoulder, a suitcase in his right hand and a bag on his back. His wife also had her hands full carrying a basket with a baby in one hand and a large bag in the other. I greeted them in a subdued voice and inquired about the content of the basket.
"She is a girl, 11 months old," the woman answered with quiet maternal pride.
They had arrived on the train I was on and had gotten off in Csorna together with hundreds of other passengers. The security guards managed to check the identifications of only a handful; the rest simply ran away from the station. The few people who lined up for the security check were Csorna residents returning home, and they kept the guards busy. These Hungarian army regulars were not too keen on doing their assigned duties anyway.
"How come it took you six hours to walk, what, six kilometers?" I asked.
"We stopped on the way out of the town for information, and the people invited us in to rest and feed the children. They gave us some directions and suggestions on where to spend the night."
This sounded reliable and useful to me. I offered the father my help in carrying one of his children. "I would be grateful if you would relieve my wife for awhile. She's already exhausted, and we have more than 15 kilometers yet to walk to reach the border."
I took over the basket and said, "I don't think it's safe to be on major roads, or any road. The enemy may patrol them, and we could get arrested. You may get away and be released because of the family. I would end up in Siberia, at best. I would be glad to carry the baby, but I'll walk 50 feet off the road." And so we did, remaining in visual contact. Following their directions, we walked towards the north about three kilometers, and then followed a dirt road to the west for another three to four kilometers, also crossing a creek. I enjoyed the feeling of a few snowflakes melting on my face.
We arrived at a settlement of several farmhouses, most likely a "socialist co-op" farm conglomerate. There were a good number of men milling around a large barn, local farm people and refugees. I surrendered the baby to the mother, who was as grateful as I was exhausted. Both of my arms and shoulders felt the effect of carrying the sweet live load. The basket seemed light at the beginning, perhaps only 25 pounds, but its wide shape made it hit my knees on the side unless I pushed it out sideways. I learned to appreciate the physical demands and chores of a mother on the march toward freedom. The emotional stress of risking the life of the family could have been overwhelming.
I walked around the settlement in order to judge whether it was safe. There were perhaps a dozen farmhouses for families, a couple of larger buildings for equipment, and several small structures in poor condition, possibly for farm animals. Newcomers were gathering in several places. I picked the largest barn, which already harbored about three dozen people, and the number kept growing.
It was a welcome shelter for us with its warmer air scented by hay, animals and the associated biological processes. There were a few young couples, one family with children, but mainly men below middle age. Clothing in most cases was not fashionable, but practical. Almost everyone wore two pairs of pants. Some wore the thick Russian pufajka pants underneath and their legs were rounded like sausages. There was a boy by himself who barely looked 16, without an overcoat. According to the comments of those near him, he was still reeking of gasoline and explosives. He knew it, but had no reason to be defensive. "I apologize if I offended your senses, but I had no chance to shower since October." I said to him: "To me, this is the perfume of a freedom-fighter. Keep it as long as you can." After some prodding, he went on telling of his battles in the Castle district of Buda in an unpretentious way as if it had been a game of soccer.
I asked those next to me if we had a guide lined up, and they pointed to a small man at the other end of the barn. He wore a worn, arms-length sheepskin coat and a black fur hat. On his feet were black boots that reached just below his knees. His face was ruddy with the darker skin of an outdoors-man, and he had a short mustache. He had an animated conversation with a couple of people for a few minutes. Then he lifted one hand and looked around. The chatter ceased immediately.
"Good evening everybody! Let me tell you first of all that I sympathize with your situation. I didn't volunteer to be your guide but only agreed to the many requests of several individuals in this room. I would prefer playing cards with my friends right now. I was born and lived 44 years in this area. You should realize that I'm taking a major personal risk as an accessory to your defection from the "people's republic" – an obvious crime. It's in my interest that we succeed in this mission of getting you safely across the border and, for my part, to live another 44 years here with my family."
He stopped at this point and looked around for eye contact with his audience, which was lit only by one dim light. His fluency and good enunciation gave proof to the contention of the noted Hungarian essayist Gyula Illyes that our farmer folks are indeed intelligent well above their lowly station in life. We were a rapt audience, full of appreciation for this extraordinary man who would help us at his own peril.
He went on, "You should know that people by the thousand have passed through here, and they're all safe in Austria. Even today, many have crossed the border in broad daylight. Doing it at night surreptitiously is actually more risky. So listen up!" All the coughing was suppressed, and we were straining our ears to get the crucial details.
"The most direct route as the crow flies would take you through a small river, wetlands and swamps, and I don't think you could handle that, not with women and children. Also, it'll freeze and maybe even snow tonight, and the water is very cold. Believe me, you don't want to get wet! My plan is to lead you across a bridge but it'll make the distance longer. I estimate 16 kilometers (10 miles). We could cover it in about four hours. We can leave here at 10:30 tonight. Since I have to return by 6 a.m., I'll have to leave you alone for the last hour approaching the border canal." Sounds of discontent arose.
"If you leave us alone, how can we find the best place to cross over to Austria?"
"When you get to the canal, and you can't miss that, you will see Austrian students on the other side. Ask them for directions to the footbridge. Ask: wo ist die Bruecke? For families, this would be the only practical way of crossing over the canal. The water may be deep, besides being icy."
"What do you know about the situation with land mines?"
"On this portion of the border there have never been many mines, perhaps because of the wet grounds. Most of the mines were removed by the Hungarian army during the last weeks. I can't guarantee you absolute safety. If you're concerned, stay in the marshland, which you will find plenty."
At this point several voiced the same request. "Would you mind mailing a letter to my parents? I'll give you all the money I have on me. I'll have no use for Hungarian currency."
He said, "Of course, I would do that within a few days. I didn't ask you for your money, but I certainly won't refuse it."
Most people, including myself began to write farewell letters to their loved ones. I wrote a brief one- paragraph note to "Dear Mother and Father", telling them that staying in Budapest would have been life-threatening for me. I continued that I was just a short distance from the Austrian border, and with a good guide and God's will I would be in Vienna by the time they got this letter.
I gave the guide my letter, the mailing address and 800 forint, all of my cash. It was a significant amount of money, at least by student standards, enough for me to get by for two months. He took the letters and the monies and assured each of us that he would do his best.
Behind me, sitting on the floor were three tough looking guys. Their conversation, spiced with colorful profanities, suggested they could be workers from Budapest. They did not write letters or give away any money. They raised questions of vulnerability and trust, using a curse word for every punctuation mark. They took turns going outside and reporting back that the perimeter was secure.
"I would feel much better with my pistol in my pocket," one of them said, and I could only echo this sentiment.
"I was thinking the same just now. I also left my gun in Budapest." I turned to them, trying to establish an association with at least someone. I began to feel the need for some teamwork. As a sole operator I was at a great disadvantage. I wished I could have persuaded my own buddies to come with me, especially Bandi Andrasi and Gabor Kezdy, who were so savvy. Just three months ago we had faced down a pack of wolves in the Slovakian Tatra Mountains. They would have been a great comfort.
"Well, we have no guns, and we shouldn't need them if we keep our eyes open and trust no one," said one of the three.
Another added, "I can't help thinking that if these letters get into the wrong hands, the AVO
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him as more of an LB2-3 long term, but once Foster is back in the mix, we should know if he will continue his LB1 pace.
Oakland Raiders
The Oakland MLB situation has been a mess for a long time. Perry Riley (2016), Curtis Lofton (2015), Miles Burris (2014), and Nick Roach (2013) were the replacements for Rolando McClain who held down the position for 3 years (2010-2012). The Raiders started out the year with Marquel Lee manning the middle, but an ankle injury has put him out of action. Xavier Woodson-Luster was the latest to fill in but will give way to Bowman as soon as Thursday according to Raiders coach Jack Del Rio. The Raiders disappointing start has caused Thursday Night’s matchup with the Chiefs a must win if they have hopes of winning the division or even make the playoffs. So how about your fantasy players impact? Let’s take a look.
Navorro Bowman
Bowman should stay on the field for every snap, maybe not in Thursday’s game since there is only a 3-day turnaround from signing to gameday. By Week 8 though, we should see 100% snaps for Bowman. In 5 games for the 49ers, Bowman collected 22 solo tackles, 16 assists and a pass defended. He should continue to give a solid floor of 4 tackles and 3 assists per game, which if you project his floor for his missed game would still make him an LB2/3. In redraft leagues and dynasty contenders, he would be a player to own as we have seen Oakland middle linebackers be productive tacklers.
Marquel Lee
Lee has been sidelined since Week 5 with an ankle sprain, but he may have to wait a while even when healthy before he can take the field for the Raiders. Bowman will be taking his starting spot and will probably not give that up even when Lee is ready to return. The positive spin on this is that he will get to learn from one of the best linebackers of the past decade. Bowman is only signed for this season, so Lee may still be the starting MLB for 2018 and beyond. I would hold on to Lee if you can afford the roster spot or stash him on the taxi squad if possible. With Bowman’s injury history and the 1-year deal Lee may get his chance soon.
Other Raiders LBs
I don’t really see Bowman affecting the other LBs as Khalil Mack and Bruce Irvin are mainly used as pass rushers. Cory James will probably be on the field in base sets, but he was a non-factor for Week 6 as he was dealing with his knee injury. Look for Mack to still be Mack, Irvin to have a big week here and there and James to pick up tackles on the weak side. Besides Mack, I don’t really want to own any of these guys this season. James could be an LB3/4 the rest of the way for deeper leagues.
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed my breakdown of the fallout from the Bowman signing. Make sure you check out all the weekly IDP coverage at DFF including Waiver Adds today. Let us know how we’re doing below or find me on Twitter @seahawksdan8.WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The top Republican in Congress on Tuesday stood by Devin Nunes, the head of the House of Representatives intelligence committee who is under fire over his handling of an investigation into possible Russian ties to President Donald Trump’s election campaign.
Democrats and some prominent Republicans have criticized Nunes, a Trump ally, since he announced last week that U.S. security agencies had collected information on Trump’s transition team while conducting legal surveillance on other targets.
Democrats see the surveillance accusations, which Nunes said were based on unspecified intelligence reports, as a distraction from the probe into possible Russian influence on last year’s election in Trump’s favor that has cast a shadow over the president’s first two months in office.
They have demanded Nunes step aside from his committee’s investigations into the Russia ties.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, asked at a news conference whether Nunes should step aside from the investigation and if he knew the source of Nunes’ claims about surveillance, said: “No and no.”
Trump, at an event in the White House, declined to comment on whether Nunes should step back.
Nunes had acknowledged visiting the White House grounds to meet a source and review the intelligence reports before making his announcement that Trump and his associates may have been ensnared in incidental intelligence collection.
However, he told ABC News on Tuesday he would not divulge who gave him intelligence reports, even to other members of his panel, saying: “We will never reveal those sources and methods.”
Critics say Nunes’ statements were an effort to justify Trump’s unfounded accusations this month that his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama, had directed surveillance on Trump Tower during the election campaign.
The Senate Intelligence Committee, which is also investigating Russia’s role in the election, wants to question Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner, about meetings he held with the Russian ambassador and a Russian banker in December.
Nunes, who was a member of Trump’s transition team after the Nov. 8 election, told reporters on Tuesday the House panel’s investigation was moving forward. Asked whether he would recuse himself, he said: “The investigation continues.”
Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong said in an email that “Speaker Ryan has full confidence that Chairman Nunes is conducting a thorough, fair, and credible investigation.”
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However, Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, both influential foreign policy hawks, questioned Nunes’ actions.
“I think he put his objectivity in question, at the very least,” Graham said on NBC’s “Today” show.
One Republican lawmaker, Representative Walter Jones of North Carolina, went so far as to join Democrats in demanding a special committee to investigate the Russia probe, telling Fox News on Tuesday that Nunes was now “tainted.”The executive chairman of internet giant Google predicted during a lecture this week that the global eradication of online censorship could come in just ten years’ time.
Eric Schmidt, who formerly served as CEO of Google until 2011, was a guest speaker on the topic of “Technology as a Spark for Growth” at Johns Hopkins University when he made the remarks Wednesday afternoon.
"I believe there's a real chance that we can eliminate censorship and the possibility of censorship in a decade,” Schmidt, 58, told an audience on the school’s Washington, DC campus, according to Reuters’ Alina Selyukh.
"First they try to block you; second, they try to infiltrate you; and third, you win,” he said. “I really think that's how it works. Because the power is shifted.”
Schmidt’s remarks were made months after a he embarked on a personal trip to North Korea, where he told Wednesday’s crowd that he attempted to get people in the largely disconnected country to try and see what a powerful tool the internet is.
"My view is that if we can get some connectivity, then they'll begin to open the country, they'll begin to understand other systems,” he said.
But according to Schmidt, he was unsuccessful in that mission. "It's clear that we failed. But we'll try again,” he said. With regards to neighboring China, however, where the colloquial “Great Firewall” has hindered open internet access to the country’s one-billion inhabitants, Schmidt said people there and in other nations where censorship and surveillance are prominent could help end that oppression by resorting to encryption.
"The solution to government surveillance is to encrypt everyone," Schmidt said, according to Reuters.
Selyukh added in her report that Schmidt boasted of Google’s recent decision to increase the length and complexity of its own encryption keys, and equated the public’s necessity to constantly encrypt their data by new standards as a “game of cat and mouse” between governments and internet users.
Aside from the situations in North Korea and China, however, Schmidt’s comments come in the midst of an ongoing scandal pertaining to the United States government’s persistent use of tools and tactics to eavesdrop on the online communications of foreigners. Leaked classified documents disclosed to the media earlier this year by former contractor Edward Snowden suggested that the US National Security Agency was gaining direct access to the servers of internet companies, including Google, for alleged intelligence gathering and counterterrorism purposes, and subsequent revelations have indicated that the NSA even unlawfully tapped into the foreign networks of Silicon Valley companies to collect customer data in an decrypted state.
During the lecture, Schmidt suggested that the spread of encryption tools and the subsequent knowledge needed to employ them properly could eventually end censorship.
"It's pretty clear to me that government surveillance and the way in which governments are doing this will be here to stay in some form, because it's how the citizens will express themselves, and the governments will want to know what they're doing," Schmidt said. "In that race, I think the censors will lose, and I think that people would be empowered."Just as their first significant public conflict as 2016 frontrunners was starting to heat up, Ted Cruz has some nice things to say about his colleague Rand Paul.
“Rand Paul is a courageous voice for liberty, and I’m honored to call him my friend,” Cruz said in a written statement, adding that the two have agreed on the “vast majority of issues.”
Cruz was responding to Paul op-ed published at Breitbart that ripped Republicans for falsely claiming the mantle of Ronald Reagan to push their own bellicose foreign policy views.
The op-ed didn’t mention Cruz by name, but came days after Cruz positioned himself between as the Reagan choice on foreign policy while calling out Paul as the dovish left flank of the GOP.
Thursday, in a speech at the “Uninvited II” national security summit, Cruz said that while Sen. John McCain is on the hawkish right flank of the party on foreign policy, and Rand Paul is at the other, left flank of the party, he’s in the middle, championing a Reaganesque policy.
Cruz had made similar remarks before, but their appearance in what was potentially Cruz’s most significant foreign policy speech apparently did not sit well with Paul.
“Every Republican likes to think he or she is the next Ronald Reagan. Some who say this do so for lack of their own ideas and agenda. Reagan was a great leader and President. But too often people make him into something he wasn’t in order to serve their own political purposes,” Paul wrote.
Cruz, in responding to the op-ed, is taking down the burgeoning conflict a notch with his kind words for the junior Kentucky senator. But his quote also included a firm indication that foreign policy debate between the two isn’t going to fade anytime soon.
“We do not agree on everything, especially regarding foreign policy, but we have agreed on the vast majority of issues, and I am sure we will continue to do so. Substantive policy disagreements are a positive aspect of the political discourse, but in the fight for liberty, I am proud to stand with Rand,” Cruz said.
Paul is set to appear on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show at 10:00pm where he will address the matter further.
The spat is the first time the two senators have had a significant public conflict since they have both emerged as major 2016 contenders.
Paul and Cruz have both worked closely on big fights in the Senate including the “Gang of Eight” immigration bill and the push to defund Obamacare that ended with a 16-day government shutdown.NEW YORK (Reuters) - Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc VRX.TOVRX.N on Monday said a group of company executives will immediately take over for its chief executive officer until he returns from medical leave, news that sent its shares tumbling 10 percent.
Michael Pearson, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc, speaks during their annual general meeting in Laval, Quebec May 19, 2015. REUTERS/Christinne Muschi
The Canadian company said CEO Michael Pearson, 56, was being treated for severe pneumonia.
The decision to put leadership in the hands of three executives was unusual, experts said, and suggested a lack of confidence in any one company executive to temporarily fill Pearson’s shoes.
A spokeswoman for Valeant, based in Laval, Quebec, declined to comment on the decision to appoint a trio to take over for Pearson.
Valeant and Pearson have come under pressure for steep price increases on some drugs and for close ties to a specialty pharmacy that used aggressive methods to overcome insurer barriers to reimbursing its medicines.
Pearson was hospitalized with the lung condition on Friday. The company spokeswoman on Monday declined to say whether he had experienced any complications or when he might return, adding it was honoring a family request for privacy. The spokeswoman also declined to comment on Pearson’s medical history.
“It is an inopportune time for their leader to take sick leave after the company has faced credibility issues in recent months,” said Morningstar analyst Damien Conover. “If the company was on solid footing, it wouldn’t be as much of an issue.”
Valeant said its board has created an “office of the Chief Executive Officer,” which will include General Counsel Robert Chai-Onn, Group Chairman Ari Kellen and Chief Financial Officer Robert Rosiello.
The board also created a committee to oversee and support the office of the CEO, including lead independent director Robert Ingram, president of ValueAct Capital Mason Morfit and former Valeant CFO Howard Schiller.
Jerome Reisman, a partner in the law firm Reisman Peirez Reisman and Capobianco of Garden City, New York, said Valeant’s three-member CEO committee will likely prove too cumbersome.
“With all these kings they’re appointing to the troika, nobody will be able to make decisions,” said Reisman, a financial legal consultant to numerous drugmakers. “A committee on a committee just won’t work. You need a strong CEO.”
Dr. Bruce Hirsch, an infectious disease specialist at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, New York, said the vast majority of patients with pneumonia fully recover thanks to effective antibiotics. But others are slow to recover and can be tired for months afterward, he said, particularly if they have pre-existing structural lung disease, including damage from emphysema, bronchitis, asthma and smoking.
He noted pneumonia can be caused by a range of bacteria, viruses, fungi, as well as inflammation, and in very severe cases can cause heart attacks or heart failure.
Pearson, who joined Valeant as CEO in 2010 after a 23-year career at consultancy McKinsey & Co, has made rapid-fire acquisitions that greatly increased Valeant’s size and share price. But Valeant’s stock has plunged more than 60 percent since August, due largely to questions about the company’s marketing practices and the sustainability of its business model.
Investors have been turning up pressure on the Laval, Quebec-based company to provide a more detailed plan on how it will boost profits in 2016.
Under a deal announced this month, Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (WBA.O) will take over many functions previously handled by specialty pharmacy Philidor Rx Services. Valeant cut ties with the Philidor in response to allegations of aggressive billing practices.
Valeant shares fell 10.5 percent to $102.14 on the New York Stock Exchange.Prepare to see this mug long past November. Photo via Flickr user Gage Skidmore
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As if the possibility of winning the American presidency isn't enough, Donald Trump may try to cash in on the audience he's mobilized this year by creating his own media conglomerate, win or lose in November, as Vanity Fair reports.
Although Trump's spokeswoman Hope Hicks vehemently disputed the idea that her candidate is thinking about diving headlong into the media game, the magazine cited sources close to the reality TV guru who took part in talks about a new platform that, like Trump's campaign, would focus on the blurry lie between entertainment and politics.
Trump moving toward entertainment full-time if he loses in November isn't completely farfetched. The real estate scion has essentially garnered massive amounts of free air time through his campaign and has clearly become a mouthpiece for a large demographic of the population that even Fox News can't seem to satisfy. Trump has reportedly expressed annoyance with how much money he generates other networks, so why not figure out a way to get a piece of that pie himself?
It's unclear what a Trump TV network would look like in today's oversaturated on-demand television market, but if his campaign is any indication, it's bound to just be all Trump, all the time—an unyielding spew of brutal rhetoric without a November expiration date.The remake of Capcom’s original survival horror masterpiece remains one of the finest games in the series, maintaining a level of visual quality and sheer terror to this day. Resident Evil is a stone cold classic, and now a reimagining of its equally beloved sequel is on the way.
We’ve compiled everything you need to know about Resident Evil 2 Remake including all the latest news, gameplay, rumours and even our very own wishlist of potential features.
Related: Best PS4 Games
What is Resident Evil 2 Remake?
First announced back in 2015, Resident Evil 2 Remake is intended as a modern iteration of the 1998 release. Fans have been requesting the project for years, and following the success of the original Resident Evil and Zero remasters, Capcom is finally listening.
At the helm is Hiroyuki Kobayashi, and as yet it remains unclear whether the title will maintain the fixed camera angles of its predecessor or opt for a first-person view as seen in Resident Evil 7. Maybe both?
Resident Evil 2 Remake release date
No release date has been confirmed for Resident Evil 2 Remake, but it’s currently in development at Capcom.
In a recent interview with Collider, series producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi said “a remade version of the game will be out by Capcom soon.”
Related: Xbox One X
Resident Evil 2 Remake story – What’s it about?
Set two months after the first Resident Evil, Raccoon City finds itself in the midst of a zombie outbreak following the Spencer Mansion incident. You play as either Leon Scott Kennedy or Claire Redfield, two rookie police officers who have since become iconic characters in the series. Your job is to survive and eventually uncover the true intentions of Umbrella and their involvement in the critical outbreak.
Resident Evil 2 Remake gameplay – How does it play?
This is a hard one to predict, as Capcom could take its initial vision in a number of directions. If it uses the same template as Resident Evil HD then it will be exactly like the 1998 original, with newly drawn artwork and voice-acting to reflect the state of gaming in 2017.
The basic combination of exploration, combat and survival will likely remain, as you’ll need to strategically dispatch enemies and horde precious items across the city. You might want to avoid getting bitten, too.
Resident Evil 2 Remake wishlist – What we’d love to see
Related: Xbox One X games
Expand on the original story
It’s been some time since the release of the original in 1998, and thus there are many improvements that could be made to Resident Evil 2. We’d love to see the story itself addressed, expanded further with better character development and deeper locations across Raccoon City.
Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield prove their mettle in later instalments, but seeing them as younger and more vulnerable personalities in such a perilous situation would be excellent. We don’t want Capcom to overhaul the original story completely, but make it more fitting for modern audiences.
A more ambitious game world
The iconic framework of Raccoon City must remain untouched, but that doesn’t mean the existing formula can’t be expanded upon. We’d love to see more explorable buildings, alleys and roads left decimated by the undead menace. Desperately searching for resources in a broken city sounds fantastic, especially with zombies lurking around every corner.
Resident Evil 2 eventually expands into underground labs and ominous locales shrouded in mystery. These settings are perfect for a little touch-up, adding additional collectibles that help bring the weird and wonderful world of Resident Evil 2 to life.
Related: Assassin’s Creed Origins Preview
Better voice acting
Some would argue that the awful voice acting from earlier Resident Evil titles adds to the charm. It certainly did, but Resident Evil 7 proved that it could be top-notch and still remain faithful to the series’ roots.
The upcoming Remake should take more than few pointers from Resident Evil 7 in terms of evoking a terrifyingly realistic atmosphere, with believable characters who don’t ham their way through every single line.
Are you excited for Resident Evil 2 Remake? Let us know on social media!TOKYO — Japan said Monday that radioactive emissions from the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in the early days of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami disaster might have been more than twice as large as a previous estimate, suggesting the accident was more grave than the government had publicly acknowledged.
It is unclear whether a more accurate reading of emissions levels would have promoted a swifter or wider evacuation from around the plant. Still, the lag in reporting the true extent of the emissions added to what some critics have called a litany of confusing and contradictory data and analysis from the Japanese authorities, putting officials on the defensive about whether they delayed, or even blocked, the release of information to the public.
Last month the government acknowledged that three of the plant’s reactors had probably suffered fuel meltdowns, after having denied that possibility.
On Monday, Japan’s nuclear regulator, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said that the reactor pressure vessel at one of the plant’s reactors appeared to have been compromised as early as five hours after the quake.
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The agency also said it now estimated that the radioactive release from the plant totaled 770,000 terabecquerels in the first week after March 11. The agency had previously estimated 370,000 terabecquerels released in the first month.South Africa has agreed to investigate an Indian citizen, Zahidmiya Saikh, an alleged aide of terrorist Dawood Ibrahim, in the murders of a VHP activist and a BJP leader in Gujarat two years ago, according to media reports.
Saikh, alias Jao is wanted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) for allegedly conspiring to kill Vishwa Hindu Parishad activist Shirish Bengali and BJP leader Pragnesh Mistry at Bharuch, Gujarat, in November 2015.
The NIA’s probe revealed that Saikh, based in South Africa, had hired killers in Gujarat on the directions of Javed Dawoodbhai Patel, alias Javed Chikna, a key member of the Dawood gang based in Pakistan, The Hindu reported.
The NIA had been in touch with South Africa since last year, requesting their cooperation. The NIA provided crucial details, including latest photographs and Saikh's phone number. Saikh is suspected to be in Pretoria.
Request for provisional arrest of Saikh has been sought under Article 12 of the India-South Africa extradition treaty, according to a report in India Today.
"An attempt to have a video conferencing between the officials of both the countries failed, with South Africa police stone-walling NIA's repeated request for a follow up. The matter was discussed at the highest level, with the agency even requesting the Indian High Commissioner in South Africa to plead their request with them. The repeated push finally yielded. NIA has been mulling to send a team to the country, but only after there is a positive development," according to the report.
South African officials responded a few days ago after the enormity of situation was brought to light. Initially, hesitation existed because the need to investigate a murder as a terrorist attack. Enough evidence was not provided to asses the situation, The Hindu reported.
“It’s a positive development that South Africa has agreed to open an investigation, based on our request. We will wait for the outcome. Earlier, they had asked why a murder was being investigated as a terror case. When we shared the details of the links to Pakistan, they agreed to act," a senior NIA official said, according to the report.
A charge sheet filed in 2016 reveals a darker plot. The murders seemed to be motivated by the Gujarat riots of 2002. The intentions were to target the anti-Muslim leaders present at the riots. "Saikh contacted young people in India and offered them handsome money to work for the ‘D’ company and lured them with foreign jobs,” according to the report.
According to India Today, the charge sheet read, “Shirish Bengali’s murder was part of a larger conspiracy to target people from the RSS, the VHP, the Bajrang Dal and the BJP. Twenty-six foreign conspirators, based in South Africa and Pakistan, formed a terrorist gang and hatched a conspiracy through voice call, SMS and WhatsApp calls and messages to kill persons belonging to a particular section of society with the intention of terrorising them and creating communal unrest.”
Javed Chikna, now settled in Karachi, had sent the names of the people to be targeted to Saikh in October 2015, a month before the murders, according to the NIA. From these reports, the links between the Gujarat riots and the conspiracy become apparent.
The case was earlier investigated by the Gujarat Police and then transferred to the NIA. Twelve persons were arrested for the murders: Saiyed Mohammad Kadri, Zuheb Ansari, Inayat Patel, Mohammad Yunus, Haider Ali, Nissarbhai Sheikh, Moshin Khan, Mohammad Altaf, Abid Patel, Abdul Salim, Abdul Samad and Nasir Khan Pathan India Today reported.
Firstpost is now on WhatsApp. For the latest analysis, commentary and news updates, sign up for our WhatsApp services. Just go to Firstpost.com/Whatsapp and hit the Subscribe button.Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) said Sunday that the take away for Republicans from the 2012 elections is that the party needs to expand its appeal by more effectively presenting conservatism as the best way to address the nation’s problems.
“We have to expand our appeal to more people and show how we will take the country’s founding principles and apply them to the problems of the day to offer solutions to fix our problems,” Ryan said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “We have to show our ideas are better at fighting poverty, how our ideas are better at solving health care, how our ideas are better at solving the problems that people are experiencing in their daily lives. And that’s a challenge that we have to rise to. And I think we’re up for it.”View 5200 Matilda St in a larger map
A 37-year-old woman said she believes her phone was recently stolen by the same woman when she was out walking.She said that she has not heard back from police whether the incidents are related and requested that her name not be used. She said she was out walking Sept. 7 at about 2 p.m. when a woman in a gold car pulled up to Henderson Avenue and Homer Street and asked to use her phone because she was having an emergency."I said 'I’ll call 911 for you' and she said 'No, my phone is dead I just need to speak to my mother,'" she said.The woman said she was standing on the passengers side of the car and called the number on speaker phone so the suspect could hear the other person. She said the suspect had an inhaler and alluded to having an asthma attack."I didn’t extend my arm, but I had to duck down so I could speak with her," the woman said. "She reached across that seat and grabbed me."The suspect then took her cell phone and drove down Homer going about 80 mph, the woman said."She is extremely convincing, extremely," the woman said.A Dallas woman was assaulted while attempting to retrieve her stolen iPhone Tuesday morning, according to a police report.The 25-year-old victim was jogging in the 5200 block of Matilda Street when a woman in a gold-colored Saturn pulled over and asked to borrow her phone. After she handed over her phone, the driver asked her to check if one of her tires was low.While the victim looked away, the woman began driving away with the phone. The victim tried to retrieve her phone by jumping into the driver’s window, but fell out of the car after being punched in the face.The woman suffered swelling to her head and eye, as well as minor cuts and scrapes, according to police.A similar case of phone theft occurred last week, less than two miles away, in the 3000 block of Mockingbird Lane. In both cases, a woman driving a Saturn borrowed a pedestrian’s phone and drove away with it.Police cannot confirm whether the cases are related.Donnie Tyndall
The Donnie Tyndall hire and fire is yet another mishap for Tennessee's athletic department. (AP Photo/Wade Payne)
Donnie Tyndall's unceremonious dismissal is the latest example of what has been a consistent state of upheaval in Knoxville.
Since 2005, Tennessee has employed five different football coaches (Jim Chaney was an interim), four different basketball coaches and three baseball coaches. Tyndall lasted a single year at Tennessee before being dismissed Friday for alleged NCAA violations he committed while at Southern Miss.
Tyndall is one of three recent Tennessee coaches -- Bruce Pearl and Lane Kiffin are the others -- to get in trouble with the NCAA. Tennessee athletic director Dave Hart claimed Friday that the school had no way of knowing about the possible violations Tyndall committed at USM, but Tyndall had run-ins with the NCAA before his time in Mississippi.
In 2010, Tyndall faced NCAA sanctions while at Morehead State for a booster reportedly offering improper benefits to recruits. Hart knew Tyndall wasn't squeaky clean when he hired him.
Tyndall is part of a series of bad hires and missteps that have turned what was once a behemoth into the most unstable athletic department in the SEC.
These missteps have come with financial consequences. The school paid nearly $8 million to make Derek Dooley and his staff go away. At one point UT was paying buyouts to Pearl, former football coach Phil Fulmer, former baseball coach Todd Raleigh and former athletic director Mike Hamilton all at the same time.
In 2013, Sports Business Daily reported the athletic department had more than $200 million in debt. That's a remarkable figure given Neyland Stadium should be a money-printing machine, but rising costs and bad football teams put the athletic department in a precarious position. It has also hamstrung the school's ability to attract top candidates given salary limitations.
The blame doesn't all fall on Dave Hart, who has been UT's athletic director since 2011, but he doesn't appear to be a popular person in Knoxville today. Hamilton was in charge of the ship as it hit a financial iceberg, but Hart's handling of the situation has left a lot to be desired.
Hart has guided UT through two major coaching searches and the school was seemingly rejected by multiple top targets. Even Louisiana Tech basketball coach Michael White, who has never guided the Bulldogs to the NCAA Tournament, said no to Hart before UT eventually settled on Southern Miss' Tyndall. When Hart replaced Dooley, he swung and missed badly on a few top targets like Charlie Strong and Mike Gundy -- not even counting the ridiculous Jon Gruden speculation. Butch Jones has proven himself as an able recruiter during his two years at the helm, but there's no denying he wasn't close to Hart's first pick.
What should be two of the more attractive jobs in the SEC have depreciated in value. It is clear that coaches were already wary about going to UT given the athletic department's woes. With the latest mess involving Tyndall, that could become an even more pronounced issue.
The one positive about the Tyndall situation is that he was fired with cause, which means the school won't have to pick up his hefty $3 million buyout. But the bad news is that the school still isn't in good financial standing and doesn't appear able -- or willing -- to throw major money at a basketball coach the way Alabama appears eager to do.
If Tennessee can ever get back on the rails, there's no doubting that it can be a major player in the SEC in both football and basketball. But as things stand now, it could take years to get back to that point.Within hours of the shooting of the House Majority Whip, Steve Scalise, and four others, one couldn’t help but feel tired watching the predictable brief moment of political unity. The country has been through enough horrors to know that political adversaries will soon line up and take their battle stations on Twitter and talk shows as no solutions are found and no lessons are learned. They will blame each other’s political ideologies and rhetoric for the bloodshed. It won’t be long until the conspiracy theorists come along and throw doubt on whether the facts are the facts, or something more sinister.
No one wants to talk policy reform so soon, but there’s one that is glaringly necessary, and really ought not to be divisive. Wednesday’s shooter, James Hodgkinson, reportedly had a history of domestic violence. Yet he was able to legally obtain an assault rifle. These two facts are incompatible with public safety.
The Daily Beast reported, on Wednesday:
In 2006, he was arrested for domestic battery and discharge of a firearm after he stormed into a neighbor's home where his teenage foster daughter was visiting with a friend. In a skirmish, he punched his foster daughter's then 19-year-old friend Aimee Moreland “in the face with a closed fist,” according to a police report reviewed by The Daily Beast. When Moreland's boyfriend walked outside of the residence where Moreland and Hodgkinson's foster daughter were, he allegedly aimed a shotgun at the boyfriend and later fired one round. The Hodgkinsons later lost custody of that foster daughter. "[Hodgkinson] fired a couple of warning shots and then hit my boyfriend with the butt of the gun," Moreland told The Daily Beast on Wednesday. Hodgkinson was also “observed throwing” his daughter “around the bedroom,” the police report said. After the girl broke free, Hodgkinson followed and “started hitting her arms, pulling her hair, and started grabbing her off the bed.”
In this, Hodgkinson fits a pattern. As Rebecca Traister has written, for New York magazine, “what perpetrators of terrorist attacks turn out to often have in common more than any particular religion or ideology, are histories of domestic violence.” Traister cites Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, who drove a truck through a Bastille Day crowd in Nice, last summer, and Omar Mateen, the Pulse night-club shooter. She also cites Robert Lewis Dear, who killed three people at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, in 2015. According to Traister, “two of his three ex-wives reportedly accused him of domestic abuse, and he had been arrested in 1992 for rape and sexual violence.”
Last year, Amanda Taub also wrote powerfully on this issue in the Times. “Cedric Ford shot 17 people at his Kansas workplace, killing three, only 90 minutes after being served with a restraining order sought by his ex-girlfriend, who said he had abused her,” Taub wrote. “And Man Haron Monis, who holed up with hostages for 17 hours in a cafe in Sydney, Australia, in 2014, an episode that left two people dead and four wounded, had terrorized his ex-wife. He had threatened to harm her if she left him, and was eventually charged with organizing her murder.”
Obviously, not everyone accused of domestic violence becomes a mass shooter. But it’s clear that an alarming number of those who have been accused of domestic abuse pose serious and often lethal threats, not just to their intimate partners but to society at large.
The statistical correlation between domestic violence and mass shootings has also been documented. As the Times reported:
When Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control group, analyzed F.B.I. data on mass shootings from 2009 to 2015, it found that 57 percent of the cases included a spouse, former spouse or other family member among the victims — and that 16 percent of the attackers had previously been charged with domestic violence.
In the meantime, many domestic-violence suspects, like Hodgkinson, are arrested only to have the charges dropped later, which leaves them armed and dangerous. The National Rifle Association and its allies have successfully argued that a mere arrest on domestic-violence charges—such as Hodgkinson had—is not sufficient reason to deprive a citizen of his right to bear arms.
After the Sandy Hook massacre, in 2012, an overwhelming majority of Americans favored tighter gun control, including laws that would require background checks for gun purchasers to be extended to sales at private gun shows. Yet a bill proposing that very measure failed to make it through Congress. And as David Cole, then a law professor and now the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union, wrote last year, in the New York Review of Books, the clout of the gun lobby is even greater at the local and state level, where, after Sandy Hook, eleven states tightened their gun-control laws but some two dozen made them even looser. The N.R.A., with its yearly budget of three hundred million dollars, has mastered the dark art of substituting money for popular will. By spending strategically and threatening to “primary” any office-holder who deviates from its agenda, it has managed to impose an extremist agenda that seems almost unchallengeable. America now has something like eighty-eight guns per hundred citizens—the highest concentration in the world—yet, inevitably, there will be calls for more tomorrow.With OLD MAN LOGAN #25, a new creative team will take over the exploits of the time-displaced Wolverine from a horrible future. Writer Ed Brisson and artist Mike Deodato take over with the June 14 issue and launch the title hero right into trouble!
Deodato’s no stranger to the world of sharp-clawed mutants, having drawn covers for OLD MAN LOGAN and also Wolvie’s son Daken in the pages of DARK AVENGERS, but he’s a longtime fan who’s excited to chronicle the elder Wolverine’s exploits. We talked with the artist about shifting from occasional cover craftsman to interior artist, working with Brisson, and channeling Logan’s years of experience and torment into a more grizzled version of the ol’ Canucklehead.
Marvel.com: You’ve done a few covers for OLD MAN LOGAN already; does that help get you ready for tackling the ongoing series or is it different muscles?
Mike Deodato: It does, but I think what helps the most is the love I feel for the character. He was the only character [on] Marvel’s roster I ever campaigned to draw. I remember bothering [Marvel Editor-in-Chief] Axel Alonso back in 2008 [until] he gave me a one-shot called WOLVERINE: ROAR, which [would have] led me to be the main artist on WOLVERINE: ORIGINS…until [writer Brian Michael] Bendis comes up with a book he created [especially] for me that I couldn’t
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to take a strike against Theresa May and he has resisted. “It's hard to believe that this is the best England can produce at this stage of the game. “We survived Thatcher by the skin of our teeth and somehow we’re still alive and we are presented with Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn. “It’s a tragedy. The UK is in a state of cultural tragedy, dominated by political correctness.”
Eight Major Powers of the World Tue, September 12, 2017 According to a think tank Henry Jackson Society, the audit of geopolitical capability ranks the eight major powers as: Play slideshow 1 of 9Judging by some ordinary voters’ reactions Thursday night, Tim Hudak’s real opponent may not be Kathleen Wynne or Andrea Horwath — but the Tory leader’s own profile.
The Progressive Conservative leader marched his campaign into Southwestern Ontario, a Tory stronghold, touting his Million Jobs Plan to put Ontario back to work and carefully enumerating his message including lower taxes, less debt, more jobs for the skilled trades and treating taxpayers’ dollars with respect.
“Look, the first rule when you’re in a hole — stop digging,” he said to a receptive crowd at a town hall-style event. “Put down that shovel.”
At a big-box mall near where Hudak ran his town hall meeting, Hudak failed to register strongly with some voters even though this is his second election at the party helm.
“I don’t have much of (an impression of Hudak), either way,” said Adam Cook, a security guard who was shopping. He said he doesn’t like or dislike the former Harris-era cabinet minister: “I’m sure he’s a great guy.”
“I’m not sure who’s who,” echoed Cindy McLean, a stay-at-home mother who was picking up cat food at the same plaza, when asked her impressions of the Big Three party leaders.
She said she’s sure the leaders are trying to connect with voters — an issue many have tagged as Hudak’s Achilles Heel, in particular.
“I do think they try,” McLean said of the leaders. But with two young children, McLean said she doesn’t have time to zero in on election issues.
McLean seems like the kind of voter Hudak hopes to charm. She doesn’t like how “big corporations” have control over wages and prices for consumer goods. One of Hudak’s main themes has been an attack on what he calls “corporate welfare” and the cozy relationship between the Liberal government and “the special interests.”
At the town hall event, Hudak took questions from a crowd of about 100. Standing on the dance floor, with a cordless mike, he used each question to hammer home the themes of his campaign.
Hudak talked about a mother he’d spoken to on the campaign trail with two sons — one working in Alberta, the other in British Columbia.
“I want to bring them home and bring that family together,” he said to applause. It would take a “bold plan,” he said. “We can bring those boys home.”
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Where the leaders are FridayPhoto by Justin Ford-USA TODAY Sports
There has been plenty of talk in the media this week about Bellator's bad matchmaking at its London card and the obvious mismatches it is handing to Michael 'Venom' Page. It's hard to blame Page but the truth is that we can’t learn anything useful about Page while he beats up guys who do not have much idea of how the striking game works or who gas out on their first takedown attempt. It is dangerous to keep playing up the striking chops of one fighter when it was in equal parts their own skill and the inability of his or her opponent which made the striking look slick. Ronda Rousey's world class boxing is a terrific example of that. But the notion that Page hasn't fought anyone good is only true in mixed martial arts. In his combat sports career as a whole Page has competed against some good names, including one fighter who you should know is very, very good: Raymond Daniels.
Raymond Daniels has quickly become a fan favorite in kickboxing after making the move over from point fighting and Chuck Norris' World Combat League. In the WCL, he even had a TKO over Stephen Thompson before the result was ruled a No Contest due to injury because Chuck Norris is generous like that. Under kickboxing rules in GLORY, Daniels found himself quickly thrown in with the best and suffered defeats to Bazooka Joe and Nieky Holzken, the two top fighters in the division. However, Daniels grew from those fights and in his rematch with Holzken he got the better of him for two rounds before a cut above his eye caused a stoppage. Daniels' style is counter kicking, particularly with the back kick, and I would highly recommend you watch my video on his growth as a kickboxer. Not only does it illustrate his style and the adjustments he made in his second fight with Holzken, it also has Run DMC in the background. What's not to like?
At the Irish Open, a point fighting tournament, Daniels and Page met in the finals of the -84kg division in 2008, 2009 and 2011 and their bouts are readily available on YouTube. And to answer your immediate question: yes, there is a dance off.
Point Fighting in General
First a bit about point fighting. If you go in expecting a fight you are probably going to hate it. Point fighting is playing tag from a fighting stance, and the points are entirely subjective and depend on what the judges see. You could try introducing electronic scoring and vests but that tends to remove all resemblance to an actual fight. There are lots of different kinds of point fighting with their own rules, for instance most karate styles allow foot sweeps and the WKF allow throws and limited clinch work. Rafael Aghayev gets in with the same 1-2 every time on much taller men, then gets into what I like to call the Jack Johnson clinch with his forearms and hands over his opponent's upper arms in biceps ties. From there he can throw with a hip throw or a Sasae-tsurikomi-ashi or push them away and kick.
The problem with any form of point fighting is that nothing strikes end up getting scored the same as legitimate ones. For instance Alexander Biamanti got himself a great many points connecting at the absolute end of his reach with a fake round kick to hook kick. A cool set up and a'strike' through a real opening, but even if he had kicked as hard as he could he wouldn't have hurt anyone with some of the point scorers he connected with his tippy toes.
And then there are the occasions of all out hilarious bollocks such as Ko Matsuhisa's scorpion kick. Keep getting thrown on your head? Spaz out and hope you get the point, then market an entire DVD around that one technique you scored with once.
Though it is worth noting that Erick Silva connected an actual one of these when an opponent was clinging onto a single leg and that was pretty cool.
And it was these nothing strikes into legitimate openings which told the story of the 2008 match between Daniels and Page. The opening was under Page's lead arm, which he always hangs low until his opponent enters his range or he wants to strike with it. Against men who can't cover the distance or cut an angle, as with all of Page's MMA opponents, Page has great success with his backhanded jab from a hands low position. In the 2008 Daniels vs Page bout, Daniels was repeatedly able to sneak in a nothing body jab which left him in position to be hit but it didn't seem to matter because he'd already scored.
Daniels also struck at this opening under Page's active lead arm with his lead leg side kick—a much more legitimate strike and one which Daniels actually hurts people with in kickboxing.
Page began the bout in an orthodox stance but after Daniels had attacked the body underneath his lead hand a few times, Page switched to a southpaw stance. But again by drawing Page's lead hand into an attack or counter Daniels was able to fire underneath it. This time instead of with the nothing jab he connected a left straight to the body while covering his head from the backfist.
Notice how tightly Page is clamping his lead arm to his body by the mid point of the bout.
The 2008 bout is interesting because it shows such a cautious Daniels and Page. Daniels' back kicks are nowhere to be seen outside of feints and the two fake each other out constantly.
There was even an appearance from Daniels' retreating lead leg back kick.
In the 2009 Irish Open, Page came out orthodox again and this time seemed intent on giving ground. When Daniels charged Page tried to connect with his right hand as he backed up. The trick Stephen Thompson used to hurt Johny Hendricks again and again.
In the 2008 match Page knew that Daniels could cover the distance fast and his lead hand came up each time Daniels lunged in, but Daniels ultimately did nothing but attack the body underneath this arm. This time he kept his lead by his side and focused on giving ground and countering, something which could work whether Daniels lunged for the body or the head.
Page fought a more mobile fight too, giving ground and angling off the line of engagement. While Daniels still wasn't back kicking, Page attempted Daniels' favorite two touch side kick – back kick counter.
When Page anticipated the side kick he tried to break the line in hopes of either avoiding it and coming in from a new angle or threading the right hand down the pipe. Because of the side on stance of this style of point fighting, round kicks chamber in the same position meaning that you can in effect side step a lead round kick too if you have your timing down.
Once a fighter is behind his opponent's leg on kicks chambered at the side he is pretty much safe and can leave his right hand behind for the kicker. Just as T.J. Dillashaw did to the low line side kick that had been bothering him from Rafael Assuncao (a great fight that I regret not writing about).
Even a point fighter as experienced as Daniels was convinced to step in and chase Page, and at one point Page very nearly scored a head kick as Daniels advanced.
The 2011 bout between Page and Daniels (the last one available on YouTube at least, I have no idea these men have met in total) shows Page continue this giving ground and countering tactic while Daniels switches between lunges at the head and body.
This fight was probably the least entertaining between the two because it turned into almost a pure boxing match over massive distances. So there's a lot of lunging, a lot of jumping back, and a lot of desperately trying to get back in after an attack falls short.
Though in the final moments Page, who was losing the match, did a nice bit of ring cutting with his round kicks. But that's fighting, not so much point fighting.
Point fighting has a whole heap of shortcomings. It makes its competitors lunge wildly across the mats just to touch their opponent and leaves them in no position to follow up or recover were it an actual fight. Point fighting considers the first touch and nothing else beyond that. But point fighting does serve as an incredibly valuable training method. The ability to close and create distance quickly is an enormous advantage in a professional fight because distance kills every technique. The man who controls distance controls the fight, no matter how goofy his punching form or how high his chin. And when top notch point fighters meet opponents who don't know how to close the distance or create distance half as effectively as they do, they have a field day.
The three bouts tell you something about Michael Page that his MMA bouts have not. Firstly, he can handle a loss and can actually come back looking better because of it. Just as Stephen Thompson and Raymond Daniels had to in MMA and kickboxing respectively. This is one of the reasons I would rather Bellator just throw Page in at the deep end now before he ends up at thirty without having shown us what he had in his athletic prime. Secondly, Page can adapt to an opponent based on what happened in their first match or the film of it. His 2009 bout against Daniels was entirely different to his 2008 one and was a much tougher contest for Daniels as Page took away all the things Daniels had sussed out about him in the 2008 meeting.
The most important lesson from watching those videos though is that this meant a huge deal to Page and Daniels. After the 2011 bout Daniels erupted with emotion that you wouldn't quite believe for what was 'just' a point fighting tournament. The rivalry had its playful moments such as the dance off but in their 2011 bout the two were getting in each others faces after points and it looked like it might come to actual blows. The fact that Page and Daniels cared so much and fought so hard when they were getting paid next to nothing to compete in a fringe sport makes me so happy for the paydays they are banking in professional combat sports now. Whether you think they are hype jobs or protected, you cannot argue that they do not love the martial arts and give it their all whether its a couple of dozen other point fighters watching them in a sports center or a world wide televised event.
Pick up Jack's new kindle book, Finding the Art, or find him at his blog, Fights Gone By.
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How Bellator London Taught Me That I Don't Care About KnockoutsSINGAPORE - The Raffles Country Club site in Tuas will be acquired by the Government for the Singapore-Kuala Lumpur high-speed rail (HSR) and the new Cross Island Line's western depot.
In an announcement on its website on Wednesday (Jan 4), the club said it will be required to hand over the 143ha site to the Singapore Land Authority (SLA) by July 31, 2018.
Opened in 1988, Raffles Country Club has two 18-hole golf courses and about 2,650 members. Club membership broker websites showed the club memberships being transacted for between $32,500 and $34,000.
Its lease was due to expire in 2028.
The high-speed rail between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur will cross the Straits of Johor via a bridge. It is scheduled to start running in 2026.
Related Story Raffles Country Club workers who lose jobs after site acquisition for HSR will be helped: Desmond Choo
The Land Transport Authority and SLA in a joint statement on Wednesday said that the country club site was the most suitable location to run at-grade tracks immediately after the bridge.
The site will also hold the tunnel portal leading to the underground tunnels that will take the high-speed rail to the Jurong East terminus, as well as crossover tracks and a siding facility to temporarily house trains near the border.
Part of the site will also be used for the new CRL's western depot as a stabling and maintenance facility. The CRL, which will serve areas such as Loyang, Hougang and Clementi, is expected to be ready by 2030.
SLA added that it will work closely with the club management to assist it through the acquisition process.
Raffles Country Club is the second country club to be acquired by the Government for the 350km-long HSR project. It was announced in May 2015 that Jurong Country Club in Jurong East will become the Singapore terminus for the HSR.New Mexico, home to several of the nation's premier scientific, nuclear and military institutions, is planning to take part in an unprecedented science project -- a petri dish, of sorts, the size of a small U.S. city.
A Washington, D.C.-based technology company announced plans Tuesday to build the state's newest ghost town, a 20-square-mile model metropolis that will be used to test everything from renewable energy innovations to intelligent traffic systems, next-generation wireless networks and smart-grid cyber security systems.
Although no one will live there, the replica city will be modeled after a typical American town of 35,000 people, complete with highways, houses and commercial buildings, old and new.
Pegasus Global Holdings CEO Bob Brumley says the $200 million project, known as The Center, will be a first of its kind in the U.S., creating a place for scientists at the state's universities, federal labs and military installations to test their innovations for upgrading cities to 21st century green technology and infrastructure in a real world setting.
It will also enable them to rub shoulders with investors, meaning it could ultimately draw enough new businesses to give the state a technology corridor like that in California's Silicon Valley or Virginia's Reston, Brumley said.
"The idea for The Center was born out of our own company's challenges in trying to test new and emerging technologies beyond the confines of a sterile lab environment," said Brumley. "The Center will allow private companies, not for profits, educational institutions and government agencies to test in a unique facility with real world infrastructure, allowing them to better understand the cost and potential limitations of new technologies prior to introduction."
For instance, he said, developers of solar technology would be able to assess exactly how their systems would be delivered and used in one house where the thermostat is set at 78, and another where it's set at 68. The center could also help show how efficient it might be in an old building versus a new one.
Brumley said Pegasus has been working with the state on the project for about 18 months, and has some initial plans already drawn up. It is now working on appointing a public-private advisory board and selecting a final site.
He said it will be developed on state-owned land, either in the Albuquerque-Santa Fe corridor or in the Las Cruces area near the Texas and Mexico borders. The northern part of the state is home to the Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories and an Intel factory. Southern New Mexico has White Sands Missile Range, Fort Bliss and New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.
Brumley indicate he had a site narrowed down but said it will likely be a few months before anything final is announced.
Initially, the project will employ about 350 people, Brumley said. But he estimates it could ultimately create 3,500 new jobs "outside the fence."
"This could give New Mexico a leadership position in the commercialization of federal research," he said. "It will serve as a magnet for investors."
Brumley said the ghost town will make money by charging user and operation and maintenance fees, selling energy to the grid by subleasing some of its state land for the development of office buildings, hotels and restaurants.
Gov. Susana Martinez said the state is committed to working with Brumley.
"I am confident this innovative project would provide a great boost to New Mexico's economy," she said in a statement. "We are pleased to be able to offer the resources, open spaces, and talented workforce required to make this effort a success."
My administration is committed to an ongoing relationship with Pegasus that will allow The Center to thrive and create New Mexico jobs."After Halloween, Evil Dead and Texas Chainsaw Massacre (just to name a few), Pumpkinhead is now the latest in a long line of horror movie franchises getting a reboot.
According to Entertainment Weekly, Saw franchise executive producer Peter Block has nabbed the rights to the Pumpkinhead franchise, and he plans on shooting the reboot next year (that’d be 2017). Block is currently on the hunt for a director, and he plans on producing the big-screen movie.
The original Pumpkinhead was released almost 30 years ago, back in 1988, and starred Lance Henriksen (Aliens) as a man who summons a terrifying creature (aka Pumpkinhead) to exact bloody, deadly vengeance on the teens responsible for his son’s death. It was the directing debut of the late, legendary makeup FX artist Stan Winston. Over the years, the movie gained a cult status and has spawned not one but three sequels (one direct-to-video and the other two films on Syfy). Here’s what Block said about the horror film:
“Pumpkinhead is one of my favorite horror films of the late ’80s, early ’90s. Stan Winston sits on that Mount Rushmore of iconic filmmakers because of his creature designs, and that was his first directing effort. The creature’s great but the emotional story is wonderful as well. I got the rights to Pumpkinhead, and hooked up with a great young writer called Nate Atkins, and we developed our script, which is really solid.”
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Block then goes on to explain that the reboot will be similar to the original film but will not be a “point-by-point” remake. Which is kind of a good thing.
“There is a similarity of theme and a similarity of story. There’s a lot of Easter eggs for people who know the original — iconic shots and iconic lines that we’re going to use. But we’ve enhanced the setting, and we’ve expanded the characters somewhat, to give it a different kind of experience. We’re just about to start going out looking for a director for it. [We need] somebody who really understands why the first one is terrific, the emotional beats of ‘Is the revenge you seek worse than whatever befell you in the first place?’ But it’s also somebody that wants to embrace what I think audiences really want these days — a really scary, fun thrill-ride. You get a lot of people who want to be in this genre because they see the commercial opportunities. I’m looking for a director who has a love for the genre and knows how to get those beats for the audience.”
Block confirmed the new movie is also titled Pumpkinhead and that they'll try to use as many practical effects as they can -- just like the first film (and most of the creature features of the time).
“I am a big proponent of practical effects. That was the great thing about the original. A lot of the films I still respond to most today, it’s because of the practical effects. We think that it’s going to be a nice slow reveal, lots of scares and lots of action in the beginning, and a great creature in the end, which everybody should be able to look at and say, ‘Oh, that’s Pumpkinhead!’ It’s not like you’re all of a sudden going to find that it’s some amorphous, nebulous, CGI wispy thing. You’re going to know it came from the Pumpkinhead family lineage.”
Are you excited to see that a new Pumpkinhead movie is heading to the big screen, or do you think this is one reboot too many? Do you believe Saw producer Peter Block is the right man for the job?
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(via EW)Getty Images Missing flight MH370 must be found in six months or search will end
An underwater search of the southern Indian Ocean is yet to locate the missing Boeing 777 which went missing on March 8 2014. The plane which took off with 239 people and crew onboard was en-route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing when air traffic control staff lost contact with it. The search has been the largest and most expensive in aviation history with Malaysia alone spending more than £50million - but it has never been found. And time is running out with the search expected to conclude in June 2016, the Australian Joint Agency Coordination Centre said in a statement.
Getty Images A piece of the plane washed up on Réunion Island, a French territory in the Indian Ocean
This year, experts have said they believe investigators are 'close to finding' the Boeing 777 airliner which is likely to have crashed into the ocean. More than 30,000 square miles of the sea floor have already been covered in the multi-national operation, to no avail. There was hope of a discovery in recent months when some debris washed ashore on Réunion Island, a French territory. Despite widespread doubt it was confirmed to be part of the plane’s wing. There have been various reports of debris sightings, but only the Réunion Island discovery has been confirmed as originating from the missing plane. This breakthrough happened after one of three numbers found on the flaperon was formally identified by a technician from Airbus Defence and Space (ADS-SAU). The Australian-led search has been combing a 120,000sq km area of seabed about 2,000km off the coast of Perth, using underwater drones and sonar equipment deployed from specialist ships.
Search areas have changed many times since the plane disappeared, due to confusion over its last movements. But in December 2015, Australian officials said they had refined the search area and were confident they were looking in the right area for the plane. The investigation which is currently being affected by bad weather is expected to continue through the Christmas period, with searchers suggesting the onset of summer is expected to provide better conditions, next year.
Getty Images Families of people onboard MH370 have fiercely criticised the search
In the event the aircraft is found and accessible, Australia, Malaysia and the People's Republic of China have agreed to plans for recovery activities, including securing all the evidence necessary for the accident investigation, Australian Joint Agency Coordination Centre
“In the event the aircraft is found and accessible, Australia, Malaysia and the People's Republic of China have agreed to plans for recovery activities, including securing all the evidence necessary for the accident investigation,” the statement said. Families of passengers who went missing have been fiercely critical of the handling of the investigation since it began. They have complained that officials have failed to adequately inform them of the status of the search. Twelve crew members on the flight were all Malaysian, led by pilots Captain Zaharie Ahmed Shah, 53, and 27-year-old co-pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid. Police have searched their homes and a flight simulator has been taken from the captain's home and reassembled for examination. Onboard the flight were 153 Chinese and 38 Malaysians, according to the manifest. Seven were children.
Getty Images The search area for MH370 has moved many times but Australia says it is looking in the right place
Getty Images Catherine Gang, whose husband is a missing passenger on Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 holds a signWhat is the biggest scandal of 2010 so far?
Allegations of fraudulent misrepresentation from Goldman Sachs? An oil spill that poses a threat to our environment and economy for generations? Mining operators freely ignoring safety violations and treating workers as disposable?
Each of these is bad. But perhaps the biggest political scandal is the one that aids and abets these others -- the pay-to-play system that buys up Congress, pollutes our political system with special-interest cash and deep-sixes the kind of bold reform agenda that we voted for and need.
The health-care industry has contributed more than $200 million to congressional candidates in the 2008 and 2010 election cycles, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Is it any wonder that there was no public option in the final bill, or that Medicare isn't able to negotiate lower drug prices for seniors the same way the Veterans Administration does for veterans?
Big banks and Wall Street financial firms spent more than $500 million since the beginning of 2009 on lobbying and campaign contributions, the center reports. In just the first quarter of 2010, the finance, insurance and real estate sectors spent more than $123 million on 2,057 lobbyists. Any bets on whether the final financial reform bill will create the kind of robust, independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency that would serve as a watchdog with teeth?
Big oil and gas spent nearly $170 million lobbying in 2009 -- nearly $1 billion in the past 12 years -- and has given more than $140 million to members of Congress in the past 20 years. Is it any surprise that we've seen so many exemptions from environmental studies for oil-exploration plans? Or that the climate bill is stalled and insufficient to confront the global warming crisis?
It is clear that the kind of strong reforms we urgently need won't be achieved simply by electing a new president or new members of Congress. Despite the voters' mandate for change, the underlying problem of Washington -- what author and Washington Post reporter Robert Kaiser calls "so damn much money" -- remains unaltered and is in many ways more powerful than even before. In the wake of the Supreme Court's recent Citizens United decision -- which awarded corporations the rights of citizens when it comes to electioneering, allowing them to use their coffers to manipulate political discourse -- the prospect of a Congress "brought to you by (insert corporate sponsor here)" has only grown.
Americans must fight back with legislation that will help organized people defeat organized money. I'm not speaking of the Disclose Act -- a good response to Citizens United that would make corporate campaign funding more transparent. Democratic leaders must recognize that such efforts are mere triage and fail to get to the heart of the money problem in Washington. Congress should also pass the Fair Elections Now Act.
This legislation would sever ties between big-money campaign contributors and members of Congress, who, in the Senate, must raise an average of $27,000 every week they are in office in order to run competitive races. The bill would bar participating congressional candidates from accepting contributions larger than $100 and allow them to run honest campaigns with a blend of small donations and public matching funds.
Sponsored by Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin and Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.), the bill has 18 Senate co-sponsors (12 of whom signed on since the Citizens United decision) and 149 bipartisan cosponsors in the House. Activists are hopeful there will be a House vote as soon as this summer, and Durbin reportedly will push for the Senate to take it up after the House does.
Fighting for this bill is good policy and good politics. A recent Greenberg/Mark McKinnon poll found that voters support the Fair Elections Now Act by a 2-1 margin, 62 percent to 31 percent. Independents support it 67 percent to 30 percent. Is there a candidate in the country who wouldn't gain votes by saying, "I want a political system in which someone who doesn't take more than $100 from anybody can run a competitive race for Congress. I want a political process that makes Congress listen to their constituents and allows them to ignore the lobbyists with fat checks in hand"?
It was a Republican president, Teddy Roosevelt, who had it right when he told Congress, "All contributions by corporations to any political committee or for any political purpose should be forbidden by law." He was so worried about the power of the trusts that he called for public financing of elections. More than 100 years later we can take a desperately needed step to protect the public interest and clean up our politics by passing this legislation.
Katrina vanden Heuvel is editor and publisher of The Nation and writes a weekly column for The Post.Against the backdrop of bloody upheaval in the Arab world, Turkey’s national election in June seemed a triumph of democracy. Candidates for parliament were secular and religious, pro-military and anti-military, in favor of Kurdish rights and opposed. Fifty million people were eligible to vote, and 87 percent turned out. There were no serious incidents. Votes were counted quickly and fairly.
The result was a decisive victory for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. His party, Justice and Development, failed to win a supermajority in parliament that would have allowed him to promulgate the country’s much-anticipated new constitution almost by decree. Nonetheless it won more votes than all other parties combined, winning its third election in a row and making Erdogan the most powerful Turkish leader in more than half a century to win three consecutive terms. He now enjoys more power than any Turkish leader since Kemal Atatürk, who founded the Republic in 1923.
This victory was testimony to Erdogan’s accomplishments. Before Justice and Development won its first national election in 2002, Turkey had spent years under weak coalition governments servile to the military. It suffered periodic economic crises and was almost invisible on the world stage. All of that has changed. Erdogan’s strong single-party governments have broken the army’s political power, turned Turkey into an economic powerhouse, and made it a major force in the Middle East, the Caucasus, the Balkans, North Africa, and beyond.
Yet despite this, many Turks are uneasy. Some worry that the economy, which grew at a spectacular 8.9 percent last year, may be overheating. Others fear that Erdogan’s renewed power will lead him to antidemocratic excesses. A boycott of parliament by dozens of Kurdish deputies cast doubt on his willingness to resolve the long-festering Kurdish conflict. There is also a new source of uncertainty, emerging from uprisings in Arab countries. For the last several years, Turks have pursued the foreign policy goal of “zero problems with neighbors.” In recent months they have been forced to realize that they cannot, after all, be friends with everyone in the neighborhood.
Politically Turkey has changed more in the last ten years than it did in the previous eighty. For generations the army was able to enforce strict secularism in the tradition of Ataturk, but a new ethos, more open to religious influence, has changed the terms of politics and public life. Erdogan prays daily and his wife wears a headscarf. In some Turkish towns, Justice and Development mayors have sought to restrict the sale of alcohol or establish single-sex beaches. This has alarmed many secular-minded citizens. Erdogan could help calm their fears, but instead he has become increasingly strident. Turkey has emerged from the shadow of military power, a breakthrough of historic proportions.…Video of training exercise at the Palais des Festivals criticised by film executives amid anxiety over security at upcoming festival
A video showing the simulation of a terror attack at the Cannes film festival has met a mixed response from film industry executives.
The exercise on 21 April saw armed police firing blank rounds on the steps of Cannes’s celebrated Palais des Festivals, as a group of “terrorists” ran towards the buildings. Medical teams were also in evidence tending to the “wounded”, who lay on the floor in red bibs.
According to comments collected by the Hollywood Reporter, however, future attendees of the festival, which runs from 11 to 22 May, were somewhat nonplussed by the decision to hold such a public demonstration.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cannes terrorist attack simulation – video.
Cannes on high alert as security ramped up ahead of film festival Read more
Yuhka Matoi, a Japanese TV executive, said: “I wasn’t thinking about it until [the video]... Maybe I’ll stay away from the red carpet [this year]”; while German film CEO Alexander van Dülmen said: “Anyone who goes to Cannes knows the French are good at putting on a show. I hope the security video wasn’t just a performance to convince us they are prepared.”
The mayor of Cannes, David Lisnard, defended the exercise, saying: “The exercise is not reality, but the exercise helps to prepare for the reality and to limit the risk. The risks are changing … The buildings were designed 30 years ago when security issues were not the same.” Claire-Anne Reix, president of the Palais des Festivals, said: “It’s not frightening. What should be frightening is all the videos you see on the internet, not the coverage of an exercise.”
France has been on high alert for a considerable period, while the local so-called “Cannes-Torcy” terror cell was broken up in 2012 after an attack on a Jewish supermarket that year.Presidential candidate makes argument for his brand of ‘democratic socialism’ in major speech comparing his ideals to those of FDR, but skimps on foreign policy
Bernie Sanders cast himself as the natural successor to President Franklin D Roosevelt on Thursday in a speech designed to place his “democratic socialism” at the heart of an American political tradition.
Bernie Sanders defines democratic socialism and details Isis plan – live Read more
Amid fears that the Vermont senator’s insurgent presidential campaign is losing momentum to Hillary Clinton – who recently ridiculed his support for social programs in Scandinavia by quipping “we are not Denmark” – Sanders argued it was current free market orthodoxy in the US that was the aberration, while his political philosophy was the authentic face of American democracy, not a radical foreign import.
“I don’t believe in some foreign ‘ism’, but I believe deeply in American idealism,” Sanders told students at Georgetown University in Washington.
“The next time you hear me attacked as a socialist – like tomorrow – remember this: I don’t believe the government should take over the grocery store down the street or the means of production,” he explained. “But I do believe that the middle class and the working families who produce the wealth of America deserve a fair deal.”
Sanders urged the enthusiastic young crowd not to grow “cynical” in the face of the flaws of the US political system, arguing there was historic precedent for transformational change.
“Almost everything [Roosevelt] proposed was called ‘socialist’,” he said to huge cheers, arguing voters needed again to be “prepared to take on and defeat a ruling class whose greed is destroying our nation”.
“Against the ferocious opposition of the ruling class of his day, people he called economic royalists, Roosevelt implemented a series of programs that put millions of people back to work, took them out of poverty and restored their faith in government,” he said.
“I know that terms like ruling class are probably not talked about too often here at Georgetown, not too often talked about on CBS and NBC, but that is the simple truth,” added the senator as he departed from his prepared speech to deliver one of his most detailed explanations of his political philosophy.
Students queued for hours in the rain to see Sanders speak in what was billed as one of the most important speeches of his 2016 campaign.
Yet despite expectations that the speech would also mark the roll-out of a new strategy for fighting Isis, the foreign policy portion of the speech was received in virtual silence and proved much less specific and detailed than the more hawkish version delivered by Clinton earlier on Thursday in New York.
“We must create an organisation like Nato to confront the security threats of the 21st century – an organisation that emphasises cooperation and collaboration to defeat the rise of violent extremism and importantly to address the root causes underlying these brutal acts,” said Sanders in perhaps the most specific policy suggestion.
At times, he sounded much more isolationist than most of his presidential rivals.
“I’m not running to pursue reckless adventures abroad, but to rebuild America’s strength at home. I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I will never send our sons and daughters to war under false pretence or pretences or into dubious battles with no end in sight,” said Sanders.
“Our response must begin with an understanding of past mistakes and missteps in our previous approaches to foreign policy. It begins with the acknowledgment that unilateral military action should be a last resort, not a first resort,” he added.
But Sanders also echoed criticism made by Clinton of traditional US allies in the Gulf.
“Countries in the region like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE – countries of enormous wealth and resources – have contributed far too little in the fight against Isis,” said Sanders. “That must change.”
He also sought to join the dots between his economic principles and a foreign policy that many critics have said is comparatively underdeveloped during the campaign.
“No one understood better than FDR the connection between American strength at home and
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4 a CD or £2.99 as a Download, with all six series three titles in special offer Dalek Empire bundles for £12 on Download and £20 on CD. Or you can join David on his adventures with UNIT as Colonel Brimmicombe-Wood in UNIT: The Wasting (with the CD bundle of Unit - Classic Series 1 reduced to £12). If you prefer your adventures more steampunk than sonic, then try The Adventures of Luther Arkwright. Based on the comic book by Bryan Talbot, David is Luther Arkwright, who fights the Disruptors in a very alternative England…
These offers only last until mid-day (UK time) on Wednesday 19th April, so enjoy whilst they last. Allons-y!Norton (Photo: Clinton Township Police Department)
Clinton Township — Talk about being born under a bad sign.
Call it karma, but criminals have been having a pretty bad time of it in Clinton Township lately.
In the latest case, a 51-year-old Roseville man showed up at the police station Saturday afternoon to bail out a buddy who had been arrested for operating a vehicle while under the influence.
“The bail was $300 and he presented three $100 bills to the station officer,” said Lt. Eric Reincke. “When he pulled out the cash, there was a small yellow baggie between the bills. When the officer asked what it was, the man replied ‘just garbage.’ ”
The officer noticed it looked like cocaine, which a field test confirmed.
Police arrested the man, whom they identified as Royal Norton, and also seized an undisclosed amount of cash from him.
Norton has been charged with possession of a controlled substance, according to police.
Quirky case No. 2 occurred when a man and a woman allegedly robbed a gas station on Harper between 15 Mile and 16 Mile last Tuesday.
“At about 6:30 a.m., a man walked into the station, said he had a gun and demanded all the money,” Reincke said. “He had his hand in his pocket and was acting like he was armed. The clerk complied and the suspect ran out with money and two cartons of cigarettes.”
He was picked up by a woman who was driving a Ford pickup with a cap on the back.
“They went westbound on Interstate 94,” Reincke said. “One of our officers spotted the truck stopped along the side of the road. He was joined by a Michigan State Police trooper, and they observed a man and woman running from the truck.”
Both were arrested after a short foot chase. In a delicious case of irony, the woman told officers they had run out of gas.
Roseville residents Vanessa Sexton, 37, and Mark Volke, 38, were charged with armed robbery and conspiracy to commit armed robbery.
And finally on Jan. 30, a dim desperado tried to make off with $500 worth of headphones from a video game store on Gratiot just south of 15 Mile.
“The suspect went into the store and purchased a refurbished game system,” Reincke said. “When the clerk went to retrieve it from a back room, the suspect stole two sets of headphones and ran from the business.”
Police found their suspect fuming behind the wheel of a car that wouldn’t start. They identified him as Michael Montgomery, 46, of Detroit.
“He has been charged with retail fraud, first-degree,” Reincke said. “He has 15 prior convictions for retail fraud first or second degree.”
[email protected]
(313) 222-2023
Read or Share this story: http://detne.ws/1Dckx8rIt’s been confirmed - Jupiter was struck by a celestial object. Don’t worry though, the gas giant has come out victorious in the cosmic fight (was there ever any doubt?).
In the video below, a small blip of light can be seen on the right side of the planet. It may look insignificant, but the resulting explosion was unusually powerful.
An amateur Austrian astronomer used a 20-centimetre telescope to chronicle the event. Because the small flash could have been the result of a technical issue, a second video - taken at the same time with a 28-centimetre telescope in Ireland - was used to corroborate the first, confirming the impact.
When you consider how massive the planet is (1,321 Earths could fit inside the gas giant), the'small' blip suddenly looks a whole lot larger. Check it out below:
Given how big the blip looks, the piece of space-rock that hit Jupiter must have been massive to cause that type of impact, right?
Well, not quite.
Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy reports that the asteroid or comet probably only measured a few hundred feet in diameter. However, when it comes to celestial collisions, the size of the attacker doesn’t matter as much as the mass of what it’s hitting. Plait explains:
"On average (and ignoring orbital velocity), an object will hit Jupiter with roughly five times the velocity it hits Earth, so the impact energy is 25 times as high. The asteroid that burned up over Chelyabinsk, Russia, in 2013 was 19 metres across, and it exploded with the energy of 500,000 tons [454,000 tonnes] of TNT. Now multiply that by 25, and you can see how it doesn’t take all that big a rock to hit Jupiter for us to be able to see it from Earth. At these huge speeds, hitting the atmosphere is like slamming into a wall. A lot of people get understandably confused how an asteroid can explode due to air, but the pressures involved as it rams through the atmosphere at these speeds are ridiculously huge."
Jupiter is a resilient gas giant. In fact, it’s probably used to getting hit by passing asteroids at this point. The planet gets hit by something big enough to see from Earth about once a year - we’re just noticing it more now because our tech is evolving.
Moral of the story: Keep your eye on the sky. You never know what you might see.
This story was originally published by Futurism. Read the original story.MILLIONAIRE businessman Dick Smith has taken aim at his own generation, saying its greed has crippled young people’s ability to own their first home.
He launched a scathing attack on Australia’s politicians, accusing them of being too scared to make tax changes that would be unpopular with the generation already on the “homeownership gravy train”.
“These people may be aware that the system that has skewed the game so heavily in their favour is locking the next generation out,” he wrote in Dick Smith Fair Go released this week.
media_camera Dick Smith at his Terrey Hills home. Picture: David Swift.
“But, along with property developers, they want to hold on to their investment properties and milk younger Australians for all they’re worth.”
The former Australian of the Year’s manifesto calls on the Federal Government to reduce immigration and make changes to tax breaks such as negative gearing and capital gains laws.
He also argued for a land tax to replace stamp duty so that people with multiple houses pay a percentage of their land’s worth annually to even out the playing field.
In the book, Mr Smith points out that older Australians who had benefited from tax exemptions, made up 68 per cent of the electorate so politicians were unwilling to change tax laws.
“Why would a turkey vote for an early Christmas?” he wrote, citing that investment properties had risen on average about 70 per cent since 2012.
It follows the former retailer’s public support of controversial One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson last year, in which he described her zero-net immigration policy as “spot on”.
media_camera One Nation leader Senator Pauline Hanson’s policy has gained support from Dick Smith. Picture: Mick Tsikas.
Zero net immigration means Australia takes in only the same amount of immigrants that leave.
Yesterday, the 73-year-old from Terrey Hills highlighted population growth as the single biggest issue impacting housing affordability.
“Every Australian family has a population policy, they don’t have 20 kids, they have the number of children they can give a good life to,” he told the Manly Daily.
“But our politicians have no equivalent plan — you must have an appropriate plan. We need to bring immigration down to the long-term average which it was at in Paul Keating’s time as prime minister — about 70,000 people a year.”
He argues most of the — roughly 4000 — immigrants coming to Australia per week, were picked for high-level skills meaning they could immediately compete with Australian first-home buyers, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne.
“Land and house prices depend on supply and demand. Australia’s housing supply clearly has difficulty keeping up with our breakneck population growth,” Mr Smith wrote.
Mr Smith denied that his sentiments were racist.
“The reason I wrote the book is to talk about what no one talks about,” he said.
media_camera Dick Smith published a 64-page book on housing affordability.
“If you mention population growth they say you are racist … it has nothing to do with racism, we need to live in balance. You can’t have endless population.”
He said the book was a warning to politicians that they will “destroy Australia” if they do not take heed.
“You need to get immigration down to that level so young people will be able to afford houses,” he said.
He added there would be 100 million people in Australia by the end of the century and 30 per cent of people will be unemployed if things don’t change.
In the book he also takes aim at “turbocharged bank lending”; overseas investors; and tax benefits as causing an “almost impossible-to-fix” situation of housing affordability.
Mr Smith pointed out that in just two generations, the price of a house had increased eightfold from 1.5 times the average annual income to 12 times the average annual income.
“A dramatically increasing population, a tax regime that unfairly subsidises the wealthy and overseas investors are the key drivers of the crisis,” the book, says.
The book can be downloaded for free at: dicksmithfairgo.com.auLet’s do something a little bit different today. Let’s just step in the time machine and look at OLD photos. I’m going to bring you a a photo essay of the construction of Expedition Everest, beginning in 2004.
There’s no hidden agenda or implied commentary with these pictures. For once, I’m really just looking at them and enjoying the historical view. We’ll start at the beginning and work our way forward.
January 3, 2004:
March 9, 2004:
May 19, 2004:
July 10, 2004:
August 28, 2004:
September 15, 2004:
October 23, 2004:
November 20, 2004:
December 19, 2004:
January 2, 2005:
January 20, 2005:
February 5, 2005:
February 27, 2005:
March 19, 2005:
April 15, 2005:
May 1, 2005:
May 15, 2005:
June 18, 2005:
July 2, 2005:
August 5, 2005:
September 30, 2005:
October 22, 2005:
November 12, 2005:
December 24, 2005:
The ride opened on January 26, 2006 for previews. Thanks for coming along for our time capsule photo essay!
Free Online Class: Fairy Tales
Some of you know that my “day job” is in Higher Education. Among the classes I teach is one on Fairy Tales, with focus on Disney, Grimms, and Perrault. This college class is now available to the general public, and it’s completely free! There’s not even a book to buy for the class!
The class is a massive open online course (MOOC) and is administered through canvas.net – it’s free to sign up and take the class! It’s a four-week course starting on August 5.
Here’s the schedule:
Week 1 – Cinderella
Week 2 – Snow White and Sleeping Beauty
Week 3 – Rapunzel and the Frog Princess
Week 4 – Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast
The class was built to expect about two hours of engagement/interaction (“work”) per week, so it’s not meant to overload the participants with chores and duties. In that sense, it’s less rigorous than my regular college classes. The class doesn’t have any required (synchronous) meetings; you do the work whenever you want within the week.
This course does not have a completion certificate – you’d be taking it just for the fun of it. There aren’t any papers or projects. While the class does offer quizzes and discussion boards, there isn’t really a rigorous process to “pass” the course since there isn’t a certificate offered anyway.
The class is, however, experimental in a different sense: it’s got game elements in it. We added badges and group competition, as well as Easter eggs, throughout the class. Each group is named after one of Walt’s seven dwarfs–it works a lot like the Harry Potter “house” competition, where individuals can earn badges for the whole group. This should be fun!
Please feel free to sign up and spread the word. I can’t wait to share with you what these fairy tales used to mean and how they’ve been changed for modern audiences!! Sign up here: https://www.canvas.net/courses/fairy-tales-origins-and-evolution-of-princess-stories#enroll_form
The Original Grimms
Do you love the Disney movies? Then you’re going to love finding out where those stories came from and how they evolved… and it will surprise you greatly! I’ve got a new book out this year, and it’s something I’ve been working on for ten years. It’s a collection of the Grimms fairy tales, but it’s guaranteed to be like nothing you’ve ever read before. This is the first-ever translation in English of the Grimms fairy tales as they appeared in the Grimms’ working manuscript. These were the stories as told to the Grimms directly; these are the tales, in other words, that truly capture the spirit and intended messages of these peasant stories.
The version of Grimms fairy tales that you’ve read before (if you’ve read them at all) is actually a translation of the seventh edition published by the Grimms. They changed the stories constantly, and it’s a revelation to view them in their original, unexpurged state.
Ever wonder why Cinderella’s prince can’t just recognize his dancing partner by face? You’ll learn the answer by reading the original and comparing it to the final version in Grimms. The Disney movie was not based on Grimms so much as another fairy tale author named Perrault, but our comparison of the Grimms versions reveals the underlying moral message which explains the princes actions in all versions, including the Disney movie.
To give you just a taste of what this book holds, consider the case of Snow White. You may think of this at the moment as a story about true love, probably due to the influence of the Disney movie. The fairy tale in the published Grimms collection is gruesome by comparison, with the evil stepmother punished for her sins with torture and death. But this was not the original Grimms story. My book will let you see the story as it appeared in the manuscript, which is different still. Gone is the stepmother, and gone is the prince as rescuer. Serving those same functions in the original story are the girl’s mother and father. If you consider that for a moment, you’ll recognize that this changes the story dramatically. It’s now a family drama, and the queen is jealous of her own daughter’s beauty. The implication is that she is worried about losing her man to the more beautiful girl. Yes, there’s a minor implication of incest in the original story, made stronger by the fact that the father does rescue the girl at the end and puts his own wife to death. Squeamish about all of these messages, the Grimms hastily replace the mother with a stepmother, and the father with a prince from the outside.
That’s not all. The Grimms kept tinkering with the story. When it was first published in the 1812 edition, the father is absent from the story, and a prince rescues Little Snow White. However, in this early version, the girl is not jolted awake when taken from the dwarfs. Rather, her coffin is carted about the prince’s castle so he can look upon her whenever he wished, and abusive servants, irritated that they had to shoulder her weight constantly, smacked her corpse in anger and accidentally dislodged the magical bit of apple.
Now that you know the true origins of Snow White, won’t it be hard to view the story the same way in the future?
This book will hopefully have an effect on readers just like that for all the stories discussed. It looks at the original and final versions of several popular tales, including Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, Rumpelstiltskin, Hansel and Gretel, and the Frog King, which was the source material for Disney’s movie the Princess and the Frog.
An essay accompanies each translation to put the different versions into context, provide some cultural analysis, and also compare both text versions to more popular modern retellings, including Disney animated features, if there is one for that tale. We even look at other Disney fairy tale movies, even if they don’t originate from the Grimms. Accordingly, you’ll find a discussion of Little Red Riding Hood, Beauty and the Beast, and the Little Mermaid. The little mermaid interpretation in particular may surprise and even shock readers.
The book is 114 pages long and can be purchased at Amazon.com and several international Amazon websites. It retails for $6.99. You will also find the book available as an e-book for Kindle devices, or the free Kindle-for-PC software. The Kindle version costs $5.99.
More information and updates
Kevin Yee is the author of numerous independent Disney books, including the popular Walt Disney World Earbook series and Walt Disney World Hidden History. Readers are invited to connect with him online and face to face at the following locations:Ron Gilbert - the DeathSpank Interview
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Ron Gilbert - the DeathSpank Interview
Interview - posted by baby arm on Tue 12 May 2009, 07:10:58
Tags: DeathSpank
1. Tell us about DeathSpank. What's the premise? The gameplay?
The elevator pitch for DeathSpank is Monkey Island meets Diablo. All the interesting and complex storytelling and humor of the golden age of adventure games blended with an action RPG. That said, DeathSpank is not a hardcore RPG.
2. Describe some of the RPG aspects you intend on having in the game (character creation, stats, equipment, etc).
The one thing DeathSpank is missing from the traditional RPG is character creation, since the game revolves around the character DeathSpank. He is who he is. Don't try to change him. But, there are a lot of different stats, equipment and abilities in the game. Players will build those up over time, customizing DeathSpank to fit their play style and challenges the game throws at them.
3. How are you combining the adventure and RPG elements? What will the balance between the two genres be? More adventure or more RPG?
Good question and probably the hardest thing about designing DeathSpank. If there were ever two genres that belonged together, I think it's Adventure and RPG. They share a lot in being story and world focused. But there are also differences, mainly in what motivates players to move forward and how they attack problems. An adventure game can be described as a bunch of immovable objects you need to navigate your way around, and a RPG is a bunch of really heavy objects you need to push out of the way. I would be lying if I said it's not a constant challenge to balance the two. As John F. Kennedy once said of the moon landings: We do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.
4. What about dialog? Will there branching dialog trees?
Yes, the way you interact with other characters (besides beating on the them with a sword if the need arises) is humorous Monkey Island style dialog trees. In the past few years this has become a lost art. Players today don't seem to enjoy a good conversation, or maybe it's that no one is giving them a good one to enjoy.
5. How important will the story be in DeathSpank? What sort of story could you create around this character?
Story is paramount to the game. This is one of the strongest aspects borrowed from traditional adventure games. There is a complex story the weaves its way through the world. DeathSpank has always been a character that stories just write themselves around given that both the character and the game are a satirizing of games and two dimensional game characters.
6. What about exploration? Will there be a world to roam around in or it will it be a more linear situation?
It's a completely open world. You can go anywhere you want, provided that you can either puzzle solve or fight your way there. There is not set order events will unfold in. This aspect of how stories are told is taken directly from good classic adventure games (not the bad ones, just the good ones).
The large non-linear world is also completely load-less. As you wonder from area to area, in and out of caves and buildings, there is never a load screen. In my mind, this kind of immersion is one of the more important aspects of the game.
7. Since a Diablo mention is unavoidable at some point, is there anything about Diablo you'd like to avoid with DeathSpank?
There are a couple of things. But first, I think Diablo is a brilliantly designed game. It should be standard for deconstruction in game schools (if game schools did that sort of stuff, which they don't, which is too bad). I never felt the Diablo world was one that I could just explore and experience. Diablo is very much about getting equipment/stats to kill the next thing you encounter (PvP mode aside). While there is a very rich world, it's mostly told as backstory. I prefer stories are told to me while I play the game. Some of the older games such as Baldur's Gate do a pretty good job of this. Zelda also does this well.
8. Does the sad fate of Hellgate: London give you any pause about going into the action RPG business? After all, these guys were professionals at this sort of thing...
No. One game failing to live up to expectations should never write off an entire genera. It's important to look at games that fail as much as games that succeed. There are always lessons to be learned.
9. Can we expect further RPGs from you in the future, whether action-oriented or more traditional?
I tend not to think too far in the future.
10. Is it anymore of a challenge incorporating comedy into an action RPG rather than an adventure game? Is there any difference in how you'd approach it?
The most important thing for me when integrating comedy into DeathSpank was to make sure -- at some level -- the combat is always taken seriously. I didn't want to give DeathSpank a bunch of silly abilities like throwing a pie in someone's face or farting. There are funny things he does, such as cast a spell that conjures a bunch of chickens that attack someone (it's the funniest thing you've ever seen) but there are real stats behind the attack. Players can look at it and understand the damage it does and the effects it has on the enemies (i.e. fearing them), plus these chickens are tearing some guy to pieces. Tragedy is when bad things happen to you, comedy is when bad things happen to someone else.
11. What made you decide to go with Hothead Games? What was your role on the Penny Arcade games?
The main reason I went with Hothead was they were a small Indie studio that self published their games. I did not want to do the game with a huge publisher that would want to water down the game. It's a weird game. I wanted to preserve that.
12. Are there any other studios you'd like to work with in the future?
I'd go work for Blizzard if they wanted me to work on their next MMO.
13. What are some of the challenges you've found working on an episodic game?
DeathSpank is no longer episodic, so I guess you could say there were some challenges. :-) I really like episodic, but it's hard for it to make financial sense unless you drop yourself into a fairly ridged structure and we decided that wasn't the best thing for DeathSpank. When the industry has matured a little more, I think episodic will be big and I very much want to do that.
14. Given your and Clayton Kauzlaric's connection to Total Annihilation, was there any consideration of going with an RTS? Any other genres you'd like to give a try? Any genre you'd never try?
Funny you should mention that. Back when I was running Cavedog Entertainment, I was designing a game called "Good & Evil" that was a melding of adventure and RTS. DeathSpank shares a lot in common with that game. As far as other genres I'd like to try? Just about anything except FPS. I'm not a huge fan of them and I'd probably make a really bad one.
15. What recent or upcoming projects in the adventure field excite you, give you hope? Anything about the current state of the genre that frustrates you?
Telltale does a lot of good things with adventure games. It's good to see them being commercially successful making them. It's also nice to see the indie movement take up the genre, but I'd love to see more market aware innovation from them. Adventure games suffer from two problems in todays market: 1) The majority of today's gamers enjoy things that are more visceral. They like to be told what to do and where to do it and then get good at doing it. Adventure games are fundamentally about not knowing what to do or where to do it and figuring it out. Adventure games are slow moving contemplative affairs. 2) I believe there is a big emerging market for more traditional adventure games. Casual players outnumber hard core players today and adventure games (with some changes) would have great appeal if we could figure out how to reach them. It's a problem time will solve.
16. Has being the "Monkey Island guy" ever been a hindrance to you in the industry? For example, pitching an idea and being told "...but that doesn't sound like an adventure game."
Just to opposite. Conversations usually start with "We don't want to hear an adventure game pitch".
17. It's pretty safe to say that most of the folks that follow your career are adults. But are you concerned about keeping DeathSpank below the threshold of a "Mature" title, especially since the yougins are likely to be drawn to any combination of the words "death" and "spank"?
There is no specific mandate to keep DeathSpank a T. If the game needs to be a M, it will be a M. Problem with a lot of M titles is they come from "developer immaturity" more than artistic need. The industry is made up of a lot of people that still giggle when they see a breast. Being M doesn't make you cool. Making a game where two girls kiss doesn't make you an "artist".
18. Where do you go after DeathSpank?
The overarching story in DeathSpank is more than one game, so I hope to finish the sequels in fairly quick succession. I don't want to have another Money Island 3 situation. At the end of the DeathSpank saga all will be explained.
19. You're given $10 million and told to go make Diablo 4 or Anachronox 2. Which would you go with and what would you do with it? Would there be any more or less pressure working with someone else's I.P.?
I have a feeling Blizzard's Diablo 3 cut-scene budget is well over $10 million. Working on someone else's IP is a lot of work if you want to be true to their creation. The thing I love about designing games is creating worlds and characters, so working on someone else's IP always removes one of the "fun components" for me.
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“Check them for weapons at the door, confiscate any you find,” I instructed the group of rebels. “Offer them nothing. When you’re done and they’re settled, stand at the edges of the room.”
“Spaced out, or…?”
“Spaced out, sure. Then keep quiet. If you make eye contact with them, don’t be the person to break it. If they say anything, ignore them. They’re going to react, they’ll push, they’ll say things, and they’ll threaten you. But you’re the ones with power, alright?”
That got me a series of nods from the rebel soldiers.
“If you absolutely have to say something, keep it short, firm, along the lines of ‘I’m going to need you to be quiet’, and make sure they can see your weapon in its holster. If you’re losing your nerve, if you can’t stay firm, or if anything comes up, I want you to use gestures, alright? Two fingers extended while your hands are in front of you, as if to cover your watch, like so. We’ll be watching from around the corner and we’ll call you out of the room.”
I didn’t miss the fact that they glanced in Jessie’s direction to confirm that it was okay to listen to me.
“If they’re not cooperating, then show them the door. If they don’t cooperate there, then, hm, one of them should hang back so they can run to us, shouldn’t they?”
The question was aimed at me.
“Yeah,” I said. “The chances there are a problem are slim. You’ll be fine.”
Jessie gave the confirmation, and the students headed to the door.
Lillian and Helen caught up with us around the time that we were hearing the commotion at the door. One loud voice with crisp enunciation stood out from the rest.
“Duncan, Ashton, Mary and the younger Lambs are on their way, and your lieutenants are heading over there to replace them. Nora is hanging back there so we know if anything happens.”
“Our lieutenants.”
“Sure, Sy,” Lillian said.
“You can give them orders and they’ll listen.”
“That’s good,” she said.
“Well, I mean, you’ve always wanted to run an Academy, and Jessie and I worked hard to get to this point. Mary’s taking to this and she’s enjoying having soldiers to order around, I think.”
“She is.”
“And this is something we should share and do together,” I said. “I get if this is bittersweet, but it’s not an entirely bad thing and-”
Lillian reached up and covered my mouth.
“Is this usual?” Lillian asked Jessie, as Helen stalked around me, giving off all of the ‘danger’ vibes, her eyes on me. She reached out and fixed my hair.
“I think he’s agitated because he’s happy,” Jessie said.
“Nuh, inf urhrifahd,” I mumbled into Lillian’s hand.
“Or he’s agitated because he’s terrified.”
“Ihm affy oo, hoh”
“Sy sounds like this man I knew once,” Helen said. “It was a long time ago, I don’t know if Jamie took notes on it, so I’m not sure if you know about it, Jessie. It was a man with a beard. I sucked his tongue out of his mouth, it took some doing, but it came off at the root.”
“I had the notes. MacPaul.”
“Macpaul! Yes! The deserter. Yes, he was lovely.”
“Ohfleh?”
“And he sounded like Sy?” Jessie asked.
“Well, I had my hand over his mouth after I pulled my head away, and there was a lot of snorting and gurgling because of the blood, but yes. I’m feeling nostalgic now. It’s making me even more restless now.”
“If this discussion goes badly, we’ll give you a chance to work out that restlessness,” Jessie said.
The group was entering the sitting room. Lillian dropped her hand from my mouth and we stepped out of the way while they got settled.
The sitting room was a middle-point in between three separate areas for the girl’s dormitories, separated roughly into the younger years, the middle years, and the senior students, at the south, west, and north walls of the building, respectively. The room was divided into stages, with roughly the same intended hierarchy, scattered chairs, seats, tables, and bookshelves serving to make the space comfortable.
I peeked and confirmed there were ten aristocrats present, but many of them paired off in husband wife pairs, and I had the impression the men would mostly do the talking. Tradition took more of a hold when moving into the upper ranks of society.
The position of the chairs gave some indication of the hierarchy of those present. They didn’t all sit as a cluster – we’d arranged chairs on the upper level so they could, but if they’d taken that bait then they would have been huddled. It implied weakness.
Still, they didn’t space themselves across the whole room. Had they been nobles, I could imagine they might, confident enough to protect themselves without the benefit of their herd.
They did, I noted, avoid sitting down, with the exception of several of the wives. They stood by chairs, claiming them, but they weren’t letting their guard down.
“They’re not even here to greet us, hm?” one man spoke. He had dark hair and a prominent chin that might have owed to Academy science. He looked athletic. He wore a suit and bore a tidy pencil mustache, and he was one of only two men present who didn’t have a wife with him. “You’re not going to respond to me?”
There was only silence.
“Burner, you know how these games are played,” said one of the husbands. A near-peer of the man who’d taken the lead and the best seat in the room? He talked to the other with a familiar tone.
“I know, believe me, but there’s a certain decorum to be expected. There’s absolutely no need or benefit in disrespecting people after they’ve waved the white flag.”
“I feel the same way, but we gain nothing by allowing them to agitate us.”
“I’m far from agitated. If I was agitated, blood would have been shed already.”
“You’ll put us all at risk if you keep that up, Burner,” a lady spoke. Interesting, that she spoke and her husband was silent, almost deferential. I noted a harsher note to her voice. A rebuke.
The conversation continued, shifting to milder observations of the space, and a few attempts at getting responses from the guards we’d assigned.
“When are they coming?”
Silence.
“What did they offer to get you to betray your King and country? I’m curious what a young man’s patriotism is worth.”
Silence.
That she’d come or been sent… I wondered if she represented a different faction.
As far as expendable messengers went, those connected to the rest by paper or by blood would cost too much to lose. The celebritas wouldn’t be sent nor would they be willing to go. Government, military, or commerce, then.
There were four players worth paying attention to, now that I was reading the room. Sir Burner Lisburn was the loud, brusque one. His friend, apparently, was a John Salford. Government and military in some proportion there, between the two of them.
The young lady was Mrs. Derby. Burner and John were friends, but Derby wasn’t a friend of theirs. She belonged to a different faction and occupied a different space in the greater structure of it all. Money, if I had to guess.
The fourth was a fat man. He didn’t speak, he wasn’t named, and the sole reason he caught my eye was that the others kept a distance from him, and he seemed content to sit in the lowest tier of the room’s stepped floor.
He was harder to peg. I had my suspicions, all the same.
A rebel approached us, leaning close to Jessie’s ear, then to Lillian’s.
Not that it was wholly necessary. By the time the sentence was fully uttered, Jessie’s hand was moving, gesturing, explaining.
Duncan and Mary were back. There was a number, and Jessie had already drawn and retrieved a lady’s pocketwatch.
She gestured the start of the countdown, then abandoned the task, leaving us to count in our heads as she saw to my cuffs. I was free. I was fairly sure that even with my mind intentionally turned to the task, I couldn’t do an abundance of damage.
Fairly sure.
Jessie resumed the countdown without glancing at the watch.
As a unit, we stepped into the sitting room, interrupting our guests mid-conversation. Duncan and Mary’s group entered from the opposite side, coordinated. The little ones weren’t present.
“And here they are. The Lambs. I must say, the Gages had a great deal to say about some of you,” Burner said.
“They’re not among our guests, as I recall,” Jessie said.
“We’ve heard the stories. There was other talk when we were cooped up in that building over there. You’re a known element.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” I said, being sure to smile.
We’d finished crossing the room. I stood between Jessie and Lillian, Mary stood next to Lillian. On the other side, Ashton, Helen, and Duncan formed a trio.
“Well,” John Salford said. “I hope this can be a civil discussion.”
“Barring incident, I do believe the plan is to have a discussion and send you back, to report to your betters,” Duncan said. He glanced at Jessie and I. I saw Jessie’s hand move in confirmation.
Burner was the first to take his seat. It was positioned so he could look down on the rest of the room. “Then here we are. I recommend everyone who’s going to take a seat should do so. This is liable to take a while.”
“Not too long,” Jessie said. “This will take a little while to digest, so we’ll send you back and discuss the minutiae in a bit.”
“I’m just going to interrupt before we get too far underway,” I said. I turned my head, looking at the nearest guard. “Would you go to the kitchen? Get tea? Food? Something hearty. Sausage, perhaps, and that fried onion mince.”
I moved my hand as I spoke, on the pretense of fixing the button at the front of
|
. 3.5/5
Taste: Immediately sweet, which brings out the malt and even a mild cola-like flavor but unfortunately none of the pumpkin. Still, the mild to moderate bitterness lasts through to the more gourd-flavored finish, though there is little actual hop flavor to be found. 3/5
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied, with substantial carbonation which is almost too crisp but helps cut through the sweetness. Very mild alcoholic heat. 3/5
Overall: There is a fair amount of detail in the spice/malt flavors, but the spice to pumpkin ratio is way off. Needs more pumpkin and less sweet malt. 3.5/5
– – –
‘POST ROAD PUMPKIN ALE’ – BROOKLYN – Pumpkin Ale – 5.00% ABV
Appearance: Poured a translucent golden orange with a two finger, egg-shell head. Virtually no carbonation is visible. 4/5
Smell: Has a moderate pumpkin aroma balanced well with some milder caramel malts and spices including clove, nutmeg, and maybe even coriander. Has some noticeable hop aromas as well in the form of slightly sharp earthy/spicy hops. 3.5/5
Taste: Strong clean bitterness which brings out the foresty hop flavors and goes quite well with the pumpkin flavor. Spices are more subdued, and there is only a touch of malt sweetness present. Very clean with a moderate finish. 4/5
Mouthfeel: Medium to light body, with a slight bite from carbonation which leads this beer to be refreshing and palate cleansing. Very smooth with no alcohol warmth. 4/5
Overall: Odd spice composition, but surprisingly light and well-balanced overall. Does a good job of not letting the pumpkin or spices take over; would be a reasonably good session beer even without these components. 4/5
AdvertisementsWhat's growing faster than the number of medical marijuana dispensaries in Colorado? The number of proposals to regulate them.
But while it now looks like competing concepts will collide at the Colorado Statehouse when it convenes the second week in January, Denver's keeping its steady pace toward regulation, with the first reading of a bill slated for January 4, and a public hearing and vote scheduled for January 11, sealing a deal that councilman Charlie Brown started working on just two months ago.
"The L.A. city council has been working for two years, and they've been unable to come up with any kind of model," Brown said after a fact-finding mission to Los Angeles last month. "There are more than a thousand dispensaries there, more than there are Starbucks. It's just ridiculous. We don't want to become another L.A."Minister has invited Japanese companies to set up manufacturing facilities in to produce 'rolling stock' for Metro rail projects.
The invitation to set up the manufacturing facilities was extended by Jaitley during a bilateral meeting with Japanese Minister Taro Aso in Yokohama. The minister is on a three-day visit to Japan to attend the 50th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors' of the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
Jaitley also highlighted various initiatives under the "Make in India" programme which is a flagship scheme of the central government to spur domestic manufacturing, it was officially stated in New Delhi on Sunday.
Besides taking part in the 50th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Sunday and the Annual General Meeting of ADB on May 4-7, Jaitley was scheduled to attend other engagements also.
--IANS
rv/dg
(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)Netanyahu vs. Rahmbo?
A few days ago, the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth published an article by Simon Schiffer reporting that several of Obama’s advisors were “demanding that Prime Minister Netanyahu dissociate himself from the venomous slurs that his aides have been disseminating against them.” Presumably the slurs in question refer to the story that Netanyahu and his aides referred to Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod as “self-hating Jews.” Quoting unnamed “sources in the administration,” Schiffer reports that the Obama aides responded to the Israelis by saying “We don’t need a certificate of approval from anyone on your side about our devotion to the State of Israel.”
Obama’s advisors were right to complain about these ugly calumnies, but isn’t there something odd about this whole controversy? Just plug the name of any other country into the sentence quoted above and see how strange it sounds. Can you imagine a top U.S. advisor telling a foreign leader from Italy or Costa Rica or Canada or Belgium that they “didn’t need a certificate of approval from anyone on your side about our devotion to [insert country name here]?”
Two features of this incident are particularly striking. The first is the assumption by people in the Netanyahu government (and apparently the PM himself) that top U.S. officials should agree with the Israeli government’s policies simply because they are Jewish. If you don’t agree with Bibi, it seems, then you must be a “self-hating Jew.” (Of course, this is also the view of some hardline pundits here in the United States, who have made similar accusations about Jewish writers who are critical of some of Israel’s current policies). This statement is absurd, of course, given that plenty of Israelis don’t agree with Netanyahu’s policies, and there is a wide range of opinion among Jews all over the world about many aspects of foreign policy, including the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Why Netanyahu expects blind fidelity from U.S. officials who happen to be Jewish is a bit of a mystery, unless he and his aides were just trying to guilt-trip Obama’s aides into backing down on the current issues in dispute.
The second striking feature is the nature of the defense. Assuming Schiffer quoted them accurately, U.S. officials are defending their position by stressing their devotion to a foreign country whose government happens to be mad at them, simply because the United States currently has a serious policy difference with that government. But why didn’t Emanuel or Axelrod do what Henry Kissinger reportedly did when Golda Meir accused him of being insufficiently devoted to Israel? He reminded her that he was firstly an American, secondly secretary of state, and thirdly, Jewish, and he made it clear that this particular ordering of identities would guide his conduct.
Obama’s aides might have responded as they did for domestic political reasons, or to try to win over sympathetic Israelis, but there’s no reason to doubt the sincerity of their statement. Emanuel, Axelrod, and other key figures in the administration clearly feel a strong personal attachment to Israel — and there’s no reason why they shouldn’t. At the same time, they disagree with Netanyahu about what policies are in America and Israel’s long-term interest. Given the amount of backing that the U.S. still provides to Israel, it’s entirely appropriate for them to make those disagreements clear, and to try to convince Israel to alter its behavior.
This discussion is naturally tied to the delicate subject of what is sometimes termed “dual loyalty,” a topic that tends to provoke conspiracy theories from some and angry denunciations from others. But given that the United States is a “melting-pot” society that has drawn its citizens from all over the world, and given the undeniable fact that Americans of various backgrounds feel strong attachments to a variety of foreign countries (and for various reasons), it is also one of those subjects that we ought to be able to talk about in a calm and rational way. An excellent place to start, by the way, would be Israeli political scientist Gabriel Sheffer’s book Diaspora Politics: At Home Abroad, which analyzes the issue in a clear and sensible fashion and avoids the hysteria that often infuses such discussions in the United States.
Pete Souza/The White House via Getty ImagesLisa Jackson's forthcoming departure from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is a major victory for transparency and accountability in Washington.
After years of whispers that EPA officials frequently used private email addresses, fake names and coded messages to circumvent the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, Jackson admitted recently to using "Richard Windsor" as her chosen nom de plume on a government email account.
That was her choice because it reminded her of a much-beloved family pet, she claimed. (At least she didn't ask how anybody could suspect a puppy lover like her of any wrongdoing.) The EPA inspector general opened an investigation into the matter because it is against federal law to use nonofficial or secret email addresses to conduct official business.
The EPA IG could hardly do otherwise. The use of private or secret emails enables high government muckety-mucks like Jackson to hide things about which they don't want the rest of us to know. But we don't need an investigation to know officials have been hiding bad things within the EPA for a very long time.
During the Clinton years, Carol Browner (a former senatorial aide to Vice President Gore) headed the EPA. She ordered the hard drive on her government computer to be reformatted and all backup tapes destroyed, just hours after a federal judge ordered her agency to preserve all agency email records. Only hopelessly naive or blindly partisan folks took seriously Browner's doe-eyed claim that it was all just a big mistake and she certainly wasn't trying to cover up anything. Nothing to see here, so move along, folks.
But nothing was done.
Then, in the course of litigation initiated a few months ago by Competitive Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Christopher Horner, an internal memo from the EPA's IT department turned up. It described the process for establishing and using secret email accounts.
That revelation sparked trench warfare among Jackson's EPA, a federal court, at least two committees in Congress, Horner and the CEI over thousands of other internal emails and documents likely to shed additional light on the illegalities going on at the environmental agency.
The conflict is far from over, and the odds favor some ugly revelations before any cease-fire is declared. Jackson's defenders will claim her departure has nothing to do with these matters. But Horner well makes the obvious point to the contrary: "It is not only implausible that Lisa Jackson's resignation was unrelated to her false identity, which we revealed, given how the obvious outcome and apparent objective of such subversion of transparency laws was intolerable. But it became an inevitability when, last week, the Department of Justice agreed (as a result of our lawsuit) to begin producing 12,000 of her 'Richard Windsor' alias accounts related to the war on coal Jackson was orchestrating on behalf of President Obama outside of the appropriate democratic process."
There's also this: Having held dozens of Jackson's most costly and controversial proposed regulations until after the election, the Obama administration is now releasing those regulatory bombs. Still having "Richard Windsor" at the EPA would have immeasurably complicated the legal and political battles occasioned by each of the new Jackson regulations.
Maybe, as Horner jokes, Jackson just wants to spend more time with her dog, but it's impossible not to think Jackson's sins against transparency account at least in part for her departure from the EPA.
Here's why this is so significant if you believe the public's business ought to be conducted in public: Nobody in government has ever gone to jail for violating the FOIA.
Jackson isn't going to jail, either, but at least now she won't be running the EPA under an alias.
Mark Tapscott is executive editor of The Washington Examiner.Wyethia helianthoides or mule's ear wildflower (on right) showing fasciation or mule's ear wildflower (on right) showing fasciation
(Carnegiea gigantea ), resulting from fasciation, located at Saguaro National Park (West), Arizona, U.S. A "crested" saguaro cactus, resulting from fasciation, located at Saguaro National Park (West), Arizona, U.S.
Fasciation (pronounced, from the Latin root meaning "band" or "stripe"), also known as cresting, is a relatively rare condition of abnormal growth in vascular plants in which the apical meristem (growing tip), which normally is concentrated around a single point and produces approximately cylindrical tissue, instead becomes elongated perpendicularly to the direction of growth, thus producing flattened, ribbon-like, crested (or "cristate"), or elaborately contorted, tissue.[1] Fasciation may also cause plant parts to increase in weight and volume in some instances.[2] The phenomenon may occur in the stem, root, fruit, or flower head. Some plants are grown and prized aesthetically for their development of fasciation.[3] Any occurrence of fasciation has several possible causes, including hormonal, genetic, bacterial, fungal, viral and environmental causes.
Causation [ edit ]
Fasciation can be caused by hormonal imbalances in the meristematic cells of plants, which are cells where growth can occur.[4][5] Fasciation can also be caused by random genetic mutation.[6] Bacterial and viral infections can also cause fasciation.[4] The bacterial phytopathogen Rhodococcus fascians has been demonstrated as one cause of fasciation, such as in sweet pea (Lathyrus odoratus) plants,[7] but many fasciated plants have tested negative for the bacteria in studies,[8] hence bacterial infection is not an exclusive causation.
Additional environmental factors that can cause fasciation include fungi, mite or insect attack and exposure to chemicals.[8] General damage to a plant's growing tip[8] and exposure to cold and frost can also cause fasciation.[4][6] Some plants, such as peas and cockscomb Celosia, may inherit the trait.[8]
Fasciation is not contagious,[4] but bacteria that cause fasciation can be spread from infected plants to others from contact with wounds on infected plants and from water that carries the bacteria to other plants.[9]
Occurrence [ edit ]
Although fasciation is rare overall, it has been observed in over 100 plant species,[8] including members of the genera Acer, Aloe, Acanthosicyos, Cannabis, Celosia, Cycas, Delphinium, Digitalis, Euphorbia, Forsythia, Glycine max (specifically, soybean plants),[10] Primula, Prunus, Salix and many genera of the Cactaceae (cactus) family.[citation needed] Cresting results in undulating folds instead of the typical "arms" found on mature Saguaro cactus.[11]
Some varieties of Celosia are raised especially for their dependably fasciated flower heads, for which they are called "cockscomb".[4] The Japanese Fantail Willow (Salix sachalinensis 'Sekka') is another plant that is valued for its fasciations.[4][8]
Prevention [ edit ]
Fasciation that is caused by damage to genetic material and by bacteria can be controlled by not using fasciated plants and disposing of fasciated plants.[9] Avoiding injury to plant bases and keeping them dry can reduce the spread of bacteria.[9] Avoidance of grafting fasciated plants and the pruning of fasciated matter can also reduce the spread of bacteria.[9]
Examples [ edit ]
Fasciation
Fasciation on Digitalis. Note the larger thickened stem compared to the normal-sized flowering spike on the left.
Fasciation on a flowering cherry ( Prunus ) tree
Asparagus ( Asparagus officinalis ) fasciation. Note the flattened state of the stem. Image published 1893.
Common dandelion displaying both regular (upper right) and fasciated (center) flowers.
Fasciation on a lilac shrub.
Fasciation on a Phacelia campanularia or California bluebell wildflower.
Fasciated showy daisy (Erigeron speciosus).
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]John Legere. Donald Trump. Two self-styled loudmouths in suits. Who would win in an epic Twitter battle?
We're finding out literally as I type this: the titans of industry are throwing shade at each other, apparently after Legere — the firebrand CEO of T-Mobile USA, who is staying at a Trump hotel in New York City — complained about a drummer on the street outside his hotel room. Shortly after, Legere praised Trump's customer service, seemingly after hotel staff got the street drummer to move.
Trump, looking to pick a fight, countered that T-Mobile's service "is terrible," and that he doesn't "want it in his buildings." Legere immediately responded that he was checking out of the hotel. Snap.
.@realDonaldTrump I will serve all customers in the USA openly but I will obviously leave your hotel right away based on this. #checkingout — John Legere (@JohnLegere) April 12, 2015
And there you have it. My guess is that Trump is uninvited from Legere's Christmas party.
By the way, John, if you need a place to crash tonight, I got you.“The announcement from Amazon to start the sales tax collection for Arkansas in March is laudable and good news for the state. Arkansas will join the other 38 states in which Amazon is collecting and remitting sales tax. This step by Amazon has been voluntary and reflects the new landscape in which retailers recognize the practicality and fairness of sales tax being treated equally between online sales and in person store sales. This decision also shifts the responsibility of sales tax payment from the customer to the retailer at the time of checkout—providing further clarity and efficiency to the current and often misunderstood Arkansas law.
“As everyone knows, lowering our state’s income tax rate has been a priority of mine from day one. This strengthened revenue stream will allow us to continue to make progress in cutting the income tax rate, making Arkansas more competitive with our surrounding states, and putting money back into the pockets of hardworking Arkansans.”
has announced it will begin collecting thex on purchases in Arkansas March 1.The news follows receptive votes in both House and Senate to measures aimed at enforcing collections of the sales tax on Internet purchases in Arkansas.This is NOT a new tax. In theory, a sales tax (or technically a "use" tax) is owed on all purchases made by Arkansans in or out of state. But the seller is not required to collect the tax if it does not have a physical operation in the state. Amazon operates no facilities in Arkansas.Legislation to require Amazon and other large Internet sellers to notify customers of taxes owed on purchases prompted Amazon to begin collecting the tax on Louisiana beginning this year. And similar legislation has advanced in the Arkansas legislature.The change could amount to millions for Arkansas. That raises anew the question of whether the money will be allowed to accumulate for starved services or to go to further cut taxes for higher income people.I presume this means a windfall not just for the state but also for cities and counties. If the practice follows those of other merchants, the tax will be computed based on prevailing sales tax rates in the place of residency of the purchaser. More details to come on this.Amazon did $134 billion in sales in 2016. Arkansas's 3 million people amount to slightly less than 1 percent of U.S. population. A rough estimate of taxes on Arkansas sales thus would be 6.5 percent of 1 percent of $134 billion, or about $78 million.UPDATE: this week filed a bill t hat would provide an income tax cut equal to any amount raised by internet sales tax collection in excess of $70 million. He'd apply that amount toward a reduction in the 4.5 percent tax rate applied to the first $12,599 in taxable income for all taxpayers.UPDATE II: from Gov. Asa Hutchinson:The Berlin Senate has announced an audacious, and some would say totally inappropriate plan to house 10,000 migrants in mid level to luxury hotels in the city with a total price tag of at least 600 million euros.
The senate has requested a contract with Grand City Hotels to lease out 22 hotels to house migrants in the city. According to German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine the senate entered negotiations with London-based Hampton Holding, the owners of the popular Holiday Inn and Wyndam hotels in Berlin.
The costs break down at 50 euros a night, 1500 euros a month and 18,000 euros a year. The costs to rent an apartment in Berlin, even in the centre of the city average far lower prices. A quick look on apartment rental sites show much cheaper prices even in the centre of Berlin.
The company who own various hotels in the city like Hotel Berlin Mitte, the Berlin City East and City West, have been incredibly attracted to the idea as the government guarantees an occupancy rate of 95 per cent, something the hotels may only see seasonally rather than all year round when the capacity averages 60-65 per cent at best.
The idea of renting out hotels in Berlin is not without precedent. The 182 room Best Western “President” hotel has been completely rented out to migrants to the tune of 150,000 euros a month. This figure excludes even what are considered “incidental” expenses meaning the actual figure could be even higher per month.
At least 80,000 migrants have come to Berlin since the migrant crisis started last year and the Berlin Senate has tried everything to house them anywhere it can find space. At least 50 school and public gymnasiums have been converted into makeshift asylum centres as well as a former office building and a former savings bank headquarters in the city. It’s expected by officials that next year the numbers will likely match or exceed the 80,000 that have already come, leading many to wonder where else the senate can look for additional housing.
Some in the Berlin senate aren’t as enthusiastic about the arrangement as they see a possibility for corruption between government officials and private business. A senior senate staff member told German paper Der Spiegel, “we almost invite abuse and corruption,” because of the lack of transparency of the deals and the fears that without a competitive bidding structure there is room for the government and the tax payers to get charged far more than they would otherwise.
There has been outrage across social media platforms in Germany and elsewhere on the deal with many commenting on how there are an estimated four to ten thousand homeless on the streets of Berlin and that there has been no mention of them by the senate.
Luxury accommodations for migrants have already been provided in Sweden, as Breitbart reported back in November when Swedish government agencies took luxury cruise ships for housing for migrants as well as ski resorts and hotels.Tayyip Erdogan was sworn in as Turkey’s president on Thursday, cementing his position as its most powerful leader of recent times in a step opponents fear heralds more authoritarian rule and widening religious influence in public life.
Reading the oath of office in a ceremony in parliament, Erdogan vowed to protect Turkey’s independence and integrity, to abide by the constitution and by the principles of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the modern secular republic.
“In my capacity as President of the Republic, I swear upon my honor and repute before the great Turkish nation and before history to safeguard the existence and independence of the state,” he said at the brief ceremony.
He was seen off by a military salute as he left to lay a wreath at Ataturk’s mausoleum on a hill in the heart of Ankara, one of the most important symbols of the secular republic. A further ceremony was then due at the presidential palace.
Moments after being sworn in, Erdogan appointed outgoing foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu as acting prime minister, according to an announcement in the official gazette. Davutoglu will oversee the existing cabinet until Erdogan asks him to form a new government, expected to be announced on Friday.
Members of parliament from the main opposition CHP walked out moments before Erdogan took his oath, while party leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu boycotted the event entirely, accusing Erdogan of breaching the constitution by remaining in office as prime minister after his presidential victory.
“We’re now more worried than ever about one-man, autocratic rule in Turkey,” CHP deputy Aykan Erdemir told Reuters.
Erdogan’s victory in Turkey’s first popular presidential election this month capped more than decade as prime minister in which the economy has tripled in dollar terms and the country has carved out a growing, though often controversial, role in the politics of the conflict-torn Middle East.
Opponents warn his ambition to establish an executive presidential system will concentrate too much power in the hands of a leader with autocratic instincts and roots in Islamist politics, and lead the EU candidate country ever further from the secular ideals of Ataturk.
Senior representatives of some 90 countries from Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Europe will attend ceremonies later on Thursday, including the emir of Qatar and Iran’s foreign minister, Erdogan’s office said.
There were no heads of major Western states, many of which have viewed Erdogan skeptically since a crackdown on anti-government demonstrations in June of last year.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko had been due to attend but canceled after accusing Russia of bringing troops into the southeast of the country in support of pro-Moscow separatist rebels.
Challenges ahead
In a final speech as AK Party leader on Wednesday, Erdogan spoke of his move to the presidential palace as the birth of a new Turkey. But he vowed that the AK’s mission to elevate the country as a major regional power would go on unchanged after he left party politics. He must cut party ties as head of state.
Erdogan’s rhetoric has long played on the divisions between his supporters among Turkey’s pious conservatives and a Western-facing, largely secular class suspicious of his Islamic ideals. In his farewell party address, he tried to strike a more conciliatory note.
“Whether they love us or not, I reach out my hand from here to every one of the 77 million people,” he said. “We understand your lifestyles, your values… We want you to understand the bans, restrictions and threats we overcame to get here today.”
His combative nature was still in evidence, however, as he vowed to fight on against the “treachery” of his ally-turned-foe U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen. Erdogan accuses Gulen of orchestrating a corruption scandal targeting the government through a network of followers in the police and judiciary.
That power struggle, along with advancing a peace process with Kurdish militants and forging a new constitution, will be among the new government’s top priorities. But it will also have to cope with a slowing economy and the threat from Islamic State militants over its southern borders with Iraq and Syria.
The current economic team, including Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan and Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek, is expected to remain largely intact, while intelligence chief Hakan Fidan, a close Erdogan confidante, and EU minister Mevlut Cavusoglu are leading contenders for foreign minister.
Erdogan aide Yalcin Akdogan was also expected to take up a position in cabinet, possibly as a deputy prime minister, while AK deputy chairman Mustafa Sentop is seen as a candidate for justice minister, senior officials have said.
The AK party must win a stronger majority in parliament in a general election due by next June if Erdogan is to secure his ambition of changing the constitution and establishing an executive presidency.
In the meantime, he will use to the full the powers of the existing presidency which has functioned under predecessors largely as a ceremonial position. He can head government meetings and exert influence by dint of his personal authority, as reflected in a series of election victories since 2002.
[wpResize]The National Transportation Safety Board has issued a new ruling stating that drones are, in fact, aircraft, and it's rattling America's fledgling drone industry.
The NTSB ruling means there could be fines for anyone operating a drone in a manner that the Federal Aviation Administration deems reckless or careless, reports CBS News transportation correspondent Jeff Pegues.
The ruling stems from an incident in 2011, but it could set a precedent for drones for a long time.
The FAA is still considering how to regulate the commercial use of drones, but the NTSB's ruling appears to give the agency the authority to punish operators who don't fly drones safely. The agency compared drones -- or unmanned aircraft systems -- to planes, which are regulated by the FAA.
Board members determined that an "aircraft" is any "device... used for flight in the air," a definition that includes, "manned or unmanned, large or small."
That could apply to the drone that led to the court case in the first place. It was flown above the University of Virginia in 2011 by Raphael Pirker, who was using it for commercial purposes to capture images of the campus. The FAA fined him $10,000, but he fought it in court and won. The FAA then appealed to the NTSB who ruled in their favor, sending the case back to an administrative law judge for further review.
The uncertainty surrounding the regulations is having a ripple effect.
Law enforcement officers can make arrests, but prosecuting cases where drones fly in restricted airspace has been difficult.
Businesses large and small are also waiting for guidelines that will allow the use of unmanned aircraft to deliver packages and even food.
By some estimates, when drone use really takes off, it will create an industry that can support more than 70,000 jobs with an economic impact totaling more than $13 billion.
But Michael Toscano, the president and CEO of the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, said that won't happen until the FAA's rules and regulations are in place.
"It's important to have regulatory structure in place to allow for the utilization of this technology. People say well the technology has outpaced the regulatory," Toscano said. "That's true with any revolutionary type technology, so you've hit upon what has to be done -- we need to have rules in place. This is one of the few industries that wants to be regulated."
Toscano said the Pirker ruling highlights unanswered questions that still exist about using drones.
Pirker, the man who went to battle with the FAA, declined CBS News' requests for an interview, but his attorney told CBS News they "disagree with the decision" and they are "reviewing the options for their next steps."Mutant champions save imperiled species from almost-certain extinction
Sandra Hines News and Information
Species facing widespread and rapid environmental changes can sometimes evolve quickly enough to dodge the extinction bullet. Populations of disease-causing bacteria evolve, for example, as doctors flood their “environment,” the human body, with antibiotics. Insects, animals and plants can make evolutionary adaptations in response to pesticides, heavy metals and overfishing.
Previous studies have shown that the more gradual the change, the better the chances for “evolutionary rescue” – the process of mutations occurring fast enough to allow a population to avoid extinction in changing environments. One obvious reason is that more individuals remain alive when change is gradual or moderate, meaning there are more opportunities for a winning mutation to emerge.
Now University of Washington biologists using populations of microorganisms have shed light for the first time on a second reason. They found that the mutation that wins the race in the harshest environment is often dependent on a “relay team” of other mutations that came before, mutations that emerge only as conditions worsen at gradual and moderate rates.
Without the winners from those first “legs” of the survival race, it’s unlikely there will even be a runner in the anchor position when conditions become extreme.
“That’s a problem given the number of factors on the planet being changed with unprecedented rapidity under the banner of climate change and other human-caused changes,” said Benjamin Kerr, UW assistant professor of biology.
Kerr is corresponding author of a paper in the advance online edition of Nature the week of Feb. 9.
Unless a species can relocate or its members already have a bit of flexibility to alter their behavior or physiology, the only option is to evolve or die in the face of challenging environmental conditions, said lead author Haley Lindsey of Seattle, a former lab member. Other co-authors are Jenna Gallie, now with ETH Zurich, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, and Susan Taylor of Seattle.
The species studied was Escherichia coli, or E. coli, a bacterium commonly found in the lower intestine and harmless except for certain strains that cause food-poisoning sickness and death in humans. The UW researchers evolved hundreds of populations of E.coli under environments made ever more stressful by the addition of an antibiotic that cripples and kills the bacterium. The antibiotic was ramped up at gradual, moderate and rapid rates.
Mutations at known genes confer protection to the drug. Researchers examined these genes in surviving populations from gradual- and moderate-rate environments, and found multiple mutations.
Using genetic engineering, the scientists pulled out each mutation to see what protectiveness it provided on its own. They found some were only advantageous at the lower concentration of the drug and unable to save the population at the highest concentrations. But those mutations “predispose the lineage to gain other mutations that allow it to escape extinction at high stress,” the authors wrote.
“That two-step path leading to the double mutant is not available if a population is immersed abruptly into the high-concentration environment,” Kerr said. For populations in that situation, there were only single mutations that gave protection against the antibiotic.
“The rate of environmental deterioration can qualitatively affect evolutionary trajectories,” the authors wrote. “In our system, we find that rapid environmental change closes off paths that are accessible under gradual change.”
The work was funded by the National Science Foundation, including money through the consortium known as the Beacon Center for the Study of Evolution in Action, and UW Royalty Research Funds.
The findings have implications for those concerned about antibiotic-resistant organisms as well as those considering the effects of climate and global change, Kerr said. For instance, antibiotics found at very low concentrations in industrial and agricultural waste run-off might be evolutionarily priming bacterial populations to become drug resistant even at high doses.
As for populations threatened by human-caused climate change, “our study does suggest that there is genuine reason to worry about unusually high rates of environmental change,” the authors wrote. “As the rate of environmental deterioration increases, there can be pronounced increases in the rate of extinction.”
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For more information:
Kerr, 206-221-3996, 206 221-7026, [email protected] Reading
The neighborhood dipped into a sustained period of decline during the 1980s. The remnants of the middle class fled to the suburbs, leaving behind a fractured community. Crime spiked. Gunfire became like a soundtrack. “There was always [police] helicopters,” says Oscar Casas, who married Christina and moved to Rusk Avenue in the late ’80s. “You could always hear them — thwock, thwock, thwock.”
About the same time, Southland Corp., 7-Eleven’s parent company, bought and leveled acres of homes in adjoining neighborhoods to make way for its grandiose Cityplace project, which included plans for twin office towers on either side of Central that would be linked by a pedestrian bridge spanning the freeway. Fallout from the savings and loan crisis combined with Southland’s crushing debt caused plans to be scaled back mid-construction. Only a single tower was built; much of the surrounding land remained fallow.
After their son Oscar was born in 1990, the couple considered moving somewhere safer with better schools, but their search was put on hold after Christina’s father was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1992. Their daughter Crystal was born in 1993, and by the time they were once again in a position to consider relocating, Oscar Jr. was enrolled in Dallas ISD’s Dealey Montessori in North Dallas, which they were happy with. Listening to the lamentations of friends who had decamped to far-flung suburbs reminded them that living five minutes from downtown had its advantages. They decided to stay put. “Why move?” Christina says. “This location right here, it’s close to everything.”
The neighborhood stabilized during the 1990s and remained gritty but livable for the next decade. Then, in 2007, around the time Oscar and Christina were replacing one of her father’s cramped old bungalows with a new, two-story model with gleaming wood floors and three-and-a-half bathrooms, a developer named Alan Kagan began approaching Rusk property owners to see if they were interested in selling. Kagan was betting that Uptown’s boom was about to start spilling over Central Expressway. “We knew that development had to happen there — it just had to,” Kagan says. “It was just too close to everything.”
The Casases told him they weren’t interested, but others were, and pretty soon eight modern townhouses, all right angles and glinting aluminum, had sprouted at the end of the block. In 2010, the Casas family watched two bungalows across the street give way to modernist dwellings. In 2011, two more modern homes appeared, making their stub of Rusk Avenue evenly divided between the tiny homes Christina had grown up in and sleek rectangular homes that were selling to young professionals for a quarter of a million dollars.
The new homes were simultaneously popping up on other streets: a couple around the corner on Carroll, a smattering on Deere Street, an enormous block of townhouses on Cabell fronted with stucco and topped with a mansard roof. In 2012, a luxury apartment complex went up on Central Expressway. A sea of others — Metropolitan at Cityplace, Fitzhugh Urban Flats, the Strata — soon flooded the area around Fitzhugh Avenue to the north.
Kagan, who estimates that he has now built close to 50 homes in the area, says the initial challenge was convincing the young professional types he was targeting that the neighborhood was safe. Early on, “most of the buyers were men,” he recalls. “Women who looked at it, they loved the product, [but were scared off by] the area.” Gradually, that changed. “Now we get everybody buying: women, singles, straights — the whole gamut.”
The Casases were amazed at the speed of change. A few years ago, Oscar says, “you wouldn’t see ’em [Anglos] walking dogs around this neighborhood.” Now, the sidewalks are flooded with them, even after dark. This, as much as anything else, highlighted a fundamental truth for the Casases: They were being gentrified.
Christina and Oscar Casas live next door to the house Christina was born in. The neighborhood has transformed over the past decade as affluent professionals have begun moving into large, modern houses.
Dallas has spent the 70 years since World War II oozing from its core. In the north, development followed Central Expressway to Richardson, moved on to Plano, then jumped to Frisco, McKinney and beyond. The advance south has been somewhat less dramatic, but places as far-flung as Red Oak and Waxahachie have become fertile ground for new suburban-style subdivisions.
That process hasn’t stopped; Dallas’ exurbs are still growing at a fantastic rate. At the same time, a countervailing trend has emerged as people began moving back toward the center of the city. The explosion of high rises
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was really upset about it and didn't want to live with it, so he moved down to Florida." That was in 1967. A Reader's Digest article titled "A Bullet From Nowhere" would be the family's first press, long before their drug-smuggling escapades would dominate headlines in the Sun Sentinel and beyond.
As the DC-4 made its third swoop above the makeshift runway, John Beserany groaned.
It was a January night in 1980, and the 29-year-old with a head of curly black hair and a handlebar mustache was crouched on top of a farmhouse roof in rural Hardee County, about 60 miles east of Sarasota. As the designated lookout, Beserany remembers watching the plane's front beam cut an incriminating swath of light through the orange groves that surrounded him and his 29 partners in crime.
The group had gone over the plan meticulously. If there were any deviation, the odds of safely landing the plane filled with 7.5 tons of marijuana would be almost nil. Police had been on high alert for low-flying aircraft, so the team needed to be as stealthy as possible.
Three weeks earlier, however, pilot Jim Wilson had refused to practice, say multiple people involved in the plot. Teddy DeLisi remembers how they had driven out to a secluded airstrip -- a route that didn't pass over any roads, homes, or strip malls. Along with brother Richie, the two scoured the area under the guise of a dove-hunting trip. The group had even gone so far as to secure permits and pack shotguns to avoid suspicion from police. But after taking a look around, the veteran flier decided he didn't need to do a test run. "He said he knew the area like the back of his hand," Teddy says.
But when it came time to execute the plan, Wilson's confidence was gone. He squinted into the inky night, trying to locate the tiny lights his coconspirators were using to illuminate the 200-foot-wide dirt runway.
What happened next came to define the DeLisi brothers' lives, and they along with others who were there remember the details: Wilson took a risk by dipping the plane down to get his bearings, but he was still too far north. He circled back again and again. The third time, he descended right over the abode of a forest ranger, who would later testify that the resulting vibration caused the dishes on his countertops to rattle and break.
Suspicious, the forest ranger headed out in a truck directly toward the plane, which had finally landed. About 20 men were urgently pulling bale upon bale of Colombian weed from its cargo bay, knowing the police had probably been alerted.
Teddy DeLisi was supposed to prevent anyone from calling the police. His job was to drive up and down an adjacent road, tying up the area's party line by dialing the farmhouses' numbers from various pay phones. But the forest ranger had a radio, and the next thing Beserany knew, he was watching police cars swarm the area from his bird's-eye view on the roof.
"Abort, abort, abort," he yelled into his radio before chucking it off the roof and then jumping. Beserany, as well as the men unloading the bales, ran into the nearby woods. The smugglers hid for a good 12 hours before Beserany decided to peek his head out onto the main road. As chance would have it, a cop car was passing. Beserany, who was bleeding from his palms, told the officer he had just gotten into a fight with his girlfriend.
His unconvincing story got him booked into the Hardee County Jail, which would precipitate a series of events that ultimately landed 29 men behind bars. Law enforcement was able to trace the DC-4 to Paul Pettie, a Broward County judge who also served as the DeLisis' lawyer. Later, Pettie would flip, becoming a major witness for the prosecution.
The DeLisi brothers were arrested. They bonded out on $400,000 apiece and spent 18 months on the lam. They were eventually apprehended and sentenced to five years in state prison each.
Florida passed its own version of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act -- or RICO -- in 1977. Under that law, the state could file a civil suit alongside a criminal one if the defendant were considered part of an organized crime ring. It was supposed to allow the state to stymie illegal activity by hitting people where it hurt -- in their pockets.
The DeLisi case was Florida's first chance to test that law. Prosecutors hoped that by taking away the brothers' homes, the two would be unlikely to reoffend. "Our ultimate hope is that the people who are dealing drugs in Florida reach the conclusion that they could be using bad business judgment and take their trade somewhere else," Don North, assistant to then-Attorney General Jim Smith, told the Sun Sentinel in 1980. "The RICO statute will be a very effective tool in taking away these illegally gained assets."
When the DeLisis were busted in Hardee County, police confiscated their homes and cars -- pretty much everything apart from their business, 320Automotive in Pompano. The brothers decided to make their money back the only way they knew how.
Eight months after they had been released from their five-year sentences, in October 1984, the brothers were seated inside a Chinese restaurant on 125th Street and Biscayne Boulevard in North Miami. Richie was there with his girlfriend, Colette; his brother Teddy; and his brother's girlfriend, Carmen Celeiro. Over a plate of beef and oyster sauce, Richie said he knew how to make things square. His friend J.J. White, a pilot, was going to hook them up with one last planeload of 1,500 pounds. And he was going to do it for free, without taking a cut, so the guys could pay off their attorneys' fees, get themselves a new house, and bulk up their business.
An affidavit shows that White was actually a Florida Department of Law Enforcement informant and that the agency monitored his contact with the brothers over the course of four months as they set up the deal. On July 24, 1988, at 8:30 in the morning, FDLE officers caught two men offloading bales into a 1985 Chevy pickup and a 1987 Ford LTD near the Lake Wales Airport. Officers later apprehended them during a traffic stop.
The DeLisis had gotten off with a relative slap on the wrist the first time, but changes had occurred since their initial offense.
Crucially, Florida's RICO Act made any criminal conspiracy a first-degree felony punishable by 30 years in prison. "Those laws were set up to go against large-scale operations like the Mafia, and the states retroactively decided to use these charges against people selling pornography and drugs," says Norm Kent, an attorney with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, or NORML. "The states abused it for other things, particularly Florida and Texas, the major nerve centers of the drug trade. And if you look, that's where you see the most draconian sentences."
Also by the mid-'80s, America was square in the middle of the drug crisis. President Ronald Reagan signed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, which created mandatory federal minimum sentences for drug offenders -- five, ten, or 20 years, depending on the amount of drugs involved.
That same year, Geraldo Rivera produced American Vice: The Doping of a Nation, the fifth-highest-rated syndicated special at the time. One memorable interview from the show was with Richie DeLisi. Seated at a Key Largo bar in amber aviators and a plaid shirt while sipping a mugged beer, he told the anchor he'd turned $12,000 into $50 million.
"Why'd you stop?" Rivera asked.
"I got busted," DeLisi replied.
That part of the broadcast lasted all of 20 seconds.
DeLisi now says his segment was -edited to make it look as if he were -bragging, and that's partly why Judge Dennis Maloney, who presided over the Lake Wales case, decided to give Richie and his brother Teddy upward departure -- more than the recommended sentence for their crimes. Although a pretrial investigation suggested that Richie serve 12 to 17 years, each of the brothers was given 90. Maloney recently declined to comment.
The cost of hosting an inmate in state prison is $17,338 per year.
"They wanted to nab me after that Geraldo interview," Richie DeLisi says now from prison. He claims that he was talked into doing the deal by White. ("I was set up by a guy who made a deal with the devil and the government") and that he would have done things differently had he not been cursed with dyslexia ("I wanted to be righteous, but I never even learned how to sign a check").
Regardless of who's to blame, taxpayers shoulder the burden. The cost of hosting an inmate in state prison is $17,338 per year, according to the Department of Corrections. Not including medical expenses, that means DeLisi has cost Florida $450,788 so far and stands to cost $208,056 more if he serves his full sentence. A geriatric, DeLisi has also gotten hearing aids and billed a litany of surgeries to taxpayers.
"Who in Florida is going to be afraid of Richard DeLisi getting out of prison?" asks Greg Newburn, of Families Against Mandatory Minimums. "This is going to cost taxpayers a lot of money, and you have to wonder what the real benefit is in terms of public safety."
The DeLisis are far from the only ones to cost taxpayers so much money for what might be described as a victimless crime. Although Richie is the only one in Florida facing such a sentence in a state case, on a federal level, more than a dozen are serving either life or de facto life sentences for marijuana. Seven of them were tried in Florida.
There's also Charles "Fred" Cundiff, a 66-year-old who so far has served 22 years of a life sentence. He suffers from arthritis, and taxpayers have paid for his back surgery as well as treatments for skin cancer and vision problems, on top of the cost of incarcerating him.
John Knock, Claude Duboc, and Albert Madrid were all busted as part of a reverse-sting operation for trafficking marijuana and hashish between 1984 and 1993. Knock was sentenced in Gainesville to two life terms plus 20 years. Duboc got life plus 240 months. Madrid got life without parole.
William Dekle, a 62-year-old from Gainesville, was sentenced to life without parole as a first-time, nonviolent, marijuana-only offender in 1991. Andrew Cox, a firefighter, had two prior marijuana-related offenses before his 2008 Gainesville trial and was sentenced to life without parole.
But perhaps the most pathetic case in Florida belongs to Leopoldo Hernandez-Miranda. He's a 75-year-old Cuban fisherman with a fourth-grade education who was sentenced on a possession charge (but acquitted of a conspiracy charge) stemming from the fact that he worked as a day laborer on a house that stored marijuana.
Soon, these men will beg the government for mercy. Kennedy and Holland, the two New York attorneys who petitioned Obama, will see their plan come to fruition. In April, U.S. Deputy Attorney General James Cole announced that the government, looking to reduce the prison population, will be recommending reduced sentences for some nonviolent federal prisoners who have already served ten years and "likely would have received a substantially lower sentence if convicted of the same offense today." This criterion was especially appealing to marijuana offenders. Groups like the ACLU and Families Against Mandatory Minimums have banded together under the banner of the Clemency Project 2014 to help inmates present their cases for consideration. Releases are slated to begin in November 2015.
Geriatric weed smugglers are getting sympathy from even the executive office.
Although the Attorney General's Office has conducted mass pardons in the past, Cole's program is unique in that it is geared toward people who would likely have received lesser sentences had they been tried today. That means many of these cases will involve marijuana, a substance that is being slowly legalized across the country. Any federal prisoner facing any crime that doesn't involve child exploitation or violence is allowed to sign up and be paired with a volunteer attorney.
But DeLisi isn't eligible for Obama's program. First of all, he wasn't tried federally. Second, it's relevant only to first-time offenders. Although other geriatric weed smugglers are getting sympathy from even the executive office, DeLisi is left without many advocates. NORML says he's not a priority, given that he's a repeat offender dealing in huge quantities. Ask anyone familiar with trafficking cases and he'll likely say, "I remember that guy: Wasn't he the one bragging on Geraldo?"
Billy Corben, a South Florida documentarian behind both Cocaine Cowboys and Square Grouper, has become a historian of the drug war. Though he has never worked on any projects involving the DeLisis' case, he says there was a big difference between smugglers who sold pot and those who dealt in coke.
"Marijuana was a cash transaction, unlike cocaine, which was a consignment business," he explains. "It was much mellower, and the guys didn't even carry guns. The only examples you see of marijuana destroying peoples' lives is with these prison sentences. You wanna see the destruction of a family unit? Put someone away for 90 years."
Teddy DeLisi got out last year, when a judge decided to drop one of his conspiracy charges, which carried a 30-year sentence. An appeals court -decided that the only evidence against him -- fingerprints found on a map of South America -- wasn't enough to hold him.
Richie, however, was caught talking about the deal on tape and still sits in prison.
Ashley DeLisi, Richie's 29-year-old daughter, says the prison sentence ruined her life. Her father was sent away when she was only 4 years old. Her mother, Colette DeLisi, "went off the deep end and was devastated about the whole thing. She was too messed up to take care of us, and I ended up being a child who raises another child."
Ashley, who now lives in Wingo, Kentucky, says she dropped out of Hollywood Hills High School in the ninth grade to take care of her little brother, David. "I started experimenting with drugs and lost myself for a while," she relates. "But I made sure he had food and clothes the best way I could." In 2009, she says, both her mother and brother, in separate incidents, overdosed on OxyContin and died. She thinks things would have been different had Richie been around.
Carmen Celeiro knows what prison does to a man. Although she broke up with Teddy when he went away the second time and she married someone else, they spoke on the phone for years, and after her husband died, Teddy came to live with her in her Coral Gables home with three dogs and four cats.
"They've been in prison so long that they've grown old but never grown up," Celeiro says. "They didn't have to mature mentally, because they weren't learning anything except what's in prison. [When they get out], it's like coming out of a cave and being in the middle of New York City."
Teddy says he still can't shake the prison routine. To this day, it's bed at 10 p.m. and up at 5. He still can't get used to the way the world is now. He feels like he's still in his 20s. He never saw a cell phone until last year, never mind an iPad. But the most startling change for Teddy was probably realizing that marijuana, the substance he wasted away in prison for, is on the cusp of being legalized. "I still can't really grasp it," he says.
Richie's attorney, Al Smith, explains that on November 7, just three days after Floridians vote on Amendment 2, he'll argue that one of DeLisi's charges should be changed from a first-degree felony to a second-degree felony. This would take years off his sentence. If all goes well, he'll become a free man.
Ashley DeLisi is praying her family can finally be made whole. Although she writes to her father religiously, she's never known him as anything but a prisoner.
"I want him to come home so I can know my father," she says. "I don't know him except for a few pictures." Richie is welcome to live with her on the farm in Kentucky, she says. It's peaceful there.
Today, Richie DeLisi is willing to accept responsibility for his actions, sort of. There's no question about his guilt -- he'll go on and on about stories from the old days. But he remains adamant that his life spent in jail is all the fault of the pilot who set him up for the FDLE.
If he should go free, he wants a book deal. Or a movie. "Something that will make a little money for me if I get out," he says, "because I won't have nothin'."
Follow Miami New Times on Facebook and Twitter @MiamiNewTimes.Graylands Hospital, an 'outdated, institutionalised old lunatic asylum', to be shut down
Updated
The century-old Graylands Hospital in Perth will be closed gradually over the next decade.
The move is part of a long-awaited, 10-year mental health plan aimed at overhauling the sector, and comes just two days after State Cabinet received the proposal.
Mental Health Minister Helen Morton said the facility would close beds in stages.
"Graylands is an outdated, institutionalised, old lunatic asylum," she said.
"That's what it was built for and that's what it still is in terms of its fabric.
"There is no excuse in this day and age for us to be providing mental health services in a facility like this.
"We can do much better than this, the people who require our services deserve much better than this."
Patients to be moved into community care
Most of Grayland's 170 patients will move into community-based care.
However some can never be released, such as those who have been referred by the judiciary, charged with a crime but deemed too unwell to plead.
At they moment those patients are housed in the hospital's 38-bed maximum-security Frankland Centre, and the Government will replace that with a new 92-bed forensic ward, which will be built on prison grounds.
I really don't think that's the appropriate place for people who are severely mentally unwell to be. Alison Xamon
The move has mental health advocates up in arms, who say the mentally ill should be in hospitals, not behind bars.
WA Mental Health association president Alison Xamon said the move would only add to the stigma surrounding mental illness.
"I really don't think that's the appropriate place for people who are severely mentally unwell to be," she said.
"We really need to remember that mental health is a health issue."
But Ms Morton defended the move, saying it was entirely appropriate.
"It's better for it to be on a prison site that can provide forensic mental health services to people in the forensic mental health facility then the psychiatrists are also on hand," she said.
Ms Morton said any change would only occur after a consultation period.
She said the cost of the entire plan, aimed at overhauling the struggling sector, could be as much as $600 million.
The Commonwealth, non-profit and private sectors are expected to contribute, but the Minister would not be drawn on how much of the overall cost the state will take on.
"Those specific figures in terms of what the state might be looking towards in the next 10 years isn't clear," she said.
"However, if you're asking me what is the total cost - whoever provides that funding - for the capital over the coming 10 years, it is in the vicinity of $600 million.
"If the state were to deliver and develop every aspect of its plan, which it will not do... it would cost $600 million."
Proposal 'long overdue' says advocate
Ms Xamon said the plan was long overdue.
"There has been a historical under-investment in mental health by successive governments over multiple years, and this has created ongoing problems to tackle mental health in WA," she said.
"So this injection of funds to address this demand is very welcome, it is long overdue.
"What the plan makes clear is that there's still room for expansion in acute settings but that it is particularly targeted."
Ms Xamon said she was concerned that the closure was done in a systematic way.
"One of the things that have been highly problematic about Graylands is that it's a hopelessly outdated facility, it's actually modelled on asylums," she said.
"What we need to intend see are the creation of facilities that are recovery focused."
Ms Xamon said the proposed additional investment for forensic beds was welcome but she was concerned about the timeframe.
"Frankly the additional beds proposed to be put online are too late in the piece," she said.
"One of the concerns that we have in relation to the plan is an underlying assumption of the plan is that federal government funding will continue on at its current rate - certainly West Australian Mental Health members are starting to relay back that entirely federally funded programs have been pulled."
Prime real estate site likely to be sold
Graylands sits on four hectares of prime real estate in Mt Claremont, nestled in Perth's western suburbs.
The Government said it intended to sell a significant parcel of the land, however refused to guarantee all revenue raised from its sale would be put back into the mental health sector.
Opposition health spokesman Stephen Dawson said it would be outrageous if the Government used any money from the sale to invest in infrastructure or pay down debt.
"They must ensure that every dollar from the sale of Graylands is ploughed back into the mental health system," he said.
Mr Dawson said Labor would support the mental health plan, including the move to close down Graylands.
"It's been a long time coming, over the past year we've seen wards at Graylands close because they're old, they're tired and people are not getting the level of service, the level of assistance they need," he said.
Topics: health-administration, mount-claremont-6010
First postedBreaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
June 13, 2016, 5:18 PM GMT / Updated June 13, 2016, 5:54 PM GMT By Benjy Sarlin and Katy Tur
Donald Trump waded into the fever swamps on Monday, suggesting in two interviews that President Obama may have a secret agenda that prevents him from combating Islamic terrorists.
The comments added to a long list of conspiracy theories from the presumptive GOP nominee about the president’s religion, birthplace and worldview. They also sent a clear message to Republicans who have begged Trump to soften his rhetoric that he's not changing his ways anytime soon.
“Well, there are a lot of people that think maybe he doesn't want to get it,” Trump told NBC’s “TODAY” on Monday while discussing the attack that killed at least 49 people at a gay club in Orlando over the weekend. “A lot of people think maybe he doesn't want to know about it. I happen to think that he just doesn't know what he's doing. But there are many people that think maybe he doesn't want to get it. He doesn't want to see what's really happening."
The comments came shortly after another interview with Fox News in which Trump insinuated that Obama might be turning a blind eye to terrorism for shadowy reasons.
“He doesn't get it or he gets it better than anybody understands,” Trump said. “It’s one or the other, and neither one is acceptable.”
In the same interview he warned that “there's something going on” that explains Obama’s refusal to use the phrase “radical Islamic terrorism.”
After spending last week fending off questions about Trump's comments on a federal judge's "Mexican heritage," GOP officials can now look forward to a week of questions about Trump's innuendo about Obama as well as his renewed call for a ban on Muslim travel, a proposal that Republican leaders have condemned in the past.
Trump voiced similar suspicions about the president -- who has overseen continuous military operations targeting terrorist groups in multiple countries throughout his presidency -- after an attack by a radicalized couple in San Bernardino last year that killed 14 people.
In a speech on December 3 to the Republican Jewish Coalition, Trump suggested Obama did not characterize ISIS attacks as “radical Islamic terrorism” because of secret motives hidden from the public.
“I'll tell you what, we have a president that refuses to use the term, he refuses to say it,” Trump said. “There's something going on with him that we don't know about.”
Obama has addressed his discomfort with the term in the past, telling reporters he believes it plays into propaganda by Islamic terrorist groups that they are legitimate religious organizations.
“We are not at war with Islam,” Obama said in February. “We are at war with people who have perverted Islam.”
While Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer said in a statement before Trump's comments that Democrats "bury their head in the sand on how dangerous the world is," Trump's insinuations go much further than mainstream Republican leaders are usually willing to go.
A source who works closely with the Trump campaign, granted anonymity in order to speak freely to NBC News, said after Sunday’s attack that the party had hoped the candidate would offer condolences and then stay silent. Trump clearly chose a different approach.
Dan Senor, a Republican strategist who served in the George W. Bush administration, told CNBC's John Harwood in an e-mail that Trump's comments on Obama "should be [a] serious concern" to officials tasked with providing classified briefings to Trump.
Trump's support for a ban on Muslim travel to the United States, which he reiterated on Sunday, has also drawn condemnations in the past from leading GOP officials like Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Representatives for Ryan and McConnell did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Trump's latest statements.
Trump has regularly insinuated over the last several years that Obama, who is a Christian born in Hawaii, secretly is a Muslim born in Kenya – a conspiracy theory that’s especially popular among Trump supporters.
Asked by NBC’s Chuck Todd in September whether America could accept a Muslim president, Trump responded that “some people have said it already happened, frankly.”
In February, Trump told Fox News that Obama visited a mosque because “maybe he feels comfortable there."
In 2011, when he blitzed the media spreading false accusations that Obama had forged his birth certificate, Trump made clear that the president's religion was closely tied to his “birther” crusade.
"He doesn't have a birth certificate,” Trump told Fox News in March 2011. “He may have one, but there's something on that, maybe religion, maybe it says he is a Muslim.”
Trump’s obsession with conspiracy theories, often with inflammatory racial, ethnic, or religious dimensions, extends beyond the president.
After terrorist attacks in Paris, Trump falsely claimed that “thousands and thousands” of Muslims in New Jersey celebrated the 9/11 attacks, even insisting he had seen them on television – no such footage existed.
He later spread an apocryphal story – apparently popularized by chain e-mails -- about World War I-era General John Pershing ordering dozens of Muslim prisoners in the Philippines executed with bullets dipped in pigs’ blood, a tale he said showed Americans need to start “getting tough.”
On Monday, he suggested – without evidence – that neighbors of accused shooter Omar Mateen, who was killed by police, might have had advance knowledge of an attack.
“The people know who the bad apples are, where the bad seeds are, and they don't report them,” Trump said in an interview with CBS.
His conspiracy theories are not limited to topics related to Islam and terrorism. Last month, for example, he accused Sen. Ted Cruz’s father of involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, citing a rumor spread by the National Enquirer.
Trump is expected to address the Orlando attack further in a speech in New Hampshire on Monday afternoon.
"Mr. Trump is tough on terrorism because there should be no other option when it comes to the threats we face to our safety and freedoms," campaign manager Corey Lewandowksi told NBC News on Sunday night. "He is a leader for all and his message today emphasizes that."
A GOP strategist working on coordinating state campaign efforts disagreed, telling NBC news Trump had struck the wrong tone.
“The things he says worked in the primary but he needs to expand his base,” the source said of Trump. “He is preaching to the choir but the choir isn’t big enough to deliver him the White House.”
Editor's note: This article has been changed to fix an editing error. A source who works closely with the Trump campaign, granted anonymity in order to speak freely to NBC News, said after Sunday’s attack that the party had hoped, not asked, that the candidate would offer condolences.Share this...
By Dr. Dietrich E. Koelle
(Translated/edited by P Gosselin)
As the reconstruction of the climate’s development in the past by proxy data shows, there’s a series of temperature cycles that appear to be unknown, or ignored by many climate scientists. Among these are the larger climate cycles of 150 million to 180 million years (see Part 1 and Part 2), but also the shorter and for us the more important following cycles:
1000 years (900-1100) Suess cycle with +/- 0.65°C
230 years (230-250) deVries cycle with +/- 0.30°C
65 years (60-65) Ocean cycles with +/- 0.25°C
In principle these cycles are sinusoidal in behavior as depicted in Figure 1. Bob Tisdale has also shown how the temperature increase of the 65-year cycle from 1975 to 1998 led to the assumption that it is due CO2 emissions because they too happened to be parallel. This has been naively extended all the way to the year 2100 and forms the basis for the climate models and the invention of the so-called “climate catastrophe”.
Figure 1: Sine wave characteristic of the 60/65-year ocean cycle (Source: Bob Tisdale at WUWT).
In this analysis we will attempt to see how the temperature development could be over the next 700 years, assuming of course that the mentioned climate cycles of the past will continue on into the future. This should not be (mis)understood as a forecast for the future climate. Up to now there is only the IPCC forecast that the global temperature will rise by 2 to 5°C by the year 2100 – based only on the expected CO2 increase. However that theory has failed to work over the last 18 ears because the various natural climate factors and cycles never got considered, or they were not allowed to be considered in the climate models. Included among these factors are the mean cloud cover (albedo) and the resulting effective solar insolation (watts per sqm) at the earth’s surface, or the sea surface, which is decisive for the temperature development.Next Figure 2 below depicts the 1000-year cycle and the 230-year cycle, which have been reconstructed from historical proxy data. They stem from a combination of results from various publications in the field of paleoclimatology over the last years. The diagram of the last 3200 years distinctly shows a 1000-year cycle; the last 2000 years of which are confirmed by historical documents. In fact this cycle goes back all the way to the end of the last ice age, i.e. some 9000 years. The reason for the cycle is still unknown today, yet its existence is undisputed.
The current warm period is no “anthropogenic product”, rather it is the natural result of a repeating 1000-year cycle that goes back far into the past. Today’s warm period does not even reach the temperatures seen in the past warm periods, which at times were 1 to 2°C higher. Moreover it is important to note that during both of the past temperature maxima of 1000 and 2000 years ago, the CO2 values were at 280 ppm while today they are at 400 ppm. This indicates that the earlier warmer periods likely were related to natural solar activity and not to a rise in CO2 because there was no CO2 rise during those warm phases.
Figure 2: Global temperature over the last 3200 years shows a distinct 1000-year cycle along with the 230-year cycle.
Of historical significance is the fact that over the course of human history warm periods were always times of economic and cultural prosperity. The cooler periods always led to serious problems that led to starvation and huge waves of human migration in Europe. Here it becomes undeniably clear that the alarmist claims that “the earth has a fever” made by politicians such as Al Gore are patentedly preposterous.
The “ideal” 1000-year cycle is varied by the 230-year cycle, which in turn gets varied by the 65-year oceanic cycle, which is depicted in Figure 1. Added to these cycles are the various typically non-cyclical events such as the ENSO, volcanic eruptions, etc. Figure 3 shows the temperature curve for the last 165 years along with the 230-year cycle and the effect of the 65-year ocean cycle. The current temperature values fluctuate by plus/minus 0.2°C due to the effects of ENSO, sunspot activity, volcanic eruptions, etc.
Figure 3: The 230-year cycle over the last 165 years has been superimposed by a 65-year cycle as well as by other effects like the irregular ENSO events and large volcanic eruptions.
The temperature rise of 0.6°C during the 1975-1998 period, which has triggered all the current climate hysteria, was of the same magnitude as the previous increase that occurred in the 1910 to 1940 period, which in turn had nothing to do with CO2 because back then the concentration in the atmosphere rose by only some 10 ppm (from 297 to 308 ppm). Also the temperature increase of 1.5°C over the last 150 to 250 years is also nothing “out of the ordinary” or “dangerous”, as we are often told in the media. Instead it is only the natural recovery from the Little Ice Age (LIA) that had gripped the planet from 1400 to 1750. The LIA not only led to the Thames River and Baltic Sea freezing over, but resulted in severe hunger in Europe and caused a mass migration to America.
The figures also show that all three climate cycles reached their maximum shortly after the end of the last millennium. With that in mind, we actually should have expected even higher temperatures than those seen in previous warm periods. Here perhaps the fact that the global temperature has seen a negative overall trend since the Holocene Maximum plays a role. That means that the global temperature has fallen by 2°C over the past 8000 years.
Based on historical climate fact, it is possible to extend the trend into the future to form a possible climate scenario. Figure 4 depicts the extrapolation of the 1000-year and 230-year cycle along with the generally expected trend. Added to this are the fluctuations of the 65-year ocean cycles, the impacts of the ENSO-events, sunspot cycles and volcanic eruptions, which result in additional fluctuations of a few tenths of a degree – just as they have in the past.
Figure 4: Extrapolating the 1000-year and 230-year cycles 700 years into the future.
Figure 4 shows the real global temperature development of the past 1000 years and its theoretical continuation over the next 700 years. This is not a forecast, but rather it is the extended possible course of the over all temperature trend, which over the mid-term in the next 100 years could see a drop of approx. 0.3°C and a 2°C drop in global temperature in 350 years – which would mean conditions just like those seen in the Little Ice Age from 1450 to 1700. In about 1000 years the 1000-year cycle will again take on its warm phase and temperatures like those of today can be expected.
In the next 50 years there would be no temperature increase, but rather a slight temperature decrease is expected. In the decades before and after the year 2300 a powerful temperature drop could occur because both the 230-year cycle and 100-year cycle would be dropping rapidly together in parallel.
References:
1 J.R.Petit et al.: Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420 000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica, Nature Vol.399, June 1999
2 Th.Steuber et al.: Low-latitude seasonality of Cretaceous temperatures in warm and cold episodes, NATURE Vo.437, 27 Oct.2005
3 W.S.Broecker and G.H. Denon: What Drives Glacial Cycles? Scientific American, Jan.1990
4 H.Kawamura et al.: Antarctic Dome C Temperature Reconstruction, Nature, 23 Aug.2007
5 J.Veizer et al.: Evidence for decoupling of atmospheric CO 2 and global climate during the Phanerozoic eon, NATURE Vo.408, 7 Dec.2000
6 K.Kashiwaya et al.: Orbit-related long-term climate cycles revealed in a 12-MYr continental record from Lake Baikal, NATURE Vol410, 1 March 2001
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Note from the Die Kalte-Sonne editors: The main point of this post is to provide any analysis of natural cycles and their logical extension into the future. Unaccounted in the projection shown in Figure 4 is the climate impact of CO2, whose role in climate today is hotly disputed. In our book “The Neglected Sun” we presented two CO2 climate sensitivity scenarios: 1.0°C and 1.5 °C warming for a CO2 doubling. Current studies have corrected the original IPCC value of 3°C strongly downwards (see our articles “Studies from 2014 provide hope: warming effect of CO2 is considerably over-estimated. Official correction is imminent“). It will be exciting to watch how research will develop with respect to climate sensitivity over the coming years.C++11 multithreading tutorial - part 2
The code for this tutorial is on GitHub: https://github.com/sol-prog/threads.
In my last tutorial about using threads in C++11 we’ve seen that the new C++11 threads syntax is remarkably clean compared with the POSIX pthreads syntax. Using a few simple concepts we were able to build a fairly complex image processing example avoiding the subject of thread synchronization.
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). Although effect estimates and confidence intervals varied by geographical region, we found the same pattern of association of RBC transfusion and all-cause mortality (positive at low predicted risk of death and negative at high predicted risk of death).
We also found strong evidence that the association of RBC transfusion with vascular occlusive events differed according to the predicted risk of death (p-value for interaction <0.0001) (Table 8). The risk associated with RBC transfusion was significantly increased for all the predicted risk of death categories, but the relative increase was higher for those with the lowest predicted risk of death. The OR of vascular occlusive events associated with RBC transfusion was 4.92 (95% CI 2.80–8.65, p<0.0001) in patients with <6% predicted risk of death, 1.66 (95% CI 1.13–2.46, p = 0.009) in patients with 6%–20% predicted risk of death, 1.80 (95% CI 1.16–2.80, p = 0.006) in patients with 21%–50% predicted risk of death, and 1.58 (95% CI 0.93–2.68, p = 0.081) in patients with >50% predicted risk of deathDetails on the game are pretty scarce, so it's not clear what the game will involve or what its mechanics will be. Niantic did say in September that the company was looking at using audio cues in future AR games because holding up a phone for an extended period of time "makes them look like a total doofus," according to Niantic CTO Phil Keslin. It's possible that Harry Potter: Wizards Unite will use sounds as cues.
According to TechCrunch, the game will borrow from Ingress, a previous endeavor from Niantic Labs. Players will move through their physical world to collect power-ups and defend locations (presumably, similar to Pokémon Go's gym system). Whatever the mechanics of the game, with the Harry Potter franchise extremely large fanbase, it's safe to say there will be a lot of interest in this game.
Update, 4:30PM ET: Since this story was published, Niantic released more details on Harry Potter: Wizards Unite. Unfortunately, there aren't any details about when the game will arrive. As expected, Niantic says the game will put players into the Harry Potter universe through augmented reality: "Players will learn spells, explore their real world neighborhoods and cities to discover & fight legendary beasts and team up with others to take down powerful enemies." We'll have to be patient for now to see how this all works, though -- there aren't any other details on gameplay to be had right now.Germany's defense minister and a Cologne-based Islamic organization have won the not-so-coveted Big Brother Award. The award is given to those regarded as having violated people's privacy rights.
German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen and the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs, known by its German acronym DITIB, are this year's big winners of the Big Brother Award, the privacy and digital rights organization Digitalcourage announced in Bielefeld on Friday.
The so-called "negative" award is handed out each year to an individual, group or organization "who act in a prominent and sustained way to invade people's privacy or leak (personal) data to third parties," according to the official website.
Von der Leyen "won" the award for the "massive digital armament" of Bundeswehr troops thanks to the new Cyber and Information Space Command based in Bonn. The youngest branch of Germany's military was announced in April 2016 by von der Leyen and is in responsible for cyber, IT, military intelligence, geo-information and communications matters.
The Bundeswehr's new cyber unit, based in Bonn, drew criticism from Digitalcourage
The department is tasked with conducting military cyberwarfare operations and developing IT systems, as well as creating tools to ward of hacking attacks.
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Islamic group accused of spying
The Cologne-based DTIB meanwhile was "honored" for its spying on followers of the Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen and critics of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It was revealed last December that some imams belonging to DTIB shared information about members of their mosques in the wake of the failed coup attempt in July 2016.
In response to news of its award, DTIB threatened Digitalcourage with a lawsuit, claiming defamation. The Big Brother Awards have been awarded in Germany since 2000. Companies that have won the award in the past include Google and Deutsche Telekom.
Rarely do the "winners" make an appearance at the awards ceremony.
blc/sms (EPD, dpa)This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: The Guardian, The New York Times and ProPublica have jointly revealed the National Security Agency is successfully waging a long-running secret war on encryption, jeopardizing hundreds of millions of people’s ability to protect their privacy online. The New York Times writes, quote, “The NSA has circumvented or cracked much of the encryption, or digital scrambling, that guards global commerce and banking systems, protects sensitive data like trade secrets and medical records, and automatically secures the e-mails, Web searches, Internet chats and phone calls of Americans and others around the world.” Security experts say the NSA program “undermine[s] the fabric of the internet.” The revelations are based on documents from the NSA and its British counterpart, GCHQ, leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
AMY GOODMAN: The documents also show the NSA spends $250 million a year on a program which, among other goals, works with technology companies to covertly influence their product designs. The NSA has also been deliberately weakening the international encryption standards adopted by developers. And according to the documents, a GCHQ team has reportedly been working to develop ways into encrypted traffic on the “big four” service providers, named as Hotmail, Google, Yahoo and Facebook. The spy agencies insist that the ability to defeat encryption is vital to their core missions of counterterrorism and foreign intelligence gathering.
Well, for more, we’re joined by Democracy Now! video stream by Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian, co-author of the new article, “US and UK Spy Agencies Defeat Privacy and Security on the Internet.” Glenn Greenwald first published Edward Snowden’s revelations about the NSA surveillance programs and continues to write extensively on the topic.
Glenn, welcome back to Democracy Now! We haven’t spoken to you since your partner, David Miranda, was held at Heathrow for nine hours, the airport in Britain, and we want to get to that. But first, talk about the significance of this latest exposé that both The Guardian, The New York Times and ProPublica have published today.
GLENN GREENWALD: First of all, I think there’s significance just in the partnership itself. It’s very unusual for three media organizations to work so closely on a story of this magnitude. And that happened because the U.K. government tried forcibly to prevent The Guardian from reporting on these documents by pressuring The Guardian editor-in-chief in London, Alan Rusbridger, to destroy the hard drives of The Guardian which contained these materials, which is why they ended up making their way to The New York Times and ProPublica. So I think it clearly backfired, now that there are other media organizations, including probably the most influential in the world, The New York Times, now vested in reporting on the story.
The significance of the story itself, I think, is easy to see. When people hear encryption, they often think about what certain people who are very interested in maintaining the confidentiality of their communications use, whether it be lawyers talking to their clients, human rights activists dealing with sensitive matters, people working against oppressive governments. And those people do use encryption, and it’s extremely important that it be safeguarded. And the fact that the NSA is trying to not only break it for themselves, but to make it weaker and put backdoors into all these programs makes all of those very sensitive communications vulnerable to all sorts of people around the world, not just the NSA, endangering human rights activists and democracy activists and lawyers and their clients and a whole variety of other people engaged in sensitive work.
But encryption is much more than that. Encryption is really the system that lets the Internet function as an important commercial instrument all around the world. It’s what lets you enter your credit card number, check your banking records, buy and sell things online, get your medical tests online, engage in private communications. It’s what protects the sanctity of the Internet. And what these documents show is not just that the NSA is trying to break the codes of encryption to let them get access to everything, but they’re forcing the companies that provide the encryption services to put backdoors into their programs, which means, again, that not only the NSA, but all sorts of hackers and other governments and all kinds of ill-motivated people, can have a weakness to exploit, a vulnerability to exploit, in these systems, which makes the entire Internet insecure for everybody. And the fact that it’s all being done as usual with no transparency or accountability makes this very newsworthy.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But, Glenn, going back to the mid-1990s in the Clinton administration, when the government tried to establish these backdoors into communications on the Internet, there was a public debate and a rejection of this. What has happened since then now in terms of how the NSA operates?
GLENN GREENWALD: Right, it’s interesting. If you go back to the mid-'90s, that debate was really spawned by the attack on Oklahoma City, which the Clinton administration—on the Oklahoma City courthouse by Timothy McVeigh, which the Clinton administration immediately exploited to try and demand that every single form of computer security or human communication on the Internet be vulnerable to government intrusion, that it all—that there be no encryption to which the governments didn't have the key. And as you said, a combination of public backlash and industry pressure led to a rejection of that proposal, and the industries were particularly incensed by it, because they said if you put backdoors into this technology, it will make it completely vulnerable. If anyone gets that key, if anybody figures out how to crack it, it will mean that there’s no security anymore on the Internet.
And so, since the NSA and the U.S. government couldn’t get its way that way, what they’ve done instead is they resorted to covert means to infiltrate these companies, to pressure and coerce them, to provide the very backdoors that they failed to compel through legislation and through public debate and accountability. And that is what this story essentially reveals, is that the entire system is now being compromised by the NSA and their British counterpart, the GCHQ, systematic efforts to ensure that there is no form of human commerce, human electronic communication, that is ever invulnerable to their prying eyes. And again, the danger is not just that they get into all of our transactions and human communications, but that they are making it much easier for all kinds of other entities to do the same thing.
AMY GOODMAN: Glenn Greenwald, in The Guardian piece, you write, “The NSA spends $250m a year on a program which, among other goals, works with technology companies to 'covertly influence' their product designs.” How does the NSA do this?
GLENN GREENWALD: So, one of the things that happens here is that a lot of these large technology companies sell products, expensive products, to their users based on the claim that these products will safeguard the privacy of people’s activities online or online communication through encryption. At the same time, these companies are working directly with the U.S. government and the NSA, either cooperatively or because they’re getting benefits from it or through coercion, to make these products vulnerable and insecure, exactly undermining the commitments that they’re making to their users that they will enable and safeguard the privacy of their communications. So it’s really a form of fraud that the—that the technology industry is perpetrating on its users, pretending that they’re offering security while at the same time working with the U.S. government to make sure that these products are being designed in a way that makes them actually vulnerable to invasion. And again, sometimes it’s the fault of the technology companies. They do it because they want good relationships with the U.S. government. They’re profit-motivated. They get benefits from it. But a lot of times there’s just pressure and coercion on the part of a very powerful, sprawling U.S. government that induces these companies to do it against their wishes.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And these revelations have some specifics in terms of those who are cooperating. Could you talk about Microsoft and its Outlook email?
GLENN GREENWALD: Sure. We actually reported about a month ago an article that focused almost exclusively on Microsoft and the extraordinary collaboration that company engages in with the NSA to provide backdoor access to its very programs that they tout to the world as offering safe encryption. If you look at what—if you just go look at Outlook.com, what Microsoft says about its Outlook email server, which is now basically the program where, if you use Hotmail or any other Microsoft service, your email is routed through, they tout Outlook as this really great service that protects people’s communications through this strong encryption. And at the very same time, Microsoft is working in private with the NSA to ensure access by the NSA across all of their platforms, not just Outlook email, but Skype and a whole variety of other services that Microsoft offers to their users to basically ensure that it’s all completely vulnerable to NSA snooping. And again, one of the big problems with it is that when you allow—when you make these programs vulnerable to the NSA, you’re also making them vulnerable to other intelligence agencies around the world or to hackers or to corporate spies or to people who just wish you ill will for any number of reasons. It’s making the entire Internet insecure.
AMY GOODMAN: After—after The Guardian revealed last month that it smashed several computers in its London office after the British government threatened legal action, editor Alan Rusbridger said he agreed to their demand in order to avoid the newspaper’s potential closure. This is what he said.
ALAN RUSBRIDGER: We were faced, effectively, with an ultimatum from the British government that if we didn’t hand back the material or destroy it, they would move to law. That would mean prior restraint, a concept that is anathema in America and other parts of the world, in which the state can effectively prevent a news publisher from publishing, and I didn’t want to get into that position. And I also explained to the U.K. officials we were dealing with that there were other copies already in America and Brazil, so they wouldn’t be achieving anything. But once it was obvious that they would be going to law, I would rather destroy the copy than hand it back to them or allow the courts to freeze our reporting.
AMY GOODMAN: Last month at a White House news briefing, the deputy spokesperson, Josh Earnest, was asked if the U.S. government would ever take similar actions against a media outlet. He said, quote, “It’s very difficult to imagine a scenario in which that would be appropriate.” Glenn Greenwald, can you talk about what happened at your paper?
GLENN GREENWALD: It should be a major scandal. I mean, the United States and the U.K. run around the world constantly denouncing other countries that aren’t friendly with it for abusing press freedoms or failing to protect them, and yet at the same time both of these countries are engaged in a major assault on journalism when it comes to those who are trying to report on what it is they’re doing. The idea that the U.K. government, at the behest of the highest levels of that government, the prime minister and their top—it’s his top security officials—went into The Guardian and threatened The Guardian's top editor repeatedly and ultimately forced him to destroy hard drives that contained the byproduct of our journalism is the stuff that, you know, the U.K. and the U.S. governments would like you to think happen only in Russia or China or other governments that they love to depict as tyrannical, and yet it's happening in the closest ally of the United States.
And, of course, in the United States itself, there is a major war on the news-gathering process with the prosecution of whistleblowers, the people who serve as sources for journalists, the theories they flirted with to criminalize the process of journalism, with the criminal and grand jury investigation of WikiLeaks or the filing of an affidavit accusing a Fox News journalist of being a co-conspirator in felonies because he worked with his source.
You really see these two governments working hand in hand to create this climate of fear in which even the largest media organizations, like The New York Times, whose celebrated reporter Jim Risen is being threatened with jail, or The Guardian, a 220-year-old newspaper, one of the most influential in the world, being threatened in the most thuggish and abusive ways to stop their reporting. And The Guardian had to take very extreme measures to evade those threats, including providing substantial numbers of documents to The New York Times and ProPublica to make sure that if they were ordered to destroy all of their sets, that there would be copies existing elsewhere in the world so that this material could continue to be reported.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Glenn, what do you think needs to happen, given these continuing revelations about the NSA especially, but our government in general, being virtually out of control in terms of its surveillance of communications of—not only of Americans, but around the world? Do you think that the impact of all of these revelations is going to move, hopefully, Congress to act in a stronger way to control these activities?
GLENN GREENWALD: I do. I think the impact of all of this reporting is often underappreciated, in part because the changes in public opinion are often imperceptible. They happen somewhat incrementally, and we don’t immediately notice the shifts. But certain polls that have been released since we began our reporting show some very radical changes in how Americans think about threats to their privacy. They now fear government assault on their civil liberties more than they fear the threat of terrorism, something that has never happened, at least since the 9/11 attacks.
But I also think it’s important to appreciate just how global this story has resonated. There are countless countries around the world in which there are very intense debates taking place over the nature of U.S. surveillance, the value of Internet freedom and privacy. There are all kinds of pressure movements to demand that those people’s governments take serious action against the United States to protect the Internet from these kind of intrusions. You see an incredibly unprecedented, really, coalition of people across the spectrum in Congress banding together against NSA spying, insisting that they will continue to engage in reform movements, something that transcends partisan divisions or ideological divisions. It’s causing serious diplomatic tensions between the United States and allies in Germany, here in Brazil and other countries around the world, that will continue, as more reporting happens, on a country-by-country basis, as we partner with more and more media organizations around the world. So I think absolutely this has had a huge impact not just on the way that people think about surveillance and the NSA surveillance program, but, as importantly, the way they think about President Obama, the credibility of the United States government in terms of the claims it makes, one after the next of which have proven to be false, and, more generally, the role of the United States and its closest allies, including the U.K., in the world, and how much defiance and challenge they actually need.
AMY GOODMAN: You know, you could, in an odd way, talk about how Syria is linked to these revelations. President Obama is pursuing a pro-strike strategy with Syria right now in Russia, as opposed to talking about, you know, using this moment at the G-20 summit to push for diplomacy. He was already isolated from Putin, angry at Putin because Putin gave temporary asylum to Ed Snowden, so he cancels his bilateral meeting with Putin, which could have been used to make a deal around Syria, since he’s the major sponsor of Syria. You also have, with the G-20, President Obama trying to get these countries to support a strike, but he’s up against—you could say, against a wall of BRICS, meaning BRICS, you know, the BRICS nations—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa—who, it’s been revealed, that the NSA has been spying on, so there’s not a lot of friendliness there. Can you talk about your more recent—the piece you did before this one, around Brazil, which has caused a furor in your country, the country where you live right now, where we’re speaking to you?
GLENN GREENWALD: Sure. We’ve been doing a lot of reporting in Brazil, in the same way that Laura Poitras, who lives in Germany because she’s afraid to edit her own film on U.S. soil because she thinks it will be seized, the footage will be, because it’s about the NSA, the way that she’s been teaming with Der Spiegel to report on U.S. spying on Germans. I’ve been teaming with British media outlets—Brazilian media outlets to report on what’s being done in Brazil and, more generally, to Latin America.
And the stories that we started off with were about indiscriminate mass collection of the communications, data and voice and Internet emails, of literally tens of millions of Brazilians, literally stealing from the Brazilian telecommunications system all of this data on the part of the NSA, on behalf of a government over which Brazilians exercise no accountability, for which they don’t vote, to which they—and which owes them no obligation. That already created a huge scandal in Brazil. And the reporting talked about how that’s being done more broadly in Latin America, which made that scandal spread.
And then, with the report that we did last week that Dilma herself, the president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, had been a very personal, specific target, along with the Mexican president, where her personal communications had been analyzed and intercepted and listened to, created an enormous furor here. It caused the Brazilian government to threaten to cancel a state dinner, which is a huge matter between the U.S. and Brazil, the only state dinner that I believe the White House is having this year, to threaten to cancel large contracts. And now, this Sunday, on the same program, which is the largest, most-watched program in Brazil, we’re going to have another report that I think is even bigger, about what the NSA is doing in terms of spying on Brazilian citizens.
And so, you know, I think that one of the things that’s happening here is that, at the very least, if the NSA wants to construct a massive spying system that literally has as its goal the complete elimination of privacy around the world, that people around the world ought to at least be aware that that’s taking place, so that they can have democratic and informed debates about what they want to do about it, about how they want to safeguard their privacy, just like Americans are entitled to know that the U.S. government is collecting all of their personal communications data, as well.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Glenn, I want to ask you about something closer to home, ask you about what happened to your partner, David Miranda, when he was detained last month by the British government at London’s Heathrow Airport for nine hours under a British anti-terrorism law. He faced repeated interrogation and had his belongings seized, including thumb drives carrying information you used in your reporting on NSA surveillance. Speaking on his return to Brazil, Miranda said he was subjected to psychological violence.
DAVID MIRANDA: [translated] A Brazilian that travels to a country like this and is detained for nine hours in this way, it, I think, breaks a person, you understand? You break down completely and get very scared. They didn’t use any physical violence against me, but you can see that it was a fantastic use of psychological violence.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Glenn, could you talk about—about this incident?
GLENN GREENWALD: Sure. I mean, first of all, what David was talking about there was the fact that they didn’t just detain him the way you sometimes get regularly detained at an airport when you visit another country for a few minutes or for even an hour to get secondarily screened. He was told right from the beginning that he was being detained under the Terrorism Act of 2000, which means that he was being detained under a law the purpose of which is to investigate people for ties to terrorism. And although it might be a little bit difficult for American citizens or for British citizens to understand, for people around the world who have seen what the U.S. and the U.K. governments do in the name of terrorism—they disappear people, they kidnap them, they torture them, they put them into cages for years at a time without so much as charges or even a lawyer—it’s an—not to mention the bombs they drop and the children they kill with drones—it’s an incredibly intimidating thing to be told that you’re being detained by a government with the behavioral record of the U.K. under a terrorism law.
The fact that hour after hour after hour went by, when they refused to allow him to speak to me or anybody in the outside world other than a list that they gave him of what they said were their approved lawyers, who they said that he was free to talk to on the phone, and when he told them that he didn’t trust their lawyers, their list or their phones, that he wanted to speak in person with a lawyer sent by me or by The Guardian, and was told that he had no right to a lawyer, no right to outside contact, that’s what he meant by the psychological violence, that he was kept in this small room, repeatedly interrogated hour after hour under a terrorism law, denied the right to his independent lawyers, ones that he trusted, not ones provided by them, and had no idea what was going to be done to him.
The entire day, I was being told by Guardian lawyers in Britain that it was likely that after the nine hours he would be arrested. That’s typically what they do. They barely ever hold anybody for more than an hour, and almost always when they do, it ends with an arrest. Sometimes they arrest them on terrorism charges, sometimes because there’s an obligation under this law to be fully cooperative, meaning answering all their questions fully, not refusing to answer anything, giving them passwords that they ask. If you even remotely refuse any of that, if they perceive that you’re not being cooperative, they will then charge you separately for a violation of that law, then will arrest you and put them in—put the person into the criminal justice system.
All of this, combined with the fact that high-level Brazilian diplomats were unable to find out any information about where he was or what was being done to him, was absolutely designed to send a message—as Reuters reported, by quoting a U.S. official, a message of intimidation to those of us who have been reporting on the GCHQ and the NSA, that if we continue to do so, this is the sort of thing that we can expect. The idea that all they wanted to do was to take his USB drives is ludicrous, for a lot of reasons, including the fact that all kinds of Guardian reporters have flown in and out of Heathrow. Laura Poitras herself flew to London and back out again without incident. They had no idea what he would be carrying. How would they possibly know? But more to the point, if all they wanted to do was take his things, that would have taken nine minutes, not nine hours. They purposely kept him for nine hours, the full amount allowed under that law, because they wanted to be as thuggish and intimidating as possible.
And the fact that he was helping Laura for a week in Berlin with our journalism, that he was carrying material back to me that Laura and I were working on journalistically, doesn’t make what they did better, it makes it worse. It shows how what the U.K. government is doing is specifically targeting the journalism process and trying to be intimidating and to force it to stop. And it’s clear it had no effect. If anything, it backfired, as I said from the beginning that it would. But I think their intent is completely clear to the world.
AMY GOODMAN: Are you suing? And did David get his equipment back?
GLENN GREENWALD: David is absolutely suing. He is pursuing a judgment in the British courts that, as even the author of that law in the U.K. said, it was a completely illegal detention because it was obvious they had no interest in investigating him about terrorism. They never asked him a single question about terrorism. There was obviously no—nobody thought he was connected to a terrorist organization. He was repeatedly questioned about everything but terrorism, including, primarily, our journalism.
He hasn’t gotten any of his belongings back. And one of the things that happened is that the U.K. government just outright lied about what took place that day. They claimed he was carrying a password that allowed them access to 58,000 classified documents. He was not carrying any password that allowed them access to any documents. They actually filed an affidavit the same day they made that claim, saying—asking the court to let them continue to keep his belongings on the ground that all of the material he was carrying was heavily encrypted, that they couldn’t break the encryption, and they only got access to 75 of the documents that he was carrying, most of which are probably ones related to his school work and personal use. But, of course, media outlet has just uncritically repeated what the U.K. government had said, as though it were true. It wasn’t true; it was a pack of lies. But even if it were true, the idea that you’re going to detain somebody under a terrorism law who you think is working with journalists is incredibly menacing, as menacing as anything the U.K. government denounces when other countries do it.
AMY GOODMAN: Glenn, we want to thank you for being with us. We know you have to leave. Glenn Greenwald is a columnist on civil liberties and U.S. national security issues for The Guardian. He’s also a former constitutional lawyer, first published Edward Snowden’s revelations about the NSA surveillance program and continues to write extensively on the topic. His most recent piece, co-authored in The Guardian, “US and UK Spy Agencies Defeat Privacy and Security on the Internet.” We will link to that at democracynow.org.
Don’t go away. After break, Bruce Schneier, one of the leading experts on security on the Internet, is coming up, and then we’ll speak with Adam Entous of The Wall Street Journal about the Saudi-Syrian rebel connection and what the U.S. has to do with it. Stay with us.by sareenajosaf in Business Tags: cheap magazine subscriptions, cosmopolitan magazine, cosmopolitan subscription, discount magazine subscriptions, j-14 magazines, j14 magazine, magazine subscriptions, popular mechanics magazine, seventeen magazine
Flipping through a magazine is something that you can do at any time anywhere, unlike reading a book, as it requires some amount of concentration. If you are an avid reader, you will probably enjoy reading a novel or a book on a subject of your interest. However, magazines are for everyone as these are a great way to kill time. These are ideal for just about any place that has a waiting room – be it the hairdresser, dentist, or just any other place. There are a whole lot of magazines that are available out there on each and every subject and there are articles on each and every topic too. So, there is essentially a magazine for every reader.
Types of magazines
Although the womenfolk love reading magazines, the men are not really far behind. They too have their hot favorites such as auto magazines and sports magazines. In fact it may surprise you to know that there are a number of women who are avid readers when it comes to auto and sports magazines.
Discounted magazine subscription
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Advantage of magazine subscriptions
There are a number of advantages when you order for a magazine subscription. The first one being the time and money you get to save. The next biggest advantage is that you will get it on a regular basis, so you will not miss out on any of the issues. Of course, the other advantage is getting it delivered at your door. Hence, ordering a subscription is a far more sensible option than purchasing a single issue every time. This is actually very expensive in the long run.
Some families that have a lot of people, who are regular readers, prefer to opt for magazine subscription instead of wasting money on purchasing single issues. If you have teenagers in the house, then you would certainly be better off getting a subscription for j-14 magazines or anything that is appropriate for their age. Even if you don’t get a subscription, these kids are likely to purchase single issues and waste money. So, sensible parents prefer to save some money by opting for a magazine subscription.
Cheap subscriptions
There are a number of websites that offer cheap subscriptions on scores of popular titles. However, a good number of people often end up paying the cover price without realizing that these publications are available at discounted subscription rates. The main aim of the website is to help you save some money, by providing unmatched pricing on thousands of popular magazines.
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There are a number of people who also love to order the gift subscriptions. It is always a great idea to purchase gift subscriptions for friends and family. Since there are a good number of people who may not have the resources or may not have the inclination to order a magazine subscription, gifting is a great idea. You may choose a special occasion such as a birthday, anniversary, or Christmas to give them a gift subscription.
What do the magazines cover?
Magazines cover a wide range of topics such as health and fitness, fashion, cookery, makeup, beauty, sports, etc. There are magazine that may cover a wide range of topics that are fit for general reading, but there are other magazines that are meant only for a particular group of people who may be interested in the subject. For instance, the sports magazine is something that may not interest some people and the fashion magazines may not be everyone’s cup of tea. However, there are a whole lot of magazines that are perfect for general reading. Most families order these magazine subscriptions as it is ideal for the entire family.
Why is reading considered to be a healthy habit?
Reading in general is a habit that needs to be cultivated at a very early age. Studies have shown that children who are exposed to visual and learning aids tend to grasp things much faster. With the advancement in technology, most children these days are less exposed to the reading habit. In fact, they spend a lot of time playing online games or watching TV. This could create a lot of problems in the long run. So, get your children magazines that are age appropriate and make some time every day to sit and read with them.
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Online subscription
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AdvertisementsDUBLIN, Ireland ― It’s not quite like Amsterdam yet, but against the odds Dublin is becoming a city of cyclists again.
A free bicycle scheme in this rainy metropolis of narrow roads, potholes and, it has to be said, bicycle thieves, has been a spectacular triumph. Indeed Dublin City Council boasts that the program is “the most successful in the world by any measure.”
Despite predictions that the 450 specially-made bikes, available from 40 stations around the city, would quickly be stolen or tossed in the River Liffey by vandals, only two have been pilfered in the first six months of operation. These were quickly recovered, and none have been vandalized, according to council spokesman Paul Finan.
It helps that the bicycle is ugly and that one needs a credit card to use it. The machine is free for the first half an
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Sinclair and Carles Gil signing, it’s less likely that Gabby Agbonlahor and Andreas Weimann will be used on the flank.
Therefore they will challenge Benteke for the lone striker role alongside Libor Kozak who has now returned to training.
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“There’s more competition with the new signings,” added Lambert. “Now Gabby and Andi, who are better as strikers, will challenge (Benteke). I’ve been playing them out wide but they are quick, smaller-type guys, whereas Christian is different. It gives me the option.
“Remember, I left Christian out against Southampton last year and played Libor. He scored that day.
“But if we could bring in another striker we would try if that was feasible.”THE Scotland squad came together yesterday with head coach Scott Johnson’s first task being to re-focus minds away from Heineken Cup disappointments and on to a Six Nations Championship.
Only one of the squad that pitched up at the Heriot-Watt training camp has any European competition to look forward to after March, skipper Kelly Brown now familiar with knockout stages at Saracens. But as Johnson also starts to firm up the biggest challenge he faces, that of a team selection to take on Ireland in Dublin in just over two weeks’ time, so players like Greig Tonks are beginning to think of what might lie ahead.
Tonks has caught the eye with the multi-faceted abilities he has shown at stand-off. Picture: SNS
The 24-year-old returned from Ireland on Sunday night battered and bruised from the six-try mauling Edinburgh faced at the hands of Munster. Criticism was ringing in his ears, from coaches who tore a strip off their players to the skipper Greig Laidlaw, who made it clear in the dressing room at Thomond Park that that performance was unacceptable. Tonks agreed wholeheartedly and insisted that no-one was attempting to put a gloss on the defeat. But he is also hoping to learn valuable lessons from Sunday’s display, notably from how Edinburgh let a promising comeback towards the end of the first half slip after the break, and how they allowed themselves to be so easily opened up in the second half.
Edinburgh are not in action again until February, so next on the horizon is an Ireland team with Munster players such as Paul O’Connell, Peter O’Mahony and Tommy O’Donnell probably at its core. Tonks said that it would not take long to begin the process of re-focusing. “You don’t want to dwell on a loss,” he said, “so it is good to get into a new environment with a fresh campaign, and the Six Nations ahead.
“It is always disappointing losing and by a large margin is worse. Munster, when they get a slight bit of ascendency, are very good at finishing off a game. They can exploit space on the field and we let them do that. We let them get in the ascendency and it was really disappointing conceding so many tries.
“Given that we pride ourselves on our defence we let ourselves down a bit in that area. But that was the Heineken Cup with Edinburgh. Scotland is different. It is a fresh start now.”
That may not apply to any player more than Tonks. Born in Pretoria, South Africa, he moved with his Ayrshire mother and English father to England at the age of two. He was educated at Nottingham High School, intriguingly back in the city where the Tonks family name first emerged around the time of the Norman Conquest in 1066 AD.
He played for Newark RFC in Nottinghamshire before signing for Leicester and going on to represent England at under-16s, under-18s and under-20s levels, touring Australia and playing in the IRB Junior World Championships in Japan where he helped an England squad featuring Ben Youngs, Charlie Sharples and Courtney Lawes to a 30-6 win over Scotland and eventual loss to an Aaron Cruden-inspired New Zealand in the final.
By then his versatility had seen him move from stand-off to full-back more often and when he moved from Leicester to Northampton in 2010 he made his first start, against Edinburgh, ironically, at full-back, and was signed for the Scottish side in 2012 primarily in that role.
However, when Alan Solomons asked him to step in at stand-off in December, when the club’s three main options were all out injured, Tonks was delighted. He has duly turned heads by doing what Scotland’s other stand-offs, Ruaridh Jackson and Duncan Weir at Glasgow, are still getting to grips with – carrying out the game-plan and leading the back line with a seemingly effortless calm.
That is a key trait for any stand-off, that ability to make the calls, deliver the kicks, the short passes, the long passes, to make tackles and take bruising hits as big forwards target you around the fringes and still find time and space to play and orchestrate. Jackson has been the most consistent performer this season so far and is maturing well – Weir’s cameo against Toulon highlighted how he is still a little behind – and so is expected to start Scotland’s campaign against Ireland in Dublin.
Johnson might think differently, but the expectation is that Tonks will be handed his chance on the bench, providing cover for full-back and stand-off, with a view to coming on at some stage at ten to begin to increase the pressure for the starting fly-half berth. There is little doubt that Tonks wants it.
“I would be up for it,” he said, with all the assured confidence of a natural fly-half. “I would love the opportunity to do it but it is not my decision. I would be happy to do it. Whether the powers that be think that I have [the ability] I have to find out.
“But I can play ten so I will play as well as I can and see what happens. As you say it was not expected a month ago, but I have quite a few games under my belt there now for Edinburgh and they have not been easy games at a low level [against Leinster, Glasgow, Perpignan and Munster]. I like to think I can compete at that level in that position.
“In fact, given how I have been playing at ten, and the fact that is what I have been working on and been comfortable with, I would be [more] comfortable going in [for Scotland] in that position.”
THE SCOTSMAN RUGBY SHOW IN ASSOCIATION WITH GINGER GROUSE
SEE ALSO:
Scott Johnson predicts tight Six Nations
The best club rugby tries of 2013
Glasgow’s Henry Pyrgos on Scotland and Toulon
Edinburgh on the rise says Du Preez
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LCS fans, the moment you’ve been waiting for has finally come. Tickets for the EU LCS stop at The SSE Arena, Wembley (formerly called Wembley Arena), are now available for purchase. The road to London starts here!
Don’t miss your chance to see the best League of Legends teams in Europe battling it out in one of the UK’s most legendary sporting and entertainment venues. The SSE Arena, Wembley, has hosted events from two different Olympic Games as well as countless other professional sporting events. But the UK has never seen anything like this.
Tickets are available in three tiers: £10, £15 and £25. Head over to the ticketing page right now to Lock In your spot!
Anyone 14 or under must be accompanied by an adult over 16.
SCHEDULE
Saturday, 21 June
EU Challenger Series finals (Best-of-three)
SK Gaming vs. Alliance
Supa Hot Crew vs. Copenhagen Wolves
Millenium vs. Roccat
Gambit Gaming vs. Fnatic
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As Donald Trump desperately tries to distance himself and his administration from links with Russia, over in Moscow businessmen, oligarchs and politicians are raising eyebrows and wry smiles.
The President may have told a Washington press conference, “I have no deals that could happen in Russia because we’ve stayed away”, but those in the know believe the truth is very different.
The Mirror travelled to the former Soviet state to investigate allegations which have engulfed Trump and his team regarding clandestine links.
We discovered that far from “staying away” Trump has formed associations with some of Moscow’s most powerful and influential players, has sold his Miss Universe contest there, has a Hollywood Boulevard-style signed star in a shopping mall and even had plans to build a Trump Tower in the capital.
(Image: Getty)
The Mirror has uncovered how Trump was so desperate to make inroads into the Russian market – which he saw as a “potential goldmine” – he tried to trademark some of his projects here as far back as 1996.
But, as recently as three years ago, Trump made a visit to Moscow to pursue business interests.
He sold the rights to the Miss Universe event here in 2013 and brought 86 contestants from around the world, including former Miss USA Olivia Culpo, as he tried to use it to open other doors.
He was so convinced he was about to make a major financial killing he tweeted: “Trump Tower – Moscow is next.” And he added: “I know the Russians better than anybody.”
In a TV interview, he spoke fondly of his trip and said: “I was with the top-level people, both oligarchs and generals, and top of the government people.
"I can’t go further than that, but I will tell you I met the top people and the relationship was extraordinary.”
On the visit, he stayed at the exclusive Ritz Carlton hotel opposite the Kremlin.
There damaging – and unproven – allegations emerged that he paid prostitutes to urinate on a bed previously slept in by Barack Obama.
He later lunched at the expensive Nobu restaurant a short walk away.
(Image: Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror)
He also made a trip to the exclusive Vegas shopping mall in Krasnogorsk, on the outskirts of Moscow. There on the floor is the Walk of Fame-style star bearing Trump’s signature.
One business associate, who asked not to be named, said: “He loved that visit. He really thought he was finally going to make a breakthrough on the business front.
"At the meal in Nobu he met some of the most senior business and political people in Russia – many very close to President Putin.
He was very close to some of the most powerful men in Russia.
(Image: Reuters)
Mr Trump tried very hard to make inroads here, but it didn’t take off and then his Presidential campaign started and we can only guess he decided to be more careful.”
One of those he met was Herman Gref, the boss of Sberbank Russia’s biggest bank. Mr Gref is very close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
He served as his finance minister for more than six years and was one of the sponsors of the Miss Universe contest.
Also present was Aras Agalarov, the owner of Crocus Group, one of the country’s largest companies, which worked on the Miss Universe competition.
(Image: Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror)
(Image: Reuters)
Mr Agalarov said he gave Trump a tour of Moscow and they inspected several different sites.
He said: “We knew he had the idea of building Trump Tower in Moscow. We agreed, but nothing was signed.”
Trump is now such a popular figure in Russia, market stalls sell classic souvenir dolls adorned with his image. With no sense of irony they are placed on the shelves right next to those of Stalin, Lenin and Putin himself.
The millionaire has spoken publicly of his “respect” for “intelligent” President Putin, who is accused of interfering in the US election to ensure a victory for “The Donald”.
(Image: Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror)
(Image: Ian Vogler/Daily Mirror)
Trump dismissed US intelligence chiefs alarming findings that Putin ordered cyber hackers to manipulate the outcome as a “total witch-hunt”.
His Attorney General Jeff Sessions faces demands to resign after being accused of lying on oath about his undisclosed meetings with top Russian officials during Trump’s election campaign,
And now as the US President continues to censor the media, banning CNN, the BBC and the New York Times as he favours his right-wing friends, he is being compared to Putin, who exerts strict control over the press.
With the FBI hacking probe and the Flynn and Sessions affairs, Trump’s team may be playing a game of deadly Russian roulette.
If they are found to have conspired with the Kremlin over the election, the results could be invalidated and might even end in Trump’s impeachment.March 13, 2017, 11:17 PM GMT / Updated March 13, 2017, 11:17 PM GMT By Chris Fuchs
Supporters of Tibet marched across the country and in cities around the world Friday to mark the 58th anniversary of a Tibetan rebellion against Chinese occupying forces.
From Tokyo to Toronto, London to New York City, thousands hit the streets in more than 100 rallies to remember the day Tibetans surrounded the summer palace of their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, amid fears that Chinese troops planned to kidnap him.
March 10, 1959, later became known as Tibetan National Uprising Day. Seven days later, the Dalai Lama escaped Lhasa and made passage to India where he has lived in exile ever since.
Demonstrators in New York City marched from the United Nations to the Chinese Consulate on Friday, March 10, 2017, to mark the anniversary of Tibetan National Uprising Day and protest claims of political and religious persecution at the hands of the Chinese government, a charge Beijing has denied. Courtesy of Students for a Free Tibet
“Generally speaking, March 10th is a day to really sort of rile people up every year,” Sonamtso, the U.S.A. grassroots coordinator for Students for a Free Tibet, told NBC News. “But I think something that stood out this year was an emphasis of unity both within different types of Tibetan communities, but also with our allies.”
Among those allies, she said, are supporters of a free Tibet, including some members of Congress, as well as residents of Taiwan and Hong Kong, both of which have found themselves at odds with China.
Relations have long been strained between Tibet and China, which invaded Tibet in 1950. Tibetans have claimed persistent political and religious persecution at the hands of the Chinese government, a charge Beijing has denied. China has called its takeover of Tibet a “peaceful liberation.”
Demonstrators pass through Times Square on Friday, March 10, 2017, shouting slogans such as, "Free Tibet" and "Allow media in Tibet," while passing out pamphlets on the history of Tibetan National Uprising Day. Courtesy of Students for a Free Tibet
At the New York City rally, several thousand demonstrators marched from Cadman Plaza in Brooklyn over the Brooklyn Bridge to the United Nations, where speakers addressed the crowd, according to Sonamtso, who asked that her last name not be published because she still has family in Tibet.
Waving Tibetan flags and carrying handmade signs calling for a free Tibet, marchers flanked by New York City police officers navigated busy city sidewalks as they made their way to the Chinese consulate on Twelfth Avenue on the West Side of Manhattan.
Outside, more speakers addressed the crowd, Sonamtso said. One of the themes this year, she said, was to call for free media in Tibet, an autonomous region of China. Freedom House, a nonprofit, labeled Tibet “not free” as of 2017.
“The common sentiment was how important it is for Tibetans and our supporters to continue staying resilient and for us to continue resisting,” Sonamtso said.
The march in New York was supposed to end with a candlelight vigil in Jackson Heights, Queens, home to a large Tibetan community, but it was cancelled because of inclement weather.
That, however, did not squelch the message of participants.
“We as people who live in the quote free world, it’s our responsibility to stand up for our brothers and sisters and amplify their voices from inside of Tibet,” Sonamtso said.
Follow NBC Asian America on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr.PHILADELPHIA—Donald Trump went to the site of one of America’s most inspiring pieces of presidential oratory and read bitter grievances from a teleprompter. In his own Gettysburg address, one his campaign had touted as a major policy speech, the faltering Republican presidential candidate veered from talk of term limits and trade deals to issue two startling vows: to launch a lawsuit against every woman who has accused him of sexual assault and to take action against the companies that own CNN, NBC and the Washington Post, media entities he has called unfair.
Speaking in Gettysburg, PA., Donald Trump's words came three days after he alarmed politicians, scholars and much of the public by refusing to guarantee at the third debate that he would accept the result of the election if he did not win. ( Mark Makela / GETTY IMAGES )
Abraham Lincoln’s Civil War speech in Gettysburg in 1863 is remembered for lines like “this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom.” The most memorable sentence in Trump’s speech: “All of these liars will be sued after the election is over.” “It was probably the (Democratic National Committee) and the Clinton campaign that put forwards these liars with their fabricated stories,” he said, without any evidence, of his accusers. “But we’ll find out about their involvement at a later date through litigation. And I look so forward to doing that.” His threats offered yet another example of the darkness that has enveloped his campaign as Election Day approaches. With 17 days remaining and Democrat Hillary Clinton ahead by more than five points in national polls, Trump is spending precious time alleging implausible conspiracies, lashing out at his critics and threatening retribution.
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His Pennsylvania discussion of media companies was more reminiscent of a diatribe from a foreign authoritarian than the bias-bashing typical of Republican politicians. He said he would try as president to reverse Comcast’s acquisition of NBC’s parent company, completed in 2013, because such deals “destroy democracy.” “We’ll look at breaking that deal up and other deals like that. This should never, ever have been approved in the first place. They’re trying to poison the mind of the American voter,” he said in a ballroom about seven kilometres from the cemetery where Lincoln spoke.
A park range speaks to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as she gives him a tour at Gettysburg National Military Park on Saturday. ( Evan Vucci )
His words came three days after he alarmed politicians, scholars and much of the public by refusing to guarantee at the third debate that he would accept the result of the election. While saying Saturday that he wanted the country to look to Lincoln’s example to “heal the divisions we are living through,” he again complained of a “rigged” election. Erica Frantz, a Michigan State University political science professor who studies dictators, said his remarks reminded her of Venezuela’s late Hugo Chávez, who was democratically elected and then weakened democratic institutions like the press. “In the years after his assumption to power, he began implementing media restrictions, which he justified by accusing the media of being excessively partisan. This is exactly the type of language Trump used in his speech today,” Frantz said.
Trump’s campaign has been in free-fall since he scrapped to a near-tie in the polls before the first of the three debates. He lost all three, and he has been besieged by the assault allegations and the controversy over the leaked 2005 video in which he claims that he has kissed and groped women without their consent. An 11th accuser came forward Saturday afternoon. Jessica Drake, a performer in adult films, said he kissed her without permission in 2006. Trump has denied accusations of non-consensual kissing from other women, including former People and Toronto Star journalist Natasha Stoynoff.
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His numerous lawsuit threats often do not turn into actual lawsuits. Veteran lawyers, though, immediately vowed to defend anyone Trump sued for speaking out. The declared purpose of Trump’s speech was to announce a “contract with the American voter,” a set of commitments for his first 100 days in office, and he did get around to policy pledges. Most of them, though, he had announced before: banning immigrants from “terror-prone regions,” seeking modifications to the North American Free Trade Agreement, rejecting the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, repealing Obamacare, banning election fundraising by foreign lobbyists. The most notable policy statement was a curious change to his most famous existing platform plank: a giant wall on the border with Mexico, to be paid for by Mexico alone. It is a staple of his raucous rallies: Trump asks who will be paying for the wall, the crowd bellows “Mexico!” On Saturday, for the first time, he said the wall would be built with American money — on the understanding that Mexico would provide reimbursement later. Trump also pledged to authorize the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Alberta, and he did not mention any conditions. In the winter and spring, while boasting of his negotiating talents, he said he would require TransCanada Corp. to give the U.S. government as much as “25 per cent of the profits forever” in exchange for his approval. Trump proceeded to a rally in Virginia Beach, where he drew another adoring crowd of thousands. Clinton was also in critical Pennsylvania, campaigning with running mate Tim Kaine in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Clinton said that after three debates, she “doesn’t even think about responding” to Trump anymore. Speaking to reporters on her plane in Pittsburgh on Saturday, Clinton said that she was “going to let the American people decide what he offers and what we offer.” She continued: “He can say whatever he wants to. He can run his campaign however he wants to. He can go off on tangents.” Clinton said she’ll talk about what the next president should do and hopes voters make their choice based on that.
Read more about:"But honey, I only opened WhatsApp to reply to my boss. He still forwards me every stupid joke he gets. I didn't notice your message about the dinner with your parents!"
"Oh. I thought you did and you ignored me."
"No, no, I swear. Is it too late to reschedule now? Please don't tell me that I'm missing another lovely evening with your mother!"
"See, I had a hunch that you were lying, but now I'm sure. You would never use the word lovely in the same sentence as my mother. Plus, WhatsApp showed me two blue checkmarks."
"Two what-now?"
"Blue checkmarks. It means you read the message, moron. Before noon. And you didn't answer until now... Eight in the evening. How convenient!"
He mutters "Shit!" then hears a click. Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep.
That and many other similar scenarios are bound to start occurring in the near future. For the millions who use the WhatsApp service, a new feature is creeping up into a few conversations: blue checkmarks. Fear the blue, feel its icy chill run to your core. No more excuses, no more evasions, no more forgetfulness. You did read those messages, and the other person knows.
Up until now, WhatsApp had a two-tier message delivery visual feedback: one grey check when the message is delivered to the WhatsApp servers and two checks when it successfully reaches the other person's phone. Unlike BBM, you had no way of knowing whether the person on the other end actually read the message. You could speculate based on their Last Seen timing, but you couldn't be sure. Now you can. When the grey checks turn blue, the other person has actually opened the app and read your message.
Fear the blue checkmarks of death!
Based on my own tests, the feature seems to be more of a server-side change than an update-related one. It is randomly activated in a few conversations but not in all of them, and it appears to be there on various versions of the app from 2.11.399 to 2.11.432.
There's a silver lining if you use an Android Wear watch: it seems that you can circumvent the checks. You can still open the notification on the watch, read the messages, and dismiss them, without triggering the blue checks of death from the app. Ni vu ni connu. You can obviously do the same thing by cutting your connection before opening the messages on the phone (that's the premise of many apps that circumvent WhatsApp's Last Seen status), but that's a bit of a pain to set up or remember.
Imma buy some popcorn, sit here with an evil grin, and enjoy this mess while still checking all my messages from my G Watch and not replying to anyone. Because I can.
Thanks Francesco Basta, Fernando, and everyone else who sent this in!A pot dispensary in Eugene, Ore., on Monday, Sept. 28, 2015. (AP Photo) Posted July 2 | Updated Sept. 18:
Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky made history in Denver when he became the first presidential candidate to raise money from the legal cannabis industry in June. That got us thinking: Where do the other candidates stand on recreational marijuana in Colorado? We've updated this post to reflect comments from the Republican and Democratic primary debates. Those debates made clear that pot is on the mind of pretty much all the candidates (just as a topic, we hope). With the Republicans candidates debating next in Boulder, don't expect the haze of legalization to clear out anytime soon. Here's what we know so far:
For Legalization
Rand Paul The Republican senator earned top marks from the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington lobbying group, for his sponsorship of a bill allowing states to set their own policies regarding medical marijuana. He has also been a vocal supporter of efforts to reduce criminal punishments for those arrested for using or possessing the drug. In the past, Sen. Paul has framed his marijuana position around states rights. "I see it just more from a federal perspective," he told the Denver Post. "And I think the federal government just ought to stay out." The Kentucky senator made the same point in the CNN debate, but also went after the other candidates for criminalizing a drug that some, including Jeb Bush, have admitted to using. "I think one of the great problems, and what American people don't like about politics, is hypocrisy," Paul said. "People have one standard for others and not for themselves." Bernie Sanders What do the libertarian and a democratic socialist running for president have in common? The short answer: legal marijuana. Sanders had said he was considering support for recreational marijuana. That changed at the first democratic debate when Anderson Cooper asked him if he'd support Nevada's ballot initiative to legalize recreational marijuana. Sen. Sanders said he'd vote for legalization of recreational marijuana at the first Democratic debate. "I suspect I would vote yet," Sanders answered. "And I would vote yes because I am seeing in this country too many lives being destroyed for non-violent offenses. We have a criminal justice system that lets CEOs on Wall Street walk away, and yet we are imprisoning or giving jail sentences to young people who are smoking marijuana."
Just Curious For Now
Hillary Clinton
Running for the Democratic nomination in 2007, Clinton said she supported research on medical marijuana, but opposed efforts to reduce penalties for cannabis use. Eight years later, her position appears to have reversed. In a CNN Town Hall, Clinton said she is now skeptical that marijuana works as medicine and is interested in seeing how the legalization efforts play out. Secretary Clinton said she still wanted to wait and see on marijuana at the first Democratic debate. She maintained that wait-and-see approach on both medical and recreational marijuana at the first democratic debate. She met a question of whether she is ready to take a position on the issue with a forceful, "No."
Not For Me, But Go Ahead
Jeb Bush
The former Republican governor of Florida has admitted to being a pot user in high school, but says he now deeply regrets it. His position on legal marijuana in is somewhat similar: it happened, but he wishes it hadn't. “I thought [legalization] was a bad idea,” Bush said at the Conservative Political Action Conference, “but states ought to have the right to do it.” He isn't so easy going when it comes to his home state. Just last year, he opposed a ballot initiative to allow medical marijuana in Florida. That postilion earned a charge of hypocrisy from Rand Paul (see above) in the second Republican debate. "Under the current circumstances, kids who had privilege like you do don't go to jail, but the poor kids in our inner cities go to jail," Paul said to Bush.
Ted Cruz
Last year, the GOP senator from Texas criticized President Obama for allowing Colorado and Washington to continue selling marijuana unimpeded by federal law. Now, it appears he has shifted into Bush's cannabis camp. At the Conservative Political Action Conference, he told Sean Hannity that, "if the citizens of Colorado decide they want to go down that road, that's their prerogative." His office explained his apparent change of position to the New York Times as a point of executive versus congressional power. Colorado should be able to do what it likes, but Obama should have consulted Congress before deciding not to enforce federal law.
Marco Rubio
The Republican senator from Florida opposes any form of legal marijuana, but could imagine supporting medical marijuana so long as it isn't mind-altering. He now takes the same leave-it-to-the-states stance as his fellow Republican candidates according to a spokesperson That last position hasn't been so clear for Rubio. As recently as May 2014, Rubio told Yahoo News that, "marijuana is illegal under federal law. That should be enforced."
Mike Huckabee
Huckabee had the most to say about legal marijuana at the Western Conservatives Summit last week, even if he basically agrees with most of his Republican counterparts. That might be because the former Arkansas governor previously opposed legalization
Now, he believes Colorado -- like other states -- has a right to legalize it without federal intervention. That said, he outlined how he thinks states should judge Colorado's legalization effort. If Colorado is making money and creating jobs, great. “If, on the other hand, you have people who don’t show up for work and who stay stoned half the time, if you have kids who end up eating what they thought was just a good nice brownie that their mama made but it makes them sick and puts them in the emergency room, if you have enough of that, then maybe the other states will step back and say, ‘Thanks, Colorado, for protecting us from making the decision that you guys made that didn’t work out real well for you,” he said.
Martin O'Malley
The former Maryland governor's presidential bid is a Hail Mary pass aiming somewhere to the left of Clinton. But O'Malley shares her uncertainty on recreational marijuana. O'Malley did sign bills decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana and creating a medical marijuana program as governor. And at a recent stop in Colorado, he told marijuana industry members he'd remove marijuana from the federal government's list of Schedule 1 controlled substances. But would he support marijuana legalization outright? "I am not there yet," he said. Ben Carson
Former neurosurgeon Ben Carson won the straw poll at the Western Conservative Summit in Denver without any mention of his marijuana politics. That may have been wise in pot-friendly Colorado. The Republican has adamantly opposed any legalization of what he considers a "gateway drug," but does offer some mild support for certain uses of medical marijuana. He told Fox News that marijuana, "tends to be a starter drug for people who move onto heavier duty drugs – sometimes legal, sometimes illegal – and I don’t think this is something that we really want for our society." John Kasich The Ohio governor is clear on one thing: he doesn't want to see recreational marijuana in his home state or any other state. Still, in a recent interview with conservative talk radio host Hugh Hewitt, he acknowledged that there is a states' rights argument for legalization. Hewitt was unimpressed with the nuance because Colorado and Washington would "pump marijuana into the national marketplace" if not held to federal drug laws. "You know, you may be right," said Kasich. "I just want to give it some thought." Carly Fiorina The former Hewlett-Packard CEO may have best articulated the states-rights position on Colorado legalization. "I respect Colorado's right to do what they did. They are within their rights to legalize marijuana, and they are conducting an experiment that I hope the rest of the nation is looking closely at," she said in an interview with the Des Moines Register Still, Fiorina doesn't see marijuana legalization as separate from the epidemic of drug addiction, maybe because she lost a child to it. "We are misleading young people when we tell them that marijuana is just like having a beer. It's not," she said at the second Republican debate. Get That Stuff Out Of Here Donald Trump The business tycoon has changed his tune on marijuana since the 1990s. Back then, he said legalization was key to winning the war on drugs at a luncheon with the Miami Herald. Today, he isn't so hot on the idea of people in Colorado lighting up legally. At CPAC, he told Sean Hannity legal marijuana was a bad idea. He did not even advocate the states' rights argument for legal marijuana when given the chance. "If they vote for it, they vote for it. But they got a lot of problems going on in Colorado right now, big problems," he said.
Bobby Jindal
Louisiana's Republican governor isn't just against marijuana on a personal level. He doesn't think states should have any right to disobey federal law. “I don’t think you can ignore federal law," he told the Washington Times when asked if he would bring down the hammer on pot shops as president. "It is still the law of the land. It still needs to be enforced.” He has offered limited support for medical marijuana under tight restrictions.If there's one thing that the United States truly excels at — aside from diabetes and predatory lending — it's psychological projection.
For those uninitiated in this ancient art, psychological projection "involves projecting undesirable feelings or emotions onto someone (or something) else, rather than admitting to or dealing with the unwanted feelings." It's a defense mechanism to avoid dealing with your own bullshit, to put it simply.
The US has no business lecturing anyone about state sponsored terrorism
So, for example, when you terrorize half a dozen countries with flying bomb-dropping robots, or are caught operating secret torture dungeons in Africa and Eastern Europe, or arm Takfiri maniacs in hopes of destroying peaceful nations on the other side of the world, or bomb multifarious brown countries with conventional planes flown by pilots hopped up on amphetamines, or impose sanctions that kill 500,000 children, or just straight-up occupy countries, sometimes for dozens of years or more, and then point the finger at a nation that you can't destroy, because it's actually capable of defending itself and protecting its national interests — this is the crème de la crème of psychological projection. Sorry for the run-on sentence. [Edit: It's not a run-on sentence. Thank you commenter "tom".]
And so we are not even remotely surprised that James Mattis, Defense Secretary of the world's biggest state sponsor of terrorism, just accused Iran of being "the world's biggest state sponsor of terrorism".
Mattis made the remarks one day after Donald Trump’s government imposed new sanctions on Iran in response to it testing a ballistic missile. Because if there's one thing the United States will not tolerate, it's any country that can protect itself from the United States.
Here's more from our friend Mattis: "We have seen [Iran's] misconduct, their misbehavior, from Lebanon and Syria to Bahrain and to Yemen and it's got to be addressed at some point."
We love how Mattis includes Bahrain in his laundry list of Iranian horrors. As if we're supposed to be outraged that any country might oppose a despotic regime propped up by the United States and Great Britain. How could you, Tehran?
And of course, it's hard to get too upset about Iran's role in Syria, considering that Tehran was invited by the sovereign government of Syria to help defeat extremists armed by the U.S., Turkey, Saudi Arabia — all the big names in the democracy promotion industry. Yes, Iran was "asked" to get involved in Syria. Is Washington even aware that this word exists? Certainly not when it comes to its "anti-terror" operations in Syria...
It really is special when the United States — a country that deposed the democratically elected leader of Iran, and then replaced him with a murderous autocrat, and then a few years later helped a neighboring rival use chemical weapons against the Iranian people, and then a few years after that shot down an Iranian airliner — wags its finger at Iran and says, "these monsters have to be 'addressed' at some point!"
Holy shit. Stick a fork in it, Mattis. You're embarrassing yourself.The New Orleans Pelicans' mascot is getting a makeover.
New Orleans announced that Pierre the Pelican will have reconstructive surgery for "a broken beak." Layne Murdoch/Getty Images
The team announced Monday that Pierre the Pelican will have reconstructive surgery for "a broken beak," which it reportedly suffered after running into a basket stanchion during a game with other mascots.
"This will be a rather unconventional surgery for us," Pelicans team physician Dr. Matthew McQueen said in a statement. "I am not sure we have something to compare this to. It will be quite complicated and will require the use of some unconventional tools and instruments to reconstruct his beak."
The tongue-in-cheek announcement also featured a statement from Carolyn Atherton, the curator of birds for the Audubon Zoo.
"We do see a lot of head trauma cases with pelicans," Atherton said. "Since they are the plunge-divers, sometimes they'll hit sharp objects and a lot of times, they'll have tears in their pouch or even eye problems. We've had quite a few pelicans we've treated for injuries similar to Pierre's. After they've been treated, they've all come back looking bigger, stronger, faster and ready to take on the world."
Grantland's Zach Lowe reported on Jan. 22 that New Orleans would re-design the mascot's head to make it "less scary." The Pelicans unveiled Pierre on Oct. 30, 2013, the team's first game as the Pelicans.There's this interesting Bethesda memo floating around. Maybe you've seen it on a fan-run gaming site or your favorite message board. It's all very exciting.
In the memo, which started circulating last week, a reputed Bethesda executive writes to employees about exciting upcoming games like "Fallout 4" and "Elder Scrolls VI." The executive also drops some neat titles like "Project Greenheart" and "Fallout: Nuka World."
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And he has wrestled with what he will tell potential recruits—how to encapsulate the experience of a soldier in the Army today. But he has settled on an answer. "The truth," he says. "All I can do is tell them the truth."Image copyright Humberside Police Image caption John Heald was on trial accused of stabbing to death the landlady of a Bridlington guesthouse
A man on trial for the murder of an East Yorkshire hotel landlady has killed himself in his prison cell while waiting for the jury to reach a verdict.
John Heald, 53, was on trial at Hull Crown Court charged with stabbing to death Bridlington guest house owner Bei Carter, on 18 July.
He was also charged with committing three rapes in South Yorkshire in July.
Heald, of Foljambe Road, Rotherham, had denied all the charges.
He was found in his cell at Hull Prison at 05:50 GMT having hanged himself, Det Ch Insp Matthew Baldwin told the court.
The Prison Service confirmed Mr Heald was not on suicide watch.
In a statement, a spokesman said: "Every self-inflicted death is a tragedy and we make strenuous efforts to learn from each one."
The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman said it had begun an independent investigation into his death.
A spokeswoman said: "Where lessons are identified, recommendations are made to the Prison Service to help prevent similar deaths in future. We also share any findings with the coroner to assist with his enquiries."
Mr Heald's death comes just two weeks after that of Leo Barnes, who was on trial for the murder of two pensioners in Halesowen, West Midlands and London. He was found hanged in his cell at HMP Hewell in Redditch, Worcestershire.
Image copyright Humberside Police Image caption Bei Carter and her husband ran the Morayland Guest House on Marshall Avenue in Bridlington
The killing of Mrs Carter, a married mother of two, sparked an intensive week-long police search by two Yorkshire forces.
Heald was arrested while hiding in woodland in Rotherham on 25 July.
He admitted stabbing the 49-year-old landlady in court but claimed it was an accident.The buzz around Netflix hit series Stranger Things hasn’t stopped, with viewers and social media users continuing to post about the nostalgic thriller. And that has shifted the series’ ranking to the top of Parrot Analytics’ list for both digital originals and overall series, a metric than includes shows from broadcast and cable networks.
The ranking marks the first time that an SVOD-based original series outpaced traditional TV series in demand, said the analytics firm.
The Stephen King-recommended series is pacing way above AMC’s Mr. Robot and HBO series Game of Thrones and The Night Of, on the overall series list. While it’s not surprising to see Thrones and Robot down overall, since their seasons ended several weeks ago, Stranger Things is vastly outpacing other digital originals, even those that just debuted, far outstripping the latest season of Narcos, which ranked only a little higher than The Get Down.
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Stranger Things hit Netflix in July, while The Get Down premiered in mid-August and Narcos just this week.
Parrot Analytics said that Stranger Things was actually up another 8 percent this week, "likely propelled by Netflix’s announcement" of, finally, a second season.
While Parrot’s demand ranking is its own creation—Netflix doesn’t release subscriber numbers and rarely discusses viewing trends on its service—other research firms are reporting similar trends. Last week, Symphony Advanced Media, which uses audio recognition to track what viewers are watching on their devices, said that Stranger Things was the third highest-rated series on Netflix in its first 35 days of availability.
The thing is, no one has been able to clearly explain why this low-key thriller series has caught on so strongly. Netflix seems to be staking its bets on its bigger, cornerstone properties like House of Cards, Orange Is The New Black, and Marco Polo – with the latter not performing nearly so well as its two highest-awarded series. And nostalgia alone isn’t the key to series success: The Get Down, with its roots in a gritty ‘70s New York City, ranks highly in digital originals, but hasn’t yet cracked Parrot’s top 10 for overall demand.
Attribution/Copyrights Parrot Analytics
For more:
- see this post
- see this Thrillist article
Related articles:
Content matters: Netflix sets sights on hip-hop nostalgia, while Amazon tags Jack Ryan for series
Netflix hit 'Stranger Things' could turn around flagging subscriber numbers
Netflix lands first global-rights deal with Fox, and signs on MST3K's new season tooUp and down go the crazy ravens in looping undulations, some of the birds suddenly splitting off into pairs to engage in their own sweeping aerobatics before joining the main group again.
I scan the brow of this grassy hill with my binoculars and see several more ravens sitting along a line of fence posts, watching the proceedings. But soon they too take to the air and join the melee. There are now more than 20 in the air, spiralling and tumbling just above the ridge in a spectacular black-winged aerial ballet.
For the last few evenings I have come to this wonderful rolling landscape of hill and wood near Dunning in southern Perthshire to watch this sky dancing. The displays always seem to occur just above the ridge, possibly because the swirling air currents provide extra lift here. These airborne antics also only ever take place an hour or so before dusk – when I visit during the day there are few ravens about.
It is well known that ravens flock in autumn and it is believed that such congregations consist mainly of young birds and adult non-breeders. Some studies also suggest that such behaviour is part of the process of pairing-up and finding the right partner.
Maybe so, but when watching these ravens toss their bodies about all over the sky, one can’t help but feel that they are also enjoying themselves and doing it all for a bit of fun. After a hard day foraging for food, why not socialise with your contemporaries before bedding down for the night?
There is often the tendency to look for explanations for every aspect of animal behaviour when perhaps there is sometimes no reason at all, other than letting off some steam and having a bit of horseplay.
I’m also sure that this evening flock doesn’t just consist of singletons, for as the light fades I often see separate pairs of ravens swooping in from afar to join the party, which I presume are well-established couples. Ravens are loyal birds and mate for life.
A traditional name for a flock of ravens is an “unkindness of ravens”, which refers to an old legend that ravens push their young out of the nest early to survive as best they can. Not true of course – ravens are very good parents.
But then again in folklore the raven has been much vilified from the earliest of times; a dark cloak of a bird that haunts our wild and lonely places. As I watch these birds silhouetted against the gloaming sky, rising and falling in the air like huge black bats, I feel a sense of empathy for this foreboding felt by our ancestors.
But it is only a fleeting moment on my part, for as I bring the swirling flock back into focus once more with my binoculars, I find it impossible to associate the macabre with a group of birds’ so intent on having so much fun.
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After centuries of persecution, a more enlightened attitude in recent decades has resulted in there being a significant increase in raven numbers and they can now be seen in many parts of Courier Country.Most of the dead were reported to have been students A suicide bomber who killed at least 22 people at a graduation in Somalia was brought up in Denmark, officials say. Somali Information Minister Dahir Gelle told the BBC that the bomber's parents, who live in Copenhagen, identified their son's body from photographs. Reports say he left Somalia when he was a child and spent 20 years in Denmark, before returning to Somalia last year. He reportedly joined the hard-line Islamist group al-Shabab - although they have previously denied the attack. Al-Shabab and other radical Islamist groups control much of the country. I had to step over their bodies to get out - people were screaming: 'Is it a bomb? Is it a bomb?'
Mohammed Olad Hassan
BBC reporter
Bomb attack: 'Light turned to dark' The Danish Security and Intelligence Service (PET) also says the bomber was from Denmark, according to local media. The Copenhagen Post quoted PET as saying the man was in his 20s and was "a Somali citizen who had residence in Denmark". "As PET has indicated numerous times in the past, there are people with ties to Denmark who have gone through militant Islamic training and radicalisation and who are involved in terror-related activities in several countries, including in Somalia," a PET statement said, according to the newspaper. The bombing took place at a graduation for medical students on 3 December in one of the few parts of the capital, Mogadishu, which is controlled by the government. The students had been graduating from Benadir University, which was set up in 2002 to train doctors to replace those who had fled overseas or been killed in the civil war. Three ministers were among the dead. Al-Shabab, which wants to enforce a strict version of Islamic law in Somalia, is accused of having links to al-Qaeda. It has previously carried out several suicide bombings on government targets - but it has usually claimed responsibility immediately. Somalia has had no effective government for almost 20 years.
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StumbleUpon What are these? E-mail this to a friend Printable version2017 post-season testing Day 3 Entry List
Day 3 of the FIA Formula 2 Championship post-season test at the Yas Marina Circuit will see more driver changes: Thiago Vivacqua will take over car #4 from Maximilian Gunther at Racing Engineering, with Leonardo Pulcini moving up from GP3 with Campos Racing in car #12, Luca Ghiotto returns to car #14 at MP Motorsport, Antonio Fuoco will sit in car #16 at Trident, Norman Nato moves over to car #19 at Rapax, and Pietro Fittipaldi slides into Arden International in car #21.
The day 3 timetable will be slightly different to the first 2 days: the final morning session of 2017 will run from 10.40 to 13.10, with the evening session from 18.30 to 21.00 (GMT+4).
Day 3 Driver ListGeorgia voters will decide on Nov. 8 whether to amend the state’s Constitution to tear down and rebuild the commission that oversees judges’ conduct.
Supporters of Amendment 3 say it’s a sensible effort to gain control of a power-drunk Judicial Qualifications Commission that answers to no one and unfairly targets judges.
Opponents of the measure say it’s a political power grab orchestrated by legislators who are friends and allies of judges who were targeted by the commission.
One of the amendment’s House sponsors, state Rep. Johnnie Caldwell Jr., R-Thomaston, was himself a Superior Court judge forced from office by the commission over inappropriate sexual comments he made to female lawyers. In 2010, upon resigning, he pledged that he would “never seek or accept judicial office again.”
Instead, he ran for the state House in 2012 and won.
In 2016, Caldwell co-sponsored bills that would abolish the independent Judicial Qualifications Commission and replace it with a commission controlled by the Legislature.
The push is not a power grab, said state Rep. Wendell Willard, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and a chief sponsor of the bill authorizing the amendment. “The people who were being appointed (to the JQC) … misused some of the powers given them. I, for one, thought there needed to be a reining in.”
But former JQC Chairman Lester Tate, who resigned in April, said the proposed amendment is all about revenge. Since 2007, the commission has removed almost six dozen judges, including Caldwell. Some resigned rather than be subject to an investigation.
And Tate said regardless of the outcome of Georgia election 2016, the current JQC is “dead in the water because the Legislature has destroyed it.”The latest legal filing from Norm Coleman’s legal team, officially registering their appeal of his defeat in the Minnesota election trial, seems to contain an interesting pair of contingency plans when it quickly lays out exactly what his case is: That either votes should be counted showing that he is the winner — or that no winner can be determined at all.
The filing is not a complicated brief, but a quick summary of what Coleman’s points will be at a later date. It mainly focused on Coleman’s claim that thousands of rejected absentee ballots that he identified ought to be counted, if he can get a standard of admission less than the strict compliance with the law demanded by the court.
But then it adds this:
II. Whether the trial court violated the constitutional protections of equal protection and due process when it declared that Respondent received the highest number of “legally cast votes” where the record demonstrated that, by the trial court’s rulings, the number of “illegally cast” ballots counted on election day and during the recount greatly exceeded the margin between the candidates and it cannot be determined for which candidate those illegal votes were counted?
What this means in plain English is that the Coleman campaign wants to overturn the strict standards and get their selected ballots in. But if they can’t do so, and are still behind in the count, then they argue that this means there are other absentee ballots already in the count that don’t meet these standards. And thus, they would argue, we can’t determine who actually won.
Coleman attorney Jim Langdon had previously floated the idea to the trial judges that the election results be “set aside,” but they didn’t bite. This sort of language, however, shows that they’re keeping this line of argument alive.
It’s a bit of a heads-I-win, tails-you-lose argument.Every backer at 'The Game' pledge level or higher will now get a free mini-expansion that will add role punch boards for the zombie player characters! These optional role cards will add abilities to the game for the players to use.
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Welcome to We Are Dead: Zombie Mall Massacre! The board game where you and your friends take on the role of the shambling zombie horde. Your goal is simple: turn as many mall shoppers as you can into zombies. Achieving your goal is not simple. Human Heroes attempt to put you down permanently and the roaming horde of your victims is trying to eat up your food supply.
We Are Dead is for 2-5 people ages 13+ and plays in about an hour.
Art for the game was done by two amazing artists, Mike Morris and Mike Collins. I cannot rave enough about how well they brought the vision for this game to life (or unlife). Throughout this page you will see many of the fantastic pieces they produced. Check the bottom for more information about the artists.
Media:
Tom Vasel Preview:
Interview with Bring Your A Game w/ the designer:
http://agamemag.com/archives/2973
Follow up interview with BYAG and the artists:
http://agamemag.com/archives/2989
Players take turns attempting to attack the mall shoppers trying to satisfy their recently unlocked hunger for humans. Players will use attack cards from their hands and infection tokens they receive to defeat heroes and turn the humans.
Attack Cards
During other players' turns each opponent will have the opportunity to play hero cards in the hopes of stopping the player. This interaction during other players' turns reduces down time and keeps all players engaged in the game.
Hero Cards
(see all of the hero art below in the 'Rewards' section)
While players are busy with their own struggles, the horde grows from their victims. When the Horde! card appears the players must work together to make sure they do not all lose to the massive horde.
Horde Card
We Are Dead is easy to learn, but provides enough depth and random elements to allow for good replay-ability. The game uses a hand management mechanic with elements of co-op play and resource management that add layers of strategy to the game.
We will be posting the rule book and game play videos soon!
The Components
Box Contents:
1 game board
5 zombie player tokens
5 zombie player score tokens
1 zombie horde token
1 zombie horde score token
20 infection tokens
94 card deck
70 shopper tokens
10 damage tokens
Kickstarter Backer Exclusive Token
These tokens will be given to each backer who pledges at 'The Game' level or higher. This backer exclusive token is the size of a poker chip and we are only pressing enough for each of the Kickstarter backers. They will not be available once the campaign is over.
This token also has a small in-game effect: It can be used as an additional infection token (if the other players let you use it). It's not much, but it's one of the small ways I wanted to thank the Kickstarter backers!
New Add-ons
We are excited to announce new (optional) add-on acrylic tokens that can be used instead of the infection and damage tokens that come with the game.
These tokens are a great upgrade from the punchboard ones that will come in the game box.
Add $8 onto any order to receive the pack of 30 acrylic tokens (20 infection & 10 damage tokens)
onto any order to receive the pack of 30 acrylic tokens (20 infection & 10 damage tokens) Add $5 onto any 'Super Bundle' order to receive the pack of 30 acrylic tokens (20 infection & 10 damage tokens)
onto any 'Super Bundle' order to receive the pack of 30 acrylic tokens (20 infection & 10 damage tokens) Anyone pledging at the $150 level or higher level will get a set of these tokens for FREE!
These will be shipped with the game, but outside the game box. The game will still contain the normal punchboard tokens as well!
An additional set of the 6 promo cards!
If you've already pledge for 'The Game' level or higher, you may add on an additional set of all six promo cards to your pledge.
Add $6 onto any order of 'The Game' pledge level or higher to receive an additional set of the six promo cards: Mall Santa, Ninja, Cowboy, Robot, Pirate, and Zombie Hunter
Rules
Here is a simple demo video of how the game is played:
We have lined up some great overfunding goals that, with the power of Kickstarter, allow us to do lots of extras for the base game. Everyone who contributes at the $30 ("THE GAME") or higher level will receive these items if achieved.
Two additional unique promo cards! For this goal we will include a copy of the Cowboy promo card and Robot promo card. Here is the rough sketch of each promo card. Believe it or not this is how all of the pieces of art start. This is a great insight into the process the artists go through!
Two more unique promo cards! For this goal we will include a copy of the Pirate promo card and Zombie Hunter promo card. We know how fun promo cards are. Not all of these promo cards will be available in the future. Some may be given out at conventions and some may be on Board Game Geek, but this is your chance to make sure you get them all at once and for free with the game!
At $35,000 we will make the game board double sided. This will add even more replay to the box. The location is a carnival. Players will be able to able to terrorize people in the middle of their favorite deep-fried snack, while the heroes might just be your favorite carnival folk.
If we can get the Never Peak Games Facebook page up to 250+ "Likes" I will add a 5th player to the game!
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Never-Peak-Games/185679291512377?ref=hl
Head over to the Facebook page and click "Like". Share the page with your gaming friends and help spread the word about the game. If we reach this goal I will happily cover the costs of putting in the extra components for your efforts to get us more backers!
MINI EXPANSION! We will do a small upgrade in the box that will come with character trait cards for the player zombies. These cards will add a bit of flavor to each zombie and give them in-game abilities.
The full We Are Dead: Carnival Chaos Expansion Pack. This will include new shopper tokens, new heroes (some of which will have design contributions from backers! See the $350 reward level), and attack cards. As with all of the previous stretch goals, this will be included free for anyone who backs at the $30 or above levels.
MINIATURES!!! At this over funding level we will be able add six unique miniatures to the game to represent the five players and the zombie horde. We are working to get a 3D mock-up of one of the miniatures soon.
We have plenty more stretch goals planned for this game. The more funding we get, the more cool stuff we can give back!
$1 - Your name in the rule book as a thank you for making it all possible. Everyone who contributes will have their name in the rule book.
$3 - Wallpapers. We are going to make 3 wallpapers that will be available for download as soon as the project is funded.
$6 - Stickers. A 4-pack of stickers for you to enjoy some of the great art.
$6 - Get the Promo Cards. You will get 1 copy each of the Mall Santa and Ninja cards.
$10 - SMALL BUNDLE - The the stickers and promo cards.
$12 Art Prints. Choose from one of these three amazing pieces. The prints will be 5"x7"
$20 - We Are Dead T-Shirt.
These are mock ups of the shirts. I have a printer lined up and we are going to use this art piece, but the colors might be a little different when they are pressed.
$30 - $35 - THE GAME
$45 - THE GAME & SLEEVES
(See details about the sleeves in the 'Add-ons' section below)
$60/ $65 SUPER BUNDLE
$150 - SKETCH CARD & SUPER BUNDLE
The sketch card will be hand drawn by Mike Morris. You will just need to provide an image for reference. He can draw you as a zombie or hero!
$200 - YOUR NAME HERE & THE GAME x2
Find the corresponding reward level on the right for the Hero that you would like to name. These are first-come first-served and whomever names that card will have their name printed in every retail copy of the game sold! For the promos the name will be on every promo printed and handed out. (Backers of this level can choose to get the Super Bundle instead of The Game x2 if they want.)
$350 - DESIGN A CARD & THE GAME x2
At this reward level you will get to design a card with me for the expansion and Mike Morris will draw the character from your likeness. You will be in every copy of the expansion printed! (Backers of this level can choose to get the Super Bundle instead of The Game x2 if they want.)
T-Shirts
+$15 Add a T-Shirt onto any order $30 or above. We will press them at almost any size. These are mock ups of the shirts. I have a printer lined up and we are going to use this art piece, but the colors might be a little different when they are pressed.
Sleeves
+$13 Choose one of our designs and add 100 We Are Dead Sleeves to any order $30 or above. Sleeves are going to be manufactured by fellow Kickstarter Kalan Vazquez. His web site www.yourcardsleeves.com is almost done. Check him out!
These images are the backs of the sleeves and they do not affect game play, they are for protecting your cards. This has been a popular request on many Kickstarters and I wanted to include them as an option for people. The art on the back of each group of 100 is exactly the same.
Prints
$10 - Add any 1 of the prints onto any order of $30 or more.
$20 - Add all 3 prints onto any order of $30 or more. This is a great value!
(The print images are shown in the 'Prints' section above.)
Connect with us
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/131982/we-are-dead-zombie-mall-massacre
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Never-Peak-Games/185679291512377
https://twitter.com/NeverPeakGames
About the Artists:
Mike Morris is a life-long artist working currently as an animator, illustrator and comic artist. Mike has worked on television and feature film projects, most notably Fox Networks' The Simpsons. He hopes that from the proceeds of the We Are Dead series of board games he can retire to a fortress on a private island in the South Pacific with his wife Dejah to await and prepare for the inevitable Zombie Apocalypse.
Mike Collins spends his days working in animation on such projects as Cartoon Network's Class of 3000, Flapjack, The Powerpuff Girls Rule!!!, Foster's Home for imaginary Friends, Adventure Time and Sym-Bionic Titan. When not working, he enjoys playing super-hero with his son Sam and spending time with his wife Deborah. He has contingency plans for the Zombie Apocalypse but since he's an artist, probably won't be of any actual help.... you can see more of his work at creativeaces.blogspot.com.
About the Designer:
Derak Morrell has been a designer on several Video Games for Sony Online Entertainment and has been developing board games for 10 years. Derak is a casual player who enjoys almost every board game and doesn't turn down a chance to play Magic: The Gathering or an RPG. See his full bio in the profile section of this page.MCubed Blue sky thinking is great, but if you’re interested in what machine learning and AI means for your business right now, you should really join us at MCubed London in October.
If you’re just beginning to examine what machine learning, AI and advanced analytics can do for your organisation - or your competitors’ - we’ll be covering the technologies and techniques that every business needs to know.
But we’ll also be going deep on practice, with speakers from companies like Ocado, OpenTable and ASOS as well as experts who’ve worked with real businesses to get projects up and running.
And of course, we’ll be taking a close-up look at specific technologies and techniques, such as TensorFlow or Graph Analysis, in advanced conference sessions, and our optional day three workshops.
Throughout, our aim is to show you how you can apply tools and methodologies to allow your business or organisation to take advantage of ML, AI and advanced analytics to solve the problems you face today, as well as prepare you for tomorrow.
None of this happens in a vacuum of course, so we’ll also be looking at the organisational, ethical and legal implications of rolling out these technologies. And yes, we will be taking a look at robotics and driverless cars and whacking great lasers.
It’s a mind and business expanding lineup, and you’ll be pleased to know this all takes place at 30 Euston Square in Central London between October 9 and 11.
As well as being easy to get to, this is simply a really pleasant environment in which to enjoy the presentations, and discuss them on the sidelines with your fellow attendees and the speakers. Of course, we’ll ensure there’s plenty of top notch food and drink to fuel you through the formal and less formal parts of the programme.
Tickets will be limited, so if you want to ensure your place, head over to our website and snap up your early-bird ticket now. ®PLAYER BIO
Professional History
NBA CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
• Selected by the Seattle SuperSonics in the first round (second overall) of the 2007 NBA Draft.
• Signed as a free agent with Golden State on July 7, 2016... Re-signed with the Warriors on July 25, 2017.
• Won an NBA Championship with Golden State in 2017.
• Named NBA Finals MVP in 2017 with averages of 35.2 points, 8.4 rebounds, 5.4 assists, 1.60 blocks and 1.00 steals in 39.8 minutes per game in The Finals... Became the second player in league history to win the Finals MVP Award while averaging at least 35 points, eight rebounds and five assists in The Finals (Michael Jordan in 1993).
• Named an NBA All-Star eight consecutive times (2010 through 2017), starting six times.
• Named to the All-NBA Team seven times... Earned All-NBA First Team honors for five-straight seasons (2009-10 through 2013-14)... Earned All-NBA Second Team honors in 2015-16 and 2016-17.
• Four-time scoring champion (2009-10 through 2011-12, 2013-2014).
• Named NBA Most Valuable Player in 2013-14, scoring a career-best and NBA-high 32.0 points and dishing out a career-high 5.5 assists to go with 7.4 rebounds and 1.27 steals in 38.5 minutes, shooting 50.3 percent from the field.
• One of seven players in NBA history to hit 50 percent from the field, 40 percent from three and 90 percent from the free throw line (while qualifying for the league minimums) in a single season, joining the 50/40/90 club in 2012-13 with averages of 51.0 percent from the field, 41.6 percent from three-point range and a career-high 90.5 percent from the free throw line.
• Named Most Valuable Player of the NBA All-Star Game in 2012, scoring 36 points on 56.0 percent shooting from the field (14-of-25 FG) and grabbing seven rebounds in 37 minutes.
• Named NBA Rookie of the Year in 2007-08.
• Has recorded eight career regular-season triple-doubles.
• Scored 50-plus points four times.
• Hit at least one three-pointer in 59 consecutive regular-season games (2/6/15-3/2/16), which ranks fifth-longest in NBA annals behind two Stephen Curry streaks, one by Kyle Korver and one by J.J. Redick.
• Ranked as the Thunder’s all-time leader in free throws (4,599) and three-point field goals (1,143) while placing second in scoring (17,566), third in field goals made (5,912), fourth in rebounds (4,518), fourth in blocks (639), fourth in minutes (24,208), sixth in games played (641), seventh in assists (2,363) and eighth in steals (774).
• Two-time Olympic gold medalist with Team USA at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro and 2012 Olympic Games in London... Won gold with Team USA at the 2010 FIBA World Championships in Turkey, earning FIBA World Championships MVP honors.
• Named Western Conference Player of the Month 14 times, Western Conference Rookie of the Month five times and Western Conference Player of the Week 25 times.
• Among active players, ranks first in scoring average (27.2, fourth all-time), third in free throw percentage (.882, 14th all-time) and sixth in free throws made (4,935, 35th all-time).
• On the Warriors’ all-time regular-season career leaders lists, ranks tied for seventh in field goal percentage (.537).
• Appeared in 703 career games (all starts) over 10 seasons with Seattle/Oklahoma City and Golden State, averaging 27.2 points, 7.2 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 1.19 steals and 1.05 blocks in 37.4 minutes while shooting 48.8 percent from the field, 37.9 percent from three-point range and 88.2 percent from the free throw line.
NBA POSTSEASON CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:
• Appeared in 106 postseason games (all starts), averaging 28.8 points, 8.0 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 1.19 blocks and 1.05 steals in 41.0 minutes while shooting 46.8 percent from the field, 34.4 percent from three-point range and 85.3 percent from the free throw line.
• Has scored 30-plus points 48 times and 40-plus seven times in his postseason career.
• Has tallied 33 double-doubles (all point/rebound) in his postseason career, including 17 30/10 games and one 40/10 game.
• On the Warriors’ all-time postseason career leaders lists, ranks third in three-point percentage (.442), third in free throw percentage (.893) and fourth in field goal percentage (.556).
• On the NBA’s all-time postseason career leaders lists, ranks 14th in three-pointers made (222).
• Recorded multiple 40-point games in the 2016 Playoffs, scoring 40 points in Game 5 of the 2016 Western Conference Finals on 5/26/16 at Golden State and a postseason career-high-tying 41 points in Game 4 of the 2016 Western Conference Semifinals on 5/8/16 vs. San Antonio.
• Recorded 35 points, 15 rebounds and six assists in Game 1 of the 2013 Western Conference Semifinals on 5/5/13 vs. Memphis, becoming the first player in Thunder franchise history to tally those numbers in a postseason game.
• Matched a playoff postseason-high with 41 points in Game 3 of the 2013 First Round on 4/27/13 at Houston... Grabbed 14 rebounds in that contest to tally his first career 40/10 postseason performance.
• Scored 17 of his game-high 36 points in the fourth quarter during Game 1 of the 2012 NBA Finals on 6/12/12 vs. Miami... Made his NBA Finals debut in that game.
• Scored 18 of his game-high 36 points (including 16-straight Thunder points) in the fourth quarter during a Game 4 win in the 2012 Western Conference Finals on 6/2/12 vs. San Antonio.
• Hit the game-winning three-pointer with 14 seconds left in Game 4 of the 2012 Western Conference Semifinals on 5/19/12 at the L.A. Lakers.
• Connected on the game-winning field goal with 1.5 seconds left in regulation in Game 1 of the 2012 First Round on 4/28/12 vs. Dallas.
• Tied his postseason career-best with 41 points in Game 5 of the 2011 First Round on 4/27/11 vs. Denver, including 16 points in the final frame.
• Set a playoff career-high with 41 points (13-of-22 FG) in Game 1 of the 2011 First Round on 4/17/11 vs. Denver.
• Corralled a postseason career-high 19 rebounds in Game 3 of the 2010 First Round on 4/22/10 vs. the L.A. Lakers.
• Made his NBA playoff debut in Game 1 of the 2010 First Round on 4/18/10 at the L.A. Lakers, scoring 24 points in 42 minutes.
2016-17 HIGHLIGHTS WITH GOLDEN STATE:
• Appeared in 62 games (all starts), averaging 25.1 points, a career-high 8.3 rebounds, 4.9 assists, a career-high 1.60 blocks and 1.06 steals in 33.4 minutes while shooting a career-best 53.7 percent from the field.
• Named to the All-NBA Second Team in 2016-17, earning his seventh career All-NBA selection.
• Tallied 51 20-point games, 15 30-point games and one 40-point game.
• Reached the 20-point threshold in 72 consecutive regular-season games from 11/23/15 to 11/9/16, tying Michael Jordan (12/29/87-12/6/88) for the fourth-longest 20-point streak in NBA history.
• Recorded 23 double-doubles, including 16 20-point/10-rebound games, one 20-point/10-assist game and six 30-point/10-rebound games. • Notched one triple-double, his eighth career regular-season triple-double.
• Grabbed 10 or more rebounds in 22 games.
• Dished out 10 or more assists in two games.
• Shot 50 percent or better from the field in 41 games, including shooting 60 percent or better 20 times.
• Blocked at least five shots in three games, a single-season career best... Entering 2016-17, had never registered more than one game with five or more blocks in a single season.
• Finished the season with 99 blocks, his second-most in a single season (most since a single-season career-best 105 blocks in 2012-13). • Named a starter on the 2017 Western Conference All-Star Team, earning his eighth career All-Star selection... Joined Michael Jordan (1997), LeBron James (2011) and Dwyane Wade (2012) as the only players to tally a triple-double in the All-Star Game, finishing with 21 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists.
• Along with Stephen Curry, named Western Conference Player of the Month for games played in January... Joined Curry, Chris Mullin and Bernard King as the only Warriors ever to receive the monthly recognition (his 14th career Player of the Month award), averaging 27.4 points (fifth in the Western Conference), 7.1 rebounds, 4.6 assists, 2.07 blocks and 1.07 steals in 34.4 minutes over 14 games in January.
• Named Western Conference Player of the Week for games played Nov. 21-27.
• Recorded 29 points to go with eight rebounds and five assists in 27 minutes on 4/12 vs.
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led ginger
Potato starch
Vegetable oil Cooking Directions Cut tofu into 4 blocks and slice it thinly. Put potato starch around tofu and deep fry it till the surfaces turn brown and crunchy. Place the fried tofu on a plate. Heat and grease the pan and lightly fry the cabbage. Place the tofu on a plate, put the cabbage, okonomiyaki sauce and mayonnaise as you prefer. Lastly, sprinkle some aonori seaweed flake, bonito flake, and red pickled ginger on top. Tips Do not cook the cabbage to much so that you can enjoy the texture of the tofu and the crunchiness of the cabbage. Recipe and photo by: Tsujita Artisan Noodle LA
Tofu Panna Cotta Recipe Tofu can be amazingly transformed into a dessert dish depending on how the ingredients are combined. This is a dessert vegans will appreciate. Ingredients (Serves 4) 1/2 block soft tofu
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/3 cup soymilk
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 tsp. agar powder
Orange marmalade for garnish (refer to the orange marmalade recipe) Cooking Directions Warm the tofu in the microwave for 30 – 60 seconds. Combine the ingredients other than tofu in a pan and bring to a boil. Put the tofu of 1) and the contents of 2) in a blender and blend well. Pour the tofu mixture into a serving dish and place in the refrigerator to chill and harden. Garnish with marmalade.
Gochiso Magazine, Nijiya MarketTrio from GOP aim to keep posts on state court
AUSTIN — Three judges on Texas' highest criminal court are seeking re-election in November, including Presiding Judge Sharon Keller, who's been a lightning rod for controversy since her last test of voters in 2006.
Elected to Texas' Court of Criminal Appeals in 1994, she is the only incumbent on the court with major-party opposition, facing a Democrat and Libertarian.
In 2007, Keller, 59, of Austin, gained national attention for refusing to keep the court open past 5 p.m. to accept a last-minute appeal of a death row inmate who was executed hours later. Charges were filed by the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct, but it ruled that she did not violate any laws or warrant punishment “beyond the public humiliation she has surely suffered,” according to court records.
In 2010, Keller received the largest fine ever levied by the Texas Ethics Commission — $100,000 — for breaking finance disclosure law by failing to report $2.4 million in personal assets. Keller did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Andrew Wheat, research director for Texans for Public Justice, said he expects Keller to extend her term despite her “embarrassing activities” because many Texans vote straight-ticket Republican and “can't quite remember why Keller's name rings a distant bell.”
“(Voters) have a perception, however fair or not, that Democrats are going to be soft on rapists and murderers,” Wheat said.
The court, comprising a presiding judge and eight associate judges, is the last judicial stop for criminal matters in Texas, hearing all appeals in which the death penalty has been assessed.
The court's two other Republican incumbents, Barbara Parker Hervey and Elsa Alcala, face Libertarian candidates Mark W. Bennett and William Bryan Strange III, respectively.
Keller's opponents are Democrat Keith Hampton and Libertarian Lance Stott.
Hampton, a defense attorney in Austin, ran unsuccessfully for the court's Place 6 in 2010. He said he hopes Keller's missteps will boost him to become the first Democrat elected to statewide office since 1994.
“We have a judge on the court who has been found to be unethical by every agency in government that can make that determination,” Hampton said. “Her actions have given (the Texas judicial system) a black eye.”
Hampton, 51, Austin, drafted the original proposal of Senate Bill 112 in 2009, which established veterans courts in Texas, and he advocated for a law passed in 2007 that established state prisoners' right to petition a court to have DNA evidence tested. He counseled against former state Solicitor General and U.S. Senate candidate Ted Cruz and then won in 2007 in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Panetti vs. Quarterman, which spared from execution a schizophrenic murderer from Fredericksburg.
Hampton said GOP straight-ticket voters should “spend an extra few seconds” to vote for him instead of Keller.
“It's not a matter of Republican or Democrat, or left and right,” Hampton said. “It's a matter of right and wrong.”
Ana Yañez-Correa, executive director for the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, a watchdog group, said Keller is a leading advocate for mental health and indigent defense. “The Judge Keller that people portray is not the Judge Keller I know, respect and care about,” Correa said. “The Judge Keller I know is the judge that advocates for indigent defense and evidence-based sentencing.”
Fundraising largely favored Hampton's campaign, which has raised $51,746 since July, compared with Keller's $2,650 during the same period, according to state finance records.
“There is no Keller campaign,” Hampton said. “She is banking that people will simply punch the ‘R.' She doesn't want any attention on this race because that's the only way she'll be re-elected.”
Alcala raised $18,750 and Hervey received one donation of $250. The three Libertarian candidates reported receiving no campaign donations.
Alcala, 48, of Houston, was appointed by Gov. Rick Perry last May, previously serving on the state's First Court of Appeals and a district court in Harris County.
“I don't know if there is anyone in the state that can match my credentials” Alcala said.
Hervey, 59, of San Antonio, served 16 years as assistant criminal district attorney for Bexar County before being elected in 2000.
Libertarian Stott, 41, of Austin said the court needs more “balance.”
“(Keller) has said she is pro-prosecution, and I think that shows in her rulings,” he said.
Wheat, of Texans for Public Justice, said the Libertarian candidates are a long shot to defeat the GOP incumbents.
“It would pretty much be on the level with an immaculate conception,” Wheat said. “It comes along every 2,000 years, if that.”
[email protected] lead singer of Against Me! talks frankly about her gender dysphoria, and what it was like to tell her bandmates, her family and her wife that she wanted to become a woman
It's a real challenge for a punk rocker to generate anything resembling actual shock nowadays. Thirty-five years after the Sex Pistols sang God Save the Queen, what seemed transgressive now looks practically quaint. It's been almost as long since sex-change surgery could work up much interest either. Even the tabloids have wearied of "gender bender" headlines about butch army officers turning into foxy chicks.
But when Rolling Stone hit the newsstands two months ago, the magazine contained a genuine sensation. Tom Gabel, lead singer of American punk band Against Me!, had an important announcement to make – to his fans, his industry, his friends and to most of his family. After 10 years on stage, thrashing out a fury of sweaty nihilism, the punk would henceforth like to be known as Laura Jane Grace. The 31-year-old married father was about to embark on a process of gender reassignment, both hormonal and surgical, and for all practical purposes should be regarded from that day forth as a woman. When Against Me! performed the very next night, its ubiquitously pierced and tattooed lead singer strode on to the stage in high heels and full makeup.
Last week Against Me! were playing in Oslo, and when I arrive I by chance run into the rest of the band in the hotel lobby. Heavy set, swaddled in black, a little bit socially awkward, they talk in amiable grunts punctuated by the word "awesome", a textbook rockers-on-tour ensemble. After some slightly stilted small talk, I get into the lift, step out on to a roof terrace, and come face to face with the most sweet-natured, articulate, nakedly vulnerable punk you are ever likely to meet.
Grace doesn't look like a woman, but then she only began taking hormones a month ago. There's a subtle feminity in her posture, though, and in the way her features soften as she talks. The twin impressions of apprehension and an eagerness to please are for a moment disconcerting – until you see just how extraordinary it must be to start telling a total stranger about the very thing she's been keeping secret for most of her life.
Grace's first intimation of gender dysphoria came when she was just five years old. "The first time I had that moment, when I knew, was seeing Madonna on a televised concert. And I thought: 'Why not me?'" The son of a military man, she grew up on army bases feeling lonely and confused, bullied at school and bewildered by an indelible sense of toxic otherness.
"It's a feeling of great existential dread. Peripherally, being aware of the way you are in your body and feeling cognisant of the fact that I'm male – like looking down and seeing male features – and feeling, internally, 'but I'm not'. You feel a detachment, and you feel hyper-aware of everything that's around you. Then, at the same time, you feel extreme feelings of shame and guilt and confusion, so that all works into a nice little cocktail in your head."
Punk rock and recreational drugs got Grace through adolescence, and at 18 she founded Against Me!, throwing herself into an ultramasculine frenzy of mosh pits, tour buses and lyrical rage. "When you're in a punk band you're framed as an angry white male. That's you: angry; white; male. And you're screaming at the top of your lungs, and you're angry about this and that." Which, in one way, suited her. "But you become a parody in some ways, and the more and more I saw that, the more and more frustrated I felt."
When the internet arrived, gender dysphoria websites confirmed who and what she really was. "If you're a transsexual, it's an incredible resource." Secretly, she would sneak off to hotel rooms to dress up as a woman – but the guilt and shame that always followed were overwhelming. "Though I guess, in a way, I'm thankful for the secrecy now, because it helped to develop an imagination. Creatively, you live in your own world, so it focused me in that way, and I'm thankful to be the person that I am from that."
Grace resolved to quit cross-dressing for good when her band was signed by Warner Bros. "So you pile everything up into a trash bag, and go behind a store and chuck everything into a dumpster. You just get rid of everything, and you're like: 'That's it.' Because you feel like you're a deviant, and there is this danger of being caught, and you're terrified." She believed it was simply a question of willpower. "You believe you have a choice in the matter. But it becomes apparent to you, after a while, that you really don't have a choice in the matter." And so she would relapse. "And that's the feeling of guilt that comes with all this."
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When Grace married, she kept her secret to herself. But three years ago, her wife Heather became pregnant, Warners dropped the band, and the compulsion became uncontrollable. She began to go a little bit crazy. "You're thinking, 'I'm going to be a father, and I'm going to have a daughter,' and you can't help but examine that as you get older – just having less patience with all the bullshit. Just thinking about the role model that you're going to be for your child, and what's the most important lesson you can teach them? Wanting to be honest was an example that I wanted to set."
Early this year, Grace arrived at what sounds less like a decision than a surrender. "I kind of reached a point where there was nothing else that I could really write about and focus on other than transsexual topic matter – whether those are stories of fiction or my own emotions writing it – I couldn't really write about anything else." So she sat down with her wife, and told her the truth.
Did it mean, Heather asked, Grace would leave her? Once reassured, Heather's support was so unconditional – so miraculous, so transformative – that three days later Grace found herself blurting out her secret to the band. "And straight away, I was completely terrified. What the fuck did I just do? Why did I do that? But I think I was just on a roll. I called my wife and said: 'I just totally told everyone, and I don't know why.'"
The band were stunned. The news was quite literally awesome. "But they were completely cool with it."
The problem Grace faced was what to do next. To leap from a lifetime of secrecy into the pages of Rolling Stone might look a little drastic, but to Grace the strategy made a lot of sense.
"There's a certain amount of normalising that happens when you do it in a fashion like that. I felt like the first time we played on a late-night TV show in the States – for my parents that was a moment when they were like: 'Oh, that's what you do.' It legitimised what you did. So when you have something like Rolling Stone that you can hand to someone and be like, 'If you have a question after you read this, feel free to ask me,' was a great thing to have. As opposed to having a million and a half conversations."
Grace knew she had to tell her parents, who divorced during her childhood, before the whole world found out. "That was the scariest of all. They're your parents; you're terrified of the way that they're going to react – that they're going to reject you. You live with that feeling of terror, that you're going to be rejected by your parents, for the way that you are and you can't control the way you are – you live with that feeling for your whole entire life. And now you're about to test it."
Her mother took the news well. Her father was less sanguine. Grace wrote him a long, emotional email – and received a three-line "cryptic and manipulative" reply. They haven't spoken since. Grace's 26-year-old younger brother was the easiest to tell. "It was really casual. I don't know if he necessarily even got it, really. I was like, 'So I'm a transsexual and this is what's happening', and he was like, 'OK, whatever you say, I love you; you're my brother.'" Grace starts to laugh. "It's like: 'Well, but actually I'm telling you I'm your sister, so you're going to have to flip that around; you just got to rewire the way you're thinking about me.'" She laughs again. "But at the same time, I appreciate his earnestness."
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She was much more worried about the reaction of her conservative, God-fearing Florida neighbourhood, but says that so far everyone's been lovely. Against Me!'s fans were an even bigger worry. "They were pretty high on the pecking order, just because there's the very real worry of: 'What if someone attacks me? What if I'm on stage and someone tries to do something to publicly humiliate me?' There's that total fear, because I've been hit in the face with bottles in the past. So there's that fear, for sure." But so far they've all been lovely too.
Grace thinks she first fell in love with punk because "the aggression is a great outlet when you have feelings of frustration", so I wonder whether gender reassignment may diminish its allure. "I don't know," she admits. "I'd love to get to that point, though, to tell you." For the first time in her life she is performing stone cold sober, so clarity is quite a novelty in itself. "Coming out has a slightly terrifying edge to it, so being focused and feeling like you're a little bit grounded is a lot better than feeling like you're out of control." She can't yet say exactly how singing as a woman feels different, but it definitely feels like a relief. "Of course, you're trying to unlearn all the mannerisms that you've picked up from posing as a man. But I'd reached a point where I felt like every time I spoke into the microphone, my voice was coming out like this dude voice – really husky – and just completely uncomfortable. So this just feels like you're more in the moment."
Only one worry threatens Grace's newfound composure, and when she talks about it her voice begins to crack. "Well, I still worry about the way that people will treat my daughter, and the way that this will affect her. I know that kids can be cruel to each other. I want to be an involved parent in my daughter's life and do the things that other parents do, like go to the PTA meetings. When I go to her ballet recitals me and my wife go, and there's already a real detachment from the people there, just when you're that 'rocker family', standing there all in black with tattoos. And when you throw 'I'm a transsexual' on top of it, I worry what they'll say about me, what their kids will pick up on and what they'll then repeat to my daughter."
Grace and Heather haven't yet begun to explain anything explicitly to their two-year-old. "But I've already noticed that – even just on that last tour we were on – she, on her own, started to pick up on the female pronouns and started to refer to me as'she' or 'her'. Then, also, I noticed she has started to morph 'Daddy' into like a 'Dadda', 'Daddo', like she's searching in the way she's saying it for some kind of twist that's going to fit her."
The person I find most fascinating, of course, is Heather. She is not bisexual, and joked to Rolling Stone, "I have no vagina experience", but intends to remain married to Grace, who will in due course become a physical woman. Heather had panicked that Grace would leave her – but surely Grace must have been more worried about Heather leaving her?
"Of course, yeah. It's something I still worry about. I'm very early on in my transition – I still blur a line – but I know the changes are going to be coming, and I fear how she's going to interpret them and whether that will affect if she's physically attracted to me is terrifying. But ideally you marry someone because you hope that they're your soulmate, and that's something that's beyond gender."
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I want to ask Grace how her marriage can be gender-blind, when gender dysphoria has been the defining affliction of her life. If a soul should ideally transcend gender, why does she need to become a woman? Afterwards I wonder why I didn't. It's partly, I think, because I liked her so much – and partly because of the unspoken code that seems to prohibit close questioning. It's odd that a transsexual punk can still command headlines, when Grace appears to inhabit a world more relaxed about the matter than almost any I can think of. The approved emotional response to her story is nonchalance – and if it's what she wants and needs, I'm happy to oblige. But it feels like a curiously inadequate response to an anguish so acute that only radical surgery can relieve her agony.
Grace's grateful trust in other people's support is both charming and disarming, and she is quite baffled by British cynicism. Has anyone suggested that this whole thing might be a publicity stunt for the band? She looks astonished. "No!" Has she ever wondered whether all the generous declarations of support might conceal unspoken reservations? "No," she says, "I guess at this point I'm just blissfully naive."
And yet she has a formidable strength. "Saying 'I'm a transexual' completely puts the power of the conversation in your corner," she explains. "Because after that, what's the worst anyone can do to you?"
I'm curious about her first experiences of living publicly as a woman, so I ask if she now finds herself scrutinising other women's beauty, longing for looks that measure up to impossible ideals?
"That's not 'now'," she laughs. "That's always been there. That's always been part of when I'm out and about, or I'm looking at magazines. That's what I'm thinking. As opposed to most men, who are thinking: 'Oh I want to fuck her.' I'd be thinking: 'Oh I wish I had her shape' or 'She has beautiful hair.'"
In a perfect world, who would she like to look like? Grace laughs. "I'm big on hair. I love Julianne Moore's hair. That's all I'd like: Julianne Moore hair."Manchester United made the long-expected appointment of former Chelsea, Real Madrid, Inter, and Porto manager official on Friday, announcing the move via their Twitter accout.
A statement posted on United's website said the 53-year-old Mourinho had signed a three-year deal with his new club, with an option for a further year which would keep him in Manchester until at least 2020.
"José is quite simply the best manager in the game today. He has won trophies and inspired players in countries across Europe and, of course, he knows the Premier League very well, having won three titles here," the club's executive vice chairman, Ed Woodward, said.
"I’d like to take this opportunity to welcome him to Manchester United. His track record of success is ideal to take the club forward."
Mourinho said it was a "special honour" to be named manager of Manchester United.
"It is a club known and admired throughout the world. There is a mystique and a romance about it which no other club can match," he said.
"I have always felt an affinity with Old Trafford; it has hosted some important memories for me in my career and I have always enjoyed a rapport with the United fans. I’m looking forward to being their manager and enjoying their magnificent support in the coming years."
Mourinho replaces the 64-year-old Dutchman Louis van Gaal, whose sacking was announced on Monday, just two days after United beat Crystal Palace 2-1 to win the FA Cup.The first female MPs in the world were elected in Finland in 1907
Women's suffrage in the world in 1908
Women's suffrage – the right of women to vote – has been achieved at various times in countries throughout the world. In many nations, women's suffrage was granted before universal suffrage, so women and men from certain classes or races were still unable to vote. Some countries granted suffrage to both sexes at the same time. This timeline lists years when women's suffrage was enacted. Some countries are listed more than once, as the right was extended to more women according to age, land ownership, etc. In many cases, the first voting took place in a subsequent year.
Some women in the Isle of Man (geographically part of the British Isles but not part of the United Kingdom) gained the right to vote in 1881.[1] Though it did not achieve nationhood until 1907, the colony of New Zealand was the first self-governing country in the world in which all women had the right to vote in, but not to stand for, parliamentary elections in 1893, followed closely by the colony of South Australia in 1894 (which, unlike New Zealand, allowed women to stand for Parliament).[2] In Sweden, conditional women's suffrage was granted during the age of liberty between 1718 and 1772.[3]
The Australian Commonwealth Franchise Act of 1902 enabled women to vote at federal elections and also permitted women to stand for election to the Australian Parliament, making the newly-federated country of Australia the first in the modern world to do so. In 1906, the autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland, which became the republic of Finland, was the second country in the world to implement both the right to vote and the right to run for office. Finland was also the first country in Europe to give women the right to vote.[4][5] The world's first female members of parliament were elected in Finland the following year. In Europe, the last jurisdiction to grant women the right to vote was the Swiss canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden (AI), in 1991; AI is the smallest Swiss canton with c. 14,100 inhabitants in 1990.[6] Women in Switzerland obtained the right to vote at federal level in 1971,[7] and at local cantonal level between 1959 and 1972, except for Appenzell in 1989/1990,[8] see Women's suffrage in Switzerland. In Saudi Arabia women were first allowed to vote in December 2015 in the municipal elections.[9]
For other women's rights, see timeline of women's legal rights (other than voting).
17th century [ edit ]
1689 [ edit ]
Friesland: Female landowners are allowed to vote in elections to the States of Friesland in rural districts.[10]
18th century [ edit ]
1718 [ edit ]
Sweden: Female taxpaying members of city guilds are allowed to vote in local city elections (rescinded in 1758) and national elections (rescinded in 1772):
1734 [ edit ]
Sweden: Female taxpaying property owners of legal majority are allowed to vote in local countryside elections (never rescinded).[3]
1755 [ edit ]
Corsica: Female suffrage in the independent republic's Diet (assembly; rescinded upon annexation by France in 1769)[11]
1756 [ edit ]
US (still under British crown up until 1776) town of Uxbridge, Massachusetts: One woman, Lydia Taft, is allowed to vote in the town meeting[12]
1776 [ edit ]
19th century [ edit ]
Portrait of an unknown New Zealand suffragette, Charles Hemus Studio Auckland, c. 1880—the sitter wears a white camellia and has cut off her hair, both symbolic of support for advancing women's rights
1838 [ edit ]
1848 [ edit ]
1853 [ edit ]
Velez Province in what was then the New Granada Republic (Colombia) grants universal suffrage to men and women. The Supreme Court annulled the provision for women.[15]
1856 [ edit ]
1860s [ edit ]
1861 [ edit ]
South Australia—Australian colony of South Australia: property-owning women were given the vote.
1862 [ edit ]
Sweden: limited to local elections with votes graded after taxation; universal franchise achieved in 1919, which went into effect at the 1921 elections.[16]
1863 [ edit ]
1864 [ edit ]
Victoria—Australian colony of Victoria: women were unintentionally enfranchised by the Electoral Act (1863), and proceeded to vote in the following year's elections. The Act was amended in 1865 to correct the error. [17]
Victoria—Australian colony of Victoria: women were unintentionally enfranchised by the (1863), and proceeded to vote in the following year's elections. The Act was amended in 1865 to correct the error. Kingdom of Bohemia - Austrian Empire: limited to taxpaying women and women in "learned professions" who were allowed to vote by proxy and made eligible for election to the legislative body in 1864.[16]
1869 [ edit ]
1870s [ edit ]
1870 [ edit ]
United States-incorporated Utah Territory: repealed by the Edmunds-Tucker Act in 1887.
May 10, 1872, New York City: Equal Rights Party nominates Victoria C. Woodhull as their candidate for US President.
1880s [ edit ]
1881 [ edit ]
Isle of Man (self-governing British Crown dependency, with its own parliament and legal system) (limited at first to women "freeholders"and then, a few years later, extended to include women "householders").[23] Universal suffrage / the franchise for all resident men and women was introduced in 1919. All men and women (with a very few exceptions such as clergy) could also stand for election from 1919.[1]
1884 [ edit ]
Ontario—Canadian province: limited to widows and spinsters to vote in municipal elections; later extended to other provinces.[24]
1888 [ edit ]
United States: Proposed Constitutional Amendment to extend suffrage and the right to hold office to women (limited to spinsters and widows who owned property).[25]
1889 [ edit ]
The municipality of Franceville in the New Hebrides (universal suffrage within its short existence.[26] Loses self-rule within months)
1890s [ edit ]
1893 [ edit ]
New Zealand: first self-governing colony in the world in which all women are given the right to vote in parliamentary elections. However, women were barred from standing for election until 1919. [27] [28]
New Zealand: first self-governing colony in the world in which all women are given the right to vote in parliamentary elections. However, women were barred from standing for election until 1919. Cook Islands (British protectorate) universal suffrage. [29]
Cook Islands (British protectorate) universal suffrage. Colorado (US state) (first state in the union to enfranchise women by popular vote)[30]
1894 [ edit ]
1895 [ edit ]
South Australia: South Australian women became the first in the world to stand for election.[31][32][33] This right had been granted the previous year in an act of the South Australian Parliament.
1896 [ edit ]
1898 [ edit ]
Denmark: Danske Kvindeforeningers Valgretsforbund (Danish Women's Society's Suffrage Union) founded in Copenhagen
1899 [ edit ]
Western Australia: the Australian colony of Western Australia
20th century [ edit ]
1900s [ edit ]
1901 [ edit ]
1902 [ edit ]
1903 [ edit ]
1905 [ edit ]
1906 [ edit ]
The first female MPs in the world were elected in Finland in 1907
Melbourne Punch cartoon of 1887 The argument over women's rights in Victoria was lampooned in thiscartoon of 1887
1908 [ edit ]
Denmark (limited to local elections)
Denmark (limited to local elections) Victoria (Australian state): last Australian state to enact equal voting rights for women in state elections
1910s [ edit ]
1910 [ edit ]
1911 [ edit ]
California (US state)
California (US state) Argentina: Julieta Lanteri, doctor and leading feminist activist, votes in the election for the Buenos Aires City Legislature. She had realized that the government did not make specifications regarding gender, and appealed to justice successfully, becoming the first South American woman to vote.
Argentina: Julieta Lanteri, doctor and leading feminist activist, votes in the election for the Buenos Aires City Legislature. She had realized that the government did not make specifications regarding gender, and appealed to justice successfully, becoming the first South American woman to vote. Portugal: Carolina Beatriz Ângelo becomes the first Portuguese woman to vote due to a legal technicality; the law is shortly thereafter altered to specify only literate male citizens over the age of 21 had the right to vote.
1912 [ edit ]
1913 [ edit ]
1914 [ edit ]
1915 [ edit ]
Puck during the Empire State Campaign, a hard-fought referendum on a suffrage amendment to the New York State constitution—the referendum failed in 1915 This map appeared in the magazineduring the Empire State Campaign, a hard-fought referendum on a suffrage amendment to the New York State constitution—the referendum failed in 1915
Denmark (full voting rights)
Denmark (full voting rights) Iceland
1916 [ edit ]
1917 [ edit ]
1918 [ edit ]
1919 [ edit ]
1920s [ edit ]
1920 [ edit ]
1921 [ edit ]
1922 [ edit ]
1924 [ edit ]
1925 [ edit ]
Italy (limited to local elections)
Italy (limited to local elections) Dominion of Newfoundland (limited to women 25 and older; men can vote at age 21. Equal suffrage granted in 1946.)
1927 [ edit ]
Turkmen SSR (Soviet Union)
Turkmen SSR (Soviet Union) Uruguay (women's suffrage is broadcast for the first time in 1927, in the plebiscite of Cerro Chato)
1928 [ edit ]
United Kingdom (franchise made equal to that for men by the Representation of the People Act 1928)
1929 [ edit ]
Romania (limited to local elections only, with restrictions) [43]
Romania (limited to local elections only, with restrictions) Puerto Rico (literate women given the right to vote. Equal suffrage granted in 1935.)
Puerto Rico (literate women given the right to vote. Equal suffrage granted in 1935.) Ecuador (the right of women to vote is written into the Constitution)
1930s [ edit ]
1930 [ edit ]
1931 [ edit ]
Ceylon
Ceylon Chile (limited to municipal level for female owners of real estate under Legislative Decree No. 320)
Chile (limited to municipal level for female owners of real estate under Legislative Decree No. 320) Portugal (with restrictions following level of education)
Portugal (with restrictions following level of education) Spain (universal suffrage)
1932 [ edit ]
First women electors of Brazil. Brazil (universal suffrage)
Brazil (universal suffrage) Maldives
Maldives Thailand
1934 [ edit ]
Chile (limited to municipal level under Law No. 5,357)
Chile (limited to municipal level under Law No. 5,357) Cuba
Cuba Portugal (suffrage is expanded)
Portugal (suffrage is expanded) Tabasco (Mexican state) (limited to regional and congress elections only)
Tabasco (Mexican state) (limited to regional and congress elections only) Turkey (parliamentary elections; full voting rights).[45]
1935 [ edit ]
1937 [ edit ]
1938 [ edit ]
1939 [ edit ]
El Salvador (with restrictions requiring literacy and a higher age) [48]
El Salvador (with restrictions requiring literacy and a higher age) Romania (women are granted suffrage on equal terms with men with restrictions on both men and women; in practice the restrictions affected women more than men)[49][50]
1940s [ edit ]
1940 [ edit ]
1941 [ edit ]
Dutch East Indies (limited to European women only)
Dutch East Indies (limited to European women only) Panama (with restrictions. Full suffrage granted in 1946.)
1942 [ edit ]
1944 [ edit ]
1945 [ edit ]
1946 [ edit ]
1947 [ edit ]
1948 [ edit ]
1949 [ edit ]
1950s [ edit ]
1950 [ edit ]
1951 [ edit ]
1952 [ edit ]
1953 [ edit ]
Bhutan
Bhutan British Guiana
British Guiana Mexico (all women and for national elections)
1954 [ edit ]
1955 [ edit ]
1956 [ edit ]
1957 [ edit ]
1958 [ edit ]
1959 [ edit ]
1960s [ edit ]
1960 [ edit ]
1961 [ edit ]
1962 [ edit ]
1963 [ edit ]
1964 [ edit ]
1965 [ edit ]
1966 [ edit ]
1967 [ edit ]
1968 [ edit ]
1970s [ edit ]
1970 [ edit ]
1971 [ edit ]
1972 [ edit ]
Bangladesh (suffrage enshrined in constitution adopted after independence. (For pre 1971 rights see British Raj 1935 and Pakistan 1947)
1973 [ edit ]
Bahrain[60] (Bahrain did not hold elections until 2002)[61]
1974 [ edit ]
1975 [ edit ]
1976 [ edit ]
1977 [ edit ]
1978 [ edit ]
1980s [ edit ]
1980 [ edit ]
1984 [ edit ]
1985 [ edit ]
1986 [ edit ]
1989 [ edit ]
Namibia (Namibia never held an election until 1989. Namibia gained independence from the South African government in 1990.)
1990s [ edit ]
1990 [ edit ]
1991 [ edit ]
1996 [ edit ]
1999 [ edit ]
21st century [ edit ]
2000s [ edit ]
2001 [ edit ]
Afghanistan[65] (re-granted after the fall of Taliban)
2003 [ edit ]
2005 [ edit ]
2006 [ edit ]
United Arab Emirates (UAE) (limited suffrage for both men and women).[70]
2010s [ edit ]
2015 [ edit ]
Note: in some countries both men and women have limited suffrage. For example, in Brunei, which is a sultanate, there are no national elections, and voting exists only on local issues.[72] In the United Arab Emirates the rulers of the seven emirates each select a proportion of voters for the Federal National Council (FNC) that together account for about 12% of Emirati citizens.[70]
See also [ edit ]
References [ edit ]Police: Zimmerman says Trayvon decked him with one blow then began hammering his head
That is the account Zimmerman gave police, and much of it has been corroborated by witnesses, authorities say. There have been no reports that a witness saw the initial punch Zimmerman told police about.
With a single punch, Trayvon Martin decked the Neighborhood Watch volunteer who eventually shot and killed the unarmed 17-year-old, then Trayvon climbed on top of George Zimmerman and slammed his head into the sidewalk, leaving him bloody and battered, law-enforcement authorities told the Orlando Sentinel.
Zimmerman has not spoken publicly about what happened Feb. 26. But that night, and in later meetings, he described and re-enacted for police what he says took place.
In his version of events, Zimmerman had turned around and was walking back to his SUV when Trayvon approached him from behind, the two exchanged words and then Trayvon punched him in the nose, sending him to the ground,
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does slamming in his own idiosyncratic, vibrant way. I’ve never seen anyone launch off a stage with the kind of arc and air he gets. That energy is so infectious that everyone keeps it moving for the whole set whenever they play.
On this occasion, Turnstile’s set was an all-out party with the staged packed with homies and the audience vibing and slamming their hardcore hearts out. Just as much time and focus is put into executing the song as having a good time, so there will be chunks of songs that go unsung and sacrificed so that everyone, including the band, can just go crazy.
The band’s music is often called hardcore meets 311 (not my description. No death threats, please), sorta making their own mellow meets agro hybrid. It’s because of that groove and rhythm that the band sounds as unruly as they do.
They opened with “Death Grip” and even before Yates could sing a lyric, the crowd exploded with high voltage bodies bouncing off the stage like bolts of hot blue electricity. Franz Lyons, the bands bass player, was rowdily jumping and stomping all over the stage until providing melodic backing vocals to infuse the songs with that 311 chill. Franz’s vocals then take center stage for the set-essential Blue By You.
When they played “Gravity” the crowd erupted into a huge sing-along, coming together to belt out the hardcore ethos encapsulated in that song.
Expose to fear, pound it out
And forget about self-doubt
Because I’ve been living a lie
Something over my eyes
Hard to lift my focus from the ground
I keep me down
It’s just the gravity I keep around
For the song “Keep It Moving”, Krimewatch’s Emma Hendry came onstage to play Franz’s bass so he could properly slam around. The band closed their set with the frenzied and fan favorite “Drop”.
Here was Turnstile’s setlist:
Death Grip
Fazed Out
Come Back For More
Harder On You
The Things You Do
Gravity
New Rules
Canned Heat
Pushing Me Away
Blue By You
7
Keep It Moving
Drop
We piled out of the Regent like a hardcore herd of cattle and I saw people bathing themselves from head to toe in the bathroom sinks and the windows above the entrance all fogged up from the clouds of sweat that rose up from our partying. I don’t think the Regent had ever seen that much energy.
CCA SHOWCASE
I didn’t think twice about ending my night early so I could rest up and do it all over again the next day because Closed Casket Activities was doing a label showcase at 5 Star Bar and a few of the bands I had been looking forward to most were playing.
The 5 Star Bar is a dinky little venue that has probably never hosted a show as insane as this one turned out to be. I walked in to hear The Cult playing over the loud speakers and it looked like the hardcore kids were enjoying it.
Atlanta’s Criminal Instinct was the first band to play and immediately the most rabid fans drew their fangs and bit the pit and toxified it with more violence and insanity than anything I saw at the festival. Dude’s punching scared fans standing at the rim of the pit to hype people up, guys turning their bodies into cannonballs right into women that were too paralyzed with fear to move. Eventually the floor got slippery with spilled beer and people would slam and slip and get right back up and keep slamming. Criminal Instinct was joined onstage with the singer of Human Garbage on guitar and Taylor Young from Nails, drumming. The band played their brutal style of hardcore for a few songs, culminating in their song “No Privilege.”
One audience member seemed especially crazy after he grabbed a chair and started wildly swinging it around. That turned out to be the singer of God’s Hate, Nate Blauvelt, who would play later.
But first, Eyes of The Lord played a surprise set with Taylor Young on guitar. They delivered only a few songs in their volatile style.
That wasn’t going to the only surprise of the night though, after they finished, Todd Jones and John Gianelli walked downstairs and took up their instruments and out of nowhere there was a surprise Nails show, playing as their original three-piece. They only played a few songs, three or four, but packed in plenty of riffage to get my fill for the night.
Of all the times I’ve seen Nails, they were never as aggressive as they were this night.
Then came on LA’s own God’s Hate and the destroyer that had been wreaking havoc in the pit was now obligated to perform. God’s Hate’s music is fucking psychotic, they’re like Deicide but hardcore. They make walls of brutal noise that breakdown behind a voice that sounds just like the tattoo the singer has on his back, Cerberus, the three-headed dog from hell.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a gnarlier human being in my life than Nate Blauvelt.
Lastly was Incendiary. Incendiary made the best hardcore album of 2017. If you mention Incendiary to fans at Sound and Fury they’ll respond with: “Dude have you heard their new album???”
That new album is called Thousand Mile Stare and it’s made a huge splash. Incendiary sounded to me at first like a NYC hardcore Rage Against the Machine because of Brendan Garone’s vocal style. He sounds like Zac de la Rocha, sorta rap-chanting over rock, but in this case, it’s over pure hardcore. Garone’s performing style reminds me of Bruce Lee. He moves with liquid kung fu.
Their songs are political and thought provoking, most notably in “The Product Is You” and “Still Burning”, both of which they played at the 5 Star. Incendiary was going to play on Day 2 of Sound and Fury right before the headliners Trapper Under Ice but I wanted to see them as many times as I could. Believe the hype. Incendiary are amazing whether in a small bar or a huge theater like the Regent.
My night ended without exhaustion, my brain chemistry felt altered. The peace and silence that came after the storm of Day 1 disturbed me, I couldn’t wait for day 2 to return to the chaos and violence that made me feel spiritually whole.
SOUND AND FURY DAY 2
I returned to the Regent for the first band and that was San Francisco’s Profile. The singer, Lucy, who would go on to sing for Primal Rite later, started the day off singing over melodic hardcore. Jumping around with pure energy and conviction, Lucy’s pig tails flopped wildly in the air with him during their badass set.
Up next was one of the band’s I had been looking forward to most and was surprised they were playing only second, that was Baltimore’s Queensway. They had one of the heaviest and most brutal sounds on record but live their most pronounced quality was their command of an audience. It seemed like they were pulling us on strings, making us slam exactly when and how they wanted. Their singer, Pat Baltimore, has the kind of voice that’ll make you stand up and follow and fight in the streets, either for a cause or just for fun.
Next was Lucy’s other band Primal Rite, also from San Francisco. They were a bit thrashier than Profile and here, Lucy really showed his metallic side with more growling. Where Profile had melody, Primal Rite had bounce and shred. The band played two songs off their new LP to be released later in the year. Lucy also gave the most shout-outs of the fest during this set, shout- outs to Step for Change and No Right and Riley and Marteen.
One of the funniest moments of the fest occurred during Primal Rite’s set where a fight broke out in the pit between a large male, (300+ pounds) and some slam dancing dude he was chasing. The pursuer was able to get in a few punches but the pursued simply slam danced to evade most of his blows until escaping in the crowd.
Day 2 was far more violent than Day 1- I went outside to smoke a cigarette and saw people consoling a young girl, overhearing her friends say “Man she got fucked up!” Once people inched away from her, I was able to get a good look at the damage and saw her nursing her bludgeoned teeth (or lack thereof) with ice. Then later, back inside, I saw a kid holding his arm and being escorted out by security, my guess: dislocated shoulder.
Tørso was another highlight of the fest for me. They’re an Oakland based band with a female vocalist and their style of hardcore infuses heaps of anarcho-punk. They’ve got an upbeat tempo that you might be able to get away with pogo’ing to. They brought the atmosphere of a backyard show to the Regent, covering the band Void in their set.
Vein definitely stepped it up, they’re a band that’s difficult to describe and what you can’t understand you fear, so yes, I fear Vein. It’s hardcore but it sounds like it comes from a very shattered mind. The riffs and arrangements of the songs are jagged and dragging and induce some kind of emotional pain in you, meanwhile the singer is going completely ape-shit at his own speed. You have to behold it before you can slam to it and when you behold it, Vein gives you chills. But apparently, chills don’t stop some folks from slamming.
Next was another band I enjoyed prior to the fest, Bent Life. The fact that they were tuning up with the song “Punishment” by Biohazard only made me more stoked for their set. They ended up playing the most straight forward hardcore music of the day till that point, a fix everyone was dying for. We all sang and slammed and went crazy with the energy they let us get out. A band like Bent Life has plenty of their own energy to bring the table but their music is really a vehicle for us to go crazy, which not every band on the bill can say.
Gotta give it up for Gatecreeper. That’s become a band I’ll support through thick and thin, having seen them thrice before, I decided to watch them from the stage. Their sound is almost too much of a death metal assault for hardcore kids to know exactly what to do with. Their bodies are telling them to slam but the music is telling them to mosh, so some cables get criss-crossed but nonetheless, this band always kills it and sets the bar for death metal in 2017.
Dangers was a band that surprised me. I listened to them and dismissed them as just another screamo band but maybe a little more crazed, boy was I wrong. They were fucking insane. None of the bands on either day showed as much intensity as the singer of Dangers, Al Brown. There were multiple moments in their set that were day-defining and really made them transcend the other bands. Things got especially intense when Brown screamed through the first verse of the Clash’s “Guns of Brixton”, then later about being a beaner, then again at the set’s end when he screamed:
“you’re all going to die, your parents, your children, you’re all going to die, but you’re not alone…”
New York’s Krimewatch is the band to watch from Sound and Fury. If you’re a girl looking for a positive female punk rock role models, fuck Downtown Boys, fuck Kim and the Created, your band is Krimewatch.
They were absolutely ferocious. The crowd went crazier for them than all the bands prior. Emma Hendry grooved on her bass, Sean Joyce ripped on his guitar, Shayne reamed the drums, and Rhylli, their singer, is the new femme fatale comic book villainess of punk rock. She encapsulates beauty, danger, and subversion just by being herself and belting out the songs.
Free is a Massachusetts hardcore band made up of former members of Have Heart. As the singer, Patrick Flynn explained, the name might sound a little too simple but to him it’s one of the most beautiful words in the English language. In fact, the name was originally meant to be an acronym for: Free to be. Right to Choose. Equal to you. Equal to me. Of all the bands, Free were the most politically charged, often ranting between songs about everything from prison reform to unity. Musically, they were a straight forward hardcore act to bounce and sing to.
At the end of the set, Flynn thanked Sound and Fury for having a diverse bill of bands play because it is a sign of progress and not greed.
More to Pride were up next. They’re a hardcore band out of Anaheim, California that plays traditional hardcore with a chicano edge. They disbanded in 2006 and are back together to demolish ear drums. More to Pride’s bass is packed with plenty of grime and their guitars screech and grind until you can’t help but go crazy. Their singer shouts with a genuine and undeniable anger that he must pull from a very real place.
Dreams do come true, folks, you just need good people to come together and make them realities. Harley Flanagan coming to the West Coast is no everyday occurrence, call me a geezer but he was the most exciting draw on the whole Sound and Fury lineup to me. Not just because I love the Cro-Mags but because Flanagan himself is a legend and walking rock and roll history book. The personality feeds my love of the music, I don’t separate the two but I also don’t let bad behavior or opinions stop me from enjoying the personality or music.
Plenty of people give a musician shit if they’ll say they support Trump, well Harley Flanagan has stabbed mother fuckers and I don’t see twitter uproars or protests targeting him, you know why?
Two reasons: Because real music fans don’t give a fuck and because real musicians are not perfect people.
Flanagan, who’s now 50, still muscular from his day job as a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu instructor, gave everything I wanted out of his set and more. The talented band of rippers he assembled opened with the classic “We Gotta Know” and right out of the gate everyone scrambled to get on stage and sing. Harley had to dodge and dip away from mother fuckers just to avoid head on collisions. To follow one classic, he dished out another with “Show You No Mercy” and then “World Peace”.
I was seeing the Sound and Fury moments of my dreams, as if you could take a time machine and grab the Cro-Mags and bring them back to 2017 to headline Sound and Fury. I looked at an old picture of the original band, Flanagan + Joseph, and thought to myself that this was the hardest band I’ve ever seen.
But make no mistake, this wasn’t the Cro-Mags, just like John Joseph’s touring band ain’t either and Harley totally took the time to make that point. I had seen John Joseph’s Cro-Mags earlier in the year and he’s still rad but I’d say Harley’s band is better and though Harley can’t perfectly execute the vocals, the show was so much more high energy than John Joseph’s Cro-Mags that we, Sound and Fury 2017, filled in for Joseph. The band then wrapped up playing Cro-Mags classics with “Hard Times”, the final, most explosive release of the set.
How do you follow that? Well, Sound and Fury had this one band up their sleeve called Turnover. Turnover is as far from hardcore as you could get. They’re a chill, delicate, introspective rock band that plays soft alternative jams. There’s a certain style of that soft stuff that will draw hardcore kids though, there’s something they latch onto in the sound and aesthetics because after all, hardcore kids don’t just want music that acts as a soundtrack to all their troubles, they want a sound that communicates the little moments of reverie in between. That’s Turnover.
I didn’t get into them at first listen but after seeing them live, melting a bunch of rough hardcore kids into mush in front of their girlfriends, now I can’t stop listening. It’s the perfect music to drift away to. Here’s another band I’m sure will break through, only they’ll do it in the mainstream world and take their punk rock fans with them. Turnover was the perfect breath before Incendiary.
Standing behind Incendiary on stage, in front of a packed Regent, is a much more visceral experience than seeing them go on at 1AM at the 5 Star bar. The audience was moving in waves as the band made the stage their bitch. Every fans’ foot and fist seemed to be heavier when they stomped and swung. The fans clearly held a connection to the band on a deeply primal level. If you could replicate how we felt during Incendiary’s set out in the streets during a protest, we could take back the power. Beating his chest as he sang “Fan the Flames”, Brandon Garone was at the top of his game and when he instructed us to “Fuck this place up!’ that’s exactly what we did. Everyone was singing to the next song, Garone’s favorite Incendiary song, “The Power Process”. The next song, “God’s Country”, was dedicated to everyone who thinks they got this band figured out, because they don’t know shit. Incendiary closed their set with “Primitive Rage” and the entire Regent came together to demand change by singing “FORCING A RECKONING. SET US FREE!”
In every genre, there are certain performances that are so well executed that they become iconic. Roger Waters at Berlin, Oasis at Knebworth, N.W.A. at the Joe Louis Arena…. From my vantage point, Trapped Under Ice’s Sound and Fury 2017 was an iconic performance for the hardcore history books. The energy was at 11 from the very first moment of “Born to Die”. Now was the time to let it all out, anything you had been holding back. After a few more songs, singer Justin Tripp took off his jacket to reveal the coolest, Iggy Pop RAW FUCKING POWER shirt I’ve ever seen- it was clearly fueling his mojo. Out of all the lead singers, in all the bands I saw at Sound and Fury, Tripp had the most makings of a star.
They debuted a new song called “Do It” off their upcoming album Heat Wave that got everyone unhinged. The whole set, the audience was so enthused that they ended up getting confused, not knowing whether to rush to the front for a chance to sing into the mic, to slam dance, or to stage dive- it was all one big chaotic sea below the stage but a fire storm above it. By the last note, with the hairs on my arms standing up tall, I knew that I had seen something special.
Here was Trapped Under Ice’s setlist:
Born to Die
Skeleton Heads
Soul Vice
Reality Unfolds
True Love
Half a Person
Believe
Do It (Live debut)
Jail
Gemini
Stay Cold
Pleased to Meet You
The main festival had come to a close, my Saturday night was now over… or so I thought….
TRIPLE B SHOWCASE
I was deeply upset that Warning had to cancel the after show that would’ve followed Saturday’s festivities due to visa issues. It’s a thrill to see a show in the Regent after hours. Visa issues have been an epidemic in 2017 among European or Asian bands trying to tour the states. I’ve now been denied seeing Taake, Warning, Conflict, and Wormrot due to these issues. I blame Trump.
So now my only option was the Triple B showcase which I was totally ready to miss until Young And In The Way, the band that was going to open for Warning, was added to the end of the lineup at the last minute.
I met up with the friend that informed me that Young And In The Way was going to play and drank at his loft for about an hour until going to the 5 Star bar. That’s where I met up with Danny B. At the bar my friend reunited with the guitarist of Eyes of the Lord from the CCA showcase the night before, they hadn’t seen each other in at least a decade when they used to play in a hardcore band in Albany, New York. Another example of this fest bringing people together, jus’ sayin’.
I crept inside to see the end of Forced Order’s great set and saw an awkward scene of youngsters standing against the wall opposite of the bar. Straight Edge kids. Swinging their arms in windmills them slamming into each other like Don Quixote.
It was now 1:20AM and Self Defense Family was just starting. I looked to my friend and assured him YAITW wasn’t going to have time to play but we both decided to take our chances and stay in the hopes I was wrong. Staying was the mistake.
Look, I’m sure for a certain people Self Defense Family is a great band that makes cathartic music but as a metal-punk-hardcore loving mother fucker, sorry that shit was some of the worst music I’ve ever heard in my life. And look, I’m going to sound like an asshole but I’m NOT just trying to be funny.
Now with the singer’s over-dramatic-eunuch-like-wailing-vocals over the band’s uninspired mesh of music they created the unholy combination of emo and shoe-gaze, emo-gaze. The floor was slippery with straight edge tears and all my friend and I could do was drink our beers and watch in a boredom so pure that we nearly overdosed.
For a moment, I considered buying the whole bar a round but then I realized the straight edge kids were too into the listening to the singer talk about wanting to punch his Dad’s fat head. The music was so bad that it made the pain of missing YAITW hilarious.
I went outside for some fresh silence and found Marteen, one of the festival’s organizer. I asked him if YAITW would play and he assured me they would. I then asked him what his favorite band from the fest was and he answered me:
“Vein”
I couldn’t let this opportunity of talking to the mastermind of Sound and Fury go without making one request for Sound and Fury 2018, which was to get Integrity to headline. I’m sure everyone shares this hope but someone had to say it.
I went back into the bar as Self Defense Family was wrapping up. The stage was now empty and the gear being torn down. It was 1:45AM and last call had already been called. Just then, Young And In The Way strolled into the bar and my friend and I jumped up with joy. Then the bar manager told them they couldn’t play and my friend and I got the hell out of there as fast as we could.
The night ended on a sour note but I wouldn’t let that be the case for the festival. There was still one label showcase left on the next day and that was for Pop Wig records and Justin Tripp’s other band, Angel Du$t, was headlining.
POP WIG SHOWCASE
The Hi Hat is a great venue. It’s small enough to make for intimate experiences but also big enough to move around freely. Not to mention, it houses Burger Lords which made a special vegan burger for Angel Du$t and then on top of that, you can shoot fucking billiards at the same time as a band is playing… where else can you do that?
I got there in time to see Bugg, a cool alternative rock band that played an awesome cover of There She Goes by The La’s.
Next up was Odd Man Out a hardcore band from Seattle with plenty of melody and kinetic energy. Bugg had left the audience chilled so it was up to Odd Man Out to warm us up to a boil, which they did, manifesting a pit out of pure nothingness. The band made as much use of the small stage as any band could and their singer sang with loads of conviction. It was such a treat for them to cover Negative Approach’s “Nothing” and it gave me plenty of hope for every generation of hardcore to come. I only wish they played the actual festival too.
Seattle’s Big Bite was next, they were a post punk band with an edge that just finished up a tour with Bugg. They were a good band but one thing I noticed and maybe it’s just me, but too many bands revert to gaze guitar whenever they want to slow things down. Shoegaze seems to be an easy and obvious direction to take any alternative song in today’s underground music. I’m not saying I don’t like gaze, I do, I just want to see things get changed up.
Firewalker played next with just as much aggression as they did in the main festival and just like two days prior the stage was flocked with girls singing the lyrics into the microphone.
I personally enjoy listening to Angel Du$t even more than Trapped Under Ice. I don’t want to call Angel Du$t Justin Tripp’s side project because in the world of Pop Wig Records I don’t think the concept of side exists- other bands are just separate entities and collaborations. Under the flag of Angel Du$t, Tripp is able to express a different side of himself, one with much more swag and melody and fun in his urban maladies.
Turnstile’s Brendan Yates joined the band on guitar and astonished us all as a Jack of all blades, Da Vinci of dope, renaissance man-o-war. Angel Du$t played all the fan favorites and together, as one big happy family. Upset that Sound and Fury couldn’t go on forever, we danced and sang and fed this one big highland park hardcore happening. Plenty of those songs, Tripp introduced as love songs and there was plenty of love in that room to go around for days.
All the hits:
Headstone
Toxic Boombox
Bad Thing
Big One
Let It Rot
Beat My Brain
Take My Love
Stay
Squeeze
Stepping Stone
Slam
Rage
Set Me Up
I feel like Angel Du$t is closer to hardcore punk and not hardcore and I think the distinction should be made. Hardcore punk is a label attributed to bands like the Misfits, Dead Kennedys, and Black Flag but these aren’t hardcore bands. Trapped Under Ice is definitely hardcore but Angel Du$t rings closer to heavy, melodic punk rock and thus deserving the hardcore punk title.
Angel Du$t’s closer “Set Me Up” is definitely my favorite of their songs and for it, the stage was swarmed by as many people as it could and that’s when we executed one of the rarest, coolest concert moments you could see: Crowd surfing on stage. The only step up from there is everyone on stage and the singer standing on their hands.
One important thing Tripp said during his set was that:
“a band is an idea nobody owns, let it be whatever you want it to be…”
He went on to say the same for record labels and that touched upon the main lesson I took from Sound and Fury that- no band reaches success alone. We all need other people to fulfill our dreams and in a record label, like Pop Wig or Closed Casket Activities or Triple B, you can find like-minded bands that will help you if you help them and together, everyone will prosper. There is no room for ego in hardcore.
Both bands Trapped Under Ice and Angel Du$t prosper, then through Trapped Under Ice’s success Brendan Yates prospers and thus Turnstile prospers. And there were so many similar examples that it can’t just be a coincidence. All the collaborations I saw this weekend only reinforced that point.
It’s family, plain and simple.
Highlights of the fest: Homewrecker playing a cover of Sepultura’s “Propaganda” at the Kickoff show, Ecostrike’s set, Lock’s set, Bracewar’s hentai backdrop, Fury’s phenomenal set, Todd Jones playing guitar on “Keep Your Mouth Shut” with Terror, Nails’ surprise show at CCA showcase, Nate Blauvelt swinging a chair in the pit at 5 Star Bar, Torso’s set, Dangers’ set, Krimewatch’s set, HARLEY FUCKING FLANAGAN, Trapped Under Ice’s set, Odd Man Out covering Negative Approach, Angel Du$t playing “Set Me Up” with everyone on stage at the Hi Hat.
MVP’s of the fest: Fury and Incendiary.
Words: Rob Shepyer
Photos: Alyson Camus and Christina BadalianMore Rochesterians are requesting help from Catholic Charities to heat their homes this winter because of the long periods of bitterly cold weather we've experienced in recent months.
Bishop of the Rochester Catholic Diocese Salvatore Matano is asking for more donations to meet the increased demand.
Diocesan spokesperson Doug Mandelaro says area churches will have a second collection at upcoming services.
“(Bishop Matano) has asked our parishes to take up this second collection sometime over the next few weeks, to promote it, and to ask people to bring their checkbooks. Just to help the poor, the vulnerable, those who are financially struggling, trying to help them make ends meet in this very cold winter. “
Catholic Charities uses both charitable funds and money from the federally-funded Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program to help 250 thousand people of all faiths each year.“I hope it gets people to think – that’s really the intent of the film. I’m really not a person that likes to tell people what to do, or say what they should and shouldn’t do, but I feel like they haven’t been presented with this information – many people are just unaware of it – and I think, after they see this, if they go home and go “hm…” and begin to think about their diets and consider consuming more plant foods, that would be something I’d really like to see people get out of this movie. I hope to see the diet change in this country. We’ve tried the animal-based diet and it really hasn’t worked out for us, so I’m hoping to see us trend toward a more plant-based diet because I think it’ll be better for people’s health and for the planet.”
—Brian Wendel, Creator and Executive Producer of Forks Over Knives, in an interview with HLifeMedia. The film, which had a series of screenings sponsored by Whole Foods, is set for release in theatres March 11, 2011. Forks Over Knives follows the research of Dr. T. Colin Campbell, an author and nutritional biochemist from Cornell University, and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, a former top surgeon at Cleveland Clinic who was instrumental in Bill Clinton going vegan, as they come to the conclusion that many of the major “diseases of affluence”, such as heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and cancer, can be prevented and in some cases reversed by following a plant-based diet.
Possibly Related Posts:Our Japanese colleague from Digicameinfo posted the first Fuji X100T images! The camera real highlight is that amazing hybrid EVF/OVF which is said to fix the century old parallax problem for the very first time!
And this are the camera specs:
– 16 million pixel APS-C X-Trans CMOS II sensor
– 3 inches 1.04 million dot LCD monitor
– Electronic shutter of 1/32000 seconds without operating sound
– A manual setting possible Full HD video. Maximum bit rate is 36Mbps
– Highest sensitivity is ISO51200
– EXR Processor II
– Lens aperture ring of F2.1 / 3 step 23mm
– Hybrid viewfinder
– 4-way controller
– Function buttons can be customized 7
– The number of possible shots increased to 700 sheets by OVF power save function
– Interval timer mode and multiple exposure
– Digital split image focus and peaking
– ND filter built 3EV
– Wi-Fi Built-in. Allows remote control from the smartphoneFiled in Encyclopedia Subscribe to Decision Science News by Email (one email per week, easy unsubscribe)
DOES IT MATTER WHERE IT IS KICKED? ANALYSIS OF OVER 10,000 ATTEMPTS
Click to enlarge
In our third of not one, not two, but three posts on kicking a football in the NFL, we take on a reader question of whether the stadium / home team matters for making a field goal. We pulled up the data on every field goal since 2002 (over 10,000) of them and plotted the probability of scoring as a function of the stadium in which the field goal was kicked. The results are above. Bars are +/- 1 standard error.
Is it a statistically significant effect? Apparently so:
Pearson's Chi-squared test X-squared = 49.9556, df = 31, p-value = 0.01693
ADDENDUM 1
We had a request to see the broken down by home team or visiting team kicking. Here you go:
Click to enlarge
ADDENDUM 2:
Owing to the generosity of the great reader / Scottish economist Adam Smith (see comments), we now have the stadiums broken down by door (indoor or outdoor). The gray stadiums are either convertible (Houston) or have a small hole in the roof (Dallas).
Correlation is not causation, but it sure does seem plausible that having an indoor stadium helps the kicker.
Click to enlarge
APPENDIX
To decode the team names, use this list:
ARI: Arizona Cardinals ATL: Atlanta Falcons BAL: Baltimore Ravens BUF: Buffalo Bills CAR: Carolina Panthers CHI: Chicago Bears CIN: Cincinnati Bengals CLE: Cleveland Browns DAL: Dallas Cowboys DEN: Denver Broncos DET: Detroit Lions GB: Green Bay Packers HOU: Houston Texans IND: Indianapolis Colts JAX: Jacksonville Jaguars KC: Kansas City Chiefs MIA: Miami Dolphins MIN: Minnesota Vikings NE: New England Patriots NO: New Orleans Saints NYG: New York Giants NYJ: New York Jets OAK: Oakland Raiders PHI: Philadelphia Eagles PIT: Pittsburgh Steelers SD: San Diego Chargers SEA: Seattle Seahawks SF: San Francisco 49ers STL: Saint Louis Rams TB: Tampa Bay Buccaneers TEN Tennessee Titans WAS: Washington Redskins
Figure 1 Data:
Stadium Miss Hit ARI 67 292 ATL 45 257 BAL 45 322 BUF 61 253 CAR 51 269 CHI 64 295 CIN 53 293 CLE 56 266 DAL 53 281 DEN 50 303 DET 34 285 GB 72 274 HOU 53 271 IND 55 308 JAC 64 252 KC 58 285 MIA 58 286 MIN 35 267 NE 63 282 NO 48 285 NYG 59 271 NYJ 50 260 OAK 72 297 PHI 51 300 PIT 65 259 SD 48 258 SEA 55 285 SF 51 289 STL 50 284 TB 58 256 TEN 63 288 WAS 70 254
Figure 2 Data:
ARI Home_Team_Kicks 32 152 Visiting_Team_Kicks 35 140 ATL Home_Team_Kicks 24 142 Visiting_Team_Kicks 21 115 BAL Home_Team_Kicks 23 187 Visiting_Team_Kicks 22 135 BUF Home_Team_Kicks 36 129 Visiting_Team_Kicks 25 124 CAR Home_Team_Kicks 23 125 Visiting_Team_Kicks 28 144 CHI Home_Team_Kicks 32 150 Visiting_Team_Kicks 32 145 CIN Home_Team_Kicks 28 162 Visiting_Team_Kicks 25 131 CLE Home_Team_Kicks 20 130 Visiting_Team_Kicks 36 136 DAL Home_Team_Kicks 30 138 Visiting_Team_Kicks 23 143 DEN Home_Team_Kicks 23 154 Visiting_Team_Kicks 27 149 DET Home_Team_Kicks 17 152 Visiting_Team_Kicks 17 133 GB Home_Team_Kicks 39 144 Visiting_Team_Kicks 33 130 HOU Home_Team_Kicks 32 131 Visiting_Team_Kicks 21 140 IND Home_Team_Kicks 19 166 Visiting_Team_Kicks 36 142 JAC Home_Team_Kicks 36 131 Visiting_Team_Kicks 28 121 KC Home_Team_Kicks 29 127 Visiting_Team_Kicks 29 158 MIA Home_Team_Kicks 32 141 Visiting_Team_Kicks 26 145 MIN Home_Team_Kicks 11 138 Visiting_Team_Kicks 24 129 NE Home_Team_Kicks 30 164 Visiting_Team_Kicks 33 118 NO Home_Team_Kicks 22 129 Visiting_Team_Kicks 26 156 NYG Home_Team_Kicks 27 138 Visiting_Team_Kicks 32 133 NYJ Home_Team_Kicks 26 138 Visiting_Team_Kicks 24 122 OAK Home_Team_Kicks 29 150 Visiting_Team_Kicks 43 147 PHI Home_Team_Kicks 25 176 Visiting_Team_Kicks 26 124 PIT Home_Team_Kicks 34 149 Visiting_Team_Kicks 31 110 SD Home_Team_Kicks 23 134 Visiting_Team_Kicks 25 124 SEA Home_Team_Kicks 19 145 Visiting_Team_Kicks 36 140 SF Home_Team_Kicks 25 156 Visiting_Team_Kicks 26 133 STL Home_Team_Kicks 22 142 Visiting_Team_Kicks 28 142 TB Home_Team_Kicks 30 136 Visiting_Team_Kicks 28 120 TEN Home_Team_Kicks 28 155 Visiting_Team_Kicks 35 133 WAS Home_Team_Kicks 39 124 Visiting_Team_Kicks 31 130
Figure 3 Data: See Figure 1 data plus the comments
Graphs were made in R using Hadley Wickham’s ggplot2 package. Pointer to the data can be found at our previous post.THE SURVEY IS NOW CLOSED
Thank you for your participation!
Why are we doing this study?
The purposes of this study are to learn more about how the new federal regulations on medical cannabis in Canada are impacting 1) patients’ access to medical cannabis; 2) patients’ satisfaction with the medical cannabis products and related health services available; and 3) patients’ use of health services and their overall health. The purpose of this study is NOT to examine if medical cannabis is an effective treatment for different diseases.
Who is eligible to participate in the study?
Any individual living in Canada who:
has used cannabis as a medicine OR has not used cannabis as a medicine
is
|
jection or CME), and neither Republican nor Democratic leaders have resolved to fix it. This must change quickly -- before it’s too late.
Though 158 years have passed since the Carrington Event, the United States remains under threat from a solar superstorm that could bring down the electric grid. In fact, on July 23, 2012, the Earth barely missed a solar superstorm comparable in strength to the Carrington Event. Had the 2012 solar storm occurred a mere nine days earlier, the Earth would have been hit. And if the solar superstorm had hit, according to Daniel Baker of the University of Colorado, “we would still be picking up the pieces” in 2014. In an article published in the journal Nature Communications, research physicist Dr. Janet G. Luhmann, who is part of NASA’s STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) team said that if the 2012 solar storm had hit Earth, “it probably would have been like the big one in 1859, but the effect today, with our modern technologies, would have been tremendous.” Another author and fellow STEREO colleague Dr. Ying D. Liu described the results of a direct hit by a solar storm of this magnitude as follows:
An extreme space weather storm -- a solar superstorm -- is a low-probability, high-consequence event that poses severe threats to critical infrastructures of the modern society. The cost of an extreme space weather event, if it hits Earth, could reach trillions of dollars with a potential recovery time of 4-10 years. Therefore, it is paramount to the security and economic interest of the modern society to understand solar superstorms.
In a 2011 report, the Department of Homeland Security conceded the significant deleterious effects of major geomagnetic storms but claimed that cost-benefit analyses did not justify work toward hardening the electric grid. However, according to a 2012 study by physicist Pete Riley published in Space Weather and quoted by NASA, there is a 12% chance of a solar superstorm comparable to the Carrington Event hitting the Earth within 10 years. This means that within 20 years there is a 23% chance of a destructive solar storm, within 50 years a 47% chance of occurrence, and within a century a 72% chance.
While such looming danger necessitates Congressional approval of legislation that requires hardening the U.S. electric grid from EMP attacks in a thorough and expeditious manner, members of both parties have either not taken the threat seriously enough or have actively stood in the way of protecting the national electric grid. According to a study by the Foundation for Resilient Societies that was presented in 2015 before a Congressional hearing on the EMP threat, the cost of hardening the electric grid would range from $10 billion to $30 billion. In a 2013 letter to President Obama about the threat of EMP, Thomas Popik, the
Chairman of the Foundation for Resilient Societies, wrote that “grid failure is an existential threat to the survival of the United States as a nation and to the American population.”
According to an estimate by Dr. William Graham, chairman of the blue-ribbon Congressional EMP Commission, as much as 90% of the U.S. population could perish from a solar EMP. According to the Foundation for Resilient Societies, “the projected costs of a regional or nationwide electric grid outage lasting months or years vary widely, but range from $1 trillion to over $10 trillion -- plus potential widespread loss of life for the substantial majority of the 320 million people living in this nation.”
According to researchers from the University of Cambridge’s Centre for Risk Studies and other institutions, if the nation’s electric grid fails from a powerful geomagnetic storm, it would cost the U.S. economy up to $41.5 billion per day. This means that a halt to the U.S. economy of even one day would surpass the high estimate for hardening the nation’s electric grid. For perspective, if the outage lasted one year, it would cost up to $15.15 trillion or over 80% of the U.S. GDP, which stood at $18.57 trillion in 2016.
Even in a more “optimistic” scenario where only 10% or even 1% of the population died from the results of a powerful geomagnetic storm, the investment needed to prevent that would be far more than worth it. For perspective, the total number of U.S. military deaths in all American wars throughout the nation’s history amounts to less than 0.5% of the current U.S. population.
The economic costs, and certainly the potential cost in life, easily necessitate swift action to harden the grid. A cost-benefit analysis based on the chance of a major solar storm (even leaving aside the risk from manmade EMP attacks) coupled with the cost of inaction lead to the inexorable conclusion that the nation’s electric grid must be hardened immediately. It is a betrayal of the highest order to leave U.S. citizens in such grave danger.
Resolution of this threat must not be placed on the back burner as Congress and previous presidents have allowed for all too long. The Critical Infrastructure Protection Act (CIPA) that was passed into law as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in December of 2016 is a toothless bill that requires research “to the extent practicable” into protecting the electric grid. CIPA only mandates that the Department of Homeland Security produce recommendations within a year about hardening the grid, with updates to Congress every subsequent two years. After years of superior bills (like H.R. 2417) being held up in committee or otherwise blocked, CIPA is at least a first step. However, it doesn’t directly mandate any implementation of hardening the electric grid, includes vague language, and is far from adequate to effectively address the EMP threat. The bill expressly grants no regulatory authority to the Administration and no funding for the grid-hardening program.
Congress and President Trump must take accelerated steps to harden the vulnerable U.S. electric grid as well as take further steps to protect all areas within the U.S. military and civilian infrastructure that may remain vulnerable to a solar storm.A team of scientists from WCS, University of York, and Uganda Wildlife Authority have developed a new method of detecting illegal activities in protected areas by as much as 250 percent.
Using ranger-collected data from SMART, the team developed a method to improve ranger patrol allocation, targeting different combinations of conservation priorities. As a result, they were able to predict where illegal activities were occurring and concentrate resources accordingly.
In a field test in Uganda's Queen Elizabeth Protected Area (QEPA), detections of illegal activities such as cattle encroachment and wildlife poaching increased by as much as 250 percent without a change in ranger resources.
The breakthrough methodology owes its success to the use of SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool), a free downloadable tool that combines software, training materials, and patrolling standards to conservation and protected area managers to improve patrolling methods. The tool is being increasingly used around the world and has already been implemented in 43 countries and in more than 120 protected areas.
The authors, Rob Critchlow and Colin Beale of the University of York; Andrew Plumptre and Mustapha Nsubuga of WCS; and B. Andira, M. Driciru, and A. Rwetsiba of the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) published their results in the early online edition of Conservation Letters.
The authors say that the easily implemented method can be used in any protected area where data on the distribution of illegal activities are collected, and improve law-enforcement efficiency in resource-limited settings.
"This is the first indication that altering ranger patrols on the ground can result in considerable benefits for conservation," said Dr Rob Critchlow, Research Associate in the University of York's Biology department. "We are keen to test this approach across other protected areas to assess its applicability to different types of protected areas."
Co-author Dr. Andrew Plumptre, Senior Scientist for WCS's Africa Program, said: "SMART is now being used in more than 120 protected areas across the globe and we strongly encourage the use of technology to aid biodiversity conservation. The method shows how such data can be used effectively to strengthen patrolling. Importantly this improvement is made at the same cost and results in a more efficient and effective deployment of rangers."
As shown in a previous analysis published in Conservation Biology, different illegal activities often occur in different areas and this has implications for managing and directing ranger patrols.
Said Dr. Colin Beale of University of York said: "In addition to targeting particular types of illegal activity, such as poaching for elephant, our new method can also incorporate different conservation priorities such as focusing on both cattle encroachment and firewood collection. It shows there are trade-offs to be made in which illegal activities are targeted and where."
Said Margaret Driciru, UWA Warden for Monitoring and Research of the QEPA: "One of the approaches used by UWA for managing the protected areas is based on the principle of Threat Reduction which involves: identification of threats to the protected areas, ranking the threats, identifying strategies for reducing the threats, implementing these strategies and monitoring the effectiveness of the threat reduction strategies. Hence the Ranger Based Data Collection system is a means of quantifying how the threat levels are changing as well as the effectiveness of our threat reduction strategies. We are happy that the analysis of these data will help us to improve in our ranger patrol effectiveness."
The scientists and practitioners encourage the collection and analysis of ranger-collected data to inform changes to existing ranger patrols for improving patrol efficiency and effectiveness and are grateful for all UWA rangers and staff involved for allowing the testing in the QEPA.APRIL 13--Meet John Scott Kincaid and Christopher Ray Fitzgerald.
The Texas men were arrested this morning after they allegedly stuck up an adult video store and made off with 50 pornographic movies. According to police, Kincaid, 21, and Fitzgerald, 20, were nabbed shortly after the 12:20 AM robbery of Adult Video and DVD in Kilgore.
After their vehicle was pulled over, officers recovered the 50 X-rated films, along with a Ruger automatic handgun, and a face mask, according to a Kilgore Police Department press release.
Kincaid (top) and Fitzgerald are pictured in mug shots snapped this morning at the Kilgore City Jail, where they were each booked on a felony aggravated robbery count. The men are suspects in two armed robberies last week, one of which occurred at the same video store robbed today. (2 pages)Driving down through the desert, from Tehran to the holy city of Qom, I am following the path of so many who have made the pilgrimage before me. They either were seeking an audience with, or a glimpse of, Ayatollah Khomeini or, if they were journalistic pilgrims, were trying to test the temperature of Iran’s clerical capital. As I arrive, darkness is gently settling over the domes and spires of the mosque and the Shia theological seminary, the latter of which is demarcated by a kind of empty moat which doubles as a market. But I am not headed for these centers of spiritual and temporal power. My objective is an ill-paved backstreet where, after one confirming cell-phone call, a black-turbaned cleric is waiting outside his modest quarters. This is Hossein Khomeini. The black turban proclaims him a sayyid, or descendant of the prophet Muhammad. But it’s his more immediate ancestry that interests me. This man’s grandfather once shook the whole world. He tore down the throne of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in 1979 and humiliated the United States. His supporters seized the American Embassy and kept 52 members of its staff prisoner for 444 days. The seismic repercussions of this event led to the fall of Carter, the rise of Reagan, the invasion of Iran by Saddam Hussein, and quite possibly the occupation of Afghanistan by the Red Army. It moved us from the age of the Red Menace to the epoch of Holy War. It was, at one and the same time, a genuine revolution and an authentic counterrevolution. I have become almost averse to shaking hands in Iran by now, because it isn’t permitted for a man to shake a woman’s hand in public in this nerve-racked country, and if you unlearn the conditioned reflex in one way, you unlearn it in another. But as I feel young Khomeini’s polite grip, I fancifully experience a slight crackle from history. Iranian hospitality is one of the most warming and embarrassing things it is possible to encounter. Before any conversation can begin on these grand questions, there must be fragrant tea, a plate of sohan, the addictive pistachio-and-saffron brittle that is the Qom specialty, and a pressing invitation to stay for dinner, and indeed for the night. The pressure is re-doubled on this occasion because the last time we met and talked I was the host. Young Khomeini has been spending a good deal of his time in Iraq, where he has many friends among the Shia. He is a strong supporter of the United States intervention in that country, and takes a political line not dissimilar to that of Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani. In practice, this means the traditional Shia belief that clerics should not occupy posts of political power. In Iranian terms, what it means is that Khomeini (his father and elder brother died some years ago, so he is the most immediate descendant) favors the removal of the regime established by his grandfather. “I stand,” he tells me calmly, “for the complete separation of religion and the state.” In terms that would make the heart of a neocon soar like a hawk, he goes on to praise President Bush’s State of the Union speech, to warn that the mullahs cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons, and to use the term “Free World” without irony: “Only the Free World, led by America, can bring democracy to Iran.” Anyone visiting Iran today will quickly become used to hearing this version of street opinion, but there is something striking about hearing it from the lips of a turbaned Khomeini. Changing the emphasis slightly, he asks my opinion of the referendum movement. This is an initiative, by Iranians inside the country and outside it, to gather signatures calling for a U.N.-supervised vote on a new Iranian Constitution. One of the recent overseas signatories is Reza Pahlavi, the son of the fallen Shah. Khomeini surprises me even more by speaking warmly of this young man. “I have heard well of him. I would be happy to meet him and to cooperate with him, but on one condition. He must abandon any claim to the throne.” (The opportunity of delivering a message from the grandson of Khomeini to the son of the Shah seemed irresistible, and the first thing I did upon my return to Washington was to seek out Reza Pahlavi, who lives in Maryland, and put the question to him. We actually met in a basement kitchen in the nation’s capital, where he was being careful to be as unmonarchical as it is feasible to be. His line on the restoration of kingship is one of “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” He doesn’t claim the throne—though he did at one point in our chat refer bizarrely to his father as “my predecessor”—nor does he renounce it. All he will say, and he says it with admirable persistence, is that the next Iran must be both secular and democratic. So, even if they remain at arm’s length, it can be said at last that a Khomeini and a Pahlavi agree.)
Iran today exists in a state of dual power and split personality. The huge billboards and murals proclaim it an Islamic republic, under the eternal guidance of the immortal memory of Ayatollah Khomeini. A large force of Revolutionary Guards and a pervasive religious police stand ready to make good on this grim pledge. But directly underneath these forbidding posters and right under the noses of the morals enforcers, Iranians are buying and selling videos, making and consuming alcohol, tuning in to satellite TV stations, producing subversive films and plays and books, and defying the dress code. All women are supposed to cover all their hair at all times, and to wear a long jacket, or manteau, that covers them from neck to knee. But it’s amazing how enticing the compulsory scarf can be when worn practically on the back of the head and held in place only by hair spray. As for the obligatory manteau, any woman with any fashion sense can cut it to mold an enviable silhouette. I found a bootlegger on my arrival at Tehran airport and was offered alcohol on principle in every home I entered—Khomeini’s excepted—even by people who did not drink. Almost every Iranian has a relative overseas and is in regular touch with foreign news and trends. The country is an “as if” society. People live as if they were free, as if they were in the West, as if they had the right to an opinion, or a private life. And they don’t do too badly at it. I have now visited all three of the states that make up the so-called axis of evil. Rough as their regime can certainly be, the citizens of Iran live on a different planet from the wretched, frightened serfs of Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong Il. Tehran is in fact more or less uncontrollable by anybody. It’s the Mexico City or Calcutta of the region: a vast, unplanned, overpopulated nightmare of all-day traffic jams and eye-wringing pollution, tissue-paper building codes, and an earthquake coming like Christmas. It’s also the original uptown-downtown city, built on the steep slopes of the snowy Elburz Mountains, which, on a good day, one can sometimes actually see. In the northern quarter, there are the discreet villas where the members of the upper crust keep their heads down and their wealth unostentatious. At the bottom of the hill, you can lose yourself in the vast bazaar, whose tough stall owners were the shock troops of the 1979 revolution. “Beware of north Tehran,” one is invariably told. “Don’t take its Westernized opinions at face value.” So I didn’t. Indeed, at one party, where the women by the interior swimming pool didn’t have a scarf or a manteau among them, and where the butler handed me a card printed in English that advertised special caviar supplies, and where the bar went on for a furlong, I met a sleek banker who, full of loathing for the regime as he was, defended Iran’s right to have nuclear weapons. In fact, his was the most vociferous defense that I heard. (Like all the others who ask so plaintively why Israel and Pakistan can have nukes and not Iran, he temporarily chose to forget that the mullahs keep denying that they have such weapons, or even seek them.) Iranian hospitality is one of the most warming and embarrassing things it is possible to encounter. Before any conversation can begin on these grand questions, there must be fragrant tea, a plate of sohan, the addictive pistachio-and-saffron brittle that is the Qom specialty, and a pressing invitation to stay for dinner, and indeed for the night. The pressure is re-doubled on this occasion because the last time we met and talked I was the host. Young Khomeini has been spending a good deal of his time in Iraq, where he has many friends among the Shia. He is a strong supporter of the United States intervention in that country, and takes a political line not dissimilar to that of Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani. In practice, this means the traditional Shia belief that clerics should not occupy posts of political power. In Iranian terms, what it means is that Khomeini (his father and elder brother died some years ago, so he is the most immediate descendant) favors the removal of the regime established by his grandfather. “I stand,” he tells me calmly, “for the complete separation of religion and the state.” In terms that would make the heart of a neocon soar like a hawk, he goes on to praise President Bush’s State of the Union speech, to warn that the mullahs cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons, and to use the term “Free World” without irony: “Only the Free World, led by America, can bring democracy to Iran.” Anyone visiting Iran today will quickly become used to hearing this version of street opinion, but there is something striking about hearing it from the lips of a turbaned Khomeini. Changing the emphasis slightly, he asks my opinion of the referendum movement. This is an initiative, by Iranians inside the country and outside it, to gather signatures calling for a U.N.-supervised vote on a new Iranian Constitution. One of the recent overseas signatories is Reza Pahlavi, the son of the fallen Shah. Khomeini surprises me even more by speaking warmly of this young man. “I have heard well of him. I would be happy to meet him and to cooperate with him, but on one condition. He must abandon any claim to the throne.” (The opportunity of delivering a message from the grandson of Khomeini to the son of the Shah seemed irresistible, and the first thing I did upon my return to Washington was to seek out Reza Pahlavi, who lives in Maryland, and put the question to him. We actually met in a basement kitchen in the nation’s capital, where he was being careful to be as unmonarchical as it is feasible to be. His line on the restoration of kingship is one of “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” He doesn’t claim the throne—though he did at one point in our chat refer bizarrely to his father as “my predecessor”—nor does he renounce it. All he will say, and he says it with admirable persistence, is that the next Iran must be both secular and democratic. So, even if they remain at arm’s length, it can be said at last that a Khomeini and a Pahlavi agree.)
Iran today exists in a state of dual power and split personality. The huge billboards and murals proclaim it an Islamic republic, under the eternal guidance of the immortal memory of Ayatollah Khomeini. A large force of Revolutionary Guards and a pervasive religious police stand ready to make good on this grim pledge. But directly underneath these forbidding posters and right under the noses of the morals enforcers, Iranians are buying and selling videos, making and consuming alcohol, tuning in to satellite TV stations, producing subversive films and plays and books, and defying the dress code. All women are supposed to cover all their hair at all times, and to wear a long jacket, or manteau, that covers them from neck to knee. But it’s amazing how enticing the compulsory scarf can be when worn practically on the back of the head and held in place only by hair spray. As for the obligatory manteau, any woman with any fashion sense can cut it to mold an enviable silhouette. I found a bootlegger on my arrival at Tehran’s airport and was offered alcohol on principle in every home I entered—Khomeini’s excepted—even by people who did not drink. Almost every Iranian has a relative overseas and is in regular touch with foreign news and trends. The country is an “as if” society. People live as if they were free, as if they were in the West, as if they had the right to an opinion, or a private life. And they don’t do too badly at it. I have now visited all three of the states that make up the so-called axis of evil. Rough as their regime can certainly be, the citizens of Iran live on a different planet from the wretched, frightened serfs of Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong Il. Tehran is in fact more or less uncontrollable by anybody. It’s the Mexico City or Calcutta of the region: a vast, unplanned, overpopulated nightmare of all-day traffic jams and eye-wringing pollution, tissue-paper building codes, and an earthquake coming like Christmas. It’s also the original uptown-downtown city, built on the steep slopes of the snowy Elburz Mountains, which, on a good day, one can sometimes actually see. In the northern quarter, there are the discreet villas where the members of the upper crust keep their heads down and their wealth unostentatious. At the bottom of the hill, you can lose yourself in the vast bazaar, whose tough stall owners were the shock troops of the 1979 revolution. “Beware of north Tehran,” one is invariably told. “Don’t take its Westernized opinions at face value.” So I didn’t. Indeed, at one party, where the women by the interior swimming pool didn’t have a scarf or a manteau among them, and where the butler handed me a card printed in English that advertised special caviar supplies, and where the bar went on for a furlong, I met a sleek banker who, full of loathing for the regime as he was, defended Iran’s right to have nuclear weapons. In fact, his was the most vociferous defense that I heard. (Like all the others who ask so plaintively why Israel and Pakistan can have nukes and not Iran, he temporarily chose to forget that the mullahs keep denying that they have such weapons, or even seek them.)
Never mind Qom, which is an easy four-hour drive. I went as far from the north-Tehran suburbs as I could reasonably be expected to go. In the city of Mashhad, way up toward the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan border, the air is clearer and the traffic lighter. The place wears an aspect of prosperity and contentment, as befits the home of one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. This is the shrine of Imam Reza, the only one of the 12 Shia imams who is actually buried in Iran. The gold dome—not gold-leafed but gold—is at the center of a series of spacious courtyards and squares into which the Iraqi mosques of Karbala and Najaf could both easily fit. The main door is a continuously busy portal for groups of men bearing coffins either inward or outward, since all the devout dead must be taken as near as is feasible to the tomb of Imam Reza himself. I have to slightly muffle my next sentences, to protect some friends, but I had an introduction to a man who was a guardian of this holy place. Presenting myself, I was led wordlessly to what looked like a tapestry on an interior wall. This curtain was drawn aside to reveal an elevator door, and I was then, like some intruding raider of a lost ark, whisked upward. At the top level, I had a heart-stopping perspective on the gold dome: a view that I think few if any infidels have ever shared. I was as near as I could hope to be to an inner sanctum (to use the word properly for once) and also to something that I can only guess about: the pulsing and enduring and patient heart of Shiite Islam. Offered a cushion on the floor, and some tea and segmented oranges, I was, as usual, made more welcome than was easy for me. My host was a very serious man. Not by any means skipping the traditional questions about my health and my journey and my needs, he soon drove to the point. “Do you suppose,” he inquired, “that the West will ever come to our aid? Or is it all hypocrisy?” I asked him in return how he would know, or how he would define, success. An invasion? He seemed to think it a fair question and gravely replied, “The minimum would be to have an American Embassy back in Tehran.”
This answer might strike you as rather oblique. (Welcome to Iran, in that case.) But it was also admirably straightforward. In September 2002, an editor and columnist in Tehran named Abbas Abdi was among those who helped conduct a Gallup poll that had been commissioned by the foreign-affairs committee of the Iranian parliament, or Majlis. The finding of the poll was that nearly 75 percent of all Iranians were in favor of “dialogue” at the very least with the United States. The chairman of the relevant Majlis committee was named Mohsen Mirdamadi. Abbas Abdi was imprisoned simply for publishing those findings. Mohsen Mirdamadi has since been disqualified by the mullahs from running again for elected office, and in December 2003 was beaten and clubbed by state-sponsored Hezbollah goons while giving a speech in the provincial city of Yazd. You may not know the names of A.A. or M.M., but you might like to know that both of them were among the student group that vandalized the American Embassy in November 1979 and violated the diplomatic immunity of its staff. And A.A. had probably marked himself for even more trouble with the authorities for having a reconciliation meeting, in Paris in 1998, with his former American hostage Barry Rosen. Both were acting “as if” a decent relationship between the two peoples were already extant.
The Islamic republic actually counts all of its subjects as infants, and all of its bosses as their parents. It is based, in theory and in practice, on a Muslim concept known as velayat-e faqih, or “guardianship of the jurist.” In its original phrasing, this can mean that the clergy assumes responsibility for orphans, for the insane, and for (aha!) abandoned or untenanted property. Here is the reason Ayatollah Khomeini became world-famous: in a treatise written while he was in exile in Najaf, in Iraq, in 1970, he argued that the velayat could and should be extended to the whole of society. A supreme religious authority should act as proxy father for everyone. His own charisma and bravery later convinced many people that Khomeini was entitled to claim the role of supreme leader (faqih) for himself. But the theory has an obvious and lethal flaw, built into itself like a trapdoor. What if some lamebrained mediocrity assumes or inherits the title of supreme leader, with its god-given mantle? You might as well accept the slobbering and gibbering firstborn of some hereditary monarch who claims divine right. For this reason, several ayatollahs in Najaf and Qom and other spiritual centers rejected the Khomeini interpretation as soon as it was proposed. Among other things, they doubted that any human was fit for the post of supreme leader or guardian, at least until the 12th and last of the Shia imams reveals himself again and concludes the long period of mourning and grief that is everyday human life. And this division between mullahs, dear reader, is why you have to concentrate with breathless interest on the difference between an Iranian-born mullah who lives in Iraq (al-Sistani) and an Iranian mullah who went into exile in Iraq and came home (Khomeini). It is also the reason why several senior Iranian mullahs are in prison or have been in prison under what claims to be an Islamic republic. Get used to learning these names, too, while there is time. Grand Ayatollah Montazeri. Ayatollah Shabestari. These men, and their courageous disciples, say that Khomeini’s version of the velayat has no Koranic justification. Hence my welcome in that small house in Qom. Hence, also, the present dictatorship by Ayatollah Khamenei: a semi-literate megalomaniac who presumes to regard his subjects as his pupils and his charges. One almost wishes the “orphan” part of the theory were truer than it is. But Iran’s problem is not a surplus of orphans. It is, rather, that the country is afflicted with a vast population of grieving parents and relatives, whose sons and daughters and nephews and nieces were thrown away in the ghastly eight-year war with Saddam Hussein, and who were forced to applaud the evil “human wave” tactics of shady clergymen who promised heaven to the credulous but never cared to risk martyrdom themselves. The word “martyr,” or shahid, is another expression that has become cheapened by overuse in Iran. Every ugly building and intersection seem to be named for one, and people are increasingly bored and sickened by the term. Still, I am bound to say that I was struck almost mute by the cemetery to the south of Tehran. I have made visits to the memorials of the Western Front, where headstones and arches bear the names of the unidentified dead of the First World War, and I have also been to the mass graves of Bosnia and Iraq. But this awful necropolis is of a different order. I don’t think I met a family in Iran that didn’t have a missing or “martyred” or mutilated relative from that era. The total butcher bill for the war was close to a million. Thus, even though the cemetery is placed right next to the hideous memorial to Ayatollah Khomeini (and “why the fuck,” said the guard at the subway station when I asked directions, “would you want to go to that bastard’s grave?”), I approached it with due respect. The Iranian expression for the war with Iraq is “the imposed war.” The odd phrasing reflects the belief that Saddam Hussein was an ally of the West when he launched his aggression, and this time I knew that there was more truth than propaganda to the accusation. (Iranian physicians are the world’s experts in treating those whose lungs have been corroded by poison gas, or whose skin has been agonizingly scalded by chemical bombardment. They have whole hospitals full of ruined patients.) Despite the terrifying culling of its youth in the 1980s, Iran is once again a young country. Indeed, more than half of its population is under 25. The mullahs, in an effort to make up the war deficit, provided large material incentives for women to bear great numbers of children. The consequence of this is a vast layer of frustrated young people who generally detest the clerics. You might call it a baby-boomerang. I am thinking of Jamshid, a clever young hustler whom I part-employed as a driver and fixer. Bright but only partially educated, energetic but effectively unemployed, he had been made to waste a lot of his time on compulsory military service and was continuing to waste time until he could think of a way of quitting the country. “When I was a baby, my mother took me to have my head patted by Khomeini. My fucking hair has been falling out ever since,” he said. You want crack cocaine, hookers, pornography, hooch? This is the downside of the “as if” option. There are thousands of even younger Jamshids lining the polluted boulevards and intersections, trafficking in everything known to man and paying off the riffraff of the morals police. Everybody knows that the mullahs live in luxury, stash money overseas, deny themselves nothing, and indulge in the most blatant hypocrisy. Cynicism about the clergy is universal, but it is especially among the young that one encounters it. It’s also among the young that one most often hears calls for American troops to arrive and bring goodies with them. Yet, after a while, this repeated note began to strike me as childish also. It’s a confession of powerlessness, an avoidance of responsibility, a demand that change come from somewhere else. A whole range of sincere Shia believers, from Grand Ayatollah Montazeri to the relatively lesser clerics such as the junior Khomeini, worry about this because they know that a whole generation is being alienated from religion. But I don’t think the regime much cares that so many of its talented young people have left or are leaving. The Iranian diaspora now runs into millions, from California to Canada and all across Western Europe. Let the smart ones go: all the easier for us to run a stultified and stalled society. And every now and then they make a move to show who is in charge. Last August, in the city of Neka, a 16-year-old girl named Atefeh Rajabi was hauled into a court for having had sex with a man. She might possibly have gotten away with one of the lesser punishments for offenses against chastity, such as a hundred lashes with a whip. (That’s what her partner received.) But from the dock she protested that she had been the object of advances from an older man, and she went as far as to tear off her hijab, or headscarf. The judge announced that she would hang for that, and that he would personally place the noose around her neck. And so, in the main square of Neka, after the Iranian Supreme Court had duly confirmed the ruling, poor Miss Rajabi was hanged from a crane for all to see. Every now and then you can sit in on late-night discussions where young people wonder when the eruption will come. Perhaps the police or the Revolutionary Guards will make an irrevocable mistake and fire into a crowd? Perhaps, at a given hour, a million women will simply remove their hijabs and defy the authorities? (This discussion gets more intense every year as the summer approaches and women face the irritation and humiliation of wearing it in heat and dust.) But nobody wants to be the first to be blinded by acid, or to have their face lovingly slashed by some Hezbollah enthusiast. The student activists of the Tehran “spring” of 1999, and of the elections which seemed to bring a reformist promise, have been picked off one by one, their papers closed and their leadership jailed and beaten. What else to do, then, except tune in to the new Iranian underground “grunge” scene, or kick back in front of the Italian soft-porn channel or one of the sports and fashion and anti-clerical channels beamed in by satellite from exiles in Los Angeles? As if …
For what was Persian culture famous? For poetry, for philosophy, for backgammon, for chess, for architecture, for polo, for gardens, and for wine. (The southern city of Shiraz, once a vineyard town, may have a better claim to the invention of sherry than the Spanish city of Jerez.) The special figure of all this ancient civilization was Omar Khayyám, whose name means “maker of tents” but who flourished as a scholar and poet in the city of Neyshabur in the 11th and 12th centuries. He is best known for his long, languorous poem Rubáiyát: a collection of quatrains, exquisitely rendered into English by Edward FitzGerald, among others. Khayyám was an astronomer and mathematician and was among those commissioned to reform the calendar. In his four-line stanzas, he praised wine, women, and song, found speculation on afterlife pointless, and ridiculed the mullahs of his day. He lived and wrote “as if” they didn’t count. I made a special journey to Ney
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so extreme with my recipes. My previous recipe from 4 years ago calls
for a sugar free syrup which I no longer personally use…we don’t really eat anything with a label anymore, BUT I have a great syrup recipe that is really easy!
(click HERE to find my keto syrup recipe).
So I thought, why not substitute my healthy sugar-free syrup for my pecan pie? Guess what? It works great!
My boys even helped me make it! It is really that easy!
On a side note, today is a very special day!
4 years ago today my life changed forever! While I was sitting in my deer stand bow hunting, at 4:30pm I received an email from our adoption agency with this photo stating this was my son.:)Unarmed Man Charged With Assault Because NYC Police Shot At Him And Hit Random Pedestrians
from the NYPD:-Times-Square-is-the-hottest-third-person-shooter-on-the-market dept
Stop me if you've heard this one:
An emotionally disturbed but unarmed man walks into heavy traffic near Times Square. Police officers arrive on the scene and try to apprehend him. The unarmed man reaches into his pocket, prompting police to open fire in a crowded area. Man is unwounded but two bystanders are shot.
I don't really remember the middle part of this joke but the punchline is this:
An unarmed, emotionally disturbed man shot at by the police as he was lurching around traffic near Times Square in September has been charged with assault, on the theory that he was responsible for bullet wounds suffered by two bystanders, according to an indictment unsealed in State Supreme Court in Manhattan on Wednesday.
Initially Mr. Broadnax was arrested on misdemeanor charges of menacing, drug possession and resisting arrest. But the Manhattan district attorney’s office persuaded a grand jury to charge Mr. Broadnax with assault, a felony carrying a maximum sentence of 25 years. Specifically, the nine-count indictment unsealed on Wednesday said Mr. Broadnax “recklessly engaged in conduct which created a grave risk of death.”
“The defendant is the one that created the situation that injured innocent bystanders,” said an assistant district attorney, Shannon Lucey.
The police arrived and the crowd grew. The hulking man continued on, ignoring the officers’ commands while eluding capture. Then the man reached into his pants pocket, withdrawing his hand as if it were a gun, the police said, and pretended to shoot at some of the officers.
Note the language of the article. “Hulking” man. “Withdrawing his hand as if it were a gun.” These aren’t the words of a news account, but the language of justification and excuses.
There are no doubt times when shots must be fired, and there are no doubt times when a bullet will strike a bystander despite the best, and most competent, efforts of police. But the video of this, taken by a bystander who was not shot, shows a great many cops in the area before the two cops shot at Broadnax, and makes it difficult to understand why the newspapers don’t question why all those cops couldn’t manage to take down one big crazy guy without shooting up the bystanders.
While you're letting that sink in, here are some more details.Here are some more details from the original coverage of the incident As Scott Greenfield points out, this descriptive wording is a prime example of Creative Writing 101 (Law Enforcement Edition).Broadnax didn't even have a gun, as officers plainly saw before opening fire. He had a Metrocard in his hand, and no matter how hulkingly he pointed it at officers, it still didn't turn into a weapon capable of wounding other people. His weaving around in traffic was potentially dangerous, but more to himself than others.Returning once again to the "language of justification and excuses" deployed by the DA's office: someone wandering around in traffic in New York City is hardly creating a "grave risk of death." NYC has plenty of pedestrian traffic, not all of which crosses only at the corners. The man certainly created a "disturbance" but the shots fired by the responding officers created the only injuries. And yet, it will be the man shot at (and missed) who will pay for the mistakes of the officers.The narrative being pushed (back at the time of the incident and again by the DA's office) is that the officers hadbut to risk firing shots in a crowded area because the man wouldn't cooperate (and menaced officers with a Metrocard). But recordings of the incident suggest the cops actually had many more options are their disposal.The video Scott Greenfield posted back in September no longer exists. But this video shows aof NYPD officers attempting to apprehend Broadnax before the shots are fired.
Broadnax was finally subdued by a single officer with a Taser but not before two pedestrians had been shot in an effort to ensure their safety. Holding the arrestee responsible for the bad decisions (and worse aim) of two cops basically sends the message to officers that irresponsible gun usage is perfectly fine, as long as the intentions are pure. If in the future officers hit other bystanders by firing in crowded areas (as they have in the past), the blame will be passed along to the intended target for "forcing" the police to make unwise decisions.
[Postscript: Ken White at Popehat has more thoughts on the NYPD's resemblance to Ike "Don't Make Me Hit You" Turner.]
Filed Under: assault, nyc, nypd, pedestriansI’ll say one thing for Donald Trump, Steve Bannon and the rest of the goon squad: they certainly don’t waste time. Only 13 days since the inauguration and other politicians generally engage in at least some flattering foreplay before getting down to action – but not these bad boys, oh no! No, they’ve gone straight in and grabbed the pussy, just as they promised. Just look at how they and their cheerleaders deal with those who object to their actions.
The demonising of the media – that is, the parts of the media that were not founded by Bannon or Rupert Murdoch – is almost an old story by this point. It has certainly stepped up a notch since Trump swore on Abraham Lincoln’s Bible to defend the US constitution: in the past week and a half, Trump has started referring to the media and anyone who fact-checks him as “the opposition party”, while Bannon told the New York Times that the media should now “keep its mouth shut”. Old news, like I said, albeit news worth keeping in mind.
A top White House official told the media to 'keep its mouth shut'. That's a threat | Francine Prose Read more
It seems apt at this point to look at the constitution that Trump so faithfully promised to uphold. And – what do you know? – the first amendment argues for “the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances”: in other words, to protest.
There have already been a lot of protests during Trump’s presidency. Not as many as there have been executive orders flooding out of the White House, but a fair few: the global Women’s March, in which millions took part; the petition, which has currently notched up more than 1.7m signatures, asking the UK government to call off Trump’s upcoming state visit; the protest at Downing Street and other UK cities on Monday night protesting about Trump’s cackhanded executive order banning immigrants from seven largely Muslim countries. The Women’s Marches and the Downing Street protest were notable for their lack of incident – a marked contrast to Trump’s campaign rallies which were infamously studded with aggression.
Now, like I said, no one can accuse this administration of dragging its feet. And if you expected Team Trump to hold its totalitarian cards close to its chest before revealing how little it cares for the constitutional right to protest, well, you haven’t been paying attention. Kellyanne Conway, the president’s senior aide, sneered about protesters in November. “We’re just treating these adolescents and millennials like precious snowflakes,” she said, using the rightwing term du jour for young people’s alleged hypersensitivity to opinions different from theirs. During the Women’s March the president tweeted: “Watched the protests yesterday but was under the impression we just had an election! Why didn’t these people vote?” Don’t try to argue that if you’re so upset by a bunch of people peacefully marching, or Alec Baldwin imitating you on a late-night comedy show, that you yourself are perhaps not exactly lacking in snowy qualities. We’re in a post-logic world, remember.
Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) Watched protests yesterday but was under the impression that we just had an election! Why didn't these people vote? Celebs hurt cause badly.
But this is coming not just from the Trump administration: an intriguing narrative is quickly taking hold in Britain that to protest against Trump is stupid, self-defeating, hypocritical, evidence of the younger generation’s oversensitive nature (never mind that people of all ages took part in the Downing Street protest and the Women’s March). The Daily Telegraph has run two pieces this week protesting against protest, and the Times published an especially sneer-heavy article claiming that the protesters are “wasting their breath”. A full-page editorial in the Daily Mail on Wednesday dismissed anyone who protests against President Trump as “liberal elites and their sheep-like followers”.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘There was an anti-abortion March for Life in Washington last weekend.’ Photograph: UPI/Barcroft Images
The so-called brains of Brexit, Daniel Hannan, has been especially vocal in his disdain for protest. On the morning of the Women’s March he tweeted: “So pleased that our female head of government ran in her own right rather than as the last guy’s wife, banana-republic-style. #WomensMarch” a tweet so stupid the New Statesman ran an article titled: “19 things wrong with Daniel Hannan’s tweet about the women’s march”. Hannan continued as he began with his thoughts on the petition: “A lot of people on Twitter seem unable to distinguish between ‘I dislike Donald Trump’ and ‘Donald Trump shouldn’t visit the UK’.” And thus Hannan himself then joined the long list of people apparently unable to distinguish between “Trump should not be granted a state visit in his first month of presidency” and “Trump should be banned from the UK”.
These arguments are, for a start, as transparently absurd and self-serving as the Republicans now complaining about Democrats obstructing President Trump’s nominee for the supreme court, when they did the same to President Barack Obama for almost a year. The purity argument is popular among anti-protesters: “You didn’t protest at XYZ, therefore you’re a hypocrite for protesting over ABC!” Who knew you had to protest against everything so as to protest at anything? As for Trump defenders who say state visits from leaders of Russia and Saudi Arabia passed with (little) objection, you may want to ask yourselves whether you’re helping your man by comparing him to Russia.
Piers Morgan, here’s why the Trump protests aren’t ‘endless hysteria’ | Wail Qasim Read more
If people in the UK pay more attention to the leader of America than that of Saudi Arabia, that’s a testament to how Brits see the president as more powerful and more relevant, and hold him to a higher standard. You can’t enjoy your man’s power and then affect outrage when people hold it to account. Or you can, but I think there might be a word for that. As for the argument that Presidents Obama and Jimmy Carter also suddenly ordered Muslim bans – they didn’t base their orders on religion and didn’t do it out of the blue. But other than that, great argument!
Leaving aside that peaceful protest is the root of democracy, the idea that mass protest doesn’t achieve anything can be made only by someone with literally no knowledge of history. As for the suggestion that the best way to deal with Trump is not mass protest but “respectful” engagement, as the Times suggested, this can be made only by someone with absolutely no understanding of the man. He is not a normal politician. To treat him as one is almost as stupid as sneering at protest.
What we are seeing is a chipping away at dissent. Those who sneer at protest should ask themselves what, exactly, they are hoping to achieve. Telling people not to protest is not proof of calm sophistication – it is anti-democratic and strongly suggestive of fear.
Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) The #MarchForLife is so important. To all of you marching --- you have my full support!
Trump’s defenders, after all, are free to protest too, and some of them are already doing so: there is a petition arguing for Trump’s state visit, and there was an anti-abortion March for Life in Washington last weekend. “You have my full support!” Trump tweeted to the March for Life protesters. Because protest is fine, as long as he agrees with it. What a snowflake.Pelosi's new office is House's costliest by far Politics
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has more than quadrupled the rent on her San Francisco district office, making the $18,736-a-month cost of her new South of Market space the highest in the House, according to a new report.
The rent - part of Pelosi's budget, which is funded by taxpayers - is nearly double the next-highest rent in the House: Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., pays $10,600 a month for his Manhattan office, while representatives from Sacramento, Boston and Los Angeles pay nearly that much, the report said.
The financial data were compiled from public records by the nonprofit Sunlight Foundation and Roll Call, a political newspaper. Information from the database is not yet available online.
Pelosi moved in the fall from the federal building at 450 Golden Gate Ave. to the 18-story federal building at 90 Seventh St. She had been paying about $4,300 a month for her old office, Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said.
"After being based in the Burton Federal Building for over 20 years, we were no longer able to meet the needs of San Franciscans in the existing space," Hammill said in a statement. "The new office space is 3,075 square feet, nearly a third larger than the old space, which was of inadequate size. Additionally, the new building is more centrally located, right off of Market Street, which allows for easier access for constituents via public transportation.
In addition to the speaker's space needs, her new office is also more secure, Hammill added.
"As speaker, the security needs are different," he said. "The new San Francisco Federal Building offers enhanced security features, which were a major factor in the decision to move offices."It’s a speck compared to the 27 big monuments the White House has targeted for federal review. Yet backers of the San Juan Islands National Monument, a Washington state tourism magnet in the Salish Sea, hardly feel safe.
WASHINGTON — With only 1,000 acres, the San Juan Islands National Monument in northwestern Washington state may be too tiny to even matter to President Donald Trump.
It’s a speck compared with the 27 big monuments that the White House targeted for a federal review on Friday, with only one on the list smaller than 100,000 acres.
Yet backers of the San Juan Islands monument, a tourism magnet in the Salish Sea, hardly feel safe. They fear that Trump could soon use an executive order he signed on April 26 to try to overturn designations of smaller federally protected sites, too.
A little-noticed provision opens the door to that possibility. It allows Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review any designation if he determines that it was made “without adequate public outreach and coordination with relevant stakeholders.”
“I don’t think anything is safe under this president,” said Democratic U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, whose Washington state district includes the 4-year-old monument, made up of 75 small islands, rocks and pinnacles and a home to orca whales, harbor seals and bald eagles. “My concern is that the president wants to get rid of national monuments altogether.”
Bryan Watt, spokesman for Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., said the language in Trump’s order includes “a huge loophole for Zinke to include smaller monuments” in the review.
Cantwell, the ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said that Trump’s order could open up thousands of acres of public lands and coastal shores, accusing the president of trying to “exploit lands held in public trust.”
“Over 100 years of conservation is proposed to be undone in just a few days by President Trump,” Cantwell said in a speech on the Senate floor two weeks ago.
Under Trump’s order, Zinke has 45 days to release an initial report, with final recommendations due within 120 days. He kicked off the review this week with a “listening tour” in Utah and stops at the controversial Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, two of the 27 monuments to be “initially reviewed.”
Since President Theodore Roosevelt designated Devils Tower in Wyoming as the first national monument in 1906, 15 other presidents have used their power under the Antiquities Act to create or expand another 156 national monuments that total 840 million acres.
Trump, who pledged as a presidential candidate to open more federal lands to energy development, isn’t the only one complaining about the law.
It has set off alarms on Capitol Hill after Trump’s predecessor, President Barack Obama, used the law 34 times to protect nearly 554 million acres of land and water as national monuments.
Last week, Idaho Republican Rep. Raul Labrador said that Obama had locked up acreage that measured “10 times the size of Idaho” while setting “a new standard for executive overreach.”
The complaints prompted a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Federal Lands, where Republicans stepped up their attacks.
California Republican Rep. Tom McClintock, the panel’s chairman, told his colleagues that the monuments often result in broad prohibitions on roads, hunting and fishing and other recreational uses, denying access to too many Americans.
“Preserving these lands for future generations does not mean closing them to the current generation,” he said.
And Labrador, another member of the subcommittee, praised Trump’s move but said the White House plan to review the monuments and then recommend any changes did not go far enough.
Labrador introduced a bill that would require approval from Congress and any state with a proposed monument before a president would designate a monument.
“Individuals who live near our public lands and state and local elected officials know how to best protect our cherished lands,” Labrador said, “more than any bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., or any think tank or any other group like that, or even the president of the United States.”
Idaho Republican Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch are promoting a similar bill in the Senate, called the Improved National Monument Designation Process Act. Like Labrador’s bill, it would require states and Congress to sign off on national monuments. Risch said the legislation “would allow for greater transparency.”
Idaho has one of the 27 monuments up for review, Craters of the Moon National Monument.
In Washington state, presidents have used the law four times to create national monuments, though there are only three now: San Juan Islands, Hanford Reach and Mount St. Helens. The fourth, Mount Olympus, became Olympic National Park in 1938.
With 195,000 acres, the Hanford Reach monument created by President Bill Clinton in 2000 is the only one in Washington state on the initial list of 27 that fits Trump’s criteria: larger than 100,000 acres and created in the last 21 years. Mount St. Helen’s National Volcanic Monument is large enough, with 110,000 acres, but it was established in 1982 by President Ronald Reagan.
But for many of Trump’s critics, fears persist that more bad news is yet to come.
Larsen said he planned to visit the San Juan Islands this week to meet with locals who battled for years to create the monument.
“They’re worried,” he said. “We don’t want a target on the back of the San Juan national monument.”
When Obama created the monument in 2013, his proclamation called the San Juan Islands “an unmatched landscape of contrasts, where forests (seem) to spring from gray rock and distant snow-capped peaks provide the backdrop for sandy beaches.”
It’s a place long cherished by those who live there.
“Right now it’s wildflower season, and the wildflowers out at Iceberg Point are gorgeous,” said Tom Reeve of Lopez Island, chairman of the San Juan Islands monument advisory committee. “And when the whales are by, there’s no place better to watch them.”
Reeve said he and other backers of the monument will fight the Trump administration if necessary, but he’s hoping that doesn’t happen.
“We’re definitely not excluded in the order,” Reeve said. “But it would take quite a stretch to say that there wasn’t strong public input in this designation. So I don’t think we’re at risk, though frankly if there are changes made to other monuments, that makes us nervous. Because it sets a precedent that the proclamations aren’t as permanent as we want them to be.”Even if you're a massive science fiction fan, there are probably still some great shows you've yet to discover. But for massively long-running shows, where to begin? Here's our guide to how to start watching twenty classic science fiction shows.
It should be pointed out that this guide is meant for potential new fans, not people who already love these shows. We advise in quite a few instances to skip entire seasons of shows, and that's not something a big fan of a show is likely to agree with. But this is all about the best way to get hooked on a show, and we of course recommend checking out the rest of a series once you've sampled the best of what a show has to offer.
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We're also focusing more on seasons of shows than specific brilliant episodes, because it's easier to reach consensus - and thus make useful recommendations to the most people - on an entire season than one particular episode. So, let's start with the biggest, most daunting science fiction franchise of them all...
Star Trek: The Original Series
Since it only ran three seasons, the easy answer is just to tell you to watch all of it. Unfortunately, the third season has a whole lot of badness in it, which is the result of slashed budgets and the influence of new producer Fred Freiberger. (He also presided over the similarly derided second season of Space: 1999.) There are a few decent episodes in there - "The Tholian Web" is probably the best of the bunch - but most of the classics are to be found in the first two seasons, and almost all the notoriously awful episodes ("Plato's Stepchildren", "Spock's Brain") are season three entries. So just stick with seasons 1 and 2, then head into season 3 with extreme caution.
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Star Trek: The Next Generation
This one is fairly straightforward - start with season three. The show hit some real lows in its first season, and anybody unsure about whether they like TNG is unlikely to get past the first dozen or so episodes. The second season, while a bit of an improvement, is missing one of the show's main cast members, as Gates McFadden's Dr. Crusher was replaced by Diana Muldaur's Dr. Pulaski. There's a lot to like about the second season (and Pulaski is hardly a total disaster), but everything clicks into place with the third season. That season has the added benefit of ending on what may be the biggest cliffhanger in television history. If that doesn't have you coming back for more, nothing will.
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Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Deep Space Nine was a far more arc-driven show than The Next Generation, so there's slightly more to be gained with starting at the beginning and putting up with the show's growing pains (which, to be fair, were never as bad as TNG's). Still, there's a fairly clear division in arcs between the first two seasons, which is more heavily focused on the Bajoran/Cardassian conflict, and the third season onwards, which focuses on the coming war with the Dominion. As such, for those on the fence about DS9, we suggest jumping in with season three.
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Star Trek: Voyager
There's really no sense in pretending otherwise - Voyager isn't really all that good of a show, and if you're going to dive into nineties Star Trek, I'd head to TNG and DS9 first. Still, the show has its charms, and it did get better as it went along. I'd jump right to the last episode of season 3, the first half of the "Scorpion" two-parter. "Scorpion" is consistently voted the series's best episode, and it also introduces the half-human, half-Borg, all-sexy Seven of Nine, who is pretty much the one iconic thing to come out of this show. Most of the show's best episodes come in the fourth season onwards, and you get to avoid the only Star Trek episode so bad that everyone involved disowned it. (Although, depending on your mindset, that might actually be just the sort of thing you want to check out.)
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Star Trek: Enterprise
When it comes to latter-day Star Trek, there's just something special about seasons 3 and 4, because that's where I'd suggest you start with for Enterprise as well. The prequel series took a while to find its feet, spinning its wheels for two seasons with a lot of not terribly interesting stuff about a new alien race called the Suliban and a far future conflict known as the Temporal Cold War. The show was retooled at the end of both the second and third season, and both were arguably improvements.
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The third season ditched the Suliban as the Enterprise headed into the war-torn region of space known as the Expanse, in the hopes of either stopping the coming war...or winning it. The fourth season went with less long-form storytelling in favor of shorter, more contained arcs, which again produced a bunch of standout episodes. Although do yourself a favor - unless you absolutely love Enterprise, skip the series finale. Actually, if you absolutely love Enterprise, that's even more reason not to watch it.
Doctor Who
We're only going to talk about the new series, because a guide to getting into the classic series is an article in and of itself. (And here it is! Although I will say that "Robots of Death" is pretty much the perfect introduction to classic Who.) The best way to approach the new Doctor Who largely depends on what you want to get out of it. If you just want to get up to speed for the upcoming series, then I'd just watch the fifth season, plus "Silence in the Library"/"The Forest of the Dead" and maybe "Blink". That'll get you pretty much up to speed on the Steven Moffat & Matt Smith era.
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If you're looking for a more general introduction, then I'd suggest starting with either the first or fourth season. The show definitely improves as it goes along, but the initial season, starring Christopher Eccleston, season has its own unique energy that's still a lot of fun to watch, and it's a good place to start (although the second season hasn't aged very well). The fourth season presents a great mix of stories without any real duds...well, until you get to the final two episodes. Those should be approached with extreme caution.
Finally, if all you want to do is sample the best (and biggest) of the new series to see if you like it, then here's the quick list: "Rose", "Dalek", anything by Steven Moffat and Paul Cornell, "The Impossible Planet"/"The Satan Pit", "Midnight", "The Waters of Mars", and, for better or worse, the five season finales.
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Torchwood
But what of Doctor Who's anagrammatic spin-off? The first two seasons aren't a complete waste of time, but they're dangerously close, and even the best episodes (probably "Captain Jack Harkness" and "Fragments") are some degree of flawed or derivative. So unless your tolerance for nonsensical plots, general silliness, and lots of sex and angst masquerading as mature storytelling is epically high, I'd skip the first two seasons completely and head straight for the brilliant, brutal Children of Earth. The mini-series might represent the greatest jump up in quality from one season to the next in television history, and it's Russell T. Davies at his nastiest and most pessimistic - which, as he also showed in the Doctor Who episode "Midnight", also happens to be Davies at his absolute best.
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Red Dwarf
While we're on the topic of British science fiction, let's talk about what is (pretty much by default) the best live-action science fiction comedy ever, Red Dwarf. I learned this the hard way when I tried to introduce a friend to Red Dwarf by showing him an episode from each of the six seasons: unless you fall instantly in love with the show, the first two seasons are very hit-and-miss. The show picks up considerably with season three, and it more or less keeps up the quality until the end of season six, when the original writing team parted ways and the show started to run out of ideas. So start with season three, save the first two seasons for later, and only head into the post-sixth season material if you really, really want more Red Dwarf.
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The Prisoner
The show only ran for seventeen episodes, so how hard can it be to start watching? The difficulty isn't the number of episodes, it's the order in which you should watch them. There are at least four different preferred orders in which you can watch The Prisoner, and the show's already challenging enough without have to figure out which episodes goes where. The fact of the matter is, although I think the so-called Six of One Order is probably the best, it doesn't really matter. Just watch "Arrival" first and "Once Upon a Time" and "Fall Out" last, and you'll be fine. Oh, and you can skip "Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling." I'd say the same about "The Girl Who Was Death", but that one is just too stupidly fun to ignore.
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The Twilight Zone
Rod Serling's legendary anthology series represents a particular challenge for potential new fans. There are 156 episodes, and nothing connecting any of them apart from Serling's iconic narration. Although the seasons have all been released on DVD - the first two are mostly brilliant, the third and fourth are a mixed bag, and the fifth is more bad than good - an entire season isn't really the best jumping-on point. I'd suggest seeking out some of the old "Best Of" DVDs they put out a few years ago. There are a few particularly brilliant showcases of the Twilight Zone format: "Walking Distance", "Time Enough at Last", "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street", "The Eye of the Beholder", "The Odyssey of Flight 33", and "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" (starring William Shatner!) are all excellent places to enter The Twilight Zone.
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Mystery Science Theater 3000
MST3K presents the same basic problem as The Twilight Zone. There are very few episodes that aren't at least mildly amusing, and the vast majority of episodes are hilarious. So where do you start? There's no point in going in any particular order - the show has barely any continuity, and it's all the better for it - so it's just a question of finding the right introductory movie. Some of the show's most famous episodes, like "Manos: The Hands of Fate" and the Coleman Francis magnum opus "Red Zone Cuba", aren't the best places to start because the movies being riffed on are just too horrendously boring. It's better to start with movies that, while equally awful, are a bit more exciting, like "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians", "Space Mutiny", "Mitchell", "Time Chasers", or "Eegah", and then move on to the exquisite tedium that is "Manos: The Hands of Fate."
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The X-Files
The X-Files is a good example of a show that, if you're going to start watching it now, it's probably wise to not get too invested in it, because it's all going to end in frustration. (Lost is another obvious example.) The show gets off to a good start in its first season, and it keeps up a consistently high quality for roughly its first six seasons, including the first movie. But the show starts running out of steam in the seventh season, and by the time Mulder has left the show in the eighth and ninth season the show is a pale shadow of its former self. Worst of all, the show's central mystery has never really been fully resolved, and it most likely never will. So definitely enjoy the first six seasons of The X-Files as nineties science fiction - hell, nineties television in general - at its finest. Just be prepared to have more questions than answers when it's all over.
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Buffy the Vampire Slayer
This one is a bit tough, because there's no obvious consensus as to which seasons were the best, and there's even less consensus as to which season is the worst. Still, it's probably safe to say that season 1 can be left for later, and the second season is a good place to start. The show had worked through a lot of its first season growing pains, and the second season sets up a lot of the characters and arcs that would endure for the rest of the show's run.
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If you want to skip ahead to the even stronger third season, I don't have a problem with that. (Particularly because the bad guy is Mayor Wilkins! How cool is that... for me!?) As for when to stop watching... well, some people hate the later seasons, which had less direct involvement from Joss Whedon, and some think they're the best of the bunch. So this is probably one of those rare times to just bust out the pragmatism and keep watching until you no longer enjoy it.
Angel
Do yourself a favor - skip the first two seasons of Angel. A very worthwhile show eventually emerged, but it took a while for that to happen, and you're not missing anything if you just skip right ahead to the third season. Seriously, what is it about science fiction shows getting really good in their third seasons? If this is actually a general rule of science fiction, I'm a little scared to imagine how good Firefly would have gotten if it had survived another couple of years. I think we can safely assume it would have won multiple Nobel Prizes for Literature... and Chemistry, just for the hell of it.
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Dollhouse
For Joss Whedon's shorter-lived shows, the temptation is to say you should just watch them all. For Firefly, that's pretty much the case (although "Shindig" and "Safe" aren't that great), but Dollhouse definitely has some eminently skippable episodes. The first five episodes are all fairly inessential, the result of - this will come as a shock - meddling on the part of Fox executives, who wanted the show to be more episodic and less serialized. There's an argument that it's worth watching the first episode "Ghost", which helps introduce this strange new world, but the sixth episode "Man on the Street" rehashes most of the essential points anyway. After that, all the rest of the episodes are more or less essential. (It's also worth watching the unaired pilot, which is included as a DVD extra and covers a lot of the same ground as the first half-dozen episodes.)
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Babylon 5
Series creator J. Michael Straczynski always intended the show to be one big story told over five seasons - unfortunately, it didn't quite work out that way. When the creative team thought the show would be canceled at the end of the fourth season, they condensed the final two seasons worth of story into one... and then they got a fifth season anyway, forcing them to come up with new stories from scratch.
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So, although all of the first four seasons are essential to the show's overall arc, it's only in the second season that the ongoing story picks up and the show really starts cooking. (In fact, there's an argument to be made that you'll get more out of the first season if you come back to it after seeing the later seasons, the better to appreciate the more subtle groundwork Straczynski and company put in.) The fifth season has its critics and isn't quite up to the standard of what came before, but it's also worth checking out.
Highlander: The Series
Although the original movie is more stupidly enjoyable than legitimately good, the TV series it spawned enjoys a relatively solid critical reputation. Like a lot of shows on this list, its first season is a bit shaky, but the second season is definitely well worth watching, and the next few seasons are also a lot of fun. Unfortunately, the show goes over a cliff in its sixth and final season, so that one can be safely left alone.
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Battlestar Galactica
When we're talking about shows with an overarching mystery and complex mythology, it's difficult to say if it's better to just start at the beginning or jump on when the show actually got good. Thankfully, the 21st century BSG removes that conundrum completely, because the first episode of the series proper, "33", is quite possibly the show's best episode. Indeed, the first three seasons are all consistently very strong, and I actually don't think there's much of a dip in the fourth season either. (That point is...debated.) So, unless you really don't think you can commit three hours to something you've seen before, just start with the mini-series and go from there. Although do yourself a favor and skip "Black Market" and "The Woman King" when you get to them. Anything worth knowing from those will be in the next episodes' recaps.
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Lost
It's hard to imagine who would want to start watching this show right now, particularly after all the rancor over the series finale. Still, if you are looking to get into Lost, the show is so heavily serialized that it really only makes sense to start with the first season. That said, the show had a tendency to spin its wheels and go nowhere slowly, particularly in the second season. If a season becomes too much of a drag, you might want to skip ahead to the next season and restart - just be prepared for a lot of googling to figure out what the hell's going on. (Another trick is to track down those special recap episodes Lost would air before some of its seasons.)
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The Stargate Franchise
Let's finish off with a look at the three Stargate shows.
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a highly specialized computer worm called Stuxnet. It managed to effectively hijack the Natanz nuclear facility and get the centrifuges to destroy themselves, researchers say.
Iranian officials pointed fingers at Israel and the United States; officials from neither country commented.
More recently, the crash of an American drone in Iran revealed covert U.S. activity in that country.
The Sentinel drone was on a mission to survey suspected nuclear sites in the country, U.S. military officials told CNN.
In public comments, U.S. officials generally focus on the sanctions, including those imposed by the United States and the U.N. Security Council, which U.S. officials call "unprecedented" for Iran.
For example, Iranian planes have been grounded when countries refused to refuel the planes due to the sanctions.
The logic behind the sanctions is "that at some point the pain for Iran will be too great and it will give in," Hibbs said. "So far, that hasn't happened."
Iran, meanwhile, has struck back on numerous fronts.
Recently, it threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, a critical transit point for one-fifth of the world's oil. The United States warned Iran against such a move.
U.S. military and Coast Guard ships had two close encounters this month with high-speed Iranian boats that exhibited provocative behavior in the Strait of Hormuz and Persian Gulf, U.S. military officials said.
While many analysts, including Hibbs, refer to the threat to close the strait as "saber-rattling," Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian-American Council, says that if Iran considers itself as being engaged in a war, it might actually try such a move.
"That's part of the reason they're playing up the Strait of Hormuz card," said Parsi, author of the book "A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama's Diplomacy with Iran."
"It's extremely counterproductive and would inflict a tremendous amount of damage on Iran itself. But in wartime, you could do things like that."
Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Ghasemi recently complained that Iran's enemies are waging "economic war," according to state-run news agency IRNA. And state-run PressTV quoted a member of the country's committee on national security and foreign policy, Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, as saying last month that the violation of Iran's airspace by a U.S. spy drone amounts to an "act of war."
Analysts also point to other steps Iran is taking as likely responses to the increasing pressure.
Among them are the arrests of Westerners. Most recently, Iran sentenced Amir Mirzaei Hekmati, a U.S. ex-Marine, to death for alleged espionage. His family and the U.S. government deny the accusations.
Hekmati and others are "potentially pawns in a game that Iran can play with the West," Hibbs said. "Foreigners are potential hostages in Iran to a negotiation."
Analysts also note the November siege on the British Embassy in Tehran, in which protesters stormed the embassy and a separate diplomatic compound. The British government warned Iran of "serious consequences" as a result.
The incident was seen as Iran, "with informal supporters that it orchestrates," threatening the safety of diplomats from "P5+1" countries, Hibbs said. P5+1 refers to the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States -- along with Germany. They have been working to bring Iran to the negotiating table.
Finally, analysts say Iran's activities in Iraq and Afghanistan are seen as a response to the pressure being mounted against it.
While the full extent of Iran's activities in each country is unclear, U.S. officials have spoken out against the idea of Iran trying to build its influence.
U.S. officials said last year there was strong evidence that Shiite militias in Iraq were using Iranian weapons to attack U.S. troops. In October, Clinton warned Iran not to view the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq as an opportunity to increase its role.
"No one, most particularly Iran, should miscalculate about our continuing commitment to and with the Iraqis going forward," she said.
President Ahmadinejad said his country will not increase its involvement with Iraq because of the U.S. withdrawal. "I don't think there is going to be any change," he said at the time.
Last year, the United States accused Iran of providing sanctuary to an al Qaeda network that provides help to jihadists moving between the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
In December, the Congressional Research Service said in a report that the Obama administration "identifies Iran as a major threat to U.S. national security interests" based not only on its nuclear program but also its "support for militant groups in the Middle East and in Iraq and Afghanistan."
As the web of pressure over Iran continues to grow, meanwhile, it is unclear what could lie ahead.
Panetta said Wednesday that diplomacy is "always an option" to pursue.
"And we've always expressed a willingness to try to do that," he said. "But we've always made clear that in terms of any threats to the region, in terms of some of the behavior that they've conducted in the region, that we'll also be prepared to respond militarily if we have to."Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump leads Democratic rival Hillary Clinton in Iowa, according to an Emerson College poll, while a separate poll showed a statistical tie in Virginia.
The survey of likely Iowa voters showed Trump leading Clinton by 44 percent to 39 percent, with Libertarian Gary Johnson at 8 percent and Green Party candidate Jill Stein at just 1 percent.
The results of the poll suggest Clinton is having difficulty securing the Democratic vote in Iowa, as 34 percent of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., voters support a candidate other than the former Secretary of State.
Gender is playing a significant role in the race, as Trump leads 51 percent to 30 percent among men compared to Clinton's 47 percent to 39 percent advantage among women.
Meanwhile, a survey of likely Virginia voters showed Clinton with a slim 44 percent to 43 percent lead over Trump. The one-point gap is well within the poll's margin of error.
Eleven percent of likely Virginia voters said they support Johnson, while another 3 percent favor Stein.
Trump holds a wide lead over Clinton among white voters, but Clinton has strong support among minority and female voters.
The Emerson poll of 600 likely Iowa voters was conducted August 31st through September 1st and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.
The survey of 800 likely Virginia voters was conducted August 30th through September 1st and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.
(Photo: Michael Vadon)
For comments and feedback contact: [email protected]
Business NewsThis past year I have been in the process of weeding out the chemicals in my life. The kind of unnecessary chemicals that are in cleaning products, skincare, hair care, makeup, non-organic produce, and so forth. I’ve chosen to do this partially to lessen my carbon footprint, and mostly for my personal health and well-being. Not to mention it’s cheaper!
Along the way I stopped using shampoo and conditioner. This may sound weird for some, or even “gross”, but I swear to you that it isn’t. I’m excited enough about it that I want to write a post to explain why you might want to give it a try too!
I came across this concept, that has been known as the “No Poo” movement, while reading online. I don’t personally like to call it that- I can’t get past the fact that poo is usually a nickname for poop, and I’m totally not into that when we’re talking about my hair. In any case, those who go “No Poo” do actually still wash their hair. We actually still condition it too. And the way we do it is actually way, way better for your hair.
(It had been 6 weeks since I shampooed my hair when I took this picture!)
So why not shampoo?
First of all, shampoo is a detergent, meaning it strips your hair completely of its natural oils. While none of us want yucky, greasy hair, stripping the oils away completely is actually counter-productive. Your scalp recognizes that all the oils are gone, and starts to pump out extra. This is why those of you who shower and wash your hair every day actually NEED to wash your hair every day: because your hair legitimately gets greasy faster than the hair of those who don’t wash their hair every day! You’ve taught it to do this. (You skin actually does this too, while we’re on the topic. This is why moisturizing after washing your face is a good idea- your skin will want to pump out extra oil if you leave it with that tight, dry feeling. And we know that’s definitely no good for acne!)
Shampoo also contains many hazardous chemicals, including fragrances, which are usually carcinogenic (aka cancer-causing) and not so friendly to your lungs when you take a whiff, DMDM hydantoin (allergy aggravator), and 1,4-dioxane (which The Environmental Protection Agency has labeled as a human carcinogen as well). Not to mention what they add in each different variety.
Also, it’s expensive! Depending on what brand you buy, what type of hair you have, and what scent you like, you might end up paying anywhere from $8-$20 every month or two. That may seem like a normal expense, but what if it’s not necessary? You could save a lot!
How do I get my hair clean, then?
That’s the best part. Baking soda! Stick with me here- it works, you guys. I had a few concerns when I wanted to try washing my hair with baking soda, too. The first is that I thought I was going to need A LOT of baking soda to wash my hair as well as shampoo. The second was whether or not it was even going to work as well as shampoo anyway. I had tried putting things like cornstarch and dry shampoo in my hair on off-days when it started getting greasy, and while it worked, it never cleaned my hair from that greasy feeling like shampoo did.
To my happy surprise, I didn’t need that much baking soda to do the trick, and yes, it cleaned my hair just as well as shampoo did. It didn’t have the nice scent like shampoo or lather into bubbles, but I’d gladly sacrifice that for the health and cost benefits.
Baking soda also doesn’t strip the oils completely from your hair, even though It totally feels like it does. No oily-ness in sight. That might sound like a half-ass job at washing your hair, but the best part is, it’s actually better. I know it sounds counter-intuitive, but when you stop stripping your hair’s natural oils away completely, you won’t get greasy as often! Your hair learns to stop pumping out extra oil all the time, and your hair gets LESS greasy the MORE you substitute baking soda for shampoo.
What about conditioner?
This is the other half of the equation, and equally exciting! I don’t use conditioner either- and let me tell you what, my hair is actually stronger, shinier, and less dry & brittle thanks to apple cider vinegar and raw (unrefined) coconut oil. A couple tablespoons of ACV in a big glass of water is all you need to condition your hair. People like to use it as a “rinse”, but I like to make sure that my dry ends get thoroughly moisturized before anything else, so I dip them in the cup and let them soak for a minute before dumping all over the rest of my hair. Then I let it sit for a few minutes while I do something else, like wash my face, and rinse it off. It does smell vinegar-y, but that smell goes away mostly after rinsing and ultimately, completely after drying.
So why ACV? Most importantly, it has a natural pH of 4.25-5.0 when undiluted. Your hair’s natural, healthy pH likes to be somewhere similar (see the table below), or just slightly more alkaline than that. Water’s pH is a neutral 7.0, and a few tablespoons of apple cider vinegar is all it takes for that water to become the perfect pH for your hair.
The amazing part about this is that when your hair is at a healthy pH level, it can function correctly. The cuticle is naturally smooth and seals itself against further chemical and heat damage. You don’t need to coat your hair shaft with chemicals to protect it from these things- with apple cider vinegar, your hair can do that by itself! It also helps the pH of your scalp (see “skin” in the graph above)- eliminating dandruff, along with clearing away product buildup from mousses, gels, and hairspray, AND rinses off whatever leftover dirt and oil is still there.
Normal conditioners that you buy at the store don’t account for your hair’s pH at all. Instead, they use oils and silicone to make it feel smooth and temporarily help make the cuticle less rough. These are not necessarily good for your hair, despite how they make it feel, and regardless of what the packaging says, they cannot actually penetrate the shaft and nourish your hair on the inside. In fact, it was just a couple decades ago that hair conditioner’s main ingredient was sheep sebum. Sebum- you know, like the stuff your shampoo just scrubbed away?
Coconut oil, however, DOES penetrate your skin and hair, nourishing them both from the inside. This is due to two different components of unrefined coconut oil, which “has a ‘medium chain’ of 12 carbon atoms but the size of the molecule is only part of the puzzle. The shape of the molecule is also important. Coconut oil is highly saturated which means the carbon atoms are “filled up” with hydrogen atoms. In addition, the molecule is a straight chain with no branching. Most oil is unsaturated (not all the carbons are ‘filled up’ and the molecule is branched.) This difference in configuration allows the coconut oil molecules to slip in between the inter-cellular spaces in the hair’s cuticle layer so it can penetrate into the cortex. …Most other oils do not have this ability. None of the other oils penetrate like coconut oil, but all of them can help lubricate hair. However, since they do not penetrate, they need to be used in a leave on product like a hairdressing. When delivered from a conditioner or other rinse off product, they will simply go down the drain.” *Please note that unrefined, or raw, coconut oil is the only kind of coconut oil with these special medium-chain fatty acids. Refined has been altered to withstand higher heats, and therefore is just pure saturated fat- which cannot penetrate into your hair or skin.
Research shows that hair can absorb around 15% of its weight in coconut oil in an hour. An overnight soaking oil (six hours) increases absorption to around 20% or 25%!
I only have two qualms with this new type of conditioning:
1) Apple cider vinegar doesn’t leave your hair silky-smooth when you get out of the shower. It will be when it dries (much smoother than normal, in fact), but the lack of that yucky, plastic-y silicone in your hair means that you have no extra coat of silky gunk on top of your hair. This is a good thing, but it does make for some rougher-feeling wet hair. A key tip here is to make sure your hair is brushed, combed, and totally de-tangled (this is especially important for long hair like mine!) BEFORE showering, so you don’t tangle it up while it’s wet. I can get past that knowing that what I’m doing is actually better for it, though!
2) With coconut oil it is impossible to get out of your hair with just the baking soda. You must use soap of some kind to effectively wash it all… but I think that once a week or a few times a month, I’m okay with that for the deep-conditioning I get from the coconut oil. I just try to use products that contain natural ingredients (like Dr. Bonner’s)!
Measurements and tips: You can use regular white distilled vinegar, especially if you’re blonde, but it’s significantly more acidic, so the standard is 1 teaspoon per cup (8 oz) of water. Apple cider vinegar takes 1-2 tablespoons per cup (8 oz) of water. ACV rinses are safe for color treated hair- mine is part colored, part natural (I’m growing the color out) and it’s worked beautifully on both. I use anywhere from 1/3-1/2 cup of baking soda for a wash, and all you need to do is rub it right into your hair and scalp! Concentrate on the scalp area more than anything, as it’s the main area that needs clarifying. You can make a paste ahead of time, but it’s really unnecessary because when you put dry baking soda on wet hair, it has the same effect anyway.Your browser does not support HTML5 video tag.Click here to view original GIF
No one likes having their game crash on them, but it’s gotta be especially painful when you’re in the middle of marathon speedrunning session.
That’s what happened to Bl00dyBizkitz in the middle of a platinum trophy attempt in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix on PS4 (available as part of the 2.5 Remix compilation). Over eight and a half hours into his run, Bl00dy went to save his game for the first time only to be greeted by a CE-37878-0 error code. He immediately closed his eyes, resigned and defeated while the Twitch chat exploded in disbelief. “Looks like you win this round game,” he said.
Most of us have been there before. You’re deep into a game, blazing through it with hours of progress under your belt, suckered into a false sense of security because of generous auto-saves and how easy it is to leave games running in the background and come back to them whenever you feel like. Then, inexplicable, your game crashes. It’s 2017, you think to yourself, how are games still allowed to crash?
The save crash in the Kingdom Hearts 2.5 HD is a well known bug by this point, at least among the people playing it on PS4. Despite a large, day-one patch from Square Enix when the game was released in March, the problem has persisted, torturing players with its twisted paradox: you need to save often to protect progress but saving the game is the very thing that triggers the crash.
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Bl00dy is a consumate Kingdom Hearts speedrunner, holding records in a handful of different categories, and was doing the platinum attempt for fun as part of his Month of Kingdom Hearts streaming schedule. But even as many speedrunners utilize glitches in games to try and beat them more quickly, there’s not much they can do in the face of bugs like the above. The game still has a handful of problems plaguing players, including multiple sound issues, but Square Enix hasn’t announced if there are any new patches in the pipeline at this time.
You can re-watch the entire speedrun, up until the crash, here.In what smacks of a desperate move, West Brom boss Tony Pulis has taken former West Ham forward Ricardo Vaz Te on trial.
It is understood the ex-Bolton man is training with the Baggies as Pulis looks to strengthen his strikeforce.
Vaz Te has been without a club since leaving Turkish side Akhisar Belediyespor in the summer after six months.
He left West Ham in January after three years at Upton Park following 19 goals in 61 games.
The 28-year-old also played for Barnsley and Hibernian after moving to Bolton in 2003 from Portuguese side Farense.
Albion have scored just three times this season and drew a blank in Saturday’s dull 0-0 draw with Southampton despite Saido Berahino’s return.
Berahino threatened on Twitter to never play for the Baggies again after they rejected deadline day offers from Tottenham but Pulis has reintegrated him back into the squad and he was a second half substitute in the draw with Saints.Have you been looking for healthy food swaps to maintain a weight loss effort or a healthy lifestyle? Have you gone down the road of making huge changes to your eating habits only to find yourself failing over and over again? Well, the truth is- making huge changes and expecting quick results isn’t manageable and may only work for a short period of time. What you would like to focus on is to learn how to make small manageable and sustainable changes that will have a huge impact in the long time. So, here are 14 healthy food swaps to help you slash the calories without making huge sacrifices to your favorite food and flavors.
14 Healthy Food Swaps
Granola may sound like a healthy breakfast option. It might shock you to know that just half a cup of granola has about 300 calories. It is high in oil, butter and sugar. Swap it for muesli instead. Muesli has the same raw ingredients as granola but without any oil, butter and added sugar. You will be saving about 156 calories.
A twelve-ounce latte with whole milk has an average of 200 calories and that’s ten percent of your daily calorie recommendation. Swap it for a cup of Americano and you’ll be saving 200 calories. If it’s too strong to your liking, you can always add a little amount of semi-skimmed milk or swap your latte with a cup of green tea.
Be aware of dressings and dips!
One tablespoon of mayo has a whopping 90 calories and 10 grams of fat. It is high in calories but very low in nutrients. Swap it for greek yogurt instead, it’s one tablespoon has 14 calories and under one gram of fat. You’ll be saving 80 calories. Use it as a salad dressing or dip, mix it with tuna, eggs, chicken or potato, or use it as the base of a creamy dessert.
The dressing you choose may ruin a healthy salad. One tablespoon of creamy salad dressing has a whopping 70 calories. It’s loaded with saturated fat, sugar and salt. Keep your salad healthy and swap it for oil and vinegar-based dressings. You’ll be saving 55 calories plus you’ll be adding healthy fats into your meal.
One small packet of crisps has 170 calories already and close to zero nutrients. They are high in saturated fat, calories and salt. Swapped it for plain or lightly-seasoned air-popped popcorn. One cup of it only has 31 calories. It is packed with antioxidants, fiber, and excellent for digestion.
Don’t be fooled by soups. One cup of creamy mushroom soup can rock as many as 220 calories and 17 grams of fat. Swap it for homemade broth-based soup which is just 18 calories per cup. You’ll be saving more than 200 calories and also your waistline.
A cup of whole dairy milk has 148 calories. Swap it for unsweetened almond milk and save 88 calories. Almond milk is also great for vegans and those with lactose intolerance.
Here are more healthy food swaps for a healthier you.
Swap soda drinks including diet sodas for sparkling water. You will still get the fizz of a can of soda but without the chemicals, colourings and artificial sweeteners that can lead to weight gain. Plus, you get to meet your daily requirement of drinking at least two liters of water.
One mini baguette has about 416 calories. If you want to reduce your calorie intake, swap it for two medium slices of bread. You’ll be saving about 236 calories or swap it for one medium tortilla wrap and save 276 calories. If you want to go for a lower carb swap and increase your vegetable intake, then swap the tortilla wrap for a lettuce wrap. Lettuce is also known as free food, because it’s extremely low in calories and you can eat it in abundance to fill you up without piling on weight.
Dried fruits are high in nutrients and make excellent healthy snack. However, if you’re watching your weight and want more volume, swap dried fruits with fresh fruits instead. A serving of fresh fruit offers more volume and contains more water which will keep you full quicker and longer.
Sugar is one of the top causes of obesity and overweight across the world. One teaspoon of sugar contains 15 calories and no other nutrients. It is also very addictive. Swap it for stevia. It’s a natural sweetener which doesn’t contain any calories and three hundred time sweeter than sugar. Hence, you only need a very small amount to replace sugar. It is also a great sweet alternative for those with diabetes.
A three and a half-ounce of dairy ice cream has 125 calories, 7 grams of fat and 14 grams of sugar. The main ingredients are heavy cream and egg yolks. Swap it for gelato instead. Gelato uses more milk than heavy cream and a few egg yolks. A similar portion packs in just 90 calories, 3 grams of fat and 10 grams of sugar. But remember to still indulge in moderation.
Red meat is an excellent source of protein and iron but can be high in saturated fat. Consuming too much of red meat can cause high cholesterol and also cardiovascular diseases. Limit your consumption of red meat to once a week and swap it for fish instead. Fish is high in protein and omega-3, but low in calories and saturated fat.
Desserts tend to be very high in calories. At a 400 calories per slice of cheesecake, it can contain more calories than your dinner. Swap it for jelly pudding instead. One serving has 150 calories. You’ll be saving 250 calories plus your efforts in the gym.
All of these healthy food swaps can add up to huge calorie savings and help you lose weight the healthy way. Start by practicing these really simple food swaps and you will notice a difference to your body and also to how you feel. What other healthy food swaps have you tried? Share and comment them down below!Bioactive Glass Reduces Decay in Tooth Cavity Fillings
23 December 2015. An engineering group at Oregon State University adapted a type of glass material that in lab models slows the decay in teeth with composite cavity fillings. The team led by materials engineering professor Jamie Kruzic published its findings in the January 2016 issue of the journal Dental Materials.
Kruzic, with colleagues from the university’s dental school and Midwestern University in Arizona, are seeking a technology to improve the performance and longevity of composite cavity fillings. The authors cite data from NIH showing Americans receive more than 122 million composite fillings a year, but these fillings face failure rates as high as 15 percent and have an average lifetime of only 6 years.
“New tooth decay often begins at the interface of a filling and the tooth,” says Kruzic in a university statement, “and is called secondary tooth decay. The tooth is literally being eroded and demineralized at that interface.”
The Oregon State team investigated the potential of a material called bioactive glass, made with silicon, calcium, and phosphorus compounds. Like window glass, bioactive glass is hard and stiff, but because of its chemistry, releases calcium and phosphate ions toxic to bacteria, which also help neutralize the lactic acid that builds up when decay begins around the fillings. Bioactive glass is already used for bone healing, and could replace the inert crushed glass material now added to composite fillings.
The lab prepared a bioreactor that simulates activity in a human mouth, where they tested human molar material filled with typical composite fillings. The molars were made with tiny gaps between the composite and tooth, like those that develop in real fillings, and biofilms of tooth bacteria were grown on their surfaces. Some of the fillings had bioactive glass added to the composite, about 15 percent by weight, while a comparison group had composite fillings alone.
After 2 weeks, the researchers measured the depth of bacterial penetration from the biofilms, and found the molars with bioactive glass had on average 61 percent less bacterial growth than the molars without bioactive glass, a large enough difference to be statistically reliable. In many molars without bioactive glass, bacteria penetrated clear to the bottom of the cavities.
“The bacteria in the mouth that help cause cavities don’t seem to like this type of glass,” notes Kruzic, “and are less likely to colonize on fillings that incorporate it. This could have a significant impact on the future of dentistry.”
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* * *Sling TV CEO Roger Lynch said his company’s service isn’t in direct competition with the virtual MVPD service being launched by the rival satellite TV operator, DirecTV Now.
“Our strategy was never to recreate that big bundle of channels. Our strategy is to create choice for consumers,” said Lynch, who appeared in a live Periscope video this afternoon outside his company’s Englewood, Colorado, headquarters.
Lynch's response to a Twitter audience question came a day after AT&T revealed a surprisingly low $35 price point for its upcoming DirecTV Now service. Sling TV and parent company Dish Network have set a $20-a-month base price for the Sling service. Even though Sling TV offers copious choices for add-on networks, its base package doesn’t compete on depth of programming with DirecTV Now, which will launch with more than 100 channels.
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“Our objective was never to be the one service that meets all your viewing needs,” said Lynch, repeating an earlier stated position. “Netflix is complimentary to Sling TV. So are Amazon Prime and Hulu. People are putting together their own bundles.”
RELATED: AT&T prices DirecTV Now at $35 a month, won't make money on it, analyst says
Lynch said he was making his Periscope appearance to celebrate Sling TV’s No. 6 ranking in Parks and Associates' annual ranking of the top 10 U.S. OTT services. Sling TV finished No. 10 last year, but moved up four spots this year, finishing behind Netflix, Amazon Video, Hulu, MLB.TV and WWE Networks.
“Competition is good for us,” Lynch added. “It’s good for consumers.”My survey says: People don’t want Ai’s ‘Fence’
BY SHARON WOOLUMS | In my 16 years serving on the Community Board 2 Parks Committee, presenting a major project as a done deal is something brand new to me.
I was one of two public members of the committee who opposed “Good Fences Make Good Neighbors,” Ai Weiwei’s large-scale sculpture for Washington Square Park. The artwork’s name comes from Robert Frost’s poem “Mending Wall,” which includes the lines: “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know / What I was walling in or walling out / And to whom I was like to give offence.”
In this case, though, no one was asked and many took offense that this was presented as a fait accompli. Given the disruption of annual public programs that would occur, that the Parks Committee received 50 form letters and e-mails in support of this project for its meeting on this subject last month, merely demonstrated the extent to which objections were anticipated — and perhaps why this project was shrouded in secrecy until the very end.
The Public Art Fund touts New York City as “a beacon for free expression and democratic ideals” in explaining why it is funding and promoting this project. Yet, for a park such as ours that embodies democracy, this process was demonstrably undemocratic.
I surveyed actual park users who felt left out of the discussion (or lack thereof) and felt their opinions were dissed. Art is subjective but parks are for everybody. For those going to parks to escape and experience nature amid so much visual noise in Manhattan, gigantic themed art installations in their small park are a distraction.
Survey participants felt the assumption that their objections stemmed from a lack of art appreciation — and that this great artist’s talent should automatically warrant acceptance — was condescending.
This is a gift! Except that nobody asked for it! Parkgoers acknowledge, however, this a great opportunity, at great expense, for Ai’s use of our park to promote his art and laudable “themes of division and separation.” Unafraid to appear politically incorrect here, most of those I surveyed resent decisions from perceived top-down art establishments.
Tourists save up and come here to get that coveted selfie of the World Trade Center or the Empire State Building framed by the park arch. During almost half a year (four months while the installation is up and one month of noise and disruption installing and dismantling it), tourists will not experience the arch as we do, but as a wall protesting walls, blocking the view and wide entrance and egress of our iconic gateway to the Village.
Washington Square Park itself is a living, breathing work of art. Through the vista of the arch (referred to as “the void” by Mr. Ai), spontaneous creativity happens naturally — acrobats, sand painting, human sculptures, would-be Bob Dylans and children dancing to music of every sort.
There’s nothing static about our park and nothing big, bulky and static need be imposed upon on our already-busy 10 acres, no matter how fabulous or correct the sentiment. Many survey respondents vehemently disdained the idea of the arch being politicized for any reason.
Neighbors worry “Fences” gawkers will create a Times Square-on-steroids atmosphere. There are thousands of art galleries and museums in the city to challenge and expand our minds and vision. But, for many, the need to escape the city’s visual clutter and just be with trees and plants is vital. They love their gateway to creative freedom as is, and find it indefensible that this gigantic sculpture will be superimposed onto the creation of another recognized genius, architect Stanford White, partially obscuring his work.
There is a wonderful sculpture on the triangle plaza at Greenwich Ave. at Eighth St. There are such plazas and empty lots all over the city, perfect for large-scale installations that will not intrude on a park’s mission of passive relaxation, which is so desperately needed at this time. The Statue of Liberty is one.
We respect that the intentions of Mr. Ai are noble, and his work appreciated by many. We might really enjoy his work in all 299 of the planned exhibition sites around New York City.
Some feel, however, that Ai is merely preaching to the choir — since New York City is a sanctuary city — but maybe not the good neighbors’ choir, who have sung traditional carols of peace and love at the holiday tree under the arch since 1909.U.S. U-17 national team star joins club in advance of 2015 season opener
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NEW YORK (March 30, 2015) – The New York Cosmos announced today that the club has signed U.S. youth international star Haji Wright. As per club policy, terms of the deal were not disclosed.
“I’m excited about joining the Cosmos,” said Wright. “The team plays with an attacking mindset that fits my style and I think it’s the perfect environment for the next stage of my development.
“Getting the chance to train with and learn from world-class players such as Raúl and Marcos Senna is any player’s dream.”
Wright, 17, is a Los Angeles, Calif. native who has been part of the U.S. youth national team program since being called into the U-14s in 2012. In 2014, he tallied 18 goals and seven assists in 22 matches for the U.S. U-17 team.
He was also a key part of the U.S. U-17 team that qualified from the 2015 CONCACAF U-17 championships for this summer’s U-17 World Cup in Chile.
“Haji is a very exciting prospect,” said Cosmos head coach Giovanni Savarese. “He has some special attacking qualities and can play as a striker or on the wing and gives us some more options in the final third.”RCMP investigators have travelled to Calgary to look into a possible link between two Ontario men — one of whom has been fighting in Syria with Islamic militants.
Abdullah Barahim of the Islamic Information Society of Calgary says he talked to investigators in May. The society operates near an apartment building in downtown Calgary that was the residence for five jihadis who eventually went to fight alongside extremist rebels in Syria.
Barahim says he was shown photographs of two men, but he was not able to recognize them.
The RCMP has neither confirmed nor denied the investigation, but a spokesperson confirms Mohammed Monir El Shaer and Ahmad Waseem — both from Windsor, Ont. — have each been charged with a passport-related offence.
Waseem flew twice to Syria allegedly to fight with Islamist extremists, but legal experts say he could evade terrorism charges if his activities abroad can't be proven.
Waseem’s Facebook page suggests he spent time in Alberta in 2010 and 2011.
Activities abroad
CBC News has previously reported on connections between some young Calgary men and militant Islamic groups.
Salman Ashrafi, known as Abu Abdullah Al Khorasani, was killed in a double suicide bombing in Iraq in November that killed 46 people.
Muslim convert Damian Clairmont, who later took the name Mustafa al-Gharib, was killed while fighting with Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda-affiliated rebel group in Syria whose membership is made up largely of European, Australian and North American extremists.
Farah Mohamed Shirdon, a Calgarian fighting overseas with the militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), was seen in a video burning his Canadian passport and threatening to destroy Iraq's oppressors. He has reportedly been killed.
CBC News has learned that as many as two dozen other young men have, according to sources, travelled to Syria to join rebel extremist groups to wage jihad in the last two years.
Hasibullah Yusufzai, a British Columbia man, has been the only person charged under a new anti-terrorism law for allegedly leaving Canada to join Islamist fighters in Syria. He faces up to 14 years if convicted.God, grant me the serenity to accept that I will never have the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.
— Steven Kaas
Early morning, May 11, 2017
San Jose
The computer whirred and chattered: the speaker producing Names faster than the
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, although their mothers said about 45 percent of them were bullied.
According to the investigators, the odds of being bullied were 63 percent higher for an obese child, compared to a healthy-weight peer.
The higher odds of being bullied among obese children were “equally strong” for boys and girls, white and nonwhite children, children from poor and more well-to-do families and across all types of schools in all 10 study cities, the investigators note.
Lumeng also thought she’d find protective factors — like having good social skills and doing well in school. “I thought maybe this would protect obese kids from being bullied. But no matter how we ran and re-ran the analysis, the link between being obese and being bullied remained,” Lumeng said.
“Parents of obese children rate bullying as their top health concern,” Lumeng and her colleagues note in their report, and obese children who are bullied suffer more depression, anxiety and loneliness.
The issue has received more attention since the suicide of 15-year-old Phoebe Prince in January. Prince was reportedly bullied for months by students at her high school in South Hadley, Mass.
“There is no simple solution to the problem,” Lumeng told Reuters Health. “I think it reflects the general prejudice against obese people,” and children, even at a very young age, pick up on this.
On a societal level, “it is important to fashion messages aimed at reducing the premium placed on thinness and the negative stereotypes that are associated with being obese or overweight,” the investigators write in Pediatrics.
Lumeng is also concerned about the “pervasive view” that obesity is all about a lack of self-control with food and not getting enough exercise. And while overeating and lack of exercise are part of it, “it’s so much more complex than that,” Lumeng said, “and we really need to work on changing this view of what causes obesity.”
Dr. Matthew Davis, who was not involved in the study, agrees. In an email to Reuters Health, he said he would encourage adults to “model good behavior for children, by not making negative comments about other people’s weight.
“Schools are increasingly addressing the problem of bullying, but programs don’t always — or even frequently — include kids’ weight as a focus for bullying prevention,” noted Davis, who directs the CS Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. “With obesity affecting 1 in 5 to 1 in 6 kids in the US, parents can encourage schools to make sure that bullying related to obesity is targeted in intervention programs,” he added.
SOURCE: Pediatrics, June 2010, online May 3.ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq is boosting its oil exports this month from 500,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 575,000 bpd, a Kurdish official said Saturday, following a revamped oil agreement with Baghdad.
“The KRG was exporting 500,000 barrels of oil on a daily basis before, but after it signed an agreement with Baghdad over exporting oil from Kirkuk through the Kurdish pipeline, the KRG’s oil exports will increase to 575,000 bpd,”
Dilshad Shaaban, deputy head of the energy and industry committee in the Kurdish parliament, told Rudaw.
He said that Kurdish oil fetches a lower price internationally than Brent, the global benchmark.
The quality of KRG oil is low compared to Brent oil, so the price hovers around $30 to $35 a barrel” he explained. Brent is currently selling at about $47 per barrel.
Last week’s oil agreement in Baghdad followed a meeting Monday between Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani and Iraqi Premier Haider al-Abadi.
At least 150,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil from Kirkuk will be jointly exported to Turkey by Erbil and Baghdad, according to the new accord.
The agreement will mean that 75,000 bpd will be exported by the Kurdistan Region and an equal volume by Baghdad to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, the sources said.
The oil will come from Kirkuk’s Baba Gurgur and Khabaza oilfields.
Shaaban described the increase in Kurdish oil exports as “significant,” saying the extra revenues would go to pay back KRG debts since 2014 that went to paying the salaries of civil servants.
“When the KRG’s budget was cut in 2014, it borrowed $1.8 billion to pay the salaries of employees and civil servants. Now, we could repay the debt with oil money,” he said.Seriously, someone – anyone – who got worked up about a New York Post report by someone I’ve never heard of simply has too much time on their hands or something like that. The faux “story” had some milquetoast quote from an anonymous source “close” to DeMar DeRozan that said he’ll opt out of his contract next summer to make about $20 million instead of about $10 million but then goes on to quote that same fictitious person as saying he/she/it doesn’t know what DeRozan will do because DeRozan himself isn’t sure?
Oh, and it adds that the Brooklyn Nets, one of the truly laughable NBA franchises with no redeeming future to speak of, would like to sign him so he can lose again for years and years? My goodness. I get that the Post is the Post (a guy intimately familiar with it once told me the sports philosophy was “don’t be afraid to be wrong big”) but that’s a ridiculous waste of printer’s ink.
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This will be a story in late June and July, folks. Right now it’s folly and filler and not worthy of your concern or attention. Still with DeRozan, sort of, there didn’t seem to be too many surprises when the league announced the latest results of balloting for all-star starters yesterday, did there? Well, maybe in one spot. It’s good, I think, that Lowry is catching up to Kyrie Irving because he’s exponentially a better all-star starting candidate this year seeing that Irving’s barely played; I would suggest that if the Cavs guard doesn’t start he doesn’t make the team through the coaches. That trickle down effect could very well land DeRozan – entirely deserving – into the game and I get that Dwyane Wade’s popularity is what it is and he’s having a pretty good year in Miami, I still think an all-Toronto backcourt is easily explained and supported.
Yes, the Heat have a good record – pretty much the same as Toronto’s actually – and Wade’s a big factor (I’d say Bosh is more of one but that’s just me) – but you could make a case DeRozan is having a better one. The Kobe thing is what it is, can’t imagine it changes over the last fortnight of balloting but it will be at least marginally interesting to see how the East backcourt shakes out not only through fans but ultimately through the coaches, who have to put the pieces of a worthy roster together.
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- So many great ones to pick on the guy’s birthday but this is a personal fave among all of them. - Could really use more mail; bailed on Washington for some maintenance so there’s a bit of time now in the day/evening to get it done. All the typing should be done at [email protected] and you’ll be glad you did. - It’s been a while but I’m sure you’ve noticed – ahem, @lauraarmy – that Tottenham’s on a bit of a role and, as the smart ones say looked headed back to “the real Europe” and when they get a result against Leicester mid-week at home, we’re setting our sights directly on Arsenal.
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But the weekend is given over now to FA Cup third round play and it speaks to one of the more fascinating things about British and European soccer these days and I’m sure one of the reasons the game – particularly the EPL – have grown so greatly in popularity. Remember back in the day – and you do have to be Of A Certain Vintage to recall – when about the only British soccer game we could see on television here was the FA Cup final? No regular season games, no pre- or post-game chat shows and analysis, certainly no midweek games and it was even hard to find a Saturday morning saloon with like-minded fans to watch your favourite team play on some scratchy satellite feed that might go in and out a half dozen times a game. Now? There are dozens of games from all over Europe available every weekend, the Champions League final is something close to a mini-Super Bowl that draws in all kinds of casual fans. It’s pretty cool and I bet the reason a lot of people pay far closer attention to the sport now than they did. - Hey, the Rock start tomorrow – Toronto’s most prolific championship contender of this era – and they seem to be living proof that a niche professional sport can sustain support over the years. Best of luck to ‘em. Super Son and I once took in a game – some nice gentleman gave us a couple of seats right on the glass as an upgrade to ours – and I will say this: If you thought the music and palaver at a Raptors game was intrusive, the NBA is like a funeral home compared to a Rock game and I hope that’s changed. - Okay, here’s one I got yesterday from a long-time loyal Irregular Doug and it’ll maybe give you a few minutes of entertainment trying to come up with the answers: “Here is a good trivia question when you are sitting with your buddies tilting back a few. Now that Griffey has been elected to the Hall Seattle will have a player in the HOF. There are 5 active teams that don't have a HOF representative, can you name them and no googling. And one of them has been a franchise for over 50 years. Cheers Okay, here we go, with no googling, I promise: Tampa and Miami, Washington, Colorado and the Angels? I don’t imagine I got it right just going through the teams in my mind but if you want to take a guess – NO GOOGLING! – and ship ‘em off to the mailbag, I’ll throw them up, with the right answers, tomorrow morning. -
Read more about:Retired lieutenant-general Roméo Dallaire has urged the military to get more involved with the families of its work force, saying they should not be treated as an "add-on."
Mr. Dallaire, who is also a former senator, has been public about his struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder and suicidal thoughts. He said on Tuesday that families are essential to ensuring the health of the Canadian Armed Forces and their people.
"We are a long way from considering that the family is not just a support of those who served and a support for those who are injured," he told the Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran Health Research conference, which was being held in Toronto during the Invictus Games for ill and injured soldiers and veterans. "The families are not support. Families are not an add-on. They're integral to the operational capability of the Forces and their care must reach that same level."
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Mr. Dallaire, who led an understaffed United Nations peacekeeping team in Rwanda in 1994 during one of the worst genocides of modern times, also renewed his concerns about the number of suicides among the country's military members and veterans, some of whom served in conflicts such as the Afghanistan War. Greater suicide-prevention efforts are needed, he said.
"Unless we treat mental health with the same sense of urgency as we treat a dangling arm on someone who has just been shot at, we will continue to take the fatal casualties," he said of deaths by suicide.
Veterans Affairs Minister Seamus O'Regan said the federal government recognizes that military work creates "unique stressors" on soldiers and their families during service and afterward. Support for families has increased in recent years, and a pilot project offering on-base services to medically released vets and their families will expand in April, 2018.
National Defence and Veterans Affairs will also soon make public a joint suicide-prevention strategy.
"Suicide is taking far too many of our service members and our veterans," Mr. O'Regan, who is also the Associate Defence Minister, told the conference earlier on Tuesday. "While we may not fully prevent these events, this strategy will help military members and veterans build resilience, reduce the risk of suicidality and offer support when they need it."
Mr. O'Regan said post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) remains a serious mental-health issue for many vets. As of the end of March, 17,623 were receiving a disability benefit from Veterans Affairs because they had been diagnosed with PTSD related to their military work.
Mr. Dallaire urged soldiers and vets who are dealing with PTSD and other mental illnesses to speak out about their therapy so that others seek help.
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"Therapy is crucial to mastering this situation and to be able to live with it in a reasonable way," he said.
He added that peer support is vital and called for more research to understand what medications are effective in treating PTSD.CATEGORY: How Should Humanity Steer the Future? Essay Contest (2014) [back]
TOPIC: The Leverage and Centrality of Mind by Alexander Hoekstra and Preston Estep [refresh]
Author Alex Hoekstra wrote on Apr. 24, 2014 @ 18:14 GMT
Essay Abstract
Many imposing challenges face humanity. Some grow relentlessly in seriousness and complexity: declining quantities and quality of freshwater, topsoil, and energy; climate change and increasingly unpredictable weather patterns; environmental and habitat decline; the growing geographical spread and antibiotic resistance of pathogens; increasing burdens of disease and health care expenditures; and so on. Some of the most serious problems remain intractable, irrespective of national wealth and achievement. Even developed nations suffer from stubbornly stable levels of mental illness, poverty, and homelessness, in otherwise increasingly wealthy economies. A known root cause of such broken lives is broken minds. What isn’t widely recognized is that all other extremely serious problems are similarly and equally intertwined with the intrinsic incapacities of human minds—minds evolved to cope with a slower and simpler time - emergent from within a paradigm that favored the relative short-term. Yet minds are simultaneously the most essential resource worth saving, and the only resource capable of planning and executing initial steps of necessary solutions. There is hope for overcoming all serious challenges currently facing us, and on the horizon, and there is only one most-efficient strategy that applies to them all. This strategy focuses not on these individual and disparate challenges – which ultimately are only symptoms – but on fixing and improving minds.
Author Bio
Preston Estep III, PhD, and Alexander Hoekstra are directors of the Personal Genome Project at Harvard University - the world's first “open source” genome project, and aggregator & repository for human Genomic, Environmental & Trait (GET) data. Estep and Hoekstra are also founders of the nonprofit Mind First Foundation, which seeks to expand the understanding and the capacity of the mind, to enhance the human condition.
Download Essay PDF File
Many imposing challenges face humanity. Some grow relentlessly in seriousness and complexity: declining quantities and quality of freshwater, topsoil, and energy; climate change and increasingly unpredictable weather patterns; environmental and habitat decline; the growing geographical spread and antibiotic resistance of pathogens; increasing burdens of disease and health care expenditures; and so on. Some of the most serious problems remain intractable, irrespective of national wealth and achievement. Even developed nations suffer from stubbornly stable levels of mental illness, poverty, and homelessness, in otherwise increasingly wealthy economies. A known root cause of such broken lives is broken minds. What isn’t widely recognized is that all other extremely serious problems are similarly and equally intertwined with the intrinsic incapacities of human minds—minds evolved to cope with a slower and simpler time - emergent from within a paradigm that favored the relative short-term. Yet minds are simultaneously the most essential resource worth saving, and the only resource capable of planning and executing initial steps of necessary solutions. There is hope for overcoming all serious challenges currently facing us, and on the horizon, and there is only one most-efficient strategy that applies to them all. This strategy focuses not on these individual and disparate challenges – which ultimately are only symptoms – but on fixing and improving minds.Preston Estep III, PhD, and Alexander Hoekstra are directors of the Personal Genome Project at Harvard University - the world's first “open source” genome project, and aggregator & repository for human Genomic, Environmental & Trait (GET) data. Estep and Hoekstra are also founders of the nonprofit Mind First Foundation, which seeks to expand the understanding and the capacity of the mind, to enhance the human condition.
Denis Frith wrote on Apr. 25, 2014 @ 03:59 GMT
The statement that “Yet minds are simultaneously the most essential resource worth saving, and the only resource capable of planning and executing initial steps of necessary solutions.” That view has no foundation in reality. Society is totally dependent on irreversibly using natural material resources. Human minds have little impact on that as it is the stark reality.
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Author Alex Hoekstra replied on Apr. 25, 2014 @ 13:05 GMT "It is an extremely serious problem that human minds seem unable to grasp!"
It seems we are in agreement, then, that the mind as is, is insufficiently capable of grasping - let alone solving - the problems at hand (and the threats around the corner).
"Human minds have little impact on [society {being} totally dependent on irreversibly using natural material resources] as it is the stark reality."
Minds, we argue, are at the foundation of the overconsumption, pollution, waste, destruction, and otherwise unsustainable depletion that has so far fueled civilization. Minds, we argue, are at the root of society; society manifests from the working of minds.
Minds with inbuilt conventionalism, shortsightedness, irrational self-interest, and self-delusion (not to mention a propensity for aggression), have yielded and will - if left unchecked and unaided - continue to yield societies and civilizations rife with waste, pollution, poverty, corruption, separatism, inequality, violence, and the many branches from which suffering blooms.
Mr. Frith, please do not overlook our fundamental position: That resolving the insufficiency of our thinking machines must made a highest priority if it is our intention to protect the survival of our species (and the myriad species we impact) over the long-term.
It seems we are in agreement, then, that the mind as is, is insufficiently capable of grasping - let alone- the problems at hand (and the threats around the corner).Minds, we argue, are at the foundation of the overconsumption, pollution, waste, destruction, and otherwise unsustainable depletion that has so far fueled civilization. Minds, we argue, are at the root of society; society manifests from the working of minds.Minds with inbuilt conventionalism, shortsightedness, irrational self-interest, and self-delusion (not to mention a propensity for aggression), have yielded and will - if left unchecked and unaided - continue to yield societies and civilizations rife with waste, pollution, poverty, corruption, separatism, inequality, violence, and the many branches from which suffering blooms.Mr. Frith, please do not overlook our fundamental position: The statement that “all other extremely serious problems are similarly and equally intertwined with the intrinsic incapacities of human minds” is a typical anthropocentric view. The technological systems of civilization irreversibly use up limited natural resources, produce immutable material waste and devastate the environment. That is the stark reality. It is an extremely serious problem that human minds seem unable to grasp!The statement that “Yet minds are simultaneously the most essential resource worth saving, and the only resource capable of planning and executing initial steps of necessary solutions.” That view has no foundation in reality. Society is totally dependent on irreversibly using natural material resources. Human minds have little impact on that as it is the stark reality.
Tommy Anderberg wrote on Apr. 27, 2014 @ 11:10 GMT
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Preston Estep replied on May. 8, 2014 @ 20:38 GMT
Thank you for reading our essay; we're glad you're in agreement with the main premise. How to go about making better minds is such an enormously complex topic that we thought it best to simply begin by making the argument we did, i.e. that it is the most efficient way to approach humanity's many disparate problems. As your comment affirms, this would seem to be fairly obvious, but our essay appears to be the only one in this competition to explicitly advance this proposal (although a few others focus on better thinking).
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Dear Tommy,Thank you for reading our essay; we're glad you're in agreement with the main premise. How to go about making better minds is such an enormously complex topic that we thought it best to simply begin by making the argument we did, i.e. that it is the most efficient way to approach humanity's many disparate problems. As your comment affirms, this would seem to be fairly obvious, but our essay appears to be the only one in this competition to explicitly advance this proposal (although a few others focus on better thinking).
Member Flavio Mercati replied on May. 31, 2014 @ 01:30 GMT
it would be nice to see whether you have any idea on how to get started with this enormously complex topic. For example, what is it that makes a mind good at science? That is a fascinating topic, to me...
best,
Flavio
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Dear Preston and Alexander,it would be nice to see whether you have any idea on how to get started with this enormously complex topic. For example, what is it that makes a mind good at science? That is a fascinating topic, to me...best,Flavio I am all for getting smarter. Would have liked to learn more about how to actually go about it, though...
Turil Sweden Cronburg wrote on Apr. 27, 2014 @ 18:29 GMT
So, health care is indeed the core solution, IF we include all the basic needs for human health, unconditionally, in our universal health care! That means high quality food, water, air, warmth (including shelter), light, information, and outlets for freely expressing our body's excess solids, liquids, gases, and energy. Only then will we have well functioning human beings, mentally and physically, so that we're operating at peak capacity as a planet.
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Preston Estep replied on May. 8, 2014 @ 20:51 GMT
We agree that many people are operating at low efficiencies on multiple levels. But we also believe that people functioning at their peak aren't either necessarily or sufficiently able to sustain humanity's current trajectory. People's brains (and general biology) have been selected for a slower and simpler time, and are maladapted to the complex world we have created. We simply don't have the rational foresight to manage this complexity. To survive and thrive we need to design and engineer minds specifically for this purpose.
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Dear Turil,We agree that many people are operating at low efficiencies on multiple levels. But we also believe that people functioning at their peak aren't either necessarily or sufficiently able to sustain humanity's current trajectory. People's brains (and general biology) have been selected for a slower and simpler time, and are maladapted to the complex world we have created. We simply don't have the rational foresight to manage this complexity. To survive and thrive we need to design and engineer minds specifically for this purpose.
Turil Sweden Cronburg replied on May. 11, 2014 @ 21:34 GMT
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Indeed, and I see that the way to design more effective minds is to focus on how to give them the resources they need to grow healthfully. We have yet to have healthy brain development because we've either been suffering from deficiencies or toxicities, or both, but once we look to supporting our biology in getting the food, water, air, warmth, light, information, and ways to express excess stuff, we'll start to see both individual and collective brains truly achieve greatness. And yes, some of that will involve technology, both adding to our biology internally, and connecting our ideas externally with some artificial intelligence sort of element, I imagine. But again, at the core of all this is supporting the biology, so that it no longer is held back by low quality crap mucking up the system, and getting in the way of our brains honestly functioning at their peak, and able to do all sorts of things that no one imagined humans might be able to do. In my own research the best way to make our brains work better is to focus on serving our basic needs (as first introduced by Maslow), with the highest quality inputs and outputs possible. Everything else just wastes resources, as far as I've seen. Our brains are biological systems that need certain things to work properly, but I've yet to meet a human being who's even getting their first two levels of physical needs met well enough, though most folks aren't even aware of the deficiencies and toxicities that they're suffering from (which only exacerbates the problem...).So, health care is indeed the core solution, IF we include all the basic needs for human health, unconditionally, in our universal health care! That means high quality food, water, air, warmth (including shelter), light, information, and outlets for freely expressing our body's excess solids, liquids, gases, and energy. Only then will we have well functioning human beings, mentally and physically, so that we're operating at peak capacity as a planet.
Ross Cevenst wrote on Apr. 28, 2014 @ 11:18 GMT
You eloquently describe in detail how the broad ability of the human mind is the underlying driver behind our ability to deal with virtually all modern problems. In particular I found very interesting the part where you mentioned how we may tend to defer direct access to information and rely on social information when confronted with certain resource constraints.
I think you're writing is very good, but I feel in a way you are simply saying that 'if we were smarter we would be better at solving our problems'. You're discussion of how that might occur hinted at something interesting, but I feel it didn't really explore the HOW as it might have. Two issues occur to me (1) mental health is sometimes focused around achieving normality rather than improving cognitive functions - how would you change its approach? (2) How would we separate intervening to make someone'smarter' with intervening to alter a person to agree with a particular social or political agenda?
Thanks for writing a good quality paper I will be giving it an above average rating once I finish reading!
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Ross Cevenst replied on Apr. 28, 2014 @ 11:19 GMT
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Also I'm interested if you have any thoughts on my paper, particularly in regard to the part on VR. Thanks again!
Ross Cevenst replied on Apr. 28, 2014 @ 11:20 GMT
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And apologies for my awful grammar! :)
Preston Estep replied on May. 8, 2014 @ 20:59 GMT
Thank you for reading our essay and thank you very much for your kind words. How to go about making better minds is such an enormously complex topic that we thought it best to simply begin by making the argument we did, i.e. that it is the most efficient way to approach humanity's many disparate problems. As your comment affirms, this seems somewhat obvious, but our essay appears to be the only one in this competition to explicitly propose this as a general solution (although a few others focus on better thinking).
You raise two important and challenging issues. First, how to achieve levels of ability beyond normalcy is a key and difficult question. Nevertheless, there are some clues to how such things might be accomplished. For example, see this recent news article suggesting that reconfiguring the brain can release suppressed talents (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/06/brain-injury-jason
-padgett-math-genius_n_5273609.html). Your second point is potentially even more challenging. We can only say that such questions are best answered at the highest levels with great deliberation. We envision and advocate an open, civilian project that would dwarf the space race. We need an international collaborative effort to tackle these issues, rather than leave mental enhancement to individual secret and military organizations around the world.
We'll take a look at your essay. Thanks again.
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Dear Ross,Thank you for reading our essay and thank you very much for your kind words. How to go about making better minds is such an enormously complex topic that we thought it best to simply begin by making the argument we did, i.e. that it is the most efficient way to approach humanity's many disparate problems. As your comment affirms, this seems somewhat obvious, but our essay appears to be the only one in this competition to explicitly propose this as a general solution (although a few others focus on better thinking).You raise two important and challenging issues. First, how to achieve levels of ability beyond normalcy is a key and difficult question. Nevertheless, there are some clues to how such things might be accomplished. For example, see this recent news article suggesting that reconfiguring the brain can release suppressed talents (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/06/brain-injury-jason-padgett-math-genius_n_5273609.html). Your second point is potentially even more challenging. We can only say that such questions are best answered at the highest levels with great deliberation. We envision and advocate an open, civilian project that would dwarf the space race. We need an international collaborative effort to tackle these issues, rather than leave mental enhancement to individual secret and military organizations around the world.We'll take a look at your essay. Thanks again. Hi Preston,You eloquently describe in detail how the broad ability of the human mind is the underlying driver behind our ability to deal with virtually all modern problems. In particular I found very interesting the part where you mentioned how we may tend to defer direct access to information and rely on social information when confronted with certain resource constraints.I think you're writing is very good, but I feel in a way you are simply saying that 'if we were smarter we would be better at solving our problems'. You're discussion of how that might occur hinted at something interesting, but I feel it didn't really explore the HOW as it might have. Two issues occur to me (1) mental health is sometimes focused around achieving normality rather than improving cognitive functions - how would you change its approach? (2) How would we separate intervening to make someone'smarter' with intervening to alter a person to agree with a particular social or political agenda?Thanks for writing a good quality paper I will be giving it an above average rating once I finish reading!
Petio Hristov wrote on Apr. 29, 2014 @ 07:01 GMT
I read your essay with great interest, because it concerns fundamental questions linked with the development and survival of the human race, forced to deal with increasingly more difficult challenges. It is without doubt that the improving the qualities and the independents of the mind is a good suggests a better future.
And although in a relatively short essay a major issue, such as this, cannot be examined in its full complexity and depth, you managed in the smartest way to provoke the minds of the intelligent to think.
Petio Hristov
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Preston Estep replied on May. 8, 2014 @ 21:02 GMT
Thank you for taking time to read our essay and for understanding the limits of what we are able to address in the space available. Indeed, this is a major and complex issue. And thank you very much for your kind words.
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Dear Petio,Thank you for taking time to read our essay and for understanding the limits of what we are able to address in the space available. Indeed, this is a major and complex issue. And thank you very much for your kind words. Dear Alexander Hoekstra and Preston Estep,I read your essay with great interest, because it concerns fundamental questions linked with the development and survival of the human race, forced to deal with increasingly more difficult challenges. It is without doubt that the improving the qualities and the independents of the mind is a good suggests a better future.And although in a relatively short essay a major issue, such as this, cannot be examined in its full complexity and depth, you managed in the smartest way to provoke the minds of the intelligent to think.Petio Hristov
Member Tommaso Bolognesi wrote on Apr. 29, 2014 @ 18:01 GMT
it occurred to me that in several observations your very interesting essay overlaps, or tightly relates with the essay by Sabine Hossenfelder. For example, you write:
"Here is a key question: why should we try to cope with modern, complex civilization, using brains provided by nature for use in a simpler time; brains that have been shaped and constrained by forces that are either already or quickly becoming irrelevant?"
This resonates with her concept (at p. 1):
"The root of the problems that humanity faces today is that our adaptation as a species has fallen behind the changes we have induced ourselves."
However, your proposed solution is:
The most efficient and generalizable solution to all human problems is to enhance our fundamental abilities to solve problems.
Her conclusions are rather different, and perhaps more surprising. To know how... take a look at her essay! (Sabine, you now owe me a rating :-)
A small question. You seem to prefer the term `mind` over `brain`. Are you implying some important difference between the two?
Best regards
Tommaso
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Preston Estep replied on May. 8, 2014 @ 20:55 GMT
Thanks for taking the time to read our essay carefully enough to detect similarities with Sabine Hossenfelder's essay. We agree that there are clear parallels in our summaries of current problems, although, as you point out, our proposed solutions are very different. We are in agreement that the root cause of human problems is the inabilities of what we call the "mind lost in time," but she believes it can be trained and tricked in various ways by diversions and rote adherence to individual and social constructs. We agree that this works to some degree, but we disagree that this will lead to sustained progress and to our best possible future, since some aspects of the mind are even more problematic than she realizes. We have commented on her essay. Take a look if you are interested.
Good question about mind and brain. Only after we uploaded the essay did we realize we should have defined these critical terms. Try these: The mind is a conceptual construct embodied by the functions of the brain together with the nervous and endocrine systems. We also accept that other kinds of minds are possible, including those consisting of non-biological systems.
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Hello Tommaso,Thanks for taking the time to read our essay carefully enough to detect similarities with Sabine Hossenfelder's essay. We agree that there are clear parallels in our summaries of current problems, although, as you point out, our proposed solutions are very different. We are in agreement that the root cause of human problems is the inabilities of what we call the "mind lost in time," but she believes it can be trained and tricked in various ways by diversions and rote adherence to individual and social constructs. We agree that this works to some degree, but we disagree that this will lead to sustained progress and to our best possible future, since some aspects of the mind are even more problematic than she realizes. We have commented on her essay. Take a look if you are interested.Good question about mind and brain. Only after we uploaded the essay did we realize we should have defined these critical terms. Try these: The mind is a conceptual construct embodied by the functions of the brain together with the nervous and endocrine systems. We also accept that other kinds of minds are possible, including those consisting of non-biological systems. Hi,it occurred to me that in several observations your very interesting essay overlaps, or tightly relates with the essay by Sabine Hossenfelder. For example, you write:"Here is a key question: why should we try to cope with modern, complex civilization, using brains provided by nature for use in a simpler time; brains that have been shaped and constrained by forces that are either already or quickly becoming irrelevant?"This resonates with her concept (at p. 1):"The root of the problems that humanity faces today is that our adaptation as a species has fallen behind the changes we have induced ourselves."However, your proposed solution is:The most efficient and generalizable solution to all human problems is to enhance our fundamental abilities to solve problems.Her conclusions are rather different, and perhaps more surprising. To know how... take a look at her essay! (Sabine, you now owe me a rating :-)A small question. You seem to prefer the term `mind` over `brain`. Are you implying some important difference between the two?Best regardsTommaso
Anonymous wrote on Apr. 30, 2014 @ 10:20 GMT
You framed well the need to change the mind to better address identifying and addressing perceived global needs.
I tend to agree with you that certain mental processes that are common to being human can better serve humanity, but I think a more important consideration is the "collective mind" of people, the social interactions that we can control. We need a diversity of...
view entire post Hi Alex,You framed well the need to change the mind to better address identifying and addressing perceived global needs.I tend to agree with you that certain mental processes that are common to being human can better serve humanity, but I think a more important consideration is the "collective mind" of people, the social interactions that we can control. We need a diversity of...
You framed well the need to change the mind to better address identifying and addressing perceived global needs.
I tend to agree with you that certain mental processes that are common to being human can better serve humanity, but I think a more important consideration is the "collective mind" of people, the social interactions that we can control. We need a diversity of brain structures to support a diversity of tasking needed by society.
The diversity of environments in which a person lives fundamentally influences the building blocks of the brain. For whatever reason, there is a city in Florida where I encountered a much larger percentage of people with mental disabilities than I have encountered anywhere else. I'm not mentioning the city's name for ethical reasons related to economics and perception, and the potential for my perception
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20pm the grenade was detonated. The explosion was heard several kilometres away. All that is left is a small crater in the dirt.
"Thank heavens it is not an every day event," Murrow said.
The site was previously an old tip so the grenade might have been dumped there many years ago and been dredged up.
"It's amazing what turns up," Murrow said. "People are always putting things in greenwaste that they shouldn't.
Police would like to remind members of the public that all military ordnance should be treated as live and very dangerous. Anyone who locates any old bombs or munitions should not touch them and should call 111 immediately.Digiconomist wrote: First of all I'd like to state that the critism on the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index (BECI) contains false information. It is claimed that BECI runs on the assumption that miners " never recover their investments (capex)". This has never been stated or implied by the information provided on BECI, and may relate to a misunderstanding. BECI assumes that the entire network is running at roughly break even, but this doesn't mean this is the case for every miner part of it. New machines may still earn themselves back easily under this assumption.
Second I'd like to add that the case laid out in this article is extremely optimistic on the electricity consumption of the Bitcoin network. It is stated that " the network's average efficiency falls between 0.055 and 0.27 J/GH". When this article was published, the best publicly available miner was the Antminer S7, running at ~0.25 J/GH. This one was released just a few months before. The Antminer S5+ was released just a little bit before at ~0.44 J/GH (in August). These machines wouldn't even have hit the market if the estimates in this article were true, as they would have been producing a loss as of day 1.
mrb wrote: Digiconomist: You *do* imply the average miner never recovers their investments (capex), precisely because you imply the average miner barely stays afloat of his electrical costs only (opex). See quote from your own site in 3rd paragraph.
BECI implies the entire network recoups opex, but loses 100% of the capex. So *not* break even. To break even you'd need to recoup capex+opex.
Do you understand the difference between capex & opex?
Also you are wrong: many mining ASICs online as of Jan 2016 (when I wrote http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-mining-is-not-wasteful/ which is where our discussion started) beat 0.25 J/GH. It seems you didn't read my post. I provide links and references to each one of them in section 1 (http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-mining-is-not-wasteful/#sec1):
1. BitFury's latest 16nm chip achieves 0.055-0.07 J/GH (a 40MW data center of them launched in Dec 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10774773)
2. KnC's 16nm Solar 0.07 J/GH,
3. Spondoolies's 28nm PickAxe 0.15 J/GH,
4. Bitmain's 28nm BM1385 0.18-0.26 J/GH,
5. Avalon's 28nm A3218 0.27 J/GH.
It seems you don't know the market of ASICs very well.
Digiconomist wrote: I don't think you can collect a random set of hardware and say "this is the J/GH" without even bothering to consider the economics surrounding that because it "seems fair" - while using economic arguments to tackle BECI. Some consistency would be nice.
You also published this post a bit too soon making it hard to discuss. If you had contacted me in advance I could have told you I was collecting data to cover 1 adjustment period in order to account for blocks being created faster (or slower) than 10 minutes on average. This held up the release of version 3, which includes some other adjustments as well. In particular the average costs mentioned here has been relaxed quite a bit. Looking at it from the bright side, you might like the updates. :)
mrb wrote: But it's not a random collection of hardware. I didn't hand pick the most efficient ones to prove my point. It's all the known manufacturers of ASICs in the *world*. Literally.
Now, there are a lot of companies that never released silicon, failed, ran out of money, etc, see: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_Bitcoin_mining_ASICs
But nowadays all the known manufacturers of mining ASICs can be counted on the fingers of one hand (the list I gave, minus KnC minus Spondoolies who have failed). And when *all* of them have been shipping ASICs doing 0.06-0.15 J/GH for a while it's pretty obvious BECI's claims of 0.427 J/GH is impossible.
I'll say it again: it seems you don't know the ASIC market and that's what prevents you from understand how far off reality BECI is.
Digiconomist wrote: But you didn't check how your estimate works out economically. You're saying the network is running at something like 0.12 J/GH. 0.15 J/GH if there has been zero improvement for a year, but that would be odd. Today the network is at 3,100 PH/s, so we're talking about 3.26-4.07 TWh per year.
We can translate this to costs directly since we can assume miners get 1 KWh per 5 cents spent on costs (per your own numbers). We get that on 3.26-4.07 TWh that translates to USD 163-204 mio in ongoing costs.
Annual income available to miners is easy to estimate as well, and it comes down to 817 mio per year (including fees). What we get is that miners are thus implied to be spending 20-25% on ongoing costs on average.
Now, of course this is in line with your example where the farm is paying 21% in costs, but you realize very well profit margins don't stay at 70-80% during the entire lifetime. On Twitter you wrote: "When I was mining with 20kW of GPUs it was pointless to mine when elec costs were ~70% of my revenues." So in my opinion you're arguing against yourself here.
If you want this to work out you're going to need something like 50% in ongoing costs on average. That's not the number I'm going with (65%), but then we're suddenly talking about BECI being just ~1.3 times the resulting estimate. That wouldn't be a massive gap at all.
mrb wrote: I wrote a new post: http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/
And I fully rewrote this post to take into account your "final release" of BECI which is still flawed.
My numbers prove to you that it is IMPOSSIBLE that miners spend more than 42% of mining income on electricity.
I think you fail to visualize how efficiency averages out. To calculate the average efficiency you need to average PER UNIT OF HASH RATE. And at any point in time in general most of the network hash rate is provided by newer farms (perhaps this is the crucial insight that makes it hard for you to accept my numbers?) So if 80% of the hash rate is provided by miners spending 20% on electricity, and if the remaining 20% spend 80% on electricity, the average is not 50% but 32%. Do the math. Read my new analysis (http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/) and let me know if you have any questions.
Digiconomist wrote: Did you really write this all just to point out that my estimate should be on the bottom end of my own error margin? From today's numbers: revenue $957M per year, costs $523M per year, so ~55.5%. As stated: "within reasonable economic boundaries one might expect to find a number that is 25 percent higher or lower". 42% costs is within that range. Anyway, anyone is welcome to pick another number if they like. I'm just trying to establish a method that produces a number that is plausible economically and not just technically (if you look at past estimates you can easily see why). BECI does that just fine.
By the way, the price is averaged over 60 days. It's not like I don't take feedback seriously ;)
mrb wrote: Your "25%" is another figure pulled out of thin air. And this error margin is wrong too: $523M ±25% is $392-654M which is not in the bounds of $142-339M from http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/ Remember anything above $339M is provably wrong. It assumes the worst possible case of miners deploying the least efficient hardware available at their time. So your entire range of $392-654M is *really* in the wrong. You cannot keep saying "this isn't economically plausible" when I present factual, verifiable data proving your model is invalid.
You don't seem to believe in the "economics of mining" so here are numbers for a real-world miner showing that it can be quite profitable to mine (new added section): http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/#economics
Do something about it. Fix BECI.
PS: ok it's good that you average over 60 days. 1 (out of many) issue fixed :)
Digiconomist wrote: I found it really hard to understand why you insist there's no overlap until I released 42% in your story isn't the same as 42% in mine, as your total revenues are based on unadjusted block rewards only. I also include fees and adjust for increasing hashrate (blocks are mined faster than once per 10 minutes on average). That leaves a serious gap of $130M between our revenue assumptions lol.
If you take 42% of the actual revenue we're going to be a lot closer, unless of course you'd like to tweak your scientific bounds in that case.
mrb wrote: There is no overlap. My calculation is that worst case electricity costs are $339M/yr regardless of fees. The amount of fees is not a variable in my model because the model is based on what ASICs are used by miners and what are their energy efficiency.
So $339M/yr represents 42% of miner income excluding fees, or 38-39% of miner income including fees.
Arguing that your lower bound being close to my upper bound makes your model "ok" is wrong. Your bigger problem is your upper bound that should be close to $339M/yr.
Digiconomist wrote: Okay, I really appreciate the effort you're putting into all this, so I'm checking out the new article later. But seriously, please fix this post.
I come to this page, and the first thing I see is a statement that I'm making a mistake on marginal costs. All I can say to that is that marginal costs don't include fixed costs like depreciation on buildings/machines or salaries like you're stating. So you'll then find that it really is mostly electricity costs.
Then I also find that you're just leaving out $100M+ from the revenue, and on top of the previous that really makes my brain explode.
mrb wrote: Marginal costs do include the cost of the hardware. What is debatable is whether they include buildings and salaries (I edited this part of the post, see the new footnote about marginal costs.) But you are categorically wrong that they do not include the cost of the hardware. A miner adding one unit of mining capacity certainly needs to pay for this hardware.
In fact, the hardware cost is the largest initial marginal cost of setting up a new farm. Look at the CSV file in http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/#economics : an Antminer S5 cost $418 and consumes only $0.71/day in electricity. It takes more than 1.5 years for the cost of electricity to surpass the cost of the hardware.
Finally, I am not leaving out $100M of fees revenue. See the new footnote explaining how 18-42% is calculated.
Let me know when you will have fixed BECI.
Digiconomist wrote: You should really check out the paper by Hayes (2015) http://www.economicpolicyresearch.org/econ/2015/NSSR_WP_052015.pdf
Specifically this part is relevant:
“Each unit of mining effort has a fixed sunk cost involved in the purchase, transportation and installation of the mining hardware. It also has a variable, or ongoing cost which is the direct expense of electricity consumption.”
Since sunk costs (unrecoverable expenses) aren’t relevant to marginal costs (it's not like they're not paid for), that’s how he’s left with electricity consumption.
mrb wrote: "Since sunk costs aren't relevant to marginal costs..." → you jump to this conclusion, but no one supports this conclusion. Not even this paper by Hayes. You quoted a part that just explains "there is capex, and there is opex" which is obvious to you and I, and which is not what we are arguing about.
You try to argue that if a miner purchases an Antminer S5 for $418 and powers it for $0.71 per day, then economic theory suggests that mining revenues will amount to $0.71 per day. That is false. In reality miners expect to recover $0.71/day plus the $418.
Digiconomist wrote: That's basic economic theory and also the reason why Hayes subsequently ignores them in the rest of his paper...
Investopedia explains this very well:
"Since decision-making only affects the future course of business, sunk costs should be irrelevant in the decision-making process. Instead, a decision maker should base her strategy on how to proceed with business or investment activities on future costs."
So basically, the price that was paid for a miner isn't relevant because it's purely retrospective. Looking forward, only electricity consumption (and some other negligible costs) matters. Putting these 100% of revenues isn't that crazy from an economic PoV (after all, the optimal output if where marginal costs = marginal revenue).
Now you're stating; I can show a new farm starting with elec costs as low as 15%, so are you kidding me with the number of miners needed at 100%+ to compensate for that.
I do agree with you that it goes against intuition, but first let's examine some reasons mentioned by Hayes why costs could exceed 100%:
"Individual decision makers may operate regardless of cost if they believe that there is enough speculative potential to the upside. Bitcoin mining may draw in those who find the features of anonymity and lack of governmental oversight attractive. Some miners may decide to hoard some or all of their lot and not regularly engage in offering mined bitcoins in the open market, a sort of bitcoin 'fetishism'"
Now I'm obviously a bit skeptical about this myself, otherwise I wouldn't have lowered the percentage.
Hayes actually mentions an important reason too why 100% could simply be too much:
"Some miners may be subject to an opportunity cost whereby it would be more profitable to expend the same electrical capacity for some other pursuit"
Objectively it should be (close to) 100% though. At least from an economic PoV. If reality differs that's not a failure of correctly applying economic theory.
mrb wrote: I agree this economic theory makes sense in a theoretical case.
But if it was in effect in the present situation, then the global hash rate would be stagnating: existing miners would continue to mine because they can recoup their electrical opex, and no new miners would join in because they expect to be unable to recoup the sunk cost of capex. Obviously that is not what is happening. The hash rate has been increasing for years precisely because new miners expect to recoup sunk costs. Therefore this theory cannot possibly apply to the present situation.
I edited "critic #1" to better explain all this.
lorschd wrote: What an interesting dispute ;) The typical discussion between engineering bottom-up and economic top down in energy modelling.
Questions / comments on bottom-up: mrb you wrote that the PUE of mining farms is “typically very low for mining farms, 1.05 or so.” Really? I would appreciate some empirical evidence. The PUE values appear pretty low compared to other data centers ( e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_usage_effectiveness ). I know about liquid cooling (eg. http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2015/01/22/bitcoin-gets-liquid-bitfury-buys-immersion-cooling-specialist/). However, there might be also some overhead for power distribution & conditioning, redundancy (n+1) or backup supply etc. Do you really think these low PUE numbers are mining industry average? From my point of view, proper lower and upper bound estimations would include the most and least efficient PUE guesstimates.
On marginal costs:
We distinguish between short-term and long-term marginal costs. Before costs are sunk, i.e. before investing, decision makers will only invest if there long-term marginal costs are covered. Broadly speaking, long-term marginal costs are the average costs and as such naturally include capex. Btw capex should not only encompass the mining hardware, but also the data center and its site infrastructure. Once investment is done or in “fixed capacity” markets marginal costs equal market price rule may apply and miners aspire positive contribution margins. For capacity expansion, however, the potential investor needs to expect that long-run marginal costs are covered.
(see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_curve ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_run_and_short_run You may also confer the discussion about the “missing money problem” in electricity markets. ).
However I think in light of inherent economics characteristics of Bitcoin - non-renewable commodity with finite availability – we may also consider that Btc may rather follow the Hotelling rule for exhaustible resources (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_rule), which would imply an exponentially increasing bitcoin price (ofc with boom/bust trading cycles, but in the long-run exponential).
mrb wrote: lorschd: About PUE, you found yourself that Bitfury self-reports 1.02. But it's mostly from acquaintances who run farms that I know they are around 1.05. Sorry I can't provide direct evidence. It makes sense for PUE to be super-optimized. Mining is a venture with such thin operating margins that a PUE of 1.15 would cut your profits by 10% compared to a competitor at 1.05, so there is an unusually strong incentive to optimize it as much as possible.
You see the result of this optimization in the design of mining farms: they either use liquid cooling or outside air cooling (never traditional CRACs), and bring relatively high voltages directly to servers (480/277 or 415/240 VAC) to eliminate some power conversion steps.
There is also typically no need for power redundancy or backup supply, so none of that affects the PUE. Backup supply/gas generators are too expensive per kWh to mine with. And redundancy is not needed because miners don't need high availability. They could tolerate even a subpar public utility having outages ~1% of the time. That would only cut their revenues by ~1% unlike traditional businesses that would be much more severely impacted.
Finally, I agree capex includes the facility and infrastructure. Ignoring/underestimating capex is one of the main errors that Digiconomist commits.
Digiconomist wrote: Hmm... before investing "fixed cost" could indeed be marginal costs. But try asking the question; who is the investor? From a new miner's perspective these could be quite high, but it's less extreme for a manufacturer. In fact, it's an entirely different model there (their fixed costs are the machines to produce the miners).
Digiconomist wrote: Added details with regard to the previous statement to the BECI page. IMO that covers #1 and #2 (the BECI was never based on Aste's work to begin with; Hayes deserves the credits). You're also very fixed on that 65% number; "the goal of the Index is not to produce a perfect estimate, but to produce an economically credible day-to-day estimate that is more accurate and robust than an estimate based on the efficiency of a selection of mining machines." The index cost % is capped at 65 and you should apply an error margin of 25% (supported by the lower bound in the supplement).
As for #3 and #4. These have been addressed. It's sufficiently clear that it concerns electricity consumption.
And with regard to #5. Well, I followed your method to determine the machines that should be active at the very least. The only economic part is that it is assumed that miners run while it's profitable to do so whether that is 1% or 99% profits. That's a lot safer than guessing what miners may or may not do.
mrb wrote: You say "could indeed be marginal costs," but they *are*. We exchanged dozens of messages and so far you have failed to explain every single time why you ignore capex (this is critic #1). On Twitter you said they should be taken into account if new hardware is deployed, and my point is that new hardware is constantly being deployed: the hash rate is shooting up every day. At least it seems you are slowly taking into account capex by assuming, at least, that a fraction of mining revenues is spent on costs other than electricity...
About critic #2, I am "fixed" on this 65% because it is the single and only variable in your model that determines all your numbers, and the percentage is very wrong. You cannot justify it by having a disclaimer tucked down at the end of your page ("the goal of the Index is not to produce a perfect estimate"). This makes BECI highly deceptive. Neither is your 25% error margin sufficient to justify your position: 65±25 implies your index cost percentage is between 40-90%. I have shown in my article the real percentage is in the range 18-42%. So you assuming it could be anything beyond 42% is, simply put, grossly flawed.
You responded to my critic #3, thanks.
You still have one more fix needed to fully resolve critic #4. Replace energy with electricity in "the entire Bitcoin network now consumes more energy than a number of countries."
Regarding critic #5, you are missing the point of what a lower bound is. A lower bound means you are absolutely certain that miners cannot possibly consume less energy than a given bound. You make a (wrong) guess/assumption that *all* miners run *all* their mining farms until their very last profitable day. But to make it a lower bound, you must prove it. You fail to do so because your guess is incorrect. Ironically you say your model is "a lot safer than guessing what miners may or may not do" but you are doing precisely that: guessing! What do you think Bitfury did once their 16nm hardware rolled out of the factory floor? You think they were waiting for the 28nm gear to stop being profitable to upgrade to 16nm? You think they spent a fortune building *additional* 16nm farms besides their 28nm farms? The answer to both questions is: no! They decommissioned their 28nm hardware right away (even if still somewhat profitable) to replace it with much more profitable 16nm hardware.
You are not a miner. You have never talked to, researched, or studied the mining industry. You have never met and interviewed professional miners. If you had done so, you would realize how flawed your assumptions and entire model is.
Digiconomist wrote: "BECI’s author’s implicit acknowledgment his earlier models would be overestimating electricity consumption by 1.57"
Okay, official reaction from BECI's author to this: I explicitely stated that BECI was fine IMO at any point in time, so this is BS, please don't spread lies.
Second, changes are far from random, even informed you of the method. The lag depends on volatility, so it if it was lower before that's because volatility was lower before. Again, you're spreading lies.
Also it's completely insane to state I would like to “keep BECI down”? What possible motive do I have???? There's no complete data on Bitcoin's actual energy consumption anywhere, so there's ZERO need for adjustments. You have offered NO information that would somehow lead me to think otherwise, and I've been trying to explain that for some time - but you don't seem to get it.
If you have to lower yourself to slandering to make a point that's absolutely pathetic.
mrb wrote: You seem to be making 3 points (and the email dump you published seems to have also been made in response to the same 3 points):
(1) I said your moving period average changes (60 days → 120 days → 150 days → 200 days) implicitly acknowledge you overestimated consumption by 1.57×. I was documenting the positive changes you made, since in my opinion they brought BECI a little bit more in line with reality (not completely though). But instead you reject this mildly positive critic and insist BECI was fine at any point? Ok, I removed that sentence and edited critic #3.1.
(By the way, BECI was certainly not fine "at any point." For example: you used to assume 100% of revenues were spent on electricity.)
(2) You said you have no motive to "keep BECI down". Well I assumed good faith on your part: I assumed your "motive" to keep BECI down by increasing the moving average period was to try to shift BECI's numbers to be closer to reality.
(3) I said you do not track, archive, or document changes to the moving average period and that the changes look random. I said it because it took 5 emails where I kept asking when you made the changes, before finally obtaining your partial best answer (an ill-specified formula). You had not yet given me the formula at the time I had last updated this post. I have now updated it to remove the "random" critic. However as you said in an email, answering the question of when did you make the changes would force you "to go through thousands of page versions to retrieve this." Therefore my main criticism remains valid: you do not track the changes in an easy/proper way, you do not want to or cannot answer, and you certainly do not *document* the changes publicly. It is therefore impossible to verify/reproduce BECI's numbers, past and present (the current moving average period is no longer documented on the site.)
You say I have offered no information that would change your mind, but that is an understatement. You have yet to refute the (updated) information I gave you in critic #1, #2, #3.1, #4, and #5. Plus I gave you my other post full of facts, data, charts, and CSV files: http://blog.zorinaq.com/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/ I gave you many counter-arguments over the last few months, many of which you have never replied to.
I am certainly NOT slandering you, but instead presenting you with facts and data disproving your model.
Digiconomist wrote: >I gave you many counter-arguments over the last few months, many of which you have never replied to.
I did, but you didn't seem to care about what the arguments were (per your emails you certainly didn't have any troubles publishing on an unfinished discussion). One way or another, it's not very pretty what you did here.
In any case, I've abandoned this discussion. We can discuss forever, but all we'd be doing would be arguing whether Bitcoin's energy consumption is insane or even more insane.
mrb wrote: You claim you replied to my critics. This is an outright lie.
For example you have completely avoided replying to my main point (critic #2): the 4 logic errors you made in choosing your model's main parameter, the "60%" percentage. See the list items numbered 1-4 concluding critic #2. Zero response from you.
Seeing you abandon this discussion simply betrays your fundamental inability to defend your flawed model.
PS: This blog post is a live document, updated as our debate progresses. It will always be "unfinished".
Digiconomist wrote: Please update it with Morgan Stanley's latest work. They did a production based analysis and concluded the cost of mining 1 Bitcoin is between $3,000 and $7,000. My model puts it at just $2,100 per coin at the same time. MS also assumes a bit higher price per KWh, so it's in the same energy range (although on the low side, but the model was supposed to be conservative). ;)
https://www.ft.com/content/93b22cb1-0346-38be-bebf-d2e676e19621
mrb wrote: You continue to ignore and to not address the flaws in your model. See the list items concluding critic #2. I have been waiting for a reply on this for months.
And you failed to read/understand Morgan Stanley's report. Their math includes non-electrical (ie. hardware) costs. In fact they assume 1,232,448 S9 machines which total 15 TWh/year, a lot less than your 42 TWh/year... See https://i.imgur.com/fTprqvC.png
Alex, every comment you make contains false information. It does not make for a very productive discussion. Take my feedback and fix BECI.
Digiconomist wrote: Well, actually they refer to me when it comes to current consumption, and to their other recent report "Bitcoin ASIC production substantiates electricity use". I'm guessing you didn't even see this report in full apart from some media snippets. https://imgur.com/a/PL6Pw
mrb wrote: And last week Bloomberg quoted my research in their report[1] on Bitcoin mining. They estimate 20.5 TWh/yr, close to my best guess of 18.4 TWh/yr. Does MS quoting you or Bloomberg quoting me proves one of us is right? No. Besides tickling our egos, it doesn't prove anything. Instead you should be addressing the flaws in your model which you are still ignoring... See the list items concluding critic #2.
[1] Bloomberg report titled "Bitcoin in Energy Crisis as China Cracks Down", available on the terminal https://blinks.bloomberg.com/news/stories/p2bo7j6jijuo or on the web https://www.bnef.com/core/insights/17793
Digiconomist wrote: I think you're missing my point. There is nothing to fix. Morgan Stanley provided some solid work that shows my simple prediction model is doing a great job. Try reading: https://digiconomist.net/bitcoin-energy-consumption#validation
mrb wrote: Missing the point? This is the 5th time you ignore critic #2. Reply.
As to those Morgan Stanley reports, not only do they present a chart agreeing with my estimate and disagreeing with yours, but they also aren't flawless. In one computation, the analysts made a basic math error by multiplying instead of dividing. Because of this, their forecast is 2× off. Read http://blog.zorinaq.com/morgan-stanley-bitcoin-research-reports/
As to your energy forecast, you literally fabricated it. Read critics #6 and #7.
Digiconomist wrote: I literally have no clue what you're trying to say. "Fabricated charts", "linear growth"of the Bitcoin price - dude, my index isn't even based on price, it's based on revenue - and stable revenue for this forecast ("the best prediction today of what a price will be tomorrow is the price today").
And regarding MS's error. Well, take it to them, but just FYI they revised their estimate for the chip-based production potential to 200 TWh per year (see "Bitcoin Critics Grab the Mic. And Electricity Use Keeps Going Up. But is it correlation?") - so you need a bigger error than off by 2.
mrb wrote: This is the 6th time you ignore critic #2. Reply.
Claiming your index is not based on price is a lie... Fact check: Your index depends on revenue. Revenue depends on price. Therefore BECI depends on price. Even your site said it: https://i.imgur.com/KpKlgS0.png
You said you assume "stable revenue." Bitcoin has demonstrated it is anything but stable. In the last 60 days its price varied 3× from $6k to $17k, so your "forecast" is nonsense as it varies 3× depending on which revenue or price figure you hand-pick. Your model cannot predict energy consumption any more so than it can predict price.
James Faucette (lead MS analyst) emailed me after they published the 3rd report. Hopefully their future reports will be corrected.
Digiconomist wrote: >Your model cannot predict energy consumption any more so than it can predict price.
Half your post here is about the 60%, which has been a target param since the very beginning. You can see it's 2.6B vs 9.4B today, that's 28%. The prediction is 60%. So how do you mean it's not predictive? It's 100% a prediction model, I don't need to pick any fancy price for that. But you've been getting that wrong from the very beginning. You keep acting like I'm saying it's 60% today. No, it's not, just check the numbers for once.
mrb wrote: Has it really been one full year since I wrote this post and you still do not understand that my text in critic #2 refers to your 60% PREDICTIVE percentage, not the 28% CURRENT percentage? Are you feigning ignorance?
Basically I showed that you overestimate energy consumption by 2.8×/2.2×/1.5× (lower bound/best guess/upper bound.) Therefore for your model to report accurate numbers you should set your PREDICTIVE percentage to 21%/27%/40%, which would make the CURRENT percentage 10%/13%/19%.
And therein lies the bigger flaw: because your model would need a dynamic (not static) PREDICTIVE percentage to accurately estimate energy consumption, it actually shows it is poorly predictive.
Digiconimist wrote: Just to add a bit of basic economics. The reason it's predictive is because in general the point where marginal cost = marginal revenue is the point of optimal production. Production will always gravitate towards this point.
Digiconomist wrote: And while it's gravitating to that point, yes, mining is hugely profitable. That should be apparent from my numbers as well (again, today's cost percentage is super low). That's why more machines will keep on being produced. Marginal costs are still < marginal revenue. When they get to that point, it's no longer profitable to produce more. And yet you counter my work by showing mining is CURRENTLY very profitable. That's not really countering anything. A bunch of arguments here just make no sense.
Digiconomist wrote: Your CSVs could be more useful if they actually covered the complete lifetime of a machine. They would most likely support my lifetime assumption that helped me set the 60% target in the first place. But you've only got the S5, which is not even at the end of its lifetime yet (https://news.bitcoin.com/antminer-s5-disrupts-t-mobile-broadband-network/). So the only thing I can get from it now is that mining is very profitable, yeah, I know.
mrb wrote: «it's predictive is because in general the point where marginal cost = marginal revenue»
Yes but you cannot predict future marginal revenue (future Bitcoin price is unpredictable) therefore you cannot predict marginal cost. That is why your chart in critic #7 is fabricated: you literally claim to know Bitcoin's price 9 months in the future(!)
mrb wrote: I found yet another error in your work. 150 blocks were mined per day in last 48 hours, miners currently collect ~50 BTC in tx fees daily, therefore annualized mining revenues are:
(12.5 × 150 + 50) × 365 × $11k = $7.7B
But somehow your site claims $9.4B. You are $1.7 billion off. That is 22% off. If you cannot even correctly calculate marginal revenue, your energy estimate is also 22% off from this error alone (ignoring other flaws.) Fix your math.
PS: I am still waiting for a proper reply to critic #2. It is the 7th time you ignore it or feign ignorance.
Digiconomist wrote: "Note that the Index contains the aggregate of Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash (other forks of the Bitcoin network are not included)."
Has been this way since the fork and was announced back then - but I remember you cannot read my Twitter updates so I won't hold it against you. And actually, this explains both your comments. :)
Digiconomist wrote: Plus, I can keep responding to critic 2, but I'd merely be repeating that the case for the 60% is solid.
The market equilibrium is in margin revenue = marginal costs. You can approach this from two perspectives. The first one is that each unit of mining effort includes a sunk cost in the form of hardware costs, which are irrelevant to the decision to mine. Hence marginal costs can be 100% electricity.
When prices are increasing, you could also consider the cost of acquiring new hardware. The S9 retailed as low as $1200, and that's still including a profit margin. Song estimated the actual production cost was around $500. Given a lifetime of two years, add $1200 in electricity costs (at 5 cents per KWh). That's 70% going to electricity for the full machine over its lifetime.
You can keep pointing at the selling price as much as you like, but that doesn't change the equilibrium for that case. Eg if Bitmain asks $2300, and miners expect an electricity bill of $1200, they won't buy the machine if
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his life; he was rushing headlong into the sea of the world, arms thrown wide open, to embrace it, to drown in it.
Let’s take “Of Pop and Pies and Fun: A Program for Mass Liberation in the Form of a Stooges Review, or, Who’s the Fool?,” published in Creem in 1970. I was too young to have read this when it came out; I would have read it in one of the thick bound volumes I used to spend summer afternoons with at the library, some years later. This is just to give an idea of the fun that Bangs could provide in such an afternoon, if you were a young teen-age fan fiendishly devoted to the Stooges and their “crazed quaking uncertainty.” Because Bangs had already won you over with his uncannily exact description of your own love of the Stooges: “an errant foolishness that effectively mirrors the absurdity and desperation of the times, but … they also carry a strong element of cure, a post-derangement sanity.”
The perfection of this assessment led you breathlessly through the rest of the piece, which mentioned: Malcolm Muggeridge, the Panthers, the Yips, Holden Caulfield, “I took acid four days ago and since then everything is smooth with no hangups like it always is for about a week after a trip?” (ugh, speak for yourself, Lester); “fantasies of a puissant ‘youth culture,’” “Jimmy Page’s arch scowl of supermusician ennui,” Mountain, Cream, Creedence, “imagine throwing a pie in the face of Eldridge Cleaver! Joan Baez!” “the onetime atropine-eyed Byronic S&M Lizard King,” an MBE returned, “a giant pie stuffed with the complete works of Manly P. Hall,” “that infernal snob McCartney and those radical dilettante capitalist pigs the Jefferson Airplane,” Marxists, A. A. Milne, Mick Jagger (“a spastic flap-lipped tornado writhing from here to a million steaming snatches and beyond in one undifferentiated erogenous mass, a mess and a spectacle all at the same time”), “the bastion (Bastille) stage,” “the oppressor is fat and weak, brothers!”
Artaud, Tinkertoys, épater la bourgeoisie, Ed Ward, the “I Ching,” sock hops, “A.B. Spellman’s moving book ‘Four Lives in the Bebop Business,’” “Trout Mask Replica,” “the essence of both American life and American rock ‘n’ roll.”
“Mark my words.”
“Some peglegged Golem hobbling toward carny Bethlehem,” Porky Pig, “beautiful Pauline Kael.”
It ends like this:
Some of the most powerful esthetic experiences of our time, from “Naked Lunch” to Bonnie and Clyde, set their audiences up just this way, externalizing and magnifying their secret core of sickness which is reflected in the geeks they mock and the lurid fantasies they consume, just as our deepest fears and prejudices script the jokes we tell each other. This is where the Stooges work. They mean to put you on that stage, which is why they are super-modern, though nothing near to Art. In Desolation Row and Woodstock-Altamont Nation the switchblade is mightier and speaks more eloquently than the penknife. But this threat is cathartic, a real cool time is had by all, and the end is liberation.
Don’t even doubt that I looked up every single book, every musical reference, hell every single word I didn’t understand. You bet your sweet bippy, I did.
Bangs openly lamented having been born too late to hang with the Beats, but he loved William Burroughs and wrote about him constantly. Suburban librarians generally hadn’t the faintest clue what was in any of these books (or maybe, just pretended not to) and any curious teen-ager could borrow them freely at the public library, or buy them at a bookshop, head shop, or thrift shop. “Naked Lunch” certainly made a striking contrast with, say, “The Catcher in the Rye,” a book you might be reading at school. I was surprised to find, returning to “Naked Lunch” just a few years ago, how full of sap and hilarity it still is. The funniest thing is that “Naked Lunch” turns out to be a moralistic book, making a better, truer, scarier case against becoming a junkie than whatever nonsense you were liable to be hearing in health ed.
The literature of mysticism and the occult, representing as it did the anti-religious, was also of interest during this time; parents were still attending church regularly. Hence the popularity of unreadable Satanist tracts, astrology, Aleister Crowley, and assorted metaphysicians of all nations. What did the anti-religions have to say? I can still remember the pseudo-mystical mantra-recommendation sung by Todd Rundgren on the album, “Initiation”: “Steiner, Gurdjieff, Blavatsky, and Boooo-dah.” I went dutifully along to the library to investigate and was soon bored out of my tree. By golly, that Madame Blavatsky is a pill. In general, you were liable to get some crackpot literary recommendations from your favorite rock stars. But Bangs could draw the marrow forth even from the metaphysicians. In the essay, “James Taylor Marked for Death,” he wrote:
Number one, everybody should realize that all this “art” and “bop” and “rock-’n’-roll” and whatever is all just a joke and a mistake, just a hunka foolishness so stop treating it with any seriousness or respect at all and just recognize the fact that it’s nothing but a Wham-O toy to bash around as you please in the nursery, it’s nothing but a goddam Bonusburger so just gobble the stupid thing and burp and go for the next one tomorrow; and don’t worry about the fact that it’s a joke and a mistake and a bunch of foolishness as if that’s gonna cause people to disregard it and do it in or let it dry up and die, because it’s the strongest, most resilient, most invincible Superjoke in history, nothing could possibly destroy it ever, and the reason for that is precisely that it is a joke, mistake, foolishness. The first mistake of Art is to assume that it’s serious. I could even be an asshole here and say that “Nothing is true; everything is permitted,” which is true as a matter of fact, but people might get the wrong idea. What’s truest is that you cannot enslave a fool.
Here was one of Crowley’s favorite notions (“Nothing is true; everything is permitted,”), by way of Nietzsche, but Bangs brought it out of occult Thelemist incomprehensibility and into the question of discovering a practical intellectual justification for the satisfaction of every appetite. This was the way the twenty-somethings we admired were living. Why these strictures? What good were they? What if we simply chose to live real life in the U.S.A. entirely unhampered by any of them at all? It took some time, but eventually one inevitably blundered into Nietzsche himself, and asked the old question from a philosophical or logical, rhetorical or moralistic perspective. Was nothing true? Was everything permitted? What was spiritual freedom? Was Kerouac free? Was Burroughs? Was Bangs?
What he was really leading us to was the one true church of intellectual curiosity and open-mindedness. There was subtlety and elegance in his reasoning, generosity, and the best kind of skepticism: the skepticism that turns back on the author himself. This last aspect of Bangs’s writing was the most revelatory to me. It was the virtue I sought most to emulate, then and now.
Indeed no other writer gave me this feeling again so purely until I ran across David Foster Wallace, so many years later, and found he’d learned the very same thing; I suspect he learned it from the same doomed, messed-up, wounded, alcoholic genius of a teacher.
In 1977, Bangs accompanied the Clash on tour, which resulted in an immense three-part interview published in the NME.
Finally [Mick Jones] looked me right in the eye and said, “Hey Lester: why are you asking me all these fucking questions?” In a flash I realized he was right. Here was I, a grown man … motoring up into the provinces of England, just to ask a goddamn rock ‘n’ roll band for the meaning of life! Some people never learn. I certainly didn’t, because I immediately started in on him with my standard cultural-genocide rap: “Blah blah blah depersonalization blab blab blab solipsism blah blah yip yap etc. …” “What in the fuck are you talking about?” “Blah blab no one wants to have any emotions anymore blab blip human heart an endangered species blah blare cultural fascism blab blurb etc. etc. etc. …”
And even though this was meant for kids to read, note that there’s not a particle of condescension in it. That, too, made young people love and trust Lester Bangs with unswerving devotion. Indeed I’ve never swerved once in all these years.
Maria Bustillos is a writer living in Los Angeles. Read her recent piece for Page-Turner on the reading lists of George Orwell, Henry Miller and others.
Photograph by Roberta Bayley/Redferns/Getty Images.Consumers typically purchase fresh meat products based upon their appearance and an attractive, bright colour is very often a consideration for the purchase. However, some chickens are found to have yellowish-green colour in their meat. Is there anything wrong with these green chickens?
Unusual green colour in chicken meat is usually due to a condition known as Green Muscle Disease (or Oregon Disease) which is found in commercially raised broiler chickens. In poultry farming, broiler chickens are kept relatively inactive during the growing period. Consequently, the pectoral muscles (breast muscles) are not exercised enough to increase efficiency of its circulatory supply. As these muscles in poultry cannot expand in response to physical activity, a short period of sudden and excessive wing flap can compromise the blood supply and lead to degeneration and cell death in the tissue. The affected muscle has a characteristic swollen reddish-brown lesion that later becomes green and shrunken and then pale green, depending upon the time of induction of the vigorous wing exercise.
The lesion does not impair the general health of the chickens and is generally found during cut-up and deboning. The condition is not associated with any infectious or harmful substance and has no food safety concern other than affecting the aesthetic appearance of the meat.An Oregon port that's being overrun by sea lions has revealed its latest weapon to scare off the invasive animals: giant inflatable tube dancers.
The unusual blow-up dolls -- typically seen promoting used car lots and in this popular episode of "Family Guy" -- are the latest effort to scare away the sea lions from Port of Astoria docks.
The port's previous attempts, which consisted of beach balls, ribbons and stakes and even a fake orca, literally went belly-up -- the whale, at least.
So far, video shows the giant neon dancers working.
KOIN Inflatable tube dancers are being used to scare sea lions from docks in Oregon.
Immediately after the dancers were turned on Thursday, sending their plastic bodies flapping wildly in the air, most of the sea lions desperately dove for cover in the water.
But only time will tell if the effect will last.
"The thing about the sea lions is, they're very intelligent animals," port official Robert Evert told Astoria station KGW TV, "and so if they realize these are not a threat or harm to them, it's possible they'll get back on the docks."
Local officials say they expect to see two thousand sea lions overtake their docks this summer.
While sea lions do attract tourists and their business, officials say, they also compete with local fishermen by stealing their catch and crowding the docks and water. Area residents also complain of constant barking that goes into the night.
The port's executive director, Jim Knight, told the Daily Astorian that they do have a backup plan underway thanks to a group of local high school students.Tyler embarked on his long public career in December 1811 when he began the first of five consecutive one-year terms representing Charles City County in the House of Delegates. Despite his youth, on December 8, 1815, the General Assembly elected him to the Council of State. In November 1816 Tyler won a special election to a vacant seat in the House of Representatives from the district that included the city of Richmond and Charles City, Hanover, Henrico, and New Kent counties. He won election to full terms in 1817 and 1819. A Democrat-Republican supporting states' rights, limited government, and a strict interpretation of the Constitution, Tyler opposed rechartering the Bank of the United States, increasing protective tariffs, appropriating federal funds for internal improvements, and Andrew Jackson's military campaigns during the First Seminole War.
Tyler initially opposed the Missouri Compromise of 1820, because he viewed it as unconstitutional and thought that new states should decide for themselves whether to permit slavery. A lifelong slaveholder, he believed the institution was a necessary evil and that it needed to expand into the western territories to disperse the slave population, which would ease problems of slave management and allow for better treatment of bondspeople because of increased demand for their labor. Tyler also argued that the political viability for eventual emancipation could be strengthened if the slave population of the older southern states was thinned out. He eventually voted for the compromise but later regretted his decision because he believed that it contributed to sectional discord in subsequent decades.
Poor health prohibited him from seeking another term in 1821, but two years later Charles City County voters returned him to the House of Delegates, where he served three consecutive one-year terms. The General Assembly elected him to a one-year term as governor on December 10, 1825. Tyler busied himself with the routine duties of the chief executive, which often related to state appointments, public improvements, the penitentiary, the militia, and military bounty claims. The assembly reelected him to another term in December 1826, but on January 13, 1827, it elected him to the U.S. Senate. Tyler's resignation as governor took effect on March 4, the day the congressional term began. Elected as a Jacksonian, Tyler objected to funding internal improvements, raising tariffs, and rechartering the Bank of the United States.Nearly 3,000 dead pigs have been fished out of the Huangpu River in China – a source of drinking water for millions of Shanghai residents. The number is likely to increase as the operation progresses.
It is remains unknown who dumped the carcasses into the Huangpu River or what the cause of their death may have been. One possibility is that the pigs were discarded into the waters by some farmer from the neighboring province of Zhejiang.
Locals have complained of the terrible smell from the river and are highly concerned with the quality of drinking water, but officials said no health risks have been registered. According to authorities, tests of the Huangpu's waters found no traces of foot-and-mouth disease, blue-ear pig disease or swine fever.
However, the cleanup operation needs to be done quickly to avoid contaminating of the drinking water supply.
"We have to act quickly to remove them all for fear of causing water pollution," Xu Rong, the environmental chief in Shanghai's Songjiang district said.
"So far, water quality has not been affected but we have to remove the pigs as quickly as possible and can't let their bodies rot in the water."
In the meantime the operation still continues in the Hengliaojing Creek, some 64km (40 miles) from central Shanghai.
The pigs were first discovered on Thursday and have been recovered en masse since then. This is not the first time the river has suffered such an invasion, locals asserted.
"We had dead pigs here last year too," complained 66-year-old Dong Aifang, who lives along the river, was quoted by The Telegraph."We seem to have dead pigs all the time. It is non-stop.”They asked me to write a half-hour with those three characters [from Lorimer], and that was the beginning of our development. It was an opportunity before us—something that wasn’t being done.
Do you think Looking would survive as a network show?
ANDREW HAIGH: I can’t imagine it working. HBO has given us the freedom to explore things that wouldn’t be OK to explore on a network show. In terms of language and sexuality and honesty and realism—you just wouldn’t be able to do it. There would be a lot of pressure to make it funny or make it something that we didn’t want the story to be.
LANNAN: And in terms of the style, they were supportive of it having a cinematic quality, of having Andrew develop the cinematic language and be unconventional, and having characters that were quite subtle in some ways, but also very emotional. Distinctly in the “comedy” department, but they let us find our own type of comedy that worked for the show.
HAIGH: Allowing them to be emotional was the key; you really cared about these people and wanted to watch their development and their journey, and keep it within the everyday, the subtle and the small.
Looking deals with the complicated boundary between sex and intimacy that is universal across relationships—gay or straight.
HAIGH: You want it to be universal. The minute you start to become specific about these characters, you start to see that their concerns and struggles universal. The notion that gay people are completely different from everybody else … well, of course they’re not. We all have similar desires and similar needs. And I think that struggle and search for intimacy and connection is such a universal one, and it’s what we wanted to focus on.
LANNAN: The best HBO shows have been about very specific, detailed worlds. Everything from The Wire to The Sopranos is about very specific places and times. But through that you get this more universal and transcendent thing.
HAIGH: It’s interesting—you watch something like The Wire, and of course you understand those characters and they resonate with you. And then there’s this idea that if you watch a show about a bunch of gay people and you’re not gay, it’s not going to reflect your life. But of course it reflects your life.
Do you think Looking challenges stereotypes about what it means to be a gay couple?
HAIGH: It’s not that we wanted to necessarily challenge the audience, but we certainly wanted to explore the subtleties and the different types of relationships people can have. Just because now gay people can get married, it doesn’t mean they want to get married. It’s important that we look at all the different ways people can have relationships and the ways they can make things work.
LANNAN: It’s built into Patrick’s journey. He begins the show with the idea that you can either have sex in the woods or settle down and get married. As the show goes on, he realizes that those aren’t the only two choices—that there’s this whole world of options.Hey Music Maniacs,
iZotope's Ozone Advanced 5 is perfect for mastering your own tracks, especially if you're on a reasonably tight budget. In this screencast tutorial we'll have a look at how to do basic mastering with Ozone, using Insight for metering. here is a tutorial to start learning how to master you own tracks.
(for those looking to save time or not ready to master themselves
Now on to the tutorial: Now lets get into a Quick Mastering Tutorial using Ozone 5.iZotope's Ozone Advanced 5 is perfect for mastering your own tracks, especially if you're on a reasonably tight budget. In this screencast tutorial we'll have a look at how to do basic mastering with Ozone, using Insight for metering. here is a tutorial to start learning how to master you own tracks.(for those looking to save time or not ready to master themselves The Maniac Agenda can master your tracks. We have an Express digital mastering Service for $20 plus we have other Analog options get the details here Now on to the tutorial:
Want to Collaborate with The Maniac Agenda?
Benefits you get for Collaborating with us
1. You get a professional production credit with a established group
2. We do A&R for MultikillRecordings, 50/50 Records, Philosophy Records, & Power ON so the chances of our Collab getting signed is very high
3. Everyone of our releases chart on Beatport no less than top 20 for its genre so has potential to add to your bio making it easier to get more tracks signed with labels
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You get paid
for your share for units sold and if the track gets license to video games, movies, etc...
6. Our collaboration gets promoted on our social networks that reach over 100,000 people a week
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9. You can upload and are encouraged to upload on all your social networks i.e. Soundcloud Youtube
Video by Mo Volans from TutplusIts something a bit different I know but its something I’ve always wanted to make. If you haven’t tried Monopoly Deal I’d suggest giving it a go, its only about £7 on Amazon right now and is a great little party game.
I used a small expansion that I found on BoardGameGeek’s forums as the foundation for my expansion, the initial authors had taken it from v1 to v2 and there were some really good ideas there. I added my own ideas, printed everything out, got it shipped and playtested with friends, this was v3, it was good but there were some big imbalances caused by the new cards. After returning to the drawing board I’ve created v4, some of the cards are displayed below:
I do not want to make any profit out of this, so I’m researching around for the best prices around for a high enough quality reproduction that’ll allow this deck to be seamlessly mixed in with the normal deck. I’ll update here in the future when I’ve got that arranged.
Here is a link for the player card image files for anyone who wants to print them off themselves
I’ve uploaded two versions to MakePlayingCards.com at this link.
The version titled “MDE Light” has a lesser quality card material and a small cardboard tuck box as a container.
The version titled “MDE” features higher quality card material and a plastic hinged card container; however costs are higher.
Board games can be as entertaining as video games, I think they’re making a long overdue resurgence recently, hopefully it continues.Buffalo Bills wide receiver Marquise Goodwin's 2016 Olympic dreams did not come into fruition on Sunday.
Goodwin finished seventh in the men's long jump at the U.S.A. Olympic Trials in Eugene, Oregon, with a mark of 8.25m (27 feet, 3/4 inches). The top three finishers qualified for the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in August.
The dual-sport athlete had been vying for his second trip to the Olympics since Buffalo's 2015 season concluded in January.
Goodwin narrowly made it to Sunday's final after finishing 12th in Saturday's qualifying round.
In 2012, Goodwin won the men's long jump at the U.S. Trials with a leap of 27 feet, 4 inches. His victory earned him his first Olympics berth, where he finished 10th at the 2012 Games in London.
Despite falling short in his Olympic bid this year, Goodwin's track and field career has been stellar. He's a two-time USA long jump outdoor champion, two-time NCAA champion and four-time NCAA All-American.
Goodwin's wife, Morgan, is also attempting to qualify for the Olympics in the 100 meter hurdles.A PICTURE is worth a thousand words and one group has created an attention grabbing image that they think sums up Tony Abbott’s approach to climate change.
Taken on Townsville’s main beach The Strand on Sunday, the image has been getting a positive response online.
It features a landscape of people with their heads in the sand with the words “Townsville salutes... the Australian government for their achievements in combating climate change” placed over the top.
The image was the brainchild of Cranky Curlew Productions and the North Queensland Conservation Council, which wanted to support the People’s Climate March on Sunday, the largest climate march in history and which attracted more than 300,000 people in New York, by doing something a bit different.
“I felt like I wanted to do something different, we attend so many marches,” NQCC co-ordinator Wendy Tubman said.
The idea to capture people with their heads in the sand was the idea of NQCC member Penelope Sheridan. Her husband George Hirst, former editor of the newspaper Magnetic Times and now founder of Cranky Curlew, took the photo.
He told news.com.au that it took about 40 minutes to get the shot but he had already done a trial on the weekend. The final image featured about 80 people and Mr Hirst said he did Photoshop it slightly to adjust the positioning of the bodies.
“It was a terrific effort for those that did it, there was sand up the nose and even a dead possum that we had to remove,” Mr Hirst said.
“I think it was an effective way of protesting but while also having a fun time. Once people had done it I think they actually enjoyed the process, they liked having their head in the sand... but maybe we shouldn’t tell people that,” Mr Hirst joked.
Mr Hirst said he hoped that the concept would take off and that others would set up their own shots.
“People seem to like the idea... I would love to see people do it on Bondi Beach.”
NQCC is particularly concerned about the Great Barrier Reef and is one of the groups fighting the expansion of the Abbot Point coal terminal.
Ms Tubman said the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority had acknowledged that climate change was the reef’s greatest threat.
“The circumstances are dire, we have such awful leadership at the moment in Australia about climate change,” she said.
Ms Tubman said the fact that Mr Abbott was skipping the United Nations Climate summit indicated that he was choosing to ignore the problem, essentially putting his head in the sand.
“The rest of the world and we will suffer because of his intransigence,” she said.
Mr Abbott has defended skipping the UN summit in New York, which is being held a day before a special security council meeting he is attending.
Instead Foreign Minister Julie Bishop will attend in his place.What can LAPD records and Google Maps data tell us about the safety of Los Angeles' bicycle routes? That's what a new interactive map of the city's 2,043 bicycle collisions from the year 2012 seeks to answer.
Pairing each reported crash site with Google Street View imagery, the map reveals potential flaws in street design that might encourage conflict between cyclists and motorists. It also breaks down the reported incidents by street. The worst offenders? Olympic Boulevard (72 crashes), Venice Boulevard (63), and Sunset Boulevard (55).
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It's one of the first installments in You Are Here, an ambitious project to visualize the smaller facts of urban life—traffic hazards, tree canopy cover, the "walkingsheds" of independent coffee houses—through a new city map each day over the next year. Eventually, the Social Computing Group at the MIT Media Lab hopes to create 100 different maps of 100 different cities.
We'll look forward to more interactive maps of the Southland as the You Are Here project continues. [MIT Media Lab]0 Family shares final moments spent with 2-year-old best man
JEANNETTE, Pa. - The parents of Logan Stevenson are sharing their emotional last moments spent together as a family, following their son’s passing Monday.
At 2 years old, Logan was an inspiration to so many, gaining national attention for the role he played in his parents’ wedding two days ago as he fought a rare disease.
After escorting his mother down the aisle and serving as his parents’ best man Saturday, Logan passed away in his mother’s arms.
“Sean and I held him all day. He was comfortable with his medication. Then at 8:18 (p.m.) my son took his last breath in my arms. Logan passed away. I’m so sad, upset and I’m in disbelief. He is with angels and he’s in no more pain. No more sickness. No more hospitals,” Christine Swidorsky wrote on her Facebook page.
You can leave your condolences for the Stevenson family on our Facebook page. Click here.
Sean Stevenson said, “We got to hold him and tell him it was OK, and tell him how much we loved him and that we would be together again sometime.
Swidorsky said they told their son, “We'll meet again Logan, you go fly with the angels.”
Surrounded by his mom, dad and grandmother, Logan took his last breath.
Logan’s grandmother, Debbie Stevenson, then gave her grandson a final hug.
“It's just going to be hard that you don't get to pick him up and hold him anymore, you know, you just have to go with the pictures and the memories,” said Debbie Stevenson.
“I understand, but I can't accept it. I can't accept it,” said Swidorsky.
At 14 months, Logan was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and had a stem cell transplant in July 2012. Several months later, he was diagnosed with a kidney tumor. In March, a kidney was removed.
During a visit to the emergency room last month when Logan fell ill, a test revealed a mass in his remaining kidney. Logan was then diagnosed with Fanconi anemia, a rare disease that often leads to cancer.
Doctors told Stevenson and Swidorsky that any further treatment would not be beneficial and gave him just weeks to live.
On Saturday, Swidorsky and Sean Stevenson married so their son could be there to witness the event. The couple said they had originally planned to wed when Logan’s health improved, but when doctors gave him just days to live, they decided to move up the date.
The public’s outpouring allowed the couple to transform Sean Stevenson’s back yard in Jeanette into their dream wedding.
"The public outpouring and support has been tremendous and wonderful," said Kelly Young, Sean Stevenson’s sister.
"Ever since they found out about Logan, they've grown stronger together. They still keep their attitudes great. They just try to stay strong for one another. It's amazing," said Seth Antoniak, a groomsman.
After local businesses heard about the couple’s story, they reached out and donated, putting the entire wedding together in a week.
“It’s like he waited,” said Swidorsky. “He saw relatives he never even met.”
“I'm not afraid to die. Logan has made me not afraid to die because I know he'll be waiting for me,” said Sean Stevenson.Friday Pokemon Announcements – Sun & Moon Plush + Release Day Merchandise
We finally got news this past Friday on some if not all of the merchandise coming out on game release day: November 18th.
First up, new Pokemon Center exclusive plush! These plush will all be the same bigger size as the previously released starter plush, with shelf price being 1,620 yen each.
The line-up includes Alola Vulpix, Rockruff, Pikipek, Komala, and Togedemaru.
Japan will finally get their own 1:1 versions of the starter plush as well, with each plush selling for 5,184 yen.
Along with the large size plush, there will also be mascot sized starters you can easily attach to your bag (if you want).
Each of the smaller mascot plushies will sell for 1,080 yen.
A bunch of Alola-region related merchandise will also come out on game day, including a small line-up of Rotom-Dex plushies and charms.
Rotom Dex Plush
1,296 yen
Rotom Dex Mascot Plush
864 yen
Rotom Dex Pass Case
1,296 yen
Rotom Dex Stand
1,350 yen
Rotom Dex Metal Charms
378 yen
Charm Keyholder
918 yen
Shoulder Bag
4,320 yen
Not Pictured
Welcome to Alola! Card Sleeves & Deck Case – 1,080 yen
iPhone 6/6s Phone Case – 2,030 yen
Die-cut Memo – 540 yen
Stationary Set – 540 yen
Microfiber Hand Towel – 735 yen
PET Stickers Female/Male Protagonist – 540 yen each
A4 Clearfiles (Rowlet, Litten, Popplio, Solgaleo, Lunala) – 260 yen each
Print Metal Charm Set (Rowlet, Litten, Popplio) – 648 yen
Print Metal Charm Set (Solgaleo, Lunala, Protagonist) – 648 yen
There is a chance we will get more announcements for stuff coming out next week (and maybe finally the Hokkaido opening promotion?!) but I guess we’ll see when the time comes.
Until next time!
————————-
Sun & Moon Release Merchandise
Sun & Moon PlushBlowing snow caused a massive pile-up on Highway 400 south of Barrie this morning.
It happened around 9 a.m. on the southbound lanes between Innisfil Beach Rd. and Hwy. 89.
The southbound 400 looked like a wrecking yard. Cars and trucks smashed into each other – scattered across all the lanes.
“Just total white out conditions – I was able to stop just in time but everyone behind just kept ramming in. It was pretty scary,” says Carlo Castellon.
The chain reaction happened quickly, drivers were blinded by the snow. Most say there was no way to avoid it.
“It felt like forever but it was only a matter of ten seconds. I was sitting here bracing myself holding the steering wheel as I heard the cars coming in behind me going bang, bang, bang,” said Rick Clement.
It happened just north of Innisfil Beach Road. The carnage stretching two kilometres along the south bound lanes. The OPP say whiteout conditions and one initial problem caused the huge pile-up.
“We had calls of snow squalls in the area and we had a very serious crash involving six vehicle and that’s when the chain reaction started,” says OPP Sgt. Dave Woodford.
Ninety-six vehicles were involved including a SUV that was crushed in between two tractor trailers. The driver had to be cut out by firefighters and was taken to hospital where he is expected to be okay.
“This driver is very lucky. It looks like they split to avoid the vehicle as much as they could,” added Woodford.
Three people were taken to hospital and are expected to recover from their injuries. Police say it is a miracle no one died.
“We’re lucky we didn’t have a fatality. It was just like an accordion – one after another after another.”
A lot of drivers were treated on scene for things like minor cuts and bumps. The pile-up shut down the 400 in both directions for several hours as emergency responders and about 100 tow trucks cleared away the smashed vehicles.
“We’ve seen a couple but not this bad. It’s a really bad mess lucky a lot of people didn’t get hurt,” says tow truck driver Mario Liotiney.
Highway 400 was fully reopened in both directions by 7 p.m. Thursday evening.Up until now, the Star Wars: Episode VII rumour mill has largely concerned itself with the will-they / won’t-they saga of Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford, with wider casting whispers having proved few and far between.
However, that’s all changed this morning with Latino Review reporting that Jonathan Rhys Meyers is in talks to join the first episode of the new trilogy.
No details have been released as to who Meyers might be playing, but the star does have previous with director J.J. Abrams, having appeared in a supporting role in Mission: Impossible 3.
Given the ferocity with which Abrams guards his secrets, don’t expect confirmation of this one any time soon, although it does make a nice change from all the talk about the return of the old guard.
Directed by Abrams, Star Wars: Episode VII will begin production in the UK next year, with the film expected to arrive in cinemas in 2015.
For a whole host of stars giving their thoughts on Star Wars: Episode VII, check out our exclusive video below:Your company is a Cisco Unified Communications environment and you are trying to identify an inbound call flow in order to diagnose an issue with hard facts. You ask yourself: "How can I find the call flow that is being accessed at the time of my issue?" This guide will help you diagnose two use cases:
Erroneous call flows in Cisco Unity Toll Fraud.
Although we are focusing on these two particular cases these solutions can be used to diagnose a variety of issues.
PROBLEM
You are unable to figure out what the inbound caller is dialing before and after they access your system (Unity, UCCX).
SOLUTION 1
Identifying the Unity call flow which was sending a customer to the incorrect destination.
Simply download the traces from call manager and search for the “KeyPadButton=”. This trace is advantageous for identifying a single call with a good idea of the time frame in which it occurred.
45883909.001 |10:26:12.047 |AppInfo |StationD: (0000053) KeypadButton KeyPadButton=4(Four).
45883939.001 |10:26:13.798 |AppInfo |StationD: (0000053) KeypadButton KeyPadButton=0(Zero).
In this case, we know that the user dialed 4 before accessing the receptionist, we can now go into the Cisco Unity call flow to check what object the caller input of 4 represents.
SOLUTION 2
Identify the call flow that was used for Toll Fraud.
Collect the output of the “debug voip ccapi inout” command on the gateway. Search for the desired keyword “Relaying Digit”.
This particular debug is not too intensive, so you can leave it running to collect the data at a later time from the logs, however, this trace is advantageous for an issue that can be viewed in real time and which is constantly occurring.
2103134: May 2 23:16:57.196: //3500648/xxxxxxxxxxxx/CCAPI/cc_api
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2 ps 4 6 Internet P obj. flew 3x speed of jet, caught up to it and disappeared
2001 8 4 100 Montreal PQ NL 3600 white 2 ps 2 5 NUFORC P diamond-shaped stationary obj. like twinkling star
2001 8 4 1400 North Bay ON DD white 2 cigar 5 5 NUFORC P pencil shaped obj. became oval, then ring; during Air Show
2001 8 5 2045 Alma PQ ND 40 yellow 2 sphere 3 7 DOT P bright round obj. w/tail; 70 deg elev; no sound
2001 8 6 2250 Ottawa ON ND 180 blue 2 disc 5 7 MUFON P saucer w/dome; 2 lights on side; rolled and flew out of sight
2001 8 7 2330 Kelowna BC ND black 1 disc 4 4 NUFORC I saucer hovered over mountain; ball of white light in center
2001 8 7 615 Winnipeg MB NL 3 1 fireball 3 8 UFOROM P radio traffic reporter described bright fireball moving S
2001 8 8 2258 Waterloo ON NL 5 white 1 sphere 3 4 NUFORC P meandering out-of-focus" ball of light flew horizon to horizon
2001 8 10 2300 Nelson BC NL 180 white 2 ps 3 6 UFOROM P light "different from airplane" moved N-E
2001 8 10 2155 Comox BC ND yellow 1 sphere 5 6 UFOBC I light size of car "flitted like a hummingbird", hovered, flew off
2001 8 10 2200 Saltspring Island BC NL 1 ps 3 3 UFOBC I flashing light seen, reported to UVic
2001 8 10 Lantzville BC NL 120 2 ps 3 4 UFOBC I star brightened, moved in zig-zag pattern
2001 8 11 1900 Saskatoon SK ND white 1 sphere 3 6 UFOROM P balloon-like thing bobbing along over river", then took off like jet
2001 8 11 2300 NS NL 1 ps 3 5 Internet P 3 bright lights in triangle, changing positions; bolide?
2001 8 11 2200 NS NL ps 3 9 MUFON P 4 independent reports of traingles and pairs of lights; rocket?
2001 8 11 Ottawa ON NL 1 ps 3 5 Internet I overhead blinker craft' w/peculiar lights, no sound, video taken
2001 8 11 2230 Chicoutimi PQ NL 60 orange 2 fireball 3 4 SOSOVNI E fireball w/long white tail [Russian rocket booster reentry]
2001 8 11 2230 La Baie PQ NL 60 orange 1 fireball 3 4 SOSOVNI E fireball w/long white tail [Russian rocket booster reentry]
2001 8 12 25 Victoria BC ND grey 6 oval 5 7 NUFORC U 7 objs. in hexagon pattern changed formation, flew off
2001 8 12 15 Victoria BC NL 180 grey 8 oval 5 7 NUFORC P 7 objs. in hexagon pattern changed formation, flew off
2001 8 12 45 Halifax NS NL 6 fireball 3 7 NUFORC E bright obj. w/3 "jets of flame" moving N-S; Russian rocket?
2001 8 12 35 Halifax NS NL 15 white 1 fireball 3 5 NUFORC P obj. w/tail "like a Navy flare"
2001 8 12 15 Edmonton AB NL 5 1 irregular 3 5 AUFOSG P 3 dim parallel streaks like shooting stars, seen briefly
2001 8 13 2315 Ottawa ON ND 180 2 diamond 3 6 MUFON I tri. obj. drifted across sky
2001 8 14 2245 Strathroy ON NL white 1 ps 5 4 NUFORC I 12 objs. in triangle then circle; aerial acrobatics
2001 8 14 2300 ON C1 white 1 sphere 6 4 NUFORC I small balls of light approaching witness, disappearing
2001 8 14 2330 Cobalt ON ND 300 red 2 diamond 4 5 NUFORC I pyramid-shaped obj. moved across sky; lights flashing
2001 8 14 2030 Burnaby BC NL 1800 4 ps 2 2 UFOBC I stationary obj moved slowly towards ground
2001 8 15 2200 Shawanigan-sud PQ NL 120 white 7 fireball 3 4 SOSOVNI I fireball crossed sky, stopped in flight then descended
2001 8 15 2155 Guysborough County NS NL 1500 white 1 ps 3 8 MUFON E 14 formations of pairs of lights moving W-NE
2001 8 16 Winnipeg MB NL 1 ps 2 3 UFOROM I witness saw UFOs "every night for a month', "sparkling"
2001 8 16 2250 New Glasgow NS NL 15 1 ps 3 9 MUFON P trio of lights going SE
2001 8 16 2359 Port Alberni BC NL 3 white 4 ps 4 6 NUFORC P obj. rose from behind mountain, zig-zagged, went "into space"
2001 8 17 2150 Sydney NS NL 20 white 1 ps 3 7 MUFON P trio of lights with other red flashing lights; flew slowly NE-SW
2001 8 17 2130 Mitchell MB ND 15 multi 1 ps 4 8 DOT U 3 unblinking lights in tri.; moved E-W; loud booms heard; B-2?
2001 8 17 1930 BC NL 7200 1 ps 2 2 UFOBC P globular obj at high alt in SSW, seemed cylindrical
2001 8 17 2300 Rocky Mountain House AB NL 30 white 1 ps 3 5 AUFOSG P light appeared, shone like flashlight, moved up & dimmed
2001 8 18 2259 Lee River MB NL 90 white 6 ps 3 7 UFOROM P 3 lights like stars in triangle; disappeared in E
2001 8 18 10 Woodstock NB NL red 3 fireball 3 5 NUFORC P sky lit up like sunset"; bright obj. moved quickly; fell 1 km away?
2001 8 18 1814 Port Colborne ON DD 1 fireball 3 4 NUFORC P Venus like star high in SE moved slowly down & disappeared
2001 8 18 2157 Saskatoon SK DD multi 2 disc 3 3 NUFORC I colour-changing saucer hovered; noise like thunder and humming
2001 8 18 220 Terrace BC ND 1 triangle 4 1 HBCUFO E tri. obj. near Kaulm River; hoax
2001 8 18 235 Terrace BC ND 1 oval 4 1 HBCUFO E 2 oval objs. near Kitimat airport; hoax
2001 8 18 2300 Malloy Lake MB NL 30 3 ps 3 8 UFOROM U trio of lights flying together; astronomers; not ISS
2001 8 18 2030 Burnaby BC NL 1800 4 ps 2 2 UFOBC I stationary obj moved slowly towards ground
2001 8 19 2147 Quebec City PQ ND 3 diamond 4 3 NUFORC I pulsating diamonds like fiery crystals flew over house w/thunder
2001 8 19 2215 Victoria BC NL 30 1 ps 3 3 NUFORC P 4 lights in tri. formation moved SE; disappeared before horizon
2001 8 19 310 Loon Lake BC ND 1200 3 triangle 5 5 UFOBC I obj w/3 lights made "rapid & unbelievable drops" & loops
2001 8 20 0 Portage la Prairie MB NL 10 1 ps 3 6 UFOROM P obj. "lit up" then made abrupt turn to S; brightened & vanished
2001 8 20 2240 Winnipeg MB NL 10 1 ps 3 6 UFOROM P light flared high in ESE, moved S
2001 8 22 2112 Charlesbourg PQ NL 180 gold 1 sphere 3 5 NUFORC I brilliant obj. made "zigzags" in sky, then ascended
2001 8 22 1415 Barrhead AB DD 300 multi 2 disc 4 5 St.Paul I saucer w/flashing lights moved up & down quickly
2001 8 23 615 Ahunstic PQ NL 1 cigar 3 7 DOT I missle w/2nd obj in smoke trail, going E-NNW
2001 8 23 2200 North Vancouver BC NL 2 ps 2 3 UFOBC P 2 lights stationary over English Bay, dimming & brightening
2001 8 23 2130 Comox BC NL 5400 orange 2 ps 3 4 UFOBC P numerous lights moving, stationary, flashes
2001 8 24 1805 Burnaby BC DD 600 red 2 oval 5 6 NUFORC U stationary blimp, suddenly moved quickly away
2001 8 25 1230 Dorval PQ ND 120 silver 1 cigar 6 8 DOT U 1 to 8 luminous lens-shaped objs. seen over airport; photos
2001 8 25 1945 Kanata ON DD 2 disc 4 5 NUFORC P quasi-transparent dome" on "metallic base"; flying high in sky
2001 8 25 2030 Coombs BC NL 1800 1 ps 2 4 NUFORC P star appears every evening and slowly moves behind trees
2001 8 25 440 AB NL 60 red 1 ps 4 4 NUFORC P 3 lights in triangle in E, going S; black objs. seen behind lights
2001 8 25 1527 St-Laurent PQ DD orange 2 5 7 FOAQC U 2 solid objs. moving slowly in blue sky; photos taken
2001 8 25 30 Manning AB NL 2700 blue 2 ps 4 6 AUFOSG U light dropped to ground, flashed intermittently, rose again
2001 8 26 2100 Nanaimo BC NL 5 white 2 ps 3 7 UFOROM P slow, falling light like airplane light; descending rapidly
2001 8 26 1750 Moncton NB DD white irregular 6 5 NUFORC I teardrop" objs. flew in parallel paths; 1 changed to gray, faded
2001 8 26 2100 Vancouver BC NL white 2 fireball 3 5 UFOBC P high obj moved SE-NW very fast
2001 8 27 2200 Sydney NS NL 60 multi 5 ps 3 9 MUFON P tri. formation of several lights, moving slowly towards airport
2001 8 27 2200 Glace Bay NS NL multi 1 ps 3 5 MUFON I tri. formation of several lights; suddenly "went out"
2001 8 27 2250 Edmonton AB NL green 1 fireball 2 5 NUFORC P ball of light accelerated and disappeared, leaving a green trace
2001 8 27 2200 Vancouver BC DD 2400 black 1 sphere 3 5 UFOBC I obj stationary in NE, slowly moved W
2001 8 28 1800 Burnaby BC DD 2700 black 3 disc 4 6 UFOBC U Mexican hat" stationary in SSW
2001 8 28 1607 Richmond BC DD white 1 sphere 5 7 UFOBC U 3 "dots" maneuvered strangely along airport flight path
2001 8 28 2300 New Campbellton NS NL red 1 ps 2 6 MUFON E 2 lights low in sky [stars]
2001 8 29 22 Newmarket ON ND 10 black 1 irregular 5 5 NUFORC P obj seen moving across Moon's disk through telescope
2001 8 29 500 Cornwall ON NL 2700 multi 2 ps 3 5 NUFORC P stationary light like "narrow triangle" moved higher as Sun rose
2001 8 29 2140 Pembroke ON NL pink 2 ps 4 5 NUFORC U obj flew across view, then veered up "at an impossible angle"
2001 8 30 1800 Vancouver BC DD 30 black 1 cigar 4 5 NUFORC P black cylinder hovered motionless on end over busy street
2001 8 1230 Mississauga ON DD 2 sphere 5 5 HBCUFO I 2 tennis balls like "frosted glass light bulbs" orbiting each other
2001 8 2200 Glace Bay NS NL white 1 ps 3 9 MUFON E triangle of steady lights, red light in middle, going NE-SW
2001 9 2 2200 Sydney NS NL 1 ps 4 8 MUFON U triangle of lights moving NE-SW
2001 9 2 2250 Thunder Bay ON NL 3 sphere 4 5 NUFORC P moving obj. "raised and fell" then moved behind trees
2001 9 5 2205 Orono ON NL 600 white 2 ps 4 7 DOT P bright "star", "wavering in air currents" as it flew
2001 9 5 2148 Whitehorse YK NL 60 white 1 ps 4 6 UFOBC P group of lights seen pacing aircraft, then vanished in E
2001 9 7 2133 Saskatoon SK NL 3 6 DOT I airline crew saw "UFO heading S at high speed"; directly over
2001 9 7 400 Regina SK NL 2700 white 1 ps 3 5 NUFORC P stationary obj. low on horizon
2001 9 9 2300 Calgary AB C1 orange 3 ps 4 5 AUFOSG U triangular group of lights over reservoir, beam shining down
2001 9 12 2200 Roblin MB NL multi 1 ps 3 7 DOT P low & fast light going E-W
2001 9 12 1230 Whites Lake NS DD 1 irregular 5 7 NUFORC P transparent circular thing' flew near mylar balloon
2001 9 13 605 Toronto ON ND white 1 triangle 4 5 NUFORC U formation of lights moving low during rainy day; no fly period
2001 9 13 315 Lacombe AB NL ps 3 2 Internet I triangular configurations of lights seen near site of crop circle
2001 9 13 900 Ladner BC DD 240 white 1 sphere 4 5 UFOBC U obj moving W-N, turned into cigar as it flew
2001 9 13 2300 Prince George BC UX 5 red 1 irregular 5 5 UFOBC U sound heard then something struck house, beam of light
2001 9 13 2030 Hobbema AB ND orange 1 disc 4 5 AUFOSG U large flat ovular shape gliding slowly N-S
2001 9 14 1730 Calgary AB DD 2 sphere 5 5 NUFORC P round shiny obj flying nr. jet; no fly period
2001 9 15 105 Lacombe AB NL orange ps 3 2 Internet I 7 triangles of lights, changed to arrow pattern; nr. crop circle
2001 9 16 30 Haliburton ON NL orange 8 ps 5 5 NUFORC P 2 flares "appeared out of thin air"; descended, rose again
2001 9 16 200 Winnipeg MB NL 3600 1 ps 2 7 UFOROM P 3 clusters of lights "on round objs.", stationary
2001 9 16 200 Edmonton AB NL 30 2 ps 3 7 DOT U shooting star" in W zoomed E, then came back E-W
2001 9 22 2000 Saskatoon SK ND 5 black 1 boomerang 3 5 NUFORC P chevron-shaped obj. passed in front of Moon
2001 9 23 30 Winnipeg MB NL 10 3 ps 3 7 UFOROM P 3 lights in triangle, in S sky going W-E
2001 9 25 2200 Red Deer AB NL multi 1 ps 3 4 NUFORC I 6 lights in boomerang shape moved swiftly in sky
2001 9 28 2355 Fredericton NB NL 2 ps 3 4 NUFORC P 6 lights in semicircle moved in formation E-W
2001 9 28 2355 Fredericton NB ND red 2 disc 4 4 NUFORC I 6 lights on disclike obj.; no noise
2001 9 30 2007 Sherbrooke PQ NL multi 3 ps 3 7 DOT I formation of 4 lights, stationary nr. Ursa Major
2001 10 2 Georgian Bay ON NL ps 2 2 Media I flashing lights in sky stopped traffic", many witnesses; satellite?
2001 10 2 2100 Cranbrook BC NL multi 1 ps 3 5 HBCUFO P red & green light hovered then slowly vanished from sight
2001 10 3 900 Mission BC NL blue 1 ps 2 3 NUFORC I light in car parked outside house stayed throughout day?
2001 10 4 2000 Victoria BC NL 1 ps 2 2 NUFORC I starlike obj. "making erratic movements"
2001 10 5 1730 Lac La Biche AB DD white 1 ps 4 7 DOT P 2 objs., flying together, then 1 went SW, other SE; left trails
2001 10 5 1930 Parksville BC ND 90 multi 2 triangle 5 6 UFOBC U triangular obj w/lights over highway, stationary, no sound
2001 10 10 2120 Halifax NS NL 1 ps 4 6 UFOROM E lights moving in formation were found to be refueling exercise
2001 10 14 Mission BC DD silver 1 3 3 Internet P obj. like "airplane crash", glinted silver in Sun; "hit side of hill"
2001 10 14 1950 Demming NS NL white 1 ps 4 4 NUFORC I light 6x size of Mars became bright, then faded and "shot off"
2001 10 14 1405 Innisfail AB NL white 1 fireball 2 4 AUFOSG E falling obj' disappeared behind clouds, reappeared on other side
2001 10 15 1530 Vancouver BC DD 1 irregular 3 7 UFOBC I after developing, photos showed obj in sky over city
2001 10 18 0 Regina SK NL red 1 ps 3 3 NUFORC P strobing" r & g light moved slowly WSW-NNE
2001 10 20 2330 Revelstoke BC NL 1 fireball 3 3 NUFORC P bright light "came down" and hit mountain
2001 10 20 2000 Mundare AB ND yellow 3 sphere 2 4 AUFOSG E large ball of light glowing through clouds [Moon]
2001 10 22 249 Peterborough ON NL 1 ps 3 3 NUFORC I 5 lights in chevron formation moved quickly N-S
2001 10 26 330 Whitehorse YK NL 120 multi 2 ps 4 6 UFOBC P group of lights behaving 'weird', then went S
2001 10 27 1930 Abbotsford BC NL 8 1 fireball 4 4 NUFORC P obj. "lit up sky", tail remained visible for few secs
2001 11 1 400 Vancouver BC NL orange 1 ps 3 4 NUFORC P bright "star" in S changed shape
2001 11 7 1925 St. Louis PQ NL yellow 1 ps 4 5 NUFORC I light with another light revolving around it; stationary
2001 11 8 204 Halifax NS NL blue 1 ps 3 3 NUFORC I bright obj. "made oval shape", became smaller with time
2001 11 11 400 Whitehorse YK ND 10 white 1 fireball 3 5 UFOBC P half and egg' w/exhaust traveled in straight line, disappeared
2001 11 11 400 Policeman's Point YK NL 180 white 1 ps 5 7 UFOBC U several lights on oval-shaped obj., flew on irregular path
2001 11 12 1720 Port Aux Basques NF NL white 1 fireball 3 6 DOT P 2 large white blue fireballs with tails falling above Table Mountain
2001 11 13 1700 Beaverlodge AB DD 40 white 2 disc 5 7 UFOBC U 2 children saw a domed obj. flying through the sky
2001 11 14 1835 Whitehorse YK NL 2 yellow 1 ps 2 7 UFOBC P rushing noise heard, light appeared in SW, flared & vanished
2001 11 14 2130 Toronto ON C1 60 yellow 1 sphere 5 4 Internet U ball of light making noise altered course & flew over witness
2001 11 15 2300 Halifax NS NL 240 red 1 ps 5 4 NUFORC I obj. stopped, released fireballs, stopped, then moved off
2001 11 16 1645 Burnaby BC NL white 1 fireball 3 4 UFOBC P light with flicker' shot towards ground, went out
2001 11 16 2300 Vancouver BC NL 30 white 1 ps 3 5 UFOBC P slow light w/no tail moved along horizon
2001 11 16 1515 Whitehorse YK DD 360 white 2 sphere 2 6 UFOBC P circular obj hovered, glowed, gained altitude [weather balloon]
2001 11 17 2000 Burnaby BC NL 60 white 1 ps 3 3 UFOBC I foo fighter' following 20' behind aircraft
2001 11 18 500 St-Louis-de-Blandford PQ ND 20 orange 1 5 6 NUFORC I obj. with 5 windows appeared suddenly near overpass
2001 11 18 150 Crofton BC NL 4 2 irregular 2 5 UFOBC P dimly illuminated fuzzy patch moving S, slower than meteor
2001 11 18 300 Braeburn YK NL 360 white 5 ps 4 5 UFOBC P strange display of lights' moved erratically in front of mtn
2001 11 18 245 Edmonton AB NL 4 4 ps 2 3 AUFOSG I somewhat translucent' obj moving E during meteor shower
2001 11 19 2230 Toronto ON NL 1 ps 4 6 DOT I 1st obj moved N-S; then 5 "brown spots" moved NW-SE
2001 11 19 2130 Brantford ON NL 1 5 3 NUFORC P 4 balls of light "would circle in and out in a dancing pattern"
2001 11 21 550 Chatham ON ND 7 orange 1 sphere 4 4 NUFORC I 4 fuzzy circles crossed sky N-S
2001 11 22 1825 Revelstoke BC ND multi 1 irregular 5 3 NUFORC I blinking lights on rotating obj moved over city
2001 11 22 2200 Mount Pearl NF ND 180 orange 1 disc 4 6 Internet I dull light'moved like water', flew low then went behind clouds
2001 11 24 2000 Bowen Island BC NL 18000 multi 1 ps 2 6 Internet P group of 9 lights "like belt of Orion" seen for 5 hours
2001 11 25 1832 Richmond BC DD yellow 3 irregular 4 4 NUFORC I 2 objs began "whizing around" & disappeared; yellow trail left
2001 11 26 1830 Lethbridge AB NL 10 2 ps 3 5 AUFOSG P 2 lights moved around each other as they flew E-W
2001 11 27 420 Kitimat BC ND 2700 2 sphere 3 2 UFOBC I egg-shaped obj seen
2001 12 1 0 Burnaby BC ND 120 1 sphere 3 2 UFOBC I egg-shaped obj flew overhead, flashed light & disappeared
2001 12 2 2157 Dauphin MB NL 15 orange 1 fireball 3 7 DOT P descending obj. seen by pilot
2001 12 8 1935 Brantford ON ND 1 triangle 3 2 NUFORC I silent dimply lit obj. sighted moving rapidly"
2001 12 11 2006 Craik SK NL 480 white 2 ps 5 8 DOT U lights thought to be on higher a/c seen by pilots
2001 12 11 530 Standard AB C4 1 8 3 DOT I witness reported "was abducted for approximately 10 minutes"
2001 12 11 2040 Surrey BC NL 120 white 2 ps 4 4 UFOBC I 3 lights moving 'haphazardly'; "Talibans coming to attack"
2001 12 11 845 Delta BC DD blue 1 circle 4 5 UFOBC U neon ring faster than plane, moving S
2001 12 12 2106 Standard AB NL green 1 ps 3 6 DOT I 4 starlike lights, "50ft alt" moving S
2001 12 16 645 Strathmore AB ND 1800 white 2 sphere 3 4 Internet P two iregular objs appearing & disappearing above rising Sun
2001 12 19 1845 Winnipeg MB ND red 2 round 3 4 NUFORC I circular obj. moving E-SSE; changed colour from red to white
2001 12 21 Chesterfield Inlet NU NL 1200 red 2 ps 3 9 UFOROM U pilots saw stationary light est.100 miles away, no explanation
2001 12 22 306 Taber AB NL 180 white 2 ps 3 4 NUFORC I 3 round lights appeared suddenly, moved slowly NE
2001 12 25 1930 Vancouver BC NL 60 green 2 ps 3 4 NUFORC I stationary triangular group of lights in NE
2001 12 29 1300 Castor River NF DD 2 irregular 5 5 NUFOR P sm. aircraft flew over ocean, landed near shore; police called
2001 12 31 1115 Victoria BC DD black 2 disc 4 6 NUFORC P dark obj. moved S over city, varying speed
2001 12 Dunnville ON NL 300 4 ps 3 5 MUFON I slow moving glowing round obj., going E-W; "went out"N. Korean leader's sister re-appears after 50 days amid childbirth By KH디지털2 Published : May 29, 2015 - 10:40
Updated : May 29, 2015 - 10:40
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's younger sister, who was believed to be pregnant, made her first public appearance in about 50 days, the North's media reported Friday, cementing speculation that she might have given birth in May.
Kim Yo-jong, 28, accompanied the young leader on his field guidance to a tree nursery, which is being constructed by the Korean People's Army (KPA), according to the North's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
In April, South Korea's spy agency said that Kim would likely give birth in May, adding that her husband may be an alumnus of her alma mater, Kim Il-sung University. The agency did not provide more details.
Kim Yo-jong made her last public appearance April 12 when she accompanied the current leader on his inspection to the construction site of a second airport terminal in Pyongyang.
Experts said that her absence seemed to back up speculation that she has recently given birth.
In November last year, North Korea unveiled her official title: deputy director of the North's ruling Workers' Party of Korea.
Both the current leader and his sister were born to Ko Yong-hui, known as the fourth wife of late leader Kim Jong-il. (Yonhap)
MOST POPULARThe Weather Channel (TWC) employs some of the top geeks in the world, and when it comes to obsessing about events in the sky, they can be hard to beat. CNN may have its holograms and election news building projectors, but TWC has added augmented and mixed reality segments to explain things, too.
In this segment, which Mashable is debuting first online, meteorologist Mark Elliot goes through a simulation of experiencing the total solar eclipse on Aug. 21 from the perspective of an observer on the ground.
As a science editor for Mashable, I know the ins and outs of what causes an eclipse, and how dark it will get if you are in the path of totality, which on Monday will cut a narrow swath from Oregon to South Carolina. However, even I was impressed by how otherworldly the sky will appear at the time of the total solar eclipse, and how many intricate details will be revealed, about the moon and the sun, during a several-minute period on Monday.
So, before looking up — with proper eyewear protection — on Monday, take a look at this clip first. And get psyched.Transport for London has announced a plan to launch a new form of pedestrian crossing in the city, with the Pedestrian Split Cycle Offset Optimisation Technique using cameras to count how many people are waiting to cross and adjusting its timings accordingly.
According to TfL, the Pedestrian SCOOT system will be empowered to control the red lights at crossings, giving the scrum longer to cross the road if needed. Car drivers will be over the moon at the development of a "call cancel" option for future installation at these smart crossings, one that will apparently be sentient enough to decide whether the person who pressed the crossing button jumped across on their own before traffic was stopped or wandered off in a different direction, allowing the system to override the stop request and keep traffic flowing.
TfL's Leon Daniels said of the crossings of the future: "These new trials of pedestrian detection technology will allow our traffic signals to become even more intelligent, bringing huge benefits to those waiting to cross the road where there is heavy pedestrian demand." [TfL]
Image credit: Pedestrian crossing from ShutterstockExtended single takes — or “oners,” as they’re often called — are fairly popular as of late. An exciting sequence in an episode from the first season of “True Detective” had people buzzing in early 2014. Last year’s best picture Oscar winner, “Birdman,” was photographed and edited to appear like one shot, while the year before, “Gravity” dazzled with its CG-assisted single takes. (Emmanuel Lubezki won the best cinematography Oscar for both.)
And this hasn’t been limited to American cinema, of course. Sebastian Schipper’s “Victoria” took things a step farther than “Birdman” by actually capturing the entirety of the film in one uninterrupted, unassisted take, while László Nemes’ Cannes prize winner “Son of Saul” tells a harrowing Holocaust story with a series of extended takes, unique in that they are all focused on the face of actor Géza Röhrig.
If you saw “Creed” over the weekend, you witnessed another example as an entire two-round boxing match is captured in one exciting take. Shockingly, given the editorial tools at the disposal of filmmakers today, there was no post-production stitching employed to connect a series of takes together and provide the effect of a single shot. “Everybody thinks we’re cheating, but that is one shot,” cinematographer Maryse Alberti says.
Related Cinematographer Maryse Alberti on Distinguishing ‘Creed’ in the Footsteps of ‘Rocky’
The 25-year veteran might not have been the most obvious choice for Ryan Coogler’s “Rocky” spin-off, but in films like “The Wrestler,” she has shown a propensity for the kind of realism the 29-year-old filmmaker was after. That realism comes to a head in this riveting sequence.
“A movie like ‘Raging Bull’ is gorgeous, but it’s not what we wanted to do,” Alberti says. “Ryan very much wanted to stay in the realm of reality and seeing the boxer alone in the ring. Once you’re in the ring, you don’t have teammates. You are alone. There’s no one to lean on. That was kind of the idea.”
Alberti, who shot the film digitally on the Arri Alexa camera, is quick to credit her steadicam operator, Ben Semanoff. He was tasked with physically pulling off the feat in the ring, moving from actor to actor as the intense choreography (courtesy of fight and stunt coordinator Clayton Barber) tells a story that builds to a breathtaking punctuation. Coogler shot 12 takes of the sequence, with the tenth take being the one used in the film.
Lighting, meanwhile, wasn’t a major concern given the environment. “Once you’ve lit a ring — and I’ve learned how to light a ring from John Duncan, who has a lot of experience in lighting live boxing events and did the lighting of the ring for us — it’s lit everywhere, evenly, if it’s well done,” Alberti says. “One of my concerns was that we’d be truly able to get close to the boxers without shadows … I was trying to always bring the camera back to the drama and the intensity of the face.”
There are actually a number of extended shots in the film, which Alberti says helps penetrate the inherent manipulation of filmmaking. And that, she surmises, is what you can achieve with a well-intended, well-executed oner.
“With one take, I think you don’t need to rely on movie editing to dictate emotion,” she says. “When it’s well done, when it’s not virtuosity, when it’s not too self-aware, it’s powerful. Sometimes the virtuosity of one take can take away from the richness, but in ‘Creed,’ you are in the ring with this boxer and I think it’s emotionally powerful.”When Wall Street types are optimistic about something, like a business or a trend, they're often said to be “long” on it — meaning they're inclined to invest in hopes of a profit. These days, a lot of folks in the financial sector are excited about bitcoin and its underlying technology, the “blockchain,” because of its incredible popularity and potential to change the way economic transactions work. But one company is taking it really, really literally.
The beverage company Long Island Iced Tea said Thursday that it's renaming itself Long Blockchain, in recognition of the fact that pretty much everyone is trying to get into blockchain technology despite knowing barely anything about it. While the company will still make its own brand of iced tea, its “primary corporate focus” going forward will be the “exploration of and investment in opportunities that leverage the benefits of blockchain technology,” it said in a statement. The company didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
[Marc Andreessen: In 20 years, we'll talk about Bitcoin like we talk about the Internet today]
To put it mildly, the announcement is paying off. Long Island Iced Tea — sorry, Long Blockchain — saw its stock price triple overnight. At the moment, shares of the company are up roughly 180 percent. Have a look:
To see this kind of stock movement taking place based on nothing more than a name change tells you virtually everything about the craze surrounding cryptocurrencies.
The price of bitcoin is soaring. To buy a single one costs well over $15,000. That's down from its peak of roughly $20,000 earlier this month but still bonkers in light of how quickly bitcoin's value has grown. Lots of people are buying bitcoin in the hope that they will be able to sell it before the price crashes; other die-hards are buying and holding no matter what happens, with the expectation that its long-term value will rise even more.
Many have called bitcoin a bubble, similar to the “tulip mania” of the 17th-century Netherlands, when the novel availability of tulip bulbs from Turkey led to spikes in demand that dramatically drove up the price. But while the extremely volatile price of bitcoin might
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i feel kind of deathly. im sorry i dragged you out to another bar. i always do that, i dont know whats wrong with me. next time you can tell me to shut up and go home.” I responded, fashionably late, on the morning of May 16, “you can always drag me to another bar. and i bet, once in a while, i’ll drag you.” If I remember these moments fondly, why do they sound so stupid now?
These were the wild times; this was our youth; these were the days for which we would feel later nostalgia. These were our friends, and Sound of Silver was the perfect soundtrack for these feelings. In a sense of the word, this was love. We were there.
Of course, Sound of Silver was more about loss than it was about love. It was a dance record, surely, but it mourned lyrically and in form. Murphy made no secret about his desire to make dance music with analog material – a lost art. At the time Pitchfork called Sound of Silver “[f]ar removed from the compressed, trebly, and overmastered paradigm that’s gripped electronic music in the last decade,” a reference to Murphy’s conservatism. The past was the way forward. To Murphy, the best music happened in New York in the 1970s and ’80s, and it was best to recapture that energy. When LCD Soundsystem played their “final show” at Madison Square Garden in 2011, Murphy had renowned 1980s no-wave band Liquid Liquid open, as if to mark what had been lost and forgotten. The crowd affably played along, while also bringing up Liquid Liquid’s Wikipedia page.
Sound of Silver arrived at a time when so-called “indie rock” was crossing into the corporate mainstream. In June of 2007, I worked for a few months at Capitol/EMI, and the company brought younger people in weekly to ask for ideas about where the industry was going. How could they recapture cool? It seemed no one was buying records anymore, and the major labels went downtown to find some supposed authenticity. The rumor inside the company was Capitol had spent something on the order of three million dollars signing and developing Interpol’s Our Love to Admire. The album was a commercial flop, causing the sort of controlled panic that takes place in a conference room with pitchers of ice water. Sound of Silver also wasn’t selling, though it was critically acclaimed and the upfront investment was less.
I emailed an old friend from the label to ask him what he remembered about Sound of Silver, and he said, politely, that he had been too busy promoting 30 Seconds to Mars. That was my memory, too. The company was focused on Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, the Starting Line, and KT Tunstall. LCD Soundsystem wasn’t a moneymaker. Murphy was rumored in the office to be unenthusiastic about radio and press in general. The album debuted at No. 46 on Billboard, the same week Modest Mouse went to No. 1 with We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank. The next week Sound of Silver dropped to No. 135, and two weeks later it was off the chart. The lead single from Sound of Silver, “North American Scum”, never charted, and Murphy felt so ambivalent about the song the band played it live only a handful of times after the Sound of Silver tour. The radio edit for “All My Friends” arrived too late and never crossed over into the mainstream. Still, the album’s cultural weight outstripped its commercial scuffling.
We listened for the pain. “All My Friends” and “Someone Great”, two of Sound of Silver’s best songs, both deal in unremitting loss: the former with the loss of one’s youth, the latter with lost love. On the album’s closing track, “New York, I Love You but You’re Bringing Me Down”, Murphy mourned for the city itself. It had become a theme park: an urban experience featuring low crime, rising wages, and the banishing of poverty – what a total buzzkill! – to the edges of the bourgeois fantasy viewfinder. The financial crisis and its somewhat sobering ramifications had yet to arrive. New York’s Disney Downtown was what drew so many young people to the New York Murphy grew to loathe. Only on the Lower East Side could you drink three-dollar PBR’s in a bar that looked like a dive-y living room, a way to approximate blue-collar living at a Happy Hour after your graphic design job. If the feelings were real, the back-lot staging of New York was fake.
The photo editor and I exchanged cheeky emails through the spring and summer, meeting for drinks and shows in a downtown scene we felt edgy but wasn’t. I was emotionally unavailable, which was the only cool thing I could think to do. She was whip-smart and culturally astute, and I was paralyzed by it. It all felt exciting and dangerous, our bizarre halfway relationship, the meeting downtown under the cover of darkness, the sneaking into each other’s lives. But the Lower East Side and East Village of the mid-aughts wasn’t the New York of the 1970s and ’80s – it was antiseptic, a pastiche of what New York might have looked and felt like 30 years earlier with the difficult parts edited out. A real estate developer had begun building a towering luxury apartment building at the corner of Houston and Ludlow, but the real construction project involved manufacturing the faux-edginess of downtown without an edge.
On “New York I Love You…” Murphy sang, “So the boring collect, I mean all disrespect, in the neighborhood bars, I’d once dreamed I would drink.” We were those boring people, and we loved his band. In a cruel paradox, we damaged the city by coming to it. “New York, you’re safer, and you’re wasting my time,” he sang. If the Lower East Side had actually held any hint of danger, we would never have come in the first place. After college, we would have moved to Boston or something.
And therein lies the complexity and the difficulty of LCD Soundsystem and Sound of Silver: Murphy longed for a bygone era, and we longed for his band, for what they represented. The band produced nostalgia. It was a brand of cool that we sought in Murphy and his band. If they were trying to recapture a lost New York scene, we were willing to live for a moment in their dreams. We longed to project ourselves into something real, and Murphy seemed to have greater proximity to it.
None of it was real. Murphy paid his dues in the 1990s New York scene, but he’d never been on the frontlines of New York culture in the 1970s and ’80s. He was born in 1970 in Western New Jersey, first coming to New York in 1988 to attend NYU. On 2005 song “Losing My Edge”, Murphy recognized the absurdity of venerating the past, of having been first, of knowing all the cultural footnotes in a scene. Of course, the song is a list of cultural footnotes, a series of firsts, Murphy leading lyrics with “I was there …” to lay claim to a moment. Murphy often found himself in two worlds, mocking the type of people who beatify nostalgia while also beatifying nostalgia. The song ends with “You don’t know what you really want” repeated 15 times. Not knowing what we wanted, it wasn’t a bad way to consider the problem, the obsession with and rejection of nostalgia.
“All My Friends” became a sort of anthem in our limited social group, as it did for so many others our age. It’s still one of my favorite songs. Like Murphy, we also experienced a strange loss, that sense of impending doom that only your mid-20s can provide. It wasn’t a city for which we mourned; it was our youth. We were getting older, and yet we weren’t old yet. I hadn’t pictured living past 25, not a death wish exactly, but I just couldn’t picture myself as an adult. I assumed the universe would kill me by 25 to save my imagining or living life as an older person. When Murphy sang, “I wouldn’t trade one stupid decision for another five years of life,” we took him too seriously. We broke up with people, had our hearts kicked in, drank too much, and stayed out too late. We listened to “Someone Great” as a burn and a salve on emotional wounds. We raged against the dying of youth. I remember one weekend afternoon in 2009, playing Sound of Silver so loud in our Park Slope apartment that our next door neighbors knocked on the door to say they couldn’t hear their television. Every excess felt necessary. This was our offensive solipsism.
I was there at Arrow Bar, sometime in the late-aughts, it might have been the summer of 2008, smashing our hands against the ceiling as the DJ played “All My Friends”. We screamed, “When you’re drunk and the kids leave impossible tasks/ You think over and over, ‘Hey, I’m finally dead,’” bouncing up and down, running out of air. Sparks, the unholy mixture of caffeine and malt liquor, was still legal, and on this night, or it might have been a different one, they were free through a promotion. Arrow Bar practically vibrated until it closed. I remember spilling out onto Avenue A at four a.m. bar time, one of those few moments the city holds a hint of its old self. I tried to hail a cab with the editor as we watched someone throwing up florescent orange onto the sidewalk. I remember seeing my friend Nate waving at me through the cab window as we pulled away from the bar and sped up Avenue A. Like the song said, “If the sun comes up/ And I still don’t want to stagger home/ Then it’s the memory of our betters/ That are keeping us on our feet.” The editor and I sailed off into the night with the feeling: I was there.
All of it was an exercise in privilege. Murphy hadn’t opened his wine bar yet, but we all bathed in the remaking of New York without realizing it. It was cultural and actual gentrification – Murphy trafficking in the past, his New York fan base wanting desperately to feel something authentic while not seeing how the city had changed, the ways in which we’d changed it, how this new New York made Murphy’s band and their cultural impact possible. It wasn’t a loft party of squatting artists where we saw them play; it was Music Hall of Williamsburg, Webster Hall, Terminal 5, and Madison Square Garden. If we’d gone in search of something that felt old and good, we’d found a thing that was new and enmeshed in corporate apparatuses. When Murphy’s band returned this year, they did so, in part, for the big festival paydays, and I don’t necessarily blame them. If we were there, we are here now.
It wasn’t sustainable, which was part of the allure in the first place. The editor and I broke things off. She started dating the guy she would later marry. Jobs that seemed like dalliances moved from avocations to careers. Some of our friends moved out of the city. I spent less time wondering if and when I would die. Eventually, I stopped thinking about dying young altogether. Depending on the terms of the deal, I now might trade a stupid decision for another five years of life.
Nostalgia still tempts the mind to remember itself too fondly, to remember experiences with all the messy stuff edited out, to not address what must be confronted. We had helped drive up prices in New York, relied on the policing policies that made New York “safe” but crushed the civil rights of those around us; we spent our money thoughtlessly on consumption; we delighted in a fantasy of a New York that never was while ignoring the one we helped make. We progressed inexorably toward a wine bar – either owning or patronizing one. You couldn’t enter or exit the wine bar; everything was now a wine bar.
Murphy had tried to help us. On the Sound of Silver title track, Murphy mutters: “Sound of silver talk to me/ Makes you want to feel like a teenager/ Until you remember the feelings of a real, live emotional teenager/ Then you think again.” Of course, adults long for their youth, not remembering how awful and bizarre it felt at the time. Nostalgia for youth represents a psychic trap, so too did LCD Soundsystem. We lived in a protracted adolescence while Murphy worked his conservative magic. He longed for a past he never lived, and we created our nostalgia on the fly. I never went to see LCD Soundsystem to see them play music; I went to remember the person I was when I went.
When the band got back together, I began remembering with more exactness. Nostalgia involves much forgetting, and seeing LCD Soundsystem take to festival stages around the globe reminded me a bit too much of who I had been and how I constructed an identity around a series of silly gestures, expenditures, and performances. Regret is a trap, too. Sound of Silver is still an empirically excellent album, an important album, and I’m glad I saw the band play live over the years. It all comes back to that first night at Webster Hall. Like kissing against a phone booth, it’s easy to not remember the long wait for the L-train home, the anxiety about the deep shitiness of your loft apartment, how you’d probably spent money you didn’t have that night, both the profound difficulty of your existence and your unaddressed privilege. That’s closer to what it felt like to being there. Those are more accurate memories, but then the romance is gone.
Maybe it was never there in the first place.ALEXANDRIA, Va. - Terrence Boyd called his return to playing soccer after a devastating injury and subsequent recall to the national team a "miracle."
The U.S. striker was nearly beaming as he fielded reporters' questions -- a sentence you don't read every day -- before the national team trained here on Sunday.
And it wasn't just because he's finally back with the squad after more than two injury-plagued years away.
"We were actually talking about retiring," Boyd, still just 25, said of the conversations he had with his bosses at Bundesliga side RB Leipzig last May, when there appeared to be no end in sight to the knee issues that had derailed his once-promising career.
"My family -- my girlfriend and I have a baby daughter now -- didn't know what was going to happen. If I stop playing soccer, what are we going to do? It was crazy, because there was so many terrible thoughts in your head."
United States United States New Zealand New Zealand 1 1 FT Game Details GameCast
Lineups and Stats
Boyd tore the ACL in his right knee in December of 2014, when Leipzig was toiling in Germany's second tier. But a series of complications caused by a cyst in his upper calf led to three more surgeries and little, if any, progress.
It got to the point where he was almost ready to give up.
"Then, within the same month, the knee was good again and I could progress and rehab, go back on the pitch," Boyd said. "It was a miracle."
He was able to go through a full training camp this summer for his newly promoted club. A preseason goal in July provided a confidence boost, and while Boyd has yet to make a match day roster, he's played in reserve games -- some for the full 90 minutes -- as he slowly rebuilds the match fitness that was decimated during his time on the sidelines.
"Now it's just a matter of games, games, games to get the experience back, just feel comfortable on the pitch," he said. Terrence Boyd has called his return to playing with the national team a miracle.
U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann has been monitoring his progress and the pair spoke on the phone after Boyd returned to the field.
"He said he was going to send someone over to actually see you play [with the] reserve team," Boyd said. "It was kind of weird. Why would you go and watch a reserve team game? It was actually very nice, very kind act from him."
Boyd still hasn't appeared in an official match in 22 months, though, which is why he's probably a long shot to win his 14th cap in Tuesday's friendly against New Zealand (8 p.m. ET, ESPN/WatchESPN).
"He's with us here actually to get reevaluated, see where he's at," Klinsmann said Sunday afternoon during a live Facebook chat. The affable forward remains a popular presence in the U.S. locker room, however. And he insists he's ready to play against the All Whites if needed.
"If he lets me play I'm going to play, of course," Boyd joked, referring to Klinsmann. "I'm not putting pressure on him.
"I'm just enjoying the moment and being back with the guys and we'll see what happens," he added. "It's a fun team. There's so many funny characters in here. It's a little family."
And after staring a premature end to his playing days in the eye, being part of it again is extra special.
He said: "I'm very thankful, because when you come through all the s--- that I've been through, it's humbling. You don't take anything for granted. I didn't do that before, but now you just appreciate everything more."
Doug McIntyre is a staff writer for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN FC. Follow him on Twitter @DougMacESPN.Welcome to WordDraw.com - Free Word Newsletter Templates
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A cool and trendy blue two page technology business newsletter template and a company expense report flyer can all be downloaded for Microsoft Word. There is also a free bake sale flyer with cupcakes for your fundraising event. Or two colorful resume templates if you want to stand out from the crowd.
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Free Family Newsletter and Announcement Templates
Does your family live all over the country and do you need a fun and interesting way to update them of your goings on and events? Consider sending out a family newsletter, it can be a fun activity for your kids. There is also a free baby announcement template that you can use to announce a birth of a child.
Monthly Word Newsletter Templates
Monthly Seasonal Templates
Monthly themed seasonal documents with word art headers in pretty colors that can be used for a variety of personal or commercial uses. A differet design for the months of the year.Navy chiefs may be sent back to sea duty The Navy may send as many as 1,100 chiefs involuntarily back to sea duty ahead of their normal rotation, cutting short current assignments.
Chief, pack your seabag.
The Navy may order more than 1,000 senior enlisted supervisors back to sea duty involuntarily, the latest move designed to tighten up manning levels at sea and in deploying operational units.
The new Navy policy announced Monday will take effect immediately and aims to fill the nearly 3,000 unfilled senior enlisted billets at sea.
Most of those gaps —about 2,080 — are at the E-7 level. Just over 700 are for senior chiefs and almost 200 unfilled billets are for master chiefs.
“When you make chief petty officer, I always tell them their job is going to get harder and part of it getting harder means we need you in those billets at sea, teaching those sailors,” Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (SG/IW) Steven Giordano told Navy Times.
The new policy is likely to be controversial, and prompted Fleet Master Chief (SW/IW/AW) Russell L. Smith, the senior enlisted leader for the Navy’s Manpower, Personnel, Training, and Education, to write a message to the fleet explaining the move.
Why involuntary orders for chiefs are necessary Fleet Master Chief Russell Smith explains the Navy's reasoning for sending chief petty officers back to sea early.
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The push to get more chiefs out to sea comes several months after Navy officials sought to fill junior enlisted billets at sea and instituted a program encouraging enlisted sailors to voluntarily extend on sea duty.
In exchange for volunteering for one to two additional years at sea, Navy officials told junior sailors they could waive the traditional up-or-out limits, allowing sailors the ability to stay on active duty longer.
For the chiefs, however, there’s no such carrot in this deal — it’s all stick.
“Our number one priority is to keep the Fleet properly manned,” said Chief of Naval Personnel Vice Adm. Robert Burke. “We are aggressively using all force shaping levers to do just that.”
At the crux of the problem for the senior enlisted ranks are 25 ratings that are overmanned ashore. Navy personnel officials estimate that the bulk of those being sent back to sea will come from these ratings, and new orders could be handed down within the next few months.
Sailors most at risk for involuntary orders are in the following ratings: AD,AE,AM,AT,AWO,BM, CS(SS), CTI Eastern Europe, CTI Latin/South America, CTR, EMN(SW),ETN(SS), ET(SW), FC, GM, HM, ITS, LS(SS), MMN(SW), MM(SW), PS, QM, UT, YN, YN(SS).
As many as 1,100 chiefs could be packing their seabags ahead of their normal rotation, cutting short current assignments.
The overmanning ashore does not stem from any mismanagement, officials say, but instead is the result of strict adherence to sea-shore flow and sea-shore rotation rules.
For example, when a sailor is selected for chief petty officer or higher, the system typically allows the sailor’s normal rotation to continue regardless of paygrade.
That means a petty officer first class who gets picked for chief might remain in a billet that no longer reflects the new rank. The same thing happens up through the ranks.
Now, under the new policy, the Navy will review the assignments of all enlisted supervisors, including those recently selected for advancement to chief petty officer and above, and consider them for potential sea duty assignments.
Navy officials acknowledge that involuntary orders for sea duty can be disruptive to sailors and their families. Personnel detailers will take into account sea-shore rotation concerns, but that will be secondary to fleet manning requirements, officials say.
Navy officials say the key factor will be the sailor’s current billet, whether they’re assigned to one of a lower paygrade or if they are considered “in excess of authorized billets.”
“I think that most senior enlisted leaders — chiefs, senior chiefs and master chiefs — are mature enough to understand that when the Navy needs you elsewhere, you go,” Giordano said. “How can we best place those senior enlisted sailors in organizations who have these critical fills?”
“Chiefs are the Navy’s critical leadership element,” Burke said.
“This change places chief petty officers into a “career path” vice “sea-shore-flow” paradigm, much like that for officers, It is essential that we have our deck-plate leaders, including newly selected chiefs, where it counts – on ships and submarines, in aviation squadrons, and in other operational or Fleet production units on the leading edge of our combat teams.”
The Navy will be taking volunteers, too, and officials are encouraging sailors from the chiefs mess to consider voluntarily terminating their shore duty and returning to sea.
Those sailors can apply using either the Voluntary Sea Duty Program or the Sea Duty Incentive Pay Program, which gives those in critical ratings a monetary bonus.
Giordano says most sailors understand the need to fill billets at sea, but believes new chief petty officers should be filling their family in on what could happen.
“Where the frustration lies, sometimes, is with the family members who may not understand that, with this increased responsibility, the Navy may ask you to go do something else, sometimes on a shorter notice,” he said.Ben Weinman has been teasing both his new supergroup and his working with award-winning actress Juliette Lewis for a while now, and guess what, it appears it’s officially all the same thing
The PRP reports that during a call with Jose Mangin of Liquid Metal, the Dillinger Escape Plan guitarist revealed that Lewis will be handling lead vocals for Giraffe Tongue Orchestra, his new project featuring Brent Hinds of Mastodon, Pete Griffin of Dethklok, and Thomas Pidgen of the Mars Volta.
“Well actually, there have been some personnel changes throughout the years, it’s something we’ve been working on for a long time and interestingly enough we finished all the music and we’re finalizing all the vocals now, Juliette Lewis is singing on the project right now along with some other guest people.” “…Me and her have become pretty close friends and she’s amazing, obviously I’m a huge fan of her work as an actress and many years ago I saw her band Juliette and the Licks play and like most people I was pretty skeptical. I’m like, “Oh another actress or actor that has a band, like vanity project blah, blah, blah.” So I went into the show and I basically saw somebody that gave 110%. By the end of the show she was drenched in sweat, she was throwing herself into the crowd, and when I thought about it I saw this person putting all her energy and spirit into this music, I thought this was almost more real that most bands because she doesn’t need this. She doesn’t need to be playing in front of 500 people on this shitty ugly club, you know? She’s a successful actress–she did a 9-minute-long acting scene with Robert DeNiro for god sakes. And here she is by choice in a grungy club with a dirty toilet just putting everything into it, so when we were thinking about singers and people to collaborate, all of a sudden I was like “You know what? I think that could be cool.”
I know we’ve all seen this coming for a while, so it’s no big surprise. Still, you have to wonder if Weinman and company looked far and wide for the perfect singer before working Lewis, or if her star power was the primary reason she got hired. That’s sort of the point of a supergroup, though, I guess.
We’ll have to see when the album comes out on Weinman’s Party Smasher Inc. later this year. Here’s Juliette & The Licks’ “Hot Kiss” video, if you want to judge Lewis’ ability for yourself.Molecular biologist David Sinclair wants to revolutionize the way people age. Sinclair is 46, but he’s been obsessed with what he calls “the gravity of life” since he was 4 years old.
A professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School and co-director of the university’s Paul F. Glenn Laboratories for the Molecular Biology of Aging, he has founded a slew of startup biotechnology companies with the lofty aim of developing drugs intended to extend the human life span. Specifically, he wants to create a pill that could simultaneously combat Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, diabetes and heart disease to ensure that people live longer, healthier lives.
Sinclair is at the forefront of research investigating a chemical called resveratrol, a compound found in such plants as grapes and cocoa, that works by activating SIRT1, a protein believed to play a role in regulating life span in animals. The research has been controversial, with some scientists saying such an anti-aging elixir has been overhyped. But Sinclair is forging ahead with his research and studying other molecules that might combat diseases associated with aging. A new study by Sinclair and colleagues in the European Heart Journal details how SIRT1 might also be involved in cardiovascular disease. Sinclair talked to The Post recently about the future of aging.
When did you come to the conclusion that aging is a problem that can and should be solved?
(Courtesy of David Sinclair)
When I became interested in it as a career, I was in the middle of doing my PhD in molecular biology and my mother contracted lung cancer. My mother survived for another 20 years.
So after that, I wanted to make a difference in medicine. I thought that tackling aging and the mechanisms that promote life would be worth figuring out. I wanted to learn why it is that some people are healthier than others and why some people live to 110 and others only to 60 or 70.
Most people don’t like to think or talk about aging. How do you want to change that?
Well, first of all, I would love for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regard aging as a condition that’s worth treating. The reason is that aging is a decline in function. That, to me, is exactly what a disease is. Unfortunately, because aging is so common and natural, we tend to think of it as destiny or something we should accept. But over the last 300 years, we’ve been fighting diseases that cause us to suffer. Until very recently, we thought that we should only tackle one disease at a time, whereas what I would like is for the FDA and the general public to appreciate that we now have the technology to prevent multiple diseases at once.
How has studying the aging process made you think differently about how you plan to age?
I have been testing molecules on myself, such as resveratrol. I monitor my own body reaction to that. I have done that for over a decade now. My mother, father and wife have also been taking molecules that we’ve been discovering. My brother recently went on resveratrol, too.
What is the ultimate goal with your aging research?
The ultimate goal is to have a pill that can prevent or reverse all diseases of aging. The major diseases that I’d like to tackle are heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s and cancer. I want to reduce those diseases by 10 percent. Eventually, I’d like to reduce diseases of aging by 50 percent or more in the general population.
Will things like exercise and a good diet still be important even if a pill exists to prevent age-related diseases?
Yes, exercise and diet will be important. Our studies show that the drugs will work even better if you’re already healthy. In an experiment we conducted with mice, a healthy diet plus resveratrol was the best combination. Resveratrol had a decent benefit when the mice were obese and sedentary. The mice that were fed a lean diet and resveratrol lived significantly longer than other treated mice as well as those that had no healthy diet and no resveratrol. So resveratrol is not an excuse to be lazy or eat whatever you want.
How much exercising do you do? And what about your diet?
I work out in a gym each week, but more exercise would be good. I used to be on a tofu and fish diet to mimic the Okinawans, who live the longest, but with the arrival of kids that went out the window. The best thing I’ve done is to give up desserts at 40.
Do you drink a lot of wine or eat a lot of grapes to get resveratrol?
You would need to drink hundreds of glasses of red wine a day.
Is it possible to consume high enough levels of resveratrol in food for health benefits?
No. There is only a few milligrams of resveratrol in a glass of red wine, and the doses required are in the hundreds of milligrams. I take resveratrol as a pill with breakfast — 1,000 milligrams, a spoonful on yogurt.
How old do you see yourself living?
I’d like to see what humanity achieves 500 years from now, but without successful pharmacological intervention I doubt I will make it past 85 with the sub-par genes I know I’ve inherited.
Do you think Alzheimer’s, heart diseases or other age-related diseases can be completely eliminated?
We will probably still die from those diseases eventually. What we want to do is stretch out the healthy period. Ideally, the end of life would be shorter, but it would still be caused by one of those diseases, a heart attack or a stroke.
What would a world in which people age better look like?
Children born after 2050 can expect to live to 100. People will be healthy throughout most of their lives. They’ll be 80 years old and still active; they could play tennis and hang out with their grandchildren. You see some people like that now, but we can expect the majority of people to look like that when these medicines are available. What that also means is that the people who are now living to 100 could instead live to 120 or 130. I think by the end of the century, people could live to 150 because there’s going to be a combination of research that will lead to pills we could start taking at the age of 30 to boost the body’s defenses against diseases and age. The combination of drugs and regenerative medicine has huge potential for age extension. My work is trying to keep the body healthy for as long as it can by activating the body’s defenses, and other scientists are working on technology to grow and replace organs.
How soon do you think we will have an approved pill that could extend life span?
In the aging field, we’re starting to organize a study to see if we can expand human life span with a drug. There are at least three other molecules that we’d like to try after that. We’ve had discussions with the FDA regarding aging as a disease and if we could start a clinical trial. We’re in the beginning stages, but it looks like the FDA will approve a clinical trial for aging.
Mullin is a freelance science writer.The Archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the Church of England, has warned Christians that their views on sexual orientation were beginning to look like an “atrocious injustice”.
Justin Welby spoke at the opening of the Evangelical Alliance on Wednesday. During a question and answer session after his speech, the archbishop was asked why he voted against same-sex marriage legislation.
“What I voted against was what seemed to me to be the rewriting the nature of marriage in a way that I have to say within the Christian tradition and within scripture and within our understanding is not the right way to deal with the very important issues that were attempted to be dealt with in that bill,” he replied.
“The bill was clearly, quite rightly, trying to deal with issues of homophobia in our society,” Welby continued.”As I said at the time in the House of Lords, […] the church has not been good at dealing with homophobia — it has at times, as God’s people, either implicitly or explicitly supported it and we have to be really, really repentant about that because it is utterly and totally wrong.”
Welby said he didn’t support same-sex marriage, but he warned the Church’s view was quickly becoming out of touch.
“We have to face the fact that the vast majority of people under 35 not only think that what we’re saying is incomprehensible but also think that we’re plain wrong and wicked and equate it to racism and other forms of gross and atrocious injustice. We have to be real about that.”
Watch listen to audio, uploaded to YouTube, below:Practice is for wusses.
To go by the US presidential debates, that’s what the 2016 Republican ticket seems to believe. During last night’s Oct. 4 showdown, vice president nominee Mike Pence followed Donald Trump’s lead in attacking his opponent for spending too much time studying up.
Both Trump and Pence appear to be betting that American voters will share their distaste for candidates who demonstrate a commitment to discipline and dry runs. They may be right. But this line of attack could also backfire, precisely because it relies upon a form of self-satisfied egotism that ought to make the Trump-Pence ticket unelectable.
Trump, a man whom no one has ever accused of appearing overly rehearsed, went after Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton during the Sept. 26 presidential debate for taking time off the campaign trail to practice for the match. The two candidates’ wildly different approaches to debate prep had been previously reported by the New York Times: while Clinton poured over a Trump dossier in the days before the debate, her opponent eschewed practice.
The Republican ticket displays a form of self-satisfied egotism that ought to make Trump and Pence unelectable.
Clinton, in turn, refused to be ashamed of readying herself for the big night with mock debate sessions and drills. ”I think Donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate,” she said. “And, yes, I did. You know what else I prepared for? I prepared to be president. And I think that’s a good thing.”
A similar theme emerged at last night’s vice-presidential debate, as Pence repeatedly suggested that his opponent, Virginia senator Kaine, was too rehearsed. When Kaine brought up Trump’s breezy response to the possibility that nuclear proliferation would make it easier for terrorists to get their hands on the weapons (“Go ahead, folks
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ballot, or pressure the legislature to amend the constitution.
And then there is Jeffrey Neary, a district judge in northwestern Iowa who eight years ago survived what he believes was the state’s first campaign aimed at removing a judge (for granting a divorce to a same-sex couple). Judge Neary said the experience made him more cautious about how he approached controversial cases. He is up for retention this year. “I don’t want judicial positions to be political positions,” he said. “If that happens I don’t want to be a judge.”Fox's Dobbs Helps Prove Mayor Bloomberg's Point About Gun Violence July 10, 2013 1:39 PM EDT ››› Blog ›››››› ERIC BOEHLERT
Lashing out at New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the influential work the group Mayors Against Illegal Guns, which he co-chairs, does in trying to combat gun violence, Fox Business host Lou Dobbs inadvertently helped prove Bloomberg's point about the nature of gun violence in America. Dobbs thought he was debunking Bloomberg's work by pointing out how, proportionately, relatively few murders are committed with assault weapons in America. But all Dobbs did was help highlight the thousands who die each year from gunfire and punctuate Bloomberg's call for drastic reform. On June 9, Dobbs hosted a "Chalk Talk" segment and tried to illustrate the futility of Mayors Against Illegal Guns advocacy work. Dobbs denounced the group for allegedly trying to curb Second Amendment rights and said the organization should really be called Mayors for Gun Control, or "more specifically, Mayors For An Assault Weapons Ban." The host then went on to detail how an assault weapons ban "focuses on a small number of fire arms that are, in fact, rarely used in the committing of crimes." Citing FBI statistics for 2011, the most recent numbers available, Dobbs mapped on out his chalkboard the fact that more than 6,000 people were murdered that year from handguns (nearly 8,500 total from all firearms), but that "only 323" murders were committed by "rifles, including so-called assault weapons." He highlighted that in comparison to the 323 figure, more American were killed in 2011 by knives and blunt instruments. For Dobbs, the numbers confirmed that Mayors Against Illegal Guns' obsession with banning assault weapons ban was misguided. In truth, Dobbs played loose with the FBI statistics. And his claim that Bloomberg's gun advocacy work revolves almost exclusively around banning assault weapons is transparently false. First the figures.
Dobbs insists "only 323" murders were committed by assault weapons in 2011. But he doesn't know that to be true and neither does the FBI. In its annual crime tally, the FBI does not include a category for assault weapons. Dobbs just assumes they fall under the "rifle" grouping used by the FBI.
From FactCheck.org [emphasis added]:
Christopher Koper, a gun violence expert who teaches criminology at George Mason University, told us "there isn't a good estimate as to the number of people killed each year by assault weapons." He said the national databases used to track murders "don't have detailed information on the particular gun models that are used in homicides."
In fact, depending on how an assault weapon is defined, some of the murders listed as handgun crimes by the FBI could have been committed by assault weapons, as Vance McLaughlin, a criminal justice professor at Jacksonville State University in Alabama recently explained to Politifact.
And note that in 2011 the FBI reported that more than 1,500 firearm homicides were committed by guns whose types were unknown or "not stated." Assault weapons certainly could have been used in a portion of those murders. Moreover, FBI data are incomplete - the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported roughly 11,000 firearms homicides in 2010, about 20 percent more than the FBI tally for that year.
And by the way, nearly one-in-five policemen killed in America is gunned down by an assault weapon. But Dobbs' "Chalk Talk" segment made sure to imply that assault weapons crimes didn't amount to much, which means Bloomberg's advocacy is misplaced.
But of course contrary to Dobbs' claim, Bloomberg's Mayors Against Illegal Guns isn't singularly focused with trying to ban assault weapons. (The group has not called for trying to ban handguns.) While the group urges Congress to improve on the country's previous assault weapons ban, which expired in 2004, they only adopted that position over the past year. Instead, the group has long embraced a wide-ranging anti-gun violence agenda.
Bloomberg has been making headlines this year as he and the group he co-founded lobbied members of Congress to pass the bipartisan background check bill in the wake of the school massacre in Newtown, CT. The group has spent years pushing for such legislation.
The MAIG agenda also includes stopping terror suspects from being able to buy guns, as well as fending off attempts in Congress to tie the hands of the ATF from prosecuting gun dealers who break the law and criminals who buy and sell illegal guns.
The fact is, more than 8,000 Americans were murdered by firearms in 2011. Yes, that number has been declining in recent years but it's still staggeringly out of proportion with other developed nations. By highlighting how large the number is, in his wayward attempt to criticize Bloomberg, Dobbs simply helped illustrate the scope of the gun violence problem in American. And that's what Mayors Against Illegal Guns is all about it.
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copy link Person Lou Dobbsrick-snyder-office-michigan.jpeg
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder in his Lansing office.
(AP File Photo | Carlos Osorio)
LANSING, MI -- Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, unlike some other top Republicans, has not publicly called on GOP state Reps. Todd Courser and Cindy Gamrat to resign over allegations that they misused state resources to hide their extra-marital affair.
And the governor, speaking with reporters on Wednesday afternoon, made clear he does not plan to weigh in at this time.
"The reason I really haven't answered that question -- and I'm not going to give you a yes or no answer on that particular piece -- is it's out of respect for the House of Representatives," Snyder said. "It's a matter before the House. I compliment (Speaker Kevin Cotter) on doing this in a very diligent fashion."
Summary findings of a House Business Office investigation released this week alleged Courser and Gamrat both engaged in "deceptive, deceitful, and outright dishonest conduct." The full report, including supporting evidence, has not been released.
Cotter, who is facing questions about when and what he knew about Courser and Gamrat's behavior and complaints from staffers, has called on both lawmakers to resign. In the meantime, he's appointed members to a select committee has been convened to consider whether the lawmakers are fit to remain in office.
Snyder, who was on a trade mission to China last week when top-level findings of the House investigation were first revealed, has said little about the sex scandal, and he made clear Wednesday that he intends to let the House resolve the matter on its own.
"They're doing hearings already. They're going through the due process process that's appropriate and outlined for the House of Representatives and the Legislature," he said. "As the Chief Executive of the State of Michigan, they're doing their job, and I respect that. I want to show respect to that process."
Snyder's comments came at the conclusion of a press conference announcing that the state had helped complete testing on more than 10,000 rape kits that were found six years ago an in old Detroit police storage facility.
In a subsequent question-and-answer session, the governor also discussed ongoing negotiations over a long-term road funding deal.
The House will devote an "appropriate amount of time" to consider the fate of Courser and Gamrat, Snyder said, and the general public is likely to pay attention as well. "But what I can tell you is, state government is working hard to serve our citizens better every day in a lot of different ways, and that's not going to stop, regardless of this issue."
Michigan Reps. Todd Courser, R-Lapeer, and Cindy Gamrat, R-Plainwell
Courser, R-Lapeer, and Gamrat, R-Plainwell, have both apologized for their behavior but denied allegations that they misused taxpayer resources to hide their affair.
They have so far resisted calls to resign from several Republican leaders, including Michigan GOP Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel.
Courser, in a Wednesday morning Facebook post, said there are "plenty of good reasons to resign" but dismissed the suggestion he should do so because he has become a distraction to the legislative process.
"...every day they focus on me they don't pass their new gas tax increase and it saves the people of this state millions of dollars," Courser wrote. "Biggest budget in history and still they want more. They will be back in the next few weeks to push their new tax again thru the state house."
Gamrat, who spoke to reporters on Tuesday after attending the first meeting of the committee that will consider her political fate, said she is hoping to help move the process along so the House can continue work on other matters. In the meantime, she's hoping to avoid expulsion.
"Above all, it would be my preference that the voters of Allegan County will not have their voice taken away in this process," Gamrat wrote on Facebook after the Tuesday hearing.
"At the same time, I am ready and willing to take responsibility for my actions. If infractions occurred than I will accept the penalties and fines in accordance for those infractions so that we can re-focus our time and attention on getting a much needed roads package completed and on the other issues that are effecting Michigan citizens."
The Select Committee to Examine the Qualifications of Representatives Cindy Gamrat and Todd Courser met Tuesday but has not yet scheduled any additional hearings. Chairman and Rep. Ed McBroom, R-Vulcan, said the panel may not convene again until early next week.
The committee is likely to recommend one of three disciplinary options for Courser and Gamrat: No further action, censure or expulsion a rare step that would require a 2/3 majority vote in the full House.
Jonathan Oosting is a Capitol reporter for MLive Media Group. Email him, find him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter.Senate Republicans introduced a tax bill Thursday that would raise federal taxes on millions of Californians by eliminating the individual deduction for state and local taxes, a move that puts the state’s GOP House members in a ticklish situation.
The legislation poses a stark choice for those 14 Republicans, many from suburban districts of the kind where Republicans got crushed in Tuesday’s election. If they support a bill party leaders say is vital to remaining in power by proving that the GOP-dominated Congress can pass significant legislation, they will have to explain to their constituents why they voted to raise their taxes. Or they can vote against a tax bill that is the top priority of the party and President Trump.
Only one California Republican, Darrell Issa of Vista, who narrowly won re-election in his suburban San Diego County district last year, has come out against the House version of the bill, in part because of its treatment of state and local taxes.
And in a telephone interview Thursday, Issa said the Senate bill goes “from bad to hopeless.” One reason is because while the House bill ends deductions for state and local income and sales taxes, it allows for up to $10,000 in property tax deductions. The Senate bill eliminates the entire deduction.
“The House bill needed to deal fairly with the recognition that Californians should not pay taxes on the same income twice,” Issa said.
But his main objection to the Senate bill is that it delays for a year the corporate tax cuts intended to spur growth. Issa described that as “fraudulent on its face.”
He said businesses will simply delay investment decisions by a year, even though Senate tax writers continue to claim economic benefits. “You don’t get a return on an investment you never made,” Issa said. “It’s frustrating that the Senate doesn’t seem to have two businessmen to rub together.”
Issa, a wealthy former businessman, blasted what he called the “marketing material” distributed by House leaders claiming that all taxpayers will see their taxes go down, saying, “It’s just not true.”
Issa said it’s impossible to claim that “everyone gets a tax cut, and that adds up to about $3 trillion, and then turn around and say, we’re doing it with $1.5 trillion.”
The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates that by the end of a decade, more than a quarter of individual taxpayers would see a tax increase, about 38 million people.
Part of the reason is the state and local deduction, which has been a trouble spot for Republicans since they began their effort this fall to slash corporate tax rates from 35 to 20 percent. Even allowing for a $1.5 trillion increase in the deficit that the tax bills would produce within 10 years, lowering business taxes requires reducing or eliminating many deductions that benefit middle- and upper-middle-income taxpayers.
One of the largest is the state and local deduction, which especially helps taxpayers in Democratic-leaning states that tend to have higher taxes.
More than a third of Californians use the deduction, on average deducting $18,437 from their income, according to calculations by the Government Finance Officers Association.
Under pressure from New York Republicans, House tax writers watered down their elimination of the deduction by exempting up to $10,000 in property taxes.
But while that helps New Yorkers, it does little for Californians, whose property taxes tend to be comparatively low thanks to a decades-old ballot measure, Proposition 13, but who pay the nation’s highest state income tax. California Republicans — Rep. Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield is the second-ranking Republican in the House and responsible for rounding up the votes — have been publicly quiet about the provision.
Now the Senate bill would eliminate the deduction entirely. Gov. Jerry Brown last month called the tax legislation “an attack on California and New York and New Jersey and other states that did not vote for Trump.”
House and Senate Democrats have pounced on both bills, arguing that their tax benefits are heavily weighted toward very high-income taxpayers, which independent analyses confirm. The bills eliminate or slash several taxes paid by the wealthy, such as the alternative minimum tax and the estate tax.
White House officials argue that because wealthy people pay the bulk of income taxes, it is impossible to cut taxes without benefiting them disproportionately, a reversal from earlier claims by White House economic director Gary Cohn that the tax plan would not benefit the wealthy.
The House Ways and Means Committee approved the House tax bill on a party-line vote Thursday, with Republican Devin Nunes of Tulare voting yes. McCarthy announced that the House would vote on the plan next week, not specifying a day.
Rep. Mike Thompson, a St. Helena Democrat on the committee, said the House bill retains a provision that he said would eliminate deductions for personal losses due to fires, earthquakes and other natural disasters, but keep it for losses from recent hurricanes.
McCarthy said in a statement that the bill “lives up to its name — cutting taxes for individuals, families and businesses of all size, and delivering more jobs and higher wages for the American people.”
Republicans are hoping to pass combined House and Senate tax legislation by year’s end and send it to Trump to sign.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said that if Republicans fail to do so, “The party fractures, most incumbents in 2018 will get a severe primary challenge, a lot of them will probably lose, the base will fracture, the financial contributions will stop, other than that it’ll be fine.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco said Republicans “have it all wrong,” if they think their tax legislation will keep them in power, citing Tuesday’s election results. Noting the Senate bill’s elimination of the state and local deduction, she said House leaders are forcing vulnerable suburban Republicans to “walk the plank” for a bill that will harm their own constituents.
Those members “should be worried, very, very worried,” Pelosi said. She has scheduled a news conference in San Francisco on Friday with Oakland Democrat Barbara Lee to highlight the state and local deduction in what she calls the “GOP tax scam.”
Asked whether California Republicans are laying low because one of their own is in the leadership, Issa said, “Certainly Kevin’s (McCarthy) telling people this is a good idea carries a lot of weight,” adding, “but Kevin has no real business experience.”
Issa compared the looming vote to the narrow passage of a big Medicare prescription drug benefit during George W. Bush’s administration, when he said GOP leaders assured their rank and file that a yes vote would give them “a permanent Republican majority,” even though they had no plan to pay for the new benefit. Republicans soon after lost their House majority, Issa said.
Carolyn Lochhead is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @carolynlochheadThe nineth week of the Season 3 ladder challenge is over. Join if you haven’t already!
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Challenge Update
209 players participated, playing 5774 games!
@sc2replaystats Thankyou for featuring my replays two weeks in a row! I wish you can be even more appreciated in the future love Howl <3 — Wangerlei Silwa (@WSnews1) September 2, 2014
If you’d like your replay featured or have a story about the ladder challenge to share, send us a tweet!
Level Players Games Slackers! 27 62 1 34 235 2 24 281 3 59 1267 4 35 1334 5 16 998 6 7 652 7 7 915
Top 5 players for this week are:
Name Games Botiz 155 IronLung 130 ChanKiM 129 Testify 127 LiLMiSsChiBi 126
Congratulations Botiz on first place this week!
Name Games 1st: Antilchrist 1004 2nd: Testify 933 3rd: ChanKiM (New!) 864 4th: FisterRoboto 856 5th: Dom 848
Statistics
Which units should be changed in LotV? The least used units, of course! Which are least used?
Battlecruiser — The glorious Terran capital ship is only built in 1.27% of the Terran replays!
Mothership — This ultimate heroic unit is only built 0.63% of the Protoss replays!
Broodlord — This extinct beast is only used 1.48% of the Zerg replays!
Per specific match-up:
Unit Least Used Matchup Produced Overall % produced
mothership PvT 10 0.35% ghost TvZ 9 0.40% viper ZvZ 19 1.97% tempest PvZ 67 21.337% battlecruiser PvT 93 15.816% carrier PvP 63 13.7% ultralisk ZvZ 67 2.61%
Featured Replays
Remember to tweet your replays to @sc2replaystats on twitter if you want them featured in this post!
Base Trade Madness
Witness two players struggle down to the last Pylon: LoudMouthJay vs WarBeak Hero Unit Hero Siege Tank: Terra vs endUser This Siege Tank lasts until the end of the game and gets 87 kills! Clan Challenge Update Every week, dozens of players battle in the Clan Challenge to represent their clan. Visit the clans listing and see how well your clan is doing! If you’re not in a clan, try contacting one of the clans on the top 5 and see if they’ll let you join! Clan Players Total Games Games This Week Games Per Player TAW 70 2504 308 35 ConFed 64 1055 118 16 Vortx 16 928 41 58 FWB 1 854 72 854 ETL 27 808 48 29
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- Sc2replaystats.com staffby Jonathan Peter Wilkinson on April 8, 2016
In case you are wondering why a majority of the US population identifies as Conservative while the “Respectable Right†gets boatraced in every major policy dispute? Just watch the video below. It’s a perfect metaphor.
The Left, you see, is playing for blood. In a real rugby match, these guys would be grabbing scrotes and raking faces every time the referee and the touch judges were looking the wrong way. They instinctively scrap for every yard, every last bloody inch of pitch. They believe, the “Respectable Right†does not.
As a result, the “Respectable Right†gets walked back towards the wrong set of goalposts on every issue under the sun. No, 75% of The State of Mississippi does not have the right to any sort of religious freedom if 0.0001% of the state’s population represented by 1-legged, trans-gendered, midgets who identify as the sparkle-pony gender feel triggered in the slightest. You will be made to care.
This is why LGBT is running the show in states all across Amerika governed by all of those severe Conservatives of the “Respectable Right.†Governor Deal wasn’t up for Pickett’s Charge when a religious freedom bill similar to that of Mississippi’s was placed on his desk. And when the Activist Left demanded that Alabama get rid of the Confederate Battle flag, Governor Bentley got bent for his cucking.
So given the utter cowardice of these men of incontinent bowels in the face of any serious left wing political pressure, you would think that they would appreciate the help when somebody offered to fight back. If you’re saying “guess againâ€, you are accurate. The Men with Hollow Chests despise and deride all who would stand vigilant in the tackle and fight back against the entropic demotism and ongoing social decay.
Ian Tuttle of Cuckservative Review Magazine, (I’ll link Occidental Dissent and not send them traffic for ad revenue) tells us the following about the “Alternative†or what I prefer to call the Legitimate Right.
The Alt-Right has evangelized over the last several months primarily via a racist and anti-Semitic online presence. But for Bokhari and Yiannopoulos, the Alt-Right consists of fun-loving provocateurs, valiant defenders of Western civilization, daring intellectuals — and a handful of neo-Nazis keen on a Final Solution 2.0, but there are only a few of them, and nobody likes them anyways. In other words, anyone familiar with Yiannopoulos’s theatrics, or Breitbart’s self-appointment as Donald Trump’s Pravda, will not be surprised to learn that the article is a 5,000-word whitewash. But it is valuable, in this way: It exhibits, albeit inadvertently, the moral and intellectual rot at the heart of the Alt-Right. …
Hunter Wallace accurately points out that our current “Respectable Right†is more interested in image than substance. They conflate social acceptability with moral good. The Left accurately attacks this by setting the rules on what gets considered acceptable. The Left wants its gay marriage, the GOP changes its platform to avoid nasty social issues. Defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman would dispossess and inconvenience the otherwise patriotic, socially responsible and respectable Americans of a livestock-screwing orientation. They are human and want to be loved – just like anyone else does.
And you know what your failure to immediately sign up for the presidential run of JEB makes you? Do I even have to Cucksplain it? (I again link to a link. The Cuck doesn’t always come off after washing with standard laundry detergent.) No, because some overrated donkey’s rear end for The Federalist does the honors.
“Hey, lefties, we finally found your racists for you. For as long as I can remember, people like me—by which I mean advocates of capitalism and free markets and freedom of speech—have been accused by the left of being secret racists who pine for the gold old days of the antebellum South. Tiresome stuff like this. Then along comes a group of actual, declared racists who really do pine for the antebellum South, and who is one of the main targets of their invective? People like me. Kind of ironic, eh?
And the Lefties are just laughing. They have their mouth-frothing scrum of screaming, deracinated, fvck-heads just waiting to pack down and obliterate The Federalist, The Resurgent, Hot Air, Ace of Spades, Speaker Ryan, Governor Bentley, Governor Deal or any other bunch of “Respectable Right†panty-waists who have the guts to turn towards the appropriate set of goal posts and pack down.
And so it goes with the Amerikan Right. They will always be too cowardly to ever put their goddamn hand in the dirt, get their butts down low enough to drive and actually fight as if they genuinely had enough of a soul to still hold beliefs. They don’t. They are empty. They are phony. The Left knows this. They keep them alive out of convenience. They always look forward to the glorious expiration date when they get the sadistic joy of hanging them by their own viscera, sending their worthless, pathetic souls to Hell and helping out Beelzebub as he toasts marshmallows over the smoking remains.
Tags: alternative right, conservatism, conservatives, manshaming, remnant, true right
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Even after implementing mobile device use policies and technology controls, many organizations remain vulnerable to mobile security risks, according to the results of a recent Deloitte poll.
One out of two adults in the U.S. owns a smartphone, and one out of three owns a tablet, according to Deloitte LLP’s “State of the Media Democracy” survey. Many of those mobile device owners want to use their personal smartphones and tablets on the job—to check work email, access corporate systems, and use web-based software.
Yet many enterprises don’t seem completely prepared to address the security and privacy risks mobile devices present, according to the responses of approximately 2,000 professionals surveyed during a recent Deloitte & Touche LLP webcast. One-third believe unauthorized devices connect to their corporate intranets. Slightly more than a third of the webcast participants believe all of the devices that connect to the corporate intranet are authorized, and approximately 32 percent have no handle on the volume of unauthorized devices accessing the corporate network. Unauthorized and unprotected mobile devices may put companies at risk for malware, data loss, and could even allow hackers to intercept unencrypted communications.
To address the risks associated with mobile devices and employees’ productivity needs, some companies—45 percent, according to Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited’s 2013 Global Mobile Consumer Survey—have implemented Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies. But even organizations with BYOD policies face challenges securing mobile device data, according to Kieran Norton, a principal with Deloitte & Touche LLP’s Cyber Risk Services practice. For example, users are less likely to report a lost device to IT when it’s their own for fear of losing their personal data, along with any company information, when the device is wiped. As a result, IT may not be able to remotely lock or wipe the device before it falls into the wrong hands. And given that users can typically install applications on their own devices, Norton notes that data leakage problems associated with mobile malware are often felt more acutely in BYOD environments.
Consequently, different models for BYOD policies are evolving. Corporate-driven BYOD policies allow employees to choose among a list of accepted devices and corporate-organized wireless plans. In return for relinquishing some choice and control, employees get a high degree of IT support. The corporate-driven approach contrasts with the user-driven approach, where employees have more choices but less IT support. In a hybrid BYOD model, enterprises establish a list of accepted devices, employees are responsible for selecting the wireless plan, and corporate IT provides support.
In addition to implementing the appropriate BYOD policy and operational program, other tactics Norton suggests for tackling mobile security risks include encrypting local data as well as encrypting sensitive communications “in transit,” using “secure containers” to partition corporate data on employee-owned devices and keep it safe from malware, and virtualization—both application level as well as running two mobile operating systems (one for personal use, the other for business use) in segregated environments on the same device.
For more stats on the state of mobile security, click here or on graphic to enlarge.When I married my smoking hot military man, I promised to stay faithful to him no matter what – and he promised to stay faithful to me. There were no ifs, ands or buts. There was no “unless you are bored.”
And there was definitely no deployment sex pact.
But the idea is a shocking thing to talk and think about. And so columnists, based on no actual evidence whatsoever, say disturbing things like this, which appeared on FoxNews.com yesterday:
Most civilian women would not defend their husband’s infidelity. But for the military wife, cheating practically comes with the territory. And rather than ignore the lusty elephant in the room, some military couples have created their own defense against infidelity: the so-called deployment sex pact.
The column, written by Militay.com’s own My Wingman Diana, makes the case that deployment sex pacts are not only common, but – if you want to stay married to your servicemember – are really an inevitable part of military life.
At SpouseBuzz we know that we do not know everything. We know that while Diana, who incorrectly calls herself the “Dear Abby” of Military.com (sorry, Diana, that would be Ms. Vicki), tends to write for the he-done-me-wrong crowd, SpouseBuzz readers tend to be more in the happily-ever-after persuasion.
But we also know that in the handful of posts on infidelity we’ve done over the last several weeks and these two we ran last year, at least 500 people have commented with one overwhelming message: cheating in any marriage – deployment or otherwise – is not OK.
And those who say their marriage did include cheating? They’re talking about the past. They’re talking about their ex-husband or ex-wife.
Like Jacey, we SpouseBuzzers didn’t get married so that our spouse could be unfaithful.
Sure, just like in the rest of society there are military couples who have what some would call “more adventurous” relationship agreements. But to say that such an arrangement is an inevitable part of military marriage is 100 percent inaccurate.
Just like haters are going to hate, cheaters are going to cheat. Being in a military marriage may result in more temptation than a normal marriage, but it doesn’t change who a person is, the temptations he or she struggles with or the expectations of faithfulness a spouse has towards him.
As far as we’re concerned, “deployment sex pact” might as well be called “divorce proceedings.”
So if this whole sex pact nonsense is nothing but a myth, why is it still getting talked about?
As far as I can tell, the first recent time the deployment sex pact subject came up was early last year, when one advice columnist claimed, based on the stories told by a “handful of military members in Norfolk,” that a whole hill of military members have pacts with their spouses permitting open oral sex with other partners. When we asked our readers about the subject, most of them told us this was the most ridiculous thing they had ever heard. Some said they knew of people who did this. No one said they did it themselves.
And thus the topic was born with Diana, who made the gigantic logical leap that because a handful of commenters on her blog supported the idea, it surely must not only be common, but the inevitable conclusion of marrying into the military.
And it really was a leap. Of the mere 49 people who commented on her post on the subject, only four thought this was a good idea. Again, none of them said they actually have this pact.
Yet Diana, who is not a military spouse and does not have any actual experience in a military marriage, seems to think that military marriages can be proclaimed as inevitably including infidelity. And so in the continuing wake of the Petreaus scandal, she resurrected the topic here.
But the fact remains that I have yet to read one comment from any reader on our blog, her blog or any Facebook post on the subject who says that “deployment sex pacts” are common or that they participate in one. There are people who have heard of other people participating. There are people whose ex-husband thought it was a good idea.
So please, find me a bunch of military spouses who say (and actively act on the belief with their spouses’ knowledge) that an open sexual relationship and deployment sex pact comes with the military marriage territory. And then I will believe that this is not a myth.
Until then – I call shenanigans.
Editor's note: As an Army wife and the managing editor of this blog I took great exception to the characterizations of military marriages in Diana Falzone's most recent op-ed at Foxnews.com (as described in this post). But while it's proper I might not agree with some of what was stated in her piece, it is not right that I would question her commitment to the military community by virtue of her efforts at My Wingman Diana or the nature of her professional standing as a blogger for Military.com. I apologize on both counts.There will probably be people sleeping rough tonight on the same benches, along the Embankment in London, where William Booth interviewed homeless men in 1890. The story of Booth’s Salvation Army hostels will form part of a major exhibition this spring – and people who go along may be surprised by the answers he got on the night of 13 June.
The men on the benches didn’t think they had found too bad a bed. “It’s very fair out here of nights, seat’s rather hard, but a bit of waste paper makes it a lot softer. We have women sleep here often, and children too,” one told him. There was rarely any trouble: “We’re too sleepy to make a row.”
Little material evidence survives from the lives of the Victorian poor, said Hannah Fleming, a curator at the Geffrye in east London. The exhibition will include photographs and paintings, but the poorest who went through the hostels owned almost nothing. The scraps of evidence that do survive are rare and precious: Fleming recently bought on eBay a bottle of carbolic acid and an enamel spittoon.
Treasures in the exhibition include a few colourful bits of broken pottery excavated from a pit at Gun Street in Spitalfields, once the outdoor privy for a common lodging house. These institutions were mainly regarded with horror – one report called them “extremely filthy and disgusting”. The crockery, however, is a different story: the pink roses and willow pattern fragments could have come from any middle-class house.
Jane Hamlett, senior lecturer on modern British history at Royal Holloway, and the leader of a group of academics whose research on Victorian homeless inspired the exhibition, said it was not always the desperate experience immortalised by Charles Dickens in Oliver Twist’s workhouse.
“If you were elderly, or ill, or a child, then often there was no alternative to going into an institution. You were stuck, and it could be very grim. But some of the able-bodied learned to play the system very well, went into and came out of shelters repeatedly, and some learned a trade and managed to get themselves out of poverty. The experience of the Victorian homeless was far from uniform.”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘Coffin beds’ at a Salvation Army shelter in London. Photograph: Salvation Army
A photograph shocking to modern eyes shows “coffin beds”, wooden boxes barely big enough for a body, laid out in rows, but Hamlett said if the alternative was sleeping in a wet doorway, many thought a hard but dry, clean bed was a fine thing. “The Salvation Army in particular was very keen on carbolic, and put a very high store on keeping everything clean,” she said. A woman in Hanbury Street shelter, Whitechapel, in 1894 told a visitor: “I did used to think myself lucky if I’d the chance of a fourpenny lodging, but now I’d a deal sooner sleep in a bunk and have the feelin’ of safety there is about this place.”
The mealtime seen in another image, a giant room filled with hundreds of men seated in long silent rows, looks truly grim, but a report on Hanbury Street said there was always boiling water so people arriving for the night could make a cup of tea.
Middle-class Victorians expected the poor to be meek and grateful for their charity, but many were not. Hamlett, her colleagues and Fleming are working hard to recover the voices of those in the system, not just the do-gooders observing them. Their views survive in interviews such as those conducted by Booth and Henry Mayhew, visitors’ accounts, rare autobiographies – and graffiti. One man wrote on a shelter wall in Chester in 1865 “this bloody hole is lousey”. An inmate of a casual ward, where people could stay for a night or two, said: “You are obliged to bathe, of course; sometimes three will bathe in one water, and if you complain they turn nasty and ask if you are come to a palace.”
The giant Rowton House hostels were built by the philanthropist Lord Rowton in an effort to provide better accommodation than the casual wards or lodging houses. Again, experience varied widely. In 1899 WA Somerville, a journalist who spent time living in one, described it as a home where a lodger “may read books, write letters, and above all mix with what he pathetically calls his ‘mates’”, but one Jack Smithers wrote that sleep was impossible “owing to the ravings of the drunken, the coughing of the sick, the nightmares of the mentally tortured, sundry grunts, snores and other indescribable
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it from the energy and industry points of view, it’s one of the most logical next steps,” said Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA), which supports offshore drilling.
“You already have the industry in the Gulf: you have the companies, you have the infrastructure, you just take the logical step to look toward the eastern Gulf of Mexico.”
The sticking point for eastern Gulf drilling has always been Florida, for whom the specter of the 2010 BP oil spill disaster still looms large. Congressional opposition to drilling there is bipartisan.
Nelson, one of Congress’s most aggressive foes of eastern Gulf drilling, said he’s “of course” worried Trump’s executive order will increase the possibility for drilling there. But he said opponents will raise concerns about drilling’s threat to Florida’s tourism industry as a way to diffuse the push.
“It’s getting easier because our friends, bipartisan, in the Florida delegation are waking up to the fact of what happened by losing a whole tourist season when the BP spill was off of Louisiana and got as far east as northwestern Florida beaches,” he said.
“So in a way it’s easier because we’re now getting bipartisan support when in fact, back in 2006, it was just Sen. [Mel] Martínez [R-Fla.] and me — we were fighting this battle alone."
Drillers and their supporters say they want to work with opponents on a plan to preserve something of a buffer zone near Florida while allowing for exploration in the eastern Gulf.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said a bill he introduced to expand drilling in the Gulf would prevent drilling within 50 miles of the coast.
“Bill Nelson always wanted to say we’re about drilling off of Florida, well you gotta be kidding around about drilling off of Florida, but that’s what he would say to kind of get people ginned up,” Cassidy said. “It’s not part of our plan.”
Oil groups say the eastern Gulf makes logistical sense for companies, given how much drilling infrastructure there is in other parts of the region.
“We think that it would be essential, from an energy security standpoint, both for national security reasons and for the continuing demand for oil and gas that we’re going to see for a long time, for Interior to take a serious look at the eastern Gulf of Mexico," Erik Milito, the upstream and industry operations group director at the American Petroleum Institute, told reporters last week.
That argument doesn’t satisfy opponents in Florida, who pulled out all the stops to combat eastern Gulf drilling last week.
After the House bill was unveiled on Monday, Nelson’s office also released a letter sent to Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) from the Pentagon that said the Department wants to maintain the drilling ban there.
The military uses the eastern Gulf as a training ground, and Florida hosts many Navy and Air Force bases.
“The moratorium … ensures that these vital military readiness activities may be conducted without interference and is critical to their continuation,” A.M. Kurta, the acting under secretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, wrote in the letter.
Surfriders' Parker said that activists have a well-worn game plan they plan to employ against offshore drilling, using a combination of arguments opposing the drilling from ecological, economic and military standpoints.
“We’re very disappointed in the executive order, but we fought it before and we’re ready and willing to fight it again,” she said.
“We have been fighting against offshore drilling forever. It’s not new to us, and it’s something that Floridians are really committed to.”
—Updated at 10:46 a.m.UPDATE 2: 9/19/2019 – Added information about the joystick installation (Requested).
UPDATE 1: 11/24/2016 – There have been some questions about how the touch sensor was wired to the encoder. Unfortunately I did not have the connections documented, so I had to take apart the control panel to check it. I have included the touch sensor wiring below in the How To section below.
A few years ago, my Dad gave me an iCade for Christmas. It was fun for a short time. However, after a while the lack of games and the Bluetooth controller latency started to bug me. I had always wanted to build one of those big Mame cabinets, so I thought, “why not mod the iCade and build a nice desktop arcade machine (bar top arcade machine?) that can play all my favorite classic games?” The goal was to be able to play Mame, Game Boy Advanced, Daphane, and Sega Games.
The first thing I did was Google “iCade mods” and started reading about others modding the iCade. The more I read, the more convinced I became to rip apart the stock iCade and begin a ground up rebuild.
Parts List :
Raspberry Pi 3
iCade Cabinet
CanaKit 5V 2.5A Raspberry Pi 3 Power Supply
GeauxRobot 3PCS Raspberry Pi Copper Cooling Heat Sinks
Zebra Case
Easyget Zero Delay Arcade USB Encoder
Xinci XC-DG003 Portable Aluminum Ultra Bright USB LED
FlePow Portable Power Strip Surge Protector Travel Charger
ARCTIC S111 USB-Powered Portable Stereo Speakers
Tontec® 10.1 Inches 1280×800 IPS Raspberry Pi Screen
Aurum Ultra Series High Speed HDMI Cable
Adafruit Standalone Momentary Capacitive Touch Sensor
iPazzPort 2.4GHz Mini Wireless Fly Keyboard
Mag-Stik Plus
Gold Leaf Arcade Pushbuttons
Plexiglas (Cover Screen)
Misc Screws, Table, Cable ties, etc.
Software :
RetroPie
Photoshop to create graphics
How To :
I started by removing the controls and taking all the panels apart. I wanted the end result to look more like an actual arcade cabinet, so I built a new panels.
The top panel was extended. The middle panel was moved closer to the front of the cabinet. This moved the screen closer to the player and helped with the overall aesthetics. I also added a speaker and bottom panel to the cabinet. The only original panels used are the two side panels, which I stripped the black vinyl off of, and the plastic iCade control panel (because I wanted the 25 cent display).
Next, I started gathering the components needed to make this cabinet come to life. I decided on a 10.1 screen. Originally, the screen was going to be mounted in the portrait orientation, but later I converted it to landscape since it made playing scrolling games much better. (Example Metal Slug, The Simpsons, etc…). With the screen in landscape orientation, the portrait games are smaller, but in the end it looks good and I hardly notice it while playing.
The next big decision was the controls. It seems like everyone on the internet has an opinion about joysticks and buttons. I like to play games that work better with a 4 way joystick (Example Ms. Pacman), but I also like to play games like Gauntlet that require an 8 way joystick. Eventually I found the Mag-Stik Plus on ultimarc.com. This joystick allows you to switch “from 4 to 8 way mode from the top of the panel”. The Mag-Stik Plus seemed to fix my 4 way / 8 way joystick conundrum, however it is too big for the plastic iCade control panel. After a few minutes with my handy dandy Dremel, a nice hole was cut and the stick was installed.
During testing, I did not like how noisy the iCade buttons were. Wow are they noisy! When playing a game like Galaga, the loud click click click sound was too much. I decided to replace the buttons with some Gold Leaf Arcade Pushbuttons. These buttons are the same size as the stock iCade buttons, were simple to install, and are much quieter.
While I was reading about other iCade mods, I ran across this site. They took an momentary capacitive touch sensor and installed it behind the stock iCade 25 cent display. This allows you to simulate sliding endless quarters into the machine by swiping your finger over the sensor (Ingenious). It took some trial and error, but I finally figured out how to make it work on all my Mame games.
The joystick, the buttons, and the capacitive touch sensor were all hooked up to the Easyget Zero Delay Arcade USB Encoder.
Update 1: Touch Sensor wiring – I do not have access to Photoshop or Visio right now, so you are stuck with my awful MS Paint skills.
First, I spliced the touch sensor’s power (VDD) and ground (GND) into the USB cable that powers the USB joystick encoder. Second I connected the OUT on the sensor to the blue wire that usually connects a button to the encoder. The other wire was not needed so I used some electrical tape tie it down.
Once the wiring was complete and tested I used some super glue to secure the sensor in place. Finally a little more electrical tape was used to secure the wires inside the control panel.
End Update 1
Update 2: Joystick Mounting – The Mag-Stik Plus came with a metal mounting plate that lines up perfectly with the holes already in the plastic ION control panel.
The plate goes on the bottom of the control panel and 4 screws are used to fasten it from the top of the control panel.
For the joystick to to fit correctly I had to cut the bottom of the panel and rotated the joystick 90 degrees. I then mapped the controller directions in RetroPie to account for the rotation.
End Update 2
I painted the cabinet black and started looking for a solution for the sound. I found some cheap ARCTIC S111 USB-Powered Portable Stereo Speakers on Amazon, ripped them apart, and mounted them into the cabinet. The speakers have a built-in amp that I also mounted in the cabinet. I have read that the Raspberry Pi’s 3.5mm audio jack outputs 1v max. I can’t confirm this, but without the amp, the speakers were not loud enough.
Next, I started to assemble all the parts. The 10.1 screen and USB LED light are powered by the USB ports on the power strip. I had to run the Raspberry Pi 3 off a CanaKit 5V 2.5A Raspberry Pi 3 Power Supply plugged into an outlet on the power supply. When the Raspberry Pi was plugged into the USB ports on the power strip, it could not get enough power and caused random game issues.
I used a 12 inch HDMI cable to connect the Raspberry Pi HDMI port to the screen controller board. When powering on, the Raspberry Pi tries to boot before the screen is fully powered. This could be because the screen is plugged into the USB port on the power supply, so I had to edit /boot/config.txt file and set hdmi_force_hotplug=1. I will post my full config.txt file below.
Using Photoshop.. that I have installed on a work computer… Shhh, I made a template of the control panel top, control panel front, marquee, and both sides. My wife and I then scoured the internet looking for classic arcade artwork and came up with a theme to cover the cabinet. I will attach the Photoshop template files below.
Once the art was complete, I sent it to Game on Grafix for printing. They did a great job and I would recommend them for your projects.
Installing the vinyl was a little tricky. We ended up using Windex and a squeegee to help position the vinyl. I am super happy with how it turned out.
The Finished Project :
Photoshop Template Files :
iCade Photoshop Files
/boot/config.txt (For Raspberry Pi 3) :
WARNING I am not responsible if you mess your Raspberry Pi up by using this. Use this an an example only. It works for me but your mileage my vary
# For more options and information see # http://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/configuration/config-txt.md # Some settings may impact device functionality. See link above for details</code> # uncomment if you get no picture on HDMI for a default "safe" mode #hdmi_safe=1 # uncomment this if your display has a black border of unused pixels visible # and your display can output without overscan disable_overscan=1 # uncomment the following to adjust overscan. Use positive numbers if console # goes off screen, and negative if there is too much border #overscan_left=16 #overscan_right=16 #overscan_top=16 #overscan_bottom=16 # uncomment to force a console size. By default it will be display's size minus # overscan. #framebuffer_width=1280 #framebuffer_height=800 # uncomment if hdmi display is not detected and composite is being output hdmi_force_hotplug=1 # uncomment to force a specific HDMI mode (this will force VGA) hdmi_group=1 hdmi_mode=4 # uncomment to force a HDMI mode rather than DVI. This can make audio work in # DMT (computer monitor) modes #hdmi_drive=2 # uncomment to increase signal to HDMI, if you have interference, blanking, or # no display #config_hdmi_boost=4 # uncomment for composite PAL #sdtv_mode=2 #uncomment to overclock the arm. 700 MHz is the default. #arm_freq=800 # Uncomment some or all of these to enable the optional hardware interfaces #dtparam=i2c_arm=on #dtparam=i2s=on #dtparam=spi=on # Uncomment this to enable the lirc-rpi module #dtoverlay=lirc-rpi # Additional overlays and parameters are documented /boot/overlays/README # Enable audio (loads snd_bcm2835) dtparam=audio=on gpu_mem_256=128 gpu_mem_512=256 gpu_mem_1024=256 overscan_scale=1 #gpu_mem=320 #RootDelay rootdelay=10 #Overclock Settings arm_freq=1300 over_voltage=6 temp_limit=80 core_freq=500 #GPU Based h264_freq=333 avoid_pwm_pll=1 gpu_mem=450 v3d_freq=500 #Ram Overclock sdram_freq=588 sdram_schmoo=0x02000020 over_voltage_sdram_p=6 over_voltage_sdram_i=4 over_voltage_sdram_c=4On August 2nd, Microsoft released the Anniversary Update for Windows 10 and when the bits arrived on computers around the globe, it brought with it new features and also broke webcams for millions of consumers. If your webcam has stopped functioning since the release of the Anniversary update, you are not alone but the good news is a fix is coming, hopefully in September.
Microsoft made a significant change with the release of Windows 10 and support for webcams that is causing serious problems for not only consumers but also the enterprise. The problem is that after installing the update, Windows no longer allows USB webcams to use MJPEG or H264 encoded streams and is only allowing YUY2 encoding.
Why did the company remove these options? The short answer is that with the Anniversary update there are new scenarios for applications to be able to access the webcam and the MJPEG or H264 encoding processes could have resulted in duplication of encoding the stream (poor performance) so the company limited the input methods to stop this from happening.
Because of this change, which Microsoft tried to defend but then realized the scale of the impact this change has caused, means that when a webcam tries to use MJPEG or H264, the device will freeze. If you use Skype and your webcam freezes after about a minute, this is the reason.
This issue impacts a wide variety of webcams including the popular Logitech C920 that both Paul and I use for podcasting. Paul has been having this issue for months where every time the camera tries to go into HD on a video call, it would freeze and now I am experiencing this issue as well. When Paul started having these issues a few months ago, we figured it was either a bad driver from Logitech or possibly even the Skylake CPU.
On my desktop, where my webcam is connected, I do not run Insider builds other than in a VM. On August 2nd, when I updated, my webcam began freezing immediately when trying to use Skype to record “What The Tech”.
In the support thread, customers are stating how Skype is freezing but more concerning are comments such as this: “We have a working product running for years and millions of unhappy users that are unable to use it at all after this update” and another user states “We have millions of users and we are in situation now where we have to tell them not to update the Windows anymore or switch to Mac OS.” These are clearly enterprise customers who have customer machines running the Anniversary update that has broken their product who are now scrambling to resolve these issues.
Mike M, an engineer on the Windows Camera team has been commenting in the support thread where the complaints are stacking up and says that a fix is in the pipeline for hopefully a September release. That’s the good news, the bad news is that there is not a temporary fix to hold everyone over until the patch is released and since you now only have 10 days to rollback your update, for most users, they are stuck on the Anniversary build.
[Update] Rafael has figured out a workaround that should hopefully stop the freezing issue; if you are comfortable tweaking the registry, make this change. HKLM\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\Windows Media Foundation\Platform, add DWORD “EnableFrameServerMode” and set to 0, you will then need to restart Skype.
Tagged with Anniversary Update, webcam, Windows 10Chapter 5 Page 64
Posted September 18, 2015 at 03:26 am
*EDIT* Our table for AWA got moved, see the updated map below!
EVERYONE VERSUS HIJACK AND I GUESS ISABEL LET'S DO THIS
If you'll recall the ancient and noble rules of hitball, Hijeff catching the ball that hit him before it hit the floor means he's in, and Webcomics Sports Anime Kid is super out. DANG!
A few announcements! First of all, Taylor and I will be at Anime Weekend Atlanta on the 24th-27th! Here, have a cool map to us she drew on the house:
Neato! Hopefully I'll see some of you there.
In other news, my wrist is doing really well! It's gotten even better than it was since the last update, and that's WITH working! I am almost back at 100% ;^)
In other OTHER news, I have a few things people who are not me made you guys might want to check out in the interest of SPREADING HIGH QUALITY CRAFT AND NARRATIVE. Stop me if you've heard of them already. Oh wait, you can't: I already wrote this, sucker. Okay, first up, we have Undertale, an amazing RPG video game by Toby Fox. I've had the pleasure of playing through it already and it is both uniquely hilarious and uniquely heartfelt, um, and, uniquely brilliantly written and put-together. So check THAT out. Next there's We Know The Devil, a much shorter and much different game- a visual novel- equally brilliant, and some of the best character writing I've been exposed to. From what I've seen, it's not for everyone, but if you think it might be for you, definitely play through all 3 endings and the Hidden Ending so you can appreciate the craft in its structure. And lastly but not leastly, I really loved this autobio mini-comic by Gale Galligan! It is not only super really funny, it's also Super Really Well-Made Comics, and a great example to look at if you want to see art done smart in action.
Anyways, that's that! I will try to keep highlighting things I find that I think you guys might like down here, especially things that are vaguely similar to Paranatural in interesting disparate ways like these three. They are all things that are going to influence my work down the line, and all things made by artists worth supporting!
A-ANYWAYS. THAT'S THAT! See you Tuesday, thanks for reading!Ewen Cameron Bruce (10 November 1890 – 16 April 1925) was a British Army officer who served with the Heavy Branch of the Machine Gun Corps (Tank Corps from July 1917) during the First World War. He was awarded the Military Cross for his conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in salvaging tanks under heavy shell fire at the Battle of Messines in July 1917 which resulted in him losing his left arm to a gunshot wound.[1][2] After the war, Bruce went to Russia and volunteered to command a British tank mission assisting the White Army under Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel to fight the Bolsheviks in the Russian Civil War. Bruce was awarded the Distinguished Service Order[3] for his bravery during the June 1919 Battle of Tsaritsyn for single-handedly storming and capturing the fortified city of Tsaritsyn, now called Volgograd, under heavy shell fire in a single tank; this led to the successful capture of over 40,000 prisoners.[4] The fall of Tsaritsyn greatly helped the White Russian Cause.[4] Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart stated that Bruce's actions during this battle was "one of the most remarkable feats in the whole history of the Tank Corps."[5]
Early life [ edit ]
Bruce was born in Cheltenham 1890, youngest son of Barrister At Law, Alan Cameron Bruce-Pryce (1836–1909), of Blaen-y-cwm, Monknash, Glamorganshire and his second wife Susanna Mary Synnot née Maunsell.[6] He married Eugenie Mary Alice (née Power) in 1915 and had three children; Diana Marjorie b:1916, Ewen Anthony Guy Cameron b:1917 and Eugenie Benedicta b:1921 (who married Peter Cadbury).[7]
Military career [ edit ]
Bruce served with the British Army in World War 1, and was wounded five times in action during the conflict. He lost his left arm in July 1917 in France, and was gassed in 1918.
Battle of Tsaritsyn [ edit ]
After the First World War, Bruce remained with the Tank Corps and in 1919, he volunteered to serve in South Russia during the Russian Civil War. From May 1919, Bruce commanded a combined small tank detachment[8] that had been initially dispatched to South Russia by the War Office in a strictly non-combative role only to train the Russian White Army forces under General Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel that were, at that time, trying to overthrow the Bolshevik regime as part of the allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. Having been twice repulsed by the Bolsheviks with an attempted advance on Tsaritsyn, General Wrangel decided to wait for reinforcements. An infantry division was sent, and also six tanks, which on Bruce's initiative, included one of the Mark Vs which was manned by a British crew under the command of Bruce, contrary to War Office instructions that the British personnel were only to train Russians, and not to actively take part in fighting. On 26 June 1919 Wrangel was approached by Bruce directly, as commander of the British tank mission, who requested that the British tankers lead the advance [5] On 28 June 1919, Bruce reconnoitered the front route into the city from an aeroplane of No. 47 Squadron RAF and saw that the enemy circled the city. During this flight the plane shot down an enemy observation balloon, thereby preventing the discovery of the concentration of tanks supporting the white army outside Tsaritsyn.[9] On the same day the third advance on Tsaritsyn was launched, which opened with the advance of the tanks bursting through the wire entanglements and crossing the outer trench line, whereupon the Bolshevik regime defenders bolted. Although the Russian White Army cavalry came forward to occupy the newly conquered ground, as no additional petrol for the tanks had come up, there was a prolonged pause. The following day, on 30 June 1919, sufficient petrol was only collected to fill one of the British-manned tanks. Bruce took command of the Mark V tank and drove it into Tsaritsyn under heavy fire[9] and captured the city from the Bolshevik Red Army.[10][11] Viewed "as the most dramatic tank action in 1919"[12] Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel awarded Bruce the Russian Cross of St. George and the Order of St. Vladimir for the "major role he played in the capture of Tsaritsyn".[2][13]
Bruce was later awarded the Japanese Order of the Rising Sun, 4th Class for his military work in the Far East.[2][14] He relinquished his commission on 12 December 1919 on account of ill health contracted whilst on active service and retained the rank of Major.[15]
Ireland 1920 [ edit ]
Despite the loss of his left arm, Bruce was accepted into the Auxiliary Division of the Royal Irish Constabulary (ADRIC) on 3 August 1920 and was given Auxiliary No. 154 and R.I.C. No. 72351. According to historian D.M Leeson, Bruce claimed to have had a "private grudge against Sinn Fein".[2] He was appointed Platoon Commander of No. 3 Platoon in "A" Company, which was the first Company formed while the Division was still in Quarters at the Curragh Army Camp in Co. Kildare.[2] In September 1920, "A" Company was posted to Inistioge, Co. Kilkenny and shortly afterwards, an incident occurred and Bruce was accused of assaulting a civilian and forced to resign. According to Brig. General Crozier, the Commanding Officer of the Auxiliary Division, Bruce was dismissed as unsuitable for the Auxiliary Division, for striking a civilian without cause. However, Historian and author, D.M Leeson comments that in the light of the murders and violence that were occurring in Ireland up to this time, Bruce's offence seems relatively mild, but nevertheless it still ended his career in the Auxiliary Division[2]
In October 1920, Bruce and his nephew hired a car and drove to Thomastown, Kilkenny, and then onto the creamery at Kells where they in the company of two soldiers, Lieutenant Cooper and Sergeant Blake of the Devonshire Regiment, robbed the creamery at gunpoint and got away with £75. Bruce was arrested in Cheltenham on 21 October and was charged with stealing £75 from the creamery. He was brought back to Ireland and tried by court martial at Waterford on 22 December. Historian and author, Leeson accounts in much detail in his 2011 book Black & Tans about Bruce's trial, conviction and subsequent numerous unsuccessful appeals which led to his court martial.[2] Leeson notes that "during the trial the creamery manager admitted that he used the safe for his own money, made unrecorded cash advances to customers, borrowed money from the till for his own use and did not know how much was there on the day of the robbery" as a result he was deemed by the judge to be an unsatisfactory witness.[2] Leeson notes that Lieutenant Cooper testified against Bruce, stating that Bruce had organised the raid and that he went along because Bruce told him he was in the secret service; however he admitted under cross-examination that he made no such claim.[2] Bruce was found guilty and sentence to one year in prison. His nephew was tried separately and received a sentence of three months imprisonment. Bruce was committed to Mountjoy Prison on 28 December and transferred to Liverpool on 8 August 1921 after the truce.[2]
Bruce, however, did not take this conviction lying down.[2] In two petitions to the crown challenging this conviction Bruce accounted that he had asked Lieutenant Cooper to include him on any raids but he had found nothing and taken nothing. Bruce also challenged the credibility of key witnesses, and referred to his previous good character and military record: handling large sums of money in Russia and Japan with no losses.[2] Bruce made several unsuccessful appeals against his conviction, these attempts eventually led to a bankruptcy hearing at Cheltenham in 1924. He was convicted by Court Martial on 22 December 1920 due to the normal civil court system having broken down in Ireland at that time and his MC and DSO were forfeited in July 1921.[16]
Death [ edit ]
Bruce died on 16 April 1925 at Abbeyholme in Cheltenham from the effects of pneumonia in his 35th year.[17]
Relatives [ edit ]
Bruce was the paternal grandfather of Charles "Nish" Bruce.Karuta (かるた, from Portuguese carta ["card"])[1] are Japanese playing cards. Playing cards were introduced to Japan by the Portuguese traders during the mid-16th century. These early decks were used for trick-taking games. The earliest indigenous karuta was first invented in the town of Miike in Chikugo Province at around the end of the 16th century. The Miike Karuta Memorial Hall located in Ōmuta, Fukuoka is the only municipal museum in Japan dedicated specifically to the history of karuta.[2][3]
Karuta packs are divided into two groups, those that are descended from Portuguese cards and those from e-awase.[4] E-awase originally derived from kai-awase, which was played with shells but were converted to card format during the early 17th-century. The basic idea of any e-awase karuta game is to be able to quickly determine which card out of an array of cards is required and then to grab the card before it is grabbed by an opponent and is often played by children at elementary school and junior high-school level during class, as an educational exercise. Chinese playing cards of the money-suited and domino types existed in Japan from at least the late 18th century until the early 20th century.[5][6] Their games would influence those played with the Hanafuda pack.
Portuguese-derived Karuta [ edit ]
Komatsufuda [ edit ]
Komatsufuda set.
The first indigenous Japanese deck was the Tenshō karuta named after the Tenshō period (1573–92).[7] It was a 48 card deck with the 10s missing like Portuguese decks from that period. It kept the four Latin suits of cups, coins, clubs, and swords along with the three face cards of female knave, knight, and king. In 1633, the Tokugawa shogunate banned these cards, forcing Japanese manufacturers to radically redesign their cards. As a result of Japan's isolationist Sakoku policy, karuta would develop separately from the rest of the world. In order to hide the proscription of Portuguese derived cards, makers turned the cards into very abstract designs known as mekuri karuta. By the mid-20th century, all mekuri karuta fell into oblivion with the exception of Komatsufuda (Japanese: 小松札) which is used to play Kakkuri, a matching game found in Yafune, Fukui prefecture.[8]
Unsun Karuta [ edit ]
Unsun karuta set.
The Unsun karuta (Japanese: うんすんカルタ) deck developed in the late 17th century. It has five suits of 15 ranks each for a total of 75 cards. Six of the ranks were face cards. The Portuguese deck used to have dragons on their aces; the Unsun karuta made the aces and dragons separate cards. The order of the court cards change depending on whether it is the trump suit or not just like in Ombre. The new Guru suit used circular whirls (mitsudomoe) as pips. Unsun Karuta is still used in Hitoyoshi, Kumamoto to play hachinin-meri, a game descended from Guritipau, a relative of Ombre.[9] This game preserves some very archaic features such as inverted ranking for the pip cards in the three round suits. Inverted ranking is a feature found in Madiao, Khanhoo, Tổ tôm, Ganjifa, Tarot, Ombre, and Maw and is believed to have originated in the very earliest card games.
Kabufuda [ edit ]
Kabufuda set.
Kabufuda (Japanese: 株札) is another derivative of mekuri karuta but all the suits were made identical. It is used for gambling games such as Oicho-Kabu. They come in decks of 40 cards with designs representing the numbers 1 through 10. There are four cards for each number and the 10 (Jack) is the only face card.
Harifuda and Hikifuda [ edit ]
The gambling game of Tehonbiki can be played with either a Harifuda (張札) or Hikifuda (引札) set. Harifuda contains seven copies of cards numbered one to six in stylized Chinese numerals for a total of 42 cards. The 48-card Hikifuda or Mamefuda (豆札) has eight copies of cards with one to six coins, similar to the coins of a mekuri karuta set. In Tehonbiki, the player tries to guess which number from 1 to 6 the dealer has selected.[10][11] Some sets may include indicator cards to raise or hedge bets.
Hanafuda [ edit ]
Hanafuda (Japanese: 花札, lit. flower cards, also called Hanakaruta) are 48 card decks with flower designs originating from the early 19th century. Instead of being divided by 4 suits with 12 cards each, a hanafuda deck is divided by 12 suits (months) with 4 cards each. Hanafuda games are mostly fishing games. Their mechanics are derived from Chinese rather than European fishing games.[12]
E-awase Karuta [ edit ]
Torifuda (left) and yomifuda (right) Torifuda from an Ita-karuta set
Uta-garuta (歌ガルタ, lit. "poetry karuta") is a card game in which 100 waka poems are written on two sets of 100 cards: one set is yomifuda (読札, lit. "reading cards"), which have the complete poem taken from the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, and the other is torifuda (取り札, lit. "grabbing cards"), which each correspond to a yomifuda and have only the last few lines of the corresponding poem on them. One person is chosen to be the reader. As the reader reads a yomifuda, the players race to find its associated torifuda before anybody else does. It is often possible to identify a poem by its first one or two syllables. This game has traditionally been played on New Year's Day since 1904.[13] Competitive karuta has competitions on various levels with the Japan national championship tournament being held every January at Omi shrine (a Shinto shrine) in Ōtsu, Shiga since 1955.[14]
A few non-matching games exist that use only the yomifuda. Bouzu Mekuri (坊主めくり), is a simple game of chance originating from the Meiji period. Iro Kammuri (Color Crowns) is a 4-player partnership game that is related to Goita (see below).[15][16] In both games, the poems are irrelevant, and the only parts of the cards that matter are the appearance of the poets such as their clothing, sex, or social status.
Ita-karuta (Japanese: 板かるた) is a variation found in Hokkaido. The torifuda are made of wood while the yomifuda remain the same or lack illustrations of the poets.[17][18] They are used to play a competitive partnership game called shimo-no ku karuta in which the last half of the poem is read.[19]
Iroha Karuta [ edit ]
Iroha Karuta (Japanese: いろはかるた) is an easier-to-understand matching game for children, similar to Uta-garuta but with 96 cards. Instead of poems, the cards represent the 47 syllables of the hiragana syllabary and adds kyō (京, "capital") for the 48th (since the syllable -n ん can never start any word or phrase). It uses the old iroha ordering for the syllables which includes two obsolete syllables, wi (ゐ) and we (ゑ). A typical torifuda features a drawing with a kana at one corner of the card. Its corresponding yomifuda features a proverb connected to the picture with the first syllable being the kana displayed on the torifuda. There are 3 standard Iroha Karuta variants: Kamigata, Edo and Owari. Each variant has its own set of proverbs based on the local dialect and culture. The Kamigata or Kyoto version is the oldest but the Edo version is the most widespread, being found all over Japan. The Owari variant existed only during the latter half of the 19th-century before being supplanted by the Edo version.
Obake karuta [ edit ]
we ( ゑ ), an obsolete syllable. Obake karuta, c. early 19th century. This one is), an obsolete syllable.
Obake karuta is an obsolete variation of Iroha Karuta unique to Tokyo. The cards were created in the Edo period and remained popular through the 1910s or 1920s.[20] Each card in the deck features a hiragana syllable and a creature from Japanese mythology; in fact, obake karuta means ghost cards or monster cards.[20] Success requires knowledge of Japanese mythology and folklore as players attempt to collect cards that match clues read by a referee. The player who accumulates the most cards by the end of the game wins.
Obake karuta is an early example of the common Japanese fascination with classifying monsters and creating new ones. The game is one of the earliest attempts by Japanese companies to categorize legendary creatures, label them, define them, and subsequently market them. As such, it is a precursor to the Godzilla films of the 1950s and later. Even more closely, obake karuta resembles the Yu-Gi-Oh! or Pokémon Trading Card Game, which also involves collecting cards that represent fabulous creatures. In fact, many Pokémon were designed specifically after creatures from Japanese mythology.[20]
Goita [ edit ]
Goita (ごいた) is a partnership climbing and beating game from Noto, Ishikawa played with 32 tiles or cards based on Shogi pieces.[21][22][23] It may be a descendant of an earlier game played with 40 or
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a dime’s or even a dollar’s worth of difference between the two ruling parties of this corporate regime. Of course there are differences, and the divergent points in public policy are very much what we would expect from a party that hopes for a better regulated form of capitalism on the “left,” and a party that hopes for a more dictatorial rule of the rich on the right. Only in the bizarrely reduced worldview of “our two-party system” would the borders of one country define the borders of political thought and practice.
Beyond our borders, millions of people freely and regularly vote for socialists and communists of various kinds and parties, and those citizens are not trembling under jackboots or facing summary execution in the soundproof basements of police states. If we insist on principle that the regime in Sweden is a political twin separated at birth from the regime in North Korea, then we will not be above calling President Obama a socialist and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont a Bolshevik. Those rhetorical steamrolling tricks can be left to the far right, however, if we identify in any way with the democratic left. Let us generously define this democratic left to include left-leaning members of the Democratic Party, as well as the growing number of people who are opposed to this bipartisan corporate regime. We need a public conversation about the present conditions and future prospects of the democratic left in the United States. This is why the question of a change in our whole economic and political system cannot be ruled out of order. That kind of censorship is not a promising premise for any political conversation.
There is not a single word of hope or political idealism that has not been dragged through the mud and blood of history, including democracy and socialism, and even “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Yet the distinction between democratic socialism and single-party forms of state totalitarianism is not a mere sectarian point of pride, but a real and necessary dividing line between radically opposed traditions on the political left. If we try tracing this conflict back to the great intellects of the 19th century, we might say that Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill were never properly introduced and never conducted a civilized conversation — neither those two thinkers nor their followers ever since. In theory and in practice, whole branches of the left have effectively disowned either class struggle or civil liberties.
That division is not simply theoretical, but founded upon all too human historical struggles between classes and regimes. The guillotine in the public square already threw a long shadow over liberty, equality and fraternity in the course of the French Revolution; even as slavery recreated the class divisions of Europe within the American Revolution; even as the bloody basement of the Lubyanka undermined the foundation of the Russian Revolution; and even as the drone wars now conducted by the apostle of hope and change have extended the meaning of empire in the 21st century. Historically, we cannot always decide in what critical period a bourgeois republic becomes a bastion of war and empire, any more than we might notice when a simmering kettle begins to boil. This late in history, however, we may have to become revolutionaries to accomplish the essentially conservative task of defending a secular and democratic republic. Even the more radical task of creating a truly social democracy is also another way of returning to the roots of the republican tradition, in the sense of making a more grounded claim upon our life in common.
Anyone who reads Hannah Arendt’s “The Origins of Totalitarianism” will linger in sadness and wonder over many passages, but for my present purpose this sentence sums up the practical program of totalitarianism: “The Leader’s absolute monopoly of power and authority is most conspicuous in the relationship between him and his chief of police, who in a totalitarian country occupies the most powerful public position.” Arendt noted that such a position of power is not the same thing as being able to seize power, since Stalin’s last chief of police, Lavrenti Beria, survived Stalin just long enough to become one more victim of state security. Beria, as Arendt wrote, “must have known that he would forfeit his life because for a matter of days he had dared to play off the power of the police against the power of the party.”
Later in the same work, Arendt wrote: “The first essential step on the road to total domination is to kill the juridical person in man,” namely, the person with any real claim to equality under the law. One way to do so, Arendt added, is by “placing the concentration camp outside the normal penal system, and by selecting its inmates outside the normal judicial procedure in which a definite crime entails a predictable penalty.” In that respect, the extrajudicial prisons and executions conducted by our current regime are stark illuminations of dark times.
A great deal of the social life of comfortable members of the Democratic Party is spent in a kind of political primate grooming, picking the nits of distinction between their chosen candidates — while insisting on the absolute Grand Canyon between the party of enlightenment, the Democrats, and the party of benighted reaction, the Republicans. An unwritten manual of good manners prevents such discussions from venturing into any clear and present consideration of honest socialism, much less of the necessity for breaking away from an anti-democratic economic and electoral system. Nostalgia for the high tide of labor struggles and for the glory days of the old New Deal is often encountered around certain middle-class dinner tables, and even in the offstage, off-the-record comments of some Democratic career politicians. Indeed, it is possible to find members of the Communist Party who find dialectical and “scientific” reasons why they must vote for the Democrat in every big election. In their heart of hearts, they keep a private shrine for Marx, while in public they campaign for Obama. The spirit of Franklin Delano Roosevelt hovers dimly in the air, evoked at such seances to comfort the grieving survivors and to resolve all contradictions.Since I have sounded a note of satire it is only fair to add that the partisan left in this country has often splintered into sectarian fiefdoms. All the same, my subject here is not the sectarian left, but the real and present prospects of the democratic left. No one expects the Green and Socialist parties to sweep into the highest offices in the next election. But if we vote with courage and conscience only when we are assured that a majority will vote along with us, then what can we possibly mean by either courage or conscience? If a good cause is worth a fair fight, then we are obliged to act now in creating the future majority. In this sense, every great social movement and revolution throughout human history has been “premature” until the very eve of every great evolutionary leap in social life.
Who honestly denies the intelligence and special talents of smooth operators such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama? Anyone convinced by the perennial “pragmatic” arguments made for the least destructive capitalist politician on the ballot will also be convinced that capitalism will be measured in the final scales of history according to some fine balance of costs and benefits, if not of outright good and evil. Something has gone far wrong with a definition of political pragmatism that forces citizens to choose only among candidates approved and financed by the ruling class. Collectively and historically, the sum of such “pragmatic” votes must be counted among the reasons that have brought this country to the brink of outright oligarchic rule. This phony pragmatism reinforces the actual dictatorship of big banks and corporations.
The environmental disasters generated by our energy and industrial system were barely alluded to in the recent Democratic convention, and Obama did not dare mention nuclear power under the fallout of Fukushima. Climate change got a formal mention, if only to keep ecologically minded Democrats within the party fold. Both corporate parties are unable to embrace ecological sanity, however, since happy talk about technological innovation within the limits of business as usual is the real ground of bipartisan consensus. Pragmatism was evident at both conventions only in the crass and obvious sense that it works to keep career politicians in public office, while the more important anti-social contract with the corporations is never called into question nor brought to a public vote.
The latest conventions of the two Titanic parties — no more than ruling class faction fights over which captains will steer the ship of state to the next disaster– are already history. Now we can get back to the politics of peace, economic democracy and ecological sanity with less distraction. This week I watched Bill Moyers interview Dr. Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala, respectively the presidential and vice presidential candidates of the Green Party. Both candidates made a good case for voter rebellion against the corporate duopoly of Democrats and Republicans. Stein was best at underlining the key points of the “Green New Deal,” the program to rebuild our economy on a sane and sustainable ecological foundation. No one else running for high office is as sharply eloquent as Stein when making the case for a truly comprehensive health care system.
Honkala was best at making the urgent case for public intervention against a rigged electoral system, and spoke about her own community work over the years with the homeless and with people struggling against home evictions. Honkala’s hunger for justice was fired up in the freezing confines of a car after she and her child had been evicted from their home in the middle of a Minneapolis winter. When she moved to Philadelphia, she continued her community activism, and in 1991 she founded the Kensington Welfare Rights Union to feed and house the poor of Philadelphia. I know the neighborhood of Kensington in North Philly well, since that was the site of one of the earliest needle exchange programs initiated by members of ACT UP Philadelphia in the same year.
Honkala has been charged by critics with public grandstanding, as though corporate politicians with all the mannerisms of Mussolini do not grandstand in American public life. There is a double standard at work here, in the most regressively class-conscious sense, since people in power are undeniably affronted by Honkala’s unapologetic determination to cut a figure in public life. Career politicians (and the kind of journalists who place “access” to power above digging for truth) made nearly the same charges of grandstanding against members of ACT UP chapters across the country in the early years of the AIDS epidemic. Not content with ruling the heights of a corporate command economy, these politicians also feel entitled to own public airwaves and attention. In the many years I lived in Philadelphia before moving to Los Angeles, I attended any number of public meetings and protests with Honkala. And yet we never met in person, not even in police wagons on the way to jail, until I introduced myself to her when she spoke at a Green Party event in Los Angeles last month.
When Moyers asked about the possible “spoiler effect” of the Green Party in a presidential election, and made the usual misinformed references to Ralph Nader, Honkala responded by saying, “You can’t spoil what’s rotten.” When lives hang in the balance, Honkala explained, an ambulance will run through red lights. Honkala argued that we live in a time of emergency, and I agree. Electorally, the Green Party will not stop campaigning merely because the corporate parties put stop signs along the electoral route to democracy. When Moyers asked why Greens were not working to reform the Democratic Party, Stein explained that the first Obama campaign for the White House had already busted the illusions of hope and change. Stein was thereby extending an open invitation for decent and disillusioned Democrats to cross party lines. That makes sense to me. The political enemy is not the decent and despairing voter looking for some way forward across the electoral minefield, but instead the dictatorship of big banks and corporations.
Moyers should also be urged to interview Stewart Alexander and Alejandro Mendoza, respectively the presidential and vice presidential candidates of the Socialist Party, the historic party of (small d) democratic socialism in this country. Since I previously interviewed Alexander about the Socialist Party presidential campaign for Truthdig, I am also drawing due attention to the Green Party campaign. For full disclosure, I am glad to put on the public record once again that I am a member of both the Socialist and Green parties.As for the pretense that NBC News chief anchor Brian Williams (to take only one well-known example) is more politically “objective” than I am, that is a fiction of the corporate mass media. That is an industrially produced item of ideological faith, and I do not share the faith. If we choose to revisit the debates about ideology — or even the illusions about “The End of Ideology” proclaimed in the previous century — we would do best to begin from the more realistic premise that position is perspective. I do not need to watch MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow and still less Chris Matthews to convince me that the Republican Party is to the right of the Democratic Party. Maddow is, of course, wittier than Matthews, and she is at her best when (with staff research) she is able to point out all the rabid bats and squirrels dwelling in the branches of that sick old oak tree, the Republican Party.
But when I found Alessandra Stanley policing the official boundaries of objective journalism in The New York Times of Aug. 31, I felt like Alice passing through the looking glass and falling down the rabbit hole. Stanley’s article, titled “MSNBC, Arch Counterprogramming to Fox,” was an ideological mash note to Williams. In Stanley’s view, Williams is an exemplary gentleman of old school objective journalism. Stanley noted that Williams “has conspicuously avoided the most fractious MSNBC discussion panels. Those anchors who do make dutiful appearances, like David Gregory and Tom Brokaw, are badly needed but don’t stay long or join the fray — like piano players in a brothel, they don’t go upstairs.”
No, on the contrary, we know that some of the best piano players in brothels did and do go upstairs, including Brahms and Joplin. Those musicians found sources of music beyond polite society, and likewise any independent journalist should describe the political whorehouse of Congress without the pieties and prejudices of a New York Times reporter. Stanley praised anchors and reporters who “stay neutral” and “keep their opinions to themselves.” Stanley’s final summary line of the riskier forums on MSNBC came down to this kiss: “No wonder Brian Williams stays away.”
Oh, but Williams does not stay away from letting the public know that he loves (quite generally) dogs, soldiers and astronauts. Williams also loves the alpha dogs of the corporate parties, and his behavior when interviewing members of the ruling class is impeccable. No question ventures beyond the limits of bipartisan etiquette, and certainly not in the direction of voter rebellion. Does anyone remember Peter Jennings, the ABC anchor who was a high school dropout and got his start on Canadian radio? Jennings was by no means a radical, but his background put his questions and comments slightly aslant the culture and political pieties of the United States. I mention Jennings because he would sometimes ask the startlingly naive question, and at least in my memory he was among the more unscripted anchors of the big networks. He died of lung cancer in 2005, and ever since the network anchors have been cast in the same leaden mold, and dropped in the depths of the best flat screen TVs money can buy.
Presently, many “progressives” have fallen under the spell of Elizabeth Warren. She has the charm and common sense and even the worldliness of an excellent school librarian I knew long ago. If the choice is between Warren and Sen. Scott Brown, I would choose Warren. But in fact I do not choose the Democratic Party over the Republican Party, since that would be a truly wasted vote. Given the menacing objective problems in this country, the partisan program of the Democrats is by no means a “pragmatic” response to reality. Not even close — not in the realm of war and peace, nor in the realms of education, health care and the economy. Certainly not in the realm of the natural world, which we still treat like a 19th century gold mine or else like a public toilet.
Warren gave a populist speech at the Democratic convention, but the Democratic Party is not even close to being a populist party. She added a spoonful of sugar to the usual dose of corporate strychnine, but whatever remains of the left wing of that party is certainly starved for small favors. She also stuck all too neatly to her own script of warmed over New Deal populism, while campaigning on behalf of a party that advanced a program of corporate and financial deregulation under the Democratic Leadership Council and the Clintonistas. Obama deviates in no important way from the party line of the Clintons, except in the factional sense that he played the game of triangulation better than Bill and Hillary. In regular four-year cycles, some new oratorical star rises to dazzle voters starved for hope and change. Obama was also among those rising stars, and now joins the firmament of burned out managerial politicians.
If the Democrats were a party committed to the real reform of capitalism, then party leaders such as Obama would be taking the advice of economist Paul Krugman, who is a regular columnist on the Op-Ed pages of The New York Times. Krugman reliably proposes a stimulus program along Keynesian lines, and the Democratic Party reliably treats him as a court jester. This is one more reason why voters inclined toward common sense social democracy should be looking beyond a party far more committed to drone wars than to labor unions.
The Socialist Party has a great deal to learn from the grounded electoral campaigns of the Green Party. I have always advocated open dialogue between Greens and Socialists, and even coalition electoral campaigns in places where this might be possible. But both parties must also keep their own programs and partisan independence. The first rule for real dialogue between Reds and Greens is simple and clear: no secret diplomacy. Of course any political party will have prudential reasons for holding sensitive negotiations in relative peace around small tables, but in every point of true public policy a future alliance of Greens and Socialists must be founded upon public communication and public charters.This country is still under the fatal spell of red scares. Famously and absurdly, even Obama is charged with the high crime of “socialism” by the usual demagogues. This background of rabid political provincialism is one reason the Green Party decided to retool the New Deal of the 1930s under the rubric of a Green New Deal. And in fact the Green Party is, if we consider its economic program, a party of European style social democracy.
The Socialist Party, on the contrary, is a party of democratic and revolutionary socialism. Democratic because we do not abstain from elections, while being well aware that the public life of any true republic neither begins nor ends on election days. Revolutionary because we do not merely claim that workers should negotiate with management, but that working people should seize public control of the economy and manage our own affairs. The ruling class under such conditions will dwindle as its hidden bank accounts are frozen and its corporate privileges are revoked, though of course it will also be free to earn an honest living.
Democracy in the realm of the economy remains the unfinished business of the Enlightenment. When we speak of a global economy we are truly speaking of a common household, including the metabolism of the human species with surrounding nature. In this sense, all economic choices will have ecological consequences. A class conscious and civil libertarian movement for democratic socialism will pay due respect to national cultures, but the perspective of revolutionary socialism goes beyond all national borders.
The United States is not an honest ambassador for democracy abroad when our Congress long ago became the front office of the ruling class. We should not be surprised that an anti-democratic system on the national scale of the United States will also be drawn into imperial adventures well beyond our borders. Both the Green and Socialist parties are resolutely anti-militarist, not least because the funds and resources exhausted in war and counterinsurgency are better spent to create real security in jobs, schools, homes and health.
A trailblazer of the Republican Party, Abraham Lincoln, noted in a letter to a friend in the wake of the Civil War that he feared the growing power of corporations over the republic. One very telling feature of current “progressive” ideology is to hark back to the era of distinctly Progressive and Populist parties and movements in the United States dating to the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. Certainly all social movements of all periods in our national history deserve to be revisited, but in one respect the contemporary “progressive” promotion of the past has a distinctly reactionary dimension. Namely, under cover of economic populism, the distinct history of explicitly socialist parties and movements is slighted or reduced to footnotes. Yet the labor history of the United States cannot be told honestly without a fair account of the revolutionary syndicalism of the Industrial Workers of the World, or the influence of socialists and communists in labor strikes and in the AFL-CIO. Even the electoral history of this country is incomplete without noting the socialists who gained public office in town halls and city councils. Today Sanders is the only member of Congress who owns up to being a democratic socialist, though elected as an Independentindependent. He was interviewed on an earlier segment of the same Moyers show that featured the Green Party candidates, and he always makes a reasonable case for a kind of Scandinavian welfare state.
On Election Day, a vote for either Obama or Romney is a vote for Wall Street criminals to go unpunished, and for working people to go under the wheels. Only a voter rebellion will put fear and trembling in the hearts of career politicians. Political liberty includes our right to fight fair and square against the Democratic and Republican parties, against a system that puts profits before people, and against corporations that are burning down the planet. The militarism of the United States is not an accidental side effect of this corporate regime, but the necessary consequence of the collision of corporate spheres of influence beyond all national borders.
This country needs both an economic and political revolution, by all peaceful and democratic methods possible. But let’s be honest about the many forms of established violence, including the class struggle of the very rich against both the working class and the increasingly proletarianized and impoverished middle class. That class struggle is coded into electoral laws that are designed to lock out any insurgent party from presidential debates, ballots and fair elections. That class struggle also breaks out well beyond the bounds of constitutional law every time police lock public protest into “free speech zones,” and terrorize legitimate public assemblies with brutal sweeps and mass arrests.
The unrestricted mobility of capital over the whole globe inevitably creates international corporate cartels, and regular boom and bust cycles whose greatest cost is always paid by workers and the poor. Next year will mark the centennial of the first edition of “The Accumulation of Capital,” Rosa Luxemburg’s great work on labor, finance and empire. As she wrote of global capitalism in 1913, “Its predominant methods are colonial policy, an international loan system — a policy of spheres of interest — and war. Force, fraud, oppression, looting are openly displayed without any attempt at concealment, and it requires an effort to discover within this tangle of political violence and contests of power the stern laws of the economic process.”
Today we can say that the wizards of high finance take more care to hide their worst gambling habits, but when the truth comes to light they still enjoy full impunity and remain entrenched in Wall Street casinos with lordly disregard of the proles below. The only practical policy for the defense of democracy is an independent, class conscious and civil libertarian struggle against the corporate state. Without widespread rebellion among voters on Election Day, and without social movements of resistance every other day of our lives, we will never regain the spirit of revolution expressed in these simple words: We, the People. That is the lost treasure of our republic, and until we dare to dive among the reefs to find it again we can be sure that the only golden rule among the ruling class will remain the pursuit of power and profit. By all means, occupy the elections. But occupy our workplaces and neighborhoods and public places as well. Otherwise we vote and they rule."Casting Assistant Device (術式補助演算機), better known as CAD (シーエーディー) is a spell support processor. Magicians also call them Device (デバイス) or Assistance (アシスタンス), and in Japan Magic Operator. It is a machine researched & developed using Magical Engineering Technology."
-Maouka koukou no rettousei wiki
This is a photorealistic rendition of the "Silver Series Silverhorn Trident Custom" used by the main character in the anime series Mahouka koukou no rettousei (The irregular at magic high school). It is a computerized magic casting device and is only gun-shaped to allow for spell aiming systems, it does not fire anything from the muzzle. The magazines are memory cartridges, storing the activation sequence for various spells. "Reloading" is therefore necessary only when the user wishes to execute a spell not stored on the current cartridge in use. One cartridge can store multiple spells.
Made in blender, feedback welcome. This is the first project in a idea for a series of works: Objects of fiction. I'll be taking objects from fiction and creating detailed photorealistic works featuring them, any suggestions for what object I should do next?by Joseph Debro
I am an 84-year-old angry Black man. I am Mississippi born, Mississippi bred and Mississippi fled. I am the son of former slaves. My parents and I rode in the back of the bus. We rode in the front of the trains. We drank from water fountains designated for coloreds only. We picked cotton in fields owned by White people.
My parents attended separate but equal schools in Mississippi. I attended separate but equal schools in Mississippi and in Oakland, California. My wife was educated in Oakland public schools and at the University of California at Berkeley. She could not get a job teaching in Oakland Public schools in Oakland in 1954. I hold an undergraduate and a graduate degree from the University of California at Berkeley. I was profiled at a Washington, D.C., hotel in 2010, forced to sleep in a homeless shelter overnight.
I saw nothing in the Zimmerman case that surprised me. The system worked as it was intended. Zimmerman, a White man, was tried by a White justice system for killing a Black boy. The outcome was predictable. Many White people saw this as a non-racial event.
The O.J. Simpson jury found for the defense. The jury found reasonable doubt. The George Zimmerman jury found for the defense. The six White women on the jury found reasonable doubt. Zimmerman admitted that he killed Trayvon Martin. Simpson denied that he killed anyone. The press excoriated the Simpson jury. The Zimmerman jury was praised.
In both cases, the state presented weak cases. There are lessons to be learned from both cases. Laws are made to control the actions of people who can’t afford to break them. Both Simpson and Zimmerman bought as much justice as they needed. Their jurors were presented with reasonable doubt.
In the Zimmerman case, there are some facts that concerned citizens should understand. George Zimmerman is White. The juror of unknown ethnicity is White. The police who refused to arrest Zimmerman and who testified for him were White. The judge, and the prosecution were White. Every critical function carried on in that justice system was performed by a White person. Such is the case in almost every trial or plea bargaining case involving a Black man in this country.
George has been described as Hispanic. That does not mean that he is not White. The term Hispanic is a political designation that describes national origin, not race. Hispanic is a protected designation under our civil rights laws, but the term is not racial. I would guess that George Zimmerman, on his driver’s license under race, is designated White.
The most important fact to know is that the prosecution worked as hard for George Zimmerman as they did for the state of Florida. The prosecution did not challenge the lack of Afro Americans on the jury. The prosecution did not present its own theory of the case; it reacted to Zimmerman’s story of the case.
The prosecution’s case should have been presented on the theory that the wounds displayed by Zimmerman were self-inflicted. Zimmerman inflicted those wounds on himself. Zimmerman knew enough about the law to know he needed such wounds. Such a prosecution theory would have forced the defense to defend against this theory, and it might have caused Zimmerman to testify.
Instead, the prosecution introduced a tape made by the Zimmerman defense. The prosecution should have fought to keep that tape out of the trial. In a just world this prosecutor would be disbarred for malpractice.
The second worst flaw in the prosecution’s case was their failure to challenge Zimmerman’s voice recognition by his friends and relatives. The prosecution needed to recode several voices saying what Zimmerman was alleged to have yelled on the 911 tapes, replay them and ask each of the witnesses to identify the Zimmerman voice.
The third flaw by the prosecution was to bring in a skinny dummy. They should have brought in a live person of the same height and weight as Zimmerman and required that person to pull his gun with Trayvon on top of him. The prosecution should have punctured a heart with Trayvon on top to test blood spatter. If Zimmerman had a broken nose, who repaired it?
Finally, if Trayvon was on top of Zimmerman when he was shot in the heart, why was there no blood of Martin’s on Zimmerman’s clothes? Why was this question not asked at trial?
The justice system worked as it is designed to do. The system exonerated a White man who admitted killing a Black boy. The Justice Department will not bring an action in this case. Just because the man who heads it is Black does not mean he runs it. DOJ is a system that runs the same no matter who is at the top.
Racism is structured into most of the important systems in this country.
Communications – 99% of the TV, radio and print media properties are owned by White people. Construction – 99% of the construction in this country is done by White people. Education – 99% of all educational resources are allocated by White people. Transportation – 99% of all transportation is controlled by White people. Justice – this system is 99.9% controlled by White people. Financial – this system is 99.9 % controlled by white people.
When Congresswomen Maxine Waters asked that 0.000001 percent of the $700 billion bailout money go to banks owned or controlled by descendants of former slaves, they tried to put her in jail.
If we think that we get fair treatment in any of these systems, we must re-examine our definition of fairness.
As an angry old Black man I have seen the diminution of racism in my lifetime. We are not there yet. It is unlikely that we will get there in the lifetime of my grandchildren.
Joseph Debro is president of Bay Area Black Builders and of Transbay Builders, a general engineering contractor, former director of the California state Office of Small Business, co-founder of the National Association of Minority Contractors and a bio-chemical engineer. He can be reached at [email protected] PARK -- Detroit Lions tailback Mikel Leshoure got just two carries last season, which means there's pretty much no where to go but up. And he anticipates that's exactly what's going to happen. "I can't tell you (what my role will be) during OTAs, but it looks like I'll be involved a little more that last year so far," Leshoure told MLive this week. "As far as the role, I don't know. That could change weekly. But I think I'll be more involved than last year obviously." Leshoure was drafted in the second round by the Lions in 2011 and was the team's leading rusher in 2012. But he fell out of favor last year following the signing of Reggie Bush emergence of Joique Bell, and even the sixth-round selection of Theo Riddick. He is hoping a new staff with a fresh approach -- one noted for its use of multiple tailbacks -- will spur his return to the lineup. "It's a new beginning," he said. "It's a lot of running plays. (Coordinator Joe Lombardi) comes from New Orleans, where backs rotated a lot. We know we're going to run the ball here, and I'm excited by the opportunity." Leshoure could have a tough fight ahead of him. Bush and Bell are entrenched as the 1-2 combo atop the depth chart, and Lombardi has hailed Riddick as one of the standouts of OTAs. Riddick also contributes as a core special teams member, which could work against Leshoure's candidacy for a bigger role. But Leshoure is committed to retaking a role in the offense. That includes showing up at OTAs in some of the best shape of his career. He says he's cut out sweets and fried food and no longer eats after 8 p.m. He says he's leaner than ever and that has given him some extra pop. "I'm not eating too late. Just cutting back on sweets and bad stuff I used to have in my diet," Leshoure said. "Nothing major has changed. Just eliminating what you're not supposed to have, like sweets and fried foods and things like that. Late-night snacking is like 10 o'clock to me. You don't need to eat past 8."BOYNTON BEACH, Fla. - Boynton Beach Police have released video of a shootout between two of their officers and a bank robbery suspect. It happened June 12th and started with a chase on Federal Highway. Police spotted Calvin Wallace's red Lincoln Town Car after getting word to be on the lookout. Wallace, 52, crashed and then it appears he opened fire on officers Chris Munro and Eric Reynolds. Reynolds was shot in the foot. Wallace later died. Police say they released the video after a review by the State Attorney's office found the shooting was justified. We spoke to former Boca Police Chief Andrew Scott, who says the video is not only a perfect training tool for police officers, but a help to the public. There are often vigorous public debates over whether an officer should have fired. But with an ironclad witness - the camera - Scott and state attorneys say there shouldn't be a debate in this case about whether officers acted appropriately. "The public is getting a fair shake because it has that independent third party, eyewitness account that can't be altered," said Scott.Irish delight is UAE heartbreak
The luck of the Irish has helped deny United Arab Emirates (UAE) a thrilling maiden World Cup victory on Wednesday night.
Gary Wilson (80 off 69) made his own fortune to help guide Ireland (8-279) to a two-wicket win with four balls to spare at the Gabba.
Earlier, No.6 Shaiman Anwar struck 106 and shared a record World Cup seventh-wicket stand of 107 with Amjad Javed (42 off 35) to help lift UAE from 6-131 to 9-278.
Ireland are now on track for a quarter-final berth after backing up their shock opening win over West Indies - thanks to a little luck.
Despite the tense finish, Irish eyes always appeared to be smiling on the Emerald Isle's team.
Opener Ed Joyce was bowled by Amjad Javed (3-60) on 17 with Ireland on 1-36, only for the bails to remain on the stumps.
Joyce looked back to see the LED lights-fitted bails flash when beaten by Javed then remarkably fall back into their groove.
Joyce's luck ran out on 37 when Javed had him caught behind, ending a crucial 68-run second wicket stand that set up Ireland's chase.
They stumbled at 4-97 in the 26th over before all-rounder Kevin O'Brien's 25-ball 50 in a 72-run sixth-wicket stand with Wilson got the Irish in sight of a heart-stopping win.
Earlier, Anwar thrashed UAE's first World Cup and second ODI ton.
Anwar celebrates his century in Brisbane // Getty Images
Anwar's knock is a UAE World Cup record highest score, eclipsing Saleem Raza's 84. He thrashed 10 fours and one six.
UAE, appearing at their first World Cup since 1996, fell just short of their record ODI team total of 7-285 posted in their opening four-wicket loss to Zimbabwe last week.
Paul Stirling (2-27) was the pick of the Irish bowlers.
"That's part of the game. I have seen it before but it has never happened to me before," Javed said of "bowling" Joyce.
Joyce is 'bowled' at the Gabba - the bails stayed on // Fox Sports
"You could say we are unlucky but we dropped O'Brien (on 24) at a crucial time.
"If you do that you let the team take the game away from you - but the boys will learn from that."
On his record stand with Anwar, Javed said: "We played our natural game despite being six wickets down and just kept going... then we were (scoring at) eight, 10 an over."
Man of the match Wilson was breathing easy after Ireland locked up back-to-back wins.
"I got them to the line but couldn't get them over it," he said.
"I did some serious pacing in the dressing room."
Ireland: William Porterfield (capt), Paul Stirling, Ed Joyce, Niall O'Brien, Andrew Balbirnie, Gary Wilson, Kevin O'Brien, John Mooney, Alex Cusack, Max Sorensen, George Dockrell.
UAE: Amjad Ali, Andri Raffaelo, Krishna Karate, Khurram Khan, Swapnil Patil, Shaiman Anwar, Rohan Mustafa, Amjad Javed, Mohammad Naveed (capt), Mohammad Tauqir, Manjula Guruge.Image copyright AFP Image caption The US says concerns remain about Cuban doctors and nurses allegedly being coerced into working on medical missions abroad
The United States has removed Cuba from its list of countries that fail to combat human trafficking.
The annual State Department report comes a week after Cuba and the US formally restored diplomatic relations.
The United States previously accused Cuba's communist authorities of forcing people to travel abroad to work on government-backed projects.
The US also removed Malaysia from the list of countries failing to address human trafficking.
Cuba was first included on the State Department's annual Trafficking in Persons list in 2003.
'Significant efforts'
US Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights Sarah Sewall said Cuba had made progress in combating sex trafficking.
But concerns remained over the country's failures to address forced labour, she said.
"The Government of Cuba does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so," reads the report.
Image copyright Reuters Image caption The Cuban flag was raised last week at the island's embassy in Washington
On 20 July, Cuba reopened its embassy in Washington after more than five decades of strained relations.
The American embassy in Havana will be reopened next week.
Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro surprised the world in December with the announcement that the two countries had decided to cease hostilities.
Several measures have been taken over the past seven months to mend relations, including removing Cuba from the list
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-Australian Plate's lower reaches through the Mohorovičić discontinuity and into planet Earth's upper mantle. This is the geothermal zone. The number of "real" people who've visited this depth in person is zero. Laura wonders if she gets to coin the term. "Mohonaut"?
The arrival hall is approximately ovoidal, a vast iron stomach lined with thick girderwork. A walkway crosses the floor to the far end. There is still no light, except for the weak blue illumination from the pod's interior. The texture of the darkness here is the same as in the rest of the listening post's semi-habitable spaces. So is the hostility of the atmosphere. Laura persuades herself that she can feel the teratonnes of extra pressure. Surely, no conventional human material can hold a habitable space open at this depth. It can't just be thick iron and thick girders. This has to be an active structure, geothermally powered, magically supported.
During her journey, Laura has been exploring her suit's characteristics. She built it in a second, on a whim, in a dream-- "I want one of what Kaz is wearing". And here it is, a miraculous reality. It is light enough to forget about, comfortable enough to sleep in, and almost robust enough to do so while standing up. The gauntlets transmit tactile sensations to her fingers. The boots massage her feet to maintain circulation. The helmet can turn completely transparent - it does this by retracting all of its thermal management foam and extra gadgetry into a compressed ring around her neck. Why? Because of a silly thing Kazuya needed once, in a dream. As far as Laura can tell, the suit is an entirely physical object, making no use of magic whatsoever. Wearing it confers a sensation of incredible safety. The only possible criticism is its tedious, almost lazy appearance-- large, flat, uniformly matte grey plates.
But she's thirty klicks below ground, now. And no spooky suit can possibly protect her from an implosion at this depth.
The railpod folds itself behind a thick, seamless steel bulkhead. The arrival hall plunges into darkness, which Laura dispels, this time using the suit's brilliant floods. If she had to guess, she'd say the batteries were plated across her back somehow, but she honestly doesn't know.
The walk across the arrival hall is only a few minutes. The hall's strange bumpy girders cast moving shadows which keep catching Laura's attention. When she looks, there's never anything there. She reminds herself that the place is sterile.
At the far end of the hall is an installation where, apparently, some kind of particle accelerator is partially exposed. A thick pipe, five or six metres in diameter, enters the hall from one side, curves gently through it at a slight rising angle, and leaves from the other. The visible curvature sets limits on the full ring's diameter. It is less than two kilometres wide.
Laura has never seen magical runic patterns drawn on such a large scale. Within the individual flowing channels, she can see nested patterns, carved into the base and even the wall of the first level of carvings. The complexity is bewildering at first, but a trained eye can quickly pick out the frequent repeated patterns.
This is a magic ring. More technically, it's sixty-two magic rings, interlocked and cooperating, all bound with conventional hoops of blue-painted tungsten. From the left and the right, Laura hears the dull roar of hardcore climate control engineering, driven by more magic. Precise shaping is critically important to magical efficiency, and temperature variations would cause structural shifts.
The pioneers at Montauk would recognise its purpose with just a glance, but figuring the thing's maximum capacity would leave them standing. This is the bilge battery at the base of the world.
All living humans generate waste mana, active mages and baselines alike. The quantity is insignificant to a magical machine of this size. Humanity has a few orders of magnitude to climb before it reaches Kardashev I.
But: from five known sites on Earth (a figure set to increase to seven or eight once surveys are completed), geothermal mana is naturally occurring. The mana is generated, coils into the sky, cools for a day, and evaporates into waste, at which point it is not only useless for all human purposes but invisible and undetectable. It sinks into the Earth, becoming presumably unrecoverable.
And then it is drawn here.
A time may well be coming when humans can steal one another's mana. Soon after that, a time may come when humans can do the same to the vast meta-mage that is planet Earth. This would instantly turn every geothermal mana source from a worthless (if spectacular) natural phenomenon into a billion-dollar oilfield.
Or then again, that time may never come. It very much depends on what is in the Wheel Group's long-term development chart for magical industry. It depends who figures what out, and when, and how much of a nudge they need to find the important threads.
Laura's waste mana reclamation process makes the entire question academic. It worked up at Hatt Group, and it'll work here. All it took to build was a month of hard labour and a painfully slippery True Name aliasing trick. "Trick" is the term she would use, not "spell". Even on close inspection, it's hard to know how it works. It's almost sleight-of-hand.
She raises one fist - she barely needs to think about what she's doing - and three long streams of lightning stab out from it: two flanking her forearm, and the third directly upwards from between her second and third finger.
She has completed less than one two-hundredth of her descent, but the hardest part is over.
*
Kazuya "Ra" Tanako said he crossed T-world by dreaming of scramjets. The man thought too small. Everybody thinks too small.
Laura stands directly on top of the listening post's virtual representation, the Manhattan-sized arthropod carapace. There is a kind of landing pad here. It's exactly as wide as Laura needs it to be. The glass universe is almost as dark as it ever is. At one end of the sky is the familiar triple-pointed galaxy, a little lower in the sky than is typical. At the other... what is that? Could those be city lights reflected off low cloud? No...
In T-world, you can have anything you can ask for. You're not even limited by your imagination. Laura knows what she wants, down to the level of bolts and circuits. A Space Shuttle launch stack takes shape above her. Tank, boosters, orbiter. Three gigantic engine bells, aimed straight down.
Laura flitters around the stack, conducting a practiced inspection. Instead of climbing inside, she hitches herself to the orbiter's exterior. She races through the launch checklist as fast as she can recall the steps, like a flipbook. The stack lights up.
Time doesn't mean anything to T-world, but it does to Laura Ferno. After a rigorously computed roll manoeuvre and six minutes of flight time, the unnamed Shuttle has stopped ascending and is accelerating horizontally, at an altitude that is T-world's equivalent of the threshold of space. Laura lets the SRBs empty themselves and disconnect, and simply builds new ones. Telemetry flickers in front of her. The velocity reading recalibrates itself, from kilometres per hour to Mach number to kilometres per second.
Looking over the edge of the orbiter and down, Laura can still just about discern individual features of glass geography. A mountain range rushes past, rising and falling, jagged like a graphic equaliser. On the final, tallest peak of the range she sees something. Someone.
It's a human figure made of cobweb-thin crystal, with his hand in the air, waving. Laura almost misses him. She turns and waves back. Her hair doesn't whip in the wind-- she is protected by the suit and extra layers of imagined shielding. The wind chill at this altitude and velocity would be enough to kill instantly.
In an eyeblink, the figure and the entirety of the mountain range are gone into the distance.
Laura cackles, turns to face forward again and steadies herself.
Take the centre of the galaxy as your North Star, and head directly south for... call it another light year. Call it a light decade. Whatever it takes, just don't stop.
In accordance with procedure, dense waves of flying demons descend on the rocketship, but Laura barely perceives them. At this relative speed, each wave is as thin as tissue, and the force of collision turns the unlucky horrors into black mist. Physical barriers rise too, but Laura has so much thaumic and kinetic energy wound up behind her that they shatter as if shot. Brute force and ignorance. There's no stopping this thing.
And after that...
It takes almost as long as a real sunrise. A yellow star rises, directly ahead of her. It is the size of the Sun, but three-pointed, forming a Y. Under the new light, the glass landscape turns sapphire, reflecting long rainbow patterns like the back of an optical disc.
Directly beneath the star-shaped star, at Tanako's world's precise South Pole, is a second artificial structure. There is no direct physical route between this object and the surface of the Earth. The only way to signal this deep is using chi, or by somehow applying modulation to a major tectonic plate movement. And the only way to get here in person is to cheat the universe.
Laura's getting good at that.
The listening post is a toy, a cheap plastic spy microphone glued to the underside of the world. This is genuine God-hardware, an artificial country at the centre of the world. It exists under pressure measured in millions of atmospheres, and temperatures beyond the boiling point of tungsten. This is the machine which makes magic.
Laura produces more SRBs, and trains her space rocket directly on the object's core.An infestation of South American red fire ants has been discovered in Sydney, Australia, prompting calls for biosecurity measures.
The ants were found earlier this week at the Port Botany container terminal. They are believed to have originated overseas.
It is the first time that the highly aggressive insect, which injects venom when it stings, has been found in Australia outside Queensland.
The discovery has sparked an emergency response, and the ants have been sent to Brisbane's Fire Ant Control Centre for genetic testing.
Rob Bowman, DPI Senior Regulatory Inspector, told SBS World News: "[We are] quarantining this area of land to prohibit the movement of soil and any other material that may harbour ants to prevent further spread.
"Fire ants are the most serious invasive ant pest that we can have. This is our first detection in New South Wales. The ant is quite aggressive and inflicts very painful stings and it will affect livestock and humans that encounter its nests."
The insect is listed as a "key threatening process" under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.
It is able to kill off other ant colonies and can have destructive effects on flora, other insects, small lizards and even hatching birds.
According to the federal Department of the Environment, the imported red fire ants can form "supercolonies" that can spread very quickly.
Trained sniffer dogs have been brought in to help destroy the ants.
"This is the foot and mouth [disease] equivalent for our environment and our way of life," said Andrew Cox, of the Invasive Species Council.
Imported red fire ants are small and reddish-brown in colour. They are native to South America, but six known species of fire ants are known to exist in the US, three of which are found in the southern state of Arizona.
According to the Texas imported Fire Ant Research and Management Project, the impact of red imported fire ants to the state of Texas is estimated to be around $1.2bn (£770m) every year.PayPal Founder Elon Musk My Wife Gets JACK SQUAT in the Divorce
PayPal Founder Elon Musk -- My Wife Gets JACK SQUAT in the Divorce
EXCLUSIVE
The woman who's divorcing PayPal founder Elon Musk is getting $4.2 million in their divorce... which is great... until you remember he's reportedly worth $680 MILLION. The woman who's divorcingfounderis getting $4.2 million in their divorce... which is great... until you remember he's reportedly worth $680 MILLION.
TMZ has obtained the divorce docs filed in L.A. County Superior Court, in which actressagreed to a settlement with her soon-to-be ex-husband... whom she married in Sept. 2010... and then separated from in July 2011.According to the docs, Riley gets to keep her Cartier watch, her Gucci watch, some diamond jewelry and her Tesla Roadster.The $4.2 million will be dished out over a 9-year span... she got $500k up front... and an additional $900k right after her lawyers signed the judgement documents.Now, the fun begins... because Talulah gets $700k on the 1-year anniversary of the signing of the judgement... followed by a $280k annual payment for years 2 through 8. On the 9th anniversary, she gets a final payment of $140k.According to the documents, the divorce will become official on September 27.No word on how Elon plans to make the payments... we're guessing it won't be through PayPal.Here’s the comic.
I’m the last one to complain about ostensibly “needless” profanity; I’ve profited handily by it, and I’ve employed others, paying them essentially in eff words. It was mostly just surprising to hear it in Star Trek. In case you were not aware, this is not your grandpappy’s episodic space navy. Don’t believe me? This is how you know a show ferries a mature payload: the characters talk like YouTubers.
I watch it at night, in the dark; I suspect a lot of people watch it with the fam, as Grob does. I don’t think it will drive young people to a life of crime or anything. It’s just that things which have never happened before are very surprising.
If you don’t want to read about shaving, you should go.
I was a fairly devoted acolyte of the Dollar Shave Cult until their handles and blades started breaking comically fast. I certainly saved money over Mach Whatever razors, and that was nice; they also had a funny commercial that I saw enough times for it to lay a cluster of black eggs in my spinal column. But if you’re trying to save money, if that’s what it’s actually about, world class razors are like twenty cents, installed in a handle sturdy enough for one of your children to inherit and then use it their entire lives.
I’d asked online and read around about using a safety razor, which is one step closer to using a straight razor, which I think might be farther than I ever get on this continuum. More than once, I read things suggesting this practice would restore my natural masculine energy. That is a crazy fucking thing to say and it made me angry. I have a bunch of sharp hairs on my face, my daughter doesn’t like them, and I need to get them off.
But that’s the thing about rituals. Maybe you can’t control the weather with them. But if you enunciate the ritual with enough enthusiasm, enough intention, if you have the right props and it’s something you do repeatedly… does it change how you think? Because that’s really all that’s required. That’s how dumb the brain is. Hashtag lifehacks.
I use Astra razors because they’re considered a solid offering for the novice. I was specifically warned away from Feather, because it’s considered an “advanced razor,” a classification I wasn’t even aware of previously. Motherfuckers online sound like they’re talking about Beyblades with this shit, and I’m not that level yet. I don’t think I ever will be. And I don’t need to be in order to benefit from it.
I have a problem where I avoid looking at my face in the mirror. A video is okay, because it’s not “my face” that I’m looking at; it’s not my favorite thing to do, but it’s at least possible. But I can’t not look at my face when I do this. And I can’t do it fast. I have to take a few minutes to apply lather and look at my Goddamn face. I have to know about it, which way the hair goes in different parts. I’m forty one, at least I think so, and I didn’t know some really fundamental shit about my own face until a month ago. I had to determine that this whole thing - I’m gesturing in a circular way at my chest - was worth knowing about. Worth spending an extra five minutes on. These things have nothing to do with hair removal and yet they’re still what I took away.
I got Kiko a razor because he’s covered with hair. He was surprised. That I got him a razor, I mean; he knew about the hair. Everybody does. You sort of have to know Kiko pretty well to know when he’s surprised, it presents as a micro-adjustment of the iris. He said, with some hesitation, “Are you getting into shaving…?” I don’t know. Read the above text. What do you think?
(CW)TB out.Christine O’Donnell brags about not going to Yale
In 1958, an English sociologist and Labour politician named Michael Young imagined a future in which the British establishment dissolved itself, abolished all forms of hereditary power, and created instead a meritocracy (a word Young invented) based on IQ. In Young’s fable, the academically talented working class happily join the elite. But the less talented resent them even more than they did the old dukes and duchesses. By 2034, this resentment leads to the creation of a violent populist revolution, which sweeps the meritocracy away.
To some, this story has always seemed like a warning to the United States. In 1972, American sociologist Daniel Bell cited it and predicted, with amazing prescience, the rise of an anti-elite-education populism. Bell got one thing wrong, however: He thought the coming attack on universities would take the form of enforced quotas and lowered standards. In fact, American universities staved off that particular populist wave in the 1970s by expanding their admissions to include women and minorities while keeping standards high.
The result of that expansion is now with us: Barack Obama, brought up by a single mother, graduate of Columbia and Harvard Law School, is now president. Michelle Obama, daughter of a black municipal employee, graduate of Princeton and Harvard Law School, is now first lady. They brought with them to Washington dozens more people, also from modest backgrounds, mostly without inherited wealth, who have entered high government office thanks in part to their education. Not that Washington wasn’t stuffed with such people already. Think of Clarence Thomas, son of a domestic servant and a farm worker, graduate of Yale Law School, and Supreme Court justice.
Despite pushing aside the old WASP establishment—not a single WASP remains on the Supreme Court—these modern meritocrats are clearly not admired, or at least not for their upward mobility, by many Americans. On the contrary—and as Bell might have predicted—they are resented as “elitist.” Which is at some level strange. To study hard, to do well, to improve yourself—isn’t that the American dream? The backlash against graduates of “elite” universities seems particularly odd given that the most elite American universities have made the greatest effort to broaden their student bodies.
Because they can offer full scholarships, the wealthier Ivy League schools in particular are far more diverse, racially and economically, than they were a few decades ago. Once upon a time, you got into Harvard or Yale solely because of your alumnus grandfather. Nowadays, your alumnus grandfather still helps, but only as long as you did well on the SATs, were the captain of your ice hockey team, and in your senior year raised a million dollars for charity. (The last was not a requirement when I got into Yale, but it seems to be now.) If you did all that and come from a broken home in Nevada, so much the better.
At one level, the use of elite to describe the new meritocrats simply means that the word has lost its meaning. As Jacob Weisberg points out, when Sarah Palin, Christine O’Donnell, or—bizarrely—Justice Thomas’ wife, Ginni, fling the word elitist at opponents, it often means nothing more than “a person whose politics I don’t like,” or even “a person who is snobby.” But after listening to O’Donnell’s latest campaign ads—in which the Senate candidate declares proudly, “I didn’t go to Yale. … I’m YOU”—I think something deeper must be going on.
I suspect the “anti-elite-educationism” Bell predicted is growing now not despite the rise of meritocracy, but because of it. The old Establishment types were resented, but only because their wealth and power were perceived as “undeserved.” Those outside could at least feel they were cleverer and savvier, and they could blame their failures on “the system.” Nowadays, successful Americans, however ridiculously lucky they have been, often smugly see themselves as “deserving.” Meanwhile, the less successful are more likely to feel it’s their own fault—or to feel that others feel it’s their fault—even if they have simply been unlucky.
I can see how this is irritating, even painful. But I don’t quite see what comes next. When Ginni Thomas tells a cheering crowd of Virginia Tea Partiers that “we are ruled by an elite that thinks it knows better than we know,” who, or what, does she want to put in its place? Young imagined a revolution (led, interestingly, by the wives of the high-IQ elites) and a classless society to follow. Unfortunately, this idea has been tried before, and let’s just agree that it wasn’t an overwhelming success.
In America, the end of the meritocracy will probably come about slowly: If working hard, climbing the education ladder, and graduating from a good university wins you only opprobrium, then you might not bother. Or if you do bother, then you certainly won’t go into politics, where your kind is no longer welcome. We will then have a different sort of elite in charge of the country—and a different set of reasons to dislike them, too.
Like Slate on Facebook. Follow Slate and the Slate Foreign Desk on Twitter.Gee, that’s really odd, when you think of a genre of music which inspires and glorifies violence, shootings and hatred, what comes to mind first?
Oh, that’s right, it’s everybody’s olde-time family favorite: Rap music.
When last I checked the FBI’s Uniform Crime Rate statistics, blacks and their ghetto sub-culture still have shockingly higher rates of murder, rape, home-invasion, armed robbery, and even mass-shootings than “nazis” do.
But hey, we’re talking about the lame-stream media here, and we can’t really expect them to focus on railing against what is the biggest and most blatant problem first, can we?
Well, wake me up when we see a strongly-worded editorial condemning violence-prone rap music, unless of course that would offend another distribution arm of the same media trust. Certain offensive music is just more “politically correct” than others, I see.
[SOURCE: LA Times]
—–
Wisconsin shooting brings secretive white power music into focus
The hate-filled music subculture is gaining attention amid news that Wade Michael Page, the suspect in the deadly Wisconsin shooting, played in white power bands.
August 07, 2012
The guitar riffs come from punk rock, the lyrics from fascist ideology. Bands stake their territory with names like Aryan Rebels and Definite Hate. And when the Blue Eyed Devils sing “White Victory,” you can bet that it isn’t a love song.
This hate-filled subculture of neo-Nazi bands has been around since the early days of punk rock in the 1970s, but has edged uneasily into the spotlight following the shooting deaths of six people at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin by alleged gunman Wade Michael Page.
Page spent years playing bass and guitar in bands that railed against a racially integrated America. His last endeavor, End Apathy, sang of compassion as a weakness and called America a “sick society.”
“There is a whole underworld of racist bands unknown to the public,” said Mark Potok, senior fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center, a group that tracks right-wing extremism. “Music is their single most important recruiting method, more than any other factor.”
Page is typical of the scene’s regulars, said Arno Michaels, a Milwaukee-based writer and peace activist with the group Life After Hate. Michaels played in white power punk bands for years, leaving after the birth of his daughter and after seeing friends die in street clashes.
“When I got into the punk scene, I enjoyed the aggression and rebellion,” Michaels said. Wearing a Nazi swastika “created an environment where the world responded with hate and violence, which to me justified what I was doing.”
Six weeks after Time Warner Inc. and black rapper Ice-T pulled the controversial “Cop Killer” song off the market, an unprecedented legal battle over another album released by a Time Warner subsidiary promises to reopen the bitter national debate over artistic expression, free speech and corporate responsibility. The case involves Ronald Ray Howard, a 19-year-old Texan who has been charged with murder following the shooting death last April of 43-year-old state Trooper Bill Davidson on a highway near Victoria, about 100 miles outside Houston.
Page became involved in white power punk after attending 2000’s Hammerfest, a fascist-punk festival hosted by the Nazi group Hammerskin in Orlando, Fla., according to an interview with Page posted on the website of Label 56, which released his albums.
In 2001, Page joined a Nazi band called Youngland that was based in Orange County, playing with the group for about two years, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
“Orange County is a huge white power music scene,” said Mark Pitcavage, director of investigative research for the ADL. “There are a lot of white power bands and there are a lot of places they can play. It’s a hot spot.”
Exact figures for the secretive scene’s reach are difficult to come by. Potok estimates there are several hundred bands, including ones based in Europe.
Most performances are underground and unadvertised, to avoid drawing attention from authorities and to prevent adversaries from disrupting the event and attacking show-goers.
An invitation to a white power punk show more often comes as a phone call or text message.
“Most common is they announce the event, and they say if you want info, contact X,” Pitcavage said. “If you contact X, they will contact you back if you did not raise any flags with them. They have learned the hard way to evolve.”
Then it gets more cryptic. “You make contact and are told to travel to a gas station,” said Aaron Flanagan, an analyst with the Center for New Community, which tracks hate groups. “You will meet up with three generally intimidating large people covered in tattoos. Once they approve you, you will be given directions to the venue.”
Mainstream venues can be deceived into accidentally hosting neo-Nazi shows. In 2009, the Doll Hut in Anaheim openly talked to the OC Weekly about unwittingly hosting a white power concert falsely booked as a wedding reception, and fearing violence, the venue let it run its course before publicizing the scam.
“Concerts are booked under completely false pretenses,” Flanagan said. “They’re booked as a birthday party, as an anniversary or a showcase. Then the VFW Hall or the American Legion Hall does not realize what they got into until people show up.”
From the earliest days of punk, bands have occasionally flirted with Nazi imagery. Sex Pistols’ bassist Sid Vicious and Siouxsie and the Banshees’ singer Siouxsie Sioux wore swastika armbands for shock value.
But underneath the antagonistic mainstream punk scene, a more troubling variant took root. In the ’70s, the fascist English political group National Front organized punk shows to recruit disaffected young men and women into its ranks. The English band Skrewdriver, one of the few musically proficient bands in the scene, is largely credited as the genre’s defining act.
Other left-leaning and inclusive punk scenes fought against this ideological strain. One of hard-core’s pioneering bands was the all-black D.C. group Bad Brains, and the leftist San Francisco band Dead Kennedys fought back with a 1981 single railing against “Nazi Punks.”
“Punk is such an extreme form of music, it’s always attracted different types of extremes,” Dead Kennedys founder Jello Biafra said in an interview Tuesday.
Years ago, Biafra recalled, he was at a club when members of Britain’s National Front — a white power group — were hanging out with the road crew of a British punk band. “It creeped me out,” he said. Rap music creeps us out as well!FILE PHOTO: New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman speaks at a news conference in New York, New York, U.S. March 29, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File Photo
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A coalition of 17 U.S. states filed a legal challenge on Wednesday against efforts by President Donald Trump’s administration to roll back climate change regulations, deepening a political rift over his emerging energy policies.
Led by New York state, the coalition said the administration has a legal duty to regulate emissions of the gases scientists believe cause global climate change.
“The law is clear: the EPA must limit carbon pollution from power plants,” New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said in a statement announcing the challenge.
Trump signed an executive order last week targeting climate change regulations ushered in by former President Barack Obama, saying they hinder U.S. energy production and jobs without providing meaningful environmental benefits.
The order’s main target was Obama’s Clean Power Plan, a law that would require states to slash carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, but which was never implemented because it was challenged in court by 26 Republican-led states.
Trump’s order directed the Environmental Protection Agency to review the regulation to decide whether to “suspend, rescind, or revise it.” Shortly after, EPA filed a legal motion asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to delay ongoing court proceedings on the regulation to allow for the review.
The New York-led coalition’s motion on Wednesday asked the court to throw out the EPA’s request to delay court proceedings, saying the delay “would waste the substantial resources already expended in this litigation.”
“This case is ripe for decision now, and nothing that EPA has proposed to do obviates the need for this court’s review,” according to the statement.
The coalition includes attorneys general from California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington - along with the District of Columbia and a number of smaller localities.Diego Costa suffered an injury scare while training with Spain
Diego Costa suffered a scare after he hurt his foot and ankle in Spain's training session on Sunday but tests have confirmed the Chelsea striker did not suffer a serious injury.
The Spanish federation said doctors will continue to monitor Costa's injury but he will remain with the national team for the friendly match against France in Paris on Tuesday.
Costa underwent a series of tests after he was forced to leave the session, having scored in Friday's 4-1 win over Israel in their World Cup Qualifier.
David Silva and Diego Costa are among the goalscorers for Spain as they thrash Israel 4-1 in World Cup qualifying Group G David Silva and Diego Costa are among the goalscorers for Spain as they thrash Israel 4-1 in World Cup qualifying Group G
The 28-year-old has been in prolific form this season, scoring 22 goals in 35 appearances for club and country, and any injury would have come as a blow to Chelsea boss Antonio Conte as his side closes on the Premier League title.
Chelsea play London rivals Crystal Palace at Stamford Bridge on April 1 when the Premier League resumes after the international break before they face Manchester City at home four days later.
Grab a Sky Sports Month Pass for half price, and let us knock your sporting socks off with a blockbuster month of sport on NOW TV. All for just £16.99.A Central Bureau of Statistics forecast predicts that haredim and Arabs will outnumber the secular population in Israel in 47 years. Israel's population is slated to grow to 15.6 million.
The CBS predicted that 2019 will see 5.84 million non-haredi Jews living in Israel, compared with 5.27 million in 2009. The number is expected to grow to anywhere between 6.09 million and 9.95 million by 2059. This marks a 16%-89% increase compared with today's figures.
Related stories:
According to the CBS forecast, the ultra-Orthodox population will number 1.1 million people by 2019, compared with 750,000 in 2009. By 2059, there will be anywhere etween 2.73 million and 5.84 million haredim – a 264%-686% increase.
It is therefore possible that there will be an equal number of non-haredi Jews and haredim in 2059.
Seculars protest religious coercion (Photo: Gil Yohanan)
The CBS also checked the expected growth of the Arab Israeli population. While in 2009, there were 1.54 million Arabs living in Israel, in 2019 they are expected to grow to 1.85 million-1.96 million. By 2059, there may be as many as 2.8 million to 4.54 million Arabs in Israel, signifying a 82%-196% increase.
The CBS forecast also predicts a rise in Israelis' life expectancy. Israeli men's life expectancy will stand at 88.7 in 2059, and women's – 94.9.
Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and TwitterWho knew owners of Call of Duty: Black Ops were getting three games in one package?
A pair of hidden games -- first uncovered by Kotaku -- is found on the menu screen of Activision's first-person shooter.
When players press start to access the menu, they'll find their character tied down to a chair in an interrogation chamber. Players can move the right thumbstick to control the camera.
To break their restraints, players quickly tap the left and right triggers alternately to escape. From there, they can explore the room.
To find the hidden games, turn left and walk around until you spot an old computer sitting on the right hand side, then hold X (or square for PS3) to use the computer.
Type "DOA" and unlock Dead Ops Arcade, a top-down, twin-stick shooter which offers a classic take on Black Ops' Zombie mode.
Also, players can type "ZORK" to unlock the text-based adventure title Zork I: The Great Underground Empire.
Readers, have you tried these games yet? What do you think?
By Brett MolinaPropaganda Fail: Taliban Use IR Light To Record Night Attack
first published on February 28, 2016 by Josh
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Taliban fighters attempt to attack and record a night attack against an American position. Apparently they don’t know how night vision works.
The Taliban conduct an attack against an American position. They initiate with RPGs and small arms fire, while their camera man attempts to record the action for propaganda purposes. It’s dark outside, so in order to get good angles on the attack, he turns on his camera’s IR light. He wouldn’t want to miss any of the heroic actions of his Mujaheddin brothers.
As soon as the Taliban start firing on the American positions, they are doomed. Not only do their muzzle flashes give away their position, but this camera guys IR light is a gigantic bulls-eye running around in the dark.Collingwood’s injury list is diminishing by the week.
A clean bill of health from both AFL and VFL games coupled with the potential return of a further three players leaves just two of the club’s 45-man list available for selection.
Daniel Wells headlines those expected to return this week.
The former Kangaroo has not played since arriving at the club last October, but, according to General Manager of Football Geoff Walsh, is in the frame to feature this weekend.
“Daniel has joined in the last three or four sessions (and has trained) strongly,” Walsh told Collingwood Media’s Blackmores Injury Update.
Click here to view Collingwood’s updated injury list.
“We expect him to get through this week and he will be available for selection this week and it is a matter for the match committee whether they select him for AFL or VFL level.
“He will be available given his strong training form in the last two or three sessions.”
Also likely to return after Jordan De Goey (knuckle) and Brayden Sier (general soreness).
“Pending a specialist’s report on his hand, we are hopeful that Jordan will be declared fit to go by the end of this week,” Walsh continued.
“This would mean he will be available for VFL selection as of this coming weekend.
“Brayden, who played two weeks ago and missed with some general soreness last week, is expected to train fully this week and, again, he will be available after missing just one week after an extended period on the sidelines.”
On the flip side, Tom Langdon will continue his stint on the sidelines.
“Tommy has had a series of injections in his troublesome knee. That course will be completed this week and we are hopeful that three weeks of some training will see Tom turn the corner,” Walsh explained.
“It’s a bit hard right at the moment to put an exact timeframe on his situation but we are just hoping that the course of treatment that he is finishing up on Monday will enable him to get some traction on the track and put some sessions together.
“Then, we will be able to judge how well he is going.”
Langdon will be joined by Ben Sinclair (hamstring) in the grandstands.
Click here to view Collingwood’s updated injury list.$\begingroup$
So we all know that the continued fraction containing all $1$s...
$$ x = 1 + \frac{1}{1 + \frac{1}{1 + \ldots}} $$
yields the golden ratio $x = \phi$, which can easily be proven by rewriting it as $x = 1 + 1/x$, solving the resulting quadratic equation and assuming that a continued fraction that only contains additions will give a positive number.
Now
|
6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush3_yellow, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush3/focusingcrystalbush3_yellow.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_black, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_black.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_blue, using defaultWarn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_green, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_green.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_orange, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_orange.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_purple, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_purple.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_red, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_red.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Error: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_red.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for focusingcrystalbush4_yellow, using defaultError: Could not load /objects/minibiomes/focusingcrystalbush4/focusingcrystalbush4_yellow.png:default asset, attempting to use default.ImageException: call to subImage with pos (0, 0) size (24, 16) out of image bounds (16, 16)0 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c7056b2 _ZNK4Star5Image8subImageERKNS_6VectorIjLm2EEES4_ + 4822 starbound 0x000000010c0cf160 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS2_6StringEE3$_4_0NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1763 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0cb669 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadImageERKNS_6StringE + 28255 starbound 0x000000010c0c9e44 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 3566 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c568b _ZN4Star6Assets8getAssetENS0_7AssetIdE + 918 starbound 0x000000010c0c5e88 _ZN4Star6Assets5imageERKNS_6StringE + 569 starbound 0x000000010c1fc5e8 _ZN4Star21ImageMetadataDatabase11imageSpacesERKNS_6StringENS_6VectorIfLm2EEEfb + 32810 starbound 0x000000010c327af4 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase17parseOrientationsERKNS_6StringERKNS_7VariantE + 805211 starbound 0x000000010c32f540 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase10readConfigERKNS_6StringE + 1542412 starbound 0x000000010c32b6f5 _ZN4Star14ObjectDatabase4loadEv + 110913 starbound 0x000000010c41b6ae _ZN4Star4Root6reloadEv + 35014 starbound 0x000000010bf2108c _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcINS_6__bindIZN4Star17ClientApplication23preSplashInitializationEvE3$_0JEEENS_9allocatorIS6_EEFvvEEclEv + 2815 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21716 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13817 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 018 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13Warn: Missing inventoryIcon for quarry_holder, using defaultError: Could not load /recipes/crew_station/crewfuelplant.recipe asset, attempting to use default.AssetException: Could not read variant asset /recipes/crew_station/crewfuelplant.recipe0 starbound 0x000000010c7b51ff _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEERKSt9exception + 3031 starbound 0x000000010c0cf9f7 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS2_6StringEE3$_1NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 4552 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 523 starbound 0x000000010c0ca9a2 _ZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS_6StringE + 984 starbound 0x000000010c0c9df8 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 2805 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 366 starbound 0x000000010c0c9893 _ZN4Star6Assets10workerMainEv + 2597 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 2178 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 1389 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 010 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13caused by: JsonParsingException: Cannot parse json file: /recipes/crew_station/crewfuelplant.recipe0 starbound 0x000000010c7b51ff _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEERKSt9exception + 3031 starbound 0x000000010c0c4410 _ZN4Star6Assets11readVariantERKNS_6StringE + 4642 starbound 0x000000010c0cf8e2 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS2_6StringEE3$_1NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1783 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 524 starbound 0x000000010c0ca9a2 _ZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS_6StringE + 985 starbound 0x000000010c0c9df8 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 2806 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 367 starbound 0x000000010c0c9893 _ZN4Star6Assets10workerMainEv + 2598 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 2179 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b899 _pthread_body + 13810 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2b72a _pthread_struct_init + 011 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x00007fff8ef2ffc9 thread_start + 13caused by: JsonParsingException: Error parsing json: bad array, should be ',' or ']' at 4:50 starbound 0x000000010c7b4c25 _ZN4Star13StarExceptionC2ERKNSt3__112basic_stringIcNS1_11char_traitsIcEENS1_9allocatorIcEEEE + 2771 starbound 0x000000010c423be2 _ZN4Star13inputUtf8JsonIPcEENS_7VariantET_S3_b + 8662 starbound 0x000000010c0c4288 _ZN4Star6Assets11readVariantERKNS_6StringE + 723 starbound 0x000000010c0cf8e2 _ZNSt3__110__function6__funcIZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS2_6StringEE3$_1NS_9allocatorIS7_EEFNS_10shared_ptrINS3_9AssetDataEEEvEEclEv + 1784 starbound 0x000000010c0cbc34 _ZN4Star6Assets16processAssetDataENSt3__18functionIFNS1_10shared_ptrINS0_9AssetDataEEEvEEE + 525 starbound 0x000000010c0ca9a2 _ZN4Star6Assets11loadVariantERKNS_6StringE + 986 starbound 0x000000010c0c9df8 _ZN4Star6Assets9loadAssetERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 2807 starbound 0x000000010c0c99e4 _ZN4Star6Assets6doLoadERKNS0_7AssetIdE + 368 starbound 0x000000010c0c9893 _ZN4Star6Assets10workerMainEv + 2599 starbound 0x000000010c7bb169 _ZN4Star10ThreadImpl9runThreadEPv + 21710 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x000
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coaches at the end of the season. And as of Thursday -- 17 days later - all of those positions have now been filled.
The Raiders fired a few coaches of their own, although for the first time in three years, head coach was not one of them. They let go of offensive coordinator Greg Knapp, offensive line coach Frank Pollack, special teams coordinator Steve Hoffman, and linebackers coach Johnny Holland.
Offensive coordinator is priority number one for the Raiders. Their search has yielded a few names such as Mike Martz, Jaguars QB coach Greg Olson, and Marc Trestman who was just hired as the head coach of the Bears.
But even with the interviews, one of the main holdups in finding their new OC was the head coaching search. As long as there were still head coaching jobs to be had, many potential offensive coordinator candidates were hoping they might land a head job. Trestman was one such candidate. With that no longer a possibility, they must focus on landing the next highest job.
The head coaches who were hired this offseason were Andy Reid (Chiefs), Doug Marrone (Bills), Mike McCoy (Chargers), Mike Chudzinsky (Browns), Marc Trestman (Bears), Chip Kelly (Eagles), Gus Bradley (Jaguars), and the final to drop Bruce Arians (Cardinals).
When former Cardinals head coach Ken Whisenhunt was sure he was not going to be moving on to another head coaching gig, he signed on offensive coordinator for the Chargers under new head coach Mike McCoy. That signing was followed shortly by the Browns hiring former Chargers head coach Norv Turner as their new offensive coordinator.
These jobs are going to really begin filling up fast now so it shouldn't be long before there is some movement from the Raiders to fill their vacant offensive coordinator position as well.
Also see: Still several prospective OC's for Raiders
Follow @LeviDamienBack in March 2017 a series of articles appeared in the media which alleged that the ‘frame’ for the Russiagate investigation was provided by the Trump Dossier: the sleazy concoction of smear and gossip compiled by the British ex-spy Christopher Steele.
In an article 31st March 2017 I expressed some skepticism about this. The scenario outlined in the Trump Dossier seemed to me quite simply too absurd and its unverifiable claims altogether too sensational for me to believe the supposedly mighty US intelligence community could take it seriously.
However by June 2017 indirect confirmation was starting to appear in the US media that not only did the US intelligence community take the Trump Dossier seriously but that it was in fact the starting point of the whole Russiagate scandal.
Here is what I said about this in an article I wrote on 24th Jun3 2017
On 11th January 2017, shortly after publication of the now notorious Trump Dossier, I speculated that this obviously fictitious document might have been the cause of the whole Russiagate scandal. After carefully explaining why the document is certainly a fiction I made the following point The big question is not whether the facts in this dossier are true or not; it is the extent to which the paranoid claims made in the dossier have shaped and might even have been the origin for the whole Russian hacking scandal. I say this because media reports confirm that the dossier or extracts from it have circulated amongst US politicians (including Hillary Clinton and John McCain), US intelligence agencies, and within the media for weeks if not months. The earliest reports in the dossier are dated to July, which suggests that some of its claims – which include circumstantial details of who supposedly within the Russian government was behind the Clinton leaks – were already circulating early in the summer. That is a very early point in the Russian hacking story, making it at least possible that the dossier at least influenced the thinking of some of the people in the US intelligence community and in the media who have been pushing the Russian hacking scandal most aggressively. Many have remarked on the absence of evidence in the ONDI report which was published last Friday. Even Masha Gessen – one of President Putin’s most relentless critics – has pointed this out. Publication of this dossier looks like an attempt to provide “evidence” which the ODNI report failed to do. If so then that at least gives rise to the possibility that the dossier is the “evidence” – or more correctly a part of the evidence – that formed the background to the ONDI report but which the ODNI report omitted. Whatever the truth of this, the fact that an obviously concocted dossier like this has circulated for weeks if not months with its source apparently still considered “unimpeachable” and “reliable” by the West’s intelligence agencies shows how wildly paranoid and ignorant about Russia the West’s intelligence agencies and its politicians and journalists have become. An Important Message from the Editor of The Duran Fantasy has replaced truth, and it seems that a clever fabricator out to make money has successfully cashed in on it, quite possibly doing serious harm along the way. My speculation that the Trump Dossier is the original cause of the whole Russiagate scandal has now received dramatic confirmation from a massive article in the Washington Post about the Russiagate scandal, which though it never specifically refers to the Trump Dossier, makes it quite clear that the Russiagate scandal is based on it. According to the Washington Post article in August 2016 the CIA received secret but supposedly conclusive intelligence that Russian President Putin was seeking to swing the US Presidential election to Donald Trump. CIA Director Brennan was supposedly so concerned that he immediately sent a secret memorandum advising President Obama of this. This is how the Washington Post describes it Early last August, an envelope with extraordinary handling restrictions arrived at the White House. Sent by courier from the CIA, it carried “eyes only” instructions that its contents be shown to just four people: President Barack Obama and three senior aides. Inside was an intelligence bombshell, a report drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the U.S. presidential race. But it went further. The intelligence captured Putin’s specific instructions on the operation’s audacious objectives — defeat or at least damage the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, and help elect her opponent, Donald Trump….. The CIA breakthrough came at a stage of the presidential campaign when Trump had secured the GOP nomination but was still regarded as a distant long shot. Clinton held comfortable leads in major polls, and Obama expected that he would be transferring power to someone who had served in his Cabinet. The intelligence on Putin was extraordinary on multiple levels, including as a feat of espionage. For spy agencies, gaining insights into the intentions of foreign leaders is among the highest priorities. But Putin is a remarkably elusive target. A former KGB officer, he takes extreme precautions to guard against surveillance, rarely communicating by phone or computer, always running sensitive state business from deep within the confines of the Kremlin (bold italics added) That this refers to the Trump Dossier is clear from the highlighted words. The Trump Dossier purports to be a “report drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the US Presidential race”, which is exactly what the report mentioned in the article is said to be. The timing is right, with the early parts of the Trump Dossier dated to June 2016 and Brennan sending out his memorandum to Obama in August 2016. No other report other than the Trump Dossier fitting the description of the report in the Washington Post article is known to exist, and the Washington Post article says that “Putin is a remarkably elusive target”, which makes it all but certain that no other such report exists. Moreover the Washington Post article slips out these further very interesting comments about the report mentioned in the article Despite the intelligence the CIA had produced, other agencies were slower to endorse a conclusion that Putin was personally directing the operation and wanted to help Trump. “It was definitely compelling, but it was not definitive,” said one senior administration official. “We needed more.” Some of the most critical technical intelligence on Russia came from another country, officials said. Because of the source of the material, the NSA was reluctant to view it with high confidence. (bold italics added) The Trump Dossier is not a US confection but was compiled by Christopher Steele, who is British, and who is a former agent of the British intelligence agency MI6. The fact that the Washington Post story says that “the most critical technical intelligence on Russia came from another country” therefore again clearly points to the Trump Dossier, which originated not in the US but in Britain. In light of these comments I do not think there is any doubt that it is the early sections of the Trump Dossier that are being referred to, and which were what caused Brennan to send his memorandum to the White House in August.
Final and conclusive confirmation that the Trump Dossier is indeed the key document behind the whole Russiagate investigation has now been provided by Carter Page, the Trump campaign foreign policy adviser who is repeatedly named in the Trump Dossier and who is at the centre of the Russiagate investigation.
Here is what Carter Page had to say about this in Congressional testimony as reported by the Washington Times
The congressional testimony of Trump-Russia figure Carter Page shows that a Democratic-financed dossier can dominate how FBI agents question witnesses. Mr. Page testified Nov. 2 before the House intelligence committee, which released a transcript Monday evening. Rep. Trey Gowdy, South Carolina Republican, was particularly interested in how the FBI is conducting its probe of supposed Russian collusion with the Trump campaign. “So what were the questions the FBI had for you?” Mr. Gowdy said. “It was an extensive series of many meetings, but they, you know, the core foundation, I would say, in terms of the overall structure in March 2017, was related to those false allegations from the ‘dodgy’ dossier,” Mr. Page said, using his moniker for the anti-Trump document…… Asked at the Nov. 2 hearing how many times he sat down with the FBI, Mr. Page said, “Approximately four. They came up — you know, typically when the FBI has reached out to me previously, they give me a call. This time, in early March 2017, they just showed up. I was in the lobby near Lincoln Center in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and they just walked up to me.” When Mr. Gowdy asked if all the FBI questions pertained to the dossier, Mr. Page said, “Not all of [them], but I would say that that was a central foundation, and again, it would sort of branch out from there.”
The Washington Times also reports Carter Page strongly denied in his testimony the allegations about him which appear in the Trump Dossier
Mr. Steele accuses him (Carter Page – AM) of several felonies, such as meeting with sanctioned Kremlin figures while in Moscow in July 2016 to address the New Economic School. Mr. Steele said Mr. Carter promised to work to end U.S. sanctions against Russia in exchange for a brokerage commission. The dossier also said he and former Trump campaign Chairman Paul Manafort orchestrated the Russian interference to include hacking Democratic Party computers. Mr. Page, a Trump campaign volunteer on national security, says that all of those charges are fiction. He never met the two Kremlin operatives and has never met Mr. Manafort…… “They are all untrue,” Mr. Page said. “Every word in that about me is completely false. The core allegations of that document were certainly all false.”…. Rep. Adam B. Schiff of California, the House intelligence committee’s top Democrat, has shown no qualms about citing opposition research from Kremlin sources. He has expressed admiration for Mr. Steele, and has quoted at length from the dossier, including the unproven charges against Mr. Page. Mr. Schiff used the hearing to ask Mr. Page about every Russian he met during his July trip to Moscow. He also tried to link him to George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign volunteer who lived in London at the time. Mr. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying to an FBI agent about when he actually started working for the campaign as he reached out to Russia-connected people. “Just to be very clear, every meeting I ever had in Russia was completely benign,” Mr. Page said. “It was nothing, you know, nothing I would be ashamed of having broadcast on national television because, again, I’ve never done anything wrong, not only in those two years but throughout my life.” Mr. Schiff referred repeatedly to the dossier, especially the part that said Mr. Page met with Igor Sechin, the CEO of giant oil firm Rosneft. Mr. Steele said the two met to discuss removing U.S. sanctions. Mr. Page said he has never met Mr. Sechin.
In a separate article the Washington Times – one of the very few newspapers in the US to express skepticism about the Russiagate allegations – has provided an interesting account of the notorious 6th January 2017 meeting between the then President elect Donald Trump and President Obama’s intelligence chiefs including James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan and FBI Director James Comey.
The article all but confirms my theory that Trump was shown the not yet publicly released Trump Dossier during this meeting in an attempt by the intelligence chiefs to blackmail him into accepting their otherwise unsubstantiated claims that it was the Russians who hacked the DNC’s and John Podesta’s computers and who provided the emails stolen from those computers to Wikileaks.
The Washington Times article speaks of the bafflement and anger of the intelligence chiefs as Trump rejected their findings
The atmosphere was not amicable. Simply put, the president-elect and President Obama’s intelligence chiefs “hated each other,” said a former official who worked with both camps….. To the Obama-era intelligence chiefs, figures at the top of the Washington establishment who, despite being political appointees considered themselves above partisanship, Mr. Trump’s questioning of their conclusions and his overall hatred of Washington were unfathomable. In interviews, current and former intelligence officials who have worked for both Republican and Democratic administrations said they were astounded that America had elected for the first time in its 240-year history a president with no government or military experience. A day before heading to Trump Tower in early January, Mr. Clapper told the Senate Armed Services Committee that policymakers, and especially “Policymaker No. 1,” should have healthy skepticism toward the intelligence community……
That their findings were however unsubstantiated the Washington Times reports that even US intelligence veterans have confirmed
In interviews The Washington Times conducted with more than a dozen U.S. intelligence and national security sources at the highest levels as well as foreign diplomats, the overlooked and disturbing question about the lack of evidence has emerged repeatedly. “I actually called them both the day after it came out and asked, ‘Why was it so thin?’” said the source close to Mr. Clapper and Mr. Brennan. “The answer I got was simple: There was a serious counterintelligence operation going on.”
In the absence of any evidence to back their claims the US intelligence chiefs were forced to resort to blackmail to try to get Trump to accept their conclusions
One of the intelligence community’s specialties is the use of psychological tactics to negotiate and interrogate in classic “good cop/bad cop” fashion. But Mr. Trump’s reaction to the news they brought him on Jan. 6 astonished them….. A source who knows Mr. Comey, Mr. Clapper and Mr. Brennan told The Times that all three were perplexed during the aftermath of the meeting at Trump Tower, where Mr. Trump had dismissed their premise outright and declared to them, “We don’t have a Russia problem; we have a cyber problem.” It’s still unclear whether the intelligence chiefs were using the briefing to examine, as they saw it, what the president-elect may have known of Russia’s meddling on his behalf. After the initial meeting with Mr. Trump broke up, Mr. Comey remained behind to brief the president-elect further. The FBI director, who at 6 feet 8 inches tall towered over Mr. Trump by 6 inches, has since revealed how he stayed for a private discussion with the president-elect to review some “personally sensitive” information that the intelligence chiefs hadn’t included in the public version of the Russian meddling assessment. Mr. Comey told lawmakers in June that the “sensitive” material in question consisted of portions of what would later become known as the Trump-Russia dossier, financed in part by the Clinton campaign and Democratic Party and compiled by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele. Full of unverified claims, the dossier, among other things, maintained that Russian intelligence had schemed to get Mr. Trump elected and that Kremlin spies had compiled sexual blackmail material on him during a 2013 trip he made to Moscow for the Miss Universe beauty pageant. In his June testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Mr. Comey maintained that Mr. Clapper had asked him to be alone with Mr. Trump to “personally do this portion of the briefing” for two reasons. The first was that among those in the Obama-era intelligence inner circle who were present at Trump Tower that day, Mr. Comey was the one who would be staying on at his position and would have dealings with the new president, given the nominal 10-year term FBI directors are given. The second, according to Mr. Comey’s testimony, was because “the material implicated the FBI’s counterintelligence responsibilities.” “It is important to understand that FBI counterintelligence investigations are different than the more commonly known criminal investigative work,” said the former FBI director, implying that the entire meeting at Trump Tower that day was actually part of a high-stakes espionage operation. Mr. Comey’s comments — vague as they may have sounded in Senate testimony — turned heads in the back hallways of America’s spy agencies. What exactly was he getting at? Was he publicly revealing that there were serious concerns at the highest levels of U.S. intelligence that the president-elect may truly have been compromised by the Russians and could be vulnerable to Kremlin blackmail?
Note the careful use of the word “blackmail” in the very last paragraph of the above extract from an article put together – as the Washington Times claims – from discussions with “a dozen US intelligence and national security sources” one of whom the Washington Times was apparently sufficiently close to Clapper and Brannon to question them about the lack of the evidence in the January ODNI report the day after it was published.
In the event – as I discussed at the time – the blackmail attempt failed.
Since then – having launched the Russiagate investigate and carried out surveillance of members of the Trump campaign on the strength of the Trump Dossier, and having tried and failed to blackmail Trump by showing it to him – the US intelligence community – first and foremost the FBI – have been working overtime to try to prove it true. Needless to say ten months later its efforts have proved fruitless for the simple reason that what this “Democrat funded document” says is not true.
In the meantime innocent people like Carter Page are being put through the grinder.
By his own account Carter Page has been interrogated by the FBI four times and has had his documents seized in illegal searches. He has been forced to give evidence to the House Intelligence Committee, his business has collapsed, and by his own account he is receiving death threats.
Carter Page inflated his own importance in the Trump campaign in order to wangle invitations from the Russians and to secure himself an invitation to Moscow’s New Economic School where he gave a speech.
He is not however the first person to do this and there is no evidence he either intended or did any harm.
As in the very similar case of George Papadopoulos – charged and bullied into into a guilty plea because he downplayed the extent of his perfectly innocent meetings with the staff members of a Moscow-based NGO, and because he mixed up the dates of his first meeting with a ‘London based professor’ – the treatment of Carter Page is grossly disproportionately and frankly cruel.
It is disturbing that no-one in authority in the US seems to care about that.Beauty and the Beast is a 1991 American animated musical romantic fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The 30th Disney animated feature film and the third released during the Disney Renaissance period, it is based on the French fairy tale of the same name by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont who was uncredited in the English version but credited in the French version,[6] and ideas from the 1946 French film of the same name directed by Jean Cocteau.[7] Beauty and the Beast focuses on the relationship between the Beast (voice of Robby Benson),[8] a prince who is magically transformed into a monster and his servants into household objects as punishment for his arrogance, and Belle (voice of Paige O'Hara),[8] a young woman whom he imprisons in his castle to become a prince again. To break the curse, Beast must learn to love Belle and earn her love in return before the last petal falls from an enchanted rose or else the Beast will remain a monster forever. The film also features the voices of Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, and Angela Lansbury.[8]
Walt Disney first attempted unsuccessfully to adapt Beauty and the Beast into an animated film during the 1930s and 1950s. Following the success of The Little Mermaid (1989), Walt Disney Pictures decided to adapt the fairy tale, which Richard Purdum originally conceived as a non-musical. Disney chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg eventually dismissed Purdum's idea and ordered that the film be a musical similar to The Little Mermaid instead. The film was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, with a screenplay by Linda Woolverton story first credited to Roger Allers.[8] Lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken wrote the film's songs. Ashman, who additionally served as the film's executive producer, died of AIDS-related complications six months before the film's release, and the film is thus dedicated to his memory.
Beauty and the Beast premiered as an unfinished film at the New York Film Festival on September 29, 1991, followed by its theatrical release as a completed film at the El Capitan Theatre on November 13. The film grossed $425 million at the box office worldwide on a $25 million budget. Beauty and the Beast won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, the first animated film to ever win that category. It also became the first animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 64th Academy Awards, where it won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and Best Original Song for its title song and received additional nominations for Best Original Song and Best Sound. In April 1994, Beauty and the Beast became Disney's first animated film to be adapted into a Broadway musical. The success of the film spawned two direct-to-video follow-ups: Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997) and Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Magical World (1998), both of which take place in the timeline of the original. This was followed by a spin-off television series, Sing Me a Story with Belle.
An IMAX version of the film was released in 2002, and included "Human Again", a new five-minute musical sequence that was previously included in the 1994 musical. That same year, the film was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". After the success of the 3D re-release of The Lion King, the film was reissued in 3D in 2012.[9] A live-action adaptation of the film directed by Bill Condon was released on March 17, 2017.
Plot [ edit ]
An enchantress disguised as a beggar arrives at a French castle and offers a cruel and selfish prince a rose in return for shelter from. When he refuses, she reveals her identity. To punish the prince for his lack of compassion, the enchantress transforms him into a beast and his servants into household objects. She casts a spell on the rose and warns the prince that the curse will only be broken if he learns to love another, and earn their love in return, before the last petal falls on his 21st birthday.
Ten years later, in a nearby village, a beautiful young woman named Belle dreams of adventure and brushes off advances from Gaston, a handsome, narcissistic and arrogant hunter. On his way to a fair and lost in the forest, Maurice seeks refuge in the Beast's castle, but the Beast imprisons him. Belle ventures out in search for him and finds him locked in the castle's tower. When Maurice's horse returns without him, Belle ventures out in search for him, and finds him locked in the castle dungeon. The Beast agrees to let her take Maurice's place.
Belle befriends the castle's servants, who invite her to a spectacular dinner. When she wanders into the forbidden west wing and finds the rose, the Beast scares her into the woods. She is ambushed by a pack of wolves, but the Beast rescues her, and is injured in the process. As Belle nurses his wounds, a friendship develops between them. Meanwhile, Maurice returns to the village and fails to convince the townsfolk of Belle's predicament. Gaston then bribes Monsieur D'Arque, the warden of the town's insane asylum to have Maurice locked up if Belle refuses to marry Gaston.
After sharing a romantic dance with the Beast, Belle discovers her father's predicament using a magic mirror. The Beast releases her to save Maurice, giving her the mirror to remember him with. After taking Maurice to the village, Belle reveals the Beast in the mirror to the townsfolk, proving her father's sanity. Realizing that Belle loves the Beast, a jealous Gaston has her thrown into the basement with her father. He rallies the villagers to follow him to the castle to slay the Beast before he curses the whole village. Maurice and Belle escape with Chip's assistance, and Belle rushes back to the castle.
During the battle, the beast's servants fend off the villagers. Gaston attacks the Beast in his tower, who is too heartbroken from Belle's departure to fight back, but regains his spirit upon seeing Belle return. He defeats Gaston, but spares his life before reuniting with Belle. However, Gaston mortally wounds the Beast with a knife, but loses his footing from the Beast's thrashing, and he falls to his death.[a] The Beast dies in her arms as the last petal falls. Belle tearfully professes her love to the Beast and the curse is undone, restoring the Beast's and servants' human forms. The Prince and Belle host a ball for the kingdom, where they dance happily.
Cast [ edit ]
Paige O'Hara as Belle[11] – A bibliophilic young woman who seeks adventure, and offers her own freedom to the Beast in return for her father's. In their effort to enhance the character from the original story, the filmmakers felt that Belle should be "unaware" of her own beauty and made her "a little odd".[12] Wise recalls casting O'Hara because of a "unique tone" she had, "a little bit of Judy Garland", after whose appearance Belle was modeled.[13] James Baxter and Mark Henn served as the supervising animators for Belle.
Glen Keane live-sketches his design for Beast in 2012
Production [ edit ]
Early versions [ edit ]
After the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, Walt Disney sought out other stories to adapt into feature films, with Beauty and the Beast being among the stories he considered.[12][29] Attempts to develop the Beauty and the Beast story into a film were made in the 1930s and 1950s, but were ultimately given up because it "proved to be a challenge" for the story team.[12] Peter M. Nichols states Disney may later have been discouraged by Jean Cocteau having already done his 1946 version.[30]
Decades later, during the production of Who Framed Roger Rabbit in 1987, the Disney studio resurrected Beauty and the Beast as a project for the satellite animation studio it had set up in London, England to work on Roger Rabbit. Richard Williams, who had directed the animated portions of Roger Rabbit, was approached to direct but declined in favor of continuing work on his long-gestating project The Thief and the Cobbler. In his place, Williams recommended his colleague, English animation director Richard Purdum, and work began under producer Don Hahn on a non-musical version of Beauty and the Beast set in 19th-century France.[31] At the behest of Disney CEO Michael Eisner, Beauty and the Beast became the first Disney animated film to use a screenwriter. This was an unusual production move for an animated film, which is traditionally developed on storyboards rather than in scripted form. Linda Woolverton wrote the original draft of the story before storyboarding began, and worked with the story team to retool and develop the film.[32]
Script rewrite and musicalization [ edit ]
Upon seeing the initial storyboard reels in 1989, Walt Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg ordered that the film be scrapped and started over from scratch.
Upon seeing the initial storyboard reels in 1989, Walt Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg ordered that the film be scrapped and started over from scratch. A few months after starting anew, Purdum resigned as director. The studio had approached Ron Clements and John Musker to direct the film, but they turned down the offer, saying they were "tired" after just having finished directing Disney's recent success The Little Mermaid. Disney then hired first-time feature directors Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale. Wise and Trousdale had previously directed the animated sections of Cranium Command, a short film for a Disney EPCOT theme park attraction. In addition, Katzenberg asked songwriters Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, who had written the song score for The Little Mermaid, to turn Beauty and the Beast into a Broadway-style musical film in the same vein as Mermaid. Ashman, who at the time had learned he was dying of complications from AIDS, had been working with Disney on a pet project of his, Aladdin, and only reluctantly agreed to join the struggling production team. To accommodate Ashman's failing health, pre-production of Beauty and the Beast was moved from London to the Residence Inn in Fishkill, New York, close to Ashman's New York City home.[31] Here, Ashman and Menken joined Wise, Trousdale, Hahn, and Woolverton in retooling the film's script.[12][32] Since the original story had only two major characters, the filmmakers enhanced them, added new characters in the form of enchanted household items who "add warmth and comedy to a gloomy story" and guide the audience through the film, and added a "real villain" in the form of Gaston.[12]
These ideas were somewhat similar to elements of the 1946 French film version of Beauty and the Beast, which introduced the character of Avenant, an oafish suitor somewhat similar to Gaston,[33] as well as inanimate objects coming to life in the Beast's castle.[34] The animated objects were, however, given distinct personalities in the Disney version. By early 1990, Katzenberg had approved the revised script, and storyboarding began again.[12][32] The production flew story artists back and forth between California and New York for storyboard approvals from Ashman, though the team was not told the reason why.[12]
Casting and recording [ edit ]
Disney had originally considered casting Jodi Benson from The Little Mermaid as Belle.[35] They eventually decided upon Broadway actress and singer Paige O'Hara in favor of having a heroine who sounded "more like a woman than a girl".[36] According to co-director Kirk Wise, O'Hara was given the role because she "had a unique quality, a tone she would hit that made her special",[37] reminiscent to that of American actress and singer Judy Garland.[38] O'Hara, who, after reading about the film in The New York Times,[39] competed for the role against 500 hopefuls,[40] believes the fact that lyricist Howard Ashman admired her cast recording of the musical Show Boat proved integral in her being cast.[41]
Animation [ edit ]
A frame from the "Beauty and the Beast" ballroom dance sequence. The background is animated using computer generated imagery which, when the traditionally animated characters are composited against it using Pixar's CAPS system, gives the illusion of a dollying film camera.
Production of Beauty and the Beast was to be completed on a compressed timeline of two years rather than the traditional four-year Disney Feature Animation production schedule; this was due to the loss of production time spent developing the earlier Purdum version of the film. Most of the production was done at the main Feature Animation studio, housed in the Air Way facility in Glendale, California. A smaller team at the Disney-MGM Studios theme park in Lake Buena Vista, Florida assisted the California team on several scenes, particularly the "Be Our Guest" number.[12]
Beauty and the Beast was the second film, after The Rescuers Down Under, produced using CAPS (Computer Animation Production System), a digital scanning, ink, paint, and compositing system of software and hardware developed for Disney by Pixar.[12][31] The software allowed for a wider range of colors, as well as soft shading and colored line effects for the characters, techniques lost when the Disney studio abandoned hand inking for xerography in the early 1960s. CAPS/ink & paint also allowed the production crew to simulate multiplane effects: placing characters and/or backgrounds on separate layers and moving them towards/away from the camera on the Z-axis to give the illusion of depth, as well as altering the focus of each layer.
In addition, CAPS/ink & paint allowed an easier combination of hand-drawn art with computer-generated imagery, which before had to be plotted to animation paper and then xeroxed and painted traditionally.[12][42] This technique was put to significant use during the "Beauty and the Beast" waltz sequence, in which Belle and Beast dance through a computer-generated ballroom as the camera dollies around them in simulated 3D space.[12] The filmmakers had originally decided against the use of computers in favor of traditional animation, but later, when the technology had improved, decided it could be used for the one scene in the ballroom.[30] Before that, CGI environments had first been printed out as wireframe, but this was the first time Disney made use of 3D rendering.[43] The success of the ballroom sequence helped convince studio executives to further invest in computer animation.[44]
The final dance between Belle and the Prince was reused from the final dance sequence between Princess Aurora and Prince Phillip from the 1959 film Sleeping Beauty. According to Trousdale, this was done because production of the film was nearing the deadline, and this was the easiest way to do that sequence.[45]
Music [ edit ]
Ashman and Menken wrote the Beauty song score during the pre-production process in Fishkill, the opening operetta-styled "Belle" being their first composition for the film. Other songs included "Be Our Guest," sung (in its original version) to Maurice by the objects when he becomes the first visitor to eat at the castle in a decade, "Gaston," a solo for the swaggering villain, "Human Again," a song describing Belle and Beast's growing love from the objects' perspective, the love ballad "Beauty and the Beast (Tale as Old as Time)" and the climactic "The Mob Song." As story and song development came to a close, full production began in Burbank while voice and song recording began in New York City.[12] The Beauty songs were mostly recorded live with the orchestra and the voice cast performing simultaneously rather than overdubbed separately, in order to give the songs a cast album-like "energy" the filmmakers and songwriters desired.
During the course of production, many changes were made to the structure of the film, necessitating the replacement and re-purposing of songs. After screening a mostly animated version of the "Be Our Guest" sequence, story artist Bruce Woodside suggested that the objects should be singing the song to Belle rather than her father. Wise and Trousdale agreed, and the sequence and song were retooled to replace Maurice with Belle. The film's title song went through a noted bit of uncertainty during production. Originally conceived as a rock-oriented song, it was changed to a slow, romantic ballad. Howard Ashman and Alan Menken asked Angela Lansbury to perform the song, but she did not think her voice was suited for the melody. When she voiced her doubts, Menken and Ashman asked her for at least one take and told her to perform the song as she saw fit. Lansbury reportedly reduced everyone in the studio to tears with her rendition, nailing the song in the one take asked of her. This version went on to win the Oscar for Best Original Song. "Human Again" was dropped from the film before animation began, as its lyrics caused story problems about the timeline over which the story takes place.[12] This required Ashman and Menken to write a new song in its place. "Something There," in which Belle and Beast sing (via voiceover) of their growing fondness for each other, was composed late in production and inserted into the script in place of "Human Again."
Menken would later revise "Human Again" for inclusion in the 1994 Broadway stage version of Beauty and the Beast, and another revised version of the song was added to the film itself in a new sequence created for the film's Special Edition re-release in 2002.[12] Ashman died of AIDS-related complications at the age of 40 on March 14, 1991, eight months before the film's release. He never saw the finished film, though he did get to see it in its unfinished format. Ashman's work on Aladdin was completed by another lyricist, Tim Rice. Before Ashman's death, members of the film's production team visited him after the film's well-received first screening, with Don Hahn commenting that "the film would be a great success. Who'd have thought it?", to which Ashman replied with "I would." A tribute to the lyricist was included at the end of the credits crawl: "To our friend, Howard, who gave a mermaid her voice, and a beast his soul. We will be forever grateful. Howard Ashman: 1950–1991."[31] A pop version of the "Beauty and the Beast" theme, performed by Céline Dion and Peabo Bryson over the end credits, was released as a commercial single from the film's soundtrack, supported with a music video. The Dion/Bryson version of "Beauty and the Beast" became an international pop hit and performed considerably well on charts around the world. The song became Dion's second single to land within the top-10 of the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at number nine. The song peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary chart. In Canada, "Beauty and the Beast" peaked at number two.[46][47] Outside of North America, the song
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to commence on Saturday 17 September 2016 is regrettably cancelled.”
“Full ticket refunds will be available on all shows from point of purchase. We are working in close conjunction with the Artist’s booking agency and management in order to organise a new run of shows in 2017.”
“You will receive an email from your local ticketing agency on how to obtain your refund.” The award-winning grime star had completely sold out shows in Sydney, Brisbane, two nights in Melbourne, Auckland, and Perth shows within minutes.I'm pretty sure MY Secret Santa > YOUR Secret Santa. I received a box FULL of gifts! I said I would love to travel more and something that represented the place my SS was from would be cool. My SS really delivered! This is sooooo much more than I was expecting. T-shirts, books, a mug, leg lamp nightlight, magnet, WMMS sticker (vintage-y looking?), a folder full of touristy stickers and leaflets that I would pick up if I were visiting Cleveland for the first time, and a really cool old ice cream box that held 2 of my t-shirts. Am I leaving anything out...? I don't know - there was so much! My photos left out some of the items (had trouble uploading them) but everything I got I loved!
Thank you, Secret Santa! I am having trouble really explaining how thrilled I am with your gifts - they were very well thought out and I just can't believe how generous you were with all the items you included. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!Former national security adviser Susan Rice. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images President Donald Trump's national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, has reportedly concluded that his predecessor, Susan Rice, did nothing wrong when she tried to learn the identities of officials on Trump's transition team who were mentioned in US intelligence reports last year.
That is according to Bloomberg View's Eli Lake, who first broke the story in early April that Rice, who served under President Barack Obama from 2013 to 2017, tried to "unmask" Trump associates mentioned by foreign officials in conversations picked up as part of the US' intelligence-gathering operations.
Almost one month after Lake broke that story, McMaster appears to have sent a letter to Rice informing her that she could maintain her security clearance, according to the conservative news outlet Circa, which obtained a copy of the letter.
McMaster added that he would "waive the requirement that you must have a 'need-to-know' to access any classified information contained in items you 'originated, reviewed, signed or received while serving,' as National Security Adviser."
"Going forward, the NSC will continue to work with you to ensure the appropriate security clearance documentation remains on file to allow you access to classified information," read the letter, which bears McMaster's signature.
McMaster said that the decision is based on his determination that "such access is consistent with the national security interests of the United States, and that appropriate steps have been taken to protect classified information from unauthorized disclosure or compromise."
Spokespeople for Rice and McMaster were not immediately available for comment.
According to Lake, documents showing that Rice made the unmasking requests were uncovered by the NSC's former senior director for intelligence, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, who was fired by McMaster on Wednesday. Cohen-Watnick was involved in providing documents related to the incidental surveillance of members of Trump's transition team to House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes in March.
Michael Ellis, a former Nunes staffer who now works at the White House, was reportedly involved, too.
It is unclear how Trump, who called the Rice unmasking revelations "the big story" in June, will respond to the news. The White House did not respond to request for comment, but senior West Wing officials told Circa that Trump did not know about the letter. McMaster, meanwhile, is apparently already on thin ice with the more nationalist wing of the White House.
Trump ally and Fox News host Sean Hannity, who dined with the president last week, tweeted: "What is this? Does H.R. McMaster need to go? Susan Rice? Omg."
One official told the outlet that the letter "undercuts the president's assertion that Susan Rice's unmasking activity was inappropriate" and argued that "anybody who committed a violation as she did would not be given access to classified information."
It is unclear what "violation" the official was referring to. Rice told NBC's Andrea Mitchell in April that allegations she unmasked Trump associates for political reasons were "absolutely false." And national-security experts broadly agree that Rice's reported requests to identify who was speaking with the foreign officials before Trump was inaugurated were neither unusual nor against the law.
"The identities of US persons may be released under two circumstances: 1) the identity is needed to make sense of the intercept; 2) if a crime is involved in the conversation," said Robert Deitz, a former senior counselor to the CIA director and former general counsel at the National Security Agency.
Rice met with the Senate Intelligence Committee late last month to discuss Russia's election interference, but the Republican chairman of the committee, Richard Burr, said he did not ask Rice about accusations that she improperly unmasked any Trump transition officials.
"The unmasking thing was all created by Devin Nunes, and I'll wait to go through our full evaluation to see if there was anything improper that happened," Burr told CNN at the time. "But clearly there were individuals unmasked. Some of that became public which it's not supposed to, and our business is to understand that, and explain it."Cremation Urns, Pet Urns, Cremation Jewelry, and other Unique Memorial Products
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My GitHub page, containing various open-source libraries for Mac and iOS development, and some miscellaneous projects
Friday Q&A 2015-12-11: Swift Weak References
In case you have been on Mars, in a cave, with your eyes shut and your fingers in your ears, Swift has been open sourced. This makes it convenient to explore one of the more interesting features of Swift's implementation: how weak references work.
Weak References
In a garbage collected or reference counted language, a strong reference is one which keeps the target object alive. A weak reference is one which doesn't. An object can't be destroyed while there are strong references to it, but it can be destroyed while there are weak references to it.
When we say "weak reference," we usually mean a zeroing weak reference. That is, when the target of the weak reference is destroyed, the weak reference becomes nil. It's also possible to have non-zeroing weak references, which trap, crash, or invoke nasal demons. This is what you get when you use unsafe_unretained in Objective-C, or unowned in Swift. (Note that Objective-C gives us the nasal-demons version, while Swift takes care to crash reliably.)
Zeroing weak references are handy to have around, and they're extremely useful in reference counted languages. They allow circular references to exist without creating retain cycles, and without having to manually break back references. They're so useful that I implemented my own version of weak references back before Apple introduced ARC and made language-level weak references available outside of garbage collected code.
How Does It Work?
The typical implementation for zeroing weak references is to keep a list of all the weak references to each object. When a weak reference is created to an object, that reference is added to the list. When that reference is reassigned or goes out of scope, it's removed from the list. When an object is destroyed, all of the references in the list are zeroed. In a multithreaded environment (i.e. all of them these days), the implementation must synchronize obtaining a weak reference and destroying an object to avoid race conditions when one thread releases the last strong reference to an object at the same time another thread tries to load a weak reference to it.
In my implementation, each weak reference is a full-fledged object. The list of weak references is just a set of weak reference objects. This adds some inefficiency because of the extra indirection and memory use, but it's convenient to have the references be full objects.
In Apple's Objective-C implementation, each weak reference is a plain pointer to the target object. Rather than reading and writing the pointers directly, the compiler uses helper functions. When storing to a weak pointer, the store function registers the pointer location as a weak reference to the target. When reading from a weak pointer, the read function integrates with the reference counting system to ensure that it never returns a pointer to an object that's being deallocated.
Zeroing in Action
Let's build a bit of code so we can watch this stuff happen.
We want to be able to dump the contents of an object's memory. This function takes a region of memory, breaks it into pointer-sized chunks, and turns the whole thing into a convenient hex string:
func contents ( ptr : UnsafePointer < Void >, _ length : Int ) -> String { let wordPtr = UnsafePointer < UInt > ( ptr ) let words = length / sizeof ( UInt. self ) let wordChars = sizeof ( UInt. self ) * 2 let buffer = UnsafeBufferPointer < UInt > ( start : wordPtr, count : words ) let wordStrings = buffer. map ({ word -> String in var wordString = String ( word, radix : 16 ) while wordString. characters. count < wordChars { wordString = "0" + wordString } return wordString }) return wordStrings. joinWithSeparator ( " " ) }
The next function creates a dumper function for an object. Call it once with an object, and it returns a function that will dump the content of this object. Internally, it saves an UnsafePointer to the object, rather than using a normal reference. This ensures that it doesn't interact with the language's reference counting system. It also allows us to dump the memory of an object after it has been destroyed, which will come in handy later.
func dumperFunc ( obj : AnyObject ) -> ( Void -> String ) { let objString = String ( obj ) let ptr = unsafeBitCast ( obj, UnsafePointer < Void >. self ) let length = class_getInstanceSize ( obj. dynamicType ) return { let bytes = contents ( ptr, length ) return "\(objString) \(ptr): \(bytes)" } }
Here's a class that exists to hold a weak reference so we can inspect it. I added dummy variables on either side to make it clear where the weak reference lives in the memory dump:
class WeakReferer { var dummy1 = 0x1234321012343210 weak var target : WeakTarget? var dummy2 : UInt = 0xabcdefabcdefabcd }
Let's give it a try! We'll start by creating a referer and dumping it:
let referer = WeakReferer () let refererDump = dumperFunc ( referer ) print ( refererDump ())
This prints:
WeakReferer 0x00007f8a3861b920: 0000000107ab24a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd
We can see the isa at the beginning, followed by some other internal fields. dummy1 occupies the 4th chunk, and dummy2 occupies the 6th. We can see that the weak reference in between them is zero, as expected.
Let's point it at an object now, and see what it looks like. I'll do this inside a do block so we can control when the target goes out of scope and is destroyed:
do { let target = NSObject () referer. target = target print ( target ) print ( refererDump ()) }
This prints:
<NSObject: 0x7fda6a21c6a0> WeakReferer 0x00007fda6a000ad0: 00000001050a44a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fda6a21c6a0 abcdefabcdefabcd
As expected, the pointer to the target is stored directly in the weak reference. Let's dump it again after the target is destroyed at the end of the do block:
print ( refererDump ())
WeakReferer 0x00007ffe32300060: 000000010cfb44a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd
It gets zeroed out. Perfect!
Just for fun, let's repeat the experiment with a pure Swift object as the target. It's not nice to bring Objective-C into the picture when it's not necessary. Here's a pure Swift target:
class WeakTarget {}
Let's try it out:
let referer = WeakReferer () let refererDump = dumperFunc ( referer ) print ( refererDump ()) do { class WeakTarget {} let target = WeakTarget () referer. target = target print ( refererDump ()) } print ( refererDump ())
The target starts out zeroed as expected, then gets assigned:
WeakReferer 0x00007fbe95000270: 00000001071d24a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd WeakReferer 0x00007fbe95000270: 00000001071d24a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fbe95121ce0 abcdefabcdefabcd
Then when the target goes away, the reference should be zeroed:
WeakReferer 0x00007fbe95000270: 00000001071d24a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fbe95121ce0 abcdefabcdefabcd
Oh dear. It didn't get zeroed. Maybe the target didn't get destroyed. Something must be keeping it alive! Let's double-check:
class WeakTarget { deinit { print ( "WeakTarget deinit" ) } }
Running the code again, we get:
WeakReferer 0x00007fd29a61fa10: 0000000107ae44a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd WeakReferer 0x00007fd29a61fa10: 0000000107ae44a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fd29a42a920 abcdefabcdefabcd WeakTarget deinit WeakReferer 0x00007fd29a61fa10: 0000000107ae44a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fd29a42a920 abcdefabcdefabcd
So it is going away, but the weak reference isn't being zeroed out. How about that, we found a bug in Swift! It's pretty amazing that it hasn't been fixed after all this time. You'd think somebody would have noticed before now. Let's go ahead and generate a nice crash by accessing the reference, then we can file a bug with the Swift project:
let referer = WeakReferer () let refererDump = dumperFunc ( referer ) print ( refererDump ()) do { class WeakTarget { deinit { print ( "WeakTarget deinit" ) } } let target = WeakTarget () referer. target = target print ( refererDump ()) } print ( refererDump ()) print ( referer. target )
Here comes the crash:
WeakReferer 0x00007ff7aa20d060: 00000001047a04a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd WeakReferer 0x00007ff7aa20d060: 00000001047a04a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007ff7aa2157f0 abcdefabcdefabcd WeakTarget deinit WeakReferer 0x00007ff7aa20d060: 00000001047a04a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007ff7aa2157f0 abcdefabcdefabcd nil
Oh dear squared! Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an Earth-shattering kaboom! The output says everything is working after all, but we can see clearly from the dump that it isn't working at all.
Let's inspect everything really carefully. Here's a revised version of WeakTarget with a dummy variable to make it nicer to dump its contents as well:
class WeakTarget { var dummy = 0x0123456789abcdef deinit { print ( "Weak target deinit" ) } }
Here's some new code that runs through the same procedure and dumps both objects at every step:
let referer = WeakReferer () let refererDump = dumperFunc ( referer ) print ( refererDump ()) let targetDump : Void -> String do { let target = WeakTarget () targetDump = dumperFunc ( target ) print ( targetDump ()) referer. target = target print ( refererDump ()) print ( targetDump ()) } print ( refererDump ()) print ( targetDump ()) print ( referer. target ) print ( refererDump ()) print ( targetDump ())
Let's walk through the output. The referer starts out life as before, with a zeroed-out target field:
WeakReferer 0x00007fe174802520: 000000010faa64a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd
The target starts out life as a normal object, with various header fields followed by our dummy field:
WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270: 000000010faa63e0 0000000200000004 0123456789abcdef
Upon assigning to the target field, we can see the pointer value get filled in:
WeakReferer 0x00007fe174802520: 000000010faa64a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fe17341d270 abcdefabcdefabcd
The target is much as before, but one of the header fields went up by 2 :
WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270: 000000010faa63e0 0000000400000004 0123456789abcdef
The target gets destroyed as expected:
Weak target deinit
We see the referer object still has a pointer to the target:
WeakReferer 0x00007fe174802520: 000000010faa64a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 00007fe17341d270 abcdefabcdefabcd
And the target itself still looks very much alive, although a different header field went down by 2 compared to the last time we saw it:
WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270: 000000010faa63e0 0000000200000002 0123456789abcdef
Accessing the target field produces nil even though it wasn't zeroed out:
nil
Dumping the referer again shows that the mere act of accessing the target field has altered it. Now it's zeroed out:
WeakReferer 0x00007fe174802520: 000000010faa64a0 0000000200000004 1234321012343210 0000000000000000 abcdefabcdefabcd
The target is now totally obliterated:
WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270: 200007fe17342a04 300007fe17342811 ffffffffffff0002
More and more interesting. We saw header fields incrementing and decremeting a bit, let's see if we can make that happen more:
let target = WeakTarget () let targetDump = dumperFunc ( target ) do { print ( targetDump ()) weak var a = target print ( targetDump ()) weak var b = target print ( targetDump ()) weak var c = target print ( targetDump ()) weak var d = target print ( targetDump ()) weak var e = target print ( targetDump ()) var f = target print ( targetDump ()) var g = target print ( targetDump ()) var h = target print ( targetDump ()) var i = target print ( targetDump ()) var j = target print ( targetDump ()) var k = target print ( targetDump ()) } print ( targetDump ())
This prints:
WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000200000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000400000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000600000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000800000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000a00000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c00000004 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c00000008 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c0000000c 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c00000010 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c00000014 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c00000018 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000c0000001c 0123456789abcdef WeakTarget 0x00007fd883205df0: 00000001093a4840 0000000200000004 0123456789abcdef
We can see that the first number in this header field goes up by 2 with every new weak reference. The second number goes up by 4 with every new strong reference.
To recap, here's what we've seen so far:
Weak pointers look like regular pointers in memory.
When a weak target's deinit runs, the target is not deallocated, and the weak pointer is not zeroed.
runs, the target is not deallocated, and the weak pointer is not zeroed. When the weak pointer is accessed after the target's deinit runs, it is zeroed on access and the weak target is deallocated.
runs, it is zeroed on access and the weak target is deallocated. The weak target contains a reference count for weak references, separate from the count of strong references.
Swift Code
Now that Swift is open source, we can actually go relate this observed behavior to the source code.
The Swift standard library represents objects allocated on the heap with a HeapObject type located in stdlib/public/SwiftShims/HeapObject.h. It looks like:
struct HeapObject { /// This is always a valid pointer to a metadata object. struct HeapMetadata const * metadata ; SWIFT_HEAPOBJECT_NON_OBJC_MEMBERS ; // FIXME: allocate two words of metadata on 32-bit platforms #ifdef __cplusplus HeapObject () = default ; // Initialize a HeapObject header as appropriate for a newly-allocated object. constexpr HeapObject ( HeapMetadata const * newMetadata ) : metadata ( newMetadata ), refCount ( StrongRefCount :: Initialized ), weakRefCount ( WeakRefCount :: Initialized ) { } #endif };
The metadata field is the Swift equivalent of the isa field in Objective-C, and in fact it's compatible. Then there are these NON_OBJC_MEMBERS defined in a macro:
#define SWIFT_HEAPOBJECT_NON_OBJC_MEMBERS \ StrongRefCount refCount; \ WeakRefCount weakRefCount
Well, look at that! There are our two reference counts.
(Bonus question: why is the strong count first here, while in the dumps above the weak count was first?)
The reference counts are managed by a bunch of functions located in stdlib/public/runtime/HeapObject.cpp. For example, here's swift_retain :
void swift :: swift_retain ( HeapObject * object ) { SWIFT_RETAIN (); _swift_retain ( object ); } static void _swift_retain_ ( HeapObject * object ) { _swift_retain_inlined ( object ); } auto swift :: _swift_retain = _swift_retain_ ;
There's a bunch of indirection, but it eventually calls through to this inline function in the header:
static inline void _swift_retain_inlined ( HeapObject * object ) { if ( object ) { object -> refCount. increment (); } }
As you'd expect, it increments the reference count. Here's the implementation of increment :
void increment () { __atomic_fetch_add ( & refCount, RC_ONE, __ATOMIC_RELAXED ); }
RC_ONE comes from an enum :
enum : uint32_t { RC_PINNED_FLAG = 0x1, RC_DEALLOCATING_FLAG = 0x2, RC_FLAGS_COUNT = 2, RC_FLAGS_MASK = 3, RC_COUNT_MASK = ~ RC_FLAGS_MASK, RC_ONE = RC_FLAGS_MASK + 1 };
We can see why the count went up by 4 with each new strong reference. The first two bits of the field are used for flags. Looking back at the dumps, we can see those flags in action. Here's a weak target before and after the last strong reference went away:
WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270 : 000000010f aa63e0 0000000400000004 01234567 89 abcdef Weak target deinit WeakTarget 0x00007fe17341d270 : 000000010f aa63e0 0000000200000002 01234567 89 abcdef
The field went from 4, denoting a reference count of 1 and no flags, to 2, denoting a reference count of zero and RC_DEALLOCATING_FLAG set. This post- deinit object is placed in some sort of DEALLOCATING limbo.
(Incidentally, what is RC_PINNED_FLAG for? I poked through the code base and couldn't figure out anything beyond that it indicates a "pinned object," which is already pretty obvious from the name. If you figure it out or have an informed guess, please post a comment.)
Let's check out the weak reference count's implementation, while we're here. It has the same sort of enum :
enum : uint32_t { // There isn't really a flag here. // Making weak RC_ONE == strong RC_ONE saves an // instruction in allocation on arm64. RC_UNUSED_FLAG = 1, RC_FLAGS_COUNT = 1, RC_FLAGS_MASK = 1, RC_COUNT_MASK = ~ RC_FLAGS_MASK, RC_ONE = RC_FLAGS_MASK + 1 };
That's where the 2 comes from: there's space reserved for one flag, which is currently unused. Oddly, the comment in this code appears to be incorrect, as RC_ONE here is equal to 2, whereas the strong RC_ONE is equal to 4. I'd guess they were once equal, and then it was changed and the comment wasn't updated. Just goes to show that comments are useless and you shouldn't ever write them.
How does all of this tie in to loading weak references? That's handled by a function called swift_weakLoadStrong :
HeapObject * swift :: swift_weakLoadStrong ( WeakReference * ref ) { auto object = ref -> Value ; if ( object == nullptr ) return nullptr ; if ( object -> refCount. isDeallocating ()) { swift_weakRelease ( object ); ref -> Value = nullptr ; return nullptr ; } return swift_tryRetain ( object ); }
From this, it's clear how the lazy zeroing works. When loading a weak reference, if the target is deallocating, zero out the reference. Otherwise, try to retain the target, and return it. Digging a bit further, we can see how swift_weakRelease deallocates the object's memory if it's the last reference:
void swift :: swift_weakRelease ( HeapObject * object ) { if (! object ) return ; if ( object -> weakRefCount. decrementShouldDeallocate ()) { // Only class objects can be weak-retained and weak-released. auto metadata = object -> metadata ; assert ( metadata -> isClassObject ()); auto classMetadata = static_cast < const ClassMetadata *> ( metadata ); assert ( classMetadata -> isTypeMetadata ()); swift_slowDealloc ( object, classMetadata -> getInstanceSize (), classMetadata -> getInstanceAlignMask ()); } }
(Note: if you're looking at the code in the repository, the naming has changed to use "unowned" instead of "weak" for most cases. The naming above is current as of the latest snapshot as of the time of this writing, but development moves on. You can view the repository as of the 2.2 snapshot to see it as I have it here, or grab the latest but be aware of the naming changes, and possibly implementation changes.)
Putting it All Together
We've seen it all from top to bottom now. What's the high-level view on how Swift weak references actually work?
Weak references are just pointers to the target object. Weak references are not individually tracked the way they are in Objective-C. Instead, each Swift object has a weak reference count next to its strong reference count. Swift decouples object deinitialization from object deallocation. An object can be deinitialized, freeing its external resources, without deallocating the memory occupied by the object itself. When a Swift object's strong reference count reaches zero while the weak count is still greater than zero, the object is deinitialized but not deallocated. This means that weak pointers to a deallocated object are still valid pointers and can be dereferenced without crashing or loading garbage data. They merely point to an object in a zombie state. When a weak reference is loaded, the runtime checks the target's state. If the target is a zombie, then it zeroes the weak reference, decrements the weak reference count, and returns nil. When all weak references to a zombie object are zeroed out, the zombie is deallocated.
This design has some interesting consequences compared to Objective-C's approach:
There is no list of weak references maintained anywhere. This simplifies code and improves performance.
There is no race condition between zeroing a weak reference on one thread, and loading that weak reference on another thread. This means that loading a weak reference and destroying a weakly-referenced object can be done without acquiring locks. This improves performance.
Weak references to an object will cause that object's memory to remain allocated even after there are no strong references to it, until all weak references are either loaded or discarded. This temporarily increases memory usage. Note that the effect is small, because while the target object's memory remains allocated, it's only the memory for the instance itself. All external resources (including storage for Array or Dictionary properties) are freed when the last strong reference goes away. A weak reference can cause a single instance to stay allocated, but not a whole tree of objects.
or properties) are freed when the last strong reference goes away. A weak reference can cause a single instance to stay allocated, but not a whole tree of objects. Extra memory is required to store the weak reference count on every object. In practice it appears that this is inconsequential on 64-bit. The header fields want to occupy a whole number of pointer-sized chunks, and the strong and weak reference counts share one. If the weak reference count weren't there, the strong reference count would just occupy all 64 bits by itself. It's possible that the strong reference could otherwise be moved into the isa by using a non-pointer isa, but I'm not sure how important that is or how it's going to shake out in the long term. For 32-bit, it looks like the weak count increases object sizes by four bytes. The importance of 32-bit is diminishing by the day, however.
by using a non-pointer, but I'm not sure how important that is or how it's going to shake out in the long term. For 32-bit, it looks like the weak count increases object sizes by four bytes. The importance of 32-bit is diminishing by the day, however. Because accessing a weak pointer is so cheap, the same mechanism can be used to implement reliable semantics for unowned. Under the hood, unowned works exactly like weak, except that it fails loudly if the target went away rather than returning nil. In Objective-C, __unsafe_unretained is implemented as a raw pointer with undefined behavior if you access it late because it's supposed to be fast, and loading a weak pointer is somewhat slow.
Conclusion
Swift's weak pointers use an interesting approach that provides correctness, speed, and low memory overhead. By tracking a weak reference count for each object and decoupling object deinitialization from objct deallocation, weak references can be resolved both safely and quickly. The availability of the source code for the standard library lets us see exactly what's going on at the source level, instead of groveling through disassemblies and memory dumps as we often do. Of course, as you can see above, it's hard to break that habit fully.
That's it for today. Come back next time for more goodies. That might be a few weeks, as the holidays intervene, but I'm going to shoot for one shortish article before that happens. In any case, keep your suggestions for topics coming in. Friday Q&A is driven by reader ideas, so if you have one you'd like to see covered, let me know!
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Protests across Australia and overseas held to fight the forced closure of remote Aboriginal communities in Western Australia
Tens of thousands of Australians have taken part in protests throughout the country in a fight against the forced closure of Aboriginal communities in Western Australia, with some continuing into Friday night.
Last November the Western Australian premier, Colin Barnett, announced the government would stop providing services to up to 150 remote Aboriginal communities there, a move that would force many to close as resources were redirected towards bigger towns.
Since then, protests have been held throughout the country and have been gaining momentum, culminating in the biggest round of protests against the closures to date, including solidarity protests overseas in New Zealand, the US and Europe.
The largest protests on Friday, in Melbourne and Sydney, all but shut down the CBDs at peak hour, as thousands of protesters marched through the streets from 4pm.
Melbourne city centre blocked by protests over closure of Indigenous communities – as it happened Read more
Meanwhile The ABC reported about 300 people attended protests in Alice Springs and Adelaide, while Fairfax reported more than 1,000 attended rallies across four New Zealand cities.
About 90 events were held altogether, organisers said, including in Broome, Canberra, Townsville, Perth and South Hedland, while the Brisbane rally was forced to be rescheduled because of severe weather.
Many Aboriginal people and peak organisations describe Barnett’s plan for their communities as disempowering and racist, and as an act of genocide that would destroy important culture and languages.
Pekeri Ruska, an organiser of the Melbourne rally and a council member for the Warriors of the Aboriginal resistance, said people wanted the communities to remain where they were.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Protesters listen to Labor senator Nova Peris at the #sosblakaustralia rally outside parliament house in Darwin. Photograph: Helen Davidson for the Guardian
“They are the traditional birth-lands of Aboriginal people and we have the right to live in them,” she said.
“The closures are an act of genocide and it must stop. It has been happening in this country for over 227 years and we want to stop it from occurring. Let us be self-determining.
“Until we are respected for what we are, we won’t get the justice we want.”
While Victoria police said they did not provide protest numbers, organisers told Guardian Australia about 10,000 people attended. The protest began at Town Hall and ended in front of Flinders St Station at about 5pm, disrupting commuters during peak hour as thousands of people staged a “sit-in” in front of the station.
A circle was cleared in the middle of the crowd where speeches were given by Aboriginal leaders, and Aboriginal dancers performed. Gum tree branches were burned and a smoke ceremony was carried out, with police barely visible among the sea of people.
After night fell, many moved on to Kings Domain to set up a makeshift camp where they will stay for two nights and hold a smoking ceremony, information sessions, and panel discussions.
Protester Lester Roberts, an Aboriginal man from Byron Bay, said the closures were “disgraceful”.
“They [Aboriginal people] live off the land and it’s what they need, you know?” he said. “It’s very disgraceful what the government is doing
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quitting the profession entirely due to the danger of working in no-go zones, the limited resources available, and complaints about pay.
The situation has become so desperate that earlier this year, Swedish National Police Commissioner Dan Eliasson begged the government for help as the number of no-go zones increased along with a 550 per cent rise in hand grenade attacks.A new survey from The Reading Agency, a British organization dedicated to promoting reading among people of all ages, has confirmed something all of us have known forever: a lot of people lie about their reading habits. The study polled 2,000 adults in the U.K., 41 percent of whom admitted to having lied about the amount and kinds of books they’ve read. (Plenty more, we assume, lied about never having lied.) Adults between the ages of 18 and 24, the perennial whipping-boy demographic of pollsters everywhere, were the most likely to have stretched the truth, with 64 percent confessing to their literary fibs.
Getting even more granular, 25 percent of those young Britons admit to claiming they’ve read J.R.R. Tolkein’s Lord Of The Rings trilogy when in actuality they’re just shield-surfing by on having seen the movies. But LOTR is only the second most lied about book-to-movie among all age groups: The top offender was Ian Fleming’s James Bond books, withThe Chronicles Of Narnia, The Da Vinci Code, and The Hunger Games rounding out the top five.
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The research was commissioned to mark The Reading Agency’s annual World Book Night event, which calls upon people to share books and recommendations with friends and family in attempt to get more people reading. The survey’s results show that’s a pretty worthwhile goal, as 67 percent of responders say they’d like to read more than they do and nearly half said they just plain don’t have the time to read.
[via BBC]The Flag of Scotland, the Saltire, blows in the wind near Berwick-upon-Tweed on the border between England and Scotland September 7, 2014. REUTERS/Russell Cheyne
LONDON (Reuters) - The British government is not making contingency plans for the possibility that Scots will vote for independence on Sept. 18, a spokesman for Prime Minister David Cameron said on Monday.
With 10 days to go before the vote, a YouGov poll for the Sunday Times showed supporters of independence had taken their first opinion poll lead since the referendum campaign began.
When asked if the government’s position on making contingency plans had changed following that poll, Cameron’s spokesman told reporters: “No. There has been no change here. The government’s entire focus... is on making the case for the UK staying together.”
Cameron will visit Scotland ahead of the vote to continue to argue the case for Scotland’s 307-year union with England remaining intact, the spokesman said.
“It is very important to go out with the strong argument that the government and others have and to make that case, because the argument has to be won. There has never been any complacency whatsoever about the importance of going out and making the argument,” he said.
Britain’s three main political parties are due to set out this week the detail of and timetable for plans to hand Scotland greater powers if it rejects independence.As I wrap up my first year writing for Mouseplanet, I thought it would be fun to do an all-encompassing walk through Walt Disney World shopping and merchandising. What better way to do that than to go through the Disney alphabet? As I work my way, I'll recap some of things we've talked about this past year, give some new tips and tricks and try to give a well-rounded picture of what's out there.
Some letters were easy (I'm four plus deep in Ms), and some not so much (still trying to come up with an X as I write this). Without further ado, as Mickey would say, on with the show!
A – Art of Disney
With locations at Disney Springs, Main Street in the Magic Kingdom and Epcot's Future World, this is the best place to get truly unique collectibles. From very expensive original artwork, reasonably priced prints and figurines, to downright cheap postcards, this is a must-visit for any Disney fan. See my article "The Art of Disney," from June 24, more information and a little history on Disney animation cels.
B – Bay View Gifts
In my humble opinion, this is the best of the Disney resort shops. They have everything you'd expect, from tee shirts to mugs, from pins to princess dolls and costumes and from housewares to throw pills. But the real prizes are the bakery counter (where you can get fresh fudge and cookies) and the watch/jewelry counter and cases that rival what you can find at Uptown Jewelers or World of Disney.
C – Crystal Arts
The Magic Kingdom Main Street home of Arribas Brothers, the great company that provides us with wonderful hand-blown glass items, both in the form of Disney characters and not. There's great porcelain and crystal here as well, from famous makers such as Lladro and Lenox (I'm a big fan of Disney getting together with other fine craftsmen and brands to make great collectibles). A great feature of this shop is the glass oven in the back of the store, where great artists provide glass-blowing demonstrations throughout the day (though stand back when its 95 degrees outside; it can get hot in there). You can also get Arribas Brothers and similar offerings at La Princesa de Cristal at Epcot's Mexico Pavilion and through their flagship store near World of Disney at Disney Springs.
D – Discovery Trading Company
We have to give a shout out to Animal Kingdom's largest shop, its version of the Emporium. They have a big selection of the usual assortments of goods and toys, and if you need that T-shirt, mug, or princess doll and happen to be on Discovery Island across from the Tree of Life, this is the place.
E – Emporium
The original Disney superstore. Located right near the Magic Kingdom park entrance on Main Street U.S.A., this was Walt's version of the small town America five-and-dime. Over time, it's exploded into a Disney shopper's paradise, carrying pretty much everything you can imagine. The shop begins right at Town Square and continues down most of Main Street, broken into sections with different kinds of goods. It's hard to pick out one kind of thing they specialize in since they have almost everything, but check out the men's and women's clothing sections toward the back of the store for a great selection (this has always been my favorite place to pick out pajamas) as well as the huge plush wall.
Near the main entrance, there's also a great technology section with a large assortment of Magic Bands and cell phone cases. Two shopping tips:
They will transport your purchases to the front gate of the park or to your resort hotel if you prefer not to carry them all day
They also usually stay open one hour past park closing, so you can shop your way out of the park after the Wishes fireworks show.
Also, check out my article, "Shopping Wars: Magic Kingdom vs. Epcot," from March 25, about Magic Kingdom shopping that goes into a little more detail on the Emporium.
Magic Kingdom's Emporium at twilight, maybe the best place to find, well, anything! Photo by Gregg Jacobs.
F – Frontier Mercantile
This great little shop in Magic Kingdom's Frontierland, near the Country Bear Jamboree, is actually the best place to buy pins in the park. They have a massive selection, including limited edition pins and exclusives for annual passholders and members of the Disney Vacation Club.
G – Goofy's Candy Company
The name of the place says it all. While you shop 'til you drop at Disney Springs, it's inevitable that you'll want a little (or big) snack. They have a massive bakery case and also sell custom pretzels or crispy rice treats with your choice of toppings. They also have tons of pre-packaged treats in bags and tins for things you may want to take all the way back home with you.
H – Happy Hound
We're going to stick to Disney Springs for this one and visit the Happy Hound. Throughout Disney Springs, there are a number of great kiosks carrying many different kinds of goods and gifts. This is my favorite, located in the Marketplace. It carries all kinds of goodies for your pet waiting at home, including toys, treats, and even some artwork. Since Disney has cut back a bit on Disney Pets goods at its shops, this is arguably the best place to find gifts for your furry friends.
Other unique kiosks include Lefty's, also in the Marketplace and home of unique gifts for, well, lefties (left-handed can-openers, notebooks, and so on) and the Pearl Factory, where they'll open an oyster for you to get your very own pearl.
I – It's a Wonderful Shop
It's the holiday season, so going a little December-heavy here. This great shop is at Hollywood Studios, located near Mama Melrose and PizzeRizzo in the little street leading off Muppets Courtyard. They're heavy on great holiday ornaments, snowglobes, and other holiday-themed trinkets. The shop fits the 1940s theme of the area and is a great place to visit while in that part of the park. I describe it in a little more detail in "Disney Days of Christmas" from November 25.
J – Jewelry
This is an area Disney has been beefing up lately. Sure there are plenty of bangles, bracelets, and necklaces with that familiar three-circle logo, but Disney has also recently joined with a lot of jewelry makers for some great pieces, such as with Pandora, to make bracelets and charms representing all areas of the Disney Universe. For your best selection, visit the jewelry counter at World of Disney at Disney Springs, the counter at Epcot's Mousegear, or Uptown Jewelers at Magic Kingdom (which has an area dedicated to Pandora in the back of the store).
K – Keystone Clothiers
This is a Hollywood Studios shop on Hollywood Boulevard I didn't pay much attention to until recently, but is worth a visit. It has absolutely the best T-shirt selection on property, with shirts from such Disney classics as Aladdin and Pixar's Up! There are tons of different Walt Disney World logo Ts as well as those featuring our favorite Mouse (I visited a few weeks ago and was very happy to see that Disney has come up with some great new clothing). It has a large selection of items from Disney label Twenty-Eight and Main, from which you can find items related to defunct WDW classics such as Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and the Adventurer's Club. The shop also has a great selection of the crazy socks everyone is wearing these days.
Keystone Clothiers has a great selection of tees. Just look at Dug from Up! Photo by Gregg Jacobs.
L – Lenox
As I mentioned earlier, I love it when great companies and artisans team up with Disney to create great collectibles. Lenox is a perfect example. There are series of figurines featuring characters from all over the Disney universe in fine Lenox china. They also make dishware, including some great pieces for the holidays. The best places to find Lenox are those that also have Arribas Brothers, such as the Arribas Brothers store at the Disney Springs Marketplace.
M – Memento Mori
M was tough. I had several options here (especially sad since I'm up to "M" and still don't have a "Q"). In the end though, I have to go with Memento Mori. Disney has come under a lot of fire lately for making generic products that are the same in every store, rather than those specific to certain parks, lands, or attractions—this shop (along with Twenty Eight and Main) helps reverse that tide. Located outside Magic Kingdom's Haunted Mansion, it has some great Mansion-themed goodies, ranging from bookends to clothing to your own photo in Master Gracey style. There are also some great figurines and other collectibles (love the coffin-shaped playing cards).
Want a little something to "follow you home" from Memento Mori? Photo by Gregg Jacobs.
Incidentally, the "M" runners-up were Mombasa Marketplace, located in Harambe at Animal Kingdom (for its great animal carvings and musical instruments), Mitsukoshi, the best Epcot World Showcase shop in my humble opinion (great representation of goods from Japan—including Hello Kitty for the little ones) and Mousegear, my favorite of the Emporium-type superstores.
N – Northwest Mercantile
Located in Epcot's Canada pavilion, the Mercantile fits the pavilion's lumberjack theme perfectly, with a lot of wood and cuddly plush everywhere. This is a also a great place to pick up some Frozen merchandise (I guess the fact it gets cold in Canada justified the Frozen additions).
O – Once Upon a Toy
Toys R Us at Disney! This cavernous toy store, located at Disney Springs Marketplace, has just about any Disney-related toy you could want. This is a great place to buy LEGO sets, plush toys, as well as playsets that include Cinderella's Castle, the monorail, and many other Walt Disney World icons and toys from different Disney properties. There's a great book section towards the back of the store and this is now home to Disney Springs' Bibbidy Bobbidy Boutique.
P – Pins
Well duh. Only one choice here. Pin trading has been a Walt Disney World staple for many years and there are thousands of pins to choose from. There's tons I could say here, but my best advice is navigating the world of pins is to pick a park, film, character, or event that you love, and focus on that. These are also fun for kids, who love trading, and there are cast members with lanyards at every turn who would be happy to trade with you. I also love limited edition pins that are made in fixed amounts to cover a specific event or happening. If you're an annual passholder or DVC member, there are also pins that only are available to you.
The best pin stops are Disney Pin Traders at Disney Springs Marketplace, Pin Central behind Spaceship Earth at Epcot, and the aforementioned Frontier Mercantile at Magic Kingdom. For more information on pins and other great small collections, read my September 23 article, "Pins, Vinylmation, and Tsum Tsum, oh my!"
Q – Question
This is where I cop out and throw it to you Mouseplanet readers (I tried. I really really did). I through the question to you about what you love about Disney shopping and collecting. Let me and Mouseplanet readers know what your favorites are (and if any of you did better than I did with "Q").
R – Refrigerator Magnets
You laugh, but these are actually great collectibles. Virtually every park, resort hotel, and attraction has some kind of magnet, and they make a great, an relatively inexpensive, thing to collect from Walt Disney World, for the old or the young. My favorites are the large ones that look like Disney treats (there's a Mickey-shaped crispy rice treat on my refrigerator as I write this).
S – Shop Disney Parks App
One of the best enhancements to the Disney shopping experience, the smartphone application makes your life easier in so many ways. While at Walt Disney World, if there's an item you want, but can't find, simply go to the app, do a quick search and you'll get a map with a listing of where it's available. If you're either home already or don't feel like walking back to the store you saw the item, go ahead and order it through the app and have it shipped home or to your resort hotel. I've used the app on many occasions to locate specific items, and it's been a big help. For more details on the app and how to download it to your phone, read my February 26 article, "Take a CLoser Look at the Shop Disney Parks App."
T – Tatooine Traders
Until Star Wars land opens up (I'm hoping before 2020, but only Bob Iger knows for sure), this is the best place to get your Star Wars goodies. I love the way the Tatooine theme fits in with the rest of the building, and you get to build your own light saber and pose as Luke Skywalker or Princess Leia for a picture. I love the items that feature Disney characters as your Star Wars favorites, and the great collectibles behind the cash register, like the cast autographed photos.
Tatooine Traders has a uniquely themed building as is the best place to buy Star Wars items (at least for now). Photo by Gregg Jacobs.
U – Uniqlo
This may seem like an odd choice, but Japanese casualwear manufacturer and retailer Uniqlo, at Town Square in Disney Springs, is a great find and stands out among the non-Disney Disney shopping experiences. Uniqlo stores are located in malls over the the country and are known for quality and reasonably priced clothing (great flannel and pajamas), but what makes this one stand out for me is the great Disney clothing. If you walk straight out of the Lime parking garage and into the Disney section of the store, you can find some awesome T-shirts, most for only $10 to $15. My favorites are those from the Mickey 100 project. Uniqlo invited Disney designers to come up with 100 images for this great series (which includes Mickey as pizza, topiary, a circuit board, and a knight). These sell for only $14.90, likely less than half what you'd pay for a shirt for anywhere else on property.
V – Vinylmation
Vinylmation didn't quite catch on the way pin trading did, but these are still fun collectibles. They come in different sizes (again, see my article on small collectibles for more details), but the three-inch-high figure in the shape of Mickey Mouse is the most common. You can buy these themed to a given attraction character or event one at a time, or as a part of larger series, packaged in opaque mystery packs that are bought like baseball cards (you get them wrapped up and can't see what you got until after the purchase). It's fun trying to get full sets. These are available all over the World.
W – World of Disney
This is billed as the largest Disney character store in the United States (it used to be the world, but the largest store is now in Shanghai, China). If you truly want a one-stop shopping experience, this is the place to go (at Disney Springs Marketplace, you truly can't miss it). Recently expanded, there are many different rooms to visit. There are sections themed to housewares, men's clothing, women's clothing, children's clothing, watches and jewelry, plush and princesses, infants, and the large center room where you can pick up knick knacks such as keychains, magnets, and tech (cell phone and tablet cases). I can't convey in words how massive this place is, and if you really want to get it all done at once, this is the place to go.
X – Xylophone
I'm totally cheating on this one, but I did, in fact, see a hand-carved wooden xylophone at Animal Kingdom's Mombasa Marketplace. This is actually a great place to pick up any one of a variety of hand-made wood instruments (drums are the favorite).
Y – Ye Olde Christmas Shop
I'm back on my holiday kick. Again, what I love best about this shop is how well it blends in with Magic Kingdom's Liberty Square. The shop has gotten a little ornament-heavy in recent years, but they are great ornaments. You can also get things like table runners, tree skirts, figurines and other holiday themed goods.
Z – Zanzibar Traders
Located in Magic Kingdom's Adventureland and part of the Baazar, the jungle theme fits in well with its land. The claim to fame here is a lot of great animal-themed clothing, which makes sense, as the Jungle Cruise sits right across the way.
So there you have it, for those who've made it this far, a comprehensive walk through the Disney shopping alphabet. Readers of this column know I love it all, and I'd love to hear parts of your shopping alphabet.
Thanks for a great year Mouseplanet readers, and I look forward to sharing more with you in 2017.Anthony Wilson will vie for the title of the AFL's fastest, his former coach says
NORWOOD-TURNED-ADELAIDE wingman Anthony Wilson's former coach Ben Warren can't imagine anyone in the AFL matching the rookie's leg speed
Wilson shone for the Redlegs during this year's SANFL finals series, helping the club claim a third-straight premiership.
The 22-year-old broke into the senior side on Anzac Day and didn't look back, playing 16 games and kicking 13 goals from half-forward and the wing.
His goal of the match against Adelaide in round seven showcased his blistering pace and incredible agility when he beat his opponent Riley Knight to the ball before turning on a dime to run into an open goal.
Warren, who played 231 SANFL matches, took over as Norwood coach this year from now-Essendon assistant Nathan Bassett, having played in the Redlegs' past two flags.
He told AFL.com.au Wilson was the fastest player in the SANFL and would push for the same title at the next level.
Warren also tipped the slightly built 181cm wingman to develop rapidly in an elite environment.
"You never see him get run down at our level, there's obviously some pretty fast men in the AFL but if you can get the ball to space to him I doubt there would be anyone who could catch him," Warren said.
"Jarman Impey (Port Adelaide) was struggling to catch him in the Grand Final and he's pretty fast.
"His improvement was quite rapid from his first game in the Anzac Day clash against North Adelaide at Adelaide Oval to the Grand Final where he was such an integral part of our team in the end.
"At Norwood he was studying teaching and working part-time so in a full-time environment I think you'll again see some rapid improvement in his game."
But speed is worthless unless a player has the skill to dispose of the ball.
While further work is required to bring Wilson's kicking up to AFL standard, Warren said the development he saw in 2014 suggested he was capable of quick improvement.
"His kicking had improved significantly from last year," he said.
"It's been a real focus for him – his foot skills – running at top speed and then trying to kick drop punts isn't easy.
"He certainly got better, he had a good year and is a terrific young man so I think he'll fit in pretty well at the Adelaide Crows.
"He's very switched on and just wants to improve and be, not only the best player he can be but the best person he can be."WASHINGTON DC, JUNE 28: Washington starting pitcher Lucas Giolito (44) makes his major league debut as the Washington Nationals play the New York Mets at Nationals Park in Washington DC, June 28, 2016. (Photo by John McDonnell / The Washington Post)
Lucas Giolito wasn’t battling history Tuesday night. He could have thrown six scoreless innings, braided Jayson Werth’s hair in the dugout and departed on a chariot drawn by Racing Presidents, and he still wouldn’t have recorded the most unforgettable June start for a Nats rookie pitching prodigy. That honor was retired six years ago, during what remains among the most indelible moments in franchise history. Giolito was a high school sophomore.
“We’re not sitting here going, if he doesn’t have a Strasburg-esque first start, the world’s going to end,” Giolito’s father Rick said Tuesday evening, before the first of two rain delays drained some drama from the proceedings.
What Giolito did, though — for this team, in this season — was more than enough. He was as advertised on the mound; smooth, quick-working and composed, hovering around an easy 95 mph with his fastball. He controlled the Mets lineup, not allowing a runner past second base. He kept the pressure off worried pitch-counters, before buckets of rain in the bottom of the fourth ended any questions about how long was his leash. (“Definitely a bummer,” Bryce Harper said of the delay that ended Giolito’s night.)
Still, 45 pitches and four scoreless one-hit innings against the defending division champs? It might not be a grand epic we tell our kids about, but it made for some enticing visions.
Because for the Nats, this night — unlike Stephen’s Strasburg’s 2010 debut — wasn’t about finding a savior, a reason to hope, or a reason to care. At some point soon, Giolito will be a regular here, and the Nats will have added strength to a strength, as the Caps did when they flung Evgeny Kuznetsov into their lineup. Like Kuznetsov, Giolito is a brilliant prospect with a longstanding pedigree, joining an established team that boasts bigger stars. Strasburg delivered a classic capital-e Washington Event, with Bob Costas and Ken Burns in attendance, throngs of national media, spiking ticket prices, and the biggest television audience in team history to that point. And Giolito’s debut, which ended in a 5-0 win?
“It does [have hype], but for better reasons,” Ryan Zimmerman said. “And that’s a good thing.”
[Top prospect Lucas Giolito makes strong first impression in Nats’ 5-0 win]
The hype, Zimmerman meant, was for a team unveiling another valuable piece, one that might pitch meaningful innings sooner rather than later. While the Mets wonder about their pitching — yup, that was Matt Harvey flirting with trouble again on Tuesday — the Nats could imagine the sort of imposing rotation New York took to the World Series last year. That group included Noah Syndegaard, a fire-spewing 6-foot-6 right-hander who made his debut the previous May.
You don’t think the Nats could find a slot for baseball’s top pitching prospect in the fall? That’s why principal owner Mark Lerner said the electricity, for him, felt familiar.
“I’m just as excited tonight as I was for Stephen’s,” Lerner said. “That one was really a turning point in the franchise; this could be too. This young man, he could be a superstar one day. He’s got the stuff. He’s got all of it.”
The Nationals Strasburg joined in June of 2010 were unremarkable and forgettable, rice cakes dipped in water. A loss to Dusty Baker’s Reds the night before Strasburg’s debut put the Nats six-and-a-half games out of first, and in their familiar last-place perch. The fan base was waiting for a jolt. The wait had lasted, oh, 700 or so days.
“Back then, we were searching for a lot of meaningful things,” said Zimmerman, the only National to play in both games. “We’ve kind of come a long way, which I think is good for Lucas, because there’s really not much pressure for him to do something like that. It’s more about winning games now than it is about having someone strike out 14 so people come and watch us play.”
“Stras came at a time when we were all looking for a positive story,” GM Mike Rizzo added. “We were not a good team. We were a franchise kind of trying to get our sea legs.”
The context that trailed the 6-foot-6 Giolito around Nationals Park on Tuesday was different. He was joining a first-place team, one focused not on a one-off media blitz but on winning a series. Hours before the game, Giolito quietly chatted with Joe Ross, who had faced the Mets the previous night. Baker’s advice came from Hank Aaron (“Be nervous but don’t be scared”) and Ted Williams (“Above all, be natural.)”
Giolito’s pending appearance had less than 36 hours to marinate, amid predictions of dire weather, and so this was a modest crowd of 29,918 at rainy Nationals Park. (“I thought it would be 72 degrees, sunny, all that stuff, that’s how I dreamt it,” Giolito said.) One fan who had imagined making a quick profit on her ticket wound up offering it to me for free an hour before the game. Another who couldn’t unload his tickets to Giolito’s debut remembered selling his same seats at Strasburg’s debut for 10 times their face value. The first random fan I asked to name the night’s starter paused — “I heard it’s some rookie,” he said — and the second fan I asked offered a valiant try. (“Isn’t it like the ice cream, Gelati?” he guessed.)
But for the savvier supporters, who gave Giolito three or four ovations before he threw his first pitch, this had been building for years. Taking a first-round gamble on a kid with an ligament tear in his elbow and a pending surgery demanded patience. The positive minor-league outings, the praise from scouts and the No. 1 prospect rating were promising, but after waiting more than four years, those four innings between rain storms felt like the beginning of a payoff.
“It gives us a real sense of pride,” Lerner said. “How many people take a chance like this with No. 1 draft choices?”
Giolito said he didn’t notice the crowd, that there might as well have been zero people in the crowd. Rizzo said he wanted to think of this start as something mundane, like the first start for Tanner Roark or for Ross. And Lerner tried to remain similarly blase.
“I just want him to feel good about himself,” he said of Giolito before the game. “I’m sure they’ll pull him at the right time, so he can walk away with a smile on his face.”
The rain took care of that. Modest hype, a pleasant weekday crowd, four scoreless innings and a series win against a divisional rival were worth at least a slight smile. The history part can come later.Calling it a “dark chapter in Norway’s history,” the government issued another apology on Monday to the country’s Tater- and Romani minority over how they’ve been unjustly treated during the last century. The apology came after the head of a commission studying their treatment delivered its report to government minister Jan Tore Sanner.
“The authorities’ policies towards the Tater- and Romani population have, throughout large portions of the last century, been totally misguided and detrimental,” stated Knut Vollebæk, who led the commission that’s studied the fate of the nomadic ethnic groups for the past two years.
Vollebæk, a former Norwegian foreign minister from the Christian Democrats party, wrote in a commentary in newspaper Aftenposten on Monday how several laws and regulations used to justify the treatment of Norway’s itinerant Tater and Romani folk in fact contributed to discrimination, or at the very least, did not protect them from discrimination. The state, through its police, its state church and the church’s social services, violated the human rights that Norway was obligated to respect after signing the European Human Rights Convention in 1953. Representatives for today’s state church and its social services agency also issued formal apologies during a ceremony at the University of Oslo’s Aula in downtown Oslo.
The commission reported that surveys among the Tater- and Romani groups show much higher mortality rates and much lower levels of education among those directly affected by the state policies that removed children from their families. Children were often placed in orphanages or foster homes where many were ridiculed and abused. Policies invoked at the time were aimed at cutting all contact between the children and their families. Vollebæk said this led to a distrust of authorities that has lasted through generations.
Families were also forced to settle, or were scared into settling, in labour colonies. At the infamous Svanviken Work Colony outside Kristiansund, nearly 40 percent of the women living there were sterilized, to limit the Tater- and Romani population. Residents of Svanviken were also subjected to gross violation of their private lives, Vollebæk said, with authorities as late as the 1960s subjecting them to near-constant surveillance, censorship of their mail, regular inspection of the small cabins where they lived and constant threats that their children would be taken away from them if they put up any opposition.
During World War II, Norway’s Nazi government tried to put forward a “final solution” to the “Tater plague” that involved custody and the forced sterilizations that continued after the war. Vollebæk told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) on Monday that many Tater- and Romani folk reported that their treatment grew even worse after the war ended, because they were not viewed as doing enough to rebuild Norway after the Nazi German occupation.
The Norwegian government issued an official apology in 1998, and Prime Minister Erna Solberg also apologized during a meeting with Roma folk in Oslo this spring. The commission claimed, however, that the apology in 1998 was weak and didn’t reach either the Norwegian or Romani population, nor have they received adequate compensation or amends for past injustices.
“The commission has determined that neither the state nor those involved have properly come to terms,” Vollebæk wrote. “A clear and well-founded settlement is necessary in order to lay a foundation for reconciliation.”
Sanner agreed that the Tater- and Romani folk, although officially recognized as an ethnic minority in Norway, have suffered human rights violations. He called the commission’s report “strong and uncomfortable reading” and said it would be studied in detail “before the government takes a position on how it should be followed up” in the form of compensation.
The report comes just two week after the European Council of Human Rights complained that Norway was still placing children from Roma families into foster care or child welfare institutions “extremely often.” The council urged Norwegian authorities to do more to help parents take care of their children, instead of removing the children from their homes.
“Many pregnant Roma women avoid giving birth at Norwegian hospitals, because they fear the child will be taken away by Barnevernet (the state child welfare agency)” the council wrote in its report. The agency is also under harsh criticism from authorities in Russia and several other European countries over incidents in which it has removed children from their immigrant parents who don’t follow Norway’s laws against physically punishing children.
newsinenglish.no/Nina BerglundNASA's always trying to reach new heights, setting its sights on, among other ambitious projects, reaching Mars in the next few decades.
But it has an urgent problem in completing them: It begins with a "P" and ends in an "oop."
Scientists are offering $30,000 to anyone who can solve this problem in what they've dubbed the Space Poop Challenge.
Launched on crowdsourcing platform HeroX, the Space Poop Challenge "seeks proposed solutions for urine, fecal and menstrual management systems to be used in the crew’s launch and entry suits over a continuous duration of up to 144 hours." The method must "operate in the conditions of space – where solids, fluids, and gases float around in microgravity... and don't necessarily mix or act the way they would on earth."
Why haven't astronauts needed this kind of waste disposal before? According to the challenge's website, up until now crew members would be in their launch and entry suits for up to only 10 hours, and then those suits would be disposed of upon reaching outer space or re-entering Earth. In the meantime, if they needed to relieve themselves they would use diapers, which would also be disposed of.
"Future missions may require long-duration waste management for use by a pressurized suited crew member," the website explains. "In the event of cabin depressurization or other contingency, crew members may need to take refuge in their launch and entry suits for a long-duration."
Entrants have until Dec. 20 to submit their proposals, and HeroX, based on the evaluation of NASA specialists, will announce the winners on Jan. 31.
Teams that have accepted the challenge so far include "Team Dookie," "The Stool Solution" and "2 Astronaughts 1 Cup."The International Olympic Committee received an urgent letter from more than a dozen national anti-doping organisations on Wednesday night urging it to immediately suspend the Russian Olympic Committee and provisionally ban all Russian athletes from the Rio Olympics.
The letter, seen by the Guardian and addressed directly to the IOC president, Thomas Bach, warned him that he needed to fulfil his obligation to take the toughest possible sanctions against “institutionalised, government-run doping and abuse of athletes” to ensure the integrity of the Olympic Games.
Dick Pound fears IOC reluctant to ban entire Russia team from Olympics Read more
However, it said Russian athletes could compete in Rio under a neutral flag if a task force approved by the IOC and World Anti-Doping Agency verified they were clean, “thereby striking a fair balance between your stated concerns between collective responsibility and individual justice so that no truly clean elite Russian athlete is barred from the Rio Olympic Games”.
The letter, which was signed by 14 heads of anti-doping organisations including from the United States, Germany, Japan and Spain, comes amid growing fears that the IOC is cooking up a deal to allow the majority of the 386-strong Russian team to compete in Rio. Those were made public on Wednesday when the longstanding IOC member Dick Pound broke ranks to warn that the organisation was “very reluctant” to issue a blanket ban.
However, Joseph de Pencier, CEO of iNADO, which represents national anti-doping organisations, warned the IOC that they should expect more revelations from professor Richard McLaren, whose report on Monday detailed widespread state-sponsored doping in Russia.
De Pencier said: “In the face of the McLaren Report, and the additional findings likely to come from professor McLaren’s team in coming days, the IOC has an unmatched opportunity to do the right thing in the interests of clean sport and clean athletes around the world.
The IOC will have our support in acting decisively and unequivocally showing that clean sport is at the heart of Olympic values.”
The letter also warned the IOC that a plan to allow international federations from each sport to separately decide whether to allow Russian athletes to compete – which is favoured by some members of the IOC’s executive board – was not feasible. “There is simply insufficient time remaining before the Rio Games and insufficient time and expertise available to the IFs within the 16 days remaining before the Games to accomplish the individualised analysis recommended by the IOC,” it says.
“Moreover, there is the risk that individualised individual federations’ processes implemented at this late date would be subject to disparities and inconsistencies which would further undermine the Wada Code goal of having a uniform, harmonised world anti-doping programme.
Meanwhile, later on Thursday the court of arbitration for sport in
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I did it, because I have something to work with as opposed to just starting the book blindly. It does mean that I just spent a year and a half on artwork I'm not using.
SPURGEON: Something I wanted to build on when we talked about your character being different. There are a bunch of stories in here that touch on class. Some of it is overt: the material about the jobs you have, and waiting on rich kids in the diner. But also seems like class informs your work more generally. When most autobio cartoonists talk about being broke or not having a ton of resources, it seems like it's coming from a different place than where you're coming from. Do you feel there's a difference?
WERTZ: I think what you're getting at -- tell me if I'm wrong -- is that when cartoonists talk about being broke, it's a self-inflicted thing. You don't have to be a struggling cartoonist. You can just get a fucking job. [Spurgeon laughs] It kind of irritates me. That whole aspect of, "I'm so poor; I just want to do my artwork." Not everyone can make money from their artwork. That's a very privileged thing to be able to do, that even if you're a great artist you can't always achieve. So sometimes you just have to nut up and get a job. The stuff that I was talking about in Infinite Wait, that came from a childhood of not having money, and growing up poor in a very rich town. I had no control over that financial situation.
SPURGEON: Do you think that has an effect on your decision-making now? You talked about not pursuing things that might be better for your career; do you think your unique perspective allows you to make stronger decisions?
WERTZ: Yeah. When you don't grow up with money, it's never of great importance. It's never a goal. I've always just wanted enough money that I could live the life I'm living now. I live alone, which is great. I don't need a whole lot of money to do what I do and be happy with it. Making money was never really a goal. When you grow up without money, you never assume you'll have it. I feel like I have it in the sense that I live the life I want to live. I don't need any more. That's why I'm able to turn down opportunities that might be more lucrative because I'm happy with where I'm at.
SPURGEON: Is it weird to take that kind of stand in public? I remember when you posted the strip about turning down the screenwriting/television work, people were hectoring you about this specific personal choice you'd made. I couldn't believe that people thought they had a vote. Have you become accustomed to that aspect of it, that people think they get to weigh in on what you're up to?
WERTZ: Yeah, I mean [laughs] that's the problem with the Internet, that people think they do get a say in your life and the way you live it. When I turned down that deal, a lot of people, they were like, "You're an idiot." [Spurgeon laughs] When you're not a creative person, if you're just someone that views the creative world as a spectator, you sort of assume that everyone's ultimate goal is to go to Hollywood and make that kind of money. That was never, ever my goal. It wasn't something I even thought of until it was right in front of my face. It wasn't something I was striving for, so it was very logical for me to turn it down when it wasn't what I wanted. People from an outside point of view don't understand that's not everyone's goal. Even people in the TV world were totally baffled why that wasn't my goal. "Isn't this what all artists want? Look at all this money we're going to give you. This is what you wanted since forever." The fact that I didn't want that, it's just confusing to a lot of people, I think.
SPURGEON: How typical are you in your peer group, maybe not this specific decision but more generally? You talk in Infinite Wait about the Pizza Island experience. Are you guys all going through these kinds experiences? Are you typical in terms of how you and your friends are processing these issues?
WERTZ: Yeah, definitely. I think so. When I was in Pizza Island, three of us were working with big publishers, and we all got dropped at the same time.
SPURGEON: And does that make that decision easier, having other people around making those decisions? You talked in Infinite Wait about suddenly discovering you had fellow travelers, an artistic peer group.
WERTZ: Yeah. We can definitely talk about it. Oh, we shit-talked so hard and that's always delightful to be able to do that with people at the same sort of level. I don't feel like I'm flying blind here at all. It's definitely a comfort.
*****
* The Infinite Wait And Other Stories through Julia Wertz
* The Infinite Wait And Other Stories through Secret Acres
* The Infinite Wait And Other Stories at Koyama Press
* Museum Of Mistakes
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* photo of Wertz taken at SPX 2012
* cover to the new book
* images from the new work hopefully used so well that there's no question as to why they're being used
* end image from the work (below)
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***** Julia Wertz turns 30 later this year, which seems to me an excellent time for any cartoonist to release their best work to date. Koyama Press'newoffers up three stories about the young cartoonist's life: one about her being diagnosed with lupus, one about her hometown library and one about her vocational history. Wertz's comics have always been funny, but in these stories we see a bit more of a formally restless comics-maker: plopping her jokes wherever she likes on the page, taking what might seem like long digressions into side-issues and stand-alone anecdotes, structuring entire sequences around a visual memory to match her facility with remembered dialogue. I liked it quite a bit, and I've been intrigued by some of the things which she's written and said through her comics about working with smaller publishers after her time working with bigger ones. I'm happy Julia took some time away from doing things in support of the new book to talk to me. At least two of those things are forthcoming: she's appearing with Nate Bulmer at Desert Island on November 15 and will be in conversation with Ellen Forney at the Strand on Nov 19th. You should go. -- Tom Spurgeon*****Infinite Wait from you directly. I wondered how much of that stuff overall you have to do for a release like this one?You mean like all the packaging and stuff?comfortableThe way that [Koyama Press Publisher] Annie [Koyama] and I did this book is that instead of getting royalties she just gave me a set amount of free books that I then sell. So it's a whole lot of... I'm actually packaging stuff right now. It's very tedious: a lot of sitting around and making keychains and signing books. It takes a couple of weeks to get those orders out.All I did was SPX for this book; I'm not going to APE or anything. I don't know, I feel like I could be doing more shows. I'll be doing a book release thing, and then I have this conversation with -- you know Ellen Forney?I'll be doing a conversation with her at The Strand.Doing this kind of deal, I was able to get more money because I put together package deals: keychains, hand-drawn panels, mixed tapes, sales that wouldn't exist if I just received royalties. There isn't much, if any, money in small press so you have to find other ways to make it work.They're into their artists. They're into their artists making money and getting the recognition and the benefits of their work, as opposed to a big publisher where they're all about, "How canmake money off of this?"Yeah. I wrote about this in the book. With the big publishers I said I wanted to do a book about having lupus and they said, "That's not mass-marketable." And they wanted to see a proposal by me. So that didn't sit well. They also don't table or anything, so they just sort of put the book out and that's it. I would end up spending my advance money on travel and tabling and it did not work out. It feels cold, because they don't care about it at all. They don't have any investment in the book once it's published other than whether it sells or not.I decided to take it to Annie because I really like what she's doing with Koyama. She's very artist-positive, and she shows up for them and she tables. It was more of a personal decision. Also she liked the idea of doing a story about lupus as opposed to being, "That's not going to sell." She never thinks about what sells or what's going to sell. That's really not something that's on her agenda. You know how it was, that there was a bubble where all the cartoonists were getting big publishing deals and that bubble sort of burst. I think it was good. We all went back to where we belong, which is small press. These indy comics aren't mass-marketable. I just feel it's sort of good to be with my people again. These are people that are going to care about the work.It makes no sense. They estimate that there's two million people in America with it. Auto-immune diseases in general... I mean, you can even group AIDS into that if you have to.I would like that, but it's not as much of a thing I want. When I talk about my drinking problem, I really want the people that have the same problem to read that. This one is not so much where I want people to connect with it -- I do get e-mails that say, "Yeah, I went through the same experience and it's really nice to see someone joke about it on paper. It's so horrible when it's happening."Yeah. Yeah, definitely I think it was affecting my work. As soon as there's a lot of money and a lot of prestige involved I caught myself leaving certain things out. With comics you kind of veer into a very weird avenue or just things that don't read well to them. They don't like books that don't have a conclusion, that aren't really about anything. Short stories are very hard to sell.I caught myself... there was one story where I wanted to get a little bit meta with it: put a diary comic in it, so it would be a different style. The editor said, "This is going to confuse people; just stick to your style." I definitely caught myself tailoring it to a larger audience. I don't want to work that way. Even though I could do what I wanted, it's a mental block that I have to work differently to sort of please them.Also during the time I decided to do this book with Annie was when I was dealing with a Hollywood deal that I ended up killing because of this reason. I just came to the conclusion that even thought it's not financially beneficial for me to work this way, so independently, it's not worth the money for me to be miserable for it to affect my creativity. That's the one thing I want to have control over at all times. If having money in it is affecting it, I don't want to do that. Even if it might be a smart career move, I just don't give a shit. [Spurgeon laughs]Yeah.I should more than I do. Especially because there are some errors inthat we did not catch. I guess it would be nice to have more professional people on top of it, I guess? [laughs] I will get help from friends to get that feedback. I feel that one of the big-publisher editors I had didn't give me the kind of feedback that was even helpful. Once she took a page and actually circled a punchline and wrote in the margins, "Can you make this funnier?"That made me so angry. I called her and I was like, "Don't ever tell me how to write a punchline for a comic." This person didn't know comics. Their editing doesn't help me with the comics; their editing is more like does it make sense to an average Barnes & Noble reader who wants a story that has a beginning and a middle and some sort of satisfying, wrapped-up end.I don't really work with people who give me feedback on it, because I just want to do what I want to do. Working with a small press means that it won't reach a larger audience. I won't break through that ceiling -- I don't know if that makes any sense. You can only go so far in comics, and if I stick with small publishers it will be harder to break through to a large audience unless I did some kind of TV deal.Well, thank you.With this one... you've read my earlier work, so you know how it was set up in four panels to be 1, 2, 3, punchline. That was very easy to do. WithI kind of throw the punchline in the middle of the page. It's actually easier that way because that's the way natural dialogue happens. It's not at the end and then the conversation's over. That's how I'm going to work from now on. I'm not going to do any of that punchline stuff.It's not really that complicated. When I'm going through times in my life that I know I'm going to turn into a comic, I write down all conversations I have that I think are worth remembering. In this case I had drawn this comic out many years ago in stick figure form. So I was basically recording dialogue how it is, how it is in real life. It's actually pretty easy.Half of it is compulsive recording. Actually, I have a very good memory for dialogue. It's a little bit creepy. I can recall conversations I had years ago, like verbatim. I think that that's just a natural skill, I guess. Maybe it's helped by recording and knowing I should remember something. But I don't know, I can remember conversations I had as a teenager word for word, so I think that's just sort of a natural thing.I'll work on it a little bit. Sometimes I'll have said a joke way later. And I'll be like, "Oh, I should have said that." A lot of conversations with my brother we would have over text messaging, and then in the comic I turned them into face to face because reading three pages of text messages does not make any sense. [laughter] I'll take conversations that happened over a week and put them into one afternoon. In that way, I sort of manipulate time and conversations. I'll take snippets of conversations and act as if they happened in an hour. There's a little bit of poetic license, I guess.I'm totally happy to hear that. It's a little bit tricky, too, though, because my brother and I, I've had friends say that if you transcribed your brother's and your conversations you would not know who said what because we have exactly the same sense of humor and have the same things we joke about. I tried to make him a little bit more dry, which is absolutely how he is. He's very good at insulting me. It was a little bit tricky because we talk the exact same way. I didn't want it to appear as if I was putting punchlines in his mouth. All his punchlines, they're all things he said in real life. Sometimes I do think it sounds a little bit too much like my character, but that's what happens, so that's what I went with.That's something I've really not considered too much. I would assume it's a reflection of myself. There are definitely things I don't work on because I'm just talking about myself. I tend to handle things in real life maybe with more humor. I'm a little bit more blase about things in real life because that's my defense. I think that comes out in the work. I will try to make my character not look too much like she's using it as a defense. I want to have the moments of humanity in there. I wonder if there's a little bit more mopey scenes. In the one I'm working on about trying to get sober, there's a few more of those. It's a little bit less jokey; I don't want that to be my gimmick: "this person clearly has a problem where they can't deal with anything without making a joke about it." So I'll probably veer away a little bit. But because that's a natural response, that's how my work comes out.It was a very instant and positive reaction. I also don't think that's too common in comics because most people grow up with comics. It never hits them over the head like that. I had never seen that kind of graphic novel before. So it was so instant. I loved it immediately, and I'm not reallythings. It takes a lot for me to be into something, but I don't know, right away I knew -- I didn't know I wanted to do it, but I knew this was a thing I was going to be obsessed with for a while.A lot of it had to do with just the way that they drew. Julie Doucet's and Will Eisner's artwork. I didn't know that comics could be that kind of artwork; I was only familiar withandand. Then they had these really detailed drawings of the city⦠or of their bedrooms. You know how Julie draws her bedrooms? I had no idea that the art could be that pleasing. I could spend all this time looking at it.I didn't understand before that there's a connection to the writing with that kind of artwork -- it fills in the blanks. The kinds of comics I was reading before, they don't fill in the blanks: they complement the text. That's how newspaper funnies work. I had no idea they could be so interconnected, that looking at the artwork could be like reading between the lines of a story. I just didn't know you could tell stories like that. Where a lot of it is silent. I think that's what really connected with me, because I had never seen that before.I hope it does. I definitely try to make the artwork tell parts of the story as opposed to just being complementary. I also know that I have a lot of limitations as an artist. I'm not as good as the average person working in comics. They did their art first and then came into comics storytelling, where I did it in reverse.I may have talked about this in the first interview we did, where I choose to do it simple because that's the way people connect to it, they can project themselves into it more than a very detailed image, which separates the artists and the reader feels that they're looking at an artist's interpretation of something as opposed to putting themselves to it. I think that my lack of artistic skill can be of benefit to the work itself in terms of progressing the story.Yeah. I hadn't really thought about it. But I guess the more complicated the work gets, the more complicated the art style gets... I don't think that was a conscious decision. I think that was me developing as an artist and wanting to put more time into the artwork. I've been debating working for my next on maybe not putting the more detailed backgrounds from, more detailed than previous work. I wonder if I should not do that, not only to save time, but also I feel it gets a little repetitive and distracting. That just might be more of a personal decision, though, not so much a conscious one.I think it's in those backgrounds where it comes through. I'm terrible at drawing people, but I think I've become good at drawing simplified versions of the backgrounds. Not so much the artwork but I like what I did with the artwork in the short story about the library. There are a lot of books; it helped create the environment.Yeah. It's not as strong or persistent as the dialogue memories, but when I have something from my childhood that had a visual sensation, I can very easily recall it in my memory. I have memories from early childhood when you're really not supposed to have memories. Those memories are very visual: the pattern of a couch or the pattern of a dress that I sort of took a picture of and then remember it for forever. If it was something I was obsessed with, like a secret hole I could hide in -- which I have a lot of -- that just stuck with me and I would try to draw it verbatim as I remember it.Actually, now that you've said that I feel like it was an accident to go last. I should have put the short story in the middle to break up the two long ones.The book that's coming out next I actually drew the whole thing, I drew 220 pages of it. I did that before I did this book. I'm going to trash it and re-do it.I do this book; I haven't made up my mind whether or not I'm going to do it. The stuff I reference as unpublished in that book is childhood stories that I haven't had time to really work on. I've maybe drawn six pages of it. I have a lot of that stuff, where it's just random pages I want to work on. I've got that whole beast of a book that's just sitting there.Well, there you go. I have a whole book. The year and a half I worked on that I'm going to flush down the toilet.Just the work. It's good that I did it, because I have something to work with as opposed to just starting the book blindly. It does mean that I just spent a year and a half on artwork I'm not using.I think what you're getting at -- tell me if I'm wrong -- is that when cartoonists talk about being broke, it's a self-inflicted thing. You don'tto be a struggling cartoonist. You can just get a fucking job. [Spurgeon laughs] It kind of irritates me. That whole aspect of, "I'm so poor; I just want to do my artwork." Not everyone can make money from their artwork. That's a very privileged thing to be able to do, that even if you're a great artist you can't always achieve. So sometimes you just have to nut up and get a job. The stuff that I was talking about in, that came from a childhood of not having money, and growing up poor in a very rich town. I had no control over that financial situation.Yeah. When you don't grow up with money, it's never of great importance. It's never a goal. I've always just wanted enough money that I could live the life I'm living now. I live alone, which is great. I don't need a whole lot of money to do what I do and be happy with it. Making money was never really a goal. When you grow up without money, you never assume you'll have it. I feel like I have it in the sense that I live the life I want to live. I don't need any more. That's why I'm able to turn down opportunities that might be more lucrative because I'm happy with where I'm at.Yeah, I mean [laughs] that's the problem with the Internet, that people think they do get a say in your life and the way you live it. When I turned down that deal, a lot of people, they were like, "You're an idiot." [Spurgeon laughs] When you're not a creative person, if you're just someone that views the creative world as a spectator, you sort of assume that everyone's ultimate goal is to go to Hollywood and make that kind of money. That was never, ever my goal. It wasn't something I even thought of until it was right in front of my face. It wasn't something I was striving for, so it was very logical for me to turn it down when it wasn't what I wanted. People from an outside point of view don't understand that's not everyone's goal. Even people in the TV world were totally baffled why that wasn't my goal. "Isn't this what all artists want? Look at all this money we're going to give you. This is what you wanted since forever." The fact that I didn't want that, it's just confusing to a lot of people, I think.Yeah, definitely. I think so. When I was in Pizza Island, three of us were working with big publishers, and we all got dropped at the same time. Lisa [Hanawalt] is doing a book with Drawn and Quarterly. We're all in the same boat of getting back to working with our people and being really happy with us. There's a lot of discussion. I spent time in Minneapolis talking about Koyama and Tom K's Uncivilized Book s, and Spit and a Half Distro. It's very exciting. I think we're happy to be in the same boat, working with less, I guess.Infinite WaitYeah. We can definitely talk about it. Oh, we shit-talked so hard and that's always delightful to be able to do that with people at the same sort of level. I don't feel like I'm flying blind here at all. It's definitely a comfort.*********** photo of Wertz taken at SPX 2012* cover to the new book* images from the new work hopefully used so well that there's no question as to why they're being used* end image from the work (below)***************Objectivity is correctly cited as an elemental trait of good journalists, which is exhibited in their ability to separate fact from fiction regardless of their personal biases. Some people unfortunately confuse that trait with the concept of equivalence that suggests all points of view are inherently equal. Objectivity and equivalence are not the same.
People and journalists in the United States are asking a lot of questions in the wake of the deadly protests, riots and attacks that occurred over the weekend in Charlottesville, Virginia. Those questions grow more complex as the White House continues to issue conflicting statements.
For journalists covering Charlottesville, its effect on their communities or similar events, the question may be: How can I objectively cover people who spew racism, anti-Semitism, homophobia and other outdated and repugnant beliefs?
The answer is that we objectively know that discrimination based on sex, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability and other inherited traits is wrong. Journalists should feel free to say so and forcefully challenge people who believe otherwise.
The Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics takes a hard line against discrimination in several ways. The Code says ethical journalism boldly tells the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience and doesn’t stereotype. The document also says ethical journalism “treats sources, subjects, colleagues and members of the public as human beings deserving of respect.”
The profession would also be hypocritical to promote diversity in newsrooms in one moment and then suggest discriminatory views inherently deserve an equal airing in another.
Journalists and news organizations can’t ignore people with those hateful views, however. The events and horrors that occurred in Charlottesville can’t go unnoticed. In those cases, journalists must remain professional and civil. They and their news organization must be especially cautious not to inflate situations or make matters worse.
Additionally, journalists and news organizations need to be on the scene to record the events and send them to people in their homes. Those who disagree should read Gene Roberts and Hank Klibanoff’s The Race Beat.
“If it hadn’t been for the media – the print and television media – the civil rights movement would have been like a bird without wings, a choir without a song,” civil rights icon and U.S. Representative John Lewis (D-GA5) is quoted as saying at the end of the book.
Conversations about racism and discrimination are uncomfortable, but unavoidable in a country that has slavery and oppression in its genetic code.
Journalists and news organizations can’t make this problem go away by ignoring it. Fortunately it’s a problem with a well-known and proven answer. Journalists should tell and lead by example by promoting that answer: discrimination is wrong.
Andrew M. Seaman is the chair of the Society of Professional Journalists‘ ethics committee.
Tags: Antisemitism, Charlottesville, Civil Rights, Code of Ethics, Discrimination, Diversity, Hate, LGBT, media, Media Ethics, Objectivity, Press, Race, racism, Society of Professional Journalists, University of Virginia, White House
Defending the First Amendment and promoting open government are more crucial now than ever. Join SPJ's fight for the publics right to know either as an SPJ Supporter or a professional, student or retired journalist.[updated 26.03] ATV Edoardo Amaldi is performing extremely well!
As of mid-day yesterday, Saturday, the first two phasing manoeuvres (burns) had been completed, and, as of 19:09 CET, Amaldi was orbiting between 275 and 295km altitude. Additional phasing burns were conducted today; with each burn, ATV gets higher and closer to the ISS orbit. Average temperature inside the ATV cargo carrier? A comfy 21.5C. Overall status? Everything is nominal.
ATV-3 LEOP and approach to the ISS — animation showing solar arrays unfolding and rotating, proximity (ATV-to-ISS) antenna boom deployment and GPS signal acquisition.
One minor issue was seen during the Launch and Early Orbit Phase (LEOP) — it was noted that the ATV’s Proximity Link Antenna Boom (the Antenna Deployable Boom or ADB) had correctly deployed, but the final sensor confirmation that the boom was locked into place was not received.
The antenna is used for direct communication and data synchronisation between the ATV and Station during rendezvous (more details on the Proximity Link System here).
The ATV-CC operations team checked with the industry technical representatives, and it was suspected that there could be a problem with the boom, or with the locking sensor.
(You can see the boom deploy in YouTube video above or in the 2011 ATV music video here – at the 3:52 point.)
Yesterday, since ATV is orbiting just 100km below the ISS, it was decided to ask the crew to get a picture for a visual confirmation that the antenna was in place. The ATV attitude was accordingly manoeuvred a bit, so that the astronauts would get a good view of the antenna boom the next time ATV passed by below.
Before the astronauts could do so however, at 09:03 CEST this morning, the telemetry status from ATV switched over to ‘ADB Locked’. End of problem.
But what caused the sensor to switch to green? ESA’s Daniel Firre, the Mission Director on console this morning when it switched, says a number of causes are possible. It could be vibrations from the manoeuvre, exposure of a boom element to solar heat, or even the unfreezing of a small piece that might have been blocking the mechanism or the sensor.
Never let it be said that we don’t
show screen-shots of ATV telemetry
“This last status [confirms] the perfect behaviour of ATV; all its systems being nominal and leaving the ground teams happy and confident in this incredible vehicle,” said Firre.
“ATV-3 is on its way to ISS”
Follow-up 26.03:
NASA have posted this note in their daily Station report:
ATV Photography: In a last-minute addition to their timeline, between 2:55am-3:15am EDT CDR Burbank, FE-5 Kuipers & FE-6 Pettit shot long-lens photography of the ATV-3 (Automated Transfer Vehicle 3) cargo ship as it passed underneath the ISS at a closest range of 104 km. Purpose: Ground analysis of the photos to verify full deployment of the ATV proximity operations antenna boom. [There have been indications that the boom may not be fully deployed (no “boom locked” signal received after deployment after launch). For the photography, Dan, Andre & Don carefully removed window scratch panes 5 & 6 in the Cupola and later reinstalled them, using PPE (Personal Protective Equipment (dust masks, nitrile gloves, photo/TV lens cloth) to protect the window scratch panes and primary pressure pane glass.]Rush Limbaugh will be evacuating his home in Palm Beach, Fla., just days after stating that creating panic around hurricanes helps advance a climate change agenda.
“May as well announce this. I’m not going to get into details because of the security nature of things, but it turns out that we will not be able to do the program here tomorrow,” Limbaugh said on his nationally syndicated radio program on Thursday. “We’ll be on the air next week, folks, from parts unknown.”
Conservative political commentator and author Mark Steyn will fill in for Limbaugh of Friday.
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Tuesday
on Thursday
on Friday
Omg. "Legally impossible" = mandatory evacuation. This is too rich. Real deniers don't listen to evacuation orders. Fight the power, Rush. https://t.co/0NAqMHxxDG — Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) September 8, 2017
“Please evacuate as we are now telling you,” County Administrator Verdenia Baker said Thursday while urging residents to move to a local shelter or stay with family outside the evacuation zone.
“Evacuate miles — not hundreds of miles.”
Controversy swirled around Limbaugh throughout the week after the 66-year-old said that while he's "not a meteorologist," and nothing he says "should be considered to be a forecast or a prediction," he believes that hurricanes are often hyped to help increase ratings on the media side while driving sales for retailers who offer storm supplies."There is a desire to advance this climate change agenda, and hurricanes are one of the fastest and best ways to do it. You can accomplish a lot just by creating fear and panic," Limbaugh said. "You don’t need a hurricane to hit anywhere. All you need is to create the fear and panic accompanied by talk that climate change is causing hurricanes to become more frequent and bigger and more dangerous, and you create the panic, and it’s mission accomplished, agenda advanced.""Now, how do you do this? Well, any number of ways," he continued. "Let’s take South Florida television, for example. There is a symbiotic relationship between retailers and local media, and it’s related to money. It revolves around money. You have major, major industries and businesses which prosper during times of crisis and panic, such as a hurricane, which could destroy or greatly damage people’s homes, and it could interrupt the flow of water and electricity. So what happens?""Well, the TV stations begin reporting this and the panic begins to increase," he added. "And then people end up going to various stores to stock up on water and whatever they might need for home repairs and batteries and all this that they’re advised to get, and a vicious circle is created. You have these various retail outlets who spend a lot of advertising dollars with the local media."After heavy criticism from The Washington Post and NBC weatherman Al Roker, among others, Limbaugh devoted considerable time on his radio show to insist he had also said Hurricane Irma, a deadly Category 4 storm with winds of up to 185 mph that has been tracking to likely hit South Florida for days, was "dire" and mammoth.""It’s gonna affect Florida no matter where it goes. And the effects in Florida, depending on where, are gonna be damaging," Limbaugh said on his radio showLimbaugh also said it would be "legally impossible" to do his program, which CNN security analyst Juliette Kayyem noted means his area of Palm Beach County is under mandatory evacuation.Survey Results: Prepar3D & X-Plane up, FSX down
The Navigraph FlightSim Community Survey 2017 conducted between 20th October and 6th of November has now been compiled and partially analyzed. This year 3,187 respondents participated, which is an improvement over last year’s 2,200 participants.
This blog posts highlights some interesting and notable observations in the survey. What’s interesting and notable depends on the reader, but in general we can say that the average flight simmer is a 47 year old male living in the US, working full time, with an average of 16 years of flight simulation experience, flying a Lockheed Martin Prepar3D v.4, mainly out of interest, about five times a week, for a weekly average of 11.5 hours.
We also note that Lockheed Martin Prepar3D is now more popular than Microsoft FSX and that Laminar Research X-Plane has doubled in popularity since last year.
We at Navigraph really like surveys. It gives us a much better understanding of things that otherwise would have been, at best, educated guesses. We used the results of the 2016 survey to guide several of our development decisions. For this reason we want to thank all of you who participated. It also feels like you should gives yourselves a round of pats on the backs too, for helping to guide the future of flight simulation.
We organized this year’s survey according to the following topics:
Demographics
Relation to aviation
Simulator habits
Consumption habits
Community
Misc. product feedback
Here are some of the insights which we think might interest you:
Demographics
The average flight simmer has grown 3 years older on average since last year’s survey. This year your typical simmer is 47 years old, but last year he was 44. However, as seen from the histogram below, we have a younger generation coming, and a rather noticeable long tail. It seems, however, like flight simulation is not very popular during university studies.
This rise and dip below 30 is not noticeable in the 2013 AVSIM survey (below).
The long tail can be confirmed in our question about employment.
11.67% are in school, a full or part time student
52.06% are employed full time
21.21% are retired
We thought it was interesting to see that 1 in 5 of our users are retired.
The 2017 survey respondents live in:
United States 23.09% (13.84%)
United Kingdom 14.21% (7.66%)
Germany 10.83% (9.31%)
Canada 4.86% (2.70%)
Australia 4.68 (2.37%)
(Percentage of users from the Navigraph user database presented in parentheses.)
This distribution of countries aligns in ordinality with the 2013 AVSIM survey (below), but not in proportion. (As seen in the meta analysis section in the end of
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blaze.
Visibility was 350 metres (yards) at the time, it said, as Moscow saw its first snowfall of the winter on Monday.
The Interstate Aviation Committee, which investigates all Russian air accidents, said "it has been established that the driver of the snowplough was in a drunken state".
It added that a primary preliminary theory was that "an error by air traffic controllers and the actions of the snowplough driver" were to blame.
The possible role of "bad weather and errors by pilots will also be checked," it said, as France dispatched three experts to join in the investigation.
The committee also blamed senior airport officials for causing the accident through "criminal negligence" as they failed to ensure proper staff coordination.
Moscow transport investigators said they had opened a criminal probe into breaches of aviation safety rules causing multiple deaths through negligence, which carries a maximum jail term of seven years.
The snowplough driver has been detained, but his lawyer suggested that his client was being made a scapegoat.
"My client has chronic heart disease, he doesn't drink at all. His relatives and doctors can confirm this," lawyer Alexander Karabanov told Interfax news agency.
"We don't want the responsibility for the accident to be shifted to just another ordinary man," he added.
CEO since 2007
De Margerie had been chief executive of Total, Europe's third largest oil company after Shell and BP, since 2007 and spent his entire 40-year career there.
A descendant of a family of diplomats and business leaders, he was the grandson of Pierre Taittinger, founder of the eponymous champagne and the luxury goods dynasty.
Married with three children and highly regarded within the oil industry, he was known for his good humour.
De Margerie had taken over the helm of Total at a challenging time for the group.
Shortly after his nomination, he was handcuffed and taken into police custody for more than 24 hours over corruption claims in deals with Iran.
He also had to defend Total against allegations of corruption during the UN "oil-for-food" programme in Iraq.
De Margerie admitted the claims had taken their toll on the company."Most people, when they speak of Total do not know what it is, but know it is not good," he said in 2009.
First Published: Oct 21, 2014 10:23 ISTCharles Allen is the CEO of Bitcoin Shop, a publicly traded US bitcoin company that leverages Amazon’s affiliate program to sell a wide selection of e-commerce products for bitcoin, litecoin and dogecoin.
Bitcoin Shop is now seeking to expand its industry goals, recently making strategic investments in key partners, including California-based bitcoin buying service expresscoin and digital currency processor GoCoin, with the goal of using e-commerce to build a universal bitcoin company.
Allen recently spoke about his company’s ambitions at The North American Bitcoin Conference, held last weekend at Chicago’s McCormick Place convention center. CoinDesk sat down with Allen to learn more about his company, the pressures of being public and why he believes Bitcoin Shop is the most misunderstood company in the space.
CoinDesk: You’ve said that Bitcoin Shop is one of the more misunderstood companies in the bitcoin industry, and that you’re not simply an e-commerce play. Can you introduce us to your vision for Bitcoin Shop and its goals?
Charles Allen: Yeah, that’s not what we’re building. Just to give you an idea where we started, the company was founded by two engineers from NASA in June last year. We launched our initial website in September and basically realized that there are bitcoins, but nowhere to spend them. That’s not a business, that’s a short-term solution to a problem. No one accepts bitcoins, now there’s someone to do it. That’s not sustainable. I joined in January and have shifted the direction of the company.
In February, we were a lead investor in GoCoin, and we use them as a payment processor, so we now accept bitcoin, litecoin and dogecoin. We also just invested in expresscoin. What we want to do is use digital currency as an onramp to digital currency adoption, and the first step in that is redoing the website. Everyone was part-time until February and we haven’t touched the website since going public.
We need to be able to take bitcoin out of the equation and that e-commerce model needs to be a standalone business.
No one’s ever done this before […] Conceptually you could shop from all the big-box retailers you trust and we would find you the best price and they would ship it to you.
We believe if we create a solution where we connected to all these people, there’s a good reason people should shop on our site as opposed to [just] bitcoin.
Do you see Bitcoin Shop evolving to become more of a traditional e-commerce company, and less focused on bitcoin, over time?
You’re still thinking about e-commerce as the core of the business, and it is now, but we want to tie all the other service offerings in. If you think about it, it doesn’t make sense to have a wallet that isn’t integrated with a payment processor or that isn’t integrated with a merchant. It’s not all tied together. You need a universal solution, then a customer can have one point of access and do all their transactions.
If you have a wallet, now you have to connect your wallet to your exchange or your payment processor. You have all these different usernames and passwords and logins, and you’re building this ecosystem of different providers that you have to manage and deal with.
We believe that we can create a unified solution through partnerships, where you can do everything in one stop, where you can shop and exchange, and you could buy products, you can get bitcoin, collecting all of the pieces, but e-commerce is the onramp.
The nice thing about e-commerce: business models are unproven at bitcoin companies. If you’re a wallet, how are you going to make money? Should a wallet be a free service that’s offered by a company?
If you start thinking about all these pieces its very difficult to transact and work in bitcoin, because no one has come out with a very elegant solution. Coinbase has done a very good job, and the fact that they have an ACH [Automated Clearing House] relationship, so they can connect to your bank account, is a great lead, but it’s not a long-term competitive advantage.
E-commerce is nice because no one is going to complain about us getting affiliate fees from the merchants we purchase from, whereas people may complain about paying for a wallet service, so a lot of the models that are being built are just untested. What is a consumer willing to pay for versus what are they not willing to pay for?
So you see Bitcoin Shop and its partner ecosystem becoming like a Coinbase, Circle-type consumer solution?
Yes, our investing in expresscoin is the step in that direction. They don’t have the ACH connection, but they’re connected to ATMs, they can wire money in, they have agents. But to be able to seamlessly offer that for our website is where I want to go.
We’ve raised just under $2m, so we’re partnering with other companies in the space that we believe we can connect with to offer a seamless solution over time. Right now the core team is putting the new website out the door and once that’s done we’re going to work to integrate expresscoin.
Our competitive advantage today is that we’re the only public company in this space.
I know you’ve said that an advantage to investing in Bitcoin Shop is the exposure investors get to companies like expresscoin and GoCoin. Do you see Bitcoin Shop becoming almost like an exchange-traded fund for investors?
I would say it’s more like a public private equity fund or like a BT6 [equity fund]. So right now, you’re right. For investors in our company, we trade anywhere from $400,000-$500,000 a day in stock. So, if you bought $10,000 worth of stock you could sell that quite easily at current volumes. When you think about for the general public, if you want to be exposed to bitcoin, you can buy bitcoin or you can buy my stock.
If you buy my stock, you get exposed to GoCoin and expresscoin, and we have an option to invest $1m in expresscoin at its current valuation. I’m not looking to be a publically traded fund; the investments I’ve made to date are strategic because I want to integrate with these companies.
For now, Bitcoin Shop is still an e-commerce company. How affected are you by new merchants that enter the bitcoin ecosystem? Is good merchant news for bitcoin bad for Bitcoin Shop?
I think it’s a positive in that the more big merchants come on, the more people want bitcoin. I think most of the merchants coming online are doing it because it’s free PR.
Dell accepts bitcoin. I’m sure they’ll talk to you or be on Bloomberg. They can be in the media to drive awareness and their customer acquisition [costs] are lower, which is great. The more adoption there is, the more its going to force regulators to make decisions.
Do you feel like Bitcoin Shop will need to rebrand in order to better communicate its goals of becoming a universal bitcoin company?
You’ll notice we bought BTCS.com. That’s our stock ticker, so there may be a point where we’ll think about rebranding when the time is right. Right now, I think it needs to be reflective of the business model we have in place.
This interview has been edited for length.
Image via BloombergHow many different ways can the Republican debates be depressing? Thursday night’s debate in Sioux City, the last before the January 3rd caucus in Iowa, was depressing in many familiar respects: There was Newt Gingrich’s smirking assertion that Barack Obama is a “Saul Alinsky radical”; Rick Santorum’s declaration that Iran is led by “the equal of al Qaeda” (it’s bad enough, Rick!); Mitt Romney’s demagogic patter about American exceptionalism; Rick Perry’s proposal that the legislative branch of the United States should meet for a hundred and forty days every other year, “like in Texas.” (Perry seemed almost amazed by his ability to get through a sentence without catastrophe: “I’m kinda gettin’ where I like these debates!”)
But there’s another subject that always seems to crop up, directly or not, in the Republican debates, and in the campaign, generally—and almost always with an ugly ring.
In terms of civil rights, in terms of the progress of human decency, one of the clearest political victories of 2011—a long and cruelly delayed victory—is the triumph, last June, of marriage equality in the State of New York. This is a victory that will, if we are lucky, spread to many more states and has already enriched the lives of countless gay and lesbian couples. That the remaining Republican candidates (except, notably, Ron Paul) have found so many ways to deride this right, so long in coming, is appalling. History should not forget that at this late date Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, and, most recently, Newt Gingrich—politicians who propose to inspire and lead—have pandered to fear and much worse by pledging their support for a Constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.
Since Gingrich is still the non-Romney flavor of the moment, let’s focus on him. In an interview with the Des Moines Register this week, the former Speaker of the House, a self-regarding “man of ideas,” ranged freely on the subject. He told the paper that he would also revive the retrograde policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell” in the military, because, “I don’t think that in the military you would particularly want sexual behavior to be an overt issue.”
Gingrich also had things to say on why people have one sexual predilection or another. “I think people have a significant range of choice within a genetic pattern. I don’t believe in genetic determinism, and I don’t think there is any great evidence of genetic determinism,” he theorized. “There are propensities. Are you more likely to do this or more likely to do that? But that doesn’t mean it’s definitional.” When he was asked if someone could choose to be heterosexual, he said, “Look, people choose to be celibate. People choose many things in life. You know, there is a bias in favor of non-celibacy. It’s part of how the species recreates. And yet there is a substantial amount of people who choose celibacy as a religious vocation or for other reasons.” Does it bear repeating why it is more than sickening to hear Newt Gingrich counsel others on the benefits of sexual restraint?
Gingrich, as it happens, has a half-sister, Candace Gingrich-Jones, who is a lesbian, and she recently told ABC News that while her relationship with Gingrich was “cordial” (“uncle-niece-like,”), she “could not support the campaign of somebody who doesn’t think I deserve the same rights as other people.”
Gingrich-Jones is, in fact, married to a woman named Rebecca Jones. Newt Gingrich did not attend the 2009 ceremony; he was on a trip abroad. “I don’t know whether the trip was planned before or after the invitation,” Gingrich-Jones told ABC. “But I’ve known since the nineteen-nineties, he’s said if I ever had a wedding and married a woman he wouldn’t come.” Newt did not send a gift or a card, she added. Gingrich-Jones said she plans to support Obama in the 2012 race: “The things we saw happen in the last four years of the Obama Administration would all, or many of them, go away under a President Gingrich. It would be a huge setback.”
In Sioux City, Mitt Romney wriggled on the issue. He is a coin of many sides. Asked about gay rights, in general, he said, “I do not believe in discriminating against people based on their sexual orientation. Some people do.” He said that when he was governor of Massachusetts, he had a gay member of his administration and would never ask potential judges their sexual orientation. When Rick Santorum said that Romney, despite his opposition to gay marriage, had signed gay-marriage licenses, Romney said, well, he had no choice, because the Massachusetts Supreme Court had ruled gay marriage legal: “I fought it every way I possibly could.”
Photograph by Scott Olson/Getty Images.LAVAL - After Michael McNiven finished his journey in Junior and turned pro this season, he probably wasn't expecting to be the number-one goalie for an American Hockey League team quite so soon.
But due to a slew of injuries which afflicted several goalies in the Canadiens organization, the 20-year-old quickly climbed the ladder and found himself tending goal for the Laval Rocket.
"It's a good experience being up here instead of Brampton. It's only going to make me better. Everything is faster and quicker. We have a good group of guys here, so they've helped me along," acknowledged McNiven, who has a 2-3-0 record with the Habs' farm club. "I've just been given opportunities and I have to make the most of them."
While he would like to be playing with a bit more consistency, the Manitoban is still in learning mode. After all, he is just a few months removed from Junior, where he was named Canadian Hockey League goalie of the year for the 2016-17 campaign.
"I feel I could be a little more consistent, but yes. Every day, I need to keep working," he explained. "My job is to stop the puck, so I have to keep doing that."
McNiven got the call-up after his fellow Habs netminders started dropping like flies. With Carey Price and Al Montoya on the shelf in November, the Rocket found themselves without a goalie after both Charlie Lindgren and Zach Fucale were called up by the big club.
"It's not just us, Las Vegas is in the same situation. It happens so quickly, so it doesn't matter if you're in the East Coast [Hockey League] or even Junior. Las Vegas' backup goalie a week ago was a kid [from] Junior," McNiven said in referencing the Kamloops Blazers' Dylan Ferguson, who was called up on an emergency basis by the NHL's newest club. "You just always have to be ready, and when you get your opportunity, you have to make sure you're in the best shape possible. You just need to be ready 100%."
Being in the best shape possible has a totally different meaning than it does in Junior, and that's one of the challenges facing the young netminder, who was never drafted.
"He's young, and he's a competitive goalie. So he has to develop certain habits and have a certain personal discipline in order to maintain those habits, whether that be off-ice or even on the ice," outlined Rocket head coach Sylvain Lefebvre. "His cardio needs to be good and he needs to be in good shape."
On the ice, McNiven is well on his way to adjusting to life as a professional. Or at the very least, the experience is exactly what he was expecting it to be.
"Since my first game in Springfield, it's everything I expected. It took me a game to adjust there, that game in Springfield. Everything is starting to slow down for me, it's becoming a little bit easier every day," admitted McNiven. "It's starting to turn into a thinking game; you have to start reading the play more, knowing who has a left-handed or right-handed shot and reading where the shot is coming from. I'm trying to think a bit more, know where everyone is on the ice at all times and just keep my speed up with them."
McNiven can also count on Fucale's support to help with his adjustment. The two have known each other for a little while now, having participated in several Team Canada Program of Excellence camps in Calgary over the last few years.
"It was frustrating going to those camps, because I had never had a goalie coach before. During some of the drills, it was a bit tougher for me when I was younger. Zach would always say to me, 'We'll see you around. Don't worry, everything will work out,'" recalled McNiven. "Funnily enough, two years later I end up in the same place he is.
"He's been nothing but a good guy and goalie partner. He's never negative, he's always a positive guy," he concluded. "That helps a lot with learning, as well as in games and everyday life."Mary of Egypt among sinners in the port of Alexandria. Emil Nolde (1867-1956), 1912. Kunsthalle (Museum of Art), Hamburg, Germany.
Men have a propensity to compete to be first and to argue about who was first. Writing about 375 GC, Jerome noted that who was the first important Christian hermit “has been a subject of wide-spread and frequent discussion.” Jerome teed up that observation in the first sentence of his work, “Life of Paul the First Hermit”. Jerome’s “Life of Paul the First Hermit” implicitly competed against Evagrius of Antioch’s popular translation of the Life of Antony, completed in 374 GC. [1] Jerome put forward the claim that Paul, not Antony, was the first important Christian hermit. That argument eventually led to honoring the penitent harlot St. Mary of Egypt.
Jerome signified the primacy of Paul over Antony in a variety of ways. Paul was 23 years older than Antony. Jerome narrated:
“the thought occurred to {Antony}, that no hermit-monk more perfect than himself had settled in the desert. However, in the stillness of the night it was revealed to him that there was farther in the desert a much better man than he, and that he ought to go and visit him [Paul].”[2]
Antony made a difficult, dangerous journey to visit Paul. At first Paul refused to see him, but Antony’s pleadings won Paul over. They competed in humility to have the other break bread for a meal. They finally agree to simultaneously break bread together for their meal. Paul requested to be buried in the cloak that Bishop Athanasius gave Antony. Antony, in awe of Paul’s presence, readily agreed. After Paul’s death, Antony took the tunic Paul had woven for himself out of palm-leaves. Antony kept Paul’s garment and wore it on the most holy days of Easter and Pentecost. If Antony recognized Paul as first among hermits, who could dare claim Antony to be first?
The “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot”, probably from the sixth or seventh century, implicitly acknowledged competition in providing stories about saints’ lives. The narrator’s frame for Mary’s life justified as a religious obligation publicly recording her life. The narrator’s frame emphasized the truthfulness of the account. The sexual dimension of Mary of Egypt’s life probably helped to motivate these meta-assertions. Yet sexual temptations and activities were issues that early Christians openly discussed. The life ends with assertion and denial of competitive striving:
“The monks continued to pass on these events by word of mouth from one generation to the other, presenting them as a model {of ascetic life}, to benefit those who wish to listen. However, to this day they have never heard that anyone else has set this story down in writing. I have put down in this written narrative what I had heard by word of mouth. Perhaps others, too, have written the Life of the blessed {woman}, and probably in a more imposing style than my own, even though nothing of this sort has ever come to my attention. Nevertheless, I wrote this story to the best of my ability, desiring to prefer nothing but the truth.”[3]
Primacy in writing and concern for style and writing ability are matters of personal status. They are common competitive issues beyond making truth widely known. The sensational sexual dimension of Mary of Egypt’s life made it a particularly potent competitor to other saints’ lives.
The “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot” describes monastic community rules designed to suppress competition among monks. In that account, the monk Zosimas, like the monk Antony in Jerome’s “Life of Paul the First Hermit”, was an exceptionally good monk concerned about whether another monk existed better than he:
“Is there any man among those leading a contemplative life in the desert who surpasses me in ascetic practice or spiritual contemplation?” [4]
Pondering this question, Zosimas received the command to go forth “to learn how many other ways lead to salvation.” Zosimas went forth and joined a community of monks who excelled in ascetic life and spiritual contemplation. On the first Sunday of Lent, each monk went out to be alone in the desert. They returned on Palm Sunday. The monks’ spiritual struggles in the desert were by institutional rule non-competitive:
“there was a rule that each monk observed as an inviolable law: not to be concerned with the way that the other monks practiced self-restraint or conducted themselves. … Each monk returned {to the monastery}, having as the fruits of his own purpose his own conscience, which knew how he had labored and with what toil he had sown the seeds {of his spiritual struggle}. No {monk} asked another anything whatsoever about how or in what way he had exerted himself in his struggle. This was the rule of the monastery and in this way it was well fulfilled. For when each of them is in the desert, he struggles by himself under the supervision of God, the Judge of the contest, so that he may free himself from the desire to please men or to practice self-restraint in order to show off. For those actions actions undertaken for the sake of men and performed in order to please them, not only do not benefit the one who does them, but are an additional cause of much harm to him.”[5]
This institutional rule indicates the reality of the corresponding problem. Early Christian monks competed with each other to be recognized as outstanding in ascetic discipline and spiritual purity.[6]
The penitent humility of the harlot Mary of Egypt trumped monks’ competition in ascetic discipline and spiritual purity. Zosimas didn’t follow the monastery’s rule on non-competition. He rapidly journeyed to the innermost part of the desert hoping to find a holy father. He encountered instead Mary of Egypt, naked and burnt black by the sun. She fled from him. He chased her and begged her for a blessing. Finally, when he was exhausted, she turned to him and addressed him by name. She described herself as a sinful woman. She asked him for his blessing. Like Antony and Paul arguing over who should break the bread for their meal, Zosimas and Mary argued over who should bless whom. With poignant irony, Mary, deferring to Zosimas’ priestly authority, obeyed his request for her to bless him.
Zosimas recognized that the penitent harlot Mary of Egypt was spiritually superior to him. Further parallels to the “Life of Paul the First Hermit” figure Zosimas as Antony and Mary as Paul. [7] Mary of Egypt, the former harlot, emerged as the ultimate victor in competition for ascetic and spiritual excellence among desert hermits.
Notes:
[1] Rebenich (2009).
[2] Jerome, “Life of Paul the First Hermit”, from Latin trans. Freemantle (1892), adapted slightly.
[3] “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot”, from Greek trans. Kouli (1996) pp. 92-3. The ancient translation into Latin is similar. Ward (1987) provides an English translation, as well as excerpts in translation from earlier accounts.
[4] “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot”, from Greek trans. Kouli (1996) p. 72. Jerome’s “Life of Paul the First Hermit” was highly popular and rapidly translated into Greek. It almost surely was known to the author of the “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot”.
[5] Id. pp. 74-5.
[6] Surviving collections of stories of early Christian hermits include the “Lausiac History” of Palladius, the “Meadow” of John Moschos, and the “Apophthegmata Patrum” (Sayings of the Fathers).
[7] Antony and Zosimas see Paul and Mary in extraordinary spiritual visions: “in robes of snowy white ascending on high among the bands of angels” (Paul), walking on water (Mary). Like Antony at Paul’s request, Zosimas returns to his community at Mary’s request. Antony and Zosimas bury Paul and Mary, respectively, with the help of lions digging the graves.
References:
Kouli, Maria. 1996. “Life of Mary of Egypt, the Former Harlot.” Pp. 65-94 in Talbot, Alice-Mary Maffry, ed. 1996. “Holy women of Byzantium: ten saints’ lives in English translation”. Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.
Freemantle, William Henry, trans. 1892. “The Life of Paulus the First Hermit.” In “The Principal Works of St. Jerome”. Philip Schaff, ed. “Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers”, 2nd Series, vol. 6. Oxford: Parker.
Rebenich, Stefan. 2009. “Inventing an Ascetic Hero: Jerome’s Life of Paul the First Hermit.” Pp. 13-28 in Cain, Andrew, and Josef Lössl. 2009. “Jerome of Stridon his life, writings and legacy”. Farnham, England: Ashgate.
Ward, Benedicta. 1987. “Harlots of the desert: a study of repentance in early monastic sources”. Kalamazoo, Mich: Cistercian Publications.
Douglas Galbi at http://purplemotes.net/2014/12/07/penitent-harlot-mary-egypt-hermits/
Like this: Like Loading... RelatedHusain Abdullah is a devout Muslim. He’s also a safety for the Chiefs, and he made a promise to himself if he ever did find himself in the end zone.
“If I get a pick, I’m going to prostrate before God in the end zone,” Abdullah said.
Early in the fourth quarter, Abdullah dropped deep in a zone coverage, read Patriots quarterback Tom Brady’s eyes and broke hard, intercepting his pass.
Abdullah then dashed 39 yards to the end zone, slid on his knees and bowed in prayer.
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His celebration drew a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, but the NFL said Tuesday that Abdullah should not have been penalized.
The league’s rule book prohibits players from celebrating while on the ground, but spokesman Michael Signora wrote in an email Tuesday that “the officiating mechanic in this situation is not to flag a player who goes to the ground as part of religious expression, and as a result, there should have been no penalty on the play.”
There are exceptions made for religious expressions, such as Tim Tebow’s prayer while kneeling. But Abdullah may have drawn the flag by sliding with both knees into the prayer.
“For me, I just got a little too excited,” Abdullah said. “I think it was for the slide.”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil liberties and advocacy organization, issued a statement early Tuesday asking that the NFL take steps in response to the penalty.
“To prevent the appearance of a double standard, we urge league officials to clarify the policy on prayer and recognize that the official made a mistake in this case,” CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper said.
Game officials didn’t say anything to Abdullah after the play, but Chiefs coach Andy Reid did when Abdullah came to the sideline.
“He said, ‘You can’t slide,’” Abdullah said.
Although Reid isn’t sure that should be the case.
“When you go to Mecca, you should be able to slide wherever you want,” Reid said after the game. “We’ve got two priests in here. They’d probably vouch for me.”
The interception — the sixth of Abdullah’s career — was still a special moment despite the penalty, which sparked controversy on social media.
If the NFL tries to fine @HAbdullah39 for his TD celebration there's going to be some problems. — CJ LaBoy (@CJLaBoy) September 30, 2014
Abdullah has a special place in mind for the football he intercepted from Brady, a future Hall of Famer.
“That’s nice,” Abdullah said. “That’s definitely going up in the house. That’s a ball that’s definitely going up in the game room area, so it was amazing.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.Network Programming in ANSI Common Lisp with IOLib by: Peter Keller ([email protected]) Version 0.0 4/02/2010 What is IOLib? -------------- IOLib is a portable I/O library for ANSI Common Lisp. It includes socket interfaces for network programming with IPV4/IPV6 TCP and UDP, an I/O multiplexer that includes nonblocking I/O, a DNS resolver library, and a pathname library. Where do I get IOLib? --------------------- The current version of IOLib is found here: http://common-lisp.net/project/iolib/download.shtml Please use the repository located in the Live Sources section for the most up to date version of IOLib. Introduction ------------ This tutorial loosely follows the exposition of network programming in "UNIX Network Programming, Networking APIs: Sockets and XTI 2nd Edition" by W. Richard Stevens. Many examples are derived from the source codes in that book. Major deviations from the C sources include converting the concurrent examples which use fork() into threaded examples which use the portable Bordeaux Threads package, more structured implementations of certain concepts such as data buffers and error handling, and general movement of coding style towards a Common Lisp viewpoint. The scope of this version of the tutorial is: 0. Exposition suitable for programmers unfamiliar with ANSI Common Lisp 1. IPV4 TCP 2. Client/Server architecture 3. Iterative vs Concurrent (via threading) vs Multiplexed Server Design 4. Blocking and nonblocking I/O It is intended, however, that this tutorial grows to contain the entirety of IOLib's API as detailed in the Future Directions section of this tutorial. As newer revisions of this tutorial are released, those gaps will be filled until the whole of the IOLib API has been discussed. Finally, the example code in this tutorial is algorithmically cut from the actual example programs and inserted into the tutorial via a template generation method. The example codes have embedded in them a tiny markup language which facilitates this in the form (on a single line) of ';; ex-NNNb' to begin an example section, and ';; ex-NNNe' to end an example section--NNN stands for an enumeration integer for which each section's begin and end must match. Acknowledgements ---------------- I would like to greatly thank Stelian Ionescu, the author of IOLib for his exposition of the various features of IOLib and his patience in our sometimes long conversations. Supporting Code --------------- The file package.lisp contains a small library of codes used widely in the examples. The supporting code implements: 0. The package containing the examples, called :iolib.examples. 1. The variables *host* and *port*, set to "localhost" and 9999 respectively. This is the default name and port to which client connect and servers listen. Servers usually bind to 0.0.0.0, however. 2. A small, but efficient, queue implementation, from "ANSI Common Lisp" by Paul Graham. The interface calls are: (make-queue) (enqueue obj q) (dequeue q) (empty-queue q) 3. :iolib.examples currently depends upon IOLib alone and uses packages :common-lisp, :iolib, and :bordeaux-threads. Running the Examples -------------------- These examples were developed and tested on SBCL 1.0.33.30 running on an x86 Ubuntu 8.10 machine. They were ran with two sessions of SBCL running, one acting as a client, and the other as a server. Supposing we'd like to start up the first example of the daytime server and connect to it with the first daytime client example. Initially, the server will bind to *host* and *port* and wait for the client to connect. We connect with the client to *host* and *port*, get the time, and exit. First we'll start up a server: Linux black > sbcl This is SBCL 1.0.33.30, an implementation of ANSI Common Lisp. More information about SBCL is available at. SBCL is free software, provided as is, with absolutely no warranty. It is mostly in the public domain; some portions are provided under BSD-style licenses. See the CREDITS and COPYING files in the distribution for more information. * (require :iolib.examples) ; much output! * (in-package :iolib.examples) # * (run-ex1-server) Created socket: # [fd=5] Bound socket: # Listening on socket bound to: 0.0.0.0:9999 Waiting to accept a connection... [ server is waiting for the below client to connect! ] Got a connection from 127.0.0.1:34794! Sending the time...Sent! T * Now we'll start up the client which connected to the above server: Linux black > sbcl This is SBCL 1.0.33.30, an implementation of ANSI Common Lisp. More information about SBCL is available at. SBCL is free software, provided as is, with absolutely no warranty. It is mostly in the public domain; some portions are provided under BSD-style licenses. See the CREDITS and COPYING files in the distribution for more information. * (require :iolib.examples) ; much output! * (in-package :iolib.examples) # * (run-ex1-client) Connected to server 127.0.0.1:9999 via my local connection at 127.0.0.1:34794! 2/27/2010 13:51:48 T * In each client example, one can specify which host or port to which it should connect: * (run-ex1-client :host "localhost" :port 9999) Connected to server 127.0.0.1:9999 via my local connection at 127.0.0.1:34798! 2/27/2010 13:53:7 T * The servers can be told a port they should listen upon and in this tutorial, unless otherwise specified, will always bind to 0.0.0.0:9999 which means across all interfaces on the machine and on port 9999. CHAPTER 1 --------- IPV4 TCP Client/Server Blocking and nonblocking I/O Overview of Examples -------------------- The examples consist of a collection of clients and servers. They are split into two groups: a set of daytime clients and server, and echo clients and servers. In some of the examples, a certain network protocol, suppose end-of-file handling, must be matched between client and server causing further delineation. Client protocols are matched to server protocols thusly: Clients: ex1-client, ex2-client, ex3-client, can work with servers: ex1-server, ex2-server, ex3-server, ex4-server. Clients: ex4-client, ex5a-client, can work with servers: ex5-server, ex6-server. Clients: ex5b-client, can work with servers: ex7-server, ex8-server Some clients and servers use the "daytime" series of protocols, those are ex1-client, ex2-client, ex3-client, and ex1-server, ex2-server, ex3-server, and ex4-server. Some clients and servers use the "echo a line" series of protocols, those are ex4-client, ex5a-client, ex5b-client, and ex5-server, ex6-server, ex7-server, and ex8-server. Even though much of the example source is included in the tutorial, it is recommended that the example sources be carefully read and understood in order to gain the most benefit from the tutorial. Daytime Clients --------------- In this section we show the evolution of a client which connects to a server and gets the time of day. Each example shows some kind of an incremental improvement to the previous one. Daytime Client IVP4/TCP: ex1-client.lisp ---------------------------------------- This example is a very simple daytime client program which contacts a server, by default at *host* and *port*, returns a single line of text that is the current date and time, and then exits.
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having a bad couple of days. You really put in a lot of thought into this for me, I wish I could hug you!The health risks of electronic cigarettes remain uncertain. But the digital risks have become crystal clear.
Hackers are turning vape pens into clever tools to breach cyber security systems.
Often used as a money-saving mechanism or by folks trying to kick their habit, the electronic smoking device creates an aerosol by heating a liquid—usually made of nicotine, propylene glycol, glycerin, and flavorings—which the user then inhales.
Most e-cigs include a rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which plugs into a cable or connects directly to the computer’s USB port.
And that’s when they get you.
During last week’s B-Sides London convention, security researcher Ross Bevington demonstrated how easily an e-cigarette could be used to attack a computer—either by interfering with its network traffic or fooling the machine into thinking the vape is a keyboard or mouse, according to Sky News.
All it takes is a few simple tweaks to the vaporizer, and you can mess with friends by issuing arbitrary commands, or install malicious software onto an unwitting victim’s computer.
Don’t expect WannaCry-level spreads of ransomware, though. Certainly, a convenient way to hand off damaging programs, an e-cigarette can only hold so much code.
“This puts limitations on how elaborate a real attack could be made,” Bevington told Sky News.
The WannaCry malware, he explained, was “hundreds of times larger” than the space available on a typical electronic cigarette.
“That being said, using something like an e-cigarette to download something larger from the Internet would be possible,” Bevington added.
As always, the best way to avoid attack is by ensuring you come up with complex passwords, your machine has the most up-to-date security patches, and you lock it when you leave.
And, of course, be wary if someone wants to plug something—particularly a ridiculous vape pen—into your computer.
This isn’t a new phenomenon: In 2014, tales of a security breach at an undisclosed large corporation pointed the finger an executive’s e-cigarette, a shady brand from China that was loaded with malware.NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oil prices surged to 2-1/2-year highs and U.S. crude touched $60 a barrel in light trading volume on Tuesday, boosted by news of an explosion on a Libyan crude pipeline as well as voluntary OPEC-led supply cuts.
ExxonMobil’s Hebron oil platform is shown off the coast of Canada’s Newfoundland & Labrador, in this June 13, 2017 handout photo. Courtesy ExxonMobil Canada/Handout via REUTERS
Armed assailants blew up a pipeline pumping crude oil to the port of Es Sider on Tuesday, cutting Libya’s output by up to 100,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to military and energy sources.
The state-run National Oil Corporation (NOC) said in a statement that output had been reduced by 70,000 to 100,000 bpd. The cause of the blast was unclear, it added.
The North African country’s output had been recovering in recent months after being held down for years amid armed conflict and unrest.
Brent crude LCOc1, the international benchmark for oil prices, settled at $67.02 a barrel, up by $1.77, or 2.71 percent. During the session, front-month prices touched a high of $67.10 a barrel, their highest since mid-May 2015.
U.S. crude CLc1 climbed $1.50, or 2.6 percent, to end the session at $59.97 a barrel after touching a session high of $60.01, the highest since late-June 2015.
The impending restart of Forties, a key North Sea pipeline, limited the extent of the rally. Oil and gas flows through the pipeline will be increased gradually, its operator Ineos said on Tuesday, adding that the Kinneil processing plant was partially restarted.
“Keep in mind that the field and pipeline are old and it may have issues and it’s probably why the market isn’t selling off,” said Scott Shelton, a broker at ICAP in Durham, North Carolina.
Trading activity was thin following the Christmas holiday and London trading was muted during Boxing Day. About 72,000 contracts of front-month Brent futures changed hands on Tuesday, well below the typical daily average of more than 250,000 contracts.
In the United States, the energy complex was led higher by heating oil futures. Prices HOc1 rose as much as 3.6 percent to a session high of $2.0410, the highest since early June 2015 on forecasts for cold weather.
Brent has risen 17 percent in the year to date while U.S. crude has rallied about 11 percent so far in 2017.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, plus Russia and other non-members, have been withholding some output since Jan. 1 to relieve a glut. The producers have extended the supply cut agreement to cover all of 2018.
Iraq’s oil minister said on Monday there would be a balance between supply and demand by the first quarter, leading to a boost in prices. Global oil inventories have decreased to an acceptable level, he added.
That outlook is earlier than predicted in OPEC’s latest official forecast, which calls for a balanced market by late 2018. [OPEC/M]
U.S. shipments to China, one of the world’s biggest oil consumers, have benefited from the OPEC-led output cuts. Russia, however, was China’s largest crude oil supplier for the ninth month in a row in November, topping Saudi Arabia for the year so far, China’s customs data showed on Tuesday.
While the OPEC action has lent support to prices all year, market participants have said the unplanned shutdown of the Forties pipeline on Dec. 11 is what helped push Brent to its 2-1/2-year high.
Forties is the biggest of the five North Sea crude streams underpinning Brent, the benchmark for oil trading in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
Still, rising production in the United States is offsetting some of the OPEC-led cuts.
The U.S. rig count RIG-OL-USA-BHI, an early indicator of future output, held steady at 747 in the week to Dec. 22, according to the latest weekly report by Baker Hughes.
U.S. crude oil inventories were likely down for a sixth straight week, while gasoline stockpiles saw a probable build last week, a preliminary Reuters poll showed on Tuesday.An EU ban on menthol- and vanilla-flavoured cigarettes was vital to “denormalise” smoking for younger people, Minister for Health James Reilly has said.
Stylishly packaged cigarettes were a particular problem, he said yesterday following a two-day meeting of EU health ministers in Dublin. “That’s what they are trying to attract our children to, particularly young girls,” he said.
He said 700,000 European were dying each year and the tobacco industry was looking for people to replace them. “They are focusing on children,” he said.
Plan for ban
Ireland had prioritised a plan for a ban even if this hurt jobs in the tobacco industry in some countries. “We have to remember it should never be a case of jobs or lives,” he said.
He said the EU should help countries to “get out of tobacco production” and to develop other types of industry instead.
European health commissioner Tonio Borg also acknowledged there would be opposition to the proposed ban.
“It is natural in those countries where tobacco production is high there will be considerations other than health which will be put forward, to put it mildly,” he said.
The aim of the law was to prevent young people from starting smoking, said Mr Borg. “Tobacco products should look like tobacco products... and it should taste like tobacco,” he said.
It was hoped the effect would be a 2 per cent reduction in the number of smokers over five years in the EU. This would represent 2.4 million fewer smokers, he added.
Tobacco-producing states
Thirteen EU states produce tobacco, including Italy, which produces the biggest amount, followed by Bulgaria, Poland and Spain.
The ban would affect menthol cigarettes, which are sold in Ireland, and vanilla-flavoured cigarettes.
The Minister said he was hoping to win agreement from other health ministers on the directive during Ireland’s EU presidency. It would then be submitted to the European Parliament for approval. The aim was to have agreement on it by next year and to have it enforced by 2015 or 2016.
Mr Reilly said he supported a proposed law in Ireland banning smoking in cars carrying children under 16, adding it was a “child protection issue”.
The law could be enacted later this year. Since February 1st, all cigarettes sold in Ireland must carry graphic images and health warnings about the dangers of smoking.Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced today the appointment of seven new senators who will sit as independents to represent the provinces of Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec.
The appointments are the first in three years and the result of a new selection process established by Trudeau's Liberals in a bid to transform the scandal-plagued Senate into a more "independent, non-partisan" institution.
The announcement comes in anticipation of new government legislation that will require the Senate's approval after the Trudeau government tables its first federal budget on March 22.
Trudeau's pick of four women and three men includes Manitoba's first aboriginal judge, a Paralympic gold medallist, a former provincial NDP cabinet minister, and a journalist.
The new senators were picked from a pool of candidates on the recommendation of an "independent" advisory board selected three months ago by the Trudeau government to advise the prime minister in a concerted effort to make the upper chamber less partisan.
Trudeau made an unprecedented decision in 2014 when he expelled every Liberal senator from his party's caucus, leaving them to sit as independents.
The 105-seat Senate includes 42 Conservative senators, 26 ex-Liberals, and 20 independents which include today's appointments.
The seven appointments brings the total number of vacancies down to 17.
Meet your new 7 senators:
1. Peter Harder (Ont.)
Trudeau appointed Peter Harder as the government's representative in the Senate to work with Liberal House Leader Dominic Leblanc to ensure legislation gets tabled through the Senate.
Harder, who managed the Liberal transition to government, will be sworn in as a privy councillor allowing him to sit in on cabinet meetings when necessary.
He spent 29 years in the federal public service, including 16 years as a deputy minister and four years as the personal representative of the prime minister to three G8 Summits.
Senate appointee Peter Hander discusses his role as government representative and how he will balance that with the goal of a non-partisan Senate. 8:01
2. Justice Murray Sinclair (Man.)
He was the first aboriginal judge appointed in Manitoba and only the second in Canada. He was the chief commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which investigated the legacy of the residential school system and delivered a landmark report in 2015.
Justice Murray Sinclair speaks during the release of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's final report in Ottawa, Canada, December 15, 2015. (Chris Wattie/Reuters)
3. Chantal Peticlerc (Que.)
She has won over 20 medals for Canada in the sport of wheelchair racing, beginning at the 1992 Paralympic Games in Barcelona. She is chef de mission for Canada's team at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
Chantal Petitclerc tweeted that she was 'feeling humbled' on Friday. (Fred Chartrand/CP)
4. Raymonde Gagné (MB)
She has worked in education for over 35 years. She served as president of Université de Saint-Boniface from 2003 to 2014. She was responsible for the college obtaining full university status and has been honoured for increasing the range of educational opportunities available in French in Manitoba.
Gov. Gen. David Johnston presents the Order of Canada to Raymonde Gagné during an investiture ceremony at Rideau Hall in Ottawa in 2015. (Sean Kilpatrick/CP)
5. Frances Lankin (Ont.)
Most recently, Lankin spent 10 years running the United Way in Toronto, taking that job after years as an NDP cabinet minister and MPP in Ontario. From 2009 to 2016, she was a member of the Security Intelligence Review Committee, the oversight body for the country's security agencies.
Frances Lankin, seen at Rideau Hall in 2013, served as CEO of United Way Toronto for years. (Adrian Wyld/CP)
6. Ratna Omidvar (Ont.)
Recognized globally for her contributions to increasing the inclusion of immigrants, she is currently the founding executive director of a think tank at Ryerson University's school of management that focuses on diversity, migration and inclusion. She is the chair of Lifeline Syria, which seeks to bring 1,000 privately sponsored Syrian refugees to Toronto. She also serves on the boards of the Centre for Mental Health and Addiction, The Environics Institute, and Samara.
Lifeline Syria's Chair Ratna Omidvar, centre left, is seen working with colleagues at the organization's offices in Toronto in 2015. (Chris Young/CP)
7. André Pratte (Que.)
Author and journalist, he spent 14 years as editor-in-chief of the Quebec daily paper La Presse. He is one of the founders of a Quebec think tank on federalism.
Journalist and author André Pratte autographs copies of the book 'Reconquérir Le Canada' (Reconquering Canada), a new pro-federalist collection of essays, at the launch in Montreal in 2007. (Ryan Remiorz/CP)
Bios compiled by The Canadian Press.
Click here for a photogallery of the new Trudeau-appointed senatorsKryptos sculpture at the CIA Wikipedia Like something from a Dan Brown novel, Kryptos is a cryptographic puzzle at CIA headquarters that has never been solved.
The sculpture is 12 feet high, and stands on the grounds of the CIA complex in Langley, Virginia. American artist Jim Sanborn built it 25 years ago.
Kryptos contains four hidden messages, carved out of metal. Those four messages are the clues to a riddle. Sanborn has hinted that solving the riddle will be something akin to a treasure hunt on the grounds of the CIA's headquarters.
Three of the messages hidden in the sculpture have been solved. The fourth is 97 letters but no one has been able to decipher it. Even the code-cracking masters at the NSA, who were the first ones to solve the other three parts, gave up.
In honor of the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and Sanborn's 69th birthday, the artist has released a clue, a hint to the world's smartest mathematicians and cryptographers to help them finally crack the last section of code.
This is only the second hint he's ever given to crack the code that hides the clues, reports Wired's Kim Zetter. Once all four clues have been revealed, the next step will be to solve the riddle itself.
Zetter reports:
Four years ago, concerned that he might not live to see the mystery of Kryptos resolved, Sanborn released a clue to help things along, revealing that six of the last 97 letters when decrypted spell the word "Berlin"... To that clue today, he's adding the next word in the sequence—"clock"... Now the Kryptos sleuths just have to unscramble the remaining 86 characters.
The first part of the puzzle that is a clue to the riddle is a poetic phrase that Sanborn composed:
"Between subtle shading and the absence of light lies the nuance of iqlusion."
The second indicates that the solution to the riddle may be a thing that's buried in the ground:
"It was totally invisible. How's that possible? They used the earth's magnetic field. x The information was gathered and transmitted undergruund to an unknown location. x Does Langley know about this? They should: it's buried out there somewhere. x Who knows the exact location? Only WW. This was his last message. x Thirty eight degrees fifty seven minutes six point five seconds north, seventy seven degrees eight minutes forty four seconds west. x Layer two."
The third message is a description of opening King Tut's tomb when it was discovered in 1922 based on the diary of Archaeologist Howard Carter.
"Slowly, desparatly slowly, the remains of passage debris that encumbered the lower part of the doorway was removed. With trembling hands I made a tiny breach in the upper left-hand corner. And then, widening the hole a little, I inserted the candle and peered in. The hot air escaping from the chamber caused the flame to flicker, but presently details of the room within emerged from the mist. x Can you see anything? q"
The code has been particularly hard to crack in part because some of the worlds have been misspelled like "iqlusion and "undergruund."
Sanborn told Wired that he's the only man alive that knows the answer to the riddle. So if the world's smartest crypto-mathematicians don't crack the fourth clue and solve the riddle while Sanborn is still alive, the mystery gracing the grounds of the CIA may remain hidden forever.CHENNAI (Web Desk) – India has 2.87 million people or 0.24% of the country’s population of 1.21 billion who have no faith in any religion, according to the 2011 census, which was the first to include a ‘non-faith’ category. The figure includes atheists, rationalists
CHENNAI (Web Desk) – India has 2.87 million people or 0.24% of the country’s population of 1.21 billion who have no faith in any religion, according to the 2011 census, which was the first to include a ‘non-faith’ category.
The figure includes atheists, rationalists as well as those not interested in any religion but believe in some ‘unknown’ force, reported Times of India.
A majority of people (1,643,640) who ticked the non-faith category live in rural areas as compared to those in urban areas (1,223,663). More males (1,463,712) than females (1,403,591) said that they did not believe in any faith.
Uttar Pradesh accounts for the most people registered as ‘non-faith’ (582,000) than any other state.Prisoners were too comfortable to want to escape, Mr Travis said Inmates are so comfortable in jail that they do not want to escape, a prison officer union leader says. Glyn Travis of the Prison Officers Association says inmates are happy to stay inside because they can get hold of drugs, mobile phones and even sex. He said a dealer regularly broke into a Yorkshire prison by using a ladder to enter cell windows - but no inmate used the ladder as a means of escape. The Prison Service said the prisoners were never in a position to escape. 'Serious crisis' Mr Travis said the authorities only became aware of the security breaches at low-security category C Everthorpe prison, near Brough, East Yorkshire, in January. "The prisoners didn't take this opportunity because we believe life is so cushy within the prison system," he said. Mr Travis said there had been similar incidents in other prisons and he knew of cases of prostitutes entering open jails to service clients. During the incident, at no time were prisoners out of their cells or able to access any other areas of the prison
Prison Service He added; "We have got no-go areas in certain prisons because prisoners have got complete control. There is not sufficient staff, there is no interaction between staff. "We have got a serious crisis in our prisons today." Mr Travis blamed a shortage of prison officers and relaxed regimes, where prisoners enjoyed satellite television and video game consoles. He said that efficiency savings had reduced staff levels and the supervision of prisoners. "Drugs are coming into prisons at a rate that's so dramatic that drugs in prison are actually cheaper than on the outside," he added. Extra fencing A spokesman for the Prison Service said: "During the incident, at no time were prisoners out of their cells or able to access any other areas of the prison. "Immediate action was taken with extra fencing, the removal of trees, extra CCTV cameras, and the transfer of the offender involved to another establishment." Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said prison officer numbers had failed to keep pace with the increase in inmates. "As our overcrowded jails turn into warehouses, staff are being pushed into acting as turnkeys. The punishment of the court is loss of liberty - harsh regimes do not lead to rehabilitation or a reduction in reoffending
Ministry of Justice spokesman "There is far too little useful work in prison, but the idea that jails are cushy is blown away by the appalling levels of suicide and self-harm." In 2007, 92 prisoners committed suicide, compared with 67 the previous year, according to government figures. And there were 23,420 incidents of self-harm in 2006 in prisons in England and Wales, figures obtained by the Prison Reform Trust show. Conservative leader David Cameron said there needed to be a "big change" in Britain's prisons. "We live in a topsy-turvy world where we've now got people trying to break into prison to sell drugs," he said. "Prison should be a place where you are put to work, where you make reparations to your victims and payback money to society and reform your character before you get out. "We're a long way from that and we need a really big change in our prisons." A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said prison conditions were appropriate. "The punishment of the court is loss of liberty - harsh regimes do not lead to rehabilitation or a reduction in reoffending," he said.
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StumbleUpon What are these? E-mail this to a friend Printable versionThis is a populist moment, no doubt of that, and the right has seized it. How? By stoking fears, among those like the former industrial working class and telling them the source of all their troubles is immigrants and racial ‘others.’ It worked in the Brexit vote, throughout Europe and for Trump in the U.S. Why mess with success? The question is: will there be a left populist alternative? Start with the U.K. It’s a real possibility there. Jeremy Corbyn leads the official opposition, Labour, and has a populist rebuttal to race-baiters. He acknowledges the damage done to workers by trade deals and globalization but denies the culprits are ‘others’ or that expulsion’s a solution. The problem, he says, lies in the deals themselves and in government inaction. His position on Brexit was Remain but Reform. Critics in his own party say he was half-hearted in his support for the EU, which is one of the best things you can say about him.
U.K. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn speaks at a 'Keep Corbyn' rally at the School of Oriental and African Studies on Wednesday in London. "It’s precisely Corbyn’s obstinacy about his principles — whatever they are — that helps colour him populist," writes Rick Salutin. "If he can survive his party, some good could come of this." ( Jeff J Mitchell / GETTY IMAGES )
It amounts to having a left populist position already in place and set to go. So of course Labour’s elite — MPs, officials, The Guardian etc. — are trying to dump and replace him with their own version of David Cameron. But Corbyn’s doing well in polls, has support from the grassroots membership, and unions. His predecessor, Ed Milliband, who says he should quit, had no perceptible guts. It’s precisely Corbyn’s obstinacy about his principles — whatever they are — that helps colour him populist. If he can survive his party, some good could come of this. Elsewhere in Europe, right populists have feasted on the shamelessness of social democratic parties, which embraced the austerity and neo-liberalism of the right. Left populist parties rose in response but they’re encountering problems. Syriza wasn’t up to it when they took power in Greece, Podemos stumbled in Spain’s election last Sunday. As for the U.S., there’s Trump but there was also Sanders. What potential that suggested. I think no one, Bernie included, expected it. But in the end, it’s the Clintons who’ll fill the void. And as Yves Smith of nakedcapitalism.com says, they, like the Bourbons, have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.
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A word on youth’s role in all this. In the U.K., ‘they’ supposedly backed Remain in contrast to the old fogeys of Leave. But ‘they’ also were massively for Bernie, who’s skeptical about globalization and trade deals. Maybe the best thing you can say about youth is you should be wary of saying too much. And so to Canada. Odd place. There’s been no substantial populism here yet. Harper struck a few xenophobic notes but no dominant, antiglobalization, chord. He remained a neo-con at heart. Justin Trudeau has resurrected conventional liberal politics and may manage to smooth over the worst effects of trade deals, to which he’s betrothed. But a poll this week said only 25 per cent of us actually support NAFTA, which sounds about right as a proportion of those who may’ve gained from it — or at least haven’t been seriously harmed. If the NDP had a brain hidden somewhere, it’d stake out a strong left populist position on trade and the economy, well before Canada generates its own Trump or Farage. Maybe, like the Tin Man, they’ll be awarded a facsimile. The smug response to Brexit populism by antipopulist commentators on all sides wasn’t reassuring. At their most empathic, they acknowledged that the populus feel genuinely hurt and afraid, but no way do they have an actual point. On CBC, former top civil servant Mel Cappe declared that globalization is here to stay. But globalization was always here to stay, from the first spread of Homo sapiens out of Africa through Marco Polo — long before NAFTA and the EU. The real issues are: which forms of globalization and to whose benefit? Cappe also decried referenda because these issues are soooo complicated. (Switzerland has about 12 a year without going into shock but never mind.) What qualifies Corbyn and Sanders as populists is they don’t, in Cappe’s patronizing way, invalidate critiques by ‘the people’ against NAFTA or the EU. What makes them left populists is their rejection of all racism and xenophobia accompanying those critiques. What’s amazing overall is how long it has taken the populus to finally turn against that kind of fatuous, derisive, largely fact-free hectoring from their betters, which has been thrown in their faces for decades. Rick Salutin’s column appears every Friday.
Read more about:Survivor 2015: 7 Things You Need to Know about Survivor Cambodia
Rob Cesternino (@RobCesternino) and Josh Wigler (@RoundHoward) discuss the 7 Things that you need to know about the upcoming season of Survivor, Survivor: Cambodia. Josh Wigler was on location doing press for Parade.com and got to witness the first 3 days of production. Josh talks about his experience and what we should expect this season on the day of the official cast release.
READ ALL OF JOSH’S PRE-SEASON COVERAGE AT PARADE.COM
The Seven Things You Need To Know About Survivor: Cambodia
1) The Tribes Have Been Revealed
Here are the breakdowns of the two tribes that are starting the game:
Bayon Tribe (Wears Purple)
Joe Anglim
Jeremy Collins
Stephen Fishbach
Keith Nale
Andrew Savage
Ciera Eastin
Tasha Fox
Kimmi Kappenberg
Kass McQuillen
Monica Padilla
Takeo Tribe (Wears Green)
Peih-Gee Law
Shirin Oskoii
Kelly Wentworth
Kelly Wiglesworth
Abi-Maria Gomes
Vytas Baskauskas
Spencer Bledsoe
Terry Dietz
Jeff Varner
Woo Hwang
2) Players Have Been Sharing Pre-Game Alliances
A number of players have discussed some of the pre-game alliance plans they’ve made, specifically Jeff Varner.
Mikey Glazer (@CelebSightings) posted a video of his pre-game interviews shot in Los Angeles before leaving for Cambodia which outlines who Jeff is planning on working with in the game. (Note: A pre-game alliance does not always translate to an in-game alliance).
3) Classic Challenges will be Coming Back
This will not only be a season featuring returning players, it will also feature many returning challenges. For some, it will be a chance to get redemption for challenges that have been problematic in the past and for others there will be chances to excel at what they’ve done best.
Additionally, the game will begin with a classic marooning with a twist that’s never been done before.
4) Idols will be Hidden at Challenges
This season, the hidden immunity idols will be hidden at the challenges. The players will find a map hidden at their camp that will tell them where to look. This game twist had long been pushed for by EW’s Dalton Ross (@DaltonRoss)
It’s finally happening! #Survivor to hide immunity idols at challenges next season. Get the exclusive scoop here! http://t.co/LHP9umoe5h — Dalton Ross (@DaltonRoss) August 24, 2015
5) Immunity Idols Won’t Always Look Like Immunity Idols
One of the other twists that are being thrown at the players involves immunity idols that look differently than you would expect them to. They may look like traditional idols or they may look like a stick. Players will need to know when people are bluffing about a potential idol and when they have the genuine article
6) The First Tribe Headed to Tribal Council will Be Rushed
The losers of the first immunity challenge will head right to tribal council without any time to discuss the vote. It’s unclear how this will affect that crucial first tribal of the season. Without having time to talk, this could be a very unpredictable first vote.Well, this is an interesting turn of events for the Android Market's universally-despised 15-minute app return window. According to the Taipei Times, the Taipei City Government was recently alerted to Google's Android Market return policies - policies that violate Taiwanese consumer protection laws requiring any product bought over the internet to have at least a 7-day "trial period."
Earlier this month, the Taiwanese government gave Google a 15-day ultimatum to revise its app return policies to include the mandatory 7-day trial period, but Google refused to comply. Faced with a $1 million fine for non-compliance, Google, after negotiations with the government broke down, decided yesterday to remove all access to paid apps for Android devices in Taiwan. This, understandably, has a lot of people extremely pissed.
The first question on every Android fan's mind is likely, "Well, what about Apple's App Store non-return policy?" Apple was slapped with the same 15-day ultimatum as Google - but Apple complied with the request. That's right. Apple, regarded by many Android fanboys as the consumer technology anti-Christ, is more willing to change its app return policies than Google. Someone check the temperature in Hell.
The Taipei City Government has called Google's retaliation a plan to "coerce Taiwanese consumers into giving up their rights," and has no intent to remit the million-dollar slap on the wrist until Google institutes a 7-day trial period as part of the Android Market service in Taiwan.
Google's argument? The provision in question of Taiwan's Consumer Protection Act doesn't apply to app stores - because consumers can instantly try an application and make a decision whether or not to keep it in a matter of minutes. While the merits of Google's return window aren't something we want to get into here (trust us - we're not totally on-board with it, either), there's clearly a lot of people that are unhappy with the present state of affairs.
This also raises an interesting question about countries without access to Amazon's Appstore. The Amazon Appstore, like Apple's App Store, does not have any sort of clear refund process or return window. Is this one of the reasons Amazon's Android Market alternative is not available outside of the US? Seems like a pretty legit explanation to us.
Google is continuing to discuss the return policy with the Taipei City government, but paid apps will remain inaccessible on the island nation until an agreement is reached. And if one isn't? We think that's pretty unlikely - Google probably doesn't want to go scratching a country off the paid apps access list.
TaipeiTimesOne of the things I do a fair bit of is building and testing from-scratch system installs. Not being crazy, I do this in virtual machines (it's much faster that way). When you do this sort of work, you live in a constant cycle of installing a machine from scratch, testing it, and then damaging the install enough so that when you reboot, your VM will repeat the 'install from scratch' part. Most of the time, the most convenient way to damage the install is with dd :
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=1024k count=32; sync reboot
(The sync can be important.)
Dd'ing over the start of the (virtual) disk makes sure that there isn't a partition table and a bootloader any more, and it also generally prevents the install CD environment from sniffing around and finding too many traces of your old installed OS.
On normal System V init or Upstart based systems, this sequence has a minor little irritation: the reboot will usually fail. This is because the reboot process needs to read files off the filesystem, which you've overwritten and corrupted with the dd. Then you (I) get to go off to the VM menus and say 'power cycle the machine', which is just a tiny little interruption.
With systemd, at least in Ubuntu 16.04, this doesn't happen. Sure, a number of things run during the reboot process will spit out various errors, but systemd continues driving everything onwards anyways and will successfully reboot my virtual machine with no further activity on my part. The result is every so slightly more convenient for my peculiar usage case.
I believe that systemd can do this for several reasons. First, systemd parses and loads all unit files into memory when it starts up (or you tell it'systemctl daemon-reload '), which means that it doesn't have to read anything from disk in order to know what needs to be done to shut the system down. Second, systemd mostly terminates processes itself; it doesn't need to repeatedly get scripts to run kill and the like, which could fail if kill or other necessary bits have been damaged by that dd. Finally, I think that systemd can handle calling reboot() internally, instead of having to run an executable (which might not be there) in order to do this.
(Systemd clearly has internal support in PID 1 for rebooting the system under some circumstances. I'm not quite clear if this is the path that a normal reboot eventually takes; it's a bit tangled up in units and handling this and that and so on.)Home > Press > Iran to Hold 2nd Prototype Nanotechnology Products Competition
Abstract:
The second competition of Iran Prototype Nanotechnology Products will be held in 2014.
Iran to Hold 2nd Prototype Nanotechnology Products Competition
Terhan, Iran | Posted on January 21st, 2014
The deadline for participation in the competition and submission of plans will be since 21 December 2013 to 5 February 2014.
In line with supporting the commercialization of the achievements of Iranian researchers, Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council supports the production of prototype by university students, university professors, researchers, technologists, and knowledge-based companies in the field of nanotechnology in form of Prototype Producing Competition.
To this end, a special zone was allocated to the demonstration of the chosen prototypes in the Sixth Iran Nano Festival. The second competition will be held in 2014, and the best plans will be displayed in the Seventh Iran Nano Festival.
In addition to rewarding the best plans, Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council will support the commercialization of the plans that succeed in attracting an investor during the festival.
Prototype competition provides the researchers and small companies with the opportunity to put on display their innovative products, specially to people who are interested, visitors, industrialists, and investors so they can take advantage from investment chances.
####
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Copyright © Fars News Agency
If you have a comment, please us.
Issuers of news releases, not 7th Wave, Inc. or Nanotechnology Now, are solely responsible for the accuracy of the content.
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February 5th, 2019Posted on by meritwager
En migga delar med sig av sina tankar och farhågor:
Tysklands agerande är ju närmast en fientlig handling. De dumpar över tusentals asylsökande som de solklart, enligt Dublinförordningen, ska ta hand om. Potentiellt kan hundratusentals komma att sätta sig på bussar till Sverige så fort gränskontrollerna lyfts i sommar. Om tyskarna står fast vid detta är ju hela Schengensamarbetet de facto avslutat. Varför skulle andra länder ta emot asylsökande från Tyskland som ska överföras därifrån när tyskarna nu ensidigt bestämt sig för att strunta i regl
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es she dooant keer what I zes, but she knaws what I zes es true, man. ‘
.
AdvertisementsFrench president says chance for poorer countries to skip fossil fuels and go straight to renewable energy is akin to mobile phone revolution in Africa
Developing countries have the opportunity to leapfrog the west in economic development, if they go straight to clean technology while rich countries struggle to wean themselves off fossil fuels, president Francois Hollande of France said on Wednesday.
“They are going to be skipping the stage where industrialised countries were stopped fro a long time, for many decades,” he said. “We were dependent on fossil fuel, which means we now have to concentrate on the transition in the medium to long term of abandoning fossil fuels. But they have the chance to move immediately to the new technologies.”
He said clean technologies such as renewable energy were “dropping in price and will continue to drop”, while industrialised countries faced costs in having to scrap old infrastructure and rebuild it anew in a low-carbon fashion.
Developing countries, many of which are constructing scores of new cities to house their burgeoning populations, would be able to build them in a low-carbon way, with better energy efficiency, he told the annual meeting of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, in Paris.
“In the old world, we are proud of our old cities, but [they are very inefficient],” he said. “But countries starting on the path of industrialisation can immediately go to new building [technology].”
He compared the opportunity with the mobile phone revolution in Africa, whereby as mobile phone technology dropped in price and became widely available all over the continent, there was little incentive to build conventional fixed line phones.
“The digital revolution and the energy revolution will go hand in hand as in a sense we are talking about the same revolution,” he said.
Hollande looked ahead to the UN conference in Paris this December, at which governments are expected to forge a new global agreement on the climate, with commitments from all to limit greenhouse gas emissions after 2020, when current commitments come to an end.
He said countries had still not done enough to reach an agreement. “We know everything [about climate change] - we do not need another report, we do not need more experts. We know a lot about this, and we know the cost of inaction.”
He called for a price on carbon as this would encourage businesses to invest in low-carbon technology and to change their practices. “Set a price for carbon then businesses will change the way they invest and perform,” he said, echoing the six oil companies which earlier this week called for such a price.
He also called for more transparency from businesses, and said France was leading the way by putting in place regulations that would require banks and investors to disclose their exposure to high-carbon assets. “We need to introduce rules that will channel investments,” he said.ES Football Newsletter Enter your email address Please enter an email address Email address is invalid Fill out this field Email address is invalid You already have an account. Please log in or register with your social account
Hugo Lloris believes Danny Rose and Kyle Walker can emulate some of the greatest full-back pairings in the history of the game.
Walker and Rose have been outstanding for Tottenham this season, with Rose producing one of the best individual displays of the campaign in the 2-1 win against Burnley yesterday.
Walker created the equaliser for Dele Alli — the right-back’s fourth assist of the campaign — while Rose scored the winner in the second half after delivering countless dangerous crosses from the left.
France captain Lloris remembers well the work of full-backs Lilian Thuram and Bixente Lizarazu, who helped win the World Cup for Les Bleus in 1998 and the European Championships two years later.
Asked whether Rose and Walker could reach that level, Lloris said: “Yes, and for England, too. They are still competing with good players but if they keep working hard, I would not be surprised if they have great international careers — and they will help the club achieve great things as well.
“They are very committed to the team. They have been at the club for a number of years and you can see that on the pitch. The way they play, the way they run; they can feel it.
“In the way we play, they have a lot of freedom. We play a very attacking game but they try to be as strong as possible at the back.
“First of all, they try to be good defenders but they also create chances. In the last two games, against Hull and Burnley, they were decisive for the team.”
Burnley boss Sean Dyche believes Spurs Moussa Sissoko, who created Rose’s goal, should have been sent off minutes earlier for a high challenge on Stephen Ward.
But Lloris countered that Burnley could have suffered a red card of their own, for a challenge by Matt Lowton on Alli in the first half. Alli had equalised for Spurs after Ashley Barnes had given Burnley the lead.
Lloris added: “In the end, although it was tight, we showed more quality.
“Moussa is a great guy who is showing in recent games that he is getting better and stronger and he made the difference against Burnley.”
Tottenham's next match sees them take on Southampton at St Mary's Stadium on December 28, and you can follow it live on Standard Sport. Click here to find out how.Digvijaya Singh said Cong lost because Rahul Gandhi was silent. Its good he was silent else Congress wouldnt hv won even 44 seats: Amit Shah — ANI (@ANI_news) September 4, 2014
NEW DELHI: The BJP on Thursday hit back at Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi over his jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying that his voice is not heard within his own party.Responding to Digvijaya Singh's statement that Congress lost the Lok Sabha polls because Rahul Gandhi was silent, BJP president Amit Shah said, "It is good he (Rahul) was silent, else Congress wouldn't have won even 44 seats."Shah, who is in Maharashtra ahead of the upcoming assembly elections in the state, added, "Till Congress is in power in Maharashtra, Modiji's 'Congress mukt Bharat' slogan wont come true."Parliamentary affairs minister M Venkaiah Naidu also dismissed Gandhi's remarks."His voice is not heard by his own party, why should we listen," Naidu said here replying to a query from reporters.Bharatiya Janata Party vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the Congress had not been able to accept the verdict of the people in the last Lok Sabha elections."People of the country are feeling proud over the change that has come about (since Modi government took office)," Naqvi said.BJP spokesperson Lalitha Kumaramangalam said Rahul Gandhi "should be aware of facts" as the NDA government had taken effective steps to check price rise."He is a senior leader. He should show responsibility," Kumaramangalam said.She said Gandhi has to answer for the poor condition of roads and power in his constituency which he has been representing for the past 10 years.BJP leader SP Jain said problems concerning water and power were legacies of the previous United Progressive Alliance government.Gandhi told reporters in Amethi that Modi was playing the drums in Japan while people in the country were battling power cuts, price rise and lack of roads and water supply.He said the BJP had made tall promises on issues such as price rise in the run-up to the general elections but there is no action on the ground after it came to power.(With inputs from IANS)OFFICIALS say they have reached a turning point in fighting an enormous wildfire, hoping to get a “death grip”’ on the blaze that ravaged parts of Canada’s oil sands town of Fort McMurray amid cooler temperatures and light rain.
Meanwhile, a massive evacuation of residents displaced by the blaze came to an end.
The fires have left a trail of destruction, causing nearly 90,000 residents to flee for their safety.
Officials are now optimistic that the worst is over. Chad Morrison of Alberta Wildfire told a news conference he’s “very happy” and called it great firefighting weather.
“We can really get in there and really get a handle on this fire and really get a death grip on it,” said Morrison, who answered yes when asked if they’ve reached a turning point.
With cooler temperatures expected in the next three or four days, he said firefighters should be able to put out hot spots. And it has allowed them to further protect fire-ravaged Fort McMurray. “I feel very buoyed and happy that we are making great progress,” he said.
Alberta Premier Rachel Notley said the wildfire grew much more slowly than had been feared and it was now 161,000 hectares. She said the blaze is quite a bit smaller than had been expected on Saturday, when officials expected the fire to double in size.
She added the city is safe for first responders and that she will visit the city on Monday to assess the damage.
David Yurdiga, the member of Parliament for the area, toured Fort McMurray on Sunday and said he was now more optimistic. “We’ll be back on our feet a lot quicker than I thought we would be,” he told reporters at a roadblock just south of the city. “All of the key infrastructure is in place. Our hospital is standing. Our schools are standing. Our treatment plant is functioning.” “I toured probably every neighbourhood in Fort McMurray and 80 per cent of the homes are standing,” he said. “Some areas you don’t even know there was a fire.” It rained on Sunday. The Rural Municipality of Wood Buffalo, which includes Fort McMurray, tweeted a picture of the rainfall and wrote: “It was only for a few minutes but the sight of rain has never been so good.”
Notley retweeted the picture and wrote “Here’s hoping for much more!” Federal Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said they “may be turning a corner” but it’s too early to celebrate and a lot of work remains.
Officials completed the transport of 25,000 residents out of work camps north of the city. Police and military oversaw a procession of thousands of vehicles Friday and Saturday, and a mass airlift of thousands of evacuees was also employed from the oil sands camps that usually house workers.
No deaths or injuries have been reported from the fire itself. Notley, however, mentioned two evacuees who died in a traffic accident during the evacuation. Her voiced cracked when talking about the two and noted it is Mother’s Day. Fifteen-year-old Emily Ryan and her stepmother’s nephew, Aaron Hodgson, died in the accident.
The images of Fort McMurray are one of devastation — scorched homes and virtually whole neighbourhoods burned to the ground. More than 80,000 people have left Fort McMurray in the heart of Canada’ oil sands, where the fire has torched 1600 homes and other buildings. Gas has been turned off, the power grid is damaged and water is not drinkable. Officials said there is no timeline to return residents to the city, but the provincial government is sending in a team on Monday to do some preliminary planning. The fire and mass evacuation has forced a quarter or more of Canada’s oil output offline and was expected to impact an economy already hurt by the fall in oil prices. The Alberta oil sands have the third-largest reserves of oil in the world behind Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Its workers largely live in Fort McMurray.
Morrison said the fire has not reached the Suncor or Syncrude oil sands facilities north of Fort McMurray and that the mines north are not under threat. Notley said there will be a meeting with the energy industry on Tuesday and said topics will include the state of facilities and the impact on operations.
About 25,000 evacuees moved north in the hours after Tuesday’s mandatory evacuation, and were housed in camps normally used to house oil sands employees. Officials then moved everyone south Friday and Saturday.
Just over 30 kilometres south of Fort McMurray, the main highway into town is blocked off by barricades and police vehicles.
Fort McMurray Fire Chief Darby Allen asked for the patience of residents who are eager to find out if their homes are still standing.
“We are really working hard on that, it’s a complicated process, what’s damaged, what’s left,” Allen said in a posted video. “We really will get that to you as soon as we possibly can. We care about all of you.” Lac La Biche, Alberta, normally a sleepy town of 2500 about 175 kilometres south of Fort McMurray, was helping thousands of evacuees, providing a place to sleep, food, donated clothes and even shelter for their pets.
Jihad Moghrabi, a spokesman for Lac La Biche County, said 4400 evacuees have come through The Bold Center, a sports facility in town.If you don’t watch the NBA, that’s fine – we can still be friends. But you’re missing out on one very awesome thing …
This man’s impeccable taste in fashion.
Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder is perhaps best known by the casual observer for this,
and this…
And yet 24-year-old freak of nature, Russell Westbrook, is best known to me for this,
and this,
and also this…
You have to be one of the best point guards in the game to pull off borrowing heavily from Jimmy Buffett Parrothead style. Or just not care at all. ‘Why Not’ is sort of a personal philosophy for Russell, an expression frequently associated with his Twitter account.
Russ, it’s the PLAYOFFS. Everyone is wearing custom suits! Are you really gonna wear that out?
Brooks, baby – you’re a professional athlete. You make millions of dollars. You don’t need to buy your shirts from a blind tailor.
Listen, Rusty: you’re ten years too late. Dressing like Urkel isn’t cool. It wasn’t even cool in the 90’s.
Russell Westbrook’s style is no stranger to criticism.
“I’ve got one word for you: Garanimals.” ~ Shaquille O’Neal
“Well, at least we know they got a TJ Maxx in Oklahoma City.” ~ Charles Barkley
“I know he wears a lot of weird shit. It’s a generational thing.” ~ Kobe Bryant
But Russell tunes out the haters. He doesn’t say a word.
Why not?
Because all of his shirts are busy saying this.Non-state armed groups have used children who appeared as young as 10 to participate in Syria’s devastating civil war, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report released Monday. Boys joined the armed groups for various reasons — and were sometimes lured with the promise of education — but many ended up being used for suicide missions and other dangerous tasks.
The report is based on interviews with 25 former or current child soldiers who talked to the HRW researchers from their homes in refugee camps, clinics and public gathering places. The total number of child soldiers fighting in the Syrian civil war is not known, but a local monitoring group, the Violations Documenting Center, found that 194 “non-civilian” male children have been killed since the beginning of the conflict, which is now in its fourth year. Recruiting child soldiers, under age 15, in both combat and support roles is considered a war crime that can be tried by the International Criminal Court.
A boy called “Saleh,” 17, told HRW he fought with the Free Syrian Army (FSA) — the Western-backed opposition group fighting against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad — at 15 after he was detained and tortured by government security forces. He later joined two other armed groups. (All children's names are pseudonyms given by the researchers.)
“I thought of leaving [the fighting] a lot,” he said. “I lost my studies, I lost my future, I lost everything.”
Another boy, going by “Majed,” 16, said that Jabhat al-Nusra — a radical Islamist anti-Assad group — in Daraa promised him free schooling at a local mosque that included military training, Quran study and target practice. He said that commanders encouraged children to sign up for suicide attacks, according to the report.
“Sometimes fighters volunteered, and sometimes [commanders] said, ‘Allah chose you.’”
Priyanka Motaparthy, the report’s author, called the use of child soldiers the war’s “blind spot” and warned about the dangers of accepting children’s participation in war as a fact made inevitable by extreme circumstances or local interpretations of adulthood.
“So many people will tell you, ‘you’re considered a man as of the age of 16,’” but children are not, she told Al Jazeera.
Children were reported to have served for groups including the FSA, Jabhat al-Nusra, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and Kurdish forces in northern Syria. The researchers found groups often neglected to check children’s real ages and failed to turn them away when suspecting they weren't adults. Some FSA commanders said their units did not accept children as a matter of official policy, but would ultimately accept anyone eager to fight.
“16, 17 is not young. [If we don’t take him,] he’ll go fight on his own,” Abu Rida, leader of the Saif Allah al-Maslool brigade, an FSA group in Daraa, told HRW.
Children’s reasons for joining varied, but contrary to the experience of child soldiers in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo or countries where children were often forced to join rebel groups, the Syrian child soldiers interviewed by HRW all said they had volunteered.
Some who had been arrested or tortured reported that disillusionment with the regime had kindled their political enthusiasm and a sense of duty. Others said they followed friends or relatives, or joined because of the promise of education in areas where the government had stopped providing classes.
“But the problem is that they are extremely vulnerable and young but they don’t necessarily have a sense of what they’re getting in to,” Motaparthy said.
“Children under that age, their brains are not fully developed, they’re not able to understand long-term consequences of action. Some of the children I talked to said, 'I didn’t understand it would take this long,' they thought they signed up for three months, not for three years.”
Since the beginning of the conflict, the levels of violence have steadily increased.
“Back in 2012 the worst weapon for a kid was a assault rifle,” she said. “Now it’s mounted machine guns.”
Some commanders also reportedly preferred younger children to execute combat mission because they were braver. One doctor described treating a boy between 10 and 12 years old whose job it was to whip prisoners held in an ISIL detention facility, according to the report.
All children interviewed by HRW are boys. Except for the Kurdish forces in northern Syria, no other armed groups had recruited girls to assist with combat operations — an observation that follows the rights group’s earlier findings on ISIL’s and other groups' increased restrictions of the movement of women and girls in accordance with their extremist interpretation of Islamic law.
HRW called on the United Nations’ Security Council to refer the crimes to the International Criminal Court. It also urged the Syrian government to stop providing aid to groups using child soldiers in their operations.
“Anyone providing funding for sending children to war could be complicit in war crimes,” Motaparthy said.That’s CAKE…not CALF, just to be clear. Mmmm…cake balls. Have you heard of these little delights? They’re fun to make, ridiculously easy, and can be adapted in so many fun ways, one of which I’ll show you today in honor of All Hallow’s Eve, which is upon us tomorrow. I’d been making them for a little while but wound up adapting the basic recipe last year: I added RUM to the cake, and made a tipsy version…and proceeded to eat eleventy-hundred of them. Hiccup! We’ll make those together next month in preparation for the upcoming Thanksgiving/ Christmas season, if you think you can HANDLE the rum.
I decided to make straight-up cake balls with the kids yesterday, inspired by a delicious site called Bakerella—and let me just tell you, if you’re more of a meticulous cake/cupcake decorating type, if you’re artistically inclined and precise, or if you just enjoy admiring the work of those who are, you must check out her Halloween Cake Pops. They’re absolutely puh-recious.
If, however, you’re not meticulous…if your kids insist on helping you whenever you attempt to bake anything remotely decorative…if you’re lucky to make it out of the kitchen in one piece on any given day and consider yourself a lucky woman if your Basset Hound hasn’t hoisted himself up on your countertop and absconded with whatever you’ve just spent two hours cooking (hypothetically speaking, of course) you might feel better after reading this post. I’m more the slop-things-together type. And I’m okay with that. I am.
At least I will be, with intensive therapy.
Seriously, CAKE BALLS in any form are a real treat. They can be made into “cakecicles” for kids, pass as truffles at a baby or wedding shower, or be arranged on a tiered cake plate for a really awesome presentation at Eastertime. They can be spiked with booze or adorned with sprinkles, swirls, and nuts…and are just plain fun to make.
So let’s do that! Call me crazy, but I think it’s only a matter of time before cake balls sweep the nation.
Or not.
Begin with this:
I used Red Velvet because that’s what I had on hand…plus, I thought it would make a nice “bloody” interior for the Halloween treats. But you can use any flavor of cake mix you want. (Yellow is one of my favorites, and the one I use for my Rum Cake Balls.)
Just prepare the cake according to the package directions, and bake it in a 9 x 13-inch pan. Cover the cake with a dish towel and allow to cool completely. Usually, I’ll bake the cake the night before and leave it covered on the counter ’til I need it.
When you’re ready to make the CAKE BALLS, begin gently crumbling the cake. I place sections of the cake into a large bowl, 1/4 of the cake at a time.
I use two forks and just gradually pull the cake apart.
And when 1/4 of the cake is finely crumbled…
Add in another section and crumble away.
When you’re finished, you should have a bunch of very fine cake crumbs.
And NOW…for the highly gourmet binding ingredient:
Prepared, store-bought icing!
I know, I know…try not to faint. I knew you’d be impressed.
The standard recipe calls for a whole container of icing, but I almost always use about 3/4 of the container. It’s entirely up to you—if you use the whole container, the CAKE BALLS will be extremely moist and sometimes slightly on the mushy side. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but I tend to like the cake balls just slightly less moist.
Either way, you really can’t go wrong. We’re talking about CAKE here, people.
Use two forks to work the icing into the cake (or the cake into the icing; it’s all how you look at it.)
Keep at it, gently working the mixture together…
Until the icing is not longer visible. Even if you use white icing with devil’s food, the white will eventually blend in entirely.
This looks a little gross, doesn’t it? Kinda like hamburger? Or guts? Remember when Marlboro Man told me he saw my guts during my c-section?
I realize this is a very untimely moment to bring that up. I apologize with every ounce of my being. And my guts.
The next thing you want to do is roll the mixture into balls—I usually make them about walnut size. HINT: If you have a small cookie dough scoop, it makes it really nice. I just scoop the mixture, dispense it into my hand, then hand roll it from there.
And NOTE: you’ll need to rinse your hands every seven balls or so—things start to get messy, and you’ll need to refresh your canvas.
Look! CAKE BALLS!
Now, this is important: pop ’em in the freezer, uncovered, for at least an hour. You’ll want the cake balls to be very firm before coating them.
When the cake balls are nice and firm, go ahead and prepare your double boiler.
This is my double boiler—a glass bowl over simmering water.
I can’t be bothered with those OFFICIAL DOUBLE BOILER things. Too many pieces to keep track of.
Next, grab whatever color of melting chocolate you want. They sell these bags at Michael’s or Hobby Lobby for two bucks, and they come in lots of different colors.
You can also add food coloring to plain, white almond bark from the grocery store…but gel or powdered food coloring works better than the liquid stuff.
Dump the pieces into the bowl of the double boiler.
Stir occasionally…
Until the candy is totally melted and smooth.
Note: If you want the candy to coat the cake balls more uniformly (i.e. less gloppy) you can thin the chocolate with a little Crisco (vegetable shortening). I like to just jump in and go for it, though, and maintain my messy approach to life. But you have that option if you want it!
Now it’s time to coat the CAKE BALLS!
Here’s where it really helps for the balls to be very frozen and firm; decreases the likelihood of crumbs falling into the melted candy.
Here’s one way to do it. Gently drop the ball into the bowl to coat the underside…
Then gently (I’m gonna be saying “gently” a lot today, so please don’t be hatin’) lift the cake ball out of the candy with a fork.
Then, with a spoon, drip candy all over the top, thoroughly coating the ball. The fork allows the candy to drip back into the bowl.
Then, very GENTLY, transfer the coated cake ball onto parchment or waxed paper. These will make delightful little “truffles”, and you can pipe a contrasting color of candy over the top for a pretty, artistic presentation if that makes your skirt fly up.
But here’s a different method. I like this method a lot. Much more “fun” factor.
You can get these at Michael’s or Hobby Lobby. And they’re $1.99, okay?
Insert a stick sideways into each ball.
You’ll notice there’s a flattened area that resulted from the cake balls cooling on the pan. Don’t forget that’s there.
Now, you can either roll the ball in the candy, or spoon it over the top—whatever’s easier for you.
Whichever method you use, be sure to thoroughly coat the bottom of the ball where it meets the stick.
Lay them back down onto waxed or parchment paper, paying attention to the flat part (get it against the parchment again.)
Next, to decorate, put a small dollup of melted white candy on each purple ball. (You can buy small squeeze bottles in which you can actually melt the candy pieces in the microwave, but I’ve just used a small spoon before. No need to take it too seriously.)
At Eastertime, I squeeze dots of yellow and green melted candy on the purple cake balls to resemble decorated Easter eggs. The sky’s the limit.
Next, I love to use this:
It’s a very glossy icing gel, and it’s really, really groovy.
And again, $1.27 at Hobby Lobby or Michaels. And each tube takes you surprisingly far!
The black is my favorite—I have five in my pantry. It’s perfect for the pupils of one-eyed flying purple people eaters. (Bakerella’s PPE’s are very, very cute—see hers for more ideas.)
You can also make white “eyeball” cake balls, piping red gel icing all over the white part to resemble bloodshot eyes. Wouldn’t that be a great item at a party celebrating someone’s graduation from Optometry school?
“Well I saw the thing comin’ out of the sky—it had one long horn, and one big eye…”
Sorry. I just love Dr. Demento. I guess it’s an L.A. thing.
And look! You can use white candy, too. And I can’t decide whether this is a skeleton, an alien, or a ghost.
Anyone? Anyone? Well, it’s scary. That’s all that matters.
Purple…White…I think I’ll try some GREEN now.
If you work quickly (but GENTLY, of course), you can sometimes swirl the stick around and get it out without leaving crumbs behind.
Though sometimes, you have to spoon some candy over the base.
Green is fun. The black gel icing looks neato on it.
I didn’t have any orange candy, so we had to opt for green jack-o-lanterns.
And unfortunately, whenever you have girls in the room, you invariably wind up with a flower. Or two.
And my boys are responsible for the Ninja Turtle.
Flowers. Ninja Turtles. My kids are playing out gender stereotypes like there’s no tomorrow.
I probably could’ve used a little orange and red in the mix…but for my house, for my kids, I think they turned out just fine.
“Take me to your leader.”
Hey, I think green Jack-o-Lanterns should be given a chance in this world.
Oh, about the black icing gel: If you leave it alone long enough, it’ll set and become somewhat firm. But it’ll always stay glossy. It’s really fun stuff.
These are exceedingly fun to eat.
Just ask Massive Headwound Harry.
(Anyone remember that SNL skit?)
Sorry, Harry. But you’re just so darn delicious.
Ewww. That’s really gross, man.
The purple people eater needs to have a closer look.
He majored in pre-med.
It’s Thursday. Have you made cake balls today?
If not, well…get after it! It’s really a lot of fun.
Love,
Pioneer WomanSprint customers who buy the iPhone 4S will be able to roam internationally on GSM networks, but will not find themselves with unlocked microSIM slots, a Sprint representative tells Ars. While some initial reports suggested that the owners of the Sprint iPhone 4S might be able to pop a local GSM microSIM into their phones while abroad and avoid Sprint’s roaming charges, Sprint denies that that is the case.
On Tuesday, Macworld reported that the iPhone 4S would be sold with its microSIM slot unlocked. In theory, this means that the iPhone 4S would be able to use prepaid SIM cards on networks outside the US so customers wouldn’t have to pay for international roaming. Macworld said this would be the case for the Verizon iPhone 4S as well, after customers had had the phone and been in good standing after 60 days.
However, while Sprint will now support international roaming on GSM networks with the appropriate monthly plan, the company will not be selling the phone unlocked for use with international microSIMs. Ars asked Michelle Mermelstein, a Sprint wireless device public relations representative, to confirm that the Sprint iPhone 4S would not work with international microSIMs. “That is correct,” Mermelstein said. “I believe Verizon’s device works the same way.”
This corroborates some forum comments from Sprint customers, who state customer service representatives have told them the iPhone 4S can roam internationally on GSM with the appropriate plan, but can’t use SIM cards other than the one it comes with. If customers could get an unlocked phone from Sprint starting at $199, it would make the $549 unlocked version of the iPhone 4S somewhat redundant—according to Apple’s product page, the unlocked one “can also use a micro-SIM card from a local GSM carrier,” and only GSM networks in the US.
Update: Sprint has clarified for us one more time regarding the locked state of their iPhone 4S's: it will be sold unlocked, but will soon be locked, but can be unlocked again, if you ask nicely. The company's statement:Pádraig Pearse's handwritten surrender letter has been withdrawn from auction after the top bid reached only €770,000.
The letter was expected to fetch between €1m and €1.5m.
Commenting on this, Stuart Cole, a Director at Adam’s, said, “On this occasion, the reserve was not met.
"The owner, based overseas, has requested that Adam’s apply for an export licence tomorrow (Thursday) to formally notify the Government that the document will be leaving Ireland and for the process to be expedited.
"The owner was saddened that the Government refused to bid for the document but now feels relieved of his obligations to keep the document in Ireland”.
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams had called on Taoiseach Enda Kenny to get the Government to buy it.
Diarmaid Ferriter, professor of modern Irish history at University College Dublin, said the letter did not belong in an auction and that the sale debases Irish heritage on the 100th anniversary of the rebellion.
Pearse wrote the surrender letter in his prison cell on April 30 1916 shortly after he had given up the fight.
He was executed three days later.
A number of typed copies exist but the handwritten and signed letter put up for sale at Adam's is one of a kind.UI/UX Frameworks That Web Developers Are Crazy About
Manoj Blocked Unblock Follow Following Apr 26, 2017
Now in Design Era, many web development companies are going to start using exclusive Design frameworks for their UX or UI web design work and the mobile apps development. So before we provide the list of best Material Design. Here is the proper definition and the feature list of material Design.
According to “ Wikipedia”
Material Design (codenamed Quantum Paper) [1] is a design language developed in 2014 by Google. Expanding upon the “ card” motifs that debuted in Google Now, Material Design makes more liberal use of grid-based layouts, responsive animations and transitions, padding, and depth effects such as lighting and shadows.
Google announced Material Design on June 25, 2014, at the 2014 Google I/O conference.
Number of modern material design frameworks provide the number of useful interfaces and other elements such as — icons, check boxes, colors, buttons, fonts etc. These components extend the design creativity and easily adaptable application for all web portal and mobile based application. Furthermore, the frameworks offer flexibility to do the modifications in the apps and enhance their user-friendly approach for the end users. Let’s inspect the highly demanded or elegant Material Design frameworks which are frequently used.
Here are the list of the frameworks:
1. Material UI
Material UI is one of the best framework consist a range of useful UI components that promote material designs of Google. It’s the cluster of many important user-friendly elements like- switches, tool bars, drop down menus, dialog boxes etc.
2. Ionic Material
Ionic Material is one of the best advanced framework which is widely used for developing hybrid application in HTML5.
3. Materialize
Materialize is a totally responsive framework based on the Google’s material design principles. This framework is consisting many CSS components such as grid, table, shadow, button etc. and as well as Java Script elements such as drop down, dialogs, parallax, tabs, transition etc.
Continue Your Reading to See Top 10 Material Design UI/UX Frameworks That Web Developers Are Crazy About
Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com on April 27, 2017.Square, the mobile payment company started by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, has signed a lease for a permanent Canadian office in Kitchener, Ont.
Dorsey originally announced he would open the first Canadian Square office in Kitchener in September.
Lindsay Wiese, a spokesperson for the company, says the plan is to expand to over 30 employees.
"Kitchener-Waterloo has a thriving and talented tech community, so we're also excited to tap into that through recruiting," said Wiese. "We're also excited by how much more we can do to empower local sellers by establishing a Square office in Kitchener."
Retailers who use the payment system must download the Square Register app and use a card reader that plugs into the headphone jack of a smartphone or tablet. The system allows retailers to process credit card transactions anywhere they can get internet access.
Stephen Kropf, the owner of Bark Avenue Pet Grooming & Boutique in Kitchener, uses Square regularly and says he's excited to hear the office is opening up.
"I think it's great, it's jobs for the community," said Kropf. "I like that you can track your sales and see what you're selling and what you're not selling."
Square announced Tuesday it had signed the lease for a permanent Canadian office in Kitchener, Ont. The company expects to open their new office sometime this spring.
Square charges a 2.75 per cent fee per transaction, which is lower than traditional credit card fees, and payments are deposited the next day, making it an attractive alternative for small businesses.
Square had opened a smaller temporary office in the Breithaupt Block in downtown Kitchener, but will move into a space at 305 King. St. W..
Craig Beattie, a partner with Perimeter Development, which manages the building, says Square is exactly the type of client he hoped to attract with the building on King Street.
"I think what they'll bring to this mix is just another world class technology company that's on the upswing," said Beattie.
Square currently has over 800 employees around the world, with offices in San Francisco, New York, Atlanta and Tokyo.Research from MIT details a new technique that analyzes data from NASA’s Kepler space observatory to determine the types of clouds on planets that orbit other stars.
Meteorologists sometimes struggle to accurately predict the weather here on Earth, but now we can find out how cloudy it is on planets outside our solar system, thanks to researchers at MIT.
In a paper to be published in the Astrophysical Journal, researchers in the Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) at MIT describe a technique that analyzes data from NASA’s Kepler space observatory to determine the types of clouds on planets that orbit other stars, known as exoplanets.
The team, led by Kerri Cahoy, an assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics at MIT, has already used the method to determine the properties of clouds on the exoplanet Kepler-7b. The planet is known as a “hot Jupiter,” as temperatures in its atmosphere hover at around 1,700 kelvins.
NASA’s Kepler spacecraft was designed to search for Earth-like planets orbiting other stars. It was pointed at a fixed patch of space, constantly monitoring the brightness of 145,000 stars. An orbiting exoplanet crossing in front of one of these stars causes a temporary dimming of this brightness, allowing researchers to detect its presence.
Researchers have previously shown that by studying the variations in the amount
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the phone after the meeting. “I don’t think there was anyone in that room who doesn’t want to see a development there. We just aren’t sure what the final outcome will be.” “We’re hoping to get something approved that fits our needs and the neighbors’.” Early drawings for the project show a new three-story building fronting the street, with new two-story townhome-style apartments on the back of the lot. The front building would include ground-floor retail space under offices and apartments. Plans shown the neighbors include about 27 total apartment units with more than 70 parking spaces on the 11,054 square-foot property. Those designs may change, cautioned Marogil. “We left a lot of things blank because we’re looking for feedback,” he said. “We’re in the process of continuing to build the plan.” Neighbors have long desired to see the property redeveloped. The building sits perpendicular to Wealthy Street between Freyling Place and Calkins Avenue SE in the Wealthy Theatre Historic District. It occupies part of the East Hills neighborhood known as
. Marogil bought the property in early 2013 from nightclub owner Roosevelt Tillman. The property sat unused for almost a decade when McDonald’s closed in 1991 after a manager and two family members were beaten up in the parking lot. Tillman bought the property from a church group in 1996 and hoped to convert it into a charter school for the construction trade. When that plan was rejected, he converted it into a strip mall that began renting to tenants in 2000. Today, it remains home to several businesses, including Jamaican Dave’s, a take-out Caribbean-style restaurant and a Detox for Healthy Living storefront. Universal consensus among neighbors is the existing building is unremarkable. “We really want something to happen at 1059 — we’ve been looking at this piece of junk for a longtime,” said longtime East Hills neighborhood resident Carol Moore. “There’s great concern this be done very well.” Marogil’s agreement with Orion calls for dividing the land between the two companies if the project can successfully navigate through various city approvals. “We have a ways to go before we actualize that,” he said.
Garret Ellison covers business, government, environment and breaking news for MLive/The Grand Rapids Press. Email him at [email protected] or follow on Twitter & InstagramIn this post, deep learning neural networks are applied to the problem of predicting Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency prices. A chartist approach is taken to predict future values; the network makes predictions based on historical trends in the price and trading volume. A 1D convolutional neural network (CNN) transforms an input volume consisting of historical prices from several major cryptocurrencies into future price information.
Data Gathering
To facilitate rapid prediction, pricing information is queried using the web API of Poloniex. A URL is provided to the API and a JSON containing the historical price information of a specified cryptocurrency is returned.
import numpy as np import os import pandas as pd import urllib.request def GetAPIUrl(cur, sts = 1420070400): ''' Makes a URL for querying historical prices of a cyrpto from Poloniex cur: 3 letter abbreviation for cryptocurrency (BTC, LTC, etc) ''' return 'https://poloniex.com/public?command=returnChartData¤cyPair=USDT_{:s}&start={:d}&end=9999999999&period=7200'.format(cur, sts) def GetCurDF(cur, fp): ''' cur: 3 letter abbreviation for cryptocurrency (BTC, LTC, etc) fp: File path (to save price data to CSV) ''' openUrl = urllib.request.urlopen(GetAPIUrl(cur)) r = openUrl.read() openUrl.close() df = pd.read_json(r.decode()) df['date'] = df['date'].astype(np.int64) // 1000000000 return df #%%Path to store cached currency data datPath = 'CurDat/' if not os.path.exists(datPath): os.mkdir(datPath) #Different cryptocurrency types cl = ['BTC', 'LTC', 'ETH', 'XMR'] #Columns of price data to use CN = ['close', 'high', 'low', 'open', 'volume'] #Store data frames for each of above types D = [] for ci in cl: dfp = os.path.join(datPath, ci + '.csv') try: df = pd.read_csv(dfp, sep = ',') except FileNotFoundError: df = GetCurDF(ci, dfp) D.append(df) #%%Only keep range of data that is common to all currency types cr = min(Di.shape[0] for Di in D) for i in range(len(cl)): D[i] = D[i][(D[i].shape[0] - cr):]
After execution, D[i] is a pandas Dataframe containing historical price data for the cryptocurrency cl[i].
Time Series Sampling
New samples are constructed that pair sequences of samples with the subsequent samples. In this way, a regression model can be fit which predicts time periods into the future given data from the past. A helper class which accomplishes this follows.
import numpy as np class PastSampler: ''' Forms training samples for predicting future values from past value ''' def __init__(self, N, K): ''' Predict K future sample using N previous samples ''' self.K = K self.N = N def transform(self, A, Y = None): M = self.N + self.K #Number of samples per row (sample + target) #Matrix of sample indices like: {{1, 2..., M}, {2, 3,..., M + 1}} I = np.arange(M) + np.arange(A.shape[0] - M + 1).reshape(-1, 1) B = A[I].reshape(-1, M * A.shape[1], *A.shape[2:]) ci = self.N * A.shape[1] #Number of features per sample return B[:, :ci], B[:, ci:] #Sample matrix, Target matrix
The above class is applied to the original time sequence data to obtain the desired sample and target matrices.
from PastSampler import PastSampler #%%Features are channels C = np.hstack((Di[CN] for Di in D))[:, None, :] HP = 16 #Holdout period A = C[0:-HP] SV = A.mean(axis = 0) #Scale vector C /= SV #Basic scaling of data #%%Make samples of temporal sequences of pricing data (channel) NPS, NFS = 256, 16 #Number of past and future samples ps = PastSampler(NPS, NFS) B, Y = ps.transform(A)
In the above code, the shapes of and are as. A holdout period is maintained to access the performance of the network. The number of time units in the period is controlled by HP.
Applying Deep Neural Networks
The TFANN module is used to create an artificial neural network. TFANN can be installed using pip with the following command.
pip install TFANN
A 1D convolution neural network is constructed which transforms the input volume of historical data into predictions. The past NPS samples are transformed into a prediction about the next NFS samples. The C1d option in the network architecture specification indicates 1-dimensional convolution.
#%%Architecture of the neural network from TFANN import ANNR NC = B.shape[2] #2 1-D conv layers with relu followed by 1-d conv output layer ns = [('C1d', [8, NC, NC * 2], 4), ('AF','relu'), ('C1d', [8, NC * 2, NC * 2], 2), ('AF','relu'), ('C1d', [8, NC * 2, NC], 2)] #Create the neural network in TensorFlow cnnr = ANNR(B[0].shape, ns, batchSize = 32, learnRate = 2e-5, maxIter = 64, reg = 1e-5, tol = 1e-2, verbose = True) cnnr.fit(B, Y)
The architecture of the CNN is shown below in Figure 1. The top set of parenthesized values indicate the filter dimension while the bottom denote the stride.
Figure 1: 1D CNN Architecture
More information and the source code for the ANNR class are available on GitHub.
Prediction
Using the above network, the next NFS time steps can be predicted. These predictions can in turn be used for subsequent predictions so that prediction can be made an arbitrary amount into the future. Code to accomplish this follows.
PTS = [] #Predicted time sequences P, YH = B[[-1]], Y[[-1]] #Most recent time sequence for i in range(HP // NFS): #Repeat prediction P = np.concatenate([P[:, NFS:], YH], axis = 1) YH = cnnr.predict(P) PTS.append(YH) PTS = np.hstack(PTS).transpose((1, 0, 2)) A = np.vstack([A, PTS]) #Combine predictions with original data A = np.squeeze(A) * SV #Remove unittime dimension and rescale C = np.squeeze(C) * SV
Using PredictFull, the outputs of intermediate layers in the network can be visualized. Figure 2 shows an input sample as it is transformed by subsequent layers of the network.
Figure 2: Intermediate Layer Outputs
import matplotlib.pyplot as mpl nt = 4 PF = cnnr.PredictFull(B[:nt]) for i in range(nt): fig, ax = mpl.subplots(1, 4, figsize = (16 / 1.24, 10 / 1.25)) ax[0].plot(PF[0][i]) ax[0].set_title('Input') ax[1].plot(PF[2][i]) ax[1].set_title('Layer 1') ax[2].plot(PF[4][i]) ax[2].set_title('Layer 2') ax[3].plot(PF[5][i]) ax[3].set_title('Output') fig.text(0.5, 0.06, 'Time', ha='center') fig.text(0.06, 0.5, 'Activation', va='center', rotation='vertical') mpl.show()
Notice how in subsequent layers the input data is reduced from NPS to NFS time units.
Results
The result of the predictions can be visualized using matplotlib.
CI = list(range(C.shape[0])) AI = list(range(C.shape[0] + PTS.shape[0] - HP)) NDP = PTS.shape[0] #Number of days predicted for i, cli in enumerate(cl): fig, ax = mpl.subplots(figsize = (16 / 1.5, 10 / 1.5)) hind = i * len(CN) + CN.index('high') ax.plot(CI[-4 * HP:], C[-4 * HP:, hind], label = 'Actual') ax.plot(AI[-(NDP + 1):], A[-(NDP + 1):, hind], '--', label = 'Prediction') ax.legend(loc = 'upper left') ax.set_title(cli +'(High)') ax.set_ylabel('USD') ax.set_xlabel('Time') ax.axes.xaxis.set_ticklabels([]) mpl.show()
The resulting plot is shown below in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Cryptocurrency Predictions
The network predicts a dip in the prices of each cryptocurrency followed by a rally. The predicted behavior is similar to Bitcoin’s price over the past few days.
More Predictions
For a user-friendly application that integrates cryptocurrency predictions with market information, please see:
Also, follow RoboInsights on Twitter for daily predictions about Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), and Monero (XMR):
AdvertisementsWildlife Forensics Lab Uses Tech To Sniff, Identify Illegal Wood
Enlarge this image toggle caption Jes Burns/OPB/EarthFix Jes Burns/OPB/EarthFix
Before you prosecute thieves, you have to know what they stole. It's the same for crimes against nature.
The world's only lab dedicated solely to wildlife forensics is in southern Oregon. The lab usually specializes in endangered animal cases, but armed with a high-tech device, it's now helping track shipments of contraband wood.
There's a small woodshop at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Forensics Lab. But there's no sawdust, or power tools. The shop is more like an archive, containing samples of some of the rarest woods on the planet — African mahogany, Brazilian ebony and more.
The samples lean neatly on dozens of shelves. Lab director Ken Goddard flips through wooden planks the size of cellphones. They're used to help identify illegal shipments of rare woods.
"Basically you would not continue an investigation unless you're pretty sure you're dealing with endangered or threatened species," Goddard says.
With shipments of processed wood this can be challenging because the limbs, leaves and DNA-rich sapwood have been removed. Just a few steps down the hall from the woodshop, deputy lab director Ed Espinoza leads the center's new forensic work on timber.
"If somebody had just called me out of the blue first saying, 'Can you identify wood with your mass spec?' I would have said, 'No, that's crazy,' " Espinoza says.
The mass spectrometer they use is a sophisticated machine called a DART-TOF (Direct Analysis in Real Time – Time of Flight) mass spectrometer.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Jes Burns/OPB/EarthFix Jes Burns/OPB/EarthFix
It doesn't look or sound like much. It's more like a humming laser printer, with a propane cylinder attached. But the humble exterior hides some powerful technology.
A few years back an investigator asked if the lab could identify the wood confiscated in an alleged illegal shipment of agarwood, a protected incense tree. It struck Espinoza that he may be able to use the DART to identify the aromatic wood, which is used to make perfume.
"Originally we had no idea if it was going to pan out or not. But I knew if it had an odor... this instrument is kind of like a massive nose, almost," he says.
Espinoza shaves off a small sliver of the wood. With tweezers, he feeds a sample into the DART. It needs just seconds to whiff the compounds and identify agarwood's unique chemical signature.
"It didn't occur to me until after the fact that I could apply it to other types of wood," he says.
Espinoza and his team began collecting baseline samples of protected trees from around the world. These are the ones stored in the lab's woodshop now.
In April, the lab became the first and only facility internationally certified to tell law enforcement that one sample is, say, legally traded Amazonian rosewood, versus contraband Brazilian rosewood.
Shelley Gardner, the illegal logging program coordinator for the Forest Service, says the new DART technology gives law enforcement a better chance to stop illegally harvested wood from becoming someone's guitar or a new dining room set.
The knowledge that investigators can send samples to the lab when working on a case increases interest, Gardner says.
Tree cases aren't necessarily as exciting as chasing tiger or ivory traffickers.
But international timber trafficking is a huge global business. Interpol estimates it's worth up to $100 billion a year. And Goddard, the lab director, says there are broader conservation goals at play.
"I think these wood cases are far more important than just the wood," he says. "Trees can be regrown. They are replaceable. That may not be true for the species that lived in that forest."
That's why disrupting illegal logging can save more than just a tree. It can also protect the homes of mammals, birds and insects.Sac PD: Device found near southeast end of Cal Expo, where Ethan Way ends
A homemade explosive device discovered Monday near the gates of Cal Expo was disabled, the Sacramento Police Department said.The device was detonated without incident, officals said.The device was found just before noon near the southeast end of Cal Expo, where Ethan Way ends, Sacramento police spokesperson Matt McPhail said. It was found by workers at the water pump facility.The bike trail in the area was closed for a while but has since reopened, officials said.All roads are now open, police said.No other information has been released.
A homemade explosive device discovered Monday near the gates of Cal Expo was disabled, the Sacramento Police Department said.
The device was detonated without incident, officals said.
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The device was found just before noon near the southeast end of Cal Expo, where Ethan Way ends, Sacramento police spokesperson Matt McPhail said. It was found by workers at the water pump facility.
The bike trail in the area was closed for a while but has since reopened, officials said.
All roads are now open, police said.
No other information has been released.
AlertMeOnly the stationery shop has some appeal. I'm convinced – alongside every other writer I know – that the only thing preventing me from becoming Tolstoy is the lack of some coloured file cards and a better pen. Throw in a display book and I could be Shakespeare. Other than the stationery shop, it's all so tedious. Clothing stores are particularly annoying. I don't know if you've noticed but, every few months, they change the design of all the clothes. This is an outrageous attack on the consumer. Finally you discover a set of clothes that leaves you somewhere short of completely hideous and so, within the bounds of hygiene, you wear the outfit day and night, until it looks like a hobo's rags. You then walk into the shop in which, five years previously, you purchased the outfit and say "same again, thanks mate," and he looks at you as if you're insane. "We no longer do the pale blue," he says with withering contempt. "But I do have something similar in a tartan."
This shows a misunderstanding of the male mind, or at least of the morose mind of most middle-aged males. For years we tried to make a fashion statement: one that could be taken down and used against us. Now, the look we're going for could be described as "blergh". It's Country Road without those flamboyant off-greys. We have only one requirement from the world of fashion: that our entry into a room produces neither hilarity or pity. Having achieved this formula for invisibility, we'd like to repeat the recipe. For a clothes shop to dump items is like Woolworths saying: "Oh, we are not doing chicken this year, but I can sell you a nice piece of fish." Speaking of which, how annoying are the supermarkets? They've created speciality sections so you never know the location of anything. Ghee could be in the fridge next to the butter, in aisle six with the International Foods, over there in Health and Goodness, or – for all I know – packaged up as a face scrub in Chemist Supplies. Again a business idea: a supermarket organised alphabetically. They'd be Apples at the door and Zucchinis at the exit, with everything else in order. Organise your shopping list accordingly and the thing could be done in 10 minutes.
Of course, there would be issues as to whether the tinned tuna is under F for Fish, T for Tinned, and O for Outrageously Overpriced, but I'm sure things would resolve over time. There's also far too much choice. Do top loaders and front loaders really require a different formation of sudsy stuff? Do we need dog biscuits offering specific formulations according to the age, breed and personality type of the dog? And at what point did the purchase of milk become a way of expressing one's deeper life journey – "Brad and I prefer the A2 protein, homogenised yet organic, in a light-to-medium formulation, from cows who've willingly agreed to the process of milking." There are people on Tinder who've chosen a new partner in less time. My fantasy, for years now, is to create a blokes' supermarket offering just five products – lamb chops, beans, potatoes, loo roll and the odd bar of soap. They could have an aisle each. The aisles could be organised alphabetically. If you insist, they could also offer bread, but in a single loaf – multigrain at one end; white at the other. The kids could start on the kiddie end, the adults on the other, and everyone would be happy. It would be the best invention since, well, sliced bread.
Hardware stores, of course, need thorough reform. How can they be this large and never have the thing you need? We used to have a neighbourhood place the size of a shoebox and yet the bloke always had everything. "I'd like a 4.5 centimetre blurgin pipe, with double-flanged ends," you'd say, and he'd reach into the drawer right next to the counter and there it would be. He wouldn't even move from where he was standing. Capitalism, I know, prides itself on offering choice, but where do I sign up to choose less choice and less time spent shopping?As they gathered over a banquet of roast chicken and rissole potatoes on May 30, 1948, members of Our Lady Help of Christians Catholic Church had every reason to think the future of their Larimer parish would be as golden as the 50th anniversary they were celebrating that night.
In its first half century, the parish had been a spiritual and cultural hub for the Italian immigrant community, officially witnessing some 2,918 marriages and 13,125 baptisms
And the landmark sanctuary — with its deep, round-arched windows and its trio of golden-colored domes — stood as a point of pride for the neighborhood.
“May Divine Providence grant to the parish of Our Lady Help of Christians continuance of grace, that its future may be no less fruitful and its history no less glorious in the annals of eternity,” the anniversary program said.
But the parish would close its doors just over 40 years later, with many of its congregants having long since moved to eastern suburbs and blended into the American melting pot.
The sanctuary had a second life as home to an independent church before it, too, closed in 2008 and put the building on the market. Since then the church has stood silent, its windows and doors boarded up like those of some other houses on its block. Ragged vines cling to the church walls, graffiti mars the Corinthian pillars, and there’s more tarnish than gleam to the domes. Inside, the bare, cavernous sanctuary has been strewn with litter and marred by blasphemous graffiti.
The Rev. Armenia Johnson, chief apostle and general overseer for Heavenly Vision Ministries -- the last occupant of the building -- shows the damage to the sanctuary. Danese Kenon/Post-Gazette
While the sanctuary’s story is unique, the arc of its rise and fall is familiar.
Throughout the older neighborhoods of Pittsburgh and surrounding communities, and in cities throughout the North and Midwest, many historic sanctuaries have fallen silent, their congregations dispersed.
Within the Pittsburgh city limits alone, the Post-Gazette has found nearly two dozen former churches and synagogues that currently sit unused. Some are well-maintained, others are deteriorating to almost dangerous levels.
That tally doesn’t count the additional shuttered sanctuaries throughout other Allegheny County municipalities, or ones like the former Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Duquesne, recently demolished after storm damage dealt a mortal blow to the decaying structure.
Nor does it count the many others in and around Pittsburgh that have been renovated and now serve as restaurants, banquet halls or other uses. Some become landmarks in their new life. They include Church Brew Works in Lower Lawrenceville — a restaurant reminiscent of a German-style beer hall, set amid stained glass and large brewing kettles — and the Grand Hall at the Priory in East Allegheny, which has hosted everything from wedding receptions to boxing matches. Both are in former Catholic churches.
And some vacant sanctuaries remain in limbo, such as the historic former Albright United Methodist Church in Bloomfield, now at the center of a dispute between preservationists and its Methodist owners, who say the cost of restoration is prohibitive and want to sell it to a developer who plans to raze and replace it with a retail development.
Number of empty churches to grow
The supply of surplus houses of worship will soon greatly expand.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh is considering the closure of dozens of its church buildings across six counties, the biggest restructuring since it shuttered Our Lady amid an earlier wave of closings in the early 1990s.
The diocese says that when it deconsecrates a church, it typically removes sacred objects and maintains the structure until it’s sold, although sometimes buildings later deteriorate under new ownership.
The diocese is contending with a steep decline in priests and church participation, as well as demographic pressures — people moving to newer suburbs, families having fewer children, young adults drifting away from religion with uncertain prospects of ever returning.
The former St. Matthew is one of several former Roman Catholic churches that are no longer being used. Steve Mellon/Post-Gazette
Similar factors are pressing on other historic religious bodies that often built sanctuaries in neighborhoods where their people no longer reside in large numbers. Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Eastern Orthodox, Byzantine Catholic and various Jewish denominations have closed multiple sanctuaries in urban neighborhoods and smaller cities and towns.
Especially affected are old immigrant neighborhoods that once re-created the sacred map of Europe in a tight jumble of steeples. But it’s also true of small downtowns whose historic supply of “First” churches often exceeds the demand.
Two former Presbyterian sanctuaries in Carnegie now host a banquet hall and a mosque. Baptist, Methodist and Presbyterian churches in the same Dormont neighborhood closed within a few months of each other in 2013 and 2014; one is now for sale, another is becoming a Buddhist temple and the third is now a campus for a non-denominational church.
The sacred landscape is undergoing a re-mapping that earlier worshipers could barely have imagined when they built their brick, stone or wooden sanctuaries to endure practically as long as the eternity proclaimed within their walls.
“In their mind, they were building for generations,” said the Rev. Charles Bober. He’s a former pastor of St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Allentown, which closed earlier this year due to declining numbers. “They just never would have thought their community would change.”
Gem of the architectural fabric
But they do — sometimes tumultuously when steel mills close, sometimes gradually when people filter out to suburbs or just drift away from the old-time religion.
And some see that as a loss not just to congregations but to their wider communities.
Often, a house of worship is “the greatest form of architecture on a given street,” said Jack Schmitt, the former longtime chair of the religious architecture heritage committee of Preservation Pittsburgh. A decaying landmark church can drag down a neighborhood, and a healthy one can lift it up, he said.
“When you come outside your door in a city area, you almost always see a church, and it adds to the architectural fabric to which our children are exposed. It makes their imagination soar,” said Mr. Schmitt, who helped spearhead the restoration of the landmark Calvary United Methodist Church in Allegheny West and has consulted with others seeking to restore historic sanctuaries.
A house of worship “makes the people feel secure in the neighborhood because it reminds them of the presence of God, even if they’re not parishioners, even if they’re not religious,” Mr. Schmitt said.
Robert Jaeger, president of the Philadelphia-based Partners for Sacred Places, said houses of worship have a “halo effect” on their neighborhoods via direct spending by congregants, boosting social cohesion or making the street more attractive for other investors.
“There’s an economic value to these places, there’s a cultural value, there’s a streetscape value, there’s a social-service value,” said Mr. Jaeger. “Do we really want to see all these places gone?”
But keeping them in place is costly. Beautiful buildings age and decay over generations, dwindling congregations strain to replace ancient, inefficient heating systems, old buildings often aren’t suited to modern standards of wheelchair access and other uses. Air-conditioning is often out of reach.
Mr. Jaeger’s organization tries to help struggling congregations stay in operation through such means as sharing their space — and expenses — with civic organizations involved in arts, education or social services such as child care.
But the headwinds are strong, he acknowledged, and not just in cities.
“Even the older suburbs were once considered immune but are starting to face the same issues,” Mr. Jaeger said.
When neighborhoods change
The issue of church closings often is closely tied with those of race and class. Many closed sanctuaries, such as Our Lady, declined when white parishioners moved out of a neighborhood and people of color, often poorer, moved in. Sometimes a locally based congregation will purchase the building, but it may lack the resources to maintain it. And churches are often not the only shuttered buildings.
“There is so much vacancy as far as other houses, other large commercial buildings. There are two vacant schools in the neighborhood,” said Demi Kolke, community development manager of Operation Better Block, an organization focused on Homewood revitalization.
But many other churches do thrive in Homewood, she said, drawing not just locals but outsiders. If more came, they might become more invested in the neighborhood’s health. “Where people worship, where they pray is oftentimes where they will be comfortable exploring more,” she said.
She hopes that denominations consider the community impact of a church closing.
“I can understand the business side of it,” such as the availability of funding and clergy. But keeping a sanctuary open “does have tremendous value” to its neighbors.
She cited the case of the Bible Center Church, which is restoring a vacant sanctuary across from Faison Arts Academy in South Homewood. The church plans to use the historic structure for everything from student programs to training of teachers and parents, with an emphasis in such areas as science, technology and math.
To be sure, new sanctuaries are being built in growing suburbs, and many of them thrive.
Father Bober has seen that first-hand now as pastor of fast-growing St. Kilian Parish in Cranberry, which in September dedicated a new church (and partly adorned it with artifacts from shuttered churches, including St. John Vianney.) Evangelical Protestant congregations known as megachurches have built large sanctuaries, typically in auditorium-like settings with large video screens and little of the ornamentation associated with old churches.
Shifts in worshipers
The former Ebenezer Baptist Church in the Hill District is barely recognizable as a church now. Danese Kenon/Post-Gazette
Overall, though, growth is the exception.
Indeed, while suburban migration and other demographics explain some of the decline in older houses of worship, an undeniable factor is the decline of worship itself.
Nearly a quarter of American adults, and a third of young ones, answer “nothing in particular” when asked their religious affiliation, according to a 2015 Pew Research Center report. In 1990, fewer than 1 in 10 said so.
Catholics and mainline Protestants are declining as a share of the population, the Pew report said, while evangelical Protestants are holding their own.
Catholic sacramental observance is down significantly, the Diocese of Pittsburgh says.
And religious groups overall in greater Pittsburgh had a net loss of at least 15 percent of their adherents between 2000 and 2010, led by declines among Catholics and historic Protestant denominations, the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies reports. Those losses outpaced smaller gains by some evangelical Protestant, Mormon and other groups.
While some congregations thrive even in economically depressed areas, many historic congregations lose the sense of energetic mission that built them generations earlier.
“We’ve seen this across denominational lines,” said the Rev. Jeffrey Johnson, regional pastor for the American Baptist Churches of Pennsylvania and Delaware. “They go from community-based congregations to commuter-based congregations, where you have people coming back into the church because they have some heritage there. But they have lost just about every bit of connection with the community. If the congregants don’t adopt the community as their own, the clock is ticking.”
Rev. Johnson said dwindling churches typically carry on until a crisis knocks them out — a burst water pipe or a killer heating bill. The Great Recession “really became for many churches a death knell,” he added.
When churches do close, they often use their remaining assets to support the launch of a congregation elsewhere, or a student ministry. “In closure there’s new life,” Rev. Johnson said.
When he helped one church close up shop, members said they felt they had failed. “Not if you close well,” he told them.
Not one church mentioned in the Bible is open today, he said: “So churches have life cycles. We have to accept that.”
And sometimes the cycle renews itself. The former St. Elizabeth Church, built by a Slovak Catholic parish in the Strip District, spent recent years as a nightclub, the Altar Bar. Now a sale is pending to Orchard Hill Church, a large Franklin Park-based church, as a permanent home for its recently launched urban campus.“
So here I go with some rather bold suggestions to increase faction flair and dynamics...
VS: We already know of the overheat mechanic, which is rather interesting, but why not expand it to their whole arsenal in an altered way (otherwise ammo boxes become redundant). All their weapons receive the overheat mechanic, but has batteries which are consumed if the shooter overheats his weapon. Batteries are resupplied at the rate of 1 battery per tick from ammo boxes and depending on the weapon type (LMG, AR or carbine, etc.) players have between 2 and 4 batteries total (increased by ammo belt) to balance out the fact that they can have infinite ammo if used correctly. As a side note the directive weapons will still have their use since they don't have the batteries to worry about.
NC: This idea is based on the fact that the faction uses electromagnetic weapons. Instead of traditional fire mode switching, the factions' infantry weapons are able to change their RPM and projectile velocities reverse proportionally (RoF goes down and velocity goes up and vice versa), but the rest of their stats remain the same.
TR: Simple thing, the spin-up time that the Butcher received recently (to compensate for the loss of uniqueness on the Butcher it should receive the belt-feed mechanic).
Plz give me some feedback on this so that I can further develop the ideas to become balanced (both in terms of inter-faction play and in terms of directive weapons).
”Vladimir Nabokov, circa 1975 | Photograph by Horst Tappe / Getty Images
By 1967, Vladimir Nabokov had published 15 novels and novellas and six short story collections. But as he told the Paris Review that year, “It is not improbable that had there been no revolution in Russia, I would have devoted myself entirely to lepidopterology”—the study and classification of butterflies—“and never written any novels at all.” As most Nabokov readers know, the great Russian-American writer had a passion for butterflies. He published 18 science papers in the field of lepidoptery, and from 1942 to 1948 was de facto curator of lepidoptery at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology.
As a lepidopterist, Nabokov’s most audacious claim was that a South American subfamily of blue butterflies was not the result of a single migration, but the effect of five different migrations to South Asia over the course of 10 million years. Few butterfly experts at the time took Nabokov’s papers seriously. At best, they said, Nabokov was an inspired amateur. But in 2011, a group of scientists at Harvard’s School of Comparative Zoology confirmed Nabokov’s theory about the subfamily of blue butterflies, using genetic sequencing.
For years literary scholars have traced the influence of Nabokov’s lepidoptery on his fiction. Nabokov collected, dissected, and illustrated butterflies with the same skill and precision as he created characters and political cultures. On butterfly-hunting trips across America, Nabokov gathered the material for the famous portrait of road-side America that emerges in Lolita. As Mary Ellen Hannibal wrote in this magazine in 2013, “Butterflies were so entwined with the novel that Nabokov celebrated an especially important find—discovering the first known female of Lycaeides sublivens above Telluride, Colo. in the summer of 1951—by making the town the site of the novel’s final scene.”
Now scholars have given us a comprehensive portrait of Nabokov’s butterfly passions. Stephen H. Blackwell, a professor of Russian literature and language at the University of Tennessee, and his colleague, Kurt Johnson, coauthor of Nabokov’s Blues: The Scientific Odyssey of a Literary Genius, have just published Fine Lines: Vladimir Nabokov’s Scientific Art. The book features 154 of Nabokov’s butterfly illustrations—most of which have never been seen by more than a handful of Nabokov aficionados—alongside 10 essays written by Nabokov specialists and leading scientists. The book will be of inherent interest to Nabokov fans, but Blackwell believes it will resonate with anyone interested in the pursuit of knowledge and beauty.
Vladimir Nabokov. Courtesy of the Vladimir Nabokov Archive at the Berg Collection, New York Public Library, used by permission of The Wylie Agency LLC.
Nautilus caught up with Blackwell about the importance of “perceiving with passion,” the connections between science and art, and how the latter imitates life.
Why was Nabokov’s scientific work not taken seriously?
There are two phases of resistance. The first phase was before he was recognized; I don’t think the fact that he was a great writer caused resistance to the ideas he wrote in the 1940s. My colleague, Kurt Johnson, suggests that what happened was Nabokov’s claims and arguments were out of sync with how leading authorities on entomology thought at the time. So they ignored him. It wasn’t until later that Johnston and his colleagues picked up his research and continued what Nabokov had done, and proved its validity. The second—Nabokov didn’t become famous until at least 8 years after his scientific period. Once he was a famous novelist, the bias crept in. People thought that, because he’s an artist, he can’t be a scientist—which we see even today, in one review of Fine Lines.
Vladimir Nabokov. Courtesy of the Vladimir Nabokov Archive at the Berg Collection, New York Public Library, used by permission of The Wylie Agency LLC.
How did Nabokov’s art influence his science and vice versa?
Nabokov’s interest in
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, though; even though these samples will no longer be available on the Learn tab, they will still be available to download on the Unreal Engine Wiki. We will no longer be updating or supporting them, but we encourage you, the Unreal Engine community, to take up that torch. We would love to see them continue to live on in your capable hands.
We have great things in store for the Learn tab so keep an eye out for new content, improved layout and navigation, and more!
The Learning Resources TeamCLOSE League of the South member explains the rally and their beliefs on Southern Heritage. Brittany Crocker/ USA Today Network - Tennessee
Buy Photo Protesters at the Confederate monument in Fort Sanders on Saturday, Aug. 26, 2017. Across the street are the counter-protesters. (Photo: Michael Patrick/News Sentinel)Buy Photo
More than 150 years after Knoxville's pivotal moment of the Civil War, Fort Sanders found itself divided again Saturday.
An afternoon rally "in support of" a monument to Confederate soldiers killed in the Battle of Fort Sanders wrapped up peacefully with no violence and only one arrest, but shouts of rage and fury on both sides as more than 300 police officers stood guard.
More: Rally at Confederate monument in Fort Sanders draws few protesters, thousands of counter-protesters
Counter-protesters - at least 2,800 - outnumbered rally participants - about three-dozen - by at least 70-to-1, Knoxville Police Chief David Rausch estimated.
A street divided
CLOSE Clips from Fort Sanders Confederate monument protest Calvin Mattheis/USA Today Network - Tennessee
Knoxville Police Department officers shut down 17th Street near the University of Tennessee campus, towed more than 80 cars left parked near the rally site, and barricaded the sidewalks, with rally participants clustered around the monument on one side and counter-protesters on the other. Demonstrators on each side had to pass through security checkpoints, with no guns, flagpoles or other weapons allowed.
KPD officers had help from Oak Ridge and Chattanooga officers, along with Knox County Sheriff's Office deputies, Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers and federal agents.
Rausch and Knoxville Mayor Madeline Rogero wouldn't say exactly how many officers worked the rally, and overtime costs for the police presence weren't available Saturday.
"The plan we had in place was a good plan," Rausch said. "Everything was very peaceful."
Buy Photo Counterprotesters yell at protesters across the street during a rally in Fort Sanders on Aug. 26, 2017. (Photo: Michael Patrick / News Sentinel)
Opponents cited ties between the rally's organizer, Tom Pierce, a onetime candidate for the Knox County Commission, and various hate groups. Pierce, a self-employed truck driver from Kimberlin Heights in South Knox County, calls himself a white separatist.
"That's the side that's full of hate," Pierce said, pointing to the jeering counter-protesters. "This (monument) is part of our history. Just because this plague of locusts is going around the country tearing our monuments down, they're calling me a racist and a Nazi. They're probably all Marxists. We may not be fighting with bullets and bayonets anymore, but it's still the same war."
CLOSE About 400 people showed up to counter a protest at a Confederate monument in Knoxville's Fort Sanders neighborhood. Video from The Standard UT student apartments. Courtesy of Lindsey Grillot.
He said more people would have showed up for the rally if they'd been allowed to carry guns "to feel more secure."
The only close-up confrontation came when a group of counter-protesters passed through the checkpoint on the monument's side of the street and started chanting at rally participants. Police quickly herded them out.
Buy Photo Counter-protestors chant during a protest for the removal of a Confederate monument in Fort Sanders along 17th Street in Knoxville, Tennessee on Saturday, August 26, 2017. (Photo: Calvin Mattheis, Knoxville News Sentinel)
The only arrest came when a woman, Kaylie Beckett, showed up at the checkpoint on the counter-protest side with a Mason jar and refused to let go of it, the chief said. She faces a charge of disorderly conduct.
Monument and memory
The monument, dedicated by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1914, has stood for 103 years near the site of the earthen fort where Confederate soldiers under Gen. James Longstreet launched a failed assault on Union defenses under Gen. Ambrose Burnside the morning of Nov. 29, 1863. The Confederacy lost 129 soldiers in the first 20 minutes, not counting others wounded and captured, and Longstreet ultimately failed to recapture Knoxville.
More: Why Knoxville doesn't have many Confederate monuments
Competing online petitions to tear down and to keep the memorial began circulating earlier this month in the wake of the violent rally over a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee in Charlottesville, Virginia. Those petitions carry no weight under state law, and the monument could be removed only by a two-thirds majority vote of the Tennessee Historical Commission.
Vandals have struck the monument at least twice recently.
More: Three women cited for vandalizing Fort Sanders Confederate monument
Pierce, who attended the Charlottesville rally, brought a Confederate battle flag Saturday stained by what he said was a paint-bombing there.
Most of the protesters on the monument's side of the street denied any ties to racist groups. Some left early, apparently bored.
Buy Photo A protester yells at the counter-protestor during a protest for the removal of a Confederate monument in Fort Sanders along 17th Street in Knoxville, Tennessee on Saturday, August 26, 2017. (Photo: Calvin Mattheis, Knoxville News Sentinel)
"I'm not part of any group here," said Jeff Ownby, a former Knox County commissioner. "This is just about preserving history."
Others said they had other motives.
"Eventually, white Southerners are going to have to fight for their own white Southern folk," said Garon Archer, a self-described white nationalist from Johnson City. "Because if we don't, no one else is going to for us."
Only a few at the rally showed much knowledge of the battle the monument commemorates. Some said they didn't know it stood there until the controversy began.
'This is about racism'
Buy Photo Crowd members hold signs speaking out against racism and hate during the Kindness Rally held in Krutch Park in downtown Knoxville on Saturday, Aug. 26, 2017. (Photo: BRIANNA PACIORKA/NEWS SENTINEL)
Across the street, counter-protesters waved signs bearing messages of everything from love and peace to "Stamp Out Fascism." Most said they opposed Pierce's views more than the monument.
"I think this many people showing up was less about, 'Oh, this monument needs to come down,' and more about there are people in Knoxville who are directly affected by these racist views,” said Sarah Tanner, a student at the University of Tennessee. “I think it was definitely more about showing support for (those affected by racism) and showing that Knoxville doesn't support those ideas.”
Some counter-protesters brought a defaced Confederate battle flag to stand on.
“These wounds from the Civil War, they have not healed,” said Eduardo Miranontes of Knoxville, who called the monument a sign of slavery. “It’s still relevant. The fact that people still come out and defend this stuff and make up all sorts of excuses for it is disgusting. I feel personally offended by it as a person of color. It bothers me. I’m afraid for my safety.”
Buy Photo Indivisible East Tennessee met up at World's Fair Park before heading to the protest area on 17th St. in Fort Sanders on Saturday, August 26, 2017. (Photo: BRIANNA PACIORKA/NEWS SENTINEL)
Sarah Herron, leader of Indivisible East Tennessee, an anti-Trump organization that stood with counterprotesters, said the event shows progress for racial healing in Knoxville, but the city still has a long way to go.
"I think it's really important to say that this isn't just about this monument, that it's about racism at any rallying point that would draw racists," she said. "We're here with this message that hate has no home here. That's why we're here, to make sure that message is heard. There should be no confusion: This is about racism, not a rock."
Buy Photo Knoxville Police officers stand guard during a protest for the removal of a Confederate monument in Fort Sanders along 17th Street in Knoxville, Tennessee on Saturday, August 26, 2017. (Photo: Calvin Mattheis, Knoxville News Sentinel)
USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee staff writers Brittany Crocker, Travis Dorman and Don Jacobs contributed to this story.
Read or Share this story: http://knoxne.ws/2wIxNX8On HBO's Silicon Valley, startups promise to "change the world" by tackling silly, often nonexistent problems. But this season, the show's characters are tackling a project that really could make a difference. In their latest pivot, Richard Hendricks and the Pied Piper gang are trying to create a new internet that cuts out intermediaries like Facebook, Google, and the fictional Hooli. Their idea: Use a peer-to-peer network built atop every smartphone on the planet, effectively rendering huge data centers full of servers unnecessary.
"If we could do it, we could build a completely decentralized version of our current internet," Hendricks says. "With no firewalls, no tolls, no government regulation, no spying. Information would be totally free in every sense of the word."
But wait: Isn't the internet already a decentralized network that no one owns? In theory, yes. In practice, a small number of enormous companies control or at least mediate much of the internet. Sure, anyone can publish whatever they want to the web. But without Facebook and Google, will anyone be able to find it? Amazon, meanwhile, controls not just the web's biggest online store but a cloud computing service so large and important that when part of it went offline briefly earlier this year, the internet itself seemed to go down. Similarly, when hackers attacked the lesser-known company Dyn—now owned by tech giant Oracle—last year, large swaths of the internet came crashing down with it. Meanwhile, a handful of telecommunications giants, including Comcast, Charter, and Verizon, control the market for internet access and have the technical capability to block you from accessing particular sites or apps. In some countries, a single state-owned telco controls internet access completely.
Given those very non-utopian realities, people in the real world are also hard at work trying to rebuild the internet in a way that comes closer to the decentralized ideal. They're still pretty far from Richard's utopian vision, but it's already possible to do some of what he describes. Still, it's not enough to just cut out today's internet power players. You also need to build a new internet that people will actually want to use.
Storage Everywhere
On the show, Richard's plan stems from the realization that just about everyone carries around a smartphone with hundreds of times more computing power than the machines that sent humans to the moon. What's more, those phones are just sitting in people's pockets doing nothing for most of the day. Richard proposes to use his fictional compression technology—his big innovation from season one—to free up extra space on people's phones. In exchange for using the app, users would agree to share some of the space they free up with Pied Piper, who will then resell it to companies for far less than they currently pay giants like Amazon.
The closest thing to what's described on Silicon Valley might be Storj, a decentralized cloud storage company. Much like Pied Piper, Storj has built a network of people who sell their unused storage capacity. If you want to buy space on the Storj network, you upload your files and the company splits them up into smaller pieces, encrypts them so that no one but you can read your data, and then distributes those pieces across its network.
"You control your own encryption keys so we have no access to the data," says cofounder John Quinn. "We have no knowledge of what is being stored."
Also like Pied Piper, Storj bills itself as safer than traditional storage systems, because your files will reside on multiple computers throughout the world. Quinn says that in order to lose a file, 21 out of 40 of the computers hosting it would have to go offline.
Storj proves that the Silicon Valley's basic idea is feasible. But unlike Pied Piper, Storj doesn't rely on smartphones. "Phones don't have much storage and the network capability isn't great, so the show's idea is a little fanciful," says Quinn. Someday, 5G wireless networks might make phones a more viable part of the Storj network. If Richard's compression algorithm was real, those smaller files will help too. But for now, the Storj network relies primarily on servers, laptops, and desktop computers. The reality is less grand than the HBO fantasy.
IPFS
As interesting as Storj is, it's not quite what Richard actually described in his pitch. Storj is a storage service, not a whole new internet. A more ambitious project called IPFS (short for "Interplanetary File System") is probably a bit closer to Richard's grand vision of a censorship-resistant internet with privacy features built right in.
The idea behind IPFS is to have web browsers store copies of the pages they visit and then do double-duty as web servers. That way, if the original server disappears, the people who visited the page can still share it with the world. Publishers get improved resilience, and readers get to help support the content they care about. With encryption a part of the protocol, criminals and spies can't in theory see what you're looking at. Eventually, the IPFS team and a gaggle of other groups hope to make it possible to build interactive apps along the lines of Facebook that don't require any centralized servers to run.
You need to build a new internet that people will actually want to use.
But the idea of building a censorship-proof internet by backing up copies throughout the internet isn't without its potential problems. Sometimes publishers want to remove old content. IPFS creator Juan Benet told us last year that the project is trying to work out ways to let publishers "recall" pages that are being shared. But that idea is also fraught. What's to stop a government censor from using the recall feature? What happens if someone creates a version that ignores recalls?
Then there are moral and legal risks. Tools like Storj and the venerable peer-to-peer sharing system Freenet make it impossible to know just what content you're storing for other people, which means you could be playing host to, say, child pornography. Quinn says that the Storj team is currently working on ways to block known problem users. But it won't be able to completely guarantee that none of its hosts will end up storing illegal content.
IPFS gets around this largely by letting people decide which of the content they've visited they actually want to share. But this means that less popular content, even if it's perfectly legal and ethical, might end up disappearing if too few people share it. Benet and company are working on a system called Filecoin that, not unlike Storj, would compensate people for providing access.
Even overcoming these trade-offs inherent in decentralization, people may still not want to use these apps. Storj may be able to win over businesses by being cheaper, but even if it is more reliable, the idea of storing data on random machines scattered across the internet instead of in a traditional data center sounds risky compared to, say, the massively robust AWS, backed by Amazon's technical know-how and billions of dollars. Convincing people to use decentralized alternatives to Facebook and Twitter has proven to be a notoriously difficult problem. Getting people to use what amounts to a whole new version of the web could be even harder.
Mesh
Even if IPFS, Storj, or one of the countless other decentralized platforms out there do win people over, they're still technically riding atop the existing internet infrastructure controlled by a shrinking number of telcos. Silicon Valley hasn't addressed this problem yet. But what if you could chain the smart phones and laptops of the world together using WiFi and Bluetooth to create a wireless network that was free and open to everyone, with no need for Big Telecom?
Australian computer scientist Paul Gardner-Stephen tried to do something like that after the Haiti earthquake in 2010. "Mobile phones have the capability to run autonomous networks, it's just that no one had implemented it," he says. Gardner-Stephen helped build Serval, a decentralized messaging app that can spread texts in a peer-to-peer fashion without the need for a traditional telco carrier. But he quickly realized, as the Pied Piper team likely will, that trying to turn people's mobile phones into servers drains their batteries too quickly to be practical. Today, the Serval team relies on solar powered base stations to relay messages.
Serval and similar apps like Firechat aren't meant to replace the internet, just provide communications during disasters or in remote locations. But the idea of creating decentralized wireless networks—mesh networks—still has merit. One such network, Wlan Slovenija, for example, now covers all of Slovenia and is spreading to neighboring countries. But these mesh networks are still a long way from replacing telcos—especially in the US. Even as wireless base stations improve, they can't quite yet compete with the fiber-optic cables that link the nation's telco infrastructure on speed and reliability, and some community networks, such as Guifi in Spain, are bolstering their wireless connections with fiber.
Even then, given a choice, would people really pick a decentralized option over the status quo? Customer service at big broadband companies may be bad to nonexistent, but you can still call someone. For those who would nevertheless prefer to wrest control of the internet from large corporations, these new alternatives will need to be better and faster than the services they hope to displace. Simply being decentralized isn't enough.
It wasn't so long ago that people questioned whether anyone would ever take to the internet at all. As the season finale of Silicon Valley approaches, Pied Piper will find out whether its version of a new internet works and whether there's a demand for it. They just have to build it and see if anyone comes—just like in the real world.At Least 526 People Were Shot in America over Thanksgiving Break One victim was celebrating his 25th birthday on Bourbon Street. Another was a 2-month-old child fatally shot by her father in an Alaska hotel room.
Denzel Mitchell, who was raised with Demontris Toliver, ties a balloon to a lamp post as people gather for a vigil at Bourbon Street and Iberville Street for Toliver, who was killed in a shooting in the early morning in the French Quarter section of New Orleans, Sunday, Nov. 27, 2016.
The streets of New Orleans’s French Quarter had swelled with tourists after the annual Bayou Classic football game early Sunday when shots rang out. An argument that started somewhere else washed up on Bourbon Street and became a gun battle. One person died, another nine were wounded. None of the victims were the intended targets.
Demontris Toliver was a 25-year-old a tattoo artist from Baton Rouge who was visiting the town where he grew up to celebrate his birthday. Toliver had just left his hotel with his fiance when bullets hit him in the chest and shoulder.
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“That was my left hand,” one of his brothers, Joshua Davis, told the Times-Picayune. “That was my everything.”
Among the wounded was 20-year-old Brittany Ben, who was shot five times while shielding her nephew from the gunfire. Two bullets remain lodged in her body. Her nephew was shot twice. “She went out there to have fun, caught five bullets and she didn’t deserve that at all,” Brittany’s mother told a local CBS affiliate.
Nationwide, at least 526 people were shot from Thursday to Sunday in America, 153 of them fatally, according to Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit website that scours more than 1,200 sources to track gun deaths and injuries in the U.S. The tally is likely to climb as more reports come in.
The carnage came in hundreds of episodes of everyday gun violence that erupted in streets, living rooms, and nightclubs across the country. In at least six instances, including the shooting on Bourbon Street, bullets struck four or more individuals — defined as a mass shooting by GVA.
Chicago, which has been ravaged by gun violence, saw one of its most violent Thanksgiving breaks in years: 74 people were shot, eight of them fatally. Last year, 28 people were shot, and eight died. The city is on pace to surpass 4,000 shootings in the next few weeks.
Notable incidents from elsewhere in the U.S. include:
On Thanksgiving Day, seven people were shot, two of them fatally, at a park in Louisville, Kentucky, the site of a youth football tournament. The gunfire was sparked when a man bumped into another man who was carrying a gun.
On Friday, 22-year-old McKay Hutton fatally shot his 54-year-old mother, 22-year-old wife, and 2-month-old child in a Hampton Inn in Fairbanks, Alaska, before killing himself. A childhood friend of Hutton’s said his role in the murder-suicide was “hard to believe.”
Also on Friday, a man was fatally shot after he tried to stop a man from beating a woman in a Walmart parking lot in San Antonio, Texas.
On Saturday, a 13-year-old boy in Niota, Tennessee, was unloading a rifle when it discharged, killing his 17-year-old sister.
On Sunday, seven people were wounded in a roaming gun battle in Kansas City, Missouri. One of the victims was unintentionally shot by a responding officer.
Also on Sunday, a man shot his pregnant fiancé, 24, in the stomach in the West Garfield Park neighborhood of Chicago. Her unborn baby died. The suspect was shot and killed by police.
As always, there’s the very real fear that these shootings will lead to more violence. Mourners gathering in Louisville’s Shawnee Park after the shooting on Thursday were spotted consoling each other — and shouting at each other. A woman collapsed to the ground near one of the two dead victims and yelled, “Get me a gun! Get me a gun!”
In New Orleans, Jessie Ben, the mother of shooting victim Brittany, said she prays for an end to the shooting: “Stop all the killing, it’s not worth it.”
[Photo by Gerald Herbert/AP Photo]GAME CRASHES on Quad Core Computers
OK, I had to edit this review. From the **s down was my original review with that had 5 stars. But after playing this game for many hours and finding a Bug in the game that crashes it completely, I've reduced my rating to a 1 star. Apparently gamers who are playing this game on a quad core computer will have problems with the game when you enter certain buildings especially small houses or shacks. Many players just tried to avoid houses throughout the entire game so that it wouldn't crash. Unfortunately there is a part called Tranquility Lane, where you must enter a house to continue the game... in this house is where the most freezes happen. I've done very much research on this crash and it seems to only be happening on Quad Core systems. There is a fix that has been created by a "user" that involves you editing an.ini game file. Frankly you shouldn't have to edit your own game files to be able to play a game. Bethesda should have tested this game on a quad core system and fixed this before it was ever released. Many of us have contacted Bethesda about this and all received an automated response that had nothing to do with this problem. One person even went as high as writing the president of the company, but was then blocked by someone in management. I suggest you do your own research before buying this game... do a search for game freezes in house or crashes in buildings. There are many... many forums dedicated to this one problem that have been ignored by the staff of Bethesda. I'm very disappointed, as I said before, this game had so much potential. ************************* Original Review ************************************* Very good open world game. Not as big as Oblivion or Morrowind, but just as much fun. This game is not Oblivion with guns though. There is a very big difference with the fighting and VATS system. Also, the leveling system is still very similar to the other two Fallouts, which is way different than the Elder Scrolls series. The visuals are absolutely stunning and the gameplay is fun and challenging. The people you meet seem to have real personalities and can the way you interact with them can change the game very much. I like the leveling up system, and too me it still feels like the Fallout universe even if it is now 1st person. Just make sure your PC can handle this game. I have a very nice gaming machine that I built myself, and it can barely run this game on Ultra, so I just keep the graphics on high. (My PC: MSI Geforce NX88000GT OC, Intel Core2 Quad 6600 cpu OC'd, 8 GB of Ram, XFX nForce 680i Lt Mobo, Antec TruePower Quatro 1000w ps)(I am actually thinking of upgrading my gpu, because that is the only thing holding me back from playing it on ultra) If all of that is gibberish to you and you don't have a newer gaming PC than you probably can't play this game on it. Check out the specs for the game before you buy this. This game is definitely not for kids: the language is very explicit and the violence is very bloody and extreme.Read full reviewThe Oakland Police Department is feeling the burn of California’s unending budget crisis, as 80 officers were laid off Tuesday night after negotiations between city and police union failed to reach an accord.
The department’s chief had said in recent days that unless the city could meet the union’s demands, officers would no longer respond in person to register sex offenders, or for reports of vehicle accidents, grand theft, identity theft, burglary, embezzlement, vandalism, stray animals and others.
Instead, victims in most non-emergency situations are being directed to file reports over the Internet. Police say the move will help them better focus on emergencies and violent crime.
In Oakland, one of the nation’s most crime-plagued cities, non-violent reports make up about a quarter of 911 calls, according to area reports. The 80 officers laid off constitute about 10 percent of the police department’s total manpower.
Tuesday’s layoffs complete an action taken by the city council, which voted on June 25 to axe the jobs. If the city’s voters refuse this November to approve new taxes, another 122 Oakland officers will be out of a job by January 1, 2011.
Union and city officials had been in talks to save the jobs by requiring police to contribute 9 percent of their paychecks to pension funds: something already required of other city employees. The police union balked and demanded Oakland ensure that if they agreed, no officers would be laid off for another three years. The city could not make such a promise, so the impasse grew.
“In a press conference tonight Brunner said the city’s final offer was to allow police union members to pay 4% of their pension now and an additional 3% come July 1, 2011,” California Beat reported. “Because the union had already agreed to pay 2% beginning January 2013, officers would have contributed the 9% the city sought, Brunner said.
“But representatives [still] held out for the three-year layoff moratorium.”
The Associated Press added: “Police Chief Anthony Batts said many of the officers laid off were on the front lines last week, trying to control protesters after former Bay Area Rapid Transit officer Johannes Mehserle was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the shooting of an unarmed black man in 2009.”
A police union official told California Beat they will move forward by lobbying the city to reinstate the fired officers’ jobs.
Layoffs leave the Oakland Police Department with just under 700 officers to enforce laws in a city of nearly 400,000.Image copyright AP Image caption Ross William Ulbricht filed a claim contesting the seizure of $150m of Bitcoins
The US has charged a California man alleged to be the owner of Silk Road, a black-market website that brokered $1bn (£613m) in transactions.
Ross William Ulbricht, 29, is accused of drug trafficking, computer hacking and money laundering.
Prosecutors allege he deliberately operated the site as a criminal enterprise and solicited six murders-for-hire.
Mr Ulbricht's lawyer says his client will plead not guilty to all charges.
"The indictment was expected and does not contain any new factual allegations," Joshua Dratel said in a statement. "We look forward to preparing Ross' defence."
Authorities say Mr Ulbricht operated the Silk Road site under the name Dread Pirate Roberts, an apparent reference to the movie The Princess Bride. Purchases were made using the virtual currency Bitcoin.
He was arrested last year as the site was shut down by the FBI. Officials seized 173,991 Bitcoins ($150m) as part of the investigation.
Mr Ulbricht has filed a claim contesting the seizure of the Bitcoins, asserting that they were found on his personal computer and belong to him rather than Silk Road.
He is also accused of conspiring to have a former Silk Road employee murdered during the course of a federal sting operation.
That murder-for-hire, along with the others, was never carried out.
Silk Road allowed visitors to browse nearly 13,000 listings, many of them for illegal drugs, but also offered forged documents, computer hacking services and pirated media content, prosecutors said.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) speaks to the media at the Capitol on March 10. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
This post has been updated.
Proving that there is virtually no issue that cannot get mired in partisan combat, an anti-human trafficking bill now under Senate consideration is in limbo after Democrats accused Republicans of sneaking anti-abortion language into the legislation before it hit the Senate floor.
The Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act, authored by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) and sporting a bipartisan stable of cosponsors, was supposed to be a turn toward comity after a couple of contentious weeks on Capitol Hill. What's not to like about a bill that would increase penalties for those convicted of slavery, human smuggling and sexual exploitation of children and provide for additional compensation for their victims?
On Monday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) locked arms in calling on their colleagues to support the measure. "I doubt if there will be problems on my side," Reid said, according to The Hill. "If there is, I will work to clear them."
But by midday Tuesday, the good feelings had eroded into a bout of finger-pointing, with Senate Democrats accusing Republicans of subterfuge in slipping language into the bill that would extend the longstanding Hyde Amendment barring the use of taxpayer funds for abortions to the new Domestic Trafficking Victims’ Fund.
The word "abortion" does not appear in the trafficking bill, but there is language specifying that the victims' fund "shall be subject to the limitations on the use or expending of amounts described in sections 506 and 507 of division H of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2014... to the same extent as if amounts in the Fund were funds appropriated under division H of such Act."
That would apply the Hyde Amendment language to the new fund, which is supported by a proposed $5,000 assessment on those convicted of a wide variety of federal crimes related to sexual abuse and human trafficking.
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) accused Republicans of "trying pull a fast one" in inserting the abortion provision. Two Democratic leaders, Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) and Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), both said Democrats had been advised that it was not among the changes made to the bill since it was taken up last year by a Democratic-controlled Senate. Earlier in the day, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), ranking member of the committee that unanimously forwarded the bill, said Judiciary Committee Democrats were "assured" the provision was not included.
In an early January e-mail reviewed by the Post, a Republican Judiciary Committee staffer sent a Democratic staffer a summary of changes to the previous version of the bill, in seven bullet points. The abortion provision was not among them.
"This bill will not be used as an opportunity for Republicans to double down on their efforts to restrict a woman's health-care choices," Murray said. "It is absolutely wrong and, honestly, it is shameful. I know there are a whole lot of us who are going to fight hard against any attempt to expand the Hyde Amendment and permanently impact women's health."
But Republican leaders — including Cornyn, the majority whip — pushed back on the notion that the abortion language represented any kind of subterfuge. A Cornyn aide suggested that Democrats knew very well about the language before the committee vote -- including, the aide said, Leahy staffers -- and thus were being "disingenuous."
"It was out in the public domain for a month before it was marked up in Judiciary Committee on Feb. 26, and all members of the Judiciary Committee voted to support it," Cornyn said. "So that leads me to believe that some of the suggestions being made now that there were provisions in the legislation that people didn't know about are simply untrue. That presupposes that none of their staff briefed the senators on what was in the legislation, that nobody read a 68-page bill and that senators would vote for a bill, much less co-sponsor it, without reading it and knowing what's in it. None of that strikes me as plausible."
Republicans and Democrats are also sparring about the impact of the abortion language. Adam Jentleson, a spokesman for Reid, called it a "significant expansion of the scope of the Hyde amendment" by applying it to fees and fines, not just taxpayer funds. He also said the rider in the trafficking bill would be permanent -- unlike the Hyde Amendment, which must be continually attacked to each year's appropriations -- and thus "could lead to a dramatic expansion of abortion restrictions in future years."
Cornyn took to the Senate floor late Tuesday to rebut that notion, noting that the 2009 health reform law included a similar restriction. "Democrats have supported legislation consistent with the Hyde Amendment for a long, long time," he said. "My hope is this: that members of the United States Senate will rise above this -- this agreement, this posturing, this attempt to try to play gotcha at the expense of these victims of human trafficking."
Reid said debate would continue Wednesday on the bill, and a Democratic aide suggested the tiff could be overcome if McConnell allows a vote on an amendment removing the abortion language from the bill -- an amendment that is likely to fail.
"You can blame it on staff, blame it on whoever you want to blame it on, but we didn't know it was in the bill," Reid said. "And... this bill will not come off this floor as long as that language is in the bill."I have to admit that I haven’t been paying much attention to Mitt Romney’s foreign policy; the domestic side already offers a target-rich environment. But my eyebrows shot up when Dan Senor popped up speaking for Romney in the Libya/Egypt flap. Dan Senor?
I mean, Senor is one of the key figures in Rajiv Chandrasekharan’s Imperial Life in the Emerald City, an account of the disastrous US occupation of Iraq. As the head of public relations for the Coalition Provisional Authority, he exemplified the core problem with that occupation: officials were chosen for political loyalty to Bush, not experience or competence, and were evidently much more interested in getting Bush reelected than in running the country they were supposed to be fixing.
In Senor’s case this meant that instead of trying to win Iraqi hearts and minds, he was busy trying to put a smiley-face on events for the American audience, spinning reality so badly that he quickly became a joke, “Baghdad Dan”, to anyone actually paying attention.
After that record, Senor should have gone on to sell insurance, make furniture, whatever — something, anything, other than advise anyone on foreign policy. Yet there he is, part of Romney’s entourage. And in general Romney has gathered around him the very same crew that botched Iraq.
Bear in mind that this is really a choice on Romney’s part; he’s under a lot of pressure from the Tea Party to show himself properly right-wing on domestic issues, but I don’t think there’s an important part of the GOP base that cares much either way whether he’s listening to Dick Cheney’s foreign policy team.
I understand, in a way, why these people are still at it; research shows that the truly incompetent often have high self-confidence, because they’re too incompetent to realize that they’re incompetent. But what does it say about Romney that he’s relying on this crew?Martin "trace" Heldt has announced he will start playing again, going so far as to declare he will not quit until he can compete.
The Danish player, who shone brightest between 2009 and 2011 in MTW, has announced that he will start playing again and will not stop until he can play competitively. Hanging his mouse in 2013 after struggling in CS:GO with fnatic, and after having attempted a comeback in late 2015 to no avail, Martin "trace" Heldt will give making it in CS:GO another try.
trace (right) at his last event with fnatic, RaidCall EMS One Summer 2013
The last time there was a buzz around trace was in December of 2015, when he and his former teammates from 1.6 reunited under the MTW banner. That team, however, didn't last over a month, as soon after the team formed Danny "zonic" Sørensen took a coaching position with the core of players which became the Astralis we know today, where he still plies his trade. Without making an appearance, that MTW team faded away.
The time is now. I'll start playing as much as I can. It'll take time, but I will do my best and not quit till i can compete. — Martin Heldt (@mtwtrace) August 15, 2017
The time is now. I'll start playing as much as I can. It'll take time, but
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first Democrat to jump into the race, and she has already locked up most of the union support. Other announced Democrats are Secretary of State Doug La Follette of Madison and state Sen. Kathleen Vinehout of Alma. The four will face off in a May 8 primary election, with the winner taking on Walker on June 5.
Although unions play a major role in Democratic politics, their opposition could turn out to be a key advantage for Barrett in this race, said Tom Holbrook, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
"Obviously, Kathleen Falk is the choice of the unions," said Holbrook, referring to her pledge to veto the next state budget if it doesn't restore collective bargaining for public workers. "She and her campaign underestimate how much damage that will do her in the general election."
Holbrook dismissed suggestions that unions would refuse to support Barrett if he was the Democratic nominee. "There's no way that they're going to sit on their hands in the general election" and hand a victory to the governor who ended most collective bargaining for most public employees, he said.
But on Friday, Mary Bell, president of the Wisconsin Education Association Council, declined to say whether her union would back Barrett in a general election.
"I'm not going to speculate about what may happen," Bell said, adding, "We're standing with our recommendation for Kathleen Falk."
Bell was one of several top Wisconsin labor officials who met privately with Barrett late last year to urge him to sit out the recall race - a request he immediately rebuffed.
Despite the heavy spending on TV ads for Falk, Barrett still holds a comfortable but not overwhelming lead over Falk in most recent polls. Barrett led Falk 36% to 29% among Democratic primary voters in a new statewide poll by Marquette Law School taken last week.
In his email to supporters, Barrett said he took his time making the decision to run for governor.
"This was not a decision I made lightly," the Milwaukee mayor wrote. "I love this state and I care deeply about our future. That's why I ran for governor in 2010 - even though I knew it was an uphill battle."
Barrett then ticked off a list of criticisms of the Republican governor, including the steps to curb collective bargaining for state workers and cut funding for education. If elected, the second-term mayor said he would "fight to restore collective bargaining rights, because it's the right thing to do."
He concluded: "Starting tomorrow, I will crisscross the state, taking our message directly to the people in every corner, and working every day to restore our values and move Wisconsin forward. With you standing with me, I know we will prevail."
Wife is 'all in'
As of March 19, Barrett's campaign had $453,008 in the bank, according to a campaign finance report filed Monday with the city Election Commission. That figure does not include money he raised Wednesday at a sold-out fundraiser featuring Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
One top Barrett adviser suggested it took some time for Barrett to make the announcement because he needed to resolve family concerns before committing to the race. He and his wife, Kris, have four children, including one in college and three attending schools in Milwaukee.
But a second aide said Barrett's wife is fully supportive of his third gubernatorial bid. The aide noted that she was laid off from her job with Milwaukee Public Schools last summer as a result of Walker's spending cuts. Kris Barrett now has a teaching job in Wauwatosa.
"She's all in," the second aide said.
This will not be the first time that Falk and Barrett have squared off in hopes of becoming the state's chief executive.
In 2002, Jim Doyle edged out both of them in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, with Barrett finishing second and Falk third.
Less than two years later, Barrett - a lifelong Milwaukee resident - was on a ballot again, winning his first four-year term as the city's chief executive.
In 2008, Barrett easily won a second term.
As mayor, Barrett has stressed jobs and economic development, highlighting new businesses in the Menomonee Valley and the Park East corridor and taking over the regional job training agency. He also brought in Edward Flynn as police chief and has trumpeted the drop in the city's crime rate since then.
On those and other issues, Barrett has employed a low-key, conciliatory style.
But he found himself repeatedly at odds with Walker, then Milwaukee County executive, even before the two went head-to-head in the last governor's race.
The board determined there were 900,939 valid signatures to recall Walker, 67% more than the 540,208 needed to trigger the election. More than 30,000 signatures were eliminated from those submitted in January by recall organizers.
The board deemed 808,900 signatures against Kleefisch were valid. The same number was needed to recall her as for Walker.
Among the signatures rejected from the petitions were more than 4,000 each for Walker and Kleefisch. Those who signed twice had one signature counted and one eliminated.
The board also rejected four names it found to be fictitious - Adolf Hitler, Mick E. Mous, Donald L. Duck and I Love Scott Walker Thanks. Board staff on Thursday had recommended striking the name Fungky Van Den Elzen as fictitious, but a board attorney later said he had determined the name was legitimate after all.
As the elections were ordered, the Republican Governors Association announced it was launching a new round of statewide ads against Barrett and Falk.
Nationally, just two other governors have faced recall elections: North Dakota Gov. Lynn Frazier in 1921 and California Gov. Gray Davis in 2003. Both were defeated.
First such recall
Kleefisch is the first lieutenant governor ever to face a recall election, according to Joshua Spivak, who publishes a blog about recalls.
The accountability board's ordering of the elections ended the ability of recall targets to raise unlimited sums to fight the efforts to remove them from office.
Republicans used that legal quirk to their advantage, with Walker raising as much as $500,000 from one businessman - 50 times the usual $10,000 limit.
Democrats had to adhere to the normal limits over the past 4 1/2 months.
Bill Glauber of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.Story highlights Sen. Elizabeth Warren visited Hillary Clinton's campaign headquarters on Friday, according to people in the room
Clinton was not at campaign headquarters when Warren visited today, according to sources
(CNN) Elizabeth Warren, a senator being eyed as a possible Democratic vice presidential pick, dropped by Hillary Clinton's campaign headquarters on Friday, according to people in the room.
Warren, who endorsed Clinton last week in an interview, mingled with aides, took photos with staffers and gave brief remarks.
"Don't screw this up," Warren said, according to attendees.
The senator also referred to Clinton as a "fighter," the same terminology she used when she endorsed Clinton last week.
"We've got one tough cookie who is going to be out there fighting on behalf of working families across this country," Warren said in her remarks, according to a video posted on Instagram.
Read MoreWhen it comes to the best cities for beer, you have to include Seattle at the top of the list, right? Not according to CNN, which doesn’t even mention Seattle in a new ranking of the top eight cities in America for beer explorers.
Portland tops the list with its 52 breweries, more than any other in the world. The rankings also give our neighbor to the south high marks for the number of brew pubs and bars serving craft beers, along with all of its beer-centric events like the Oregon Brewer’s Festival and the Portland International Beer Festival.
It’s tough to argue against, but how can the list omit Seattle altogether? It doesn’t say, instead picking San Francisco, San Diego, Boston, Denver, Philadelphia, Bend, Ore., and Asheville, N.C. over the Emerald City.
Suffice it to say, a number of beer lovers are hopping mad.
“Flawed list. The boom took off in the early 80’s and Seattle was at the forefront with Redhook and Grant’s, followed closely by a long list of micro-breweries before they were ‘cool,'” said one commenter responding to the list. “The Seattle area to this day has a longer list of quality breweries than half of these cities and a history that tops all but San Francisco, and that is solely because of Anchor Steam.”
“Who compiled this list? How anyone could leave Seattle off the list of best beer is beyond me!” said another. “I’ve lived in Portland, San Diego, and Seattle and I would put Seattle and Portland right next to each other, but San Diego would be much further down the list.”
The head of the Washington Beer Commission is more diplomatic. Eric Radovich says he’s baffled as well, given Seattle has at least 40 breweries and counting.
“I took a walking tour of the Ballard neighborhood this past Saturday and they have nine breweries in Ballard alone,” he said. “They were all fantastic making very creative artisan beers.”
While he agreed many of those on the list deserve praise, clearly whoever compiled the list didn’t do their homework, or a whole lot of tasting.
“Most of them don’t compare to what we’ve developed here in the greater Seattle area and the state as a whole now has 173 craft breweries and it’s still growing.”
The author of the list said history, breweries, bars and events were the criteria she used to come up with the top brew towns.A few weeks ago, the good folks at Mondo announced a "year-long celebration of Stanley Kubrick", which would include specialty screenings at the Alamo Drafthouse, a new line of Kubrick-themed apparel, and other Kubrick-related goodies.
Today, we're getting our first look at the apparel, and it's pretty sweet. We'll look at those offerings in just a moment, but first: here's the press release:
Austin, TX – February 22, 2017 – Alamo Drafthouse and Mondo, in partnership with Warner Bros. Consumer Products, are excited to announce the release of officially licensed apparel for Stanley Kubrick’s dystopic masterpiece, A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. Available for a limited time exclusively at Mondotees.com, the epic new t-shirts, hooded sweatshirts and enamel pins designed by Mondo for Alamo Drafthouse feature iconic imagery of Alex and his droogs as well as the instantly recognizable bright and bold opening credits screen from the film featuring "A Stanley Kubrick Production.” "To launch our Stanley Kubrick apparel collection with A CLOCKWORK ORANGE is particularly meaningful for us," said Jay Shaw, Brand Director. "For so many years, the film's total design and forceful iconography has inspired both us as a company and many of our artists." This apparel collection for A CLOCKWORK ORANGE is the first of a new line, from Alamo Drafthouse and Mondo, celebrating the masterworks of Stanley Kubrick. Alamo Drafthouse and Mondo, in partnership with Warner Bros. Consumer Products, will continue this collection of officially licensed apparel for 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, FULL METAL JACKET and THE SHINING, as part of a year-long celebration of arguably one of the greatest filmmakers of all time.
Now, let's take a look at the merch.
First up, we have this collectible pin.
There's also a trio of new T-shirts (the one on the far left is my jam).
And, finally, there's this hoodie, which seems to suggest that Kubrick is the father of whoever's wearing it. Fair enough.
All of these items can be picked up right now via this page at the Mondo website. As always, prospective buyers are encouraged to make their purchases in a timely fashion; these items will only be available for a limited time, and supplies will probably go fast.
Which of the above are you guys picking up? I'm not generally into pins, but the one up top is calling my name.Media playback is not supported on this device Billy Vunipola on player welfare and pay cuts
England and Saracens number eight Billy Vunipola says he would take a pay cut to play less rugby and believes players are at risk of "burning out".
Vunipola learned on Sunday he will be out for four months after injuring a knee during Sarries' defeat of Sale.
The 24-year-old had only recently returned after a year blighted by knee and shoulder problems, the latter forcing him out of the Lions tour.
Speaking prior to his latest setback, he said "something has to change".
"I didn't enjoy being on the surgery table twice in one year and that's supposed to be deemed as normal," he told BBC Radio 5 live's Rugby Union Weekly podcast.
"Kids want to play rugby because it's fun, but they also need to know that it's tough, and it's normal to have surgery at 25 because you're so worn down.
"I'm not complaining, I just want people to understand that having surgery is not fun, and it's not fun being injured.
"It gets to a point when you are just done, and you can't control when your knee goes out or your shoulder comes out.
"That was the weirdest feeling I've ever had in my life, not being able to control that and prevent it from happening.
"So something probably needs to change, or the players will just burn out."
Billy Vunipola has played 34 times for England
Asked if he would consider a pay cut in return for playing fewer games, Vunipola replied: "Yes."
England's elite players are limited to 32 games per season, but Vunipola says recovering from a match can take up to five days.
"32 games is a lot, but it's doable," he added.
"But do you want people to just do it, or do you want people to go out there and smash it?"
Vunipola is one of a number of leading players to voice their opposition to the proposed extended season post-2019, with the Rugby Players' Association not ruling out strike action.
Media playback is not supported on this device Game time at the limit for players - Youngs
'Missing the Lions made me grateful'
Vunipola was expected to play a leading role for the Lions in New Zealand, but pulled out of the tour because of an ongoing shoulder problem.
He says missing the tour has given him a fresh perspective.
"I never [used to be] grateful for being on these tours. I kind of took it for granted. [Missing the Lions] made me be grateful for going on these tours.
"When I was on holiday, all I wanted to do was be on tour. So now, if ever I'm on tour, I'll never sit there and be negative."
'I'm learning my limits with alcohol'
Vunipola revealed he only started drinking alcohol last year, and is still learning how to deal with it.
"After I did my knee against Argentina, and went through a tough break-up with my ex, I needed something to take my mind off it," he said. "So I drank that night at [England's team hotel] Pennyhill for the first time ever.
"I just never got into it before, and it took a massive change in my life to bring it on. I was always adamant I was never going to drink.
"I'm still learning [my limits], but it's something I do with the boys."
Media playback is not supported on this device What will Billy Vunipola do when he retires?
'I'd like to be a plumber or electrician'
Vunipola says he does not fear life after rugby, and says he would like to train as a plumber or electrician upon retirement.
"It's something I think will be the closest environment to a rugby environment," he said.
"Life after rugby will come. A lot of people are scared of it, but my philosophy after rugby is 'just try'."
Tongan first, English second
Vunipola, who moved to the United Kingdom with his family at the age of six, says he still considers himself Tongan first and foremost.
"Both my parents are Tongan, my culture was fully invested in Tonga," he said.
"I'm here now, and I obviously embrace it, but I'm not going to sit here and say I'm born and bred English, because I'm not.
"But I'm very proud to represent us as a country, I have adopted the English culture, and I'd like people to see me as one of their own."A tortoise has been given a 3D printed prosthetic shell to protect her own, as she suffers from a painful disease which has caused it to wear away.
Cleopatra, a leopard tortoise who was taken in by Canyon Critters Reptile Rescue in Colorado, suffers from a metabolic bone disease known as pyramiding, or peaking. It is caused by poor nutrition, and means her shell has grown in in erratically raised sections, instead of smoothly.
As tortoises play and mate by clambering on top of each other, Cleopatra's delicate shell became damaged and worn in places, leaving her susceptible to infections, reported the Huffington Post.
Roger Henry, a Colorado Technical University student, designed the tortoise a prosthetic shell, and 3D printed it with assistance from The 3D Printing Store in Denver.
"I heard this tortoise was damaged, needed some help and it seemed like the right thing to do," Mr Henry told the Denver Post. "We basically told the software that this is a piece of cloth. Therefore, drape it onto the tortoise."
Canyon Critters Reptile Rescue owner Nico Novelli and Cleopatra the tortoise. [RJ Sangosti via Getty Images]
The lightweight prosthetic shell attaches using velcro, and will only need to be worn when Cleopatra is around other tortoises. Her shell is expected to regrow within a couple of years thanks to the optimum temperature and a diet including dandelions and cactus.
Cleopatra is believed to be in her teenage years, and could live until well into her eighties, growing up to three times her current size, meaning she's likely to require new plastic shells in the next few years.
Cleopatra's shell will eventually regrow now she is eating a nutritious diet [RJ Sangosti via Getty Images]BANGKOK — One month ago, after Thailand’s army seized control of the nation, the instructions were quite clear: Praise us or keep your mouth shut.
Dissent is now punishable by detention in military-run Thailand. Those who have directly condemned the coup in public have been summoned to military camps for “attitude adjustment.”
The army has instructed citizens to feel “happy” about their takeover. The generals have hoped to sway them by screening the World Cup for free and holding festivals featuring ponies, free food and camo-clad dancer girls.
At the same time, officials goad citizens to turn in co-workers expressing anti-coup sentiments. Come across a photo on Facebook or Instagram in which a Thai citizen criticizes the coup? Police will dole out $15 if you rat out the offender.
Thais dismayed by the coup know speaking out is dangerous. So they’ve resorted to a range of silent and subtle protest techniques, each designed to determine just how petty the authorities can be.
They have arrived at this approach the hard way. Thailand’s military and police appear willing to drag away protesters for the most absurdly minor offenses. The list now includes:
Wearing the wrong shirt: T-shirts have repeatedly landed protesters in military detention. The offending shirts aren’t scribbled up with slogans urging bloody uprising. One simply read “PEACE PLEASE” and was worn by a Belgian man at a Bangkok traffic circle briefly used as a rally site until troops drove protesters away. This week, a Thai woman in her 70s was arrested at a temple for wearing a shirt that simply said “Respect my Vote!”
Eating a sandwich: Since early June, student pro-democracy activists have handed out free sandwiches and staged quiet picnics in lieu of holding protests. Surely, the junta can’t arrest them for eating sandwiches, right?
Wrong. The sandwich activists announced a “picnic” on June 22 outside a glitzy Bangkok mall. On cue, a young Thai man showed up that afternoon. He pulled out a sandwich with trembling fingers and ate it in silence.
He was promptly surrounded by authorities and hauled off. Six others, according to the BBC, were also detained. Their offense? Possessing sandwiches with ill intent. Officers have previously thwarted “sandwich parties” in advance. Thai headlines have even warned that eating sandwiches with anti-coup intent is a criminal act.
Reading “1984” in public: The young sandwich-eating Thai was also reading 1984, the George Orwell masterpiece about a civil servant who tries to rebel against a dystopian tyrannical state. Previous gatherings in which Thais gathered on sidewalks to silently leaf through the book have gone undisturbed by authorities. But any future public readings could lead to more arrests.
Throwing up the three-finger “Hunger Games” salute: In the “Hunger Games” science-fiction series, the subjects of a cruel authoritarian regime raise three fingers to signal their dissent. Anti-coup Thais later adopted the salute and began flashing it in Bangkok.This form of protest has tactical advantages: You don’t have to carry around an incriminating sign, book or sandwich. But plain-clothes police have still managed to spot and nab Thai saluters.
Arrests for anti-coup dissent keep mounting. At least 500 to 700 people have been summoned or arrested by the junta, according to estimates provided by the organization Thai Lawyers for Human Rights. Detainees include deposed politicians, activists, journalists and small-time street protesters.
“In many cases, their heads are covered with black plastic bags so they won’t know their detention center’s location,” said Yaowalak Anuphan, an attorney with the group. Troops often refuse to reveal detainees’ locations to worried relatives, she said. But most are freed after several days worth of psy-ops sessions with military officers. “This is commonly known as an ‘attitude adjustment,’” she said.
Instead of gradually easing martial law, Thailand’s military appears keen on smothering even the meekest expressions of dissent. The generals insist their tight grip on society is necessary to “Restore Happiness to the People,” which has become the junta’s de facto slogan.
A top junta spokesmen, Werachon Sukhondhapatipak, even urged reporters to stop calling their power seizure a “coup.” He prefers “military intervention." Forced detentions? Those should be called “military accommodation,” he said.
But Thailand’s National Human Rights Commission — which now answers to the army — has told the army that harsh tactics will only “seed further resistance in society.”
“Thailand is like a sick man with cancer. But martial law is a very powerful dose of medicine,” said Nirun Pitakwatchara, a physician who heads the commission. “As a professional doctor myself, I know an overly strong dose of medicine can kill the patient.”Wolves ended a run of six home games without a win as they beat Midlands rivals Birmingham at Molineux.
The victory came courtesy of a Marlon King own goal and also helped ease the pressure on Wolves manager Stale Solbakken.
Blues striker King sliced a Bakary Sako free-kick into his own net after 34 minutes and his side failed to recover.
Wolves applied plenty of pressure in the second half but could not get a second goal before seeing out the win.
Wolves had beaten Bristol City last time out and overcoming the Blues gave them back-to-back wins for only the second time this season.
The defeat added to Birmingham's struggles and, despite starting promisingly, they went behind.
King's attempted clearance at the near post only resulted in him diverting Sako's free-kick past his own keeper Jack Butland.
Wolves should have put the game beyond Birmingham's reach in the second half but Kevin Doyle shot wide, while the impressive Butland saved from Stephen Ward.
Butland's performance will have enhanced his reputation and he pulled off a superb instinctive save to keep out Bjorn Sigurdarson's header.
The Blues keeper even went up for a late corner but the visitors could not find an equaliser.When Ari Shaffir announced the release of his latest specials, Double Negative: Children and Double Negative: Adulthood streaming now on Netflix, the news came at the same time Comedy Central announced that the stand-up would no longer be a part of This Is Not Happening, the storytelling show he co-created and hosted for three seasons.
It’s a bummer, but Shaffir’s not caught up on it. With the release of his new specials, on a platform he’s passionate about, he’s definitely looking to the future.
The two-part “series” of specials, Double Negative is something we haven’t really seen since George Carlin’s 1972 release FM & AM. We spoke with Shaffir (who also hosts the podcast “Ari Shaffir’s Skeptic Tank“) to learn more about his motivation for releasing the specials as a double header, and to dive into the message behind them — mainly, how not having children allows the comic to be an unrestricted adult at a time when his peers are tied down by family matters.
You recorded your new special at Cap City Comedy Club in Austin. In a time when almost every new special is shot in a theater, was the goal of intimacy the reason for shooting it in a comedy club again, similar to what you did with Paid Regular?
First of all, I’m a club comic. My feeling is you should shoot the kind of special [that shows] the comic you are. Gaffigan, he does theaters — so fine, go to a theater and do your special. That’s what kind of comic you are.
But a lot of these comics are club comics, so why change your environment, your show, and stuff? It’s representative of “here’s who I was this year.”
On a second level, theaters aren’t as good — they’re just better money. Small clubs are just better. Comics enjoy those more almost across the board. If you could make the same amount of money in a theatre or a club, almost every comic would take the club. You kill harder. It’s more conversational and more presentational. So yeah, I just liked filming there.
This was recorded in November. Was this shot over 1 or 2 nights?
It was shot over one night. Two shows, and then I would take an intermission in the middle of the show, change clothes and stage, and then do the second. A 10:30 show.
Each special had its own wardrobe, and the lighting was flipped for each one.
Yeah, I wanted them linked, but separate. Not completely different, but mixed. They play off each other, but they are different too. Unique, but not crazy different.
Was the idea to make them two separate specials based off of the particular themes or the amount of material you had?
I usually have a through-line to each of my specials. It may not be obvious, but it’s something I know. The first one is about growing up — [then] I realized it was two, two separate ones. And I had longer to prepare, because I got kinda sidetracked editing This Is Not Happening. I had more time with it, so I would think of it in terms of these two different themes, and I was like, maybe I will do two different themes.
I [toured] all through Scandinavia, and I would do an intermission and I would really try to imagine it like that — the crowd takes a few minutes off, then comes back and we do the other one.
So, it is all about children, and all about this life that you really can’t have if you have kids, and a wife. You won’t have these conversations about STDs, and explore your whole sexuality in Thailand, and sh*t like that. No one who has a wife and kids does that.
Each special has a unique artwork for the intro. Who did the artwork at the beginning of each special?
That’s Brian Romero.
You worked with Eric Abrams again, who is the same director and producer for This Is Not Happening. Was this to keep a similar, “intimate” show vibe?
Yeah. He understands my aesthetics. He’s been a producer with me on This Is Not Happening and he gets what I do. He shares my belief that you gotta work very hard to mimic the actual experience of being at a show, and that’s what’s going to bring the best out of a comic and the best out of an audience. Most directors don’t really get that, and he does.
And we do a minimum loss of seats. We really try to like be careful about it, where sometimes they are just like, “Alright, take out this whole row,” and Eric is smart enough to go, “No, no, that was just one seat. We don’t need to lose this whole row. You just lost 12 people. Nothing is gonna kill as hard with 12 less people.”
I liked the points where the waitress walks into the shot delivering drinks. The camera keeps focused on you, while she is still in the way, out of focus. The shot stayed in there, giving it that intimate feeling of sitting in the crowd.
Yes, exactly. They were like, “the waitress is in the shot,” and I was like, “it’s fine man, unless she is front and center she’s really distracting.” The live show is going on and it’s not going to be that distracting. You are going to realize there are people here. I want to register those peoples’ heads.
The Children set seems more themed whereas Adulthood feels more natural. Adulthood is more of a set one would expect from you and your voice. Were you more conscious of the children set and the focus?
Yeah, good notice. I had that Tinder bit, and when I started playing with it, I kept going back to it — that Tinder lady, my friend Nicole. The Children side is really clearly about children, getting pregnant, and you not wanting kids — whereas the Adulthood is kinda like, “what’s the theme here?” It’s stuff you can’t do with kids and a family.
I ran them sort of separately and put them together. I didn’t mind if one kind of through-lined the whole way through and keeps having callbacks. I kinda like that.
The Children set begins with, “My friend got pregnant off a Tinder date.” No banter. No, “How you guys doing?” Just right into it, which kinda of sets the tone that mistakes was made and these mistakes will grow two feet and walk. There is a theme that children are an inconvenience. You even say, “Children are garbage – yes, your kid too.” Do you realize that your views on children are generally the same views parents have, especially when there is regret involved?
It’s new for people, man. New people with kids are like, “It’s amazing! It’s so great!” They start seeing that it is not always great, and then they start to admit little things here and there. They still say how awesome it is, but sometimes they will admit it like, “Oh yeah, it’s sh*tty sometimes.” But you know how they are, they are always like, “You gotta do it!” They refuse to ever give any attention to the fact that they are tired all the time. You can’t do what you want to do and you can’t f*cking just go off to Thailand for three weeks. You can’t do it. So admit it — admit it’s not great.
I’ve seen studies. I’ve seen scientific studies saying that child bearing destroys your happiness; it takes down your happiness. It is provable. And people go, “Nah, that’s not me.” Ok, well I’ve also seen a study that said 95% of parents will lie about the reason they have kids. They use to say, “I had kids so they can take care of the farm when I’m too old,” and when that didn’t become a thing, at the same rate, people gave other reasons why they are a parent. They are like, “It’s self-fulfilling.” You are just looking for a reason. You did it, fine. You don’t have to justify it, but they all want to. They all want to tell you its amazing and the best thing ever.
At one point you sort of ask for the truth on being a parent. Would the brutal honest truth actually make you consider pursuing kids in the future, or are you 100% set on remaining kid-free?
If I get a real representation with the truth in it, I might be able to make up my mind. But I know what I’m getting. Fox News mixed with MSNBC. What am I suppose to believe? I’ve never gotten a real f*cking version of it, so I have no idea. I know I’m being lied to. I know I’m being lied to! I keep going back to those scientific studies, but at this point its too late.
Adulthood includes grownup problems such as STDs, weed, travel, offers of BJs from a gay friend, and lady-boys. You are almost teasing parents to say, “Look what my freedom has given me!”
Yeah, man. I had friends who would say, “I wish I could go do that, but I got to take care of the kid this weekend.” And I decided that I had to start living my life to make those people jealous. Because I can be the single guy — you know, at this point in my life, it’s past when I am supposed to have kids. People mostly already have them. All my friends from high school have them. So, they see me as the guy who plays Xbox all day, and they are sitting there going, “My life is worth more than Ari’s. It’s so sad. He is by himself on the Xbox till 3 in the morning, doing nothing.”
I travel the world, I meet interesting people, I f*ck women out of my league, and I have a great time. I have a great time! And I want them going, “F*ck, if I hadn’t done this maybe I could do that sort of thing.”
So yeah, that’s what sort of what drives me a little bit. It drives me because I want to have those good experiences and enjoy it, but if I make them jealous, I know I’m on the right path.
Going back to the material, do you dump these bits now that the special is out or do you keep some?
I haven’t done those bits since I recorded it. Somebody asked me the other day to do some old bit, and I was like, “I don’t know,” and the crowd was like, “Come on, do it!” I was like, “guys, it’s been five years. I don’t know how it goes. I haven’t thought about it.”
Do you plan on going on the road to support the specials?
My plan before was to take some time off. A lot of my material became about travel and going other places. I was on the road so much, like I had a bit about TSA in my last special. So I was gonna stay at home so I could, I don’t know, get some regular stuff to draw from. You know, like fights with your neighbor, getting dumped, or trash pickups. Sh*t like that, that people could relate to more. So, I think I’ll start doing stuff in 2018. But, it might change if I get the bug.
Double Negativeis streaming now on Netflix.Bob Arum’s Top Rank Promotions has offered to promote a proposed Donald Trump vs. Bernie Sanders debate, pledging to donate the proceeds, a minimum of $20 million, to charity.
“It’s the debate of the century between two of the top pound-for-pound politicians in the country — Mr. Trump, the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee and Senator Sanders, the Democratic candidate,” Mr. Arum said in a press release. “We have two contenders ready, willing and able to go mano a mano over the most important issues facing the United States. And I am ready to promote it.”
The idea of the debate was first proposed Wednesday night during Mr. Trump’s appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” Asked if he would consider the matchup, Mr. Trump responded: “We would have such high ratings and I think I should take that money and give it to some worthy charity.”
Mr. Arum, an International Boxing Hall of Famer, agreed.
“It would be the biggest pay-per-view of all time,” he told USA Today Thursday night. “I’m not going to charge crazy prices. I’ll take a fee, and I’ll put a guarantee up, and it’ll be for charity.”
As far as moderators are concerned, Mr. Arum said, “Screw these media moderators. They’re all … I recommend Hillary Clinton, Ted Cruz and Mitt Romney.”
He said it would be the “greatest-watched television show of all time … at least there would be a huge amount going to charity.”
Top Rank’s proposal said it would negotiate a site fee from a major U.S. venue for the debate and produce and distribute the debate live on pay-per-view. Eighty percent of the net proceeds would go to the charity or charities of the candidates’ choice, agreed upon in advance, with a minimum of $20 million being donated. The moderator or moderators would also be subject to the approval of the candidates, USA Today reported.
Copyright © 2019 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.By supporting the Saudi kingdom with military aid and intelligence cooperation, while ignoring the regime’s human rights abuses and support for terror organizations, Israel and the U.S. risk repeating the Cold War era’s worst mistakes.
By Eitay Mack (translated by Ofer Neiman and Tal Haran)
Israel and Saudi Arabia have been close partners with the American political and economic elite for several decades. In recent years, their parallel relationships with the U.S. have become a close triangular relationship. Israel and Saudi Arabia promote their mutual interests in the Middle East and, it seems, maintain intelligence ties, the details of which remain secret. Even if Israel is not selling weapons to Saudi Arabia or providing intelligence support, there is no doubt that Israel has given the United States the green light to massively arm the Saudi kingdom.
Dramatic political changes have been reflected in recent reports of ongoing communication between Israel and Saudi Arabia: calls by senior Israeli officials for full normalization of relations between the two counties; repeated statements by Netanyahu that Israel has shared interests with the Gulf States in the fight against Iran and ISIS, especially with Saudi Arabia, which sees Israel as a partner, not an enemy; and an exceptional interview that Commander-in-Chief of the army Gadi Eizenkott gave to a Saudi news site, in which he praised the partnership between Israel and Saudi Arabia, at least in their joint struggle against Iran, and announced that Israel is willing “to share intelligence with the moderate Arab states
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0 and down six points from the 60/37 pro-Democratic ratio of 2012.
So despite talk of millennial “disappointment” with Obama, the best evidence is that their enthusiasm for him as manifested in 2008 and 2012 is not transferable to other Democrats — or is not exhibited in the mix of millennials willing to vote in a midterm. And the same may be true of the minority voters discussed above.
What are the implications, then, for the election cycle we have just entered? Some of the Republican advantage can be expected to melt away instantly due to the age and race/ethnicity differential for a presidential cycle. That shift will apply to downballot races as well. So a more favorable-to-Democrats electorate will vote on a Senate landscape as difficult for Republicans as this year’s was difficult for Democrats. The GOP will need all those wins from yesterday to survive Election Night in 2016 with a majority intact.
But more generally, and with respect to the presidential election itself, the big question is whether Barack Obama’s successor can recapture his extraordinarily high vote percentages among young and minority voters, and/or make inroads among the older and whiter voters who have now consistently rebuffed him and his party in three straight cycles. For their part, the newly triumphant Republicans may be reaching a ceiling among those older white voters, and should probably think long and hard about killing off their prospects for a revival of pre-Obama voting levels among minorities with egregiously hostile legislative proposals on issues ranging from immigration to the “reforms” they want for the social safety net.
On a more mechanical level, the apparent failure of the DSCC’s Bannock Street Project to significantly change the shape of the midterm electorate in key Senate states will require an honest post-mortem for Democrats. Were the targeting and mobilization techniques wrong, or was the landscape and the atmosphere of this midterm just too difficult? Does it take a presidential candidate to build this particular village? We’ll know soon enough.A look at the Wren Library, Lincoln by Dr Anna Marie Roos FLS, University of Lincoln.
There are two Christopher Wren libraries. The most well known is in Trinity College, Cambridge, completed in 1695 under the Mastership of Isaac Barrow who persuaded Wren to design it. The renowned woodcarver Grinling Gibbons decorated the library with lime wood carvings, and the library sports marble busts of several Fellows of the Royal Society and Trinity fellows: John Ray, Francis Willughby, Richard Bentley, and Sir Isaac Newton. Not surprisingly, Trinity’s library also has an exceptional collection in the early modern history of science.
The other Wren library, which deserves to be better known and used, is in Lincoln Cathedral, and it has many similarities to its cousin. Like Trinity’s library, it also has exquisite classical proportions and is light and spacious. The Cathedral Library at Lincoln also has a noteworthy collection in early modern science, but it differs from Trinity in that it was not gathered or built by a college, but rather by an individual.
On my visit, after making a pilgrimage up the medieval ‘Steep Hill’ to reach the Cathedral (once the tallest building in the world), I rang the bell by the library office’s red door in the Exchequergate. There I met Canon Dr Nicholas Bennett, the Vice-Chancellor and Cathedral Librarian, who kindly gave me a tour. We walked through the Cathedral, the home of the famous Lincoln Imp, a little cross-legged gargoyle perched in the Angel Choir that is the symbol of Lincolnshire, and into the library.
Appropriately enough, rather than statues of Fellows of the Royal Society, the Wren Library at Lincoln features a portrait by Cornelius Janssen of the library’s founder, Michael Honywood (1597-1681). Canon Dr Bennett pointed out to me that on the same wall hangs another portrait of Honywood’s grandmother, of whom Honywood was exceptionally proud; she had 114 grandchildren. The coat of arms of this prodigious family is also prominent, as well as several gilded wall grotesques; as typical to many early modern libraries, the books are organised by size, from pocketbooks to lavish folios.
Honywood was installed as Dean of Lincoln Cathedral on 12 October 1660, and he was a life-long bibliophile. Educated at Christ’s College, Cambridge, he served as its President. However, when Cambridge was threatened by Civil War in 1642, the royalist Honywood migrated to the Low Countries, leaving behind a ‘vast storehouse of books’ which were seized by Parliamentary forces but redeemed by Honywood’s brother Henry for £20. Honywood’s other brother Thomas was a colonel in Cromwell’s army and probably had a discreet word with the Parliamentary Commissioners.
Whilst in Amsterdam, and then Utrecht, Honywood continued to collect books, leaving behind a manuscript in the Cathedral Library enumerating what he bought, as well as the books he lent to friends and colleagues. Henry Oldenburg, who would become Secretary of the Royal Society from 1663 to 1677, borrowed a variety of texts from Honywood. These included a Hebrew Bible, works by Cardinal Bellarmine, and John Selden’s De diis Syris (1617) (On the Syrian Gods), demonstrating both men’s polymathic interests. Oldenburg was known for his facility for language, and it was clear that he was actively engaged in learning new tongues. It was one of reasons that Oldenburg was such an effective Secretary of the early Royal Society, as he could correspond with virtuosi from the international Republic of Letters who were communicating their scientific discoveries.
After the Restoration, Honywood returned to England and the Deanery of Lincoln, bringing his books with him and reuniting them with his earlier collection. The depredations of the Civil War meant that the fabric of the Church was in urgent need of repair, and Honywood spent much of his career in restoring buildings and recreating the boy’s Cathedral Choir. Indeed, Honywood had a special love for music. Canon Dr Bennett indicated that Honywood treasured and heavily annotated his books of ‘sacrarum cantionum’ by William Byrd.
In 1674, Honywood paid the sum of £780 out of his private purse to erect a handsome new library built to the design of Wren ‘which replaced the north walk of the cloister... taking the form of a long gallery’. The Wren library would house his collection, as well as that of the Chapter; 5000 books are from Honywood’s private library.
Mr Clive Hurst, Head of Rare Books and Printed Ephemera at the Bodleian Library, edited the Catalogue of Lincoln’s Wren Library, the collections of which he characterised as “extraordinary”. He told me that the collection has several highlights, remarking that “The Civil War pamphlets constitute a major collection gathered mainly while Honywood was in exile.”
The early English literature is also notable, “with association copies such as the volume of Edward King obsequies, including Lycidas – King and Milton being fellow students at Christ’s”. Mr Hurst also indicated that “Honywood was typical of the 17th century in being interested in all fields of knowledge, especially the latest thinking in natural philosophy and practical science.”
Indeed, Honywood bought several works in geometry, mathematics, and astronomy. In his collection are books by William Oughtred, inventor of the slide rule, and John Napier, who invented logarithms, as well as several early atlases and tracts about “dialling” or making sundials. A special highlight of Honywood’s collection is a first edition of Galileo’s Two Chief World Systems (1632), in which three characters debate the merits of the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems. Honywood also collected works by Thomas Digges that introduced the Copernican system to England, and two editions of FRS John Wilkins’s tract (1638) that postulated the Moon could be an inhabited world. On 3 June 1663 Samuel Pepys noted in his Diary, “Up betimes and studying of my Horizontall diall againste Deane Honiwood comes to me, who dotes mightily upon it and I think I must give it him”. We could say that Honywood was not only a bibliophile and good administrator, but very persuasive.
These works are but a fraction of the early modern printed books in the history of science available in the Wren Library at Lincoln Cathedral. Clive Hurst’s catalogue of the Wren Library has recently been put online. In July 2013, there will be a lecture about science in the Wren Library, and an accompanying exhibit. So climb up the Steep Hill, take a look at the mischievous Lincoln imp, and visit the other Wren Library for a glimpse into the mind of an early modern bibliophile enamoured with early science.PRINCETON, NJ -- Seven in 10 Americans say religion is losing its influence on American life -- one of the highest such responses in Gallup's 53-year history of asking this question, and significantly higher than in the first half of the past decade.
Americans' views of the influence of religion in the U.S. have fluctuated substantially in the years since 1957, when Gallup first asked this question. At that point, perhaps reflecting the general focus on family values that characterized the Eisenhower era, 69% of Americans said religion was increasing its influence, the most in Gallup's history.
Views of the influence of religion shifted dramatically in the mid-1960s. By 1970, in the midst of the protests over the Vietnam War and general social upheaval, a record 75% of Americans said religion was losing influence in American society. These views moderated in the years thereafter. At several points during the Reagan administration, a plurality of Americans returned to the view that religion was increasing its influence. By the early 1990s, Americans became more convinced again that religion was losing its influence. These views persisted until a sharp reversal after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, when a number of social and political indicators, including presidential and congressional approval and overall satisfaction with the way things were going, showed substantial increases.
Views that religion was increasing in influence began to fade in the second half of the last decade. The 7 in 10 Americans who now say religion is losing its influence is tied with 2009 for the most who have held such a view since 1970.
Personal Importance of Religion Broadly Stable in Recent Years
Americans' views about the influence of religion in their own lives have been considerably more stable over the past six or seven decades than their views about the influence of religion on American society.
Fifty-four percent of Americans in 2010 say religion is "very important" in their lives. This is down slightly from the past two decades, but roughly equal with levels measured in the 1980s. Americans were much more positive about the effect of religion on their own lives in the 1950s and 1960s, including the historic high of 75% who said religion was very important in 1952.
Church and Synagogue Membership Reflects Slow Decline
Self-reported church or synagogue membership has drifted slowly downward over the past 70 years. The current 61% of Americans who report church or synagogue membership is tied with 2007 and 2008 as the lowest in Gallup's history and down significantly from a high of 76% in 1947.
Implications
When Gallup asks Americans to opine about the influence of religion on American society in general, they most likely take into account a wide variety of social, political, and economic factors in arriving at their responses. Although views that religion was increasing its influence were highest during the Republican administrations of Eisenhower, Reagan, and George W. Bush, this political connection does not appear to be the primary explanatory factor. Views on the increasing influence of religion were quite low during the Republican administrations of Richard Nixon and George H.W. Bush.
Gallup's trends reflecting more personal views of religion do not show the same patterns of fluctuation as the broader questions about American society. What trends there are provide a somewhat mixed message. While almost all measures show that Americans were more religious in the 1940s and 1950s than in recent decades, Americans appear to be as personally religious now as they were in the late 1970s and 1980s. Church and synagogue membership, on the other hand, has drifted downward in a more steady fashion. The current 61% of Americans who report being a church or synagogue member is as low as has been measured by Gallup since the 1930s.Scholars Say Pupils Gain Social Skills in Coed Classes
—Laura Segall for Education Week
Preschool teacher Jacque Radke started the school year at Kenilworth Elementary in Phoenix with a pretty typical bunch of 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds. Some of the girls had started to form cliques and “no boys allowed” lunch tables, while Ms. Radke and her instructional assistant worried that one quiet little girl was getting shunted to the sidelines by the boys.
Generally, boys and girls become more polarized through their first years in school. Now, researchers have started to explore how to span that sex divide and are finding that more-equitable coed classrooms can have social and academic benefits for boys and girls alike.
While children of both sexes play together as toddlers, by the end of kindergarten, they spend only 9 percent of their playtime with children of the other sex, according to research by Lise S. Eliot, an associate professor of neuroscience at the Chicago Medical School.
“Separation is a fact of human childhood and is equally common among young monkeys and apes,” Ms. Eliot says in the 2009 Houghton Mifflin Harcourt book Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow Into Troublesome Gaps and What We Can Do About It. That early separation, she says, creates “two separate cultures that persist throughout childhood.”
But researchers at the American Educational Research Association’s annual conference, held in Vancouver, British Columbia, last month, stressed that while all children naturally develop gender identity, classroom demographics and teacher practices can make a big difference in how and whether students develop sex-based stereotypes and prejudices.
Not ‘Hard-Wired’
In a meta-analysis of studies based on more than 7 million children in kindergarten through 11th grade, Janet S. Hyde, a psychology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found small average gender differences in such areas as activity level (favoring boys) and ability to focus (favoring girls), but no significant differences in mathematics or reading comprehension and “no solid evidence that boys and girls actually learn differently.”
“You never hear a good, modern neuroscientist say the brain is hard-wired,” Ms. Hyde said. “In fact, it is characterized by great neural plasticity, so... any differences you see are at least as likely caused by differences in the experiences of males and females as to any kind of anatomical differences present from birth.”
Even if boys and girls don’t learn differently, classroom demographics can change how students learn, according to research by Erin E. Pahlke, an assistant research professor of social and family dynamics at Arizona State University in Tempe. Ms. Pahlke analyzed the achievement of more than 21,000 pupils in the federal Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort, and found that as the percentage of girls in a kindergarten or 1st grade classroom increased, the reading and math achievement of both boys and girls at the end of 1st grade rose, too.
Moreover, boys and girls in classes near sex parity had better self-control than those of either sex in a class in which they were the dominant majority, 80 percent or more.
Ms. Pahlke said she was still digging into the reasons why coed parity might be beneficial, but a few things jumped out at her. For one, teachers reported classes with more girls as better behaved, which could translate into better interpersonal skills and more time on task for learning, yet she cautioned that girls do not behave better when they are the overwhelming majority in the classroom.
Teacher Modeling
Teacher stereotypes about student abilities may also be tempered in a more balanced classroom, Ms. Pahlke said. Prior research has shown that teachers’ own beliefs about gender stereotypes—such as that girls perform worse in math, or boys in reading—can bring down their students’ performance.
“In a class where teachers see there are more boys in the classroom, and I would argue teachers are hyperaware of these issues,... maybe in a math class where they have more boys they say: ‘Oh, boys are better in math. I can use more-advanced-math approaches in my classroom,’ ” Ms. Pahlke said, “and it could work the other way in reading.”
Seemingly benign and insignificant practices, such as greeting students with “Good morning, boys and girls,” or seating students boy-girl-boy-girl, can have big and unintended consequences, according to other, ongoing studies of social labeling and group identity.
Rebecca S. Bigler, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, has studied how children develop a sense of group differences and biases, especially related to gender and race.
Both Ms. Radke, the Phoenix preschool teacher, and her instructional assistant Erica K. Flynn, said they routinely referred to their preschool classes by gender.
“Growing up, I’d always seen, oh, boys are in this line and girls are in this line, and I’d not thought anything about it,” Ms. Flynn said.
Yet even casually organizing students by gender or mentioning it in a way that labels causes boys and girls to develop the idea that gender is fundamentally oppositional, in ways the teacher has not mentioned or discussed, Ms. Bigler’s and other research has shown.
“If you compare it to race, if you said to your 1st grade classrooms, ‘Good morning, whites and Latinos; let’s have the Latinos get your pencils,’ what would happen is you would go to federal prison,” Ms. Bigler said. “Labeling children routinely by race in your classroom is a violation of federal law, and, of course, you can do this routinely with gender.”
While infants as young as 6 months can differentiate people by gender, they can also differentiate by any number of other characteristics, from ethnicity to hat wearing, she said. They look to an adult’s behavior to decide which differences are important in a given context.
“Children can attend to any salient difference set out in their environment,” Ms. Bigler said. “Labeling is especially powerful,” she noted; using a noun description like calling someone a “hat wearer,” rather than saying “he likes to wear hats often,” makes the description seem more permanent and intrinsic in children’s minds.
In one series of experiments discussed at the research conference, elementary school students were separated into two random groups and given either red or blue shirts to wear for the duration of the summer session. In some classrooms, the teachers were asked to hand out the shirts and never mention them again. In others, teachers were asked to use them casually to group students—asking students to form a red line and a blue line, using separate red and blue cubbies or asking, “Let’s have the red students turn in their books now.”
In some versions, the blue- and red-shirted pupils were put in separate classrooms.
—Laura Segall for Education Week
At the end of the summer session, Ms. Bigler said, “what we find is when teachers use groups to label children in their classrooms, you get the formation of stereotyping and prejudice, and when teachers ignore the presence of those groups in their classrooms, you do not find stereotyping and prejudice.”
That sort of adult modeling may help explain why children in their first few years of school are far more rigidly oriented along gender lines than toddlers or even the adults they will become.
During that period of schooling, children begin to play and interact overwhelmingly with others of their own sex and become less comfortable interacting with those of the other sex, according to Laura D. Hanish, the co-director of the Lives of Girls and Boys: Initiatives on Gender Development and Relationships project at Arizona State.
Ms. Hanish’s research found that when boys and girls played mostly with same-sex classmates in preschool, they began to behave in more gender-stereotyped ways: Boys played farther from teachers, became more aggressive, and used more “rough and tumble” play over time; girls moved closer to teachers and included more gendered play.
“As girls play with other girls, they start to become more skilled in the interactional styles and patterns typical of girls and less skilled in the interactional styles and patterns associated with boys,” Ms. Hanish said. “You start to see increasing segregation. Children develop a fairly limited set of interaction skills: less understanding, appreciation, respect of one another.
“All of that can translate into a host of problems across classrooms,” she said. “It can translate to less effective interactions across academic tasks, harassment, bullying.”
Building Relationships
The Sanford Harmony Program at Arizona State is working with schools to ease the polarization of boys and girls in early grades without preventing normal gender identification. In Phoenix, Ms. Radke and Ms. Flynn are part of an experimental curriculum intended to re-engage boys and girls in two critical transition grades, preschool and 5th grade.
The educators received professional development on gender biases and child development, including research on teacher labeling.
“It was an eye-opening thing realizing how many times I was inadvertently categorizing the children in biases based on whether they were boys or girls,” Ms. Radke recalled. “There was personal self-awareness that came out.”
Throughout this school year, Ms. Radke and Ms. Flynn have not directly discussed gender with their students, but each week, every child is paired with a new “class buddy” of the other sex. Every day, buddies do a different activity together, from art projects and music to active physical games outside.
The program also includes regular activities to teach the children social skills, such as listening, sharing, and cooperation.
In a preliminary study of 94 preschool and 199 5th grade low-income students in matched classrooms, Ms. Hanish found students who participated in the buddy matching and social curriculum were more socially competent, less aggressive, less exclusionary, and showed better social skills toward both boys and girls.
Teachers of students in the program also reported that those children were better behaved and better at following directions than those from nonparticipating classrooms.
The Phoenix educators said the program has made a big difference in their students’ general behavior and their relationships with one another over the course of the year.
“Every Monday, they’re excited to come in and see who their new buddy is,” Ms. Radke said. “What we began to see was on their own, they would sit with their buddy for the sit-down, read-aloud activity. … Not every buddy partnership works well, but I resisted the temptation to change it, because there were a lot of odd couples that ended up working well.”
The cliquishness at the beginning of the year has dissipated, Ms. Flynn said, and across the board, students are now more likely to play together, cooperate, and help each other. Even the youngest girl has become accepted by her bigger classmates and speaks more often.
“Before, there was a lot more arguing,” Ms. Radke said. “Now, we’ll hear them say ‘good job’ or ‘it’s OK’—really supportive words. It’s like they’re kinder to each other.”
Moreover, she said, the small-scale bullying that was common earlier in the year, such as telling a child he was not a friend, or she couldn’t sit with a particular group at lunch, has vanished.
“I truly believe that as the children engage in structured buddy activities, they are learning to know each other, and this connection is reflected by growth in their patience and tolerance as they interact together throughout the day,” Ms. Radke said. “Not hearing that [bullying] language is a huge change in our class.”
Vol. 31, Issue 30, Pages 1, 15
Published in Print: May 9, 2012, as Researchers Cite Social Benefits in Coed Classes
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ELK RAPIDS, Mich. -- It's a place in Elk Rapids that's giving animals a second chance at life, taking in senior dogs and finding them new homes. For some, it's about making them comfortable in the time they have left.
There are more than 900 senior dogs within 500 miles of Traverse City. Kim Skarritt, the founder and president of Silver Muzzle Cottage, says families abandoning their senior dogs is a problem that no one wants to talk about.
Once she saw the number of elderly canines ending up in shelters, she decided to start the rescue to let the dogs know they've been loved by someone before they pass on.
They move a little bit slower, their naps are a little bit longer, but their love remains the same.
"They're the sweetest, gentlest souls and they don't ask for anything," said Skarritt.
Skarritt started Silver Muzzle Cottage in 2015 and has rescued more than 100 dogs since then. On average, two dogs come in each week, but Silver Muzzle is different than other rescues.
"Our rescue takes very specifically dogs with three years or less to live based on their breed standards," said Skarritt.
The cottage provides a hospice-like atmosphere for some dogs. Here, the walls and cages come down and instead are replaced with an environment that feels like home.
"I wanted something a little more special for the dogs, so I personally rescue and adopt the dogs myself," said Skarritt. "When they come in here, they are my dogs. This is my home. I live here and I have a little room off to the back, so this is where we sleep. This is the dogs' home."
108 dogs have come to the cottage and 85 of them have found new homes. Some of the dogs have become permanent residents, while others needed to be put down.
"For me, it's a mission and I really stay focused on that mission," said Skarritt. "The mission is just to make sure that they leave this world knowing that they've been loved by somebody."
It's a part of the job Skarritt and volunteers alike say comes with the territory.
"It's not always sad," said volunteer Christine Varner. "It's sad for us to say goodbye, but it's such a gift to give those dogs and know that they're not suffering anymore."
Volunteer Christine Varner says she had an immediate connection with one dog.
"Her name was Penny," said Varner. "What drew us to her were her eyes. She had these beautiful golden eyes and they were very sad. There's just a connection that happens and for me it's with the eyes."
They said goodbye to Penny six weeks later, but Varner hasn't stopped fighting for senior dogs without a home.
"It's not about us," said Varner. "It's about the dogs."
It's giving the dogs a second chance at life, no matter how long it is.
"It could be two days," said Varner. "It could be two years. We don't know."
"I think the shortest we ever had a dog was two hours," said Skarritt. "They came in, they should've been euthanized before they came to us, but by the time we got them to the vet two hours after they arrived here they were in pretty horrific shape. The decision was just made that there was not even enough time for a ceremony for that dog. We needed to end their suffering. It was pretty bad."
Before a dog is put to sleep, there's a ceremony.
"We gather and surround the dog," said Skarritt. "We gather around the dog, the vet comes here and we surround the dog with love and positive energy. Animals work off of energy and we send them all the positive energy we can muster at the time. The tears are for our own loss, they're not for the dog. We just let them know that they are surrounded by love as they cross over."
"Their life matters," said Varner. "If they are going to pass, and they're all going to pass at some point, it shouldn't be in a shelter environment. It shouldn't be in concrete. It shouldn't be with a fence around them and it shouldn't be with people that don't care about them."
It's a cycle that's never-ending for Silver Muzzle Cottage: owners giving up their pets for whatever reason, for many it's because the dog is old or sick.
"Most oftentimes they are found as strays," said Skarritt. "People find it very difficult to own the act of dropping their senior dog at a shelter, so they set them free and somebody finds them and then they take them to the shelter."
Silver Muzzle Cottage started with one man dropping off his dog.
"He threatened to shoot the dog if we didn't take it, so we took it," said Skarritt. "That was our first rescue."
For some of the dogs it's hospice care, giving them comfort and security in their final moments.
"If you can't love your animal, if you can't care for your animal, I thank you," said Skarritt. "Thank you for letting somebody else have the opportunity to do it because the animal deserves that. Sometimes it's not about their journey, but their landing and where they're supposed to be when their time comes."
Until then, the animals enjoy their remaining years, also known as the golden ones.
"You get the best of the best," said Varner.
Soon, more animals will get to enjoy the 'best of the best.' Silver Muzzle is moving to a new location that'll be able to accommodate their growth.
"We are expanding and moving to a new location which is bigger," said Skarritt. "The list of dogs that are 12 and older needing homes is never-ending."
The new home sits on 15 acres of land, has a sanctuary and lots of space for much-needed naps. It also won't look like a typical shelter.
"We wanted it to be a home for everybody involved, dogs included," said Skarritt.
For whatever reason the dogs have been surrendered to Silver Muzzle Cottage, Skarritt and her crew do their best to make their time left the best it can be.
"This is a happy place, "said Varner. "How can you not smile with that? You love on them and you let them know that their life matters."
Currently, there are seven dogs at Silver Muzzle Cottage, less than usual because they want to move to their new location before taking in new dogs. Some of the dogs are permanent residents, but the others are all available for adoption. For every dog that comes in, they average about $320 in vet bills to start, which doesn't include ongoing medical costs. In addition to volunteers, they're always looking for financial support.
If you'd like to get involved with the mission of Silver Muzzle Cottage, visit their website.Just how racist is Twitter? Study finds 10,000 slurs a DAY posted on social network
Thinktank Demos analysed number of tweets containing racial slurs
Most popular insult was 'white boy'
Claims many of the terms were used in a non-derogatory way
Casual racism accounted fro 5-10% of tweets
Published: 16:42 EST, 13 February 2014 | Updated: 17:40 EST, 13 February 2014
10,000 racist tweets are sent ever day, a major new study into racism on social networks has discovered.
Research by the think tank Demos found the biggest insult was 'white boy'.
Researchers analysed 126,975 English-language tweets from across the globe over a 9-day period in the biggest ever study of Twitter racism.
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Copy link to paste in your message +2 The Demos researchers claim 10,000 racist slurs are tweeted every day - but says many of them are used in a non-derogatory way
HOW RACIST IS TWITTER?
The study found that slurs were employed in six distinct ways: negative stereotype; casual use of slurs; targeted abuse; appropriated; non-derogatory; and offline action/ideologically driven.
The most common type of slurs were actually meant in a non-offensive, non-abusive manner, or to express in-group solidarity.
This group represented between 47.5-70 percent of tweets, depending on whether human or computer analysis were employed..
Researchers revealed the most common racial slurs used on the micro-blogging site included ‘whitey’ and ‘pikey’.
However, as many as 70% of tweets using such language were deemed to be using slurs in non-derogatory fashion.
'This sparks the debate about the extent to which Twitter truly is a platform for racism and abusive language,' the report claims.
Jamie Bartlett, Director of CASM at Demos and author of the report, said: 'Twitter provides us with a remarkable window into how people talk, argue, debate, and discuss issues of the day.
'While there are a lot of racial slurs being used on Twitter, the overwhelming majority of them are not used in an obviously prejudicial or hateful way.
'This study shows just how difficult it is to know what people really mean on the basis of a tweet.
'Context is king, and often it’s more or less lost on Twitter.'
Of the 126,975 English-language tweets from across the globe, further analysis suggests only 1% of tweets used a racial slur in an ideological context within a political statement or in a call to action in the real world.
Analysis found that as few as 500 tweets a day were directed at an individual and appeared on first sight to be abusive.
'There were very few cases that presented an imminent threat of violence, or where individuals directly or indirectly incited offline violent action,' the report's authors said.
'We estimate that, at the very most, fewer than 100 tweets are sent each day which might be interpreted as threatening any kind of violence or offline action.'
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Copy link to paste in your message +2 (L - R) Twitter chief executive officer (CEO) Dick Costolo, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, Twitter co-founder Evan Williams and Twitter co-founder Biz Stone: Today it was claimed over 10,000 tweets a day are sent on the service they created
The most used racist slurs found on Twitter
A Twitter spokesperson told MailOnline 'It’s important to know that Twitter does not screen content or remove potentially offensive content.'
'Our Twitter Rules outline content boundaries on the platform.
'Targeted abuse and specific threats of violence are violations of our rules, and users can report this type of content from within the Twitter application or at this link on our website.
'Twitter is a social broadcast network that enables people and organizations to publicly share brief messages instantly around the world. This brings a variety of users with different voices, ideas and perspectives.
'Users are allowed to post content, including potentially inflammatory content, as long as they’re not violating the Twitter Rules.'
The Anti-Social Media report estimates between 50-70% of tweets were used to express in-group solidarity with're-claimed' slurs used within ethnic groups.
It cites 'P**i' as one term becoming appropriated by users identifying themselves of Pakistani descent.
Last year also saw much debate over use of the term ‘Yid army’ by supporters of Tottenham Hotspur, a British football club with a strong historical connection to London’s Jewish community, to describe themselves.
In December, UK Labour MP Jack Dromey also caused uproar by referring to his postman as ‘Pikey’ in a tweet.
Dromey responded to criticism by explaining that the nickname derived from Corporal Pike, a character in TV show Dad’s Army, demonstrating the potential for racial slurs deemed offensive to be intended non-offensively.A flaw in Electronic Arts's (EA) Origin platform could leave more than 40 million people open to attack, according to researchers.
In a paper published late last month, ReVuln researchers Luigi Auriemma and Donato Ferrante reported that the social network/online store has a loophole that allows hackers to swap games for malicious code.
"In fact, an attacker can remotely compromise millions of systems in a very silent and undetected way, by exploiting any possible local issue or feature exposed by any of the games available on Origin," they said.
There have been no reported Origin hacks to date.
Electronic Arts opened its rebranded Origin store in June 2011, offering a place for gamers to buy, download, and manage games, and chat with friends. EA designed the platform to compete directly with Steam, which has its own vulnerabilities, as ReVuln pointed out in October.
Origin's fatal flaw lies in the way the Origin URI handles commands. To access content, users download a client that connects to the Origin server using a custom URI origin://. But a hacker who discovers the Game ID can use local vulnerabilities to force arbitrary code onto a gamer's machine.
"In other words, an attacker can craft a malicious Internet link to execute malicious code remotely on [a] victim's system, which has Origin installed," the researchers said.
The EA team "is constantly investigating hypotheticals like this one as we continually update our security infrastructure," a company spokesman said in a statement.
There is a possible fix, according to Auriemma and Ferrante: disabling the origin:// URI globally. The workaround means that users can no longer run games via desktop shortcuts or websites with custom command line parameters, but players can still run games directly from Origin.
Electronic Arts can't afford for tens of thousands of users to get hacked, following two weeks of SimCity launch problems. The trouble began March 5, when the Maxis-made game returned after a 10-year hiatus to such fanfare that EA's servers were quickly overloaded. When the company refused to issue refunds to those who purchased digital downloads, unhappy players were forced to wait for the company to fix its capacity problem.
The consolation prize: a free PC game download. EA announced on Monday that users can begin picking from "some of the hottest games in the EA portfolio," including Battlefield 3, Dead Space 3, Mass Effect 3, Bejeweled 3, Medal of Honor Warfighter, Need for Speed Most Wanted, Plants Vs. Zombies, and SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition.
Amidst all of the SimCity drama, EA CEO John Riccitiello announced that he will step down, effective March 30.
For more, see PCMag's reviews of Origin and SimCity, as well as the slideshow above.
UPDATE: Electronic Arts on March 25 issued an update that will make the hypothetical exploit of the Origin URI inoperable. According to a company spokesman, "We have no reason to believe it was ever used, but out of an abundance of caution for our players, we wanted to quickly address it."
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wire fraud conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy and wilful failure to file a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts, and to six counts of tax evasion. He forfeited $1.96 million and agreed to forfeit a second amount, to be determined at the time of sentencing, but he was never jailed as the investigation continued. He also agreed to pay a FBAR civil penalty for $487,875.
He was banned from soccer for life by FIFA on July 9, 2015.
"His misconduct, for which he accepted full responsibility, should not obscure Chuck's positive impact on international soccer," his lawyers said. "With Chuck's guidance and leadership, CONCACAF transformed itself from impoverished to profitable."
An NYU graduate, Blazer started in soccer coaching his son's club in New Rochelle and joined boards of local and regional soccer organizations. He was the U.S. Soccer Federation's executive vice-president from 1984-86, becoming chair of the national teams committee. In 1988, he and Clive Toye, who had brought Pele to the United States as the general manager of the New York Cosmos, formed the American Soccer League.
Blazer urged Warner to run for president of CONCACAF in 1990. When the Trinidadian won, he made Blazer the general secretary. In 1991, Blazer created the CONCACAF Gold Cup, the organization's national team championship that is played every two years, and he rose within FIFA to become chairman of its marketing and television advisory board.
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AP freelance writer Mark Didtler in Tampa, Florida, contributed to this report.Filho da Puta (14 April 1812 – 25 August 1835) was a British Thoroughbred racehorse. He won nine of his 12 races including the St. Leger Stakes and Doncaster Gold Cup. He also sired St. Leger winner Birmingham and was the leading sire in Great Britain and Ireland in 1828. He was owned by Sir William Maxwell and later T. Houldsworth. His name means "son of a bitch" in Portuguese.[2]
Background [ edit ]
Filho da Puta was a bay horse[3] with a white snip and a star foaled on 14 April 1812[4] and bred by T. Hornby.[1] He was sired by Haphazard, who won three Great Subscription Purses. As a stallion Haphazard also produced 2000 Guineas winners Antar and Reginald, 1000 Guineas winner Rowena and Doncaster Cup winner Figaro.[5] Filho da Puta's dam was Mrs Barnet, a daughter of Waxy.[3] He was purchased by Sir William Maxwell as a foal.[1]
Racing career [ edit ]
1814: Two-year-old season [ edit ]
Started his racing career on 21 June 1814 by walking over for the Tyro Stakes at Newcastle.[6] In September he beat Agapanthus and a filly by Clinker to win a Sweepstakes of 20 guineas each over the last mile of the Pontefract course.[7] These were his only two races as a two-year-old.
1815: Three-year-old season [ edit ]
Filho da Puta returned to the track as a three-year-old at the end of March, when he won a Sweepstakes of 100 guineas each at Catterick Bridge. Restoration finished second and a filly by Shuttle was last of the three runners in the one and half mile race.[8] In the Autumn he won the St. Leger Stakes at Doncaster Racecourse, beating fourteen rivals. Earl Fitzwilliam's Orville colt finished second, with Fulford third and Shepherd fourth.[9] Three days later he beat two opponents to win the Doncaster Club Stakes over two miles.[10] He was then bought for 3,000 guineas[11] by T. Houldsworth and in his final race of the season he won the four-mile Richmond Cup. He beat Doctor Syntax into second place, with the Luck's All gelding finishing third of the ten runners. Filho da Puta had started the race as the 1/3 favourite.[12]
1816: Four-year-old season [ edit ]
In April Filho da Puta was beaten for the first time in his career when he lost to Sir Joshua in a 1000 guineas match race over one mile at Newmarket.[13] In the summer he was beaten by Doctor Syntax in the Preston Gold Cup, before returning to Doncaster in October, where he four horses in a Sweepstakes of 50 guineas each over the St. Leger course.[14] Later in the day he started as the odds-on favourite for the Gold Cup over four miles. He won the race from Leopold.[15] At Richmond he beat Rasping and Clinkerina to win the Dundas Stakes.[16] Later in the day he could only finish third behind Leopold and The Duchess in the Gold Cup.[17]
1817-18: Injury and final race [ edit ]
Filho da Puta never raced in 1817 due to a leg injury, but he was kept in training.[1] His final race came in 1818 when after starting as the heavy favourite, he was beaten by Cerberus in a match race over two miles at York. After York he was retired to stud.[18]
Stud career [ edit ]
Filho da Puta initially stood at Farnsfield in Nottinghamshire for Houldsworth at a fee of 10 guineas and half a guinea for the groom.[19] He became a successful stallion and was the leading sire in Great Britain and Ireland in 1828. His son Birmingham won the St. Leger in 1830.[20] He died at Rock Hill Paddocks near Mansfield on 25 August 1835.[4]
Pedigree [ edit ]
Pedigree of Filho da Puta, bay stallion, 1812[3][21] Sire
Haphazard (GB)
br. 1797 Sir Peter Teazle (GB)
br. 1784 Highflyer
1774 Herod* Rachel Papillon
1769 Snap Miss Cleveland Miss Hervey (GB)
ch. 1775 Eclipse*
ch. 1764 Marske Spilletta Clio
1760 Young Cade Starling mare Dam
Mrs Barnet (GB)
b. 1806 Waxy (GB)
b. 1790 Pot-8-Os
1773 Eclipse* Sportsmistress Maria
b. 1777 Herod* Lisette Woodpecker mare (GB)
b. 1788 Woodpecker
ch. 1773 Herod* Miss Ramsden Heinel
1771 Squirrel Principessa
Note: b. = Bay, br. = Brown, ch. = Chestnut
See also [ edit ]Product Overview
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SpecificationsNever again will the world's best cricketer be a batsman-slash-fast bowler-slash-stoic © Getty Images
Has this game of ours ever suffered such a prolonged outbreak of mourning? Tendulkar, Dravid, Ponting, Kallis, Yousuf, Laxman, Boucher (wk), Lee, Swann, Ntini, Muralitharan: a team composed of Test retirees this middle-aged decade makes depressing reading. A makeshift opening duo, true, and a tad light on pace; then again, McGrath, Pollock, Vaas, Flintoff, Harmison and Hoggard all quit the five-day fray between 2007 and 2009. Granted, Chris Rogers could wind up as the new Mike Hussey, but since India's selectors now seem irretrievably allergic to Virender Sehwag, the sense of grievous and irreparable loss hardly recedes.
Nor, for that matter, is there too much petrol left in the collective tank of this half-decent XI: Graeme Smith, Gayle, Sangakkara (wk), Jayawardene, Pietersen, Younis, Chanderpaul, Johnson, Ajmal, Steyn and Anderson. All the more reason to wonder, as Gideon Haigh did in the Times last week, whether a game whose aspirants can now fulfil their ambitions less taxingly can possibly maintain its capacity "to make, rather than merely to sell".
But before we get too tearfully fearful about ever seeing their likes again, consider the following XI, all of whose members hung up their whites between December 1990 and the end of 1993: Greenidge, Haynes, Richards, Miandad, Gower (wk - for the fun of it), Border, Botham, Imran, Kapil, Marshall and Qadir. And between 1984 and 1987? Gavaskar, Wright, Greg Chappell, Zaheer, Lloyd, Marsh (wk), Holding, Lillee, Garner, Thomson, Willis. Between 2000 and 2003? Anwar, Mark Waugh, De Silva, Azharuddin, Andy Flower, Healy (wk), Wasim, Waqar, Donald, Ambrose and Walsh.
Nor should this be regarded as an exclusively modern trend. Rewind to the years spanning 1953 and 1957 and it is hard to argue that this combo would be significantly inferior to the aforementioned: Morris, Hutton, Headley, Hassett, Compton, Miller, Gomez, Tallon (wk), Wardle, Bedser and Johnston.
Who, furthermore, is to say with any vestige of certainty that the following XI will not bid adieu in a similarly emotional and adulatory rush between 2020 and 2023 - Cook, Amla, Clarke, Taylor, Bell, De Villiers (wk), Shakib, Ashwin, Philander, Broad and Morkel? Or that they won't be emulated, if not eclipsed, come the end of the 2020s by one numbering Dhawan, Pujara, Kohli, Rahane, Stokes, Williamson, Dominic Hendricks (wk), Gazi, Boult, Junaid and Chathura Peiris? Among the chief assets of spectator sport, after all, is its capacity for renewal and regeneration. Then again, quite why we should expect anything less of those steeped in the art of competition is utterly beyond me.
But another Jacques Henry Kallis? Really? Not in the conventional sense of an allrounder - as Kartikeya Date stressed in his recent blog here, Kallis was a batsman who bowled, not a man equally or even similarly productive in both guises - but as a truly modern allrounder, as liable to neutralise and/or obliterate opponents over five days as 50 overs or 20? Doubts are rabidly unconfined.
Let's deal quickly - if not lightly - with the bottom line. To average more with the bat in Tests than all bar one of one's illustrious peers is affirmation enough (despite debuting half a decade after Kallis, Kumar Sangakkara surely counts as a peer); to lead them all across three formats (combined average just south of 50) supplies icing of the lushest sort. To throw in 577 international wickets, enough to penetrate the all-time top 20 of another category altogether, defies credulity. We could go on and on, but a lily of this lustre surely has no need of gilding.
While others have entertained as regally as Sobers, will anyone ever again endure as productively as Kallis?
Which brings us, inevitably and not a little painfully, to The Sobers Question. Having witnessed both in their prime, I have no doubt whatsoever that a) Garry Sobers and Kallis, the only two Test players ever to have amassed 6000 runs and 200 wickets, were the finest flannelled fools I've ever seen, and b) however odious comparisons may be, I have no intention of resisting them.
I am no less obstinately adamant that Sobers, infinitely more the showman, scored vastly higher on the thrill-o-meter. True, his pomp coincided with impressionable boyhood rather than been-there-seen-that adulthood, but whereas both men subverted the mindset of their times, they did so with contrasting philosophies: Kallis prospered through attrition, drawing on a bottomless well of patience and persistently winning the mind games; Sobers grabbed matches by force of personality and scruff of neck, shaking so hard they had no option but to change course.
Even so, amid an era of unquestionably greater demands on body, mind and soul, one where allroundedness is a compliment more readily applied to wicketkeepers, it should be marvelled that Kallis, in terms of overall returns, so often stands ahead of Sobers, notably with the ball.
Check out the respective workloads. Sobers totted up *383 Test and other first-class appearances, 95 one-dayers of sundry hues, and a few dozen more in the grimly competitive Lancashire Leagues; Kallis clocked on for *257 Test and first-class outings, *421 ODIs and other List A fixtures, and *134 T20 contests in various dodgy uniforms. Nor did he conserve energy by cutting his run and floating up some spin, nor drop down to No. 6. Besides, if he was more averse to risk, given the more venomous attacks he had to confront, can we blame him? The keywords are consistency and constancy: the team man par excellence.
Yet if Kallis challenged our perception of what was possible after Sobers abdicated, why should it not be within the realms of foreseeability that someone will match, even surpass both? Right now, even if this inveterate Pom refuses to get carried away by the intoxicating promise of Ben Stokes, and accepts that Stuart Broad the batsman will never rise from part-time handyman to full-time usefulness, there are still three plausible candidates to couple 5000 Test runs with 500 wickets - Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and Shakib Al-Hasan. That all are spinners is assuredly no coincidence: such are the demands on body and soul, it is becoming increasingly difficult to envisage their faster brethren undertaking as prolonged a quest for that particular grail as Kallis, let alone Botham, Imran, Kapil and Pollock.
Unfortunately - for us as well as him - the most compelling member of that aforementioned triumvirate has the disadvantage of representing Bangladesh. After all, since debuting in 2007, Shakib, the 25th man to harvest 2000 runs and 100 wickets at the highest level, has averaged fewer than five Tests per annum.
It is a measure of his potential, nonetheless, that only five others have achieved such a double while averaging 35-plus with the bat and less with the ball: This, though, is where we separate men from boys. However impressive you may find the differentials for Tony Greig (8.23), Keith Miller (+14) and Imran Khan (14.88), they pale next to those brandished by Kallis (22.71) and Sobers (23.74). But while South Africa could well have been a force without Kallis and West Indies without Sobers, the burden Shakib will have to bear for the next decade promises to be of largely Sisyphean proportions.
In their different ways, Sobers and Kallis scaled the heights of versatility © Getty Images
So, as the final arbiter of Kallis' uniqueness, let's settle for simplicity: a tidy number that, helpfully, has no need of decimals - nor, for that matter, a comparison with Sobers. Admittedly, Test cricket's first Man-of-the-Match award had yet to be made when the latter retired, but Kallis' tally of 22 nonetheless heads all comers. Next, on 19, comes Muttiah Muralitharan, who played 33 matches fewer and was named Man of the Series 11 times in 61 starts to Kallis' nine in 61. Subjective as such judgements invariably are, only a very small minority defy credibility. And just as no single cricketer has yet meant as much to his team as Muralitharan meant to Sri Lanka, Kallis was three times the cricketer.
Yet in many ways he defined what Huw Richards of the International New York Times dubbed "passive-aggressive" cricket, the same strategy that first hoisted then petarded England. Effective while the game was shifting away from viewing pace as the chief weapon, less so once David Warner and Faf du Plessis began ridiculing the assumption that alleged T20 specialists cannot adapt when tactics are determined by time.
In their different ways, Sobers and Kallis scaled the heights of versatility. The former, a professional with an amateur outlook, aimed to entertain; for all his remarkable late conversion to T20 destroyer, the latter's priority was to endure. But while others have entertained as regally as Sobers, will anyone ever again endure as productively as Kallis? Since this would mean maintaining discipline, efficiency, focus, fitness and occasional fabulousness for the best part of two decades, often in three formats, this is where doubts are gravest.
"Never again" is a big statement, a dangerously Churchillian statement. Made by the then British PM in the aftermath of the Holocaust, it is a proclamation, given subsequent atrocities in Rwanda, Kosovo, Darfur and elsewhere, that really ought never to be uttered without an insurance policy that covers thoughtless misinformation. In this case, recklessness seems justified.
Never again will the world's best cricketer be a batsman-slash-fast bowler-slash-stoic. Never again will caution breed greatness. Never again will a sporting superstar enjoy the delights of a low profile. Never again will a national hero mean so little to the majority of the population. Never again, therefore, will we see another Jacques Kallis. Our children must judge whether this is a cue for undiluted mourning.
09:45:52 GMT, January 9, 2014: Figures corrected.
Rob Steen is a sportswriter and senior lecturer in sports journalism at the University of Brighton
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.Members of France's lower house were set Wednesday to adopt a final version of a bill that outlaws paying for sex and would penalize prostitutes' clients for the first time.
The law has been championed by France’s Socialist government as a measure to strengthen the fight against prostitution, and comes after almost two and a half years of political wrangling.
Since its first reading in December 2013, the bill has come up for a vote in the National Assembly three separate times.
MPs and senators have struggled to agree on the key component of the measure, which outlaws paying for sex, with fines of 1,500 euros for clients and up to 3,500 euros for repeat offenses.
But Wednesday’s vote in the lower house will be definitive.
Sex workers who oppose the law were scheduled to protest neat the National Assembly on Wednesday. They say it will push prostitution further underground and make them more vulnerable.
France has between 30,000 and 40,000 prostitutes, according to official estimates.
The move to decriminalise prostitution draws its inspiration from Sweden, which has penalised clients since 1999.
Prostitution is legal in France, but prostitutes are often arrested and charged for soliciting in public, which is prohibited.
Brothels, pimping and the sale of sex by minors are also illegal.
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This sign in Monroe, NC caught my eye, and raised a few questions.
My wife and I were recently traveling through Monroe, NC and came to an intersection and saw this sign.
I had to stop and take a picture. It wasn’t a busy intersection and it was in an older commercial area of the town.
Our questions were: Why is this sign here? Is prostitution that big of a problem in this town? Does this imply that we can go elsewhere in town and find some action? And, now where are we supposed to go the next time we’re looking for a hooker on a Thursday afternoon?“Ego is able to convert everything to its own use, even spirituality.For example,if you have learned of a particularly beneficial meditation technique of spiritual practice,then ego’s attitude is, first to regard it as an object of fascination and, second to examine it. Finally, since ego is seeming solid and cannot really absorb anything, it can only mimic. Thus ego tries to examine and imitate the practice of meditation and the meditative way of life. When we have learned all the tricks and answers of the spiritual game, we automatically try to imitate spirituality, since real involvement would require the complete elimination of ego, and actually the last thing we want to do is to give up the ego completely. However, we cannot experience that which we are trying to imitate; we can only find some area within the bounds of ego that seems to be the same thing. Ego translates everything in terms of its own state of health, its own inherent qualities. It feels a sense of great accomplishment and excitement at having been able to create such a pattern. At last it has created a tangible accomplishment, a confirmation of its own individuality.” ~ Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, “Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism”
I have been working on the next part in the Vipassana Series, though I have been held back by some technical difficulties, unfortunately (recovery of emails, etc, for use in the illustration of what is being explained), however, I felt I have not made a post in a while, and though formatting is difficult, am providing a recent “quickie”, so to speak.
I will now provide the following images –
This is actually amazing, for a psychological case study…..
The page in question is the following:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/151719691704163/
If anyone understands how pages work in Facebook, there is a “seen” heading on each post, that shows not only how may have seen it, but WHO sees it.
This specific page is about the yoga sutras of patanjali, and Ania Ziolkowska has “seen” every post that has been made on the page, which are verses from the sutras.
Here is where it gets interesting (and when you can know if someone has actually read the sutras, or understands them) –
The only sutras Ania has “liked” so far are also the only ones that can be misinterpreted as ego-centric.
The one and only post Ania Ziolkowska commented on is an exercise in her attempting “magic” – “Say it, and it will be true”
Ania Ziolkowska is STILL attempting to convince herself that everything she is doing, everything she has done so far, is the “right path”, or even a path at all.
Ania Ziolkowska is still attempting to convince herself that everything she gave up was for the right reasons, that it was worth giving up at all.
Ania is looking for forgiveness she doesn’t deserve because she refuses to take responsibility for what she’s done, believing there is a “path” that can avoid that “requirement”.
Ania Ziolkowska is still trying to convince herself she is “happy”.
Maybe some don’t see this, however I would deem that as interesting, due to the fact that, like a child, Ania is ruled by her Id, and has finally reached the point where the Id is all she is, which, essentially, means she’s an empty shell, with very little impulse control.
Also notice that her comment, the only one Ania Ziolkowska has provided, is “shallow”, without any deeper explanation of what the sutra means, to her?
Notice how Ania asks no questions, to gain a deeper or more clear understanding?
Essentially, what Ania Ziolkowska is practicing is a confirmation bias, brought forth by cognitive dissonance, in that she cannot relate the other sutras to herself, and therefore ignores them, as they are too difficult, just as Ania ignores any mention of Yamas – “rights”, or Niyamas – “wrongs”
And by asking no questions, Ania protects her “Id”, by not chancing that “she”, her Id self, could possibly be wrong.
The avoidance of “Unpleasure”.
Thus taking the safe route.
Ania Ziolkowska merely wishes to be “acknowledged”, but not in a way that is actually beneficial to her.
Related articlesFormer pupils of £24,000-a-year school make allegations of historical abuse from 1970s to 90s after #MeToo campaign
A prestigious private girls’ school, which asked former pupils to contribute to a drama project about sexual harassment inspired by the #MeToo campaign, has found itself at the centre of historical allegations of sexual abuse.
St Paul’s girls’ school in west London contacted former pupils, known as Old Paulinas (OPs), inviting them to help the drama department create a piece of documentary theatre about sexual harassment to take to the Edinburgh festival fringe next year.
The school had hoped to interview people about experiences of sexual harassment in the workplace. After receiving the letter, a small number of OPs responded by making allegations of sexual abuse while they were at the school.
Two women made claims relating to personal experiences, while others notified the school about alleged abuse described to them by friends. The allegations, first reported in Huff Post UK, focus on a period from the 1970s to the 90s.
The high mistress, Sarah Fletcher, has since written to alumnae urging any other former pupils with allegations of sexual abuse to come forward, adding: “There can never be any excuse for an adult, particularly one in a position of trust, to abuse that position and to take advantage of a pupil to commit what is a terrible crime.”
She said the school now had strict protocols governing interactions between staff and students and clear safeguarding policies. Given recent allegations, however, she has requested an independent safeguarding inspection by the local authority to ensure best practice.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest St Paul’s Girls’ school in Brook Green, Hammersmith. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
The allegations surfaced after the school’s director of drama, Isabel Foley, wrote to former pupils requesting help for the Edinburgh production. The email began: “Shocked by the Weinstein stories in the press? Surprised? Not surprised? Did you post #MeToo? Then we need your help.
“We are looking to interview women and men from all sectors and age groups to gain a greater insight into what seems to be commonplace sexual harassment in the workplace by men in a position of power, be it low level ‘banter’ or more extreme cases of physical abuse.”
Fletcher’s subsequent letter this week explained: “The email we sent, in conjunction with #MeToo and the stories about abuse currently in the press, prompted a small number of OPs to get in touch with the school.
“They have told us of past sexual abuse at St Paul’s. Two wrote from personal experience, others about what they had heard from friends. The allegations relate to a period spanning from the 1970s to 1990s.”
The former pupils who contacted the school appear to have chosen not to identify any alleged perpetrator. The high mistress’s letter states: “The police can only do their job, however, if they have a name.
“I have, therefore, asked these OPs to consider whether they would feel able to identify the individual(s), so that they can be held to account. I realise this is a big and difficult step to take, and we shall do all we can to support anyone who decides to go to the police.
“It is only through proper reflection on what went wrong that we as a school can ensure that present and future students are as safe as possible.
“This is the power of #MeToo, and of the stories of these OPs who contacted us. If you suffered abuse at St Paul’s and would like to report a crime, our local authority have advised us that you should call 101.If you would like to get in touch with the school to talk to us, please let me know.”
The Metropolitan police were unable to confirm reports. A statement from the £24,000-a-year school said, however: “We can confirm that the school recently received some allegations of past abuse.
“While these refer to events in the 1970s and 1990s, we take any information of this nature extremely seriously and have passed all the details immediately to the relevant authorities, with whom we remain in close contact.”
Former pupils include the novelist and playwright Dodie Smith, scientist Rosalind Franklin, broadcast journalist Sophie Raworth and actor Rachel Weisz.The latest selling point for American warfare is “smart power” humanitarianism, dispatching the U.S. military to eliminate foreign leaders designated by pundits as evildoers taking lives and resisting freedom. Ex-FBI agent Coleen Rowley warns against this latest con.
By Coleen Rowley
In recent years, it has become evident that use of deadly force by a U.S.-dominated NATO is not only outside the parameters of international and constitutional law, but also in some cases outside basic legal principles that have stood the test of time for decades and even centuries. One explanation for why American civil society has not pushed back is the “better rhetoric” now being used to sell war.
What is this better rhetoric for the same U.S.-NATO war agenda, what was once blurted out by a U.S. officer in Vietnam as “it became necessary to destroy the town to save it”? Today’s proponents of “Smart Power” make their compelling case for more (endless) war by successfully urging us to “recast the fight against terror and nuclear proliferation from a dark, draining struggle into a hopeful, progressive causeaimed at securing an international system of liberal societies and defeating challenges to it.”
This message comes from seemingly reasonable men and women as they rotate through the revolving doors of official appointments, jobs at foreign-policy think tanks, and directorships of “human rights” organizations.
David Swanson, author of War Is a Lie, speaking at the 10th annual Peacestock gathering, sponsored by Veterans for Peace in Hager City, Wisconsin, this summer, commented on this new “progressive-led” war propaganda: “That wars must be marketed as humanitarian is a sign of progress. That we fall for it is a sign of embarrassing weakness. The war propagandist is the world’s second oldest profession, and the humanitarian lie is not entirely new. But it works in concert with other common war lies.”
Lies about war, in humanitarian disguise, were clearly evident in Chicago last March. Peace activist Ann Wright (a former Foreign Service State Department official and retired U.S. Army colonel); Ann Galloway, a member of Women Against Military Madness, and myself were among the thousands of antiwar activists who were in Chicago for the protest of NATO wars. There we noticed, in billboards and announcements, the new campaign of Amnesty International-USA: “Human Rights for Women and Girls in AfghanistanNATO: Keep the Progress Going.”
Unwilling to let this go unchallenged, we packed into a taxi along with a few other antiwar activists, to head to the Chicago hotel where AI-USA’s “Shadow Summit” was being held, a conference billed as a feminist cause regarding the supposed improved status of women and children under US-NATO occupation. The summit featured former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and other U.S. State Department officials and Council on Foreign Relations figures.
We weren’t allowed to carry in our “NATO bombs are not humanitarian,” “NATO Kills Girls,” and anti-drone bombing posters that we had with us for the protest march later that day, but we did witness enough of the event to prompt Ann Wright and me to issue a warning about the exploitation of women’s rights as a cover for war: “Amnesty’s Shilling for US Wars.”
The United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC) later issued a Statement on NATO Claim of “Progress” for Women and Girls in Afghanistan, as well as a Statement Condemning Amnesty International USA’s Campaigns in Support of U.S./NATO Wars. UNAC condemned Amnesty’s pro-war stance and propaganda efforts supporting continued occupation in Afghanistan and intervention in Syria, and asked for Amnesty to reaffirm its commitment to human rights, not war, and remove those responsible for their current pro-war policies and campaigns.
A “Tool” of U.S. “Smart Power
Suzanne Nossel, the current executive director of Amnesty-USA, previously worked at different times as a State Department official for Richard Holbrooke and Hillary Clinton and is personally credited with having coined the term “Smart Power,” which Clinton announced as the defining feature of current U.S. foreign policy. “Smart” indeed, certainly better-sounding, to project a contrast with the formerly unabashed Bush-Cheney reliance on “Hard Power.”
“Smart power” employs “Soft Power:” diplomatic, economic, and cultural pressures, which can be combined with military force, to “work our will” upon foreign nations, as described by Nossel:
“To advance from a nuanced dissent to a compelling vision, progressive policymakers should turn to the great mainstay of twentieth-century U.S. foreign policy: liberal internationalism, which posits that a global system of stable liberal democracies would be less prone to war
“Washington, the theory goes, should thus offer assertive leadership, diplomatic, economic, and not least, military [writer’s emphasis], to advance a broad array of goals: self-determination, human rights, free trade, the rule of law, economic development, and the quarantine and elimination of dictators and weapons of mass destruction (WMD).”
Even more relevant to the issue of human rights and peace and justice organizations being co-opted, however, Nossel also described Smart Power, in Foreign Affairs magazine, March/April 2004, as “knowing that the United States’ own hand is not always its best tool: U.S. interests are furthered by enlisting others on behalf of U.S. goals.”
The question that emerges is, how could otherwise highly effective human rights organizations, respected for their good work largely because of their independence from powerful, self-interested governments, so easily fall into being used as tools of what Nossel once referred to as U.S. “Superpowerdom”? When Amnesty-USA invited Madeleine Albright and other State Department officials to speak at its NATO women’s forum, it was not the first time it had reached out to the architect of harsh economic sanctions, such as the Clinton administration’s sanctions against Iraq that were blamed for killing a half million Iraqi children.
Shortly after becoming executive director of AI-USA in January 2012, Suzanne Nossel moderated a panel at Wellesley College, during which she goaded fellow panelist Madeleine Albright to favor even more U.S. intervention:
“Now as the head of Amnesty International-USA, one point of great frustration and consternation for human rights organizations and civil society organizations over the last eight or nine months has been the failure of the UN Security Council to address, in any way, the deaths of now five thousand civilians in Syria at the hands of President Assad and his military.
“Last spring the Security Council managed to forge a majority for forceful action in Libya and it was initially very controversial, [causing] many misgivings among key Security Council members. But Gaddafi fell, there’s been a transition there and I think one would have thought those misgivings would have died down. And yet we’ve seen just a continued impasse over Syria and a real, almost return to cold war days and paralysis in the Security Council.
“How do you explain that and what do you think is the missing ingredient to break that logjam and get the Security Council to live up to its responsibilities on Syria?”
Even the savvy Madeleine Albright seemed genuinely taken aback by the Amnesty director’s push for a US-NATO Libya-like intervention in Syria. Albright and the other speaker responded skeptically as to what could be achieved through bombing or military force. What shouldn’t have been surprising, however, was Nossel’s minimalizing the thousands of NATO bombing sorties on Libya by calling them a “forceful action,” and her urging a potential UN Security Council authorization to do the same to Syria, referring to this as “living up to its responsibilities.”
She was already on record, in her prior think tank capacity, lamenting that failure in Iraq might mean Americans would lose their “willingness to use military force [writer’s emphasis], Iraq as a failed state is likely to herald an era of deep reservations among the U.S. public regarding the use of force, a kind of post-Vietnam, post-Mogadishu hangover.”
Little Skepticism
Sadly, Amnesty is far from being the only human rights or peace and justice organization being misled in varying degrees by the U.S. State Department’s newly minted “Responsibility to Protect (R2P)” doctrine, otherwise known as “humanitarian intervention”, and its newly created “Atrocity Prevention Board,” chaired by Samantha Power, one of the main architects of U.S.-NATO’s bombing of Libya.
Human Rights Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, the Peace Alliance, Citizens for Global Solutions, Think Progress, and AVAAZ are just some of the groups that seem to have swallowed that particular Kool-Aid.
This is not entirely new, as neo-con war hawks years ago co-opted the various big “liberal” think tanks: Brookings; the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Carnegie Endowment for Peace; etc. NATO war
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。 Ainz had no idea what he was talking about. 对此安兹毫无头绪。 Since Demiurge felt it ought to be this way, then it should be a better answer than anything Ainz came up with. If all those deaths brought benefits to Nazarick, then let them die. Rather, Ainz would think about whether killing more would bring even more benefits to Nazarick and such things. 迪米乌哥斯觉得应该如此的话，那就是比安兹的考虑更正确的答案吧。死这么多就能为纳萨力克带来利益的话，那就死吧。倒不如说安兹还会考虑是不是再多杀些纳萨力克的利益会更大呢，这种事情。 However, the problem lay in the fact that Demiurge had asked Ainz for humans here which could not be killed. 可问题在于，迪米乌哥斯希望安兹能给出、不要在这里杀掉的人类。 Frankly speaking if that was all, then he would randomly select a few and be done with it, but there was one more thing to note. 话要是就这么结束了那随便提几个人名就好，可是有一条注意事项。 That was humans who were devoted to Ainz, or who might be persuaded to join Ainz’s side. 那就是仅限心醉于安兹，或者有可能加入安兹一方的人类。 『I feel that there must be several humans who are as devoted to you as those Dwarves, so please tell me their names, and when I make my move, I will take care not to kill them off.』 When he received that message from Demiurge, he had even thought, “Are you kidding me?” as he doubted Demiurge’s thinking. 『因为觉得是安兹大人的话应该已经像那群矮人一样出现几个为您心醉的人类了，请您告诉我那些人类的名字。我行动时好注意着不杀掉他们』当接到迪米乌哥斯的这般联络的时候，心里甚至“这是在说风凉话吧”这样怀疑起了迪米乌哥斯的想法。 “...There’s nobody like that.” 「……没有啊，那样的家伙」 Those despondent words escaped Ainz. 安兹不由得说出了丧气话。 There were no humans here who were devoted to AInz. 心醉于安兹的人类完全没有。 Rather, he had keenly experienced how much the undead were hated in the Holy Kingdom. 不如说能切身体会到不死者在圣王国是怎样地被深恶痛绝着。 Under these dire circumstances, how many people would be devoted to his undead self? 在这种逆境下不死者的自己要如何让人为自己心醉啊。 Thus, he had told Demiurge that there were none. 然而，对迪米乌哥斯说不出一个人也没有这种话。 Demiurge sincerely believed that Ainz could fascinate several humans. So what would happen if he told Demiurge that he had not managed to do so with anyone? 迪米乌哥斯是真心相信着安兹可以让好几个人类为之心醉。这样的话，一个人都做不到，这种话说出来迪米乌哥斯会怎样想呢。 My stomach hurts... （胃好疼……） The Dwarf Demiurge was speaking of must have been Gondo Firebeard, but that had simply been lucky. He had scored a critical hit on a weakness in his heart by pure chance, and such luck would not repeat itself. 迪米乌哥斯所说的矮人是龚德·法雅比奥德吧，那位说到底是因为运气好。碰巧自己的攻击在他内心脆弱的部分暴击了而已，这种幸运是不可能反复出现的。 And it was precisely because he had the font of information which was Gondo that he had managed to strike a chord in the hearts of the runesmiths. However, there was nobody like that in the Holy Kingdom. 而且正是因为有了龚德这一情报源，才能对矮人的卢恩工匠打出会心一击的一手。然而，在圣王国并没有那样的人物。 There was one person with whom he had formed a friendly relationship, Neia Baraja, but that was all. 唯一一位，和侍从的涅娅·巴拉哈到了构建友好关系的程度，但也就到这种程度为止了。 Besides, he had given her a magic item to improve their relationship as well as for another reason, but how effective it had been was still unclear. 姑且，含着进一步提升友好度的意义，以及另一层意义，把魔法道具借给她了，但其成效还是不明。 She kept looking at him with murderous eyes, so he probably should not expect anything good to come of it. 因为总是在用杀手般的目光盯着自己，恐怕还是不期待为好吧。 What would Demiurge think if I told him there was only one person, Ainz asked himself. （只有一个人，这么说的话迪米乌哥斯又会怎样想？） 安兹质问自己。 Would the image of Ainz which Demiurge held in his heart not crumble completely? 迪米乌哥斯心中的安兹像不会彻底崩塌吗？ And then, what would happen in the future? 那么今后究竟会变成怎样啊。 In the Dwarven Kingdom, I told Demiurge that I wasn’t that smart, but at that time it didn’t seem like he believed me completely… this is bad. How great a person am I in his eyes? Or rather, it seems I’m getting greater and greater; am I imagining things? Normally, wouldn’t it be the other way around? （在矮人国对迪米乌哥斯说，我没那么聪明哦，的时候好像完全没被相信……不妙。在那家伙眼中我究竟是怎样伟大的存在啊……不如说好像还变得越来越伟大了，是我的错觉么？普通来说不该反过来吗？） The wait hurt. It was not weighty; it just hurt. 期待好疼痛。不是沉重而是疼痛。 In the past, he had pondered how heavy and painful the word “duty” could be. In particular, the part where his subordinates viewed Ainz as a great being was the most painful of all. 曾经的自己未曾想过忠义一词是如此沉重，痛苦的东西。特别是部下们把安兹看着伟大的存在这一点最为痛心。 I guess I should take this opportunity to tell Demiurge that I’m not really that amazing, but what would happen if I did? What should I do if it caused the plan that Demiurge labored for so long over to end in failure? If I spent several years courting a big client, only to have it fall through because of a word from a bastard boss who didn’t care about all that... （这时候果然，就此机会告诉迪米乌哥斯，我不是那么了不起的家伙，怎么样呢？但那要是导致迪米乌哥斯长时间苦心策划的计划以失败告终该怎么办？要是自己花费数年才搞好关系的大客户，毫不顾虑这些的**上司的一句话就让一切泡汤的话……） Ahhh, Ainz said as he scratched his hairless head. 啊啊啊，这么说着的安兹挠起了一根头发也没有的头。 What should he do? 怎么办才好？ What was the best answer he could give? 怎么做才是最好的答案？ No matter how he tried to simulate it, it all ended in Demiurge looking at him in disappointment. He could not reach a conclusion that he could accept. 无论再怎么进行模拟，都会是让迪米乌哥斯失望地看着自己的结果。得不出能够接受的结论。 He’s expecting too much of me -- the higher the climb, the longer the fall. That’s why I said i”m nobody amazing... （期待太大了——爬得越高摔得越痛。所以我才说自己不是什么了不起的家伙的……） And then, Ainz’s own plan had been quite the failure. 而且安兹自己的计划相当的失败。 Ainz reached into his pocket space and drew a sword. 安兹将手伸入空间，拿出了一把剑。 It was an ordinary sword inscribed with runes. 刻着卢恩的平凡的剑。 However, it contained power comparable to the bow he had lent to Neia. 然而它却有着可以匹敌借给涅娅的那张弓的力量。 Of course, these were not Dwarven runes. The runes carved on it had no power at all. This was a piece of equipment made with YGGDRASIL techniques. 当然，这不是矮人们制造的卢恩武器。刻着的卢恩什么力量也没有，这是用YGGDRASIL的技术做出来的装备。 “Haaaa…” 「哈……」 Ainz sighed. He had several weapons like this. The original plan was to lend these weapons to the Holy Kingdom. 安兹吐出了一声叹息。这样的武器安兹准备了好几把。根据当初的预定，是打算把这些武器借给圣王国那边的。 The people of the Holy Kingdom would be awed by the overwhelming power of the sword and think, “so this is the power of runic weaponry” which would in turn improve the reputation of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s rune weapons. 对着因为剑那压倒性的力量而吃惊的圣王国的人们「这就是卢恩武器的完成品」这样，提高魔导国制作的卢恩装备的评价才是安兹的目的。 This was the other reason why he had lent Neia the weapon. 这正是把武器借给涅娅的另一个理由。 He felt that the people of the Holy Kingdom would see that weapon and secretly borrow them from Ainz. 本觉得看到那武器的圣王国的人们，会偷偷地过来问朝安兹借武器的。 However-- 然而—— Ainz grabbed his head. 安兹抱住了头。 Why didn’t anyone borrow them? I even thought people would talk about it because it was so flashy… I guess I should have forced her onto the frontlines and made her fight, huh... （为什么谁都不来借啊？还觉得看上去那么华丽所以肯定会变成话题的……果然，即使强硬点也应该把她送去前线，让她战斗么） Just then, there was a tok tok tok as someone knocked on the door. 这时，咚咚的敲门声响起了，安兹的肩膀抖了一下。 He quickly checked his robe and other messy places before putting the sword back into his pocket dimension. Then he put his hands behind his back, looked at the door like a sovereign, and spoke loudly: 对下摆之类凌乱的地方进行高速检查。将剑放回空间，把手背在后面，以支配者的姿势向着门高声放话。 “Who is it?” 「来者何人？」 “Your Majesty, may your servant enter?” 「魔导王陛下，属下可以入室吗？」 There was no way to tell if it was a male or female voice through the door. Normally, he should have asked the visitor’s name, but Demiurge had already told him that someone was coming, and so Ainz granted his permission without any hesitation. 听到了因为隔着门，分不出是男是女的声音。普通来说应该问问名字，但因为从迪米乌哥斯那里听说过要来了，安兹毫不犹豫地给出了入室许可。 “Ahh, it’s fine. Come in.” 「啊啊，没关系。进来吧」 The person who entered AInz’s room closed the door behind himself, and his body changed as well. 进入安兹房间的人物关上了门，外形也随之改变。 It had an egg-shaped head with a mouth and two eyes that looked like sunken holes. Its three-fingered hands were as slender as stick insects. 它有着在眼睛和嘴的部分陷进深洞的蛋一样的头部。三根手指像是竹节虫一样细。 It was a Doppelganger. 二重幻影[Doppelgänger]。 It was a Doppelganger he had lent Demiurge at his request. 经迪米乌哥斯拜托而借出的异形。 SInce it was a monster Doppelganger, it was not very strong. 因为是作为魔物的二重幻影，所以不怎么强。 Even when transformed, it could only copy level forty abilities, and it was even weaker without transformation. It’s more potent abilities was how it could freely make use of karma-restricted gear. That said, it could not use magic items above relic-class. 即使变身也只能模仿四十级程度的能力，变身前就更弱了。谈到比较强的能力，也就是能随意地使用带有罪恶值等限制的装备了吧。话虽如此遗产级以上的魔法道具也是无法使用的。 Its vacuous hole-like eyes turned to Ainz, and then it bowed deeply. 空旷的洞穴一样的眼睛朝向了安兹，然后它深深地低下了头。 “Your servant sincerely apologizes for the many offenses he has caused you during the course of his duties. He prays you will forgive him.” 「任务中对安兹大人多有冒犯之处，属下在此诚挚向您致歉。还望恕罪」 “Don’t worry about it. You were just doing your job. I have nothing to say about that.” 「别在意。你只是做好了你的本职工作。对此我没什么好说的」 “Your servant is grateful for your generous words.” 「感谢您宽宏大量的话语，属下无胜感激」 Ainz looked at the room’s door. 安兹看向房门。 “Aren’t you busy now? There ought to be many things you need to direct, no? And is there anyone outside? If there’s anyone, we’ll be in trouble if we don’t keep our voices down.” 「你现在不是非常的忙碌吗？有很多不得不去指挥的事情吧？还有门外面有人吗？有人的话不把声音压低就不妙了」 “It is fine. Nobody will object to your servant going alone to see you, Ainz-sama.” 「没关系。说要一个人去会见安兹大人的话，谁都不会有意见的」 “Is that so…” 「这样啊」 Oh yes, the Doppelganger replied. However, it was still important to be careful. 是的，二重幻影这样回答。不过小心谨慎还是有必要的。 “Then, Ainz-sama, please inform your servant of your decision.” 「那么安兹大人。请您告诉属下吧」 “Inform you of what?” 「告诉、什么」 That said, Ainz knew very well why the Doppelganger had come here. 话这样说但安兹实际上很清楚，这个二重幻影过来的理由。 Or rather, it was time to tell this Doppelganger. 或者说，应该告诉这个二重幻影了。 Yes, the question of who he had enthralled. 是的，那个让谁心醉了的问题。 “Forgive me. This one speaks of the matter from earlier -- the matter of those humans who are devoted to you and whose lives must be spared, Ainz-sama.” 「失礼了。是之前的愿为安兹大人尽忠的——必须留他们一命的人类的事情」 “Mm…” 「嗯……」 Ainz nodded forcefully, and began to walk. 安兹大气地将头一点，慢慢走了起来。 Of course, he could not leave the room. Ultimately, he could only pace around inside this room. There was no telling where the Doppelganger’s eyes were looking, but Ainz was certain that they were following his movements, Ainz was certain. In truth, it would be quite scary if they did not look his way. 当然，不能出去房间外面。到底只能在这房间里踱步。二重幻影那分不清是在看哪里的眼睛正在追随自己移动，安兹确信着。说起来要是它不看着这里也挺恐怖的。 Time was running out. As Ainz thought with all his might, he suddenly stopped in place. 时间不多。拼命考虑着的安兹忽然停下了脚步。 --He could not find the right answer. Naturally, he did not have any ideas to allow himself to continue covering things up any more. ——找不到正确的答案。然而也没有能让自己继续掩饰下去的主意。 Surely a human heart would be pounding by now, but his body lacked any organs which could move in that way.. 要是人类肯定会心脏砰砰直跳吧，可这具身体没有那能跳动的器官。 A powerful emotion welled up, causing his emotion override to take effect, and as the small ripples bounced around inside his heart, Ainz told the Doppelganger the answer. 强烈的感情沸腾而起，使得强制压抑特性开始生效，微小的波动反复冲击过来的时候，安兹将答案告诉了二重幻影。 “Umu. I’ll be frank. There are no human beings who need to be saved. Leave a few alive as needed.” 「嗯。我直说吧。没有必须救下的人类。适当地留几人就好」
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Part 4 Both retaking the city and freeing its citizens were trivial before the power of the Sorcerer King. 无论都市的夺还，民众的解放，在魔导王的力量面前都变得简单起来。 The attacking paladins and conscripts were virtually unhurt, and while some of the imprisoned residents lost their lives in the chaos, it was a shockingly small amount. 进攻一方的圣骑士和民兵们几乎没有损伤，被囚禁的居民中虽有人在混乱中不幸殒命，但数量惊人的少。 This outcome was only possible due to the Sorcerer King’s presence, to the point where some people thought, if only we had handed everything to him from the start, we might not have needed to lose anyone. 这正是因为魔导王的存在才获得的结果。要是最初就把一切都交给他，说不定谁都不用牺牲了吧，甚至到了让人不禁这么想的地步。 Whether they were rejoicing over being freed or shedding tears over a bowl of hot soup, everyone was smiling as Neia and the Sorcerer King walked down the street. 为解放而欢喜的人们，为一碗热汤而落泪的人们。涅娅和魔导王走在满是笑容的街道上。 Although they had been told that their freedom was thanks to the Sorcerer King’s aid, once they saw the Sorcerer King moving around in person, the residents’ eyes were filled with shock, confusion and dread, but that could not be helped either. 尽管听说了获得解放是多亏了魔导王的帮助，但在实际看到了魔导王行走的身姿后，居民们的眼中还是浮现出惊愕、混乱还有忌讳感，但这也是没有办法的事吧。 Of course, whether Neia could accept this state of affairs was a different matter entirely. While she wanted to do something in case the Sorcerer King was displeased, it would seem the man himself did not seem to mind. That being the case, it would be very rude of Neia to do something on her own. 不过，这件事能否被涅娅接受就得另当别论了。虽然想着要是魔导王感到不悦的话就采取些措施，但本人看起来并没有在意的样子。那么涅娅自作主张反而会很失礼吧。 Neia addressed the back of the Sorcerer King, who was walking in front of her. 涅娅向着走在前方的魔导王的背影搭话了。 “Your Majesty, where are you going now?” 「魔导王殿下，您这是要去哪里？」 The Sorcerer King was looking at his palms, and he did not look back at Neia. 看向手掌的魔导王头也不回地对着涅娅说明起来。 “Umu. I’m heading for this big building in the center of town. If that’s an enemy base, I’ll need to investigate it as soon as possible. The paladins are all tied up with tasks like freeing the captured residents, distributing food, treating the wounded, imprisoning the captured demihumans, and other things.” 「哼嗯。位于这座都市中枢的、那栋巨大的建筑物。如果那是敌人的据点就得尽快去调查一下。圣骑士们也在为了解救被囚禁的居民、发放食物、为民众疗伤，监禁抓起来的亚人们等等各种事情忙的不可开交啊」 Neia nodded slightly. 涅娅将头微倾。 “That building is quite large. If the paladins judged it to be a base, shouldn’t they have already investigated it?” 「那座建筑物可是相当的大啊。圣骑士们判断为据点的话，难道不是会在最开始就进行调查吗？」 While the Sorcerer King was the one who had conquered the city, the many assorted tasks after that were given over to the citizen-soldiers and the paladins to complete. In that case, surely they would have inspected the building that was the Sorcerer King’s objective. 虽然攻陷了都市的确实是魔导王，但那之后的繁琐事务都是交给圣骑士和民兵们完成的。那样的话，魔导王目的地的建筑物也就理所当然的被搜查过了吧。 The Sorcerer King stopped walking for a moment and then looked intently at Neia. Then he shrugged and continued walking. 魔导王一下子停止了脚步，紧紧盯向了涅娅。接着耸了耸肩，再次迈步前进起来。 “Ah, mm. Actually, I posted my subordinates outside to make sure the paladins did not draw near. So I doubt they’ve checked it yet.” 「啊，嗯。实际上，为了不让圣骑士们靠近，我将我的部下安排在入口处待机了。所以应该还没有被调查过才是」 “Eh? Then what you said earlier--” 「诶？那和之前说的——」 “--Baraja-san. I have told you many things until now, but from time to time it would be best if you considered matters on your own. For instance, the reason why we are the ones who are going to investigate the building.” 「——巴拉哈小姐。虽然至今我告诉了你各种事情，但有时还是自己去思考会比较好。比如、应该由我们作为代表前去调查的理由」 “Ah! Yes, Your Majesty!” 「啊，是的！魔导王陛下」 The Sorcerer King looked at his palm again. Within it was an item once worn by that demihuman -- the late Buser. The Sorcerer King was evaluating the item as he walked, using the power of magic to carefully examine it. 魔导王再次看向自己的手掌。那里是那位亚人——巴扎装备着的道具。魔导王在行走的同时对这些道具进行鉴定，并用魔法之力仔细调查着。 From what the Sorcerer King said, the sword was called Sand Shooter, the armor was known as Turtle Shell, the shield was named Lancer’s Merit, the horn coverings were called Charge Without Hesitation, the rings were Ring of Second Eye and Ring of Running, while the cape was called the Mantle of Protection. 根据从魔导王那里听来的，剑是沙之射手[Sand Shooter]，铠甲是龟之甲壳[TurtleShell]，盾是兰萨的功勋[Lanza's Merit]，镶在角上的外壳叫毫不犹豫的突击[Charge of Without Hesitation]，戒指是第二只眼的戒指[Ringof Second Eye]和疾奔之戒[Ring of Run]，披风则是防护披风[Mantle of Protection]的样子。 There also seemed to be other magic items like the necklace and the like. Although he said none of them possessed any impressive enchantments, the Sorcerer King still seemed quite happy about them. 其他好像还有项链等魔法道具，虽然嘴上说着没什么了不起的魔力，但魔导王看起来却很开心的样子。 Neia shifted her eyes from the Sorcerer King’s back to the ground, and then she did as the Sorcerer King said, which was to ponder the reason why the Sorcerer King had to personally investigate that building. However, she did not reach any answer which made her think, “that’s it!” 将视线从那样的魔导王的后背移开，目不转睛地盯向地面的涅娅按照魔导王所说的，自己思考起魔导王亲自探索的原因。然而却没能找到「就是这个！」之类的答案。 However, if she asked the Sorcerer King for the answer because of that, surely he would be speechless. The thought of the Sorcerer King she so respected thinking of her as useless and casting her aside was far too frightening. 可是，这样就去询问答案的话不会让魔导王无语么。让尊敬着的魔导王觉得自己无能、将自己舍弃什么的太可怕了。 While she desperately tried to find the answer, the aforementioned building had already appeared before her eyes. 还在拼命考虑着的时候，提到的建筑物却已经出现在眼前了。 Two undead beings -- High Wraiths -- stood at the entrance to the building. 两只不死者——上位死灵站在公馆的入口前。 As the Sorcerer King approached, they stepped aside to allow the Sorcerer King and Neia to pass. 随着魔导王的靠近，那两只就让开道路、让魔导王和涅娅通过。 “This… seems to be the residence of the city’s former lord.” 「这里……好像是这座都市的领主的住所啊」 Neia was not too sure which noble had ruled this city. However, given the size of the city, he must have been more than a baron, but less than a count. 涅娅还不至于清楚统治这座都市的贵族具体是谁。不过，既然是这种规模的都市，应该是男爵以上，伯爵以下吧。 “Yes. Not even the undead have entered this place. Be careful. There might be more demihumans who have not yet been subdued.” 「是啊。这里连不死者也没进去过。我们是第一批。多加注意，说不定还有没被镇压的亚人」 “Eh!? Your Majesty! Then--” 「诶！？魔导王陛下！那——」 She hesitated over whether she should say “You should stop”, but the other Neia in her quietly said that it ought to be fine if it were the Sorcerer King. 犹豫着要不要说出“请停下”这句话。但魔导王的话应该不要紧的吧，心中另一个涅娅却如此低语着。 “I have to be here. This is the enemy headquarters, and it might be the lair of the demihumans’ leader. While the only reason for that conclusion is because this building is very large -- there might be a powerful being on par with Buser ahead of us. I want to tie off all the loose ends in this city.” 「这里我不得不去。此处是敌人的大本营，也可能是亚人首领的休息处。虽然理由就只有建筑很大这一点——但说不定前方有着能匹敌巴扎的强者。我想要漂亮地为都市解放收个尾啊」 “Ah!” 「啊！」 After learning the answer to the question from just now, Neia suddenly pressed her head in realization. At the same time, gratitude flowed forth in her heart for the Sorcerer King’s compassion. 得知了刚才问题的答案，涅娅恍然大悟，按住了自己的额头。同时对魔导王的慈悲为怀心生感激。 He didn’t let the paladins get close because there might be powerful foes within! Unlike what he said just now, could it be that he wasn’t willing to tell me about this because he felt embarrassed about fighting as someone else’s shield?” （因为说不定有强者存在，才不让圣骑士们靠近啊！和之前所说的不一样，是因为魔导王觉得让人瞧见、自己作为他人之盾而战斗的身姿会有些不好意思么，所以才不愿意告诉我吗？） While Neia knew that thinking this way about the Sorcerer King was very rude, for some reason she felt the Sorcerer King was a little cute. 虽然涅娅很清楚抱有此种感情是非常失礼的事情，但不知怎么的总觉得魔导王有点可爱。 “...Well? Do you understand?” 「……怎么样？能理解了吗？」 The Sorcerer King looked at Neia’s face as he asked that question. Neia nodded, and the Sorcerer King seemed happy as he replied, “Ah, that’s good.” 看向涅娅的脸的魔导王如此问道。涅娅点头后，面露喜色的魔导王「是么，那太好了」这么说着。 He’s actually happy that I can understand him… what a gentle and kind person he is. （竟对我能理解感到如此开心……真是温柔呢，这位大人） “Your servant understands why Your Majesty does not wish to draw attention from others!” 「魔导王陛下不愿引人注意的想法，属下理解了！」 “...Hm? Ah… exactly. Then… you understand, right? I don’t wish to stand out too much.” 「……嗯？啊……正是如此。那……明白的吧？我不想太张扬」 “Understood!” 「谨遵钧命！」 The Sorcerer King looked like he was pondering something. For some reason that also looked very adorable. 魔导王看起来像是在考虑些什么。不知为何这样子看起来也很可爱。 “...Ah-- let’s go then.” 「………………啊—，那么我们走吧」 “Yes!” 「是！」 As a squire, she felt it was wrong to let the Sorcerer King walk out in front, but the Sorcerer King did not allow Neia to walk ahead of him. Neia looked with admiration at the back of the generous and magnanimous person before her. Watching a king lead from the front was truly a sight to make her heart swell up. 虽然觉得作为侍从让魔导王打头阵很不妥当，但让涅娅走在前面是魔导王所不允许的。面对那宽容大量的背影，涅娅送去了憧憬的视线。看着王者身先士卒的身姿，作为下属果然会觉得胸潮澎湃啊。 After passing through the wide entrance, Neia asked a question. 走进广阔入口处的涅娅提出了疑问。 “Where shall we start looking from? There doesn’t seem to be any sign of others around…” 「要从哪里开始调查呢？好像没有其他人存在的迹象……」 “Mm… your eyesight and hearing are both quite keen, Baraja-san, but how about your sense of smell?” 「嗯。……巴拉哈小姐的视觉和听觉似乎都十分灵敏，不过嗅觉又是怎样呢？」 “Frankly speaking, I’m not too confident in my sense of smell. However, I think I’m better than most in that field. As for taste, I think mine is just average. However, I’ve never tasted poison before, so I can’t be a poison-taster or anything…” 「嗅觉的话，说实在没什么自信。但是，想来要比普通人优秀些。而味觉的话我想也是差不多的水准。不过，因为没尝过毒药所以做不到试毒之类的事情……」 “Really now. Then, can you detect the smell of death and hatred?” 「是么。那你有感受到这股死与憎恶的气味吗？」 As he said “death and hatred”, his kingly aura of dominion coiled up around him. 在将死与憎恶说出口时，魔导王身上缠绕着作为王者的霸气。 “Death and hatred?” 「死与憎恶吗？」 “--This way.” 「——这边」 The Sorcerer King set off. There was no trace of hesitation in his footsteps. He walked as though he was familiThursday seemed like the perfect day for the struggling Dodgers to turn things around with their ace, Clayton Kershaw, taking the mound. Unfortunately, things don’t always go as planned.
Kershaw started the game off terribly, allowing a 3-run home run off the bat of Nolan Arenado before recording a single out.
He would give up another run thanks to a Jonathan Lucroy sacrifice fly before being pulled in the 4th inning. He threw 86 pitches in 3.2 innings and accumulated 7 strikeouts and 3 walks. Obviously, this is not the type of performance we have come to expect from Kershaw. He made sure to let his frustration out once he arrived to the dugout.
Clayton Kershaw threw his glove against the dugout wall and yelled, audible in the press box. He kicked something too. How's your day going? — J.P. Hoornstra (@jphoornstra) September 8, 2017
After the game, Clayton Kershaw was very honest with reporters about how the team has been feeling over these last couple of weeks.
Clayton Kershaw: "It's bad right now. There's no getting around that." — Andy McCullough (@McCulloughTimes) September 8, 2017
When asked what he thinks the team needs to do, Kershaw responded with this:
Just win a game. That’s usually how it starts. Bad nights are going to happen, pitching wise. I picked a really bad time to have a bad night.
Kershaw was also asked about his back and if it felt okay after the rocky start, but he said that he physically felt fine.
Overall it was a tough loss for Los Angeles, with the offense producing just 1 run thanks to an RBI double by Yasiel Puig. Like Clayton Kershaw said, they just need to win a game to begin to turn things around. Let’s hope that comes sooner rather than later!The shadow defence secretary said that too many soldiers “continue to face discrimination” in the UK.
Labour is tabling amendments to the Defence Reform Bill in a bid to increase the punishments given to anyone who commits a crime against service personnel.
It would put members of the Armed Forces in the same bracket as disabled, gay, transgender and ethnic minority crime victims.
“Today still too many of our Forces continue to face discrimination, whether in the workplace or when they go about their daily lives,” Mr Murphy told Labour’s party conference in Brighton.
“It’s sad that those who fight for our country might need the protection of our laws, but some do.”
He added: “Next month in Parliament we will table amendments to the Defence Reform Bill so that for the first time ever it would be a specific criminal offence to attack members of our Armed Forces, ensuring they are treated with the dignity that their bravery deserves. I want the Forces to feel at ease in our country.”
A poll of troops last year found that nearly one in 20 members of the Armed Forces said they had experienced violence or threats of violence.
Of the troops polled, around 20 per cent also said that members of the public had shouted abuse at them while they were wearing their uniform.
Philip Hammond, the Defence Secretary, last year conceded that there was “still more we can do” to ensure that troops are treated “with the dignity they deserve”.For more news videos visit Yahoo View.
A retired Alabama police officer said she and her colleagues were told decades ago to “make sure” Roy Moore “didn’t hang around” high school cheerleaders, and confirmed previous reports that the Republican Senate candidate was
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to ensure an orderly transition of all client accounts to alternative registered dealers and clients will be receiving information on those transfers shortly.”
Salman Partners has been involved in investment, market analysis and investment banking since 1994.
The resource sector, particularly mining and exploration, has been in crisis since about 2011. Investors have lost faith in resource sector companies, with the junior mining and exploration sector particularly hard hit.
The TSX Venture composite index – heavily weighted with junior exploration companies – was down 27% in 2015, and is down 76% since 2011. A total of 187 junior mining and exploration companies have been delisted from the TSX Venture exchange since 2011. Half of those were in the last two years – 55 in 2014 and 43 in 2015, as of October.
While low commodity prices are one of the reasons for the resource sector crisis, some retail investors have also blamed securities regulators and the Toronto Stock Exchange for hamstringing the junior resource sector with costly and overly bureaucratic listing requirements.
Earlier this month, the Venture Capital Markets Association, which represents a small group of local retail investors, blamed regulators like IIROC, the Capital Markets Regulatory Authority and BC Securities Commission for killing jobs in Vancouver’s junior mining sector.
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In the UK, a leading animal charity has warned that pet emus are not suitable domestic pets after a high profile case involving a female emu called Kevin.
24-year-old Charlotte Harrison raised Kevin from infancy after her father gave her an emu egg bought off eBay for £25. She tended to the egg in an incubator for 47 days before Kevin was hatched last week, imitating the squeaking noises of an emu mother to help the chick feel safe. The mother of three compared the experience to childbirth.
"Having coaxed him through the birth, I feel so protective of Kevin," she told the Daily Mail. "I think it's because I nurtured him through incubation to hatching and the process has similarities to pregnancy."
After posting videos of Kevin on YouTube, including one where she discovered that her pet was actually female, Harrison received a distressing visit from the RSPCA, a British animal charity. "I was hurt that someone tipped off the RSPCA because we'd created a lovely home for Kevin," she said. Later, she voluntarily committed Kevin into their care.
"It's so sad without Kevin," Harrison added forlornly. "I cried saying goodbye."
Read more: Zookeepers Explain What It's Like To Raise Celebrity Gay Animal Couples
While Harrison and Kevin's time together was short, it was full of joy. Harrison used her YouTube channel to chronicle happier times with Kevin. Here she is feeding Kevin broccoli: "Here boy," Harrison coaxes. Kevin seems to like broccoli. In another, Kevin runs into a wardrobe (she appears unharmed.)
In comments to Broadly, a RSPCA spokesperson denied they forcibly separated Kevin from her mother. "We received a call about the emu and went to speak to her," the spokeperson says. "During our officers' conversations with her they spoke about the different needs of an emu...When our officer explained this to them, they realized they could not meet her needs and signed her over to us."
Kevin and Charlotte. Image via YouTube
It's not technically illegal to own an emu in the UK, but it is not advisable. Emus are the second largest bird in the world by height, and can grow up to 1.9 meters tall. They have also been known to become sexually attracted to their owners. As such, they are obviously inappropriate household pets.
Meanwhile, the RSPCA claim to have relocated Kevin to specialist care. However, Broadly has been unable to independently verify Kevin's whereabouts as the animal charity refused to disclose Kevin's location or provide us with the contact details for her new family.
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"We are deeply concerned about the number of exotic animals now being kept as pets," warns RSPCA exotics officer Philip Hamilton. "We would encourage anyone thinking of getting an exotic pet to find out as much as possible about the animal's needs and whether they're a realistic pet."
A chastened Harrison has changed her views on emu ownership. "I don't even know why people would just think, 'I'm going to buy an emu,' and then buy an emu," Harrison commented in a recent video. "There's no rushing into emu-keeping. If you're thinking about doing emus...[wait] you've had time to plan and prep everything for them. They're not to be messed with."
Disturbingly, the underground emu trade continues, with emu eggs widely available on eBay. In the course of my investigations, I even stumbled across one listing offering an adult male emu for sale. The fear is that there may be other vulnerable emus out there in need of a loving, adequately sized home."Barrett.50" redirects here. For other uses, see Barrett
The Barrett M82, standardized by the U.S. military as the M107, is a recoil-operated, semi-automatic anti-materiel sniper system developed by the American Barrett Firearms Manufacturing company. Despite its designation as an anti-materiel rifle, it is used by some armed forces as an anti-personnel system. The M107 variant is also called the Light Fifty for its.50 BMG (12.7×99mm NATO) chambering and significantly lighter weight compared to previous applications and the 15% heavier base M82 model [1] [2]. The weapon is found in two variants, the original M82A1 (and A3) and the bullpup M82A2. The M82A2 is no longer manufactured, though the XM500 can be seen as its successor.
Overview [ edit ]
Barrett Firearms Manufacturing was founded by Ronnie Barrett for the sole purpose of building semi-automatic rifles chambered for the powerful 12.7×99mm NATO (.50 BMG) ammunition, originally developed for and used in M2 Browning machine guns. The weapon was first sold to the Swedish Army in 1989. In 1990, the United States armed forces purchased the M82A1 during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm in Kuwait and Iraq. About 125 rifles were initially bought by the United States Marine Corps, and orders from the Army and Air Force soon followed. The M82A1 is known by the US military as the SASR—"Special Applications Scoped Rifle", and it was and still is used as an anti-materiel rifle and explosive ordnance disposal tool.
The original Barrett M82
In 2006, Barrett completed development of the XM500, which has a bullpup configuration similar to the M82A2.[citation needed] Barrett M82 rifles were bought by various military and police forces from at least 30 countries, such as Belgium, Chile, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Indonesia, Italy, Jamaica, Mexico, the Netherlands,[3] and others.
The Barrett M82A1 rifle was used in 2002 as a platform for the experimental OSW (Objective Sniper Weapon) prototype. This weapon was fitted with a shorter barrel, and fired 25mm high-explosive shells developed for the 25×59 mm OCSW (Objective Crew Served Weapon) automatic grenade launcher. The experimental OSW showed an increased effectiveness against various targets, but the recoil was beyond human limitations. This weapon, also known as the Barrett "Payload Rifle", has now been designated the XM109.
M82 to M107 [ edit ]
The XM107 was originally intended to be a bolt-action sniper rifle, and the rifle Barrett M95 was originally selected by the U.S. Army in a competition between such weapons. However, under the trials, the decision was made that the U.S. Army did not, in fact, require such a weapon.
Then the Army decided on the Barrett M82, a semi-automatic rifle. In summer 2002, the M82 finally emerged from its Army trial phase and was approved for "full materiel release", meaning it was officially adopted as the Long Range Sniper Rifle, Caliber.50, M107. The M107 uses a Leupold 4.5–14×50 Mark 4 scope.
Overwatch being provided by an army sergeant during a high-level meeting in Baghdad
The Barrett M107 is a.50 caliber, shoulder-fired, semi-automatic sniper rifle. Like its predecessors, the rifle is said to have manageable recoil for a weapon of its size owing to the barrel assembly that itself absorbs force, moving inward toward the receiver against large springs with every shot. Additionally, the weapon's weight and large muzzle brake also assist in recoil reduction. Various changes were made to the original M82A1 to create the M107, with new features such as a lengthened accessory rail, rear grip, and monopod socket. Barrett has recently been asked to develop a lightweight version of the M107 under the Anti-Materiel Sniper Rifle Congressional Program, and has already come up with a scheme to build important component parts such as the receiver frame and muzzle brake out of lighter-weight materials.
The Barrett M107, like previous members of the M82 line, is also referred to as the Barrett "Light Fifty". The designation has in many instances supplanted earlier ones, with the M107 being voted one of 2005's top 10 military inventions by the U.S. Army.[4]
Technical description [ edit ]
A U.S. Army sniper using an M107
Demonstration of an M82 during a training course at Hurlburt Field, Florida
A U.S. Coast Guard TACLET marksman using an M107 from a helicopter
M82A2
The M82 is a short-recoil semi-automatic firearm. When the gun is fired, the barrel initially recoils for a short distance (about 1 in (25 mm)), while being securely locked by the rotating bolt. After the short travel, the lower part of accelerator arm, held by receiver upper part, is already hinged in bolt carrier and the middle portion strikes it back to the barrel by a rod place in bolt carrier, transferring part of the recoil energy of the barrel to the bolt to achieve reliable cycling and unlock it from barrel. The bolt is unlocked by turning in the curved cam track in the bolt carrier. Then, the barrel is stopped by the combined effect of the accelerator, buffer spring and the muzzle brake and the bolt continues back, to extract and eject a spent case.[clarification needed] On its return stroke, the bolt strips the fresh cartridge from the box magazine and feeds it into the chamber and finally locks itself to the barrel. The striker is also cocked on the return stroke of the bolt. The gun is fed from a large, detachable box magazine holding up to 10 rounds, although a rare 12-round magazine was developed for use during Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
The receiver is made from two parts (upper and lower), stamped from sheet steel and connected by cross-pins. The heavy barrel is fluted to improve heat dissipation and save weight, and fitted with a large and effective reactive muzzle brake. On the earlier models, the muzzle brakes had a round cross-section; later M82 rifles are equipped with two-chamber brakes of rectangular cross-section.
M82A1 rifles are fitted with scope mount and folding backup iron sights, should the glass scope break. The U.S. military M82 rifles are often equipped with Leupold Mark 4 telescopic sights. The M82A1M (USMC M82A3) rifles have long Picatinny accessory rails mounted and US Optics telescopic sights. Every M82 rifle is equipped with a folding carrying handle and a folding bipod (both are detachable on the M82A3). The M82A3 is also fitted with a detachable rear monopod under the butt. The buttpad is fitted with a soft recoil pad to further decrease the felt recoil. M82A1 and M82A3 rifles could be mounted on the M3 or M122 infantry tripods (originally intended for machine guns) or on vehicles using the special Barrett soft-mount. The M82A1 can be fitted with a carry sling, but according to those who carried it in the field, the M82 is too uncomfortable to be carried on a sling due to its excessive length and weight. It is usually carried in a special carry soft or hard case.
The M82A2 differed from M82A1 mostly in its configuration; the pistol grip along with trigger was placed ahead of the magazine, and the buttpad placed below the receiver, just after the magazine. An additional forward grip was added below the receiver, and the scope mount was moved forward.
The maximum effective range of the M107 is 1,830 metres (2,000 yd). The maximum range of this weapon (specifically the M107 variant) is 4,000 metres (4,400 yd), as quoted in the owner's manual. Fifty caliber (and larger) rounds have the potential to travel great distances if fired in an artillery-like fashion, necessitating the observance of large safety margins when firing on a range.
Users [ edit ]
Norwegian M82 (foreground) in a long range fire fight in Afghanistan.
Awards and recognition [ edit ]
On February 26, 2016, Tennessee named the Barrett Model M82 as its official state rifle.[29][30][31][32]
See also [ edit ]You’ve likely walked its streets: Before Nathan Phillips Square and Toronto General Hospital, a wide swath of downtown was known as The Ward: one of the city’s most notorious slums. Yet, writes John Lorinc, co-editor of a new book of essays and articles on the neighbourhood, Toronto the Good could not look away from the burlesque theatres, overcrowded rooming houses and ‘chop suey’ restaurants. Then we tore the whole thing down
The Ward was one of Toronto’s earliest neighbourhoods, predating confederation. Most of it was razed post-Second World War, partly to make way for New City Hall. Jan. 8, 1959. (The Globe and Mail)
The money could scarcely have arrived at a more opportune moment.
In late 1845, John Strachan, the first Anglican bishop of Toronto, learned his financially struggling diocese had received an anonymous £5,000 bequest from England. The funds were to be used to build and sustain a new Gothic-style church to serve the poor. The donor’s will specified the pews must be “free and unappropriated forever.”
Strachan was a key figure in the Family Compact. Yet after the 1837 rebellion, he faced criticism over his affluent lifestyle and the church’s dominance. With the money, Strachan hired Henry Bowyer Lane to design the church, to be located in St. John’s Ward, on the site of an estate northwest of Yonge and Queen. Almost 50 years later, it was revealed that the mystery donation came from a young British woman named Mary Lambert Swale. Born to a family of wealthy bankers and lawyers, she married Hogarth Swale, a Yorkshire Anglican priest. Though they never visited Canada, the couple learned about Toronto from Strachan’s articles in an Anglican journal. Swale died in May, 1845, at the age of 25. The bequest had been part of her will, as was a similar gift to establish a place of worship for Australian convicts.
None of that backstory was known immediately after her death because Reverend Swale wanted the gift to remain a secret. When builders finished the Church of the Holy Trinity in 1847, writes Eric Arthur in No Mean City, “Strachan published a notice inviting ‘the poor families of the United Church of England and Ireland to make the church their own’ and another announcing the opening for service of the ‘Parochial Church of the Poor of Toronto.’”
Elizabeth Street in downtown Toronto, April, 1955. (The Globe and Mail)
Long before St. John’s Ward came to be branded as Toronto’s most notorious slum, the working class enclave bounded by Queen, College, Yonge and University had a distinctive, diverse character. While Holy Trinity’s mission was to serve its poorest, the area was more than just impoverished.
“The Ward,” as the neighbourhood came to be known, was home to Irish immigrants and the city’s thriving black community, whose ranks included successful entrepreneurs, merchants and professionals. Many were escaped slaves who fled to Canada via the Underground Railroad and were drawn to Toronto for its reputation as a hotbed of abolitionist sentiment.
Those African-American immigrants in 1845 also acquired land for a church in The Ward, just blocks from Holy Trinity. When it opened, the British Methodist Episcopal Church, at 94 Chestnut St., offered services, educational programs and space for public meetings for members of the tight-knit black community.
Then, in 1847, another Victorian-era institution relocated to The Ward. The trustees of the “Poor House” – at Elizabeth and Elm, also blocks from Holy Trinity – dispensed welfare to destitute women and children, and forced men to break stones in order to receive their allotment.
Intriguingly, these three structures offered clues about The Ward’s future. Here was a complex, urban neighbourhood already characterized by diversity, poverty and upward mobility, as well as the presence of well-intentioned outside institutions that claimed to act in the interests of the locals.
What became of this community? In the 1890s, with Toronto’s economy surging, immigrants from Italy, Eastern Europe and China began to settle in The Ward. The area offered a supply of cheap rooms in crumbling wood-frame cottages.
The whole city was in flux. Between 1871 and 1911, Toronto’s population had exploded, from 56,000 to more than 376,000. Foreign-born residents accounted for almost 10 per cent of the population, many from non-English speaking countries.
With real estate speculation pushing in from all sides, Ward landlords had little incentive to upgrade aging buildings. But they responded to demand for inexpensive living space by erecting rough-hewn shacks and outdoor privies in The Ward’s litter-strewn rear alleyways.
The streets of this'slum' teemed with newcomers who were visibly, audibly and culturally distinct. Today, one might describe the area using journalist Doug Saunders’s resonant phrase, 'arrival city.'
In 1911, Toronto medical officer of health Dr. Charles Hastings reported that The Ward’s now predominantly immigrant population had ballooned to more than 11,000. New immigrants packed into filthy, overcrowded rooming houses. Hastings ordered city photographer Arthur Goss to document the conditions.
The streets of this “slum” teemed with newcomers who were visibly, audibly and culturally distinct. Today, one might describe the area using journalist Doug Saunders’s resonant phrase, “arrival city.”
In fact, that period marked a historic point of inflection – the moment when Anglo Toronto came face-to-face with ethnic diversity. The Town of York may trace its roots to Parliament and King. But modern Toronto begins in The Ward.
Public reaction was hardly sanguine. A 1905 Globe article fretted about an “influx of a large population foreign in race, speech and customs.”
Three years later, a less anxious Globe feature noted the proliferation of synagogues in The Ward, as well as night schools and shops:
The little rough-cast houses of Centre Avenue, Terauley and Elizabeth streets, from which three of four years ago the Irish wash lady wended her way to us on Monday mornings, where the Italian fruit vendor ripened his bananas under his bed at night, and the negro plasterer and barber gave colour to the social scene of a summer evening, have in these later days thrown their shelter over the oppressed Slavonic Jew.
Yet this tract of apparently impoverished exoticism drew not only waves of immigrants; the area also garnered attention from the city beyond The Ward’s well-defined boundaries. Toronto the Good simply could not look away.
Writers, journalists, painters and photographers explored the neighbourhood’s teeming streets. Missionaries and social reformers sought to recruit new souls, prevent juvenile delinquency and promote “Canadianization.” Public health nurses visited immigrant homemakers, offering stern advice. Psychiatrists trawled for “feeble-minded” foreigners. Civic officials and researchers (among them, an ambitious young graduate student named William Lyon Mackenzie King) recorded everything from the number of flop-house beds and so-called “dark rooms” to language and behavioural shortcomings. Baths, settlement agencies and even an Italian consulate provide a range of services.
Need of an island or other protection at curve from Teraulay into Queen Street, in front of now-old City Hall in Toronto, July 1922. (TORONTO PUBLIC LIBRARY)
The Ward was also attracting interest from ordinary Torontonians. Audiences flocked to the vaudeville and burlesque theatres on Terauley and Queen. Onlookers crowded into the Elizabeth Street playground (located on the site of the new wing of the Hospital for Sick Children) to watch amateur baseball and youth festivals. By the 1920s, a growing number of intrepid diners ventured into The Ward for Italian ice cream or chop suey. Fortune tellers worked other Ward restaurants, such as Mary John’s, a popular café at Elizabeth and Gerrard. From the 1930s, artists settled in The Ward’s northern half, renting old cottages for studio space. In the 1950s and 1960s, those blocks became a precursor to Yorkville in its heyday.
Not all this interest was benign. Jewish peddlers and Chinese café owners were attacked by thugs. Meanwhile, the police prowled for bootleggers, gambling dens and merchants open on “Protestant Sundays.” There was more than a hint of moral panic. At one point, council passed a bylaw preventing white women from working for Chinese businesses.
News coverage, in turn, ranged from alarmist to intrigued. “Negros and Chinese seem to mingle well together,” a Globe reporter noted in 1922. “[T]he native Chinese restaurants are filled with negro customers, several of them women, while here and there an occasional white girl can be seen partaking of a meal with either a brown or yellow-skinned partner.”
Was the writer sending a dog-whistle signal to conservative readers, warning about mixed-race relationships or prostitution? Or was s/he merely recording something unusual about the way people from different backgrounds mix? Did such “sightings” subtly validate a form of social mixing that may have been taboo until then? And is this how ethnocultural acceptance in Toronto germinated?
It’s possible. But more strident calls for reform prevailed. Fretting about the “evils” of tenements, municipal leaders become preoccupied with the spread of New York-style slums. While he didn’t disparage poor immigrants, Dr. Charles Hastings warned Torontonians they were living in a “fool’s paradise” if they thought the city was immune. Less cautious headline writers slung around shrill words such as “canker,” “menace” and “human derelicts.” By the 1920s, nativist sentiment was palpable, much of it directed at The Ward’s growing Chinese population. As a 1922 Globe article all but shouted, “Moral leprosy spreads.” The message was clear.
July, 1947: A summer night in Toronto’s downtown Chinatown, where the streets are mostly empty. (John Boyd/The Globe and Mail)
In time, all the anti-slum/anti-immigrant rhetoric inevitably hit the mark. Council in 1946 authorized the expropriation and clearance of the lower Ward, which at that point encompassed Chinatown. The process of razing, land assembly and redevelopment all the way up to College continued steadily until the 1990s, with office, apartment and institutional buildings (most notably City Hall, the Toronto General and Sick Kids) replacing almost all of the older structures, including stores, homes, synagogues, churches, theatres, cafés, studios, offices and Chinatown’s landmark restaurants, as well as a public school and a popular playground. Streetcar tracks were pulled up and several roads were cut or erased altogether, including the southern portion of Elizabeth, which had served as The Ward’s main thoroughfare for more than a century and, since the 1930s, Chinatown’s high street. In fact, the city combined several blocks of Chinatown into the parcel that would become Nathan Phillips Square.
Besides a handful of row houses on Dundas, Gerrard and Elm streets, as well as Holy Trinity and the Poor House, scant tangible evidence remains. (The British Methodist Episcopal Church was sold and then demolished in the late 1950s after the diminished congregation relocated to Shaw Street; the land where it stood for more than 100 years remains a parking lot near City Hall.) To find The Ward today, in fact, we must imagine our way back into a complicated world whose physical traces have been systematically expunged. Yet The Ward’s deeply compelling stories, and its wider legacy, remain woven into the fabric of a global city now defined by the diversity it first encountered well over a century ago, within a few cramped blocks of the downtown. Now, as then, we still struggle with questions about difference and deprivation, heritage and renewal, equity and political exclusion.
Nov. 19, 1965: Toronto’s new City Hall looms over Chinese restaurants on Elizabeth Street. The Nanking Restaurant and the rest of Chinatown is dwarfed by the twin towers rising to the south of it. (Harold Robinson/The Globe and Mail)
Adapted with permission from The Ward: The Life and Loss of Toronto’s First Immigrant Neighbourhood (Coach House Books), edited by John Lorinc, Michael McClelland, Ellen Scheinberg and Tatum Taylor.Monroe County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo. (Photo: TINA MACINTYRE-YEE/@tyee23/File)
Monroe County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo has joined other local officials who are pushing for Uber and Lyft to come to the Rochester area.
Dinolfo, a Republican, released a letter Tuesday that called on state lawmakers to pass legislation to allow ride-sharing services upstate, including in Rochester.
That legislation faces an uncertain fate. State lawmakers are at odds over the details, and the end of the legislative session is looming on Thursday. Negotiations remain under way.
Dinolfo joins Mayor Lovely Warren, a Democrat, who has previously come out in favor of allowing ride-sharing locally. Assembly Majority Leader Joseph Morelle, D-Irondequoit, also has co-sponsored legislation to allow and regulate the expansion of ride-sharing services.
READ MORE
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Taxi drivers and unions have opposed this push, arguing that Uber and Lyft will push out full-time cabbie jobs and replace them with low-paying, independent contractor work without benefits. Uber has said there is no evidence to support this concern in cities where its service is already available.
In a letter to state Sen. Rich Funke, R-Perinton, Dinolfo wrote that ride-sharing can provide "flexible job opportunities for individuals who are vetted and approved as drivers," while providing consumers another means of accessible and affordable transportation. She also cited environmental benefits.
"This not only allows for easier travel throughout the county for riders, but connects our local businesses to a larger market of consumers," Dinolfo wrote.
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Funke also sent a letter to Gov. Andrew Cuomo and legislative leaders, calling for passage of a Senate bill to allow ride-sharing upstate.
Legislators in the Senate and Assembly disagreed early this week about the minimum levels of insurance that Uber and Lyft would have to carry for their drivers.
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Read or Share this story: http://on.rocne.ws/28CcVLKThe Untold Story of How Immigrants Turned the Wobblies into a Global Force
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn addressing the a crowd in New York City. (Getty)
Declaring, “an injury to one is an injury to all,” the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) upended and forever changed the labor movement a little over a century ago. The Wobblies’ commitment to organizing workers on an industry-wide basis, their cynicism about legislative action and electoral politics, their aversion to signed contracts and their preference for sudden strikes remain fascinating subjects for labor studies. Their multiculturalism, anti-racism and pioneering bohemian approach to God, country and sex remain a rich vein to be mined for cultural studies.
Although there is no shortage of books about the history of the IWW, they mostly tell the story of a North American union and revolutionary movement. But naming themselves the Industrial Workers of the World was no mere rhetorical flourish. The globalism implied in their name is fleshed out in a new book, Wobblies of the World: A Global History of the IWW, edited by In These Times contributor Peter Cole, along with David Struthers and Kenyon Zimmer.
Of the World
In American parlance, the national bodies that connect our local unions are typically referred to as “international” unions, which basically means that they have a couple of locals in Canada. That’s what the “I” usually stands for in a union’s acronym.
Landing on the “of the World” part of its name in 1905 was a conscious act of internationalism by a founding convention delegation that contained no small number of immigrants. Significantly, prewar immigration didn’t require nearly as much paperwork, and a worker might call several countries “home” while chasing transplant jobs in that earlier era of globalization. Globetrotting workers both imported new ideas and tactics to the IWW and exported the Wobbly gospel. The papers that are collected in Wobblies of the World explore both dynamics.
Kenyon Zimmer’s chapter examines the various foreign national and ideological influences that helped develop the IWW’s “direct action gets the goods” credo. Interestingly, he also finds evidence that the legendary Paterson silk strike of 1913, which has traditionally been portrayed as a “spontaneous” work stoppage that the IWW then came to the aid of, was actually sparked by Italian anarchists who were salting the factories. Elsewhere, Dominique Pinsolle explores the ways that Wobblies Americanized the French concepts of syndicalism and sabotage.
Much of the back-and-forth transnational migration was facilitated by Britain’s extraction of natural resources from its imperial holdings, which created a voracious need for itinerant workers. And so IWW chapters were most common in the English-speaking world. The Wobblies’ most practical global legacy may be its commitment to interracial organizing. Mark Derby mines the surprising archives of the first Maori-language union literature distributed in New Zealand. Lucien van der Walt documents how the Wobblies were organizing on a multi-racial basis in South Africa decades before the Communist Party and the African National Congress.
Other fascinating contributions include Tariq Khan’s account of how colonial India’s diasporic Ghadr (an Urdu word for mutiny) movement found itself at home in Wobbly outposts in the American west, and Marjorie Murphy’s tale of how Jim Larkin’s and James Connolly’s brief experience as American IWW’s influenced the Irish Easter Uprising.
Weird Wobblies
The IWW has such an outsized role in our romantic imagination of labor’s past glory. Frequently, treatments of the Bread and Roses strike, the many arrests of “Rebel Girl” Elizabeth Gurley Flynn or the lynching of organizer Frank Little play like a left-wing equivalent of the History Channel’s “all World War II all the time” approach to scholarship.
What I find more interesting is how Wobbly activists evolved and reinterpreted the one big union’s principles as the march of history moved on. Call them the Weird Wobblies.
There is a growing body of Weird Wobbly scholarship. Howard Kimmeldorf wrote the terrific Battling for American Labor on how a couple of strong IWW locals from the prewar era eventually found homes within AFL craft unions. David J. Goldberg looked at how A.J. Muste and Evan Thomas (brother of Socialist leader Norman) re-organized the former IWW Paterson, Passaic and Lawrence textile workers into an independent union modeled on the Amalgamated Clothing Workers in the 1920’s in A Tale of Three Cities. The effort was crushed in the open shop era that followed World War I. From its ashes arose Brookwood Labor College, which played an essential role in developing the strategies and tactics that led to labor’s great upsurge in the 1930’s.
Wobblies of the World is a valuable contribution to this niche field of labor studies. This global history of the IWW was a challenging project. Given the number of languages that required translation and mastery of national histories required for context, a volume like this would necessarily need to be an edited collection of papers. One hopes this book is not the last volume on the global influence of the IWW.
Of course, while I use the past tense to describe the Wobblies’ heyday, the IWW is still an active workers’ organizing project. Twenty-first Century Wobblies are weird by definition, but they are nimble and thoughtful and picking some very strategic fights. In New York City, they are the backbone of Brandworkers, a workers center that leverages direct action and boycotts within the food chain of the city’s fancy restaurants and markets to improve the lives of low-wage workers. In the Midwest, they have sparked a “free speech” fight with their protest over Jimmy Johns sandwich shops’ abysmal and unhygienic sick day policy.
It’s precisely this sort of experimentation that is crucial for figuring out our way towards labor’s next great upsurge. The Wobblies may live long enough to upend and forever change the labor movement once again.UPDATE 06 AUG. 11:20am: BRITISH film and TV comic Rowan Atkinson hospitalised today after crashing his McLaren F1 supercar in east England.
56-year-old comedic actor Rowan Atkinson lost control of his £650,000 (AUD $1.05 million) McLaren F1 supercar, which then spun several times before smashing into a tree and then a lampost, the Daily Mirror reported.
Atkinson' s McLaren F1 then reportedly burst into flames, before Atkinson managed to pull himself free from the burning wreckage.
The Evening Starreported that emergency services were called to the scene of an accident on the A605 near the village of Haddon, Cambridgeshire at 7.30pm, following reports that a man had been involved in a single car collision.
On arrival, paramedics found that the car had left the road.
Firefighters put the blaze out and Mr Atkinson was taken to Peterborough District Hospital suffering from a shoulder injury, the Mirror reported.
An onlooker noted that "Rowan is lucky to be alive considering the state of the car."
It was not reported if Mr Teddy was in the car at the time of the accident.
It is the second time that Atkinson, well known for his roles in the British comedy series Blackadder and Mr Bean, has crashed his McLaren F1 supercar which he purchased to celebrate the success of his Mr Bean movies.
In a previous collision that occured in October 1999 on the A6 at Forton in Lancashire, the front of the supercar was wrecked when he ran into the rear of a Rover Metro.
Rowan Atkinson collects classic and vintage cars, and has also written articles for specialist car magazines.
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The more we hear about the GOP-funded Green Party petition drive, the more it's clear that Republicans are engaging in dirty tricks to try and prevent Democrats from winning in November. I guess they don't think they can win on the merits, and need to cheat. How else would you explain the news that Governor Rick Perry's top political operative is clearly connected with the Republican-funded petition drive benefiting the Green Party of Texas?
Dave Carney, a top Perry political consultant, engaged in identical petition efforts to get Ralph Nader on the ballot in swing states in 2004, working with the same individual behind the 2010 Green Party signature drive here in Texas. Carney was already working for Perry–he's been on board since 2000–when he worked to make Nader a spoiler for Democrats in 2004.
From the Lone Star Project:
Top Perry Operative linked to Head of Green Party/GOP Ballot Scam
Dave Carney worked with Tim Mooney in New Hampshire to get Ralph Nader on the ballot Documents obtained by the Lone Star Project reveal that Rick Perry's top political adviser Dave Carney has a long and direct link to the manager of the Texas Green Party/GOP ballot scam. In 2004, Carney teamed-up with Texas ballot scam leader Tim Mooney to gather signatures to put Ralph Nader on the ballot in order to assist the George W. Bush Presidential campaign. In 2004, Carney worked with a group called “Choices for America, LLC” which was “run” by Mooney – the same Republican operative who collected signatures for the Green Party of Texas in 2010. (Dallas Morning News, August 12, 2004) Both Choices for America, LLC, the shell group used in 2004, and Take Initiative America, LLC the shell group used in 2010, are registered to Charles Hurth III. (Missouri SOS) According to the Dallas Morning News, “Perry campaign spokesman Mark Miner said the governor's campaign had nothing to do with the petition-gathering effort.” It now appears that statement is likely not true.
Furthermore, Carney and Mooney were co-named in a 2004 FEC complaint about their Nader petition drive, which was termed an illegal corporate contribution. Carney, Mooney and cohort ended up having to pay for the drive personally, and report it as an official in-kind to Nader. Don't worry, though — Carney could afford the fine. Carney has been with Perry since 2000 and Perry's campaign has paid Carney's firm more than $2 million dollars.
Let's recap:
Texas Republican operatives engage in petition drive for Green Party to put a candidate on the ballot that will most likely draw from Democratic Bill White's vote total.
The Perry Campaign denied they had anything to do with the effort.
Top Perry political staffer Dave Carney was found to be deeply involved in identical efforts to
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launching a 64GB variant next month, but this could be a sign that Telstra won't be carrying every variant of the device. Color wise, it appears as though the two devices will be launching in a trio of different colors, with their own strange names to match like Quite Black or Very Silver as well as Reality Blue. Where Telstra customers are concerned, it looks as though Quite Black or Very Silver will be available as choices to get the Pixel and Pixel XL in, as there's no sign of the Reality Blue color option in this latest leak. There is, as always, a good chance that this color option is a retail exclusive in Australia, as well as being sold direct from the Google Store online.
Carrier partners for the Nexus line of devices is nothing new, especially in Australia, but it is is nice to see that while the name for this year's devices will be changing, the status quo for how users get their hands on them is staying relatively the same. We've heard a lot about the Pixel and Pixel XL, and while all of these rumors paint a picture of a pair of powerful stock Android devices with a few niceties thrown in, and a design aimed towards the average user,we'll find out exactly what Google has been working on next week.It’s true. The Warriors are in the Western Conference finals because Stephen Curry is unbelievable. Because their defense is as potent as the numbers indicate. Because their depth is second to none.
But it’s also true the Warriors are here because coach Steve Kerr is growing as he goes.
Kerr proved he was a good fit for this team during the 67-win regular season. But the playoffs are a different deal. And the Warriors survived their biggest test — shifting gears and putting away a Memphis Grizzlies squad that through three games of the conference semifinals looked wholly problematic for the Warriors — because Kerr proved game for the challenge.
His relentless pursuit of perfection and humility prompts constant self-checking and ensuing adjustments. And because he milks the talent of his staff, the likelihood is the Warriors bench will figure things out. That was evident against the Grizzlies.
What we watched unfold, or at least what hindsight is revealing, was a rookie coach growing on the job. In the playoffs.
What we witnessed was the Warriors’ greatest weakness, a leader inexperienced at his position, morph into a strength over the course of six games.
Kerr’s handling of the weight of postseason basketball, his openness to and adeptness at the chess of it all, is a huge reason the Warriors are in the conference finals. It’s also a big reason to be confident going forward, no matter who faces the Warriors.
Every idea will be heard. Every angle will be spied. Every correction will be made, the politics be damned. Kerr showed all of that in the Warriors series triumph over Memphis.
Some examples:
Kerr made a bold move to bolster the defense to start the season, allowing Stephen Curry to defend point guards, something Kerr’s predecessor, Mark Jackson, didn’t do. Kerr got lots of praise for it, from fans, from media, from Curry. But after Grizzlies point guard Mike Conley went off in Game 2 at Oracle Arena, scoring 22 points on 12 shots, Kerr took a page from Jackson’s book and had Klay Thompson defend Conley. It proved to be a pivotal move as Conley, who was battling injuries, was taken out of the series by Thompson, who at 6-foot-7 can smother smaller guards. Over the last four games of the series, Conley averaged 11.2 points on 31.2 percent shooting.
Kerr also took defensive stalwart Tony Allen out of the series. Allen was spectacular on defense in Games 2 and 3, frustrating Thompson and disrupting the Warriors offense. Kerr assistant Ron Adams, the defensive wizard, had a plan for Allen. And Kerr put into action for Game 4. The Warriors put center Andrew Bogut on Allen, leaving the Memphis guard wide open to shoot as he desired. He did, and it wasn’t pretty. Eventually, the Grizzlies, who already struggle to score, had no choice but to take out Allen.
Leandro Barbosa is one of Kerr’s guys. He trusted Barbosa while most others scratched their heads. But Kerr sat his guy and turned to Shaun Livingston. It was not a coincidence the series turned. Livingston is not only a post-up option and a guy who can set up others, but he’s also a good perimeter defender. He was pivotal in the series, and it was possible because Kerr wasn’t hung up on being right about Barbosa at the expense of making the right move. Another change: giving David Lee a shot. The injury to Marreese Speights forced Kerr’s hand a bit, but Lee got off the bench and produced. “For him to come in after the way this season has gone,” Kerr said, “the fact that his dumb coach hasn’t played him enough probably, he’s kept his attitude up. … I’m really proud of David.”
There was a noticeable absence from Kerr’s coaching repertoire: technical fouls. He finished the regular season tied for third-most in the NBA with eight, two behind New York Knicks coach Derek Fisher. But Kerr hasn’t drawn a single technical in the playoffs.Many companies and business publish internal newsletters or magazines, and America’s intelligence services are no different. The CIA runs the pulpy fount of weirdness that...
Many companies and business publish internal newsletters or magazines, and America’s intelligence services are no different. The CIA runs the pulpy fount of weirdness that is Studies in Intelligence while the NSA puts out the Cryptologic Quarterly.
The agencies often declassify and digitize back issues of these magazines for the public. The articles are a wealth of weird, wonderful and fascinating takes on historic and current events written by people who have access to secret information not privy to the public.
A recently declassified article from a 2000 issue of Cryptologic Quarterly is a doozy.
Fifteen years ago, the historian and blogger John Schindler worked for the NSA, where he wrote an article for its internal magazine about how the Korean War averted nuclear Armageddon. Dodging Armageddon: The Third World War That Almost Was, 1950 tells the story of how a clash between two communist dictators led to a buildup of troops in Eastern Europe, forced the West to consider launching nukes and brought the world to the brink of annihilation.
Schindler’s sources make the account far more interesting than a typical history. As an NSA analyst, he had access to secret documents and sources off-limits to other academics. The NSA recently declassified the article, but some of it — including Schindler’s name — are still redacted. We know he wrote it because he claimed responsibility on his website.
“By dispatching the 24th Infantry and 1st Cavalry Divisions from comfortable occupation duty in Japan to death and destruction in Korea in mid-summer 1950,” Schindler asserted. “The United States actually did nothing less than save the world from a global conflagration.”
He makes a strong case. The global hotspot wasn’t the Korean Peninsula but Yugoslavia, and that country heated up because Marshal Josip Broz Tito refused to let Joseph Stalin push him around.
Tito was an ardent communist unconcerned with provoking Western aggression. After World War II, he supplied communist rebels in neighboring Greece with supplies, support and troops. Stalin didn’t like it. He wanted Tito to pull back and the Yugoslav dictator refused.
Tito’s refusal to fall in line enraged Stalin, who decided to get rid of Tito by any means necessary. “Stalin’s declaration of war on the Titoist heresy was initially greeted with unconcealed glee by the U.S. government,” Schindler wrote. “To our ambassador in Moscow, the split was nothing less than ‘a Godsend to our propagandists,’ offering Washington novel options in the budding Cold War.”
As the Cold War bloomed and the Korean War began, Stalin obsessed over Tito. “Stalin was determined to exterminate the Titoist menace,” Schindler explained.
“As Robert Conquest, the preeminent scholar of Soviet totalitarianism, explained, the Yugoslav upstart became ‘a major villain almost at Trotsky’s level in Stalin’s personal psychodrama.’ Stalin planned to employ the same methods which had silenced Trotsky – propaganda, intimidation and assassination.”
The conflict between Tito and Stalin began between spies. Moscow executed Yugoslav intelligence officers and plotted various assassination attempts. Tito’s counterintelligence services thwarted the Soviets. But the tension soon escalated and Warsaw Pact troops began to mass on Yugoslavia’s borders.
Béla Király, a Hungarian army officer who defected to the West, explained just how bad the situation had become. “As Kiraly recounted,” Schindler wrote. “A Soviet colonel who visited his office in July 1951 castigated him for teaching officers the geography of any country but Yugoslavia: ‘Your students must be taught one battleground only, the territory of the enemy, Yugoslavia.’”
“Soviet invasion plans forecast a massive push by an infantry-heavy first echelon,” Schindler continued. “Composed of Hungarian and Romanian troops; the brunt would be borne by the 300,000-strong Hungarian People’s Army, which would pierce Yugoslav defenses in the flat northern province of Vojvodina, opening the door to Belgrade, which would be taken by mechanized Soviet forces forming the invasion’s second, decisive echelon.”
In January 1951, 80,000 Hungarian troops ran a simulated invasion of Yugoslavia right along the country’s border. To the West, it looked as if Eastern Europe would soon fall to aggressive Soviet forces. “The CIA concluded that Yugoslav resistance was dependent ‘on the degree and promptness of Western assistance,’” Schindler wrote. report this ad
But the West lacked the conventional ground troops to resist such a force and those it did have were tied up in South Korea. To stave off a Soviet invasion of Yugoslavia, America would have to use nukes.
“Within weeks of the invasion of South Korea, Washington had accepted in principle that due to the dearth of conventional forces, atomic weapons would probably have to be used to defend Yugoslavia against Soviet attack,” Schindler explained.
America’s ‘freedom of action to employ atomic weapons in such a localized conflict if the situation dictates’ was a jealously guarded prerogative, as well as the strategic logic underpinning NATO policy towards Yugoslavia.”
Luckily, it never came to that. The rapid Western response to the invasion of South Korea startled Stalin. “If America would commit two divisions at once,” Schindler wrote. “And eventually more than a half-dozen, to save South Korea, what might it do to rescue the strategically vital Tito?”
Stalin continued to obsess over Tito — his intelligence services attempted more assassinations — but the Man of Steel backed away from a military solution. For Schindler, making Stalin blink was one of the most important, if not the most important result of America’s involvement in the Korean War.
“By their sacrifices, the doomed men of Task Force Smith, the heroes of Inchon, the scarred veterans of Chosin, prevented Armageddon,” he wrote. “It is fashionable today to hail the veterans of the Second World War as ‘the kids who saved the world,’ and rightly so. Yet the fine young men of 1950 did no less, though few knew it then – or now.”Patients wait in line at Nuestra Clinica Del Valle in San Juan, Texas. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)
President Obama's impending executive action on immigration apparently won't bestow health care benefits on millions of undocumented immigrants, according to an individual familiar with the decision.
That means the millions who will be protected from deportation won't be eligible to purchase subsidized coverage from the public health insurance marketplaces established under the Affordable Care Act.
The decision will disappoint advocacy groups, but it doesn't come as a total surprise. The Obama administration passed on a similar opportunity two years ago to extend health-care eligibility to so-called "dreamers," illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children. In September, the Obama administration said it cut off ACA marketplace coverage to about 115,000 immigrants who failed to provide proof of their citizenship or immigration status. And many Hispanics, who have the highest uninsured rates of any group, are hesitant to sign up for Obamacare coverage for fear of an undocumented relative being deported as a result.
Extending government health care to undocumented immigrants has been a lightning rod in the Obamacare debate since it was drafted in Congress. Rep. Joe Wilson's (R-S.C.) infamous "You lie" moment was in direct response to President Obama's assertion that his health-care plan wouldn't insure illegal immigrants.
The truth is that the government already funds some care for undocumented immigrants and has been for years before the ACA. It's through a program that's known as "emergency Medicaid," which pays hospitals to provide emergency and maternity care to immigrants who'd 1) otherwise be Medicaid eligible if they weren't in the country illegally or 2) are legally present in this country but haven't been here for at least five years. As my colleague Sandhya Somashekhar reported last year, the federal government paid out $1.3 billion for this program in 2011, and states paid out hundreds of millions more from their own budgets. That program will grow in the states that have expanded their Medicaid programs under the ACA.
Previous estimates from the Congressional Budget Office found that between 7 million and 8 million undocumented immigrants will remain uninsured under the ACA. They still have limited options for insurance: They can buy coverage through an employer if it's offered, they can purchase directly from an insurer (but not receive federal subsidies), or receive care from Federally Qualified Health Centers. Some states do extend benefits to undocumented immigrants, but they still face greater barriers to care.
However much Obama's executive order may change the lives of these immigrants overnight, their health care will remain the same for most — as if the ACA never happened.Two motorcyclists have died and five other people have been hurt after a collision involving a car and six motorcycles.
The incident happened on the A5104 at Pontblyddyn, near Mold, Flintshire, at 12:53 BST.
Police, fire and ambulance services attended, and five casualties were taken to hospital by ambulance and air ambulance.
The road was still closed at 19:50 BST and diversions were in place.
Police are trying to contact the next of kin, and the coroner has been informed.
Insp Gareth Jones, of North Wales Police, said: "The incident involved a car and six motorcycles - two riders of which passed away at the scene.
"Five further casualties were conveyed to hospital by the Helimed and ambulance. An update is awaited on their condition. Officers remain on scene continuing with their investigations."Westbrook on Durant's comments this week: "That's cute. We're gonna worry about all the selfish guys we've got over here, apparently." pic.twitter.com/FLjzjAZgla
Hoo, boy! It’s getting pretty hairy out there. The state of electoral politics is sad, and disgusting, and gross, and really deserving of the vast majority of our focus right now. But can we just take a quick break from the depressing reality we find ourselves in to appreciate Russell Westbrook?
The Oklahoma City Thunder guard was asked about recent comments made by his former teammate and friend Kevin Durant, who departed Oklahoma for the Golden State Warriors over the summer. Durant recently talked openly about the selflessness and camaraderie of the Bay Area team.
When a reporter at practice on Thursday recited Durant’s quote to Westbrook, he responded in such a perfectly Westbrookian way that it should be typed up, printed out and framed somewhere within the Chesapeake Energy Arena.
“That’s cute, man,” he said. “That’s cute. My job is to be able to worry about what’s going on here. We’re going to worry about all of the selfish guys we got over here, apparently.”CM Punjab Shahbaz Sharif takes notice of the incident, orders immediate investigation.
GUJRANWALA: A girl’s body was found lying outside the grave early Wednesday morning in Qila Didar Singh, Gujranwala, and was reportedly assaulted sexually. Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif took notice of the incident, ordering an immediate investigation, Express News reported.
Fifteen-year-old Zainab, daughter of Muhammad Munir, died of electrocution a day before and was buried by the family Tuesday night.
Local residents found her body lying outside the grave early Wednesday morning and informed the family and the police.
The police suspected that the body was taken out from the grave with the intention of rape. Officials said desecration of the body would be confirmed once the investigation was completed, and any criminals involved would be punished accordingly.
Qila Didar Singh Police arrested a suspect and have started inquiries.
Past necrophilia cases
October 2011: Mohammad Riaz, arrested in North Nazimabad, Karachi confessed to having defiled the corpses of 48 women in the Paposh Nagar graveyard in the last eight years.
September 2011: A father and son were arrested after they exhumed and desecrated the body of a woman from the the Pir Koray Shah graveyard in Karampur.
Read full storyI write to address the unscrupulous and untrue accusations made by Ben Owens ’17, a former member of Alpha Epsilon Pi, regarding the decision made by the chapter to turn its back on membership in AEPi and start a “local” fraternity.
Saying that AEPi International does not “understand the issue of sexual assault on college campuses” is a bold-faced lie. When I met with the chapter’s leaders last fall, I explained the International Fraternity’s position on sexual assault and sexual harassment. Simply put, we have a zero-tolerance policy for non-consensual or coercive conduct. On an international level, AEPi is working with a number of organizations and college campuses to establish programs that protect all college students, educate all of our 10,000 undergraduate members about proper and responsible behavior and ensure that they understand the fraternal and criminal consequences that perpetrators of sexual assault may face. AEPi is also working with our International Board of Rabbis to develop sexual assault prevention programs that are based on our Jewish values.
When I met with the undergraduates last fall and heard their concerns, I asked them to help us develop even better programs. Instead of helping, they chose to quit. This fits a pattern of accusation followed by inaction. After our 2013 international convention, some undergraduates from the Brown chapter expressed concerns about our programs, and a member of our staff asked the Brown chapter to work with the International Fraternity to develop better programs. We never received a response.
We take great pride in the fact that AEPi is the largest Jewish, non-discriminatory fraternity in the world. With about 185 chapters spread across the United States, Canada, Israel, the United Kingdom, France and Austria, our members should all know what our mission is: to develop leaders for the Jewish community. Please note that our mission statement does not say, “Develop Jewish leaders for the Jewish community” and, in fact, never has. Every brother of our fraternity — no matter the race, religion, sexual orientation, creed or beliefs — is equal to every other brother. Obviously, as a fraternity with a distinctively Jewish mission (I’m pretty certain that we’re the only fraternity with an International Board of Rabbis, and we are the only fraternity that has chapters in Israel), it is important that we look to continue to recruit Jewish members. But any student identifying as male who wants to join a Jewish fraternity is welcome, and over the years we’ve had many non-Jewish brothers, many of whom have become volunteers, staff members and board members.
We explained that policy to the Brown undergraduates last fall and, instead of working with us to ensure that this is explained to all current and potential members, they chose to quit. It is also interesting to note that Owens alleges that non-Jewish brothers were told they were somehow less of a brother when, under his leadership, the current undergraduates and alums who disagreed with the plan to quit AEPi were pressured, ignored or disenfranchised.
AEPi International is disappointed that it has come to this. We strongly believe that membership in AEPi — or in any other national fraternity — has a number of important benefits. Not the least of these benefits is liability insurance (a major component of the annual dues that our former members did not want to pay), which provides coverage for individuals and their families. Local fraternity members do not get equivalent coverage, from the University or otherwise, and are putting themselves and their families at risk.
The current (now former) members of our Brown chapter of AEPi have thrown away more than 20 years of history and tradition and turned their backs on their alumni brothers. We’re confident that in the very near future we will identify students at Brown who want to rebuild AEPi to be stronger than ever. When that time comes, we will once again establish a fraternity chapter dedicated to brotherhood, perseverance, humility and developing the future leaders of the world’s Jewish communities.
Jonathan Pierce, Vanderbilt ’86, is a past International President of the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity.
Please send responses to this opinion to [email protected] and other op-eds to [email protected] in the shuffle of Super Bowl week is Kyle Williams, whose two turnovers in the NFC Championship game may have cost the Niners a trip to the big game last year.
The most costly of the mishaps came in overtime, when he fumbled a punt deep in Niners’ territory, allowing the New York Giants to advance to the Super Bowl on a game-winning field goal.
Now, Williams is speaking out against the league for failing to punish the Giants, who admitted to targeting the wide receiver in the championship game.
“The thing is, we knew he had four concussions, so that was our biggest thing was to take him out of the game,” said the Giants’ Jacquian Williams after the game.
The NFL did not punish any of the Giants for specifically targeting Williams’ injury, and he is clearly unhappy with it.
“The league announced the bounties and that (former Saints defensive coordinator) Gregg Williams said the same things the Giants were saying,” he said, referring to the “Bountygate” scandal, where the Saints paid their players to injure their opponents. “They took it to the highest level they could with the Saints. But it seemed like the league decided it was no big deal what the Giants said.”
Williams suffered a season-ending injury against (ironically) the Saints in Week 11, tearing his ACL.Donald Trump Donald John TrumpREAD: Cohen testimony alleges Trump knew Stone talked with WikiLeaks about DNC emails Trump urges North Korea to denuclearize ahead of summit Venezuela's Maduro says he fears 'bad' people around Trump MORE is suggesting Speaker Paul Ryan Paul Davis RyanBrexit and exit: A transatlantic comparison Five takeaways from McCabe’s allegations against Trump The Hill's 12:30 Report: Sanders set to shake up 2020 race MORE (R-Wis.) might not want the Republican presidential nominee to win in 2016 because Ryan may want to launch his own White House bid in four years.
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"I don't want to be knocking Paul Ryan," Trump said in an interview that aired Tuesday morning on ABC's "Good Morning America."
"I think he could be more supportive to the Republican nominee. We're doing well. I think we're going to win the election."
When asked if he thought Ryan wanted Trump to win, the GOP nominee said: "Maybe not."
"Because maybe he wants to run in four years and maybe he doesn't know how to win," Trump said.
"Maybe he just doesn't know how to win."
Trump has been knocking Ryan in recent days since reports surfaced that the Speaker would no longer campaign with or defend Trump.
Ryan's decision came after the release of a 2005 tape in which Trump talks about how he can grope and kiss women without their consent because of his celebrity status. Since its release, multiple women have come forward to accuse the GOP nominee of sexual misconduct.
On Sunday, Trump tweeted that Ryan was "always fighting the Republican nominee" and called for Ryan to focus on the issues facing the country.
“Paul Ryan, a man who doesn't know how to win (including failed run four years ago), must start focusing on the budget, military, vets etc.,” Trump tweeted Sunday.Dragon Quest X Has An Impressive 300,000 Daily Active Players In Japan
By Sato. March 14, 2014. 5:23pm
It’s safe to say that the current top two MMORPG titles in Japan are Dragon Quest X and Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn. Long before that, it was Final Fantasy XI that led the chage, and even today continues its service in the competitive marketplace. Recently, the producers of all three games got together for a 4Gamer interview.
The interview starts with 4Gamer asking the three producers to talk a little about the present state of their respective titles.
“I’d like to start out by talking about the current number of players (accounts for Final Fantasy XIV), as we currently surpassed the mark of 1.8 million,” starts Naoki Yoshida. “The total number of characters is at 6.75 million, and the total playtime just surpassed 400 million hours.”
4Gamer then asks how many of the 1.8 million accounts are active on a daily basis.
“Hmm, daily actives are numbers that can easily be misunderstood… and the peak time between Japan and other countries are different,” responds Yoshida. “If we go by the amount of people who log in each day, it’s about 500,000 people worldwide. There are people who also log in at least once every two days, so if we were to include those, the the figure would be much higher.”
“As far as the number goes for specific countries… sorry, you’ll have to excuse me on that front. Although, I believe a global administrator for MMORPG titles would say something along the lines of China having the most people,” says Yoshida with a laugh.
Next, 4Gamer asks Dragon Quest X producer Yosuke Saito to share a few words on the current state of his side.
“We’ve only released the game in Japan, so you’ll be getting only Japan’s numbers, but we have about 300,000 people a day who actively enjoy the game,” answers Saito. “Thanks to having released version 2 at the end of last year, we’ve had even more active players since then.”
“At the time, we feared that version 2 could have actually decreased the amount of players,” he continues. “However, that didn’t happen so we were relieved. Well, it was a little unexpected that people who purchased version 2 and haven’t even been to Lendagia [One of the main continents in Dragon Quest X].”
4Gamer asks what the reason for that could be.
“… Maybe they’re spending their time in the casino. It feels as though they’re all playing at their own paces,” suggests Saito.
Finally, 4Gamer asks about how Final Fantasy XI is doing.
“Comparing it to the previous two titles, it’d be hard for me to say,” responds Final Fantasy XI producer Akihiko Matsui. “Last year we released ‘Seekers of Adoulin’ and we’ve had quite a lot of players return to the game. However, due to the influence of Final Fantasy XIV, we’ve had a lot of people go over to that game.”
“Now now, if you say that then companies who manage other online games might get upset by hearing that!” chimes in Yoshida. “I’ve seen the actual numbers, and you guys still have a lot of players. In the midst of Dragon Quest X and Final Fantasy XIV’s competition, you guys still manage to have that many players, which I think is actually amazing.”Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Commissioner John Koskinen is the people’s choice for “Porker of the Year,” Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) announced Monday.
Koskinen won the worst-in-Washington recognition for repeatedly stonewalling congressional investigations and allowing IRS employees to wipe hard drives that were under court preservation orders, among other things. Republican members of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform are calling for Koskinen’s impeachment.
Koskinen took 43 percent of the vote in a six-candidate pool during CAGW’s annual competition.
“Commissioner Koskinen’s extensive and dubious track record of evasive, incompetent, and hostile behavior to taxpayers and their representatives has been unmistakable and unacceptable,” CAGW President Tom Schatz said in a news release. “It is long past time that Commissioner Koskinen be replaced with an individual who respects taxpayers and their interests.”
The IRS in 2014 erased back-up tapes containing as many as 24,000 emails from former Director of the IRS’ Exempt Organizations Division Lois Lerner, despite a court order. More recently, the IRS wiped a hard drive despite a court preservation order related to a Microsoft-filed Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Bob McDonald took second place in CAGW’s poll, with 19 percent of the vote. McDonald, in the eyes of CAGW and other critics, has taken few significant steps to reform the VA since he took office in the wake of the wait-time scandal.
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact [email protected] to get a real job. If you fail, you're done. You're an entrepreneur. If you succeed, try to keep the job. If you fail, you're done. You're an entrepreneur.
Dollar Number One: Congrats, you've failed to keep a job. Make money by any means necessary, other than getting a job (in the US, there is a preliminary step called "get health insurance by any means necessary). A shocking number of people with entrepreneurial ambitions have never made a non-paycheck dollar. Do it now. I am not setting a high target. Just ONE dollar that's not from a paycheck. "Making money" is a very different activity from "earning a paycheck." For one thing, it's like P. T. Barnum's definition of PR. In a job, if you do nothing for long enough, somebody might eventually notice and get rid of you. Even if they do, you might actually be able to stay (cf: Wally of Dilbert, or Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener). But there's a good chance they won't even notice until you're ready to retire, and they have to think of something nice to say about you. And you'll still get paid all the way. Surprisingly, they won't make you give the money back when they notice you haven't been doing anything. But as an entrepreneur, if you do nothing, a very scary thing happens. NOTHING. And when nothing continues to happen for exactly one month after you use up your savings, you are out on the streets. There's nowhere to hide. You default to destitution. Revenue: Once you've made your first buck by any means necessary, you make your next buck. Then your next buck. And so on. You'll notice something very strange about your Rate of Incoming Bucks (RIB). It is very, very uncertain. So you have to learn a strange kind of arithmetic known as book-keeping just to figure out whether or not you are financially alive. In a paycheck job, you keep track of money with the formula: Paycheck - Expenses = Retirement Savings. As an entrepreneur, you keep track with the formula: Vague Money-Making Activities - Expenses = Varying Levels of Anxiety. Operating Cash Flow Positive: If you're lucky, you'll keep surviving one rent-check at a time, so you can continue to "fail to get/keep a job" one month at a time. This is like when Mr. Miyagi teaches Daniel San to punch while standing on the sides of a dinghy in the Karate Kid (original version). The punches are your rent checks. The dinghy is your revenue. Mr. Miyagi shaking the boat is also known as VUCA: Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity. The ability to keep doing this no matter how hard Mr. Miyagi rocks the boat, is called cash flow generation. Falling into the water and NOT clambering back into the dinghy immediately is called "failing to fail to keep a job." It is necessary for, but not the same as "keeping a job." Keeping a job is an entirely different skill that maps, in our convoluted metaphor, to learning to swim. So if you fall into the water, you either keep climbing back into the dinghy, or you learn to swim, or you DROWN. If you manage to stay on the dinghy for more than two quarters in a row, congrats. You are "operating cash flow positive." Vision: Now, once you can keep your footing on the shaky dinghy and keep punching well enough that you can dare to actually look around, you'll notice stuff around you in the universe that is NOT a rocking dinghy or punches or Mr. Miyagi. It's called the "environment." You probably noticed it before, but you never really noticed it. You cannot really see see the environment for what it is unless you are throwing punches while standing on a wobbly boat. Seeing the environment while throwing punches on a rocking boat has a special term to describe it: vision. Any idiot can look around while standing on firm ground. It is also easy to look around while swimming (it's called the back stroke). Innovation: Now once you've got the vision thing down, you'll start noticing tempting, alluring, attractive flying fish occasionally jumping out of the water. These are of the species called slipperius opportunitus, otherwise known as "opportunities." But if you try to reach out and grab any of them, you'll most likely fall into the water. Then you get back in (unless you accidentally learn to swim), find your footing again, get going with the punching again. Eventually after enough falls, you'll notice that you can catch some opportunity-fish without falling into the water. Once you get a fish into the boat while continuing punching, congratulate yourself. You've risen above merely making rent. You just learned a skill known as "innovation." Some people just get tired of falling into the water and switch to just excitedly yelling out each time, "there's an opportunity, and THERE goes another one." This is not innovation. This is an activity that looks superficially similar called "R&D." These people eventually fail to fail to keep a job, fall into the water, and learn to swim. Many go on to win Olympic gold medals in the back stroke. Marketing: Eventually you'll notice that certain things you do -- certain combinations of wobbly punches -- seem to actually create opportunities (=flying fish, remember). This is called "marketing." You'll notice that these opportunities tend to be better than those you randomly catch flying around. The more of this voodoo behavior called "marketing" you do, the more such opportunities are created. Unlike "grab 'em as they fly by" opportunities, created opportunities are an autocatalytic thing. The more you create and grab, the more show up. Yeah, those fish are kinda dumb that way. This is called "creating a customer." Once you're past this step, and have learned a few of these voodoo patterns, feel free to make and print out a certificate declaring yourself "Drucker-Certified Real Businessperson." You get this because you just learned innovation and marketing and have "created a customer" rather than simply paid yet another rent check. Your life now has Business Meaning. It is doing more than just surviving and failing to keep a job. Doctrine: Now, many people stop here. They just grab all opportunities as they fly by, and dump 'em in the boat, where they thrash around until they jump back into the water accidentally. This is like unintentional catch-and-release fishing. If you stall here, there's only one useful thing you can do, which is to tag the fish with RFID chips before they escape, a weird kind of evil anti-business known as "patent trolling." There's a famous, smart and rich guy named Nathan Myrhvold who is really good at this. But he's still a troll. You later make money by blackmailing the people who do manage to keep those specific tagged fish from wriggling away. Anyway, getting back to our story, at this point, you can only progress further if you learn a REALLY neat trick: knowing when to quit. You'll find that you can only hold on to some fish longer if you actively throw out other fish faster than they wriggle away naturally.When you are able to quit effectively and intuitively, and without recourse to things like patent trolling, and can state with precision your principles for holding on or letting go, you've learned the business skill known as doctrine. You Now Know What You Believe. Strategy: (sometimes spelled "strategery"): At this point, you're standing on a wobbly boat, catching fish without falling off, doing not-too-evil things that make more fish jump out at you, and deciding which fish to keep and which fish to throw back into the water. But you still haven't learned the master trick required to avoid learning how to swim long-term. At some point, you'll recognize that having certain fish in your boat is even better at attracting more fish than your voodoo punch combinations that we identified earlier as "marketing." You keep the opportunity-fish that most increase the rate at which MORE opportunities jump out at you, constantly trading up along the way. This is called "getting inside the tempo of the market" for people who believe in a mysterious business religion called OODA. When more fish start jumping out at you than you can catch, you've hit a state called Product-Market Fit. At this point, you are in danger of your boat sinking due to too many fish in there. Getting yourself a bigger boat that can hold more fish is known as SCALING (hehehehehe! this whole answer was an exercise in getting to this one pun). You can also scale by getting some good swimmers to swim alongside your dinghy, throwing them dead fish to eat, so they can concentrate on swimming. In return, they do various useful things for you that will really push the limits of this metaphor.
Sit down, make yourself comfy. Grab a beer. This might take a while.There are two basic choices. You can either become a(SVSE), or a small-e entrepreneur. I won't say anything about the former. I've said enough in other places, and there are many other good sources.Now there
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care. Thirty-six states and the District of Columbia have enrolled some or all of their Medicaid population in private health plans, which last year cost the states and federal government about $108 billion.
“The Kentucky case is a harbinger of what can happen when states don’t allow enough time and devote sufficient resources to strengthen the Medicaid agency’s oversight capacity and systems — or develop strong contracts and care monitoring systems from scratch if they haven’t contracted with managed care plans before,” said Debra Lipson, a senior researcher for Mathematica Policy Research, a nonpartisan think tank
Kentucky health officials admit there have been some rough spots because of the speed of the changeover that started in late 2011. But they insist that claims now are being paid promptly and the quality of care has improved.
“We’re changing the delivery of health care in Kentucky for the good,” Kentucky Medicaid Commissioner Lawrence Kissner said.
Kissner, a former CEO of two managed care companies, said that in one year, child immunization and diabetes testing rates have jumped, emergency room use has dropped and prescriptions for controlled substances such as Oxycontin are down.
In May, Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear announced that the state would expand Medicaid under Obamacare to about 308,000 more Kentuckians, who will be placed in managed care plans.
But many say that problems persist, especially in rural areas where access to services can be spotty. And mental health advocates say the plans have denied prescriptions that patients have taken successfully for years and many community mental health centers have limited or canceled programs because the plans won’t authorize enough treatment.
“The whole thing has been a mess,” said Sheila Schuster, executive director of the Kentucky Mental Health Coalition, an advocacy group. “It’s extremely difficult to get any resolution on issues people are facing. If you bring up problems, state officials say you’re just being resistant to managed care.”
Advocates say they’re also worried about managed care’s impact on patients with developmental disorders.
Sheila Schuster, executive director of the Kentucky Mental Health Coalition
Darlene VanHoeve, who lives in the hills of southeastern Kentucky, was shocked to learn that health plan WellCare of Kentucky wouldn’t pay for services at an autism center for her son Reuben, whose doctor thought he had Asperger’s Syndrome. The lanky 17-year-old with curly brown hair and thick glasses is depressed, she says, often hyper-focuses on one thing and gets agitated if he has to do multiple tasks.
The doctor recommended that he get testing and counseling at the center, an hour away, because no local child psychologists were in his plan’s network. But WellCare denied the request, saying the center wasn’t in its network.
“I’ve got a child who’s almost non-functioning,” said VanHoeve, who home schools her children and whose husband, Frank, is a missionary. “He’s going to have to take at least another year to finish high school.”
The VanHoeve family, which lives on about $22,000 a year, is paying $1,650 out of pocket to have Reuben tested at the autism center, which has given him an Asperger’s diagnosis. Their ministry has stepped in to help by temporarily offering the family insurance.
WellCare of Kentucky president Mike Minor couldn’t comment on the case because of privacy laws, but he wrote in an email that the plan believes that its provider network is capable of covering members’ behavioral health needs.
Kentucky is largely rural, with a population that has serious health care needs. Last year, its national overall health ranking was 44th and it ranked 50th in smoking and cancer deaths and 40th in obesity, according to a United Health Foundation study.
Medicaid pays a lot of the medical bills. When the state faced a $100 million shortfall in its $6 billion Medicaid program, Beshear announced a plan to move members to managed care in 2011. Officials signed contracts with three national managed care companies and transferred about 550,000 people within four months.
The companies had to scramble to recruit and train employees and contract with a network of doctors and hospitals.
“It was a significant challenge,” said Michael Murphy, CEO of CoventryCares, which is part of the Bethesda, Md.-based Coventry Health Care chain that recently was purchased by Aetna. “Obviously we learned a few lessons in Kentucky,” he adds. “We have the scars to prove it.”
Payment disputes soon erupted between the plans and hospitals and doctors, who complained that claims were being denied or delayed improperly and that the cumbersome pre-authorization process hindered treatment.
“It’s just been a litany of issues – slow payment, network adequacy, denials, pre-admission problems,” said Michael Rust, president of the Kentucky Hospital Association. “States usually phase this in. Here, it was the whole enchilada. It was almost a change overnight.”
A 2012 evaluation by the Urban Institute called the transition in Kentucky “extremely rapid.”
It found that patients faced delays in getting care, mental health gaps were exacerbated and an “adversarial relationship” plagued the state, the plans and the medical community.
Medicaid chief Kissner said most problems have been resolved. But some state legislators say they continue to be flooded with complaints from disgruntled doctors, dentists and hospitals.
“The state is tone deaf to the providers,” said state Sen. Julie Denton, a Louisville Republican who chairs the Health and Welfare Committee and has held hearings on the issue. “They have let these health plans run amok because they want the savings and they don’t want to do anything to jeopardize that. It’s all about the money. It’s not about patient care and access to care.”
Earlier this year, the legislature unanimously passed a bill that would have set up an appeals process at the Department of Insurance to mediate disputes between the medical community and the health plans. The governor vetoed it, saying it would have resulted in excessive costs and could have interfered with contractual agreements. Instead, he announced an “action plan” that included insurance department audits and a requirement that plans meet with every hospital to review past-due bills.
Kissner said those meetings have taken place, and the plans aren’t finding anywhere near as many unpaid claims as the hospitals allege. New claims are being paid promptly, he added.
For the three national health plans, Medicaid managed care in Kentucky has been a loser financially.
Kentucky Spirit, a subsidiary of the St. Louis, Mo.-based Centene Corp., pulled out of Kentucky this month, saying it had lost $120 million. It has sued the state for damages, arguing that the data it received when it initially bid was flawed and underestimated the actual costs and poor health of members. The state, which has started transferring about 125,000 members into the two other plans, announced it would sue Kentucky Spirit for breach of contract.
CoventryCares CEO Murphy said his plan has lost about $156 million since the contract started. But he said the payment disputes with doctors and hospitals are now being resolved and the situation has “improved and stabilized.”
In January, the state amended its contracts with CoventryCares and WellCare, agreeing to increase their rates by 7 percent. That’s an additional $18 million in state funds and $22.5 million from the federal government, according to Kissner.
While payment issues have gotten most of the attention in the halls of Frankfort’s capitol, there’s also concern about whether the plans’ network of doctors and hospitals is adequate, especially in underserved areas.
In rural Eastern Kentucky, Appalachian Regional Healthcare, the predominant hospital chain, is suing Coventry, which severed its contract after the health care system refused to agree to reduced rates. Appalachian also did not contract with Kentucky Spirit because of a disagreement over rates. Only WellCare remains in the Appalachian system.
Hospital officials say that means many poor Eastern Kentuckians are left without ready access to certain services, such as maternity care and radiation therapy.
Medicaid’s Kissner disputes the criticism about the network’s adequacy. He said his office performs a monthly review to insure services are available in rural areas within 60 miles or 60 minutes of members, as required by state law.
Advocates are also distressed about the safety net for vulnerable mentally ill Kentuckians. They say that not only have programs been cut and access been limited under managed care, but psychiatrists and therapists have reduced the amount of time they spend with patients.
“The result is decompensation, poor illness management and more hospitalizations,” said Kelly Gunning, advocacy and public affairs director for the National Association for the Mentally Ill in Lexington. “The people are powerless. They have no say.”
Kissner disagreed with the advocates’ assessment about the decline in mental health care. He said the community mental health centers have been rattled because the plans are demanding information about discharges and the expected outcome for patients.
“I think they’re struggling with oversight of managed care. They’ve operated in a different environment and now the (plans) are requiring more oversight,” Kissner said. “The goal is not to be in a facility the rest of your life.”
While Kissner and other Medicaid officials view the move to managed care in Kentucky as a monumental step toward improving patients’ health, that view isn’t shared by Alcott, the mother of the boy who was born without a rectum or bowel control.
Alcott said that for years she was grateful that Kaden was on Medicaid, which paid for all his health care expenses. Even though she teaches adult education and Kaden’s father is an electrician, they relied on the state program for their son’s treatment because it would have been too costly if he was on her private health plan.
Alcott said she was hopeful about managed care until CoventryCares stopped paying for the PediaSure last year. She has had to take on extra jobs to pay the $180 to $200 a month it costs.
Coventry spokesperson Kristine Grow said that the plan generally covers “medically necessary” nutritional supplements, but she couldn’t discuss the case because of privacy laws.
What’s been even more disturbing for Alcott was that the Louisville children’s hospital where Kaden’s long-time surgeon is on staff decided to stop accepting CoventryCares patients in June. She switched plans in July.
“At first, managed care was great. Now it’s really stressful,” Alcott said. “It’s been so hard. I feel like I’m a strong person, but I’ve cried. You feel powerless.”
This article was produced by Kaiser Health News with support from The SCAN Foundation.It’s safe to say that everyone is madly in love with Benedict Cumberbatch. Whether he’s solving mysteries in Sherlock, breaking Nazi codes in The Imitation Game, or getting his soul punched out of his body by Tilda Swinton in Doctor Strange, people are always happy to make gifs of his face and post them on Tumblr or whatever. But what if he really tested the limits of that love? What if he came down from his mountain on Christmas eve and swiped the roast beast right out of your icebox? What if he took all of the pop guns, pampoogas, pantookas, and drums? Or the checkerboards, bizilbigs, popcorn, and plums? Would you still love him?
Well, we’re going to find out soon either way, because Variety is reporting that Cumberbatch has signed on to play the Grinch in Illumination Entertainment’s new animated adaptation of How The Grinch Stole Christmas. This project has been in the works for several years, with Illumination hoping to move onto another Dr. Seuss adaptation after its Horton Hears A Who and The Lorax movies, but since then it started to really focus on the Minions and their proclivity for printing money. The new Grinch movie took a backseat to those little monsters, but now the project is finally moving forward.
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Speaking of the Minions, Variety is also reporting that South Park’s Trey Parker will play the lead villain in Despicable Me 3. This will be Parker’s first time doing voice work for a project he didn’t help create, and he’ll apparently be playing “a former child star” named Balthazar Bratt. Despicable Me 3 will open on June 30, 2017, and How The Grinch Stole Christmas will debut in November of 2017.The University of Oregon shouldn�t need a six-page letter from the U.S. Department of Education to tell it to respect the privacy of students� medical and counseling records. But the department�s letter clarifies what ought to be a matter of common sense: Universities provide health services to promote their students� physical and mental well-being, but students will avoid those services if they have reason to believe their medical records might somehow be used against them.
The letter was sent to colleges across the nation Tuesday, and does not mention any particular university. But it was clearly prompted by events at the UO, where a student alleged she had been raped in 2014 and was preparing to sue university officials for what she claimed was mishandling of her case. As it gathered ammo for its defense, the UO obtained the student�s records from the university counseling center.
The UO maintained it had done nothing wrong, pointing to a university policy allowing an exception to confidentiality when a student�s �emotional condition is being used as a claim or defense in a legal situation.� Not everyone is at peace with that justification. Two employees of the counseling center intend to sue the UO for what they claim was retaliation after they complained that the alleged rape victim�s privacy rights had been violated, and the state Board of Psychologist Examiners moved to review the actions of six UO employees.
The �legal situation� exemption is of recent vintage, and came at a convenient time for the UO � it was not included in the university�s privacy policy as recently as 2014. Lawmakers thought the exemption went too far. The Oregon Legislature passed a bill in April barring the disclosure of student records relating to sexual assaults. U.S. Rep. Susan Bonamici called the exemption a �loophole� and joined a fellow Oregon Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden, in calling upon the Department of Education to clarify the question of when the confidentiality of student health records can be breached.
Tuesday�s letter came in response to that call, and makes it clear that universities can�t engage in fishing expeditions when they find themselves in a legal dispute with a student. Kathleen Styles, the department�s chief privacy officer, writes, �without a court order or written consent, institutions that are involved in litigation with a student should not share student medical records with the institution�s attorneys or courts unless the litigation relates directly to the medical treatment itself or the payment for that treatment, and even then disclose only those records that are necessary and relevant to the litigation.�
Styles explains that this level of privacy protection is provided by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which in the case of student health records parallels federal laws ensuring the confidentiality of medical information.
The UO is eager to leave this matter behind, and in a recent settlement agreed to pay the alleged rape victim $800,000 and provide her with free tuition, room and board. But Styles� letter demands attention all the same � it warns of the chilling effect that a lack of confidentiality may have on students seeking counseling or medical help, and it interprets privacy protections as extending beyond the cases of sexual assault covered by the new Oregon law. It�s common sense, but sometimes common sense needs to be spelled out clearly.Update: South Korea’s Joint Chief of Staff told the Wall Street Journal on Monday morning that reports of North Korea deploying landing craft towards the frontline are not true
As marathon inter-Korean talks entered their third day, North Korea deployed amphibious landing crafts carrying special forces towards the frontline, military sources said on Monday.
Approximately ten “air cushioned landing crafts” left their base in Cholsan and sailed forward to a naval base some 60km north of the Northern Limit Line, anonymous sources told South Korea’s Yonhap news agency on Monday.
The development comes as marathon negotiations between the two Koreas, which resumed on Sunday afternoon after an eleven hour break, appeared to be still be ongoing as of dawn on Monday morning.
“Negotiations are under way,” Blue House presidential spokesman Min Kyung-wook told South Korean reporters Monday morning, without revealing any details about progress.
An effective media blackout on negotiation progress is being observed, Min said, to avoid any negative effect on the outcome.
Despite the talks, South Korea is continuing to conduct regular propaganda broadcasts towards the North, something Pyongyang previously warned should stop or Seoul face the consequences.
And on Saturday the U.S. – South Korea joint WatchCon alert system was raised from three to two. WatchCon two is implemented on the peninsula when the threat from North Korea is deemed as being at a “vital” level.
In addition to moving landing crafts towards the border, intelligence sources said on Sunday that the North Korean side had also moved over 50 submarines from their bases, and deployed double the normal number of artillery units along the border.
The ongoing military maneuvers on both sides of the Koreas underscore the high pressure for negotiators to exit talks with a positive outcome, something that could be tricky to do given the sharp division.
The ongoing talks are being led by Hwang Pyong So, Pyongyang’s senior military political officer and South Korean National Security Adviser Kim Kwan-jin. Also present are South Korean Unification Minister Hong Yong-pyo and his DPRK counterpart, Kim Yang Gon.
The talks represent the first high-level contact between the two Koreas since a surprise meeting meeting between Hwang and Kim in October last year, which took place at the end of the Incheon Asian games.
Prior to the talks, North Korean state news outlet the Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) notably referred to South Korea by its official name – the Republic of Korea – for the first time since the current conservative party begun its administration in Seoul.This article is about the song by Bob Wells and Mel Tormé. For other uses, see Christmas music and Christmas Song (disambiguation)
"The Christmas Song" (commonly subtitled "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire" or, as it was originally subtitled, "Merry Christmas to You") is a classic Christmas song written in 1945 by Robert Wells and Mel Tormé.
According to Tormé, the song was written during a blistering hot summer. In an effort to "stay cool by thinking cool", the most-performed (according to BMI) Christmas song was born.[1] "I saw a spiral pad on his (Wells') piano with four lines written in pencil", Tormé recalled. "They started, 'Chestnuts roasting..., Jack Frost nipping..., Yuletide carols..., Folks dressed up like Eskimos.' Bob didn't think he was writing a song lyric. He said he thought if he could immerse himself in winter he could cool off. Forty minutes later that song was written. I wrote all the music and some of the lyrics."
The Nat King Cole Trio first recorded the song in the spring of 1946. At Cole's behest – and over the objections of his label, Capitol Records – a second recording was made later the same year utilizing a small string section, this version becoming a massive hit on both the pop and R&B charts. Cole again recorded the song in 1953, using the same arrangement with a full orchestra arranged and conducted by Nelson Riddle, and once more in 1961, in a stereophonic version with another full orchestra arranged and conducted by Ralph Carmichael. Cole's 1961 version is generally regarded as definitive, and in 2004 was the most-loved seasonal song with women aged 30–49,[2] while the original 1946 recording was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1974.[3]
Nat King Cole recordings [ edit ]
First recording: Recorded at WMCA Radio Studios, New York City, June 14, 1946. Label credit: The King Cole Trio (Nat King Cole, vocals & piano; Oscar Moore, guitarist; Johnny Miller, bassist). Not issued until 1989, when it was (accidentally) included on the various-artists compilation Billboard Greatest Christmas Hits (1935–1954) Rhino R1 70637(LP) / R2 70637(CD).
Second recording: Recorded at WMCA Radio Studios, New York City, August 19, 1946. First record issue. Label credit: The King Cole Trio with String Choir (Nat King Cole, vocals & piano; Oscar Moore, guitarist; Johnny Miller, bassist; Jack "The Bear" Parker, drummer; Charlie Grean, arranger and conductor of 4 string players and a harpist).[4][5] Lacquer disc master #981. Issued November 1946 as Capitol 311 (78rpm). This recording is available on the 2000 Cole compilation CD Christmas for Kids: From One to Ninety-Two, as well as on a CD called The Holiday Album, which has 1940s Christmas songs recorded by Cole and Bing Crosby.
Third recording: Recorded at Capitol Studios, Hollywood, August 24, 1953. This was the song's first magnetic tape recording. Label credit: The King Cole Trio with String Choir (Nat King Cole, vocals; Buddy Cole, pianist; John Collins, guitarist; Charlie Harris, bassist; Lee Young, drummer; Charlie Grean, Pete Rugolo and Nelson Riddle, orchestral arrangement; Nelson Riddle, orchestra conductor).[5][6] Master #11726, take 11. Issued November 1953 as the "new" Capitol 90036(78rpm) / F90036(45rpm) (Capitol first issued 90036 in 1950 with the second recording). Correct label credit issued on October 18, 1954 as Capitol 2955(78rpm) / F2955(45rpm). Label credit: Nat "King" Cole with Orchestra Conducted by Nelson Riddle. This recording is available on the 1990 Cole compilation CD Cole, Christmas, & Kids, as well as on the various-artists CD Casey Kasem Presents All Time Christmas Favorites. It was also included, along with both 1946 recordings, on the 1991 Mosaic Records box set The Complete Capitol Recordings of the Nat King Cole Trio. This version is sometimes (though quite rarely) played on the radio during the Christmas season and is nearly identical to the popular 1961 recording. Aside from being in mono, it is easy to tell apart from the 1961 version in that the final notes (the "Jingle Bells" guitar coda) sounds faster and more rushed.
Fourth recording: Recorded at Capitol Studios, New York City, March 30, 1961. This rendition, the first recorded in stereo[5], is widely played on radio stations during the Christmas season, and has become the most popular/familiar version of this song. Label credit: Nat King Cole (Nat King Cole, vocals; Hank Jones, pianist; John Collins, guitarist; Charlie Harris, bassist; Lee Young, drummer; Charlie Grean, Pete Rugolo and Ralph Carmichael, orchestral arrangement; Ralph Carmichael, orchestra conductor).[5][7] The instrumental arrangement is nearly identical to the 1953 version[5], but the vocals are much deeper and more focused. Originally done for The Nat King Cole Story (a 1961 LP devoted to stereo re-recordings of Cole's earlier hits), this recording was later included in a reissue of Cole's 1960 holiday album The Magic of Christmas replacing "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen". Retitled The Christmas Song, the album was issued in 1963 as Capitol W-1967(mono) / SW-1967(stereo) and today is in print on compact disc. This recording of "The Christmas Song" is also available on numerous compilation albums. Some are Capitol pop standards Christmas compilations while others are broader-based. For example, it is available on WCBS-FM's Ultimate Christmas Album Volume 3. An alternate take of the 1961 recording, featuring a different vocal and missing the solo piano on the instrumental bridge, appears on the Deluxe Edition of the 2014 compilation The Extraordinary Nat King Cole.
There were several covers of Nat Cole's original record in the 1940s. The first of these was said to be by Dick Haymes on the Decca label, but his was released first – not recorded first. The first cover of "The Christmas Song" was performed by pop tenor and bandleader Eddy Howard on Majestic. Howard was a big Cole fan, and also covered Nat's versions of "I Want to Thank Your Folks" and "(I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons", among others.
Charts [ edit ]
Chart (1961) Peak
position Sweden (Sverigetopplistan)[8] 28
Chart (1991) Peak
position UK Singles (Official Charts Company)[9] 51
Mel Tormé recordings [ edit ]
Mel Tormé himself made several recordings of the song, including versions released in 1954 (on his live Coral Records album At the Crescendo), 1961 (on his Verve Records album My Kind of Music), 1970 (on a Columbia Records promo single), 1990 (in a medley with "Autumn Leaves", on his live Concord Records album Mel Tormé Live at the Fujitsu–Concord Festival 1990), and 1992 (on his Telarc Records album Christmas Songs).
The 1970 Columbia version of the song adds an opening verse, written in 1963 while Tormé was working as musical arranger for The Judy Garland Show. He first performed and introduced the opening verse as a guest for the show's Christmas Special which aired on December 22, 1963.
All through the year we waited
Waited through spring and fall
To hear silver bells ringing, see wintertime bringing
The happiest season of all
Additionally, his recordings typically include a coda adapted from "Here We Come A-wassailing":
Love and joy come to you
And to you your Christmas too
And God bless you and send you a happy New Year
And God send you a happy New Year
Other notable renditions [ edit ]
"The Christmas Song" has been covered by numerous artists from a wide variety of genres. It has charted by the following:
Other artists who have recorded the song include:Busalacchi, Philip
Perspectives: A Journal of Historical Inquiry, Vol.37 (2010)
Introduction: During the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries German and Danish clergymen and knights set off on a crusade to the lands of the eastern Baltic Sea into the modern day Latvia. Henricus Lettus, a young German priest joined the mission and wrote extensively about his experiences. The goal of the crusade was to conquer and convert the local pagan population to Catholicism and create an ecclesiastical state, thereby expanding the boundaries of Christianity.
Three hundred years later and thousands of miles away, Emperor Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur led an army of Muslims from their central Asian homeland of Transoxiana into the Indian sub-continent. He planned to conquer “Hindustan” to establish his own empire and expand the lands of “Dar al-Islam” or the land of Muslims. As for the local Hindu population, Babur was indifferent to their religious beliefs and practices, so long as they did not interfere with his mission.
These seemingly unrelated events do contain a common thread. Both efforts to expand religious powers were endeavors that constructed pagans as “others.” Christian and Muslim societies of the Middle Ages have been the subject of much research, but usually standing alone or studied together in locations where they came into contact or conflict with each other, such as the Holy Land during the Crusades. This type of research, while extremely important and informative, provides a limited perspective into these two distinct cultural realms. Few scholars have studied the way Christians and Muslims viewed and constructed pagans, a group they both fought against but each in their own distinct way. A comparative analysis of Christian and Muslim constructions of pagan people as inferior “others” has the potential to help historians to understand both Christian and Muslim cultures and societies of the medieval period.Light is essential in our everyday lives. We need it to see—when in cars, when finding keyholes, even when we’re outdoors. We have noticed that many everyday carry, or EDC, essentials are too dull, and current EDC flashlights are too big and bulky, so we set out to create our own.
It all started when I needed a flashlight one evening after I dropped my phone under my car. I immediately needed a light but did not have one. I thought to myself, "It would be great to have a flashlight, but the size of a bullet."
Inspired by the 9mm round.
A sleek, minimal, and beautiful design, we present to you BULLET, providing a strong LED mini flashlight in its most minimal form, while eliminating bulky flashlights from your everyday carry. Minimize your life.
Everyday Carry Done Right
We believe that your everyday carry items are a reflection of you and your lifestyle. BULLET’S functionality, beauty, and minimalism make it the best everyday carry tiny LED flashlight available. The easiest way to carry your flashlight is on your keys! Save the space in your pockets for what truly matters.
A quick quarter rotation on the head of the BULLET to turn it on, and a quick rotation back to turn it off. We wanted to get rid of unnecessary buttons to keep it slick and precise. A built in key chain allows you to carry BULLET with you everywhere you go.
Bullet clipped on a backpack.
Available in Matte Black, Gunmetal, and now Blue!
We took the smallest, sleekest possible design, and combined it with aircraft-grade aluminum and an anodized finish to bring you a powerful tiny LED light, perfect for everyday use. We believe that the shape, and size kept the design minimal, functional and easy to carry, completely hassle-free in any situation.
Measuring in at an incredible 10.5mm x 30mm and weighing only 6 grams, BULLET is the perfect size flashlight for modern day wear. Powered by three LR41 Button Cell batteries to produce 15 lumens of light, keep it with you at all times, anywhere you go.
Why BULLET?
We like keeping things simple, and easy to carry around everywhere you go. What makes us different? We eliminate the bulk, weight, and hassle from traditional everyday carry flashlights, creating a seamless experience for you every single day.
Compared to other alternatives, the choice is simple.
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Designed with aerospace-grade aluminum and a sleek anodized finish, the BULLET is built for any situation possible. Rain, sleet, hail, snow, the BULLET will illuminate in any weather, helping solve any problem.
An LED light is ideal for everyday use over a long period of time. Never worry about breaking the light, since no glass or filament is used, or replacing it, since LEDs can last a lifetime. Battery's also last much longer with LED light, saving you both time and money in the long haul.
What is an LED you ask? Well, for all you who don’t know, LED’s are the most efficient kind of light bulbs out on the market today. One small bulb can last you anywhere from 25,000 to 100,000 hours. Of course you'll still have to replace the batteries periodically.
We went through many iterations, finishes, and housings for the design of BULLET.
We decided to use the bottom twist due to the leverage provided by the key ring. By holding onto the keyring, twisting to turn on was easiest. Furthermore, the triangle ring offered increased stability when on a keychain.
Original Prototype Rendering 1
Original Prototype Rendering 2
Original Prototype Rendering 3
SPECIFICATIONS
Weight: 6 Grams
Width: 10.5mm
Length: 30mm
Materials: Aerospace Grade Aluminum Alloy
Battery: LR41 Button Cell
Type of Bulb: LED 5mm
Special Features: On/Off Twist Setting, and Mini Keyring Attached
Colors: Matte Black/ Gunmetal
Slughaus is a small company based out of San Francisco with the sole mission of helping you stay minimal and functional, all at the same time. We believe that your everyday carry essentials influence your lifestyle. BULLETS' elegance inspires innovation, while its functionality keeps you minimal and on-the-go. We hope that our products not only help keep you minimal, but help mold your lifestyle as a whole.Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte at a news conference in Beijing on Oct. 19. (Jason Lee/Reuters)
In the few months he has been in power in the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte has seemingly convulsed relations between his country and the United States, a longtime ally and former colonial ruler. He has repeatedly made vulgar comments about America's president and envoy in Manila and, without much warning, threatened to throw out U.S. Special Forces operating in the country and end annual exercises with the U.S. military.
Duterte went one provocative step further on a visit to China this week.
“In this venue I announce my separation from the United States," he declared in Beijing's Great Hall of the People. He would go on to suggest that “Americans are loud, sometimes rowdy,” and that their vocal chords are “not adjusted to civility" — a rather peculiar claim given Duterte's notoriously salty tongue.
As my colleague Emily Rauhala reports, Duterte's camaraderie with China has surprised many and compelled even his own officials to attempt to backtrack. The U.S. State Department has expressed puzzlement.
“We are going to be seeking an explanation of exactly what the president meant when he talked about separation from us,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said. “It’s not clear to us exactly what that means and all its ramifications.”
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte clarified earlier comments about wanting to "separate" from the United States. At a news conference on Oct. 21, Duterte said he was not severing ties with the U.S., but instead wants to "separate" Manila's foreign policy from that of Washington. (Reuters)
Rauhala brings up a crucial point about Philippine public opinion: "Many Filipinos are also perplexed. Though opinion polls suggest the president remains popular at home, his anti-U.S. rhetoric is at odds with public opinion. The vast majority of Filipinos hold a positive view of the United States; many are skeptical of China."
This is undeniably true. According to Pew Research Center's last survey of global attitudes, no country in the world had a greater proportion of people who admired the United States than the Philippines.
In 2015, 92 percent of respondents in the Philippines said they had a favorable view of the United States; only 54 percent said they regarded China favorably. Filipinos' enthusiasm for the United States was considerably greater than attitudes in other traditional American allies in Asia, including Japan and South Korea. As one Manila-based newspaper put it in 2014, "Filipinos like the U.S. even more than the Americans do."
(Pew Research Center, Global indicators Database)
That 92 percent figure becomes even more striking when you set it against Washington's allies in Europe.
In other words, Duterte's hostility toward Washington is hardly reflected in the broader attitudes of his public. Of course, there is and has always been a constituency in the country suspicious of American activities, first in the form of Washington's imperial rule and then its subsequent military presence. Duterte has championed that set of politics as part of a broader program of populism, raging against corruption and poverty and the elites and criminals who supposedly profit from the status quo.
Reports also suggest that his resentment is personal — connected even to an episode in his childhood when he was abused by an American Jesuit priest as a schoolchild.
“He is a very knee-jerk kind of politician who is extremely sensitive to criticisms and personalizes them,” Walden Bello, a Philippine academic and analyst, told the Financial Times this week. “L’état, c'est moi — that’s him.”
It'll be interesting to see what Pew's 2016 indicators in the wake of Duterte's rise reveal about any shift in sentiment toward the United States.
Read more:
Here's how one man survived when the 'death squad' came after him
Before he was the Philippines' president, Duterte was 'the Death Squad Mayor.'
The ‘son of a whore’ story is about so much more than Duterte’s dirty mouth
With China pressing south, U.S. ships return to the Philippines’ Subic BayAmericans now confuse renting money from the bank for true home ownership.
“The system of banking we have both equally and ever reprobated. I contemplate it as a blot left in all our Constitutions, which, if not covered, will end in their destruction, which is already hit by the gamblers in corruption, and is sweeping away in its progress the fortunes and morals of our citizens. Funding I consider as limited, rightfully, to a redemption of the debt within the lives of a majority of the generation contracting it; every generation coming equally, by the laws of the Creator of the world, to the free possession of the earth he made for their subsistence, unencumbered by their predecessors, who, like them, were but tenants for life.”
Thomas Jefferson
California borrowers created a culture of maximizing and servicing debt that makes them tenants for life. Thomas Jefferson would not recognize the concept we routinely accept as “ownership,” but he would have recognized the corruption of our lending gamblers sweeping away the fortunes and morals of our citizens.
A Conceptual History of Real Estate Ownership
In a pioneer society, people stake claims to real estate by using it. If property fails to produce food (income) and provide shelter, it has no value. Canadian and Siberian tundra is a modern pioneer expanse of thinly populated land of little value. On the frontier, owning is occupying land and making use of it.
Most pioneers live on a subsistence level, but increased settlement fosters a division of labor and fewer subsistence farmers. By necessity ownership becomes more complex as people enter into agreements where they exchange stored wealth (money) for shelter. Increased complexity requires government to maintain order. Bureaucrats keep ownership records, collect taxes, and ensure all encumbrances on land are dutifully noted.
Ownership is a special right of ongoing use, whereas rental is a contractual right of finite use followed by a reversion to owner. In societies of inherited multi-generational wealth, real estate is the best vehicle for transferring wealth because it provides a perpetual cashflow. With exception of low-yield savings accounts, no other asset class provides this feature.
One of the key features of true ownership is a lack of encumbrances. The more restrictions a property has on it, the smaller the bundle of rights an owner controls. For instance, if you pioneer a property in Northern Canada, nobody is going to review and approve your cabin’s front elevation or limit your exterior color choices as they will in a planned community in the United States. We give
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war, saber rattling, and nation building. In truth, both parties have reckless ideologies when it comes to spending and Ron Paul is not afraid to go against the establishment. Paul plans to cut back America’s swelling deficit by ending the war in Afghanistan, completely ending the war in Iraq, and closing down military bases around the world and bringing home those foreign-stationed troops.
And while some are tempted to say that such actions are too “liberal”, there is surprising support from the conservative side of the spectrum for Paul’s positions. Public Radio International aired an August 2011 segment titled “Trimming the Defense Budget, Tea Party Style” and although Ron Paul’s name is never mentioned, based on the interviewees’ statements it’s tempting to say that every one of them would feel comfortable with Ron Paul’s proposals. Chris Littleton of the Ohio Liberty Council stated that America’s foreign policy has lost sight of its Constitutional mission:
“It does not include being the world’s police, being the world’s peacemaker, or trying to advance our culture or causes around the world as a singular purpose. It’s for common defense,” said Littleton. “And so if we are not directly threatened, and we are not involved in an altercation, that we need to defend ourselves (from), then we can absolutely scale back our operations from throughout the world. So I’d be for both domestic and foreign military installations brought back, trimmed down, and hopefully many of them even eliminated.”
Tea Party supporter Jason Rink stated:
“Traditional conservatives, they believed we should have a humble foreign policy, they believed that we shouldn’t police the world, they believed that we shouldn’t get into foreign wars, and that our defense spending needed to be something that we addressed and we were modest about,”
Even Sarah Palin, who isn’t exactly perfectly aligned with Ron Paul’s vision of foreign policy, has made recent statements on foreign policy that Ron Paul supporters would be comfortable with. In a speech made at Colorado Christian University in May 2011, Politico reported:
First, Palin said, “we should only commit our forces when clear and vital American interests are at stake. Period.” That point led to her second, dismissing nation-building as a “nice idea in theory,” but not the “main purpose” guiding American foreign policy. Palin continued down that track by insisting that a president must be able to articulate “clearly defined objectives” before foreign interventions – a standard she has recently said Obama failed to live up to in Libya. As her fourth point, Palin declared that “American soldiers must never be put under foreign command.”
Is there a shift in the winds about America’s foreign policy and the debt it entails? It would seem so. A March 2010 Zogby poll revealed:
More than twice as many U.S. adults (58%) say that debt owed to China is a more serious threat to the long-term security and well-being of the U.S than is terrorism from radical Islamic terrorists (27%). Interestingly there was little variation by party identification with a majority of Democrats, Republicans and independents all agreeing that the debt owed by the United States to China poses the greater threat.
In an article titled “Ron Paul: You Want Him”, NorthwestMilitary.com reported that Paul, who served as a flight surgeon in the Air Force and the Air National Guard, raised more money for campaign donations from active duty military personal than any other candidate in his 2008 presidential run and that he repeated the same feat in 2011. Quoting campaign manager Jesse Benton: “Our fighting men and women take an oath to protect America, defend our Constitution and defend our borders. They look at Ron Paul and see a leader who takes their oath seriously, and who will fight to ensure that we don’t misrepresent that oath by sending them off to police the world, instead of defending our country“.
And despite the government propaganda, spending money on war does not stimulate the economy, it only makes the GDP look more impressive because government spending is a component of GDP. If war spending was so beneficial, perhaps we could just build a fleet of aircrafts, sink them directly to the bottom of the sea, and repeat the whole process over and over again until the economy improves. If that idea doesn’t make a lot of sense, then you understand perfectly how Washington works. Washington’s central planning to stimulate the economy inevitably fails, and then the politicians from D.C. (the District of Criminals) plea for more power so that they can spend more borrowed money so that it appears that they are “doing something”. As Ron Paul’s old friend Harry Browne used to say, “Government is good at one thing: It knows how to break your legs, hand you a crutch, and say, ‘See, if it weren’t for the government, you wouldn’t be able to walk’.” If you want to get the economy rolling again, capital needs to be available to the private sector instead of being needlessly wasted on war. The surest path to big government is war, and the surest path to more war is big government.
Budget Balancing Through Domestic Spending Cuts
For his 2012 campaign platform, Ron Paul introduced his “Plan to Restore America” which calls for abolishing five cabinet departments: Education, Housing & Urban Development, Commerce, Interior, Energy. The Transportation Security Administration is also abolished, and along with other cuts such as a 10% reduction to the federal workforce, Ron Paul plans to reduce the deficit by $1 trillion his first year in office and balance the budget in year three. There are mild changes to Social Security and Medicare. The Paul plan “Honors our promise to our seniors and veterans, while allowing young workers to opt out. Block grants Medicaid and other welfare programs to allow States the flexibility and ingenuity they need to solve their own unique problems without harming those currently relying on the programs.”
Why focus so much on balancing the budget when entitlements are also going to be a big problem in the near future? The Washington establishment is going to attack Ron Paul from every angle just for trying to balance the budget with his proposed cuts. “Ron Paul doesn’t care about education!” is the cry you’ll hear, as if the Department of Education was some vital component of government that we somehow managed to live without from 1776 to 1980, a period in which Americans must have been swinging through the vines of trees looking for breakfast when they weren’t clubbing potential mates over the head and dragging them back their caves, hair clenched in fist. Yet when Alexis de Tocqueville visited America in the 1830s, he was impressed that America’s literacy rate was about 90 to 95 percent, higher than any other country at the time (Tocqueville’s France was about 5%). Perhaps Americans were able to educate themselves without a Department of Education and perhaps Americans were capable of reading and writing more than just what was carved inside a cave. The bottom line is that the Washington establishment will be breathing down fire at Ron Paul just for trying to balance the budget, and perhaps Ron Paul is wise in trying not to slay too many dragons at once by leaving open the challenge of massive entitlement reform. One thing is for sure – no one can legitimately claim that Ron Paul is going to dump grandma off the cliff.
Diffusing the Fed’s Inflation Bomb
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it. – Frédéric Bastiat – The Law. 1850
If the debt bomb is one financial weapon of mass destruction that will destroy America if not resolved by balancing the budget, inflation is the other. The difference is that there is a timer on the debt bomb but the inflation bomb is more of a wild card that can go off at any second. What causes inflation? An increase in the money supply. Who increases the money supply? The Federal Reserve. Who needs the Federal Reserve? Nobody, except the banks that expect to get bailed out when they make risky decisions that devastate the economy. This is exactly the reason Ron Paul wants to abolish the Federal Reserve.
Too often establishment figures in the media say that abolishing the Fed, which wasn’t even signed into existence until 1913, is a “crazy” idea. What you won’t often hear is whose crazy idea it was to create the Federal Reserve in the first place. In “Paul Warburg’s Crusade to Establish a Central Bank in the United States”, available on the Minneapolis Fed’s website, author Michael A. Whitehouse writes:
“One evening in early November 1910, Warburg and a small party of men from New York quietly boarded Sen. Aldrich’s private railway car, ostensibly for a trip south to an exclusive hunting club on an island off the coast of Georgia. In addition to Warburg and Aldrich, the others, all highly regarded in the New York banking community, were: Frank Vanderlip, president of National City Bank; Harry P. Davison, a J.P. Morgan partner; Benjamin Strong, vice president of Banker’s Trust Co.; and A. Piatt Andrew, former secretary of the National Monetary Commission and now assistant secretary of the Treasury. The real purpose of this historic “duck hunt” was to formulate a plan for US banking and currency reform that Aldrich could present to Congress.”
Paul Warburg was a partner in Kuhn Loeb & Company and a representative of the Rothschild European banking dynasty. His brother was Max Warburg, head of the Warburg banking consortium in Germany and the Netherlands. Senator Nelson Aldrich, who was considered one of the most powerful men in Washington D.C., was a Republican “whip” in the Senate as well as a business associate of J.P. Morgan, and father-in-law to John D. Rockefeller, Jr. According to Jekyll Island Museum historian Tyler E. Bagwell, this group was also accompanied by Charles D. Norton, president of J.P. Morgan’s First National Bank of New York.
The important thing to take notice here is that this group represented an enormous concentration of wealth. Author G. Edward Griffin writes:
An article appeared in the New York Times on May 3, 1931, commenting of the death of George Baker, one of Morgan’s closest associates. It said: “One-sixth of the total wealth of the world was represented by members of the Jekyll Island Club”. The reference was only to those in the Morgan Group (members of the Jekyll Island Club). It did not include the Rockefeller group or the European financiers. When all of these are combined, the previous estimate that one-fourth of the world’s wealth was represented by these groups is probably conservative”
Now if a group of the world’s most powerful oil tycoons gathered in secret to write legislation to be presented to Congress, you can be sure that this legislation would be used for the benefit of the oil industry. If a group representing the biggest tobacco companies gathered in secret to write legislation, you can bet it would be used to benefit the big tobacco companies. If a group of bankers representing one-fourth of the world’s wealth gathered in secret to create a bill, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the bill would benefit the big bankers. And indeed it did. In a July 1914 issue of The Independent, Nelson Aldrich stated “Before the passage of this Act, the New York bankers could only dominate the reserves of New York. Now we were able to dominate the bank reserves of the entire country”. What the Federal Reserve Act allowed was for banks to create money out of thin air, earn interest on it, and get bailed out when overextended. Or at least the big, powerful, connected banks get the bailouts. They are deemed “too big to fail” while the smaller banks are deemed “too small to rescue” and are often consolidated by the big banks. This system allows for the price to be paid for by the public in the form of inflation – inflation caused by creating money out of thin air by the banking system and inflation caused by money created out of thin air by the Federal Reserve System to bail out the banks. If the Fed was created by, for, and of the banks, you shouldn’t be too surprised that the banks are still running the Fed today. In his outstanding May 2009 article for Slate entitled “Fed Dread”, former New York Attorney General and former Governor Eliot Spitzer described how the New York Federal Reserve Board is composed of members chosen by the private banks as well as members chosen as public representatives. Spitzer writes:
So whom have the banks chosen to be the public representatives on the board during the past decade, as the crisis developed and unfolded? Dick Fuld, the former chairman of Lehman; Jeff Immelt, the chairman of GE; Gene McGrath, the chairman of Con Edison; Ronay Menschel, the chairwoman of Phipps Houses and also, not insignificantly, the wife of Richard Menschel, a former senior partner at Goldman. Whom did the Board of Governors choose as its public representatives? Steve Friedman, the former chairman of Goldman; Pete Peterson; Jerry Speyer, CEO of real estate giant Tishman Speyer; and Jerry Levin, the former chairman of Time Warner. These were the people who were supposedly representing our interests!
If the Federal Reserve corruption and the Wall Street bailouts weren’t enough to boil your blood, consider the national security side of the issue. The Fed basically acts as the federal government’s credit card, paying the bills for unsustainable military and domestic spending. If America stays on the path of unsustainability, elements beyond the U.S. government’s control could cause that credit card to get cut up and the currency that pays the credit card bills to become worthless, leading to a hyperinflationary collapse. Gregory Zerzan was Deputy Assistant Secretary and Acting Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the administration of President George W. Bush. In his October 2009 article entitled “Dollar is a National Security Issue”, he wrote:
The ability to cripple the U.S. economy by massively devaluing the dollar is the type of “asymmetric warfare” that the People’s Liberation Army has discussed openly in recent years. This is not to suggest that the People’s Republic wants to destroy the dollar, nor that doing so would come without cost. But such power would clearly give China tremendous leverage.
Dr. Jerome Corsi reported on a 2010 Joint Operating Environment report released by the United States Joint Forces Command concerning America’s debt:
With regard to national-defense implications of the deteriorating U.S. economic position, the JOE 2010 worried that should China demand higher interest rates as an inducement to continuing to buy the U.S. Treasury debt needed to finance continuing trillion-dollar U.S. federal budget deficits, the U.S. could suffer a “hard landing” that could increase the perception the U.S. no longer controls its financial future. Noting President Obama’s warning that the U.S. economy will add $9 trillion debt over the next decade, the JOE 2010 warned the result could be “a decreased ability of the United States to allocate dollars to defense.”
Humor writer P.J. O’Rourke once stated that giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. I would add credit cards to that list. Since the Fed essentially acts as a credit card and the government just can’t help itself, the only solution is to abolish the Federal Reserve. Liberals should cheer for the end of Wall Street favoritism and bailouts. Conservatives should cheer for a stable national security outlook. Libertarians should cheer for the free market to determine the price of borrowing money instead of a quasi-government agency headed by a Soviet style commissar. All Americans should cheer for an end to inflation. Thomas Sowell, a very well known economist who is highly praised by conservatives, libertarians and independents, even said on Fox Business Network’s Freedom Watch with Judge Napolitano in January 2011 that “judged by its track record, there’s really no argument for continuing the Federal Reserve System.” Sowell’s agreement that the Fed should be abolished should for many put to rest the idea that ending the Fed is “crazy”.
2012: No One But Paul
In 2008, Americans were hoping for change but got more of the same. Barrack Obama brought to the table the same aggressive and bankrupting foreign policy of George W. Bush. He significantly increased the number of troops in Afghanistan and continued the Bush failed nation building policy, and all the while Afghan president Hamid Karzai was proclaiming “If I had to choose sides today, I’d choose the Taliban,” over the United States. Obama further launched air strikes in Libya with no Congressional authorization and sent 100 U.S. troops to Uganda on his own authority. He even wanted to keep troops in Iraq past the withdrawal deadline set by George W. Bush but the Iraqi government resisted during negotiations.
On the finance side, Obama supported the bank bailouts just like George W. Bush. Obama named Tim Geithner, who was president of the New York Federal Reserve during the Bush years and during the 2008 financial collapse, as Secretary of Treasury. Geithner hired Goldman Sachs lobbyist Mark Patterson as his chief of staff. Obama’s Deputy Secretary of State Jacob Lew was the CFO of Citi Group until 2008, and Michael Froman was another CFO of Citi who became assistant to President Obama and Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economic Affairs. Obama chose the same failed Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, that Bush appointed. Search Youtube for “Ben Bernanke Was Wrong” if you have 5 minutes of free time. For those who believe that insufficient regulation was a problem that lead to the financial crisis, note that Bernanke then picked Patrick Parkinson to be in charge of regulation and supervision at the Federal Reserve. According to Prof. William K. Black of University of Missouri–Kansas City, “Patrick Parkenson was the person Alan Greenspan used to lead the charge against Brooksley Born in 2000 and 1999 when she wanted to regulate credit default swaps- which is what blew up AIG and is where we bailed out Goldman Sachs.” The economy is still in the tank and Obama continues to rack up massive deficits George W. Bush style.
Ron Paul’s top Republican opponents in the 2012 race seem to be Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Both men supported the bailouts, both men want to spill more American blood and treasure in futile foreign misadventures, both men have no serious plan to balance the budget in 4 years, and both men are serial flip-floppers who are suddenly appalled by Obamacare even though one enacted state run healthcare as governor and the other supported George W. Bush’s Medicare D drug entitlement program which former U.S. Comptroller General David Walker called “the most fiscally irresponsible piece of legislation since the 1960s.” In the anti-establishment atmosphere of the Tea Party, if Newt Romney becomes the Republican nominee after stimulus supporter (just so long as it wasn’t Obama’s stimulus) John McCain, after 2-term neocon budget busting bailout boy George W. Bush, after Mr. Moderate Bob Dole (who urged passing of Obama’s health care reform bill in 2009 by the way), and after “No new taxes” George H.W. Bush, then Republicans truly are a lost cause. The Who could rewrite a few lyrics and release “Will Get Fooled Again” that people could play back while laughing and pointing at the GOP. It could be the bestselling single of 2012.
In the anti-establishment atmosphere of Occupy Wall Street, the same goes for Democrats and voters in general if it comes down to Ron Paul vs. Obama and Obama wins. And despite what the Republican establishment would have you believe, Ron Paul is very much electable and stands a good chance against Obama. In April 2010, Rasmussen released a poll saying it would be virtually dead even if it came down to Paul (41%) vs. Obama (42%). This of course was before the surge Paul is currently experiencing in Iowa as of December 2011, where many consider him a strong candidate to win the Iowa primary. For comparison’s sake, Rasmussen’s Dec. 2011 poll showed it would also be virtually dead even between Romney (43%) and Obama (42%). However, Ron Paul performs the best of the Republicans against Obama among independents according to recent polls by Public Policy Polling.
No one but Paul is afraid of bucking the system with a serious proposal to balance the budget. No one but Paul has any credibility when it comes to opposing banker bailouts and hacking at the root of the problem – the Federal Reserve. No one but Paul takes seriously the twin financial weapons of mass destruction: debt and inflation.
Think about what life would be like should the debt time bomb finally go off. Think back to that 2007 GAO report: by 2040, nearly every dollar the government collects in taxes will be needed for Social Security, Medicare, and paying interest on the national debt. Not a penny will be used to pay down the debt, only paying off the interest on the debt. Not a penny will be left for even the most basic function of government – defense. We will all be defenseless tax slaves living in a black hole of debt in a nation that is no longer worth defending. Passing the debt onto those too young to vote or not yet born is taxation without representation, the very thing America rebelled against in 1776.
Think about what life would be like if the inflation bomb goes off. The cost of borrowing money skyrockets, businesses are afraid to make any long term deals when the value of the currency is uncertain, fuel becomes too expensive for anyone or anything to move around, savings get wiped out, and the economy grinds to an even bigger halt. People will panic and clamor for the government to “do something” and the people in charge at the government will be the very people who got us into the problem in the first place. They will offer band-aid solutions at best, and tyrannical solutions at worst, especially if it’s not just high inflation but hyperinflation.
Despite the rhetoric that you’re likely to hear from the establishment, Ron Paul will not bring anarchy to America. His proposals will take us back to 2006 levels of spending. Government will still be too big in my opinion. Dr. Paul won’t be able to achieve the libertarian utopia he and I would like to live in. What he can do is stop the bleeding and offer his informed medical opinion on how to best treat the wound. When Americans find that the sky isn’t falling despite the “radical” steps Paul will take, perhaps then we can take a long, hard look at ourselves and decide that stopping the bleeding was a good first step, and starting the process of healing is a good second one.Captain the Vegendary Heroes, survive the Zombiegeddon and take revenge upon the birds, the pigs, and the zombies! Enjoy this mind-blowing travesty of mobile game hits! Enemies have joined forces to destroy all plants! They trample down young innocent seedlings, besiege the allotment and steal the seeds! Take charge of Vegendary Heroes special fertilisation squad and box the blighters mugs! To win, you will have to use anything that can shoot – and you'll find that nearly everything CAN! Discover: • 11 superfighters, each with a unique fighting style (and potential for development!) • A host of enemies endowed with various abilities (any resemblance to famous persons is entirely coincidental :) • 45 fascinating missions: base defense, hostage rescue, carpet bombing, etc. (we won't leek [gettit?] any more secrets for fear of spoiling your pleasure!) • Elementary controls – you shoot where you tap! • And if that doesn’t fill your boots - for afters we got screwby bonuses and SUPER BOSSES! The final battle will require total involvement: baste the birds with tomatoes, take advantage of carrot ordnance, chop zombies and sprinkle on the salad to watch your green-as-grass recruits grow into seasoned sergeants. Download it for free and let them see who is the veggy here!General Musharraf’s return
"Today, God has given me the opportunity to set the tone for my political legacy. Come join me in changing Pakistan’s destiny. It is not an easy task but one we must work for, as Pakistan is ours. ‘All Pakistan Muslim League’ is our platform from where I will work tirelessly to serve Pakistan and bring back national unity-Pakistan First." With those words on one of his Facebook pages, as promised, former Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf appears to have launched his new political party out of London. Clearly, he is attuned to the technology of today. But is he attuned to Pakistan?
Musharraf claims to have more than 300,000 youth followers. He has also attracted some serious Pakistani Diaspora supporters, including successful entrepreneurs. But his key support comes from his inner team whom he promoted while in power in Pakistan. Few major politicians inside the country appear to have spoken publicly about their support for him. Some who have met him and then are reported by his media staff to have considered joining his campaign to return to Pakistan in political triumph privately deny that they wish to join him. If his advance guard is telling him that the ground is ready for him in Pakistan, Musharraf needs to do some independent checking. The deck is stacked against him.
First, he faces personal danger from the moment he lands. The militants whom he challenged and attacked have long memories. Second, the leading political parties are more than likely to coalesce against him at the provincial and federal level. He knows well from his own time in power that the rules of the game favor those in power. Imposition of restrictions on public gatherings, closure of meeting places, and other ways of disrupting a political campaign, including ostensibly for Musharraf’s own personal safety (as he did by imposing restrictions on Benazir Bhutto immediately after her return in 2007) will likely hobble his campaign. His own Pakistan Muslim League (Q), also known as the King’s Party during his presidency, has split and is largely out of the central political game for now. If Musharraf can manage to bring all the bits and pieces of the Muslim League together under his new All Pakistan Muslim League, he may have a core to launch his campaign. But current indications are not very bright on that score. The Muslim League over time has become known as a party of hangers-on and relies on official largesse for life support. Out of power generals and politicians cannot give the Muslim League what it needs to survive.
And then there is the Pakistani Army. It has turned the corner on its former chief, as it always does. A previous Army chief, General Mirza Aslam Beg, found little support inside army headquarters when he launched his party. He has had no traction since. Indeed, few Pakistanis would be able to tell you its name (the Awami Qiyadat Party). Recent conversations with officers at different ranks and including many senior generals about Musharraf’s standing indicate clearly that they resent what they call Musharraf’s move away from professionalism of the army and infusion of the army into civilian jobs. They are trying to restore that inner core of the army’s professionalism now and would resist being drawn into the political fray by Musharraf’s return. Most of Musharraf’s favorite generals are no longer in key positions inside the army. Some of them have been superseded in the recent promotions as General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chosen by Musharraf to succeed himself, puts his own stamp on the upper echelons of the army and on the institution as a whole. Finally, the chances of Musharraf being charged with "high treason" and other crimes for upending a democratically elected government in October 1999 and thus drawing the Pakistan army into the defendant’s box in court worry the military high command enormously.
While the weakness of the current civilian government may appear to be a tempting target, the negatives surrounding Musharraf’s return militate against the successful rebirth of Musharraf the politician. For his own sake and to save Pakistan from further political turmoil, he may wish to re-examine his plans to return. He could do a lot for Pakistan from his current perch abroad by drawing together bright young Pakistanis who could share their knowledge and experience and help foster the rebirth of civil society, using the technological instruments of our times to foster change for the better. He could also perform the role of a philanthropist and an apolitical spokesman for Pakistanis at home and abroad rather than someone who is missing the trappings of power. As he would put it, he needs to place "Pakistan first!"
Shuja Nawaz is director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council in Washington DC.Essendon CEO, Xavier Campbell, has provided an update on the coaching selection process in the wake of ongoing media speculation.
Campbell wanted to be firm the process is ongoing and that a decision had not been reached on the senior coaching position.
"We have met and had positive discussions with a number of high quality candidates and we continue to do so," Campbell said.
"We said from the outset that in order to respect the confidentiality and integrity of the selection process we wouldn't provide a running commentary, but the sub-committee felt it was necessary to provide an update in light of ongoing media speculation which is incorrect and misinformed.
“There has been no offer tabled, informally or formally, to any candidate for the senior coaching position at the Club.
"We are currently midway through the process and the sub-committee firmly believe we have a number of quality candidates that could coach the Essendon Football Club.
"We will take the appropriate time necessary to make sure we select the best person to coach the Club next season and beyond."
The Club anticipates a decision on the successful candidate will be made in October.Cancun-Riviera Maya Wine & Food Fest 2013 Coverage (Photos)
I’ve been spending my winter months in the beautiful Riviera Maya, (purely for Luxury Branded research, of course) with the local cuisine being my top highlight. My timing was perfect too, as I found myself in Playa del Carmen for the second annual Cancun-Riviera Maya Wine & Food Fest. This is my first real trip experiencing Mexico, so the opportunity to taste the best of this country could not be missed. For the four day festival, Roz du Jour (fashion blogger/photographer and our newest team member) and I were able to attend a variety of amazing events. We took tons of photos to share, but we can’t truly express the flavours we experienced. You’ll just have to book tickets and fly down next year!
The Future of Cuisine: Star Chefs Panel
I attended an opening event for the festival which invited acclaimed chef Massimo Bottura from Italy and chef Enrique Olvera from Mexico. Both have received recognition as being two of the best chefs in the world, as well as running two of the best restaurants in the world. The spoke on their experiences, history and the future of cuisine. In attendance were local government and tourism officials, other top chefs, representatives for the best local hotels and restaurants, local gastronomy students and other VIPs. The event took place in the scenic Xcaret Park.
Both Massimo and Enrique were both excited for the future and definitely got the crowd feeling the same way. One story that the crowd really enjoyed was Massimo’s first visit to Playa del Carmen in the 80s. Not just because of his take on the cuisine and culture at the time, but because it also included gunshots and a car chase when he visited the ruins of Chichen itza (you’ll have to ask him for the details lol).
Click on an image below to open the full-size gallery:
Enterance to Star Chefs Panel at Xcaret Park Setting up for the Star Chefs Panel Star Chefs Panel for the Cancun-Riviera Maya Wine & Food Fest Chefs Massimo Bottura and Enrique Olvera Cancun-Riviera Maya Wine & Food Fest Star Chefs Panel
**Follow the links below for our posts and photo galleries**Image caption Catherine O'Brien is having surgery next month
A woman says she is donating a kidney to a stranger in order to repay the NHS for saving her husband's life.
Catherine O'Brien, 37, from Salford, Greater Manchester said she is having surgery to remove one of her kidneys and become a living donor next month.
She said her husband Shaun found a cancerous lump on his neck in 2015. He was given the all-clear following surgery and treatment in March.
"I'm sharing a spare rather than losing one," said truck driver Catherine.
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Catherine O’Brien explains why she will donate her kidney to a stranger
She said she heard of another woman becoming a living donor and turned to her husband and said: "I could do that."
Catherine contacted Salford Royal Hospital and "it went from there".
'Incredible generosity'
Although she has never had surgery before, she said: "I'm sort of excited as I know the impact it will have on someone and their family."
She said her husband was "100% behind me".
"I suppose he's worried... it is a major operation but it is a very safe and highly successful."
Catherine said she was not concerned about problems which may occur as a result of having only one remaining kidney in future.
"I could get hit by a bus tomorrow. I'm just providing the organ; the NHS are doing the hard work."
Some risks for living kidney donors
Image copyright Getty Images
Infection
Blood clots
Damage to major blood vessels
Damage to organs near to the kidney
Risk of damage to mental health if things do not work out as expected
Slightly higher chance of a small increase in blood pressure or the amount of protein in urine as a result of having one kidney
Overall risk of developing significant kidney disease in your remaining kidney after donation is very low, occurring in less than one in 200 (0.5%) donor
Slightly increased risk of gestational hypertension or pre-eclampsia
Ongoing fatigue and persistent pain have been reported by small numbers
Source: NHS
NHS Blood and Transplant said more than 500 people have helped save the life of stranger by becoming a living kidney donor since changes to the law made it possible a decade ago.
Lead nurse for Living Donation at NHS Blood and Transplant Lisa Burnapp said: "Nearly 300 people died waiting for a kidney transplant last year.
"Hundreds of people have had their lives saved and transformed in reaching this milestone over the past decade, thanks to the incredible generosity of these donors."The received wisdom about television scheduling is that the closer you get to summer, the worse things get. It’s true, but thankfully standing between us and the parched televisual wasteland looming on the horizon is the hulking bulwark of May. Blooming flowers be damned; we’ve got regicidal Shakespearean drama and Birmingham crime gangs.As the BBC’s Shakespearean vessel lays anchor once more, the big news is that Benedict Cumberbatch is playing Richard III. But this is so much more than a star vehicle; director Dominic Cook and writer Ben Power take Shakespeare’s first history tetralogy, famously unwieldly material, and condense it into three feature length instalments of throne-toppling intrigue. Tom Sturridge is particularly magnificent as Henry IV, a peace-lover facing down insurrection.As Cillian Murphy, Helen McCrory and co. return to our screens, expect more pistol-toting, more trilby-sporting, and more sharp-suited chaos. Chances are you’re already au fait with the BBC’s hit drama but if not, then you’ve still got time to catch up before the third season gets underway. The story of an organised crime gang in post-WWI Birmingham (and later London) makes for compulsive viewing.National treasure status is only conferred on a select few, and David Attenborough is surely among them. Nothing says Sunday evening quite like the great naturalist’s voice. He’s introduced generation after generation to the inestimable wonders of the natural world, and this year he turns 90. To celebrate his birthday, the BBC will be launching Attenborough season; among much else, they'll be screening Zoo Quest, his first major show, in full colour. Very much of its era, each episode saw Attenborough travel to a different country to capture an animal to take back to London Zoo. Yes, really.Who better to star in France’s first Netflix original series than Gerard Depardieu, titan of the nation’s screen? Yes, recent press attention might have focused on his somewhat erratic behaviour, but there’s little doubting his acting nous. He stars as the mayor of the southern French city, embroiled in a fearsome competition with a young pretender. Early buzz surrounding the show suggests cinematic production values, further sweetening the deal.In some ways, it’s surprising that a show like Billions has taken so long to be made. With Wolf of Wall Street and The Big Short proving that financial malpractice can be immensely watchable, this Showtime series feels long overdue. Wolf Hall and Homeland star Damian Lewis plays a rogue hedge fund manager, and Paul Giamatti the US attorney trying to bring him to justice.The Church currently pays tax on several properties it owns that are commercial enterprises but is exempt if at least some of the activities on the property are "non-commercial" - for example a chapel in a hotel.
"The regulatory framework will be definite by January 1, 2013 - the start of the fiscal year - and will fully respect the (European) Community law," Prime Minister Mario Monti's government said in a statement late Tuesday.
In February, the government had amended Italy's property tax law to end the Church's privileges amid rising calls for the Vatican to share in debt crisis sacrifices and in the face of intense scrutiny from the European Commission.
On Monday the Council of State, Italy's highest ranking court for administrative litigation, rejected the decree. But the government insisted everyone would pay property tax, Church included.
In 2010 the EU opened an investigation into whether tax breaks enjoyed by some Church properties in Italy could be classed as illegal state aid.GOMTV StarCraft 2 Open Ro8 Day 2 - Live Report
MarineKing, MC, choya, and Jinro fight for the remaining two spots in the semi finals.
GSL Season 3 - Quarter Finals
December 7th, 11:00 CET
MarinekingPrime 1-3 oGsMC
LiquidJinro 3-2 choyafOu
13:55 - That's it for today! The semi finals will start on Thursday:
Some photos from Fomos.kr:
Some photos from Fomos.kr:
13:55 - Jinro interview:
Q: You made top 4, say some words
“ First it was the round of eight and the S-code, now round of 4, I'm so happy ”
Q: In game five your opponent didn't get thermal lance, how about that?
“ I'm happy he did that mistake, it sucks for him, but good for me ”
Q: You made the top four, your next opponent is MC, what are you going to do to prepare?
“ The same I did for this one, there's not much I
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inside their heads and understanding what they need to hear,” he told me later. “It really feels great to know I’m helping people in pain.”
***
To understand how the credit-card industry got interested in psychology, you have to go way back, to a time when many Americans didn’t have a credit card, when almost every company charged the same interest rate regardless of a cardholder’s riskiness and when people often paid off their entire balance each month. All the way back, that is, to the 1980s.
Just a little more than two decades ago, the credit-card business was a quiet, slightly boring industry dominated by banks looking for easy revenue. Card issuers made money by collecting annual dues and interest payments from cardholders as well as fees from merchants each time a customer used a card. Then the math whizzes arrived. They emphasized that the biggest profits didn’t come from people who always paid off their bills but rather from less-responsible clients who never paid their entire balance, and thus could be milked through silently skyrocketing interest rates, late fees and other penalties. Since 1995, the percentage of the industry’s income from cardholder fees has more than doubled to 40 percent. In 2005, as the push to sign up cardholders peaked, the industry sent out more than 10.2 billion credit-card solicitations, which would cover more than the entire world’s population. Two years later, card companies collected $40.7 billion in profits before taxes, according to R. K. Hammer, a credit-card advisory firm. Today Americans carry an average of 5.3 all-purpose cards in their wallets, and the average household has $10,679 in credit-card debt, according to the industry publication The Nilson Report.
But giving credit cards to riskier customers posed a problem: How do you know which cardholders will pay something each month, providing fat profits, and which will simply run up a huge tab and then disappear?
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The Ph.D.’s arrived at two solutions. The first was to create thousands of new kinds of cards with their own credit limits, terms and interest rates. Such a strategy theoretically protected companies by limiting how much a cardholder could buy and by charging sufficiently high interest rates to ensure that if a few cardholders walked away, the companies still made plenty of money.
The other solution was learning to predict how different types of customers would behave. Card companies began running tens of thousands of experiments each year, testing the emotions elicited by various card colors and the appeal of different envelope sizes, for instance, or whether new immigrants were more responsible than cardholders born in this country. By understanding customers’ psyches, the companies hoped, they could tell who was a bad risk and either deny their application or, for those who were already cardholders, start shrinking their available credit and increasing minimum payments to squeeze out as much cash as possible before they defaulted.
The exploration into cardholders’ minds hit a breakthrough in 2002, when J. P. Martin, a math-loving executive at Canadian Tire, decided to analyze almost every piece of information his company had collected from credit-card transactions the previous year. Canadian Tire’s stores sold electronics, sporting equipment, kitchen supplies and automotive goods and issued a credit card that could be used almost anywhere. Martin could often see precisely what cardholders were purchasing, and he discovered that the brands we buy are the windows into our souls — or at least into our willingness to make good on our debts. His data indicated, for instance, that people who bought cheap, generic automotive oil were much more likely to miss a credit-card payment than someone who got the expensive, name-brand stuff. People who bought carbon-monoxide monitors for their homes or those little felt pads that stop chair legs from scratching the floor almost never missed payments. Anyone who purchased a chrome-skull car accessory or a “Mega Thruster Exhaust System” was pretty likely to miss paying his bill eventually.
Martin’s measurements were so precise that he could tell you the “riskiest” drinking establishment in Canada — Sharx Pool Bar in Montreal, where 47 percent of the patrons who used their Canadian Tire card missed four payments over 12 months. He could also tell you the “safest” products — premium birdseed and a device called a “snow roof rake” that homeowners use to remove high-up snowdrifts so they don’t fall on pedestrians.
Testing indicated that Martin’s predictions, when paired with other commonly used data like cardholders’ credit histories and incomes, were often much more precise than what the industry traditionally used to forecast cardholder riskiness. By the time he publicized his findings, a small industry of math fanatics — many of them former credit-card executives — had started consulting for the major banks that issued cards, and they began using Martin’s findings and other research to build psychological profiles. Why did birdseed and snow-rake buyers pay off their debts? The answer, research indicated, was that those consumers felt a sense of responsibility toward the world, manifested in their spending on birds they didn’t own and pedestrians they might not know. Why were felt-pad buyers so upstanding? Because they wanted to protect their belongings, be they hardwood floors or credit scores. Why did chrome-skull owners skip out on their debts? “The person who buys a skull for their car, they are like people who go to a bar named Sharx,” Martin told me. “Would you give them a loan?”
Some credit-card companies began using these and other discoveries to find new customers and to scrutinize existing cardholders. A few firms began sending offers to people who had registered for baby showers or weddings, for example, since data showed that getting married or having a child — in addition to making people buy lots of new stuff — often also makes them more responsible. Other companies started cutting cardholders’ credit lines when charges appeared for pawnshops or marriage therapy because data indicated those were signs of desperation or depression that might lead to job loss.
But on the whole, companies, including Canadian Tire, stuck to more traditional methods of managing risk, like raising interest rates when someone was late paying a bill, because they worried that customers would revolt if they found out they were being studied so closely.
“If you show us what you buy, we can tell you who you are, maybe even better than you know yourself,” said Martin, who now works for Wal-Mart Canada. “But everyone was scared that people will resent companies for knowing too much.”
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Then last year, the economy blew up. Three things became obvious very quickly. First, all those extra charges that theoretically protected credit-card companies from losing money? Well, the worst-case models were way off, and some companies started hemorrhaging cash. Second, many of the predictions that card companies built around their understandings of people’s psyches were surprisingly accurate, even during an economic tsunami. And finally, when people start losing their jobs and feeling poor, it suddenly becomes very, very important to figure out how to persuade them to pay their credit-card bills.
Data-driven psychologists are now in high demand, and the industry is using them not only to screen out risky debtors but also to determine which cardholders need a phone call to persuade them to mail in a check. Most of the major credit-card companies have set up systems to comb through cardholders’ data for signs that someone is going to stop making payments. Are cardholders suddenly logging in at 1 in the morning? It might signal sleeplessness due to anxiety. Are they using their cards for groceries? It might mean they are trying to conserve their cash. Have they started using their cards for therapy sessions? Do they call the card company in the middle of the day, when they should be at work? What do they say when a customer-service representative asks how they’re feeling? Are their sighs long or short? Do they respond better to a comforting or bullying tone?
“It’s really hard to get clean insights of a cardholder’s state of mind,” said Andy Jennings, the head of research and development at FICO, one of the biggest and oldest analytic firms. “The more subtle the insight, the more cleverness finding it requires. If someone pays for a big cable television package each month with their card, are they rich? Or does it signal they don’t have the sense to avoid products they can’t afford? If they check their balance three times a day, are they worried or uptight? We may look at 300 different characteristics just to predict their delinquency risk.”
If a credit-card company detects unsettling patterns, it might start cutting credit lines, raising interest rates or accelerating repayment schedules. (Companies are expected to withdraw $2.7 trillion of credit by the end of 2010, according to a March report from the Meredith Whitney Advisory Group, a banking-analyst firm.) But the most useful information the card companies are deriving from their data are the insights that help them deepen their relationships with customers, particularly when a cardholder is going through a rough time. One of the strongest conclusions of the psychological studies is that cardholders are most likely to pay the bills of those companies with which they have an emotional connection.
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“Today the goal is for customers to get a warm-and-fuzzy feeling from their credit-card company,” said Carl Pascarella, a former chief executive of Visa USA. “If we have a deep relationship with you over a range of products and experiences, if we trust each other, you’ll listen when we give you advice.”
***
It was the first day of training for Bank of America’s newest credit-card customer-assistance employees, and some of the 12 new hires sitting around the classroom were a little confused.
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At another company, these employees — who earn about $35,000 a year — might be called “collection agents” or “at-risk account reps.” But at Bank of America, “our whole program is built around assisting the customer,” explained Ric Struthers, president of the credit-card division. “We call it assistance, because we’re here to find a solution.”
To see how one company transforms thousands of low-paid employees into telephone psychiatrists, I attended a day of Bank of America’s four-week training program at the company’s Delaware offices. (I was allowed to attend on the condition that I neither identify nor interview the trainees during the course.) At the front of the classroom, a poster explained the company’s “Customer Delight Model.” The trainees were supposed to “provide a delightful opening, ” “ employ delightful words,” “acknowledge and empathize” and “personalize with a POWER close.” They spent the morning discussing hypothetical cases, like a cardholder with twins whose husband announced he had fallen in love with another woman. He handed over divorce papers, had a moving truck outside and in short order took over the house and left the cardholder with two kids, only $400 a week and a ton of credit-card debt.
“I would tell her to castrate the man,” one trainee said to the others in her assigned group. “You know, Mel Gibson is getting a divorce, and what he’s doing to that poor woman, he should get his gut hacked up with a rusty knife. I would tell her to cut the husband where it matters, and then ask the new girlfriend what she thinks of what’s down there now!”
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These were not, apparently, the “delightful words” that Bank of America had in mind. A much younger male trainee opined that there might be more delicate ways of handling the conversation.
“What do you know?” the woman retorted. “You’ve never been married! You spent your whole life on vacation! Why don’t you learn something instead of moving your mouth all the time?”
Score one for the power close.
As the class discussed how to talk to someone who has recently lost her husband or her job, a young man raised his hand.
“Uh, when we hear a story like this, how are we going to ask them for money?”
“We’ll get to that later,” the instructor, Sheri Roberts, replied.
Then the trainees listened to a recording of an actual call with a cardholder who was about $10,000 in debt, divorced and couldn’t pay her bills. The Bank of America representative was chipper and positive and after 10 minutes offered to cut the woman’s minimum monthly payments in half and drop her interest rate to 5 percent.
“Oh, my God,” the cardholder sobbed on the tape. “Oh, that would help so much. I’m not a bad person.”
“No, of course you aren’t,” the representative replied. “We’re going to figure this out together.”
Such conversations, credit-card companies say, happen all the time. Indeed, just days earlier I spoke to Donna Tiff, a 49-year-old Missouri woman. We were introduced through the Center for Responsible Lending, an advocacy organization that Tiff contacted after companies began hounding her about the $40,000 she owed on multiple cards.
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“The phone would ring nonstop,” she told me. “I would get on, crying, and tell them I don’t believe in suicide, but I’m close. That I’m going to file for bankruptcy, and then you’ll get nothing.”
And then Tracey came along. She worked for a company that today is a subsidiary of Bank of America. Tracey had talked to Tiff several times and noticed that there was a mistake on her account — an automatic payment was going to be deducted twice from her checking account. If that happened, Tiff’s other checks would bounce.
“I told her, thank you so much for catching that,” Tiff recalled. “And then we talked for over an hour about my problems and raising kids. She was amazing. She was so similar to me. She gave me her direct number and said that I should call her directly anytime I had any questions or just needed to talk about what was going on.”
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Over the next three years, Tiff paid off the entire $28,000 she owed Bank of America and spoke regularly with Tracey, she said. And the $12,000 she owed on other cards? Well, those companies didn’t have a Tracey. They never got fully repaid.
It’s a heartwarming story. Unless you’ve seen how people like Tracey are schooled in the art of bonding. What are the odds that the random customer assistant who dealt with Tiff would have so much in common with her and manage to strike such a close bond? I tried to call Tracey myself, using the information Tiff provided. But I was told she didn’t work there anymore.
One Bank of America executive acknowledged that Tiff — and the caller on the recording in the training course — probably could have cut her debt in half just by asking. Much of what they’re paying, after all, is fees and interest that Bank of America itself tacked on.
“Some cardholders are not as savvy as others,” said Tony Allen, a company spokesman, who added that the company tries to educate cardholders about their options. “I’m sure some people feel like we have conflicted interests and that we’ll only educate as much as it helps us get paid. But we take our responsibility seriously.”
I asked Tiff if she ever asked Tracey to write off the late fees and the interest charges.
“Oh, no,” she told me. “She was so kind to me. How could I ask her for something like that?”
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***
If you ask credit-card executives about the current financial crisis, they’ll admit things aren’t good right now. But what really has them worried is what’s going on in Washington.
Just last month, President Obama invited 14 credit-card executives to the Roosevelt Room and told them he planned to ask Congress to outlaw “anytime, any-reason rate boosts and late-fee traps” and to increase scrutiny of the industry. A week later, the House passed the “Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights” by a margin of 287 votes. The legislation would force companies to give advance notice of interest-rate hikes, ban most retroactive rate increases and stop companies from issuing cards to people under 18 years old. And if that fails to become law, in 2010 new Federal Reserve Board rules will bar issuers from changing interest rates on existing balances in most cases. In other words, once you get a credit card, it will be much harder for the company to suddenly start charging you more.
The industry has responded by warning that interest rates will rise for everyone. Already, some issuers, including American Express, Bank of America and Citigroup, have started rejecting more card applications. You’re almost sure to get fewer offers in the mail, and the days of interest-free cards for six months (followed by soaring interest rates) are probably gone.
Despite their woes, it’s hard to feel sorry for the card companies. A survey conducted last year by Consumer Action, an advocacy group, revealed that the average penalty interest rate for cardholders who had missed a payment was 26.87 percent. And for years companies have also denied consumers the right to go to court by requiring arbitration, have aggressively marketed to college students and have adopted policies like “universal default,” which allows them to hike your interest rate if you miss a payment on a card issued by a completely different company. Some of their innovations, like cash-back rewards for unpaid balances, were designed to get cardholders to stop paying the full amount they owe.
Meanwhile, as they prepare for an uncertain future, the card companies are scurrying to find the next breakthroughs in credit-card psychology. Take, for instance, Capital One ’s Card Lab, a festive Internet site that lets customers design their own cards. I ordered one with my son’s photo on it.
The site is interactive. If I indicate I don’t want to pay an annual fee, for instance, the Web site tells me I must pay a higher interest rate. If I want a low rate, the site tells me I can’t get any rewards points. In essence, the Web site offers a series of choices that determine the relative values I place on different options. Capital One can watch as I navigate the site, learning more and more about me. The industry doesn’t have to drop rats in a maze anymore. We’ve started going there on our own.
“Card Lab is at some level an enormous real-time, ongoing experiment,” says Jack Forestell, senior vice president of marketing and analytics at Capital One. By observing people’s choices and then tracking how they use their cards, the company has learned who is more willing to pay annual fees and who wants airline miles badly enough to pay higher interest rates. “We’ve learned interesting things, like people are more loyal to cards that have their kids’ photos on them,” Forestell says.
What the card companies realize — and what legislation most likely won’t change — is that no matter how much we say we dislike credit cards, they’ve become an essential part of our lives. It’s really hard to rent a car without a card. Or shop online. Or buy plane tickets. Often, executives say, we are just looking for an excuse to use our cards, and so companies are becoming experts in figuring out which excuses we each most want to hear. They’ve let me transform my card into an expression of love for my son. They’ll let you tell yourself that charging a meal gets you closer to a free flight to Tahiti.
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Before I left the Bank of America training session in Delaware, the instructor gave the class a little pep talk.
“You’re going to have some days when you help customers, and you’re going to walk out and feel really, really good,” she told them. “It’s O.K. to help people know that we are all working to make the world a better place. It’s O.K. to help them believe.”
Then she turned to the young man who had previously inquired about bringing up the indelicate topic of money with someone who had just lost her job, her house or her husband.
“We are the ones who let them know that there’s always a brighter tomorrow,” she told him. “That’s how we get paid back.”Jessica Boyle, an Alverno College student who is student teaching at Hoover Elementary School in New Berlin, helps students build their vocabulary skills last week. A report suggests that the supply of new teachers in Wisconsin is shrinking. Credit: Rick Wood
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Public school teachers in the Milwaukee area are leaving the profession at a higher rate than the state as a whole, and Wisconsin’s teacher preparation programs are not enrolling enough candidates to fill their shoes in the classroom, according to a new report released Monday by the nonprofit Public Policy Forum.
“Help Wanted: An Analysis of the Teacher Pipeline in Metro Milwaukee” is the last in a three-part series by the forum that has looked at local workforce trends for teachers and principals.
According to the report, 700 teachers, or nearly 5%, left the profession in the four-county Milwaukee area between 2009 and 2014, nearly half of the 1,478 statewide total, while the student population held relatively steady.
At the same time, it says, enrollments in Wisconsin’s teacher education programs fell nearly 28%, from 12,323 students in 2008-’09 to 8,887 in 2013-’14, the most recent year available. The number of graduates from those programs fell 6.6%.
“The data show that Milwaukee-area districts and districts throughout the state are having trouble retaining current teachers,” said Joe Yeado, senior researcher for the forum and author of the report. “What it says to me is that, moving forward, each teacher vacancy will become harder to fill because the supply of new teachers is shrinking.”
Yeado stressed that it is not a Milwaukee, or Wisconsin, problem. Similar trends are being seen in neighboring states and across the country.
“That suggests that as neighboring states try to fill their teacher vacancies, it’s not beyond the possibility that they would begin to take Wisconsin graduates...which further constricts our supply,” he said.
The report, which will be the subject of a Viewpoint Luncheon on May 4, offers a detailed look at teacher workplace trends: who’s leaving and when; the demographics of those replacing them; and the difficulties that teacher prep programs have in recruiting and retaining students.
Key findings
Among the findings:
■ Wisconsin saw a spike in departures between the 2010-’11 and 2011-’12 school years. Act 10, the state law restricting bargaining rights for public employees, including teachers, took effect in the intervening summer. But the report could not definitively point to the law as the cause.
■ Milwaukee Public Schools, the state’s largest district, lost 9% to 15.4% of its teachers annually over a four-year period. But others, including Waukesha and several in rural communities, saw higher rates.
■ While departing teachers tended to be retirement age, more than a third in the Milwaukee area were in their 20s and 30s. New teachers with less than five years of experience were the second-largest group to leave.
■ More than a fourth of the teaching workforce in metro Milwaukee is over 50, suggesting that departures will increase, and about 62% of the replacement teachers come in with no prior experience.
■ In any given year, about 40% of new teachers are in their 30s and 40s, suggesting that many are coming to the profession as a second career.
■ Among the state’s teacher preparation programs, the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh saw the steepest enrollment decline, at 1,526, or 70%, since 2008-’09.
The report suggests several potential reasons for the departures, including pay — from low starting salaries to capped raises — burnout, increasing accountability requirements, promotions and family obligations.
And it offers a number of policy options for retaining teachers and increasing the supply, including loan forgiveness programs for college debt, higher salaries and part-time positions to accommodate teachers who leave for family reasons.
Dan Chanen, chief human capital officer for Milwaukee Public Schools, said his district has developed a number of strategies aimed at boosting its teacher ranks. They include tapping alternative licensing programs through such groups as Teach for America; and two new programs still in the planning stages that would grow their own teachers, targeting students and paraprofessionals.
“We recognize that the pipeline is going to be a challenge. And we’re working hard to help people find their calling when they come to Milwaukee,” he said.The father of a toddler found wandering in Glendale on Sunday evening said he had left his daughter with a baby-sitter found on a popular Web site.
Shane Englehart, 25, told Glendale police he had hired the baby-sitter on Craigslist, an online listing for a variety of services.
But Englehart told police that when he returned home, he found his apartment empty with no sign of the baby-sitter or his 2 1/2-year-old daughter, police spokesman Jim Toomey said.
Toomey said police found Englehart's statement credible. He is not expected to face criminal charges.
A passer-by had found the child wandering unattended at an apartment complex near 63rd and Northern avenues, police said.
The girl was placed in custody of Child Protective Services as authorities continued to sort out the matter, Toomey said.
The case is a reminder that parents should ask for references of potential baby-sitters and check those references before hiring anyone, he said.The advertising industry has a diversity problem. That much is no longer in dispute as a growing number of clients either suggest or insist that their teams employ more women and people of color.
In recent months, however, some have turned to another, arguably more pervasive form of discrimination: ageism.
"I'm a 45-year-old woman with 20 years agency experience who was laid off from my senior media position," read one response to a recent Adweek blog post on the topic. "I have been unable to secure even an interview, let alone a job, for four months." Another reader wrote, "This is one of the few industries where wisdom counts for nothing."
"After the [2008] recession, we lost a lot of people in the 40 to 50 range because those were the big salaries that the agencies could cut," noted 4A's president and CEO Nancy Hill. "And those jobs are not coming back."
A business that perpetually caters to the young has seen its hiring practices shift accordingly. The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that "advertising, public relations and related services" employed 192,000 Americans over 45 in 2010, and the average age of an industry professional was 40.7. Five years later, the 45-plus total had risen by only 6,000 while the median age dropped to 38.8.
"In many instances, these are people who spent their careers working on traditional packaged goods and financial services [accounts], and they had not been exposed to digital media," Hill said. "If you're in the middle of downsizing … you're going to [favor] the most current skill sets."
Yet even digital-only agencies with house Spectacles and craft beer taps sometimes find themselves lacking something only those with fuller portfolios can provide.
"We wouldn't be where we are without the people who had the right experience at pivotal times," said Adam Katzenback of Carrot Creative. The Vice-owned agency's president continues, "We weren't set up for success on things like procurement that often require outside resources, because we just hadn't dealt with them before."
Katzenback, in turn, had no real mentors. "One of my first bosses told me, 'There are no retirement parties in advertising; no one gets that far,'" he recalled. "That has to change within the industry."
One solution for aging creatives involves moving into client-side gigs from which they might eventually advise up-and-comers on an unstable job market. Hill also speaks of an executive who got laid off during the recession, then accepted a much lower-paid digital job. "They ended up hiring him full-time at a regular salary," she said. But he had the financial stability required to handle the initial cut; most lack that luxury.
Where, then, should agencies invest? "Training, training, training," said Hill. "I can't say that enough." Some turn to industry-wide organizations like the 4A's. Others, like Dentsu's 360i, work internally; 360i University caters to both senior- and entry-level employees.
"In any discipline, it's hard for a 50-year-old to find a good job," said Richards Group founder Stan Richards, who entered the business in 1953. "I would have no problems with hiring a 50-plus copywriter knowing that we can turn him into a person who is comfortable on the digital side within six to eight months."
Richards focuses on recruiting talent early and instilling loyalty. "We hire roughly 40 kids a year straight out of college, and at any given moment we have somewhere between 35 and 50 interns," he noted. The shop also requires each new employee to pick an older adviser. "If we do that the way we're supposed to, we're going to keep people a very long time," he said.
Retention will only become more challenging in the years ahead—which could be welcome news for veterans who can prove their worth but not for those the business deems inessential.
"The saddest thing is thinking you're not needed anymore," opined Katzenback. "There's going to have to be some serious societal discussion about the declining value of human labor."
This story first appeared in the December 5, 2016 issue of Adweek magazine.
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Mezzo soprano Catriona Morison has been crowned the winner of this year's BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition.
The 31-year-old from Scotland was the judge's wildcard and one of five finalists who performed with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales at St David's Hall, Cardiff.
The week-long competition featured 20 young classical singers.
They were selected from an original list of 400 entrants before auditions.
Ms Morison was presented with the Cardiff Trophy and £15,000 prize money.
Image caption The five finalists of BBC Cardiff Singer of the World
The other finalists were round winners Kang Wang, 29, a tenor from Australia, Anthony Clark Evans, 32, a baritone from the USA, Ariunbaatar Ganbaatar, 29, a baritone from Mongolia and Louise Alder, 30, a soprano from England.
Ms Alder was awarded the Dame Joan Sutherland Audience Prize.
Image caption Catriona Morison is the first Scottish winner of the competition
The Welsh representative in the competition was Sioned Gwen Davies, a mezzo soprano from Colwyn Bay, Conwy county.
The final's judging panel was made up of director of Welsh National Opera David Pountney, mezzo-soprano Grace Bumbry, soprano Sumi Jo, baritone Wolfgang Holzmair and conductor Anu Tali.If you’re a Comcast customer, you might want to enjoy that unlimited home internet you’ve currently got, because starting in November, most of Comcast’s subscribers will be subject to one-terabyte caps. While there are quite a few regions dealing with such caps right now, Comcast is set to implement that cap in many more regions on November 1.
This means if you spend most of your free time on the internet, you may want to check with Comcast to see how much you’re using each month. That’s especially true if you frequently download games or stream HD movies. You’ll want to this because, naturally, data caps mean overages if you happen to find yourself on the wrong side of 1TB.
Go over twice in a 12-month period and nothing will happen in those first two instances. However, on the third time going over that 1TB cap, Comcast will charge $10 per 50GB in overages. Overage charges will halt at $200, and if you already know that this 1TB cap will be problematic, you can pay an extra $50 per month to have unlimited internet.
In an FAQ about this new data cap, which Comcast is calling the “XFINITY Terabyte Internet Data Usage Plan,” Comcast lists the areas that are already subject to this data cap and which ones will be getting it come November 1. Have a look at the full list below:
XFINITY Internet customers in the following locations have the Terabyte Internet Data Usage Plan: – Alabama (excluding the Dothan market)
– Arizona
– Arkansas
– Florida (Fort Lauderdale, the Keys, and Miami)
– Georgia (excluding Southeastern Georgia)
– Illinois
– Northern Indiana
– Kentucky
– Louisiana
– Maine
– Southwestern Michigan
– Mississippi
– Tennessee
– Eastern Texas
– South Carolina
– Southwest Virginia Effective November 1, 2016: – Alabama (Dothan)
– California
– Colorado
– Florida (North Florida, Southwest Florida and West Palm)
– Southeastern Georgia
– Idaho
– Indiana (Indianapolis and Central Indiana; Fort Wayne and Eastern Indiana)
– Kansas
– Michigan (Grand Rapids/Lansing, Detroit, and Eastern Michigan)
– Minnesota
– Missouri
– New Mexico
– Western Ohio
– Oregon
– Texas (Houston)
– Utah
– Washington
– Wisconsin
If you’re worried about being able to track your internet usage, Comcast says it will be sending out in-browser alerts when users are approaching their cap, have met their cap, or have surpassed their cap. You can also opt to receive text message notifications on top of the in-browser alerts.
To read more on the XFINITY Terabyte Internet Data Usage Plan, Comcast’s full FAQ can be accessed by clicking the source link below.
VIA: Multichannel News
SOURCE: ComcastLawmen are searching for two Birmingham brothers charged in a suspected burglary at a Center Point cell phone store where one of them was the assistant manager.
Vincent Warren Long, 28, and Joseph Daniel Long, 21, both are charged with first-degree theft, said Jefferson County sheriff's Chief Deputy Randy Christian. They remain at large.
Deputies responded about 1 a.m. on June 4, 2017 to a burglary alarm at the T-Mobile store on Center Point Parkway. Deputies contacted the store manager who met them at the scene and found 113 cell phones, as well as a large amount cash, missing from the store, Christian said.
A sheriff's detective assigned to the case checked surrounding businesses for video surveillance cameras. A nearby ATM was found to have a camera that had a clear view of the front of the T-Mobile store, and a review of that video showed two men both wearing T-Mobile shirts loading items into their vehicles after the store had closed.
The detective interviewed the employees of the store. Only three employees had keys to the store and the safe combination.
The investigation showed that the Long brothers had committed the theft and staged it to appear as a burglary to deflect suspicion of them. Vincent Warren Long was the assistant store manager, and his brother, Joseph Daniel Long, also was employed by T-Mobile.
"You give someone a job, a promotion and your trust and this is how they repay you,'' Christian said. "That's pretty sad."
Anyone with information on their location is asked to call the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office at 205-325-1450 or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777.Like most, I was taken by surprise last weekend, I never expected this to happen, at all.
Given that I was the one to poke a rather big hole in the Raspberry Pi image a year and a half ago, and since i have been playing a bit of a role in freeing ARM GPUs these last few years, I thought I'd say a few words on how I see things, and why I said what I said back then, and why I didn't say other things.
It has become a bit of a long read, but this it's a eventful story that spans about two years. Getting acquainted. I talked about the lima driver at linuxtag in may 2012. As my contract work wasn't going any where real, I spent two weeks of codethink time (well, it's not as if I ever did spent just 8h per day working on lima) on getting the next step working with lima, so I had something nice to demo at Linuxtag. During that bringup, I got asked to form a plan of attack for freeing the Raspberry Pi GPU, for a big potential customer. Just after my lima talk at the conference, I downloaded some code and images through the linuxtag wifi, and set about finding the shader compiler on the train on the way back.
I am not one for big micro-managed teams where constant communication is required. I am very big on structure and on finding natural boundaries (which is why you have the term modesetting and the structured approach to developing display drivers today). I tend to split up a massive task along those natural boundaries, and then have clued folks take full control and responsibility of those big tough subtasks. This is why I split the massive task of REing a GPU between the command stream side and the shader compiler. This is the plan of attack that I had formed in the first half of 2011 for Mali (which we are still sticking to today), and I was of course looking to repeat that for the RPi.
On the train, I disassembled glCompileShader from the VideoCore userspace binary, and found the code to be doing surprisingly little. It quickly went down to some routines which were used by pretty much all gl and egl calls. And those lower routines were basically taking in some ids and some data, and then passing it to the kernel. A look at the kernel code then told me that there was nothing but passing data through happening at that side...
There was nothing real going on, as all the nifty bits were running somewhere else.
In the next few days, I talked to some advanced RPi users on IRC, and we figured out that even the bootloader runs on the Videocore and that that brings up the ARM core. A look at the 3 different binary blobs, for 3 different memory divisions between the ARM and the VideoCore, revealed that they were raw blobs, running directly on the videocore. Strings were very clearly visible, and what was immediately clear is that it was mostly differences in addresses between the 3 blobs. Apart from the addresses, nothing was immediately apparent, apart from the fact that even display code was done by the Videocore. I confirmed with Ben Brewer, who was then working on the shaders for Lima, and who has a processor design background.
The news therefor wasn't good. The Raspberry Pi is a completely closed
|
auti, came under suspicion. On 3 March 1972 Franco Freda, Giovanni Ventura and Rauti were arrested and charged with planning the terrorist attacks of 25 April 1969 at the Trade Fair and Railway Station in Milan, and the August 8 and August 9, 1969 bombings of several trains, followed by the Piazza Fontana bombing.
In 1987, after a number of trials, the Court of Cassation ruled that despite evidence linking Freda, Ventura, and others to the Piazza Fortana bombing, it could not be determined for certain who planned it, nor who carried it out.[2] The Court confirmed the convictions of Freda and Ventura in relation to the bombs placed in Padua and Milan, for which they each received a sentence of 16 years.[8]
Also in 1987 the Milanese Guido Salvini reopened the investigation based on new evidence. Martino Siciliano, a member of Ordine Nuovo, decided to cooperate when presented with a taped telephone conversation between Delfo Zorzi and some associates which contained the observation that, "the Siciliano problem could be solved with a 9 caliber gun".[9] Siciliano said that he had been present at a meeting with Zorzi and Carlo Maria Maggi in April 1969, in the Ezzelino bookstore in Padua owned by Giovanni Ventura, when Freda announced the program of the train bombings. Despite a death threat from Pino Rauti, electrician Tullio Fabris testified that he had supplied Freda with primers and timers.
Carlo Digilio, confessed explosives expert and advisor to the Ordine Nuovo in the Veneto was convicted in June 2001, which was subsequently upheld on appeal in March 2004.[10] Digilio displayed instances of memory loss after suffering a stroke in 1995. His subsequent confusion regarding dates and events led to the Court declaring him an unreliable witness.
In a 2004 trial of neo-fascists the Milan Court of Appeal attributed the Piazza Fontana bombing to Freda and Ventura. However, since they had been acquitted in 1987 they could not be retried.[11]
In 1998, Milan judge Guido Salvini indicted U.S. Navy officer David Carrett on charges of political and military espionage for his participation in the Piazza Fontana bombing et al. Salvini also opened up a case against Sergio Minetto, an Italian official of the U.S.-NATO intelligence network, and "collaboratore di giustizia" Carlo Digilio [it] (Uncle Otto), who served as the CIA coordinator in Northeastern Italy in the sixties and seventies. The newspaper la Repubblica reported that Carlo Rocchi, CIA's man in Milan, was discovered in 1995 searching for information concerning Operation Gladio.[12]
State security service [ edit ]
General Gianandelio Maletti, the head of SID (Servizio Informazioni Difesa), and a member of the secret "masonic" society P2 was found responsible for obstructing the investigation and withholding information during the first trial in Catanzaro. In an effort to protect extreme right-wing groups, Maletti destroyed a report concerning the Padua cell of Ordine Nuovo and arranged for potential witnesses to leave the country. Maletti subsequently emigrated to South Africa.[13]
Captain Antonio Labruna, of SID, was also implicated in aided and abetting the departure of witnesses Marco Pozzan and Giannettini Guido. Maletti and Labruna were convicted in January 1987.
Several elements brought the investigators to the theory that members of extreme right-wing groups were responsible for the bombings[citation needed]:
The composition of the bombs used in Piazza Fontana was identical to that of the explosives that Ventura hid in a friend's home a few days after the attacks.
The bags where the bombs were hidden had been bought a couple of days before the attacks in a shop in Padua, the city where Freda lived.
Main stages of the trial [ edit ]
First trial [ edit ]
Main stages of the trial:
Rome, 23 February 1972, the trial started. Main defendants: Pietro Valpreda and Mario Merlino. Ten days later, the process was moved to Milan for lack of territorial jurisdiction. Then it was transferred to Catanzaro for reasons of public order. [14]
Catanzaro, 18 March 1974, second trial. It was suspended after 30 days due to the inclusion of new defendants: Franco Freda and Giovanni Ventura. [14]
27 January 1975, third trial. Co-defendants: anarchists and neo-fascists. After a year, new suspension: Defendant: Guido Giannettini (Italian secret agent). [14]
18 January 1977, fourth trial. Defendants: anarchists, neo-fascists and SID. [14]
23 February 1979, judgment: life imprisonment for Freda, Ventura and Giannettini. Acquitted: Valpreda and Merlino. [14] Freda and Ventura were also sentenced in relation to the bombs placed in Padua and Milan from April to August 1969, while Valpreda and Merlino were sentenced to 4 ½ years for conspiracy. [15]
Freda and Ventura were also sentenced in relation to the bombs placed in Padua and Milan from April to August 1969, while Valpreda and Merlino were sentenced to 4 ½ years for conspiracy. Catanzaro, 22 May 1980, starts the appeal process. [16]
20 March 1981, judgment of appeal: all defendants were acquitted. [14] The Appeal Court confirmed the sentence for Freda and Ventura (15 years of jail) in relation to the bombs placed in Padua and Milan, [8] and confirmed the sentences to Valpreda and Merlino for conspiracy. [17] The Prosecutor had asked for all the defendants to life in prison. [18]
The Appeal Court confirmed the sentence for Freda and Ventura (15 years of jail) in relation to the bombs placed in Padua and Milan, and confirmed the sentences to Valpreda and Merlino for conspiracy. The Prosecutor had asked for all the defendants to life in prison. 10 June 1982: the Supreme Court cancelled the judgment, acquitted Giannettini and ordered a new trial. [14]
Bari, 13 December 1984, new appeal trial. Defendants: Pietro Valpreda, Mario Merlino, Franco Freda and Giovanni Ventura. [14]
1 August 1985, new judgment: all defendants were acquitted for lack of evidence. [14] [19] The Prosecutor had asked life imprisonment to Freda and Ventura, [20] full acquittal to Valpreda, [21] and acquittal for lack of evidence to Merlino. [22]
The Prosecutor had asked life imprisonment to Freda and Ventura, full acquittal to Valpreda, and acquittal for lack of evidence to Merlino. 27 January 1987: the Supreme Court confirmed the sentence.[7][14]
The supreme Court of Cassation sentenced two members of the Italian secret services – General Gian Adelio Maletti (1 year of jail) and Captain Antonio Labruna (10 months) – to having misled the investigation and acquitted Marshal Gaetano Tanzilli, accused of perjury.[7]
Second trial [ edit ]
Catanzaro, 26 October 1987, new trial. Neo-fascists defendants: Massimiliano Fachini and Stefano Delle Chiaie. [14]
20 February 1989, judgment: the defendants were acquitted for not having committed the crime. [14] The Prosecutor had asked life imprisonment to Delle Chiaie and acquittal for lack of evidence to Fachini. [23]
The Prosecutor had asked life imprisonment to Delle Chiaie and acquittal for lack of evidence to Fachini. 5 July 1991: the Appeal Court in Catanzaro confirmed the acquittal to Stefano Delle Chiaie.[14]
Third trial [ edit ]
Milan, 24 February 2000, new trial. Neo-fascists defendants: Delfo Zorzi, Carlo Maria Maggi (a physician), Carlo Digilio and Giancarlo Rognoni. [ citation needed ]
30 June 2001, judgment: life imprisonment for Delfo Zorzi, Carlo Maria Maggi and Giancarlo Rognoni. Carlo Digilio received immunity from prosecution in exchange for his information. [24]
Milan, 16 October 2003, starts the appeal trial. [25]
12 March 2004, judgment of appeal: Zorzi and Maggi were acquitted for lack of evidence, Rognoni were acquitted for not having committed the crime. [26]
3 May 2005: the Supreme Court confirmed the sentence.[27]
Stefano Tringali, accused of abetting, benefited from the prescription after being sentenced to one year in prison in the appeal trial.[28]
The Supreme Court rejected as «false» Digilio's «alleged affiliation with US services». The Court found that in 1969 the Venetian group of Zorzi and Maggi organized the attacks, but it is not proven their participation in the massacre of 12 December. The Court certifies that Martino Siciliano (another Ordine Nuovo's pentito) attended to the assembly with Zorzi and Maggi in April 1969, in the library Ezzelino of Padua, where Freda announced the program of the train bombings. But since those bombs didn't kill nobody, it's not evidence the involvement of Zorzi and Maggi in the next subversive strategy of Freda and Ventura, and in the other acts of terrorism. The tragic events of 12 December 1969 didn't represent a loose cannon, but were the result of a subversive operation enrolled in a program subversive well settled.[11]
Political theories of responsibility for the bombing [ edit ]
The bombing was the work of a right wing group, Ordine Nuovo whose aim was to prevent the country falling into the hands of the left-wing by duping the public into believing the bombings were part of a communist insurgency.[3]
A 2000 parliamentary report published by the Olive Tree coalition (an alliance of the Communist Party and the Democratic Party of the Left) claimed that "U.S. intelligence agents were informed in advance about several right-wing terrorist bombings, including the December 1969 Piazza Fontana bombing in Milan and the Piazza della Loggia bombing in Brescia five years later, but did nothing to alert the Italian authorities or to prevent the attacks from taking place." It also alleged that Pino Rauti (current leader of the MSI Fiamma-Tricolore party), a journalist and founder of the far-right Ordine Nuovo (New Order) subversive organization, received regular funding from a press officer at the U.S. embassy in Rome. "So even before the'stabilising' plans that Atlantic circles had prepared for Italy became operational through the bombings, one of the leading members of the subversive right was literally in the pay of the American embassy in Rome", the report says.[29]
Paolo Emilio Taviani, the Christian Democrat co-founder of Gladio (NATO's stay-behind anti-Communist organization in Italy), told investigators that the SID military intelligence service was about to send a senior officer from Rome to Milan to prevent the bombing, but decided to send a different officer from Padua in order to put the blame on left-wing anarchists. In an August 2000 interview with Il Secolo XIX newspaper Taviani said that he did not believe the US Central Intelligence Agency was involved in organising the Milan bomb. However he alleged "It seems to me certain, however, that agents of the CIA were among those who supplied the materials and who muddied the waters of the investigation."[30]
See also [ edit ]
Further reading [ edit ]
References [ edit ]
Coordinates:A heroic 65-year-old man jumped directly into a powerful Florida riptide and rescued a little girl before suffering a "cardiac event" in the water that led to his death.
Alan Hall went to Honeymoon Island, Fla. Sunday to spend the day relaxing with his wife and daughter, but the day quickly took a dramatic turn.
While taking a walk with his wife, Eileen, to collect seashells, the couple spotted three children playing near the shoreline as a powerful current began to build.
"[My dad] said, 'I hope somebody's watching them. That's a pretty strong current,'" Julie Hall recounted.
Seconds later, the children started screaming for help. Their parents rushed into the water and were each able to pull a child to safety, but a third child, a little girl, was still in harms way in the rough water. Alan Hall jumped into the tide without hesitating, Julie Hall said.
"My dad was able to push Ruby out of the way and towards the shore, where it was safe," said Julie Hall.
Riptides, also known as rip currents, are extremely dangerous channels of discolored water that can form unexpectedly and pull swimmers away from the beach.
After pushing the child to safety, Alan Hall's heart stopped. Nearby boaters managed to get him back to shore, where a crowd was gathering.
His wife began performing CPR immediately but Alan Hall was not breathing and did not have a pulse.
"My mom said one of the things she remembers so strongly is the circle of people around him that all started praying for him," Julie Hall said. "That's something that has stuck with her."
Emergency medics arrived and attempted to resuscitate Hall, but they were unsuccessful. He was transported to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Medical examiners have not yet released a cause of death, but Julie Hall said her father suffered from a "cardiac event."
A spokeswoman from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection said that no lifeguards were on the section of the beach because it is not a designated swimming area. Other parts of Honeymoon Island State Park are open for swimming but only have seasonal lifeguards on duty from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
Five-year-old Ruby, the child Alan Hall saved, traveled to the hospital with her parents and siblings to thank the Halls. The family had been on vacation in Florida, visiting from Ohio.
"They were so distraught and they were so guilty," Julie Hall said. "We told them not to feel guilty because if my dad had known the outcome, he would have done it anyway. That's how he lived his life. He would have done it regardless. He was one of those people that actually lived what he preached."
Hall said her recently-retired parents moved to the Land O'Lakes area of Florida from Connecticut not long ago. Her mother is a retired nurse and Alan Hall most recently worked in sales for Frito Lay.
The couple was getting ready to celebrate their 42nd wedding anniversary. Hall said her mother is doing "as good as can be expected."
"I think because she's still in shock, she's okay right now," Hall said. "She's strong. She's tough."
Hall said her family is extremely proud of her father, and hopes the example he set will move others to perform acts of kindness and caring for strangers.
"He wouldn't have done it to be a hero, but he's probably grinning somewhere," Hall said.Mike Keenan is set to embark on the most extraordinary challenge of his hockey career.
Considering that Keenan has served as head coach of eight NHL teams -- the Philadelphia Flyers, Chicago Blackhawks, New York Rangers, St. Louis Blues, Vancouver Canucks, Boston Bruins, Florida Panthers and Calgary Flames -- that is significant.
Keenan, long known as Iron Mike for his uncompromising methods, ranks fifth among NHL coaches in career playoff victories (96) and ninth in regular-season wins (672). He famously piloted the Rangers to the 1994 Stanley Cup to end the team's 54-year championship drought.
He later became the first coach to win a championship in both the NHL and the Kontinental Hockey League when he guided Russian club Metallurg Magnitogorsk to the 2014 KHL title. But the same tenacity that pushed Keenan to great success sometimes created friction with players and management. None of his tenures lasted more than four seasons.
Mike Keenan won a KHL championship with Metallurg Magnitogorsk and will look to replicate that success with Kunlun Red Star, the Russian-based league's only franchise in China. Alexander Nemenov/AFP/Getty Images
In some ways, all that serves as mere prologue to the job Keenan just accepted -- head coach of Kunlun Red Star, the only China-based franchise in the 29-team KHL. Keenan, 67, recently spoke with ESPN to discuss his future before returning to China to begin his new job in earnest this week.
"It's certainly a hockey experience," Keenan said. "But it's a life and educational experience as well."
Why Keenan accepted the job
Keenan became intrigued by the possibility of taking on "an exciting and interesting challenge."
As part of the new role, in addition to coaching Kunlun, Keenan will help oversee the Chinese men's and women's national teams. The goal is for the nation to put its best foot forward at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. He will also help establish the infrastructure for a feeder system to those teams, meaning his fingerprints will be on most aspects of hockey in China.
"It's an untapped hockey frontier with the biggest population in the world," Keenan said. "They are hosting the Olympics, and they do not want to be embarrassed. They want to be represented well."
Editor's Picks Chinese team hires veteran NHL coach Keenan Kunlun Red Star, a Chinese team in the Kontinental Hockey League, has hired longtime NHL coach Mike Keenan.
Keenan was recommended to Kunlun by KHL organizers and was named to the team's technical committee in February. The team completed its inaugural season on March 2 with, coincidentally, a playoff loss to Magnitogorsk, Keenan's previous club. Russian coach Vladimir Yurzinov Jr. resigned from Kunlun because of family reasons, according to the team, and the club announced the hiring of Keenan last week.
"The KHL is a very good league," Keenan said. "They've got some very deep [rosters with] talented players throughout the league. I'm experienced enough, and I've seen enough North American teams play and [KHL] teams play. The top teams in the KHL can compete with some teams in the NHL, maybe up to the middle of the NHL pack."
What Keenan's team will look like
Keenan plans to immerse himself in player evaluations this week and begin making roster decisions. He will maintain authority over personnel, while a general manager will handle contractual matters. Unlike the NHL, where players go through a draft process, the KHL offers more options in free agency. While this allows clubs greater flexibility in finding players to fit a particular playing style, Keenan said he won't devise a system of play until his roster has been established.
One distinct difference from the NHL to the KHL is the presence of Olympic-size ice surfaces. The standard NHL rink measures 200-by-85 feet. In the KHL, some surfaces are NHL-sized, while others are the 200-by-100 Olympic variety that caters to skill and wide-open play.
"Your preparation is different on a nightly basis," Keenan said. "It depends on what ice surface you're playing on."
Keenan reached the pinnacle of his profession in 1994 when he led the New York Rangers to the Stanley Cup championship. B Bennett/Getty Images
With that in mind, Keenan will have to construct a versatile roster. Meanwhile, the veteran coach said he hasn't yet considered the makeup of his coaching staff.
"I haven't even gotten that far, but I've had many, many calls from North American coaches wanting to go with me," he said. "I'm not going to make any decisions about staffing until I go over there this week. I want to evaluate what we have there and make some decisions. There has been a lot of interest, though, from North America and Russia."
Kunlun has tasked Keenan with making sure at least five Chinese players get regular playing time, and the league has stipulated that the club must carry at least five Russians on its roster. But Keenan said he doesn't anticipate either mandate being a competitive hindrance. He's already familiar with KHL personnel, and he will be able to tap players of Chinese ancestry from minor leagues and the collegiate and junior ranks to satisfy that requirement.
"It doesn't necessarily mean they have to be from China," Keenan said. "They can be from North America with some lineage to China -- maybe their parents or grandparents or even great-grandparents. So in selecting five players from around the globe, I don't think it's that much of a challenge."
Why this team is unique
The KHL maintained franchises in eight nations for the 2016-17 season. Russia is home to 22 of them, and Belarus, China, Croatia, Finland, Kazakhstan, Latvia and Slovakia have one team each. That creates a travel footprint spanning 10 time zones across eastern Europe and Asia, requiring creative scheduling and extremely long flights.
Kunlun reached the KHL playoffs in its inaugural season. Dmitry Serebryakov\TASS/Getty Images
Kunlun split its games between Beijing and Shanghai this past season, but it will be based exclusively in Beijing next season in a renovated downtown facility. Keenan attended the team's first two playoff games in Beijing, dropping the ceremonial first puck in the series opener, and he estimated the attendance was 8,000 for each game.
Keenan doesn't consider language to be an obstacle to success with Kunlun. On the contrary, he expects that most players will speak English or Russian, and the vast majority of team staff and ownership already speaks English.
"Russia was more challenging," Keenan said. "Because where I went in Russia, very few, if any, people could speak English -- even amongst the team."
Keenan believes establishing a franchise identity is the biggest task for his young organization. The 2016-17 roster was assembled quickly, and the team exceeded expectations by reaching the playoffs. But to keep improving, Keenan said the organizational framework must be cemented from the ground up.
"Developing the foundation and culture that is a prerequisite for winning is going to be a big challenge," he said. "But it's one that I think I've had tremendous experience over my career in being able to manufacture the environment that is needed to win."Most of us have our favorite openings to play, and lots of players know their favorite chess piece.
Despite our preferences and best intentions, though, most of the actual pieces on the chessboard don’t survive to the end of the game.
Chess is a brutal game of captures, exchanges, and sacrifices. It’s not uncommon to throw pieces and pawns away to achieve a greater goal.
So which chess pieces and pawns are the least likely to survive until the end of the game?
A Quora user asked this exact question recently. Oliver Brennan, a chess amateur and programmer (according to his profile), provided a brilliant answer by sampling data from 2.2 million master-level chess games.
Based on Brennan’s data, here are the 10 pieces and pawns least likely to survive a chess game.
(Also check out the MOST likely pieces to survive.)
10. Black’s Dark Bishop: 35.43% Chance of Survival
by Joel Kramer
Black's dark-square bishop is often the more aggressively placed bishop, and its early development spells its doom in nearly two-thirds of all games.
9. Black’s c-Pawn: 34.28% Chance of Survival
by Alan Cleaver
Black's c-pawn is frequently exchanged for White's d-pawn, especially in popular openings like the Sicilian. Getting in a timely c5 push is usually good for Black, but it means that the hapless c-pawn doesn't make it to many endgames.
8. Black’s Light Bishop: 34.09% Chance of Survival
By Angelo DeSantis
Black's light-squared bishop has even worse a chance of surviving than its dark-squared counterpart. This bishop is often swapped for White's powerful attacking light bishop.
7. White’s Dark Bishop: 32.45% Chance of Survival
by DeerSlayer
White's dark-squared bishop is often exchanged with its Black counterpart, leaving a slim chance of survival to the end of the game.
6. Black’s d-Pawn: 31.73% Chance of Survival
by Alejandro Greene
The center pawns, in general, are usually doomed early in the game. Fighting for control of critical territory means that most central pawns are expendable.
5. Black’s b-Knight: 28.21% Chance of Survival
by Little Sadie
Knights can jump over other pieces, so they can quickly advance to the center of any skirmish on the chessboard. Knights are often traded for other knights, leading to double the piece carnage. Black's b-knight actually survives the most often of all the cavalry, but only at a rate of 28 percent.
4. White’s b-Knight: 27.05% Chance of Survival
by brefoto
White's b-Knight usually finds its way to c3 or d2, and often those squares are its last safe resting point before being traded for an opposing knight or bishop.
3. White’s g-Knight: 26.95% Chance of Survival
by Alla Ischenko
From its perch on f3, this knight is often the earliest-developed piece on the board. It's no surprise, then, that it survives in less than 27 percent of all chess games.
2. Black’s g-Knight: 25.95% Chance of Survival
by Uckhet
Black's key defensive knight barely makes it to a quarter of all ended games, usually trading itself for the safety of the Black king.
1. White’s d-Pawn: 24.45% Chance of Survival
By Auntie P
White's d-pawn is the least likely survivor of all, perishing in more than 75 percent of all games. This pawn is usually traded for Black's c-pawn, and it's unusual for this central pawn to make it past the opening.
Let us know your thoughts on piece survival rate (and the reasons behind it) in the comments or on Facebook.Vegan beauty isn’t always as clear cut as food. Ingredients lists tend to be a lot more confusing with chemical names and the branding and marketing doesn’t make it any clearer - especially now brands have started to market themselves as vegan while they still test on animals. We’ve put together this guide to help you understand vegan beauty a little better and help you find the best vegan beauty products. In this guide: What is vegan beauty?
Vegan vs cruelty free
How to check if a brand is cruelty free
Ingredients to avoid
Vegan vs vegetarian
Symbols & what they mean
Vegan beauty brands
Vegan beauty products
Vegan beauty routines We’ve created a free download of this guide for you to read and refer back to when you need. It also comes with bonus beauty routines, DIYs, dupes and tutorials. What is vegan beauty? Vegan beauty products are those that are made without animal derived ingredients. A lot of animal ingredients are standard in cosmetics production. These products may still be labelled natural or organic, which often leads people to believe that they're more ethical. Beeswax is a natural ingredient, however it is definitely not vegan. Vegan beauty should also mean without animal testing but this isn’t always the case in products labelled as vegan.
Vegan vs cruelty free Veganism is about reducing the cruelty to animals, therefore a vegan beauty product should not be tested on animals. However as we've come so accustomed to vegan meaning 'plant-based' in food terms, some products become mislabelled as vegan when they are still tested on animals. Are cruelty-free products vegan? Cruelty-free products are not necessarily vegan. A product that is cruelty free has not been tested on animals and does not contain ingredients tested on animals by another party. It must also not be sold in the Chinese market as this requires animal testing by law. If you read a brand's FAQs and they mention that they do not test on animals, except where required by law, it means that their products ARE test on animals and therefore not cruelty free. Because the term ‘cruelty-free’ only refers to animal testing, it does not take into account any ingredients that are derived from animals, no matter how cruel you may deem that to be. E.g A product might be cruelty free but contain carmine - the red pigment from crushed insects (read more about the truth behind the colour red). To put it simply... Cruelty free beauty products: Have not been tested on animals
Do not contain ingredients tested on animals
Are not sold in China
May contain animal derived ingredients Vegan beauty products: Have not been tested on animals
Do not contain ingredients tested on animals
Are not sold in China
Do not contain ingredients derived from animals But, the vegan label used on products is mostly determined by ingredients and so it has been used by companies who test on animals but have a product that doesn’t have animal-derived ingredients. In the true definition of vegan, we would not consider it to be vegan. Because of this, it’s important to check both the ingredients and the cruelty free status of the brand.
How to check if a brand is cruelty-free Now that we know the two criteria to checking vegan beauty products: vegan ingredients & cruelty free status, here’s how you can check. Check the brand’s FAQ Cosmetics companies will have an FAQ section that almost always contains information about animal testing. There are a lot of sneaky ways that they get around the fact they they test on animals so you have to read carefully. If they say that they don’t test on animals, unless where required by law it means that their products are sold in countries, like China, that require animal testing by law. They have a choice to be in this market and so they are willingly participating in animal testing. They are not cruelty-free. Check an online resource A quick Google search of ‘company name cruelty-free’ will pull up resources and articles determining whether a brand is cruelty-free. One of the most trusted resources is Cruelty Free Kitty’s brand directory. She contacts brands herself and determines whether they are cruelty-free (note: they’re not all vegan and don’t all produce vegan products). She now has an easy ‘search’ function. You might also find people’s blog posts - but remember to check that they have evidenced their statement with brand emails or brand FAQs. Contact the brand If you’ve had no luck searching for the brand or what your own reassurance, you can reach out to brands yourself. The questions that Cruelty Free Kitty asks are: Do you test on animals, at any point during the production of your products? Are your ingredients tested on animals by your suppliers? Does any third party test on animals on your behalf? Do you test on animals when required by law? Are you owned by another company? (optional if you don’t buy from parent-owned companies - a company might be cruelty-free but are owned by a company that tests on animals)
Vegan cosmetics: Ingredients to avoid Now that you’ve determined whether a brand is cruelty-free, you need to look at the ingredients of the specific product you’re interested in. The main ingredients you need to look out for are: Carmine (Alt: Cochineal Dye, Cochineal Extract, Crimson Lake or Carmine Lake, Natural Red 4, C.I. 75470, or E120) A red pigmented collected from crushed insects. Typically found in blushers and lipsticks but can also be seen in lots of cosmetics. Cosmetics that have a red or warm undertone to them often use this pigment.
(Alt: Cochineal Dye, Cochineal Extract, Crimson Lake or Carmine Lake, Natural Red 4, C.I. 75470, or E120) A red pigmented collected from crushed insects. Typically found in blushers and lipsticks but can also be seen in lots of cosmetics. Cosmetics that have a red or warm undertone to them often use this pigment. Lanolin (Alt: Wool Wax or Wool Grease) A wax ('fat') produced by wooly animals like sheep. These animals are bred to produce more wool and in turn produce more lanolin. Can often be found in most cosmetics, including eyeshadows.
(Alt: Wool Wax or Wool Grease) A wax ('fat') produced by wooly animals like sheep. These animals are bred to produce more wool and in turn produce more lanolin. Can often be found in most cosmetics, including eyeshadows. Beeswax (Alt: Cera Alba or E901) Often used in waxy products like lipsticks but can also be found in foundations.
(Alt: Cera Alba or E901) Often used in waxy products like lipsticks but can also be found in foundations. Gelatin (Alt: Gelatine) A gelling or thickening agent derived from boiled skin, tendons, ligaments and bones of animals. Will tend to find in creamy products.
(Alt: Gelatine) A gelling or thickening agent derived from boiled skin, tendons, ligaments and bones of animals. Will tend to find in creamy products. Collagen A protein from animal tissue. Is often used in skincare for its supposed plumping effect.
A protein from animal tissue. Is often used in skincare for its supposed plumping effect. Retinol (Alt: Vitamin A) Retinol does not always have to be from an animal derived source, but often is. Double check as there are skincare products that contain vegan retinol.
(Alt: Vitamin A) Retinol does not always have to be from an animal derived source, but often is. Double check as there are skincare products that contain vegan retinol. Tallow (Alt: Rendered Animal Fat) Tallow is an animal fat that comes from boiling an animal's carcass. It can be found as a base to many cosmetics.
(Alt: Rendered Animal Fat) Tallow is an animal fat that comes from boiling an animal's carcass. It can be found as a base to many cosmetics. Guanine (Alt: G, Gua) A crystalline material found in crushed fish scales. It's often used in mascara, nail varnish and lipstick.
(Alt: G, Gua) A crystalline material found in crushed fish scales. It's often used in mascara, nail varnish and lipstick. Ambergris (Alt: Ambergrease or Grey Amber) Produced in the digestive system of sperm whales, it's commonly used in perfume. Vegan vs vegetarian We've mentioned that products can be labelled as cruelty free and / or vegan, but what about vegetarian? Sometimes products are labelled as vegetarian, which can lead you to believe that it doesn’t contain animal products. What the vegetarian symbol means: A vegetarian beauty product does not contain parts of an animal e.g fat, gelatin or its meat (this would be unusual to find anyway.) Some products do contain animals fats - predominantly in skincare. A vegetarian beauty product may still contain animal by-products that are not part of the animal's body like lanolin or honey. Vegetarian products are also not necessarily cruelty free. Vegetarian products are not vegan - but some products that are labelled vegetarian might be vegan and just not labelled as so - so don’t immediately assume they won’t be vegan.
Vegan beauty: Symbols to look out for & what they mean If you've already started to look out for vegan products, you might have found it a little difficult to find certification on the packaging. Firstly, there are a lot of products (just like food) that are vegan but just aren't labelled. Some vegan labels, like the Vegan Society, must be paid for and a lot of brands do not have the budget for it. So don't assume that a product must have a label. These are accredited symbols that verify the vegan status of the product. This means that an external party have reviewed the products and their production process to ensure that they meet their standards. You might see that products create their own symbol, or simply label a product as'vegan' or use a ‘v’. This means that the company is confident in making this claim, but hasn't necessarily been assessed by a third party. Generally a brand would be foolish to lie about labelling like this, especially because of legal implications, BUT, as we mentioned earlier, there is sometimes a misconception that vegan just refers to the ingredients, so always give a product labelled like this a check to be safe.(Reuters) - U.S. small businesses ramped up borrowing in October, pushing the Thomson Reuters/PayNet Small Business Lending Index to a record high, according to data released on Tuesday.
The reading of 131.8, up from 127.1 in September, was the highest since the index launched in 2005. The previous record was set in January 2007; later that year, the nation’s economy fell into its deepest downturn in decades, a recession from which it has yet to fully recover.
This time around the signs point to more growth ahead, not less, PayNet founder Bill Phelan said.
“The conditions then were so much different than they are today,” Phelan said, offering as evidence data on loan delinquencies as tracked by a separate PayNet index.
Loan delinquencies had been steadily rising in the months before the January 2007 borrowing peak, reaching 2.5 percent of all loans. In October 2014, however, delinquencies fell to 1.56 percent from 1.57 percent the previous month.
That means borrowers today probably aren’t taking as many risks with their money as they were back then, when over-leveraging led to a surge in defaults.
The U.S. economy last quarter registered its fastest growth in a decade, allowing the Federal Reserve to finally end two years of bond-buying stimulus at the end of October.
Still, lingering concerns about the health of the U.S. labor market and subdued inflation mean the central bank is likely to keep interest rates near zero until the middle of next year.
PayNet collects real-time loan information such as originations and delinquencies from more than 250 leading U.S. lenders.By Andy Rowell
These are dangerous days for the climate. Not only do we have a climate denier in the White House, we have one in the Kremlin, too.
At the end of last week, while visiting the Arctic, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that global warming was not caused by humans: "The warming, it had already started by the 1930s," he said. "That's when there were no such anthropological factors such as emissions, and the warming had already started."
In comments that will alarm many, Putin said that trying to curtail climate change was not a priority, but rather adaption was the key:
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Dent, SS, University of Florida
23, 706, Garrett Gordon, RF, Wabash Valley (IL) College
24, 736, Matthew DeRosier, RHP, Southwestern (CA) Comm. College
25, 766, Travis Ott, LHP, Shippensburg (PA) High School
28, 856, Joey Webb, LHP, Menlo (CA) College
29, 886, Michael Sylvestri, RHP, Florida Atlantic University
30, 916, Ryan Ullmann, RHP, Concordia (TX) University
31, 946, Willie Medina, SS, High Point (NC) University
34, 1036, Jake Walsh, LHP, University of Missouri
The remaining unsigned picks (round, overall selection, position, name, school):
4, 136, Nicholas Pivetta, RHP, New Mexico Junior College
11, 346, John Simms, RHP, Rice (TX) University
12, 376, Andrew Cooper, RHP, Sierra (CA) Junior College
13, 406, John Costa, RHP, Palm Beach (FL) Comm. College
16, 496, Willie Allen, OF, Western Oklahoma State College
17, 526, Geoffrey Perrott, C, Rice (TX) University
20, 616, Brenton Allen, OF, University of California-Los Angeles
26, 796, Garrett Hampson, SS, Reno (NV) High School
27, 826, Bryce Harman, OF, L.C. Bird (VA) High School
32, 976, Pat Boling, LHP, University of Georgia
33, 1006, Andrew Dunlap, RHP, Westbury (TX) Christian
35, 1066, Lukas Schiraldi, RHP, Navarro (TX) Junior College
36, 1096, Reid Humphreys, SS, Northwest Rankin (MS) High School
37, 1126, Karsten Whitson, RHP, University of Florida
38, 1156, Caleb Hamilton, SS, Woodinvillie (WA) High School
39, 1186, Robbie Tenerowicz, 2B, Campolindo (CA) High School
40, 1216, Shaun Anderson, RHP, American Heritage (FL) SchoolPubs will remain closed on Good Friday 2016 despite a campaign from vintners for the alcohol ban to be lifted.
Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald on Thursday ruled out an imminent change to the trading rule. “I won’t be doing it this year,” she told RTÉ radio. But she added that it is an issue that would be considered under new alcohol laws.
Publicans said they were extremely disappointed with Ms Fitzgerald’s decision not to introduce legislation which would permit all licenced premises to serve alcohol on Good Friday this year.
The Licensed Vintners Association (which represents Dublin pubs) said its members and the public at large will struggle to understand the rationale behind the Minister’s decision. “Our legal advice was that the law only required a minor legislative change,” said its chief executive Donall O’Keeffe.
“This is a lost opportunity not just for publicans but for the capital city and the tourist sector as a whole. This year there was a particular urgency around this issue given the Ireland 2016 celebrations would focus on the Easter weekend and that we have an international soccer friendly between Ireland and Switzerland taking place in the Aviva Stadium on Good Friday itself. Once again thousands of tourists and holiday goers are going to be at a loss wondering why they can’t go to a pub for a drink” O’Keeffe said.
Publicans had called on the Government to lift the ban on the sale of alcohol on Good Friday and on Monday launched the #AboutTime campaign.
“The Minister has had ample time to repeal this archaic law,” said Padraig Cribben of the Vintners’ Federation of Ireland (which represents publicans outside Dublin). “ Frankly it’s an embarrassment that this legislation is still in force in 2016. Both the VFI and the LVA have had a very positive reaction to our #AboutTime campaign and we were very hopeful that the Minister would finally move on this issue this year.”
He continued: “Previously the Minister indicated that Good Friday trading would be permitted in the context of the Sale of Alcohol Bill and she has had plenty of time to advance that legislation.
“Most other retail businesses will be open and trading but once again the licensed trade will be closed. For a Government which claims to be pro business and seeking election it makes no sense.”
The Intoxicating Liquor Act, when introduced in 1927, said alcoholic drinks could not be sold on Christmas Day, Good Friday and St Patrick’s Day. The St Patrick’s Day clause was repealed in 1960 to accommodate visitors coming from overseas to celebrate the national holiday.
The legislation provides exemptions allowing the sale of alcohol to those attending events or travelling by sea, rail, air or ferry. Alcohol can also be sold in a licensed theatre. Guests staying in hotels can be served alcohol, as long as it is taken with a meal.The report looks as the company’s sales in the first half of the fiscal year, and the data is fairly promising for Ubisoft. The report shows that the video game publisher reeled in around € 484.2 million, which is up 65.1 percent from the first half of the 2013-14 fiscal period.
The report also found that Ubisoft is selling over twice as many games for PS4 consoles than it is selling for Xbox One consoles. According to a sales chart in the report, 32 percent of sales are on the PS4, while only 15 percent of sales are on the Xbox One.
Despite the large gap between PS4 and Xbox One game sales, the PS3 and Xbox 360 are almost tied at 17 percent of sales and 14 percent of sales, respectively.
What do you think about the huge gap between PS4 and Xbox One game sales? Have you bought any Ubisoft titles this year?
[Source: Ubisoft]An unlikely on-camera romantic pairing prompted the 'Transparent' star to "help give voice to marginalized people" in TV and film.
At the first-ever Transparent table read, Jill Soloway stood up and declared that her purpose for creating the show was to make the world a safer place for her own transgender parent. The mission was imminent and quickly expanded to safeguarding and empowering all transgender people (and eventually all marginalized/underrepresented voices).
This revolution in artmaking and culture changes everyone who comes in contact with the show. Even my character, Josh Pfefferman, whom Jill refers to as "the roving male id" of the show, opens to the idea of gender fluidity in season three. In the fallout from losing his greatest love and future child with Rabbi Raquel (Kathryn Hahn), Josh finds chemistry with Shea (Trace Lysette), a gorgeous trans woman who shows up at a messy Pfefferman family soiree.
I've been told that Josh's love interest in Shea is quite possibly the first of its kind on television. A cisgender man takes interest in a trans woman simply because he is attracted to her … not a fetish, not a secret, not an experiment. Shea is simply a woman who's come into Josh's lonely world at the right place and the right time. Of course, it goes horribly wrong, but the fallout isn't due to transphobia. Josh's inherent shortsightedness and lack of empathy — his "Pfefferman-ity," if you will — is what takes them down.
Like Josh, I now experience the wide spectrum of gender on a daily basis, when only a few years ago it seemed like one of two boxes to check at the doctor's office. On Transparent, I work closely with LGBTQ and gender nonconforming people who are now my close friends — truth be told, we're all more like family. So when I'm asked what it's like to have an onscreen romance with a trans woman, my reaction is often something akin to, "Oh, you mean Trace? I guess I forgot she's trans." But it wasn't always this way. I grew up in a small, old-school Catholic world, imprinted with an above-average number of categories and judgments. I wasn't exposed to trans people in media or real life, didn't even know any openly gay people until college, and I've had fewer sexual partners in my life than Josh has in season one. So yeah, Transparent opened my heart and my mind, but it also changed my world. All of the sudden I found myself deeply entrenched in a civil rights movement, with a whole new chosen family and, wait … I'm an actor now?
If there is a downside to Transparent, it's that the bar is now extremely high. I no longer think in terms of, "How can I make something that doesn't suck?" That's how my brother, Mark, and I started as suburban New Orleans kids, with no path or expectation that we could ever make it in this industry.
Instead I now have regular conversations with my colleagues about how I, a straight white American male, can help give voice to marginalized people. Tangerine, our 2015 indie feature starring two transgender women of color, was a breakthrough experience for Mark and me, paving a new path of inclusivity that now pervades everything our company does. Recently we were having trouble casting a male lead for our Miguel Arteta-directed film, Duck Butter, until we realized that the two leads/love interests could both be women, and the script didn't need to be altered to accommodate that.
It's been a while since Togetherness, the last project Mark and I wrote and directed ourselves. We're in the process of opening our personal storytelling to a bigger, more inclusive world. But it's not about being PC or cool. We just believe it's our responsibility, especially being straight white cisgender males who are now experiencing some success, to stand up and advocate for all voices.
If we are to maintain a relevant and just industry, we must all open our eyes to the obvious lack of equality in wages, representation and access. From casting to hiring to awards races like the Emmys, taking active steps toward inclusion will make for richer stories, a stronger democracy and a better world.
This story first appeared in the June 7 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China said on Thursday it would punish carmakers by restricting their production and publicly naming them if they fail to meet fuel consumption requirements on passenger vehicles set for 2015.
A boy looks out from the sunroof of a car during a traffic jam on the Jingshi Highway connecting Beijing to Shijiazhuang, on the second day of the seven-day national day holiday in Zhuozhou, Hebei province October 2, 2014. REUTERS/Stringer
Punitive measures outlined for offenders of the already-announced fuel economy rules reflect Beijing’s latest effort to fight pollution and promote more efficient use of energy.
They are also likely to push automakers, both foreign and Chinese, to embrace more cutting-edge technology such as gasoline-electric hybrids and all-electric cars.
China’s fuel economy rules, as stringent as those to be enforced in the United States, Europe and Japan, involve a fleet-wide corporate average target of 6.9 litres per 100km in 2015 and 5.0 litres in 2020. They take effect on Nov. 1.
China said on Thursday it would publicly name carmakers who fail to meet the 2015 target and would ban the production of new models that do not meet fuel economy targets, to be determined by a special weight-based formula.
The government will also reject expansion plans by offenders, who be required to submit improvement plans.
James Chao, director of IHS Automotive for the Asia-Pacific region, said the punitive measures for 2015 “may not matter in a practical sense”, because most automakers, save for a few, are projected to be able to comply with the requirements.
But if similarly tough punitive measures were to be enforced in connection with targets for 2020, “it could have a very significant effect, given that few (makers)... are projected to be able to comply on a corporate average fuel efficiency basis,” Chao said.
The rules were published by five government agencies including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).
China has already taken a series of measures to fight pollution, including restricting car sales in major cities and providing incentives for selling electric vehicles. But the latest measures would put further pressure on carmakers.
Last year, 85 car manufactures in China measured their corporate-average fuel consumption, and about 30 percent of them, mostly domestic brands, failed to meet their annual target for 2013, according to results published by MIIT earlier this year.
No punishments were imposed at the time but China’s desire to tighten up is behind the punitive measures backing the 2015 and 2020 targets.
The rules also apply to importers of foreign passenger vehicles. Last year, 13 importers of foreign brands, including General Motors Co (GM.N), Nissan Motor Co (7201.T), Porsche (PSHG_p.DE), Hyundai (005380.KS), failed to meet their annual target, partly reflecting the fact that most imports are bigger and more powerful models.Dr. Burgdorfer sometimes said that his discovery was serendipitous — an accident that might have happened only to someone with more than three decades of experience in tick surgery.
“Some people use the translated quote from Pasteur that says something like ‘chance favors the prepared mind,’ ” said Dr. Schwan, who is also a medical entomologist. “I heard that many times regarding Willy’s discovery.”
Wilhelm Burgdorfer was born on June 27, 1925, to Karl and Else Burgdorfer. He received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees from the University of Basel and the Swiss Tropical Institute in Basel, where he specialized in zoology, parasitology and bacteriology.
His survivors include his wife, Lois; his sons, Bill and Carl; two grandchildren; and a brother, Karl. His wife of more than 50 years, the former Gertrude See, known as Dale, died in 2005. Another influential Lyme disease expert, Stephen E. Malawista, who helped oversee Dr. Steere’s work at Yale, died last year.
In 1951, Mr. Burgdorfer received a fellowship from the United States Public Health Service to work at the Hamilton lab. In the 30 years before he discovered the cause of Lyme disease, he spent much of his time studying Rocky Mountain spotted fever, relapsing fevers, plague and other diseases that can be spread by blood-feeding arthropods, including ticks (which are arachnids) as well as mosquitoes and fleas (which are insects).
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that about 300,000 people are found to have Lyme disease each year. A vast majority of reported cases are in the Northeast and the Midwest. Lyme disease can usually be treated successfully with antibiotics, but not always, and it can continue to cause harm and illness for months or even years after treatment has ended. A vaccine developed at Yale was licensed in 1998, but taken off the market in 2002.
Knowing the role ticks play has prompted educational efforts about Lyme and other tick-borne diseases. When people learn how to recognize and remove ticks, Dr. Burgdorfer said in 2001, “then the chances of getting sick are not so great.”
He retired in 1986. He won numerous awards as well as other forms of recognition.
The bacterium that causes Lyme disease has been named in honor of him: Borrelia burgdorferi.Introduction
Angela Nagle’s “Kill All Normies” is a short book that aims to document and explain the new culture wars of the internet age, and in particular the conflict of the so-called “Alt-Right” and “Alt-Lite” versus the SJWs of Tumblr and the establishment progressive left. I went into the book expecting there to be an absurd amount of bias and misrepresentation, however I was pleasantly surprised by the fact Ms. Nagle puts at least some recognizable effort into carefully separating out the various factions she discusses and not strawmanning their ideologies. Her work is not perfect and nor is it unbiased; Nagle is clearly of the Old Left and to some degree writes for such an audience. She also arguably misrepresents (to some degree) Gamergate, Elevatorgate and Atheism Plus, and other similar culture wars to some extent; this clearly is due to her unquestioning acceptance of the victimhood claims of people such as Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkeesian. She also arguably underestimates the degree to which transgressiveness has played a part on the so-called ‘right’ historically. She also is a bit sloppy when she addresses the Men’s Human Rights Movement, however she is more accurate and less unfair than almost all feminist critics of the MHRM and effectively concedes that the MHRM is a legitimate movement. She also seems too willing to ignore troublesome facts which complicate her theory, particularly in terms of her characterization of nerd culture. In spite of all this, Nagle weaves together a pretty good story that covers a substantial amount of the cultural politics surrounding the new culture wars; most notable in my view is that she is the first leftist commentator to fully understand and accept the gender-transgressive and socially-liberal nature of the 4chan/nerd culture/Alt-Lite/Alt-Right sphere.
This social liberalism and gender-transgression is a fact which seems very obvious and has been pointed out repeatedly, but so far “the narrative” (so to speak) has not yet accepted this truth; perhaps with more leftists recognizing this reality, that narrative will be further destabilized.
A Summary
Nagle begins by looking at the enthusiastic embrace of social media by the left back in 2008 to 2010; in the wake of the Arab Spring and the election of Obama, social media was cast as a tool of liberation. The internet was seen as enabling a bright future for the left, but in 2016 the exact opposite outcome had been delivered; the online world had developed a substantial contingent of radicalized anti-leftist activism which managed to elevate the candidate of the “right.” Trump was lifted up, in part, by the same apparatus which was meant to be inherently anti-conservative, inherently anti-heirarchical, and inherently transgressive. More disturbingly, some of those who elevated Trump were outright white nationalists and literal fascists. How did this happen? Not to mention, this was not a culture war between old fuddy-duddy social conservatives and young rebels (like the culture wars of the 60s), but rather both factions were populated mostly by young people with a stridently countercultural mindset and style; the Chan-Rightists were from a subculture marinated in sexual depravity, pornography and a general lack of religious fervor.
Nagle explains this paradox through pointing out that the culture of 4Chan and 8Chan, and nerd subculture in general, actually has a very long history of the precise kind of cultural transgressiveness typically admired by the left. This history comes from the exact same 60s counterculture that the New Left was birthed from. Nagle argues that the 60s counterculture produced a style of transgressiveness which, whilst at the time used by the left to advance left-wing ideals, is in fact able to be adopted by any ideology. As such, the fusion of “chan culture” with the ideologies of the alternative right is really an accident that came from the frustrations held by nerds/channers/transgressors with the stifling sensibilities and demands of the Tumblrite Left. The ideology was adopted to shock and horrify the new Squares, but whilst of course some are indeed in it “for the lulz” there have been many whom underwent Becoming The Mask.
This countercultural transgressiveness is rooted in the amoralist libertinism of de Sade and the decadent Romantics, the underground hacker culture’s techno-utopian visions of decentralized futures, libertarian individualism, Neitzsche, and left-wing critiques of post-war American cultural conformity and mass consumption. Trolling is seen as a form of culture jamming (shocking sensibilities to make people think critically). But within this tradition is also a substantial streak of misogyny based on the identification of women with mainstream, conformist, domesticated, tame and emasculating consumerism and normalcy. This, according to Nagle, explains the alleged hostility of nerdy spaces to women.
The atrocities of SJW spaces are well documented in this text and whilst Nagle absolutely is extensively critical of chan culture/anti-PC spaces, she is no less critical of SJW spaces (and perhaps moreso since she blames them for damaging the left and creating the Chan-Rightists in the first place). She sees these spaces as the ultimate intellectual dead-end of a left that has no real ideas and has abandoned the concerns of the Old Left (of which she is part).
Ultimately, Nagle argues that SJWism and “Nerd Culture” both have much in common with each other; most obviously they are (in her assessment) elitist countercultures which see themselves as above the “sheeple.” As an Old Leftist, she thinks that this is precisely the wrong attitude to have; she argues that instead the left need to move away from identity politics and “neoliberalism” (basically the shifts towards identity politics and away from outright anti-capitalism which happened on the American left in the last few decades). Instead, she supports a rejection of transgressiveness and countercultural positioning. With a rejection of transgression and the accompanying elitism, Nagle hopes for the left to return to class politics and anti-capitalism.
What Nagle Gets Right
The most obvious thing Nagle gets correct is the countercultural nature and heritage of Chan culture and nerd culture more broadly; she recognizes the counterculture status and gender nonconformity of Chan culture; she thus rejects the SJW narrative of these cultures being mere reflections of socially dominant prejudices. She is also correct to point out how these cultures are very much at odds with historical conservatism of all kinds, and that they are a product of norms and ideas which have a substantial history on the American left.
In general, Nagle is careful to differentiate between the subgroups and factions within the overarching coalitions she describes. She fully accepts that there are Chan Culture participants who use alt-right ideology merely to shock and don’t actually believe it. She generally doesn’t misrepresent the ideological positions of those she names; she describes Christina Hoff-Sommers as a classical liberal (which is generally true although Sommers describes herself as a libertarian-sympathetic moderate), Cathy Young as a libertarian, and even Milo’s beliefs are characterized as effectively classical liberalism once one gets beyond his trolling and theratrics. She differentiates the alt-right from libertarians/classical liberals, from neocons, from theocons and from paleocons. She does separate out MGTOWs, Red Pillers, Neomasculinists and MHRAs to at least some extent. Unsurprisingly she differentiates between old leftists, left-liberals (the socially liberal left) and the SJW/Establishment left. Some of her characterizations of those she dislikes (Mike Cernovich and Richard Spencer for instance) do unnecessarily psychologize and/or implicitly mock and shame (she mocks Cernovich for being the recipient of money from a divorce settlement, and describes Richard Spencer as the kind of guy one would imagine wearing surgical gloves to leave the house), but she at least avoids the ideological defamation that most on the left are prone to.
Overall she produces a generally coherent narrative which is well-written (and clearly written). She doesn’t fixate too much on one character (thankfully she doesn’t blame Milo for the alt-right, as I feared she would do). She accepts the role that the SJW left played in creating the stifling orthodoxy against which anti-PC rebellion became almost laudable, and she accepts the intellectual bankruptcy of SJW beliefs. Kill All Normies isn’t without flaws but it is certainly among the better works of analysis that focus on the modern culture war.
And Speaking Of Those Flaws…
1. Left-Wing Misogyny, GamerGate, Atheism and Nerd Culture: Listen And Believe
The biggest flaw Nagle’s analysis has is that she has a complete blind-spot with respect to not just GamerGate but nerd culture’s alleged misogyny more generally; this blind-spot is an example of her putting a pet theory over empirical reality.
Her summary of GamerGate is, frankly, terrible; it focuses on Anita Sarkeesian (who was barely involved in the controversy until she inserted herself into it) and then Zoe Quinn (whom even Nagle accepts made a terrible game worthy of mockery). At no point does she ever address the actual flashpoint of GamerGate, which was the simultaneous publication of all the “Gamers Are Dead” articles (often written by white male journalists and inspired by the work of a white male Australian pseudoacademic named Dan Golding) followed by the revelation (delivered by Milo Yiannopoulos and Allum Bokhari of Breitbart) that games journalists were collaborating with each other to simultaneously push this narrative in party-line fashion. This is an extremely surprising omission; Nagle knows Milo covered GamerGate and refers to this in her work, and has clearly seen a lot of Milo’s articles and speeches. However, the article in which the existence of GameJournoPros was revealed (and its evidence of collusion in order to push a preconceived narrative) doesn’t get mentioned, nor do any of the “Gamers Are Dead” articles. I hate to accuse her of intellectual dishonesty, but the fact that the true flashpoint of GamerGate was ultimately based in the works of mostly white male journalists, and that it was them (rather than Quinn and Sarkeesian) who were the ultimate targets of rage, contradicts the preconceived narrative of her own.
Indeed, the theory Nagle advances is that the anti-consumerist, non-conformist, pro-rebellion attitudes which nerd culture inherited from the counterculture are misogynistic; these attitudes equate women with conformity, mindless mass consumption, domestication, motherhood and thus the emasculation and disempowerment of men. In Paglia-esque fashion, Nagle cites the work of de Sade and its preoccupation with sodomy (a preoccupation which, she notes, is reflected frequently in the pornography found on 4Chan) and then cites a literary critic who argues that the fixation on non-procreative sex is a form of the degradation of the mother figure. The horror of matriarchs, as symbolized in Kessey’s “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” and its figure of Nurse Ratched, is also positioned as a precursor to nerd culture’s ideal of masculinity.
Under the influence of this theory, it is all too easy for Nagle to accept and perpetuate the idea that nerd culture (from the Chans, to video gaming, to atheism) is a uniquely hostile place for women in particular. She blames left-wing misogyny rather than right-wing misogyny for this, but she still alleges that nerd culture is misogynist at the core. This, of course, is hard to square with the fact that at several moments in the book she chronicles online abuse and doxxing which is directed at men rather than women. However, perhaps due to confirmation bias, she treats every harassment claim made by Sarkeesian and friends with uncritical acceptance.
She again argues that the New Atheist movement was hateful of women, merely on the basis of the allegations made by Rebecca Watson (allegations which several female skeptics/atheists, like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, contested). She further argues that anti-SJW atheists are/were motivated by a desire to protect a “male space” (thus erasing the many women in atheism/skepticism), yet even Rebecca Watson once spoke of how welcoming the skeptic community was towards women.
“In the land of the nerds, the double “x” chromosome is queen. The lack of women getting actively involved in skepticism has led to a peculiar deification of any female brave enough to dive into debates, engage in philosophical arguments, or just withstand the flirtatious banter that permeates online forums. The skepchick is held up as an ideal in an intellectual community – a woman who is smart, interesting, and most of all, approachable.
Despite what I saw as a distinct willingness for men to accept and embrace (sometimes literally) skeptical women, there were just not that many around. Somehow, the word was not getting out.”
(Watson, R (2005), Skepchicks International, eSkeptic, http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/05-11-03/).
She keeps pushing this narrative of motivated-exclusion-of-women when she misrepresents the saying “there are no girls on the internet” as implying that the audience of 4Chan is almost always male. But the actual meaning of the phrase is that “there is no female privilege on the internet.” When women, and particularly attractive ones, talk to men in real life, men will often judge what the woman says much more charitably or much more positively than if a fellow man said the same thing. This is due to the fact that being benevolently sexist is seen as being kind and courteous towards women, and also due to the fact that in nerd culture there is a very large cohort of romantically unsuccessful men who dream of a ladyfriend with common interests and hobbies (as the Rebecca Watson quote referenced previously makes very clear). But on an anonymous imageboard like 4Chan, men have no incentive to be benevolently sexist and everyone may as well have no identity for everyone is anonymous. As such, women on such boards who are perceived as drawing attention to their woman-ness are perceived as attempting to assert their privilege (hence demanding special treatment).
Nagle, however, casts it as an attempt to keep women out of a male space, even though the Rebecca Watson quote above makes clear that nerdy spaces have always been very accepting towards women. What is hated is not women, but rather non-nerd women who fake an interest in order to get fawned over and treated as super-special princesses; the object of hatred regarding “fake geek girls” is not that they are girls, but rather that they are fake geeks (see http://honeybadgerbrigade.com/2014/02/13/complaining-about-fake-geek-girls-is-not-misogyny/). Hatred of “poseurs” is very common in countercultures, particularly those surrounding music (and Nagle derives her analysis from the study of alternative music subcultures, so it is surprising she didn’t see this).
Nagle Listens And Believes to every story of alleged abuse and harassment, even though there are at least some which are questionable and the evidence makes it clear that it isn’t a gender-exclusive or gender-based thing. However, she has a theory to prove and she’s happy to cram the evidence into it no matter how bad the fit. The mythology of hostile male spaces trying to keep women out simply for being women is too irresistible for Nagle. This is probably the biggest problem with her recount; she misrepresents nerd culture and New Atheism, and she misrepresents the origins of Gamergate because she has to make things about anger at women entering a male space. If the flashpoint of Gamergate is driven by anger at mostly-white-male game journalists who made a coordinated attack on the very identity of “gamer” then this greatly complicates the narrative and doesn’t fit the theory.
2. The MHRM And Anti-Feminism: A Surprising Omission
The history of feminist critique and characterization of the manosphere is full of extreme distortions, some arguably accidental and others clearly deliberate. Nagle at least tries to do a better job; she begins by agreeing men have issues that are legitimate, that feminists have often been cruel towards men and dismissive of men’s issues, and that she is “not at all unsympathetic to the genuinely egalitarian goals of fairness also found in the men’s rights movement.” She points out that the manosphere is composed of different factions that substantially disagree on many issues, and clarifies that her critique is limited to the “darker underbelly” of the manosphere that flourishes online.
This sounds very good at first, however she then says that this underbelly would be horrified to learn about how the men’s movement was once part of second-wave feminism, that it critiqued rigid sex roles. In reality, the Men’s Human Rights Movement is quite aware of this origin since its intellectual founder is Dr. Warren Farrell; Farrell is a former NOW board member and was involved with the precise men’s movement that Nagle speaks of, until he got kicked out by higher-ranking feminists for not believing that men are the oppressors of women. Nagle cites Michael Kimmel (a feminist and misandrist) to make her case, and cites several pro-feminist men’s organizations (like “Men Against Sexism”) as an example of a men’s movement group.
Then things get worse; she cites the National Coalition of Free Men and how it was indeed inspired by the work of Dr. Farrell; at no time does she mention the fact that Farrell was a leader of the men’s movement during the days of that movement being part of Second Wave Feminism. How could she miss this historical fact? And doesn’t she know that Farrell, in spite of being against contemporary feminism, is also against traditional gender roles?
And then she names A Voice For Men, the largest Men’s Human Rights Movement website. She concedes it is “closer to an older style of men’s rights politics” yet doesn’t specify in what way; the answer is that it is an anti-gender-traditionalist group that supports men’s liberation from rigid sex roles and also endorses the Equal Rights Ammendment. AVFM is also supported by Dr. Warren Farrell; apparently, the “darker underbelly” of AVFM would be horrified to learn what they already know (that once, NOW was in favor of Farrell’s work against rigid sex roles faced by men, but eventually kicked him out).
Nagle criticizes AVFM’s tone; at no time does she take issue with the actual arguments made. She complains that sometimes AVFM sounds like a genderswapped version of the worst excesses of Radical Second Wave Feminism, but doesn’t ask as to what the purpose of sounding that way might be. She digs into Buzzfeed‘s hit piece on Paul Elam, but the ultimate problem with Nagle is the omission of Farrell’s historical presence as a leader of the precise men’s movement she seems willing to praise, as well as his central place in the Men’s Human Rights Movement of today. She referenced Farrell’s most famous book, so it seems hard to believe she didn’t also know of Farrell’s experiences in NOW and presence in AVFM. Of course, if she were clear about the MHRM’s intellectual heritage (as the descendants of the same men’s rights activism she approvingly cites as descended from the Second Wave), this may make people wonder why the feminist movement is now opposed to the men’s movement that allegedly came from it. People may wonder what happened to feminism, now that it sees Second-Wave-compatible men’s issues activism as a threat.
3. The Transgressive “Right”
Nagle is not wrong in pointing out that many norms of Chan culture come from the transgressive traditions beloved by the left, yet Nagle doesn’t particularly look at the tradition of transgression on the right (she gives it mention yet no detailed analysis). In particular, whilst libertarians generally do not identify as “right wing,” old leftists like Nagle usually classify them as such and in terms of coalition politics libertarians have typically worked more with conservatives than those on the left (at least for the last several few decades).
But there is a very rich tradition of transgressiveness on the libertarian right. Nagle mentions “South Park Republicans” more than once, yet South Park’s creators are both libertarians. In addition, one simply cannot talk about modern libertarianism without mentioning Ayn Rand (who is not universally agreed with by all libertarians, but is responsible for the radicalization of more libertarians than anyone else). Rand was an extremely transgressive figure; she was a polyamorous atheist illegal immigrant who rejected Christian morality (in extremely vehement terms) and celebrated an anti-conformism and individualism that flies in the face of conservative sensibilities.
Several themes Nagle cites as critical to the transgressiveness of nerd culture and Chan culture are echoed in libertarian literature; the artist who goes against the establishment and masses without selling out? Howard Roark is a clear example. The technological genius who revolutionizes the world? Rand has more than one example. Indeed, the “rebel capitalism” of early Silicon Valley is pretty obviously inflected with Randian notions and more than one journalist has criticized Silicon Valley, and its relatively higher portion of libertarians relative to the rest of the Bay Area, for having such sympathies.
To an extent, we can forgive Nagle for not looking too much at the contributions of libertarians to cultural transgressiveness. It is also possible she simply isn’t that familiar with libertarianism. But people on the left were scarcely the only contributors to the contercultural, transgressive sensibilities Nagle speaks of.
4. Countercultural Elitism, Tu Quoque, And Nerd Culture
Nagle’s ultimate conclusion about how countercultural politics should be rejected is quite novel for someone on the left, given that countercultural politics have basically been the only substantial source of left-wing success in the recent decades; no longer is classical socialism considered a viable alternative to a market economy, and the Scandinavian Social Democratic mixed economy model represents the left-wing edge of the Overton Window in economics departments. Nagle’s argument for leaving behind the counterculture is based, ironically enough, in populism.
Nagle argues that the counterculture has always been based in a form of elitism derived from Frankfurt-School-style ideas; the masses are of course dumb and brainwashed rubes. Mass culture, therefore, is to be disdained. It is prolefeed, soma, and fit only for animals. Counterculturalists, thus, differentiate themselves from mass culture and assert their superiority through rebellion against the mainstream. One rebels against mass culture out of hatred for the masses.
Nagle targets both nerd culture and SJWism for this critique, although she doesn’t dwell on the minutae of how SJWism fits the pattern (perhaps this is due to her presuming the audience already knows and accepts the elitism inherent in SJWism). Technically this is not an argument for or against either side; it is merely casting both sides as Not So Different From Each Other. This, Nagle
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is a nice solution to this problem in a form of a one-liner utility function that creates a promise resolved on the next tick of the event loop. We can use it with Jest’s built-in support for returning a promise from the test:
Elegant solution to running assertions for Promise based code without handle to the Promise chain
How to test?
What options are there, for verifying the app responded to the user interaction correctly?
Markup. You can inspect the markup of the page to check that the UI is correctly modified, for example using Jest’s snapshot feature. Note: for the following test to work you will need to setup a Jest snapshot serializer, for example using enzyme-to-json package.
Using Jest’s snapshot feature to verify markup changes
This kind of assertions is incredibly easy to write, but tests using them tend to be quite unfocused. The snapshot of the app’s markup will probably change often, making your seemingly unrelated tests fail. They also don’t document the expected behaviour, only verify it.
State. Check the modification to the state of the application. It’s easy in a Redux application with a centralised store, might be more tricky if the state is distributed. Also in this case snapshot could be used, but I prefer the explicitness of object literals.
Verifying changes in Redux store state
This types of assertion is less user-centric, as the store state sits “under the hood” of your application. However, testing like this will be less susceptible to flakiness caused by design-driven changes to markup.
Side effects. Depending on your application, there may be other side effects that you should check (e.g. network requests, changes to localStorage ). You could, for example, use the isDone method from nock to verify that the request mocks created have been consumed.
Dispatched actions. This approach takes advantage of one of the strongest features of Redux, the serialisable log of actions. We can use it to assert on the sequence of the actions dispatched to the store, e.g. with help of the useful redux-mock-store library. First, the renderAppWithState method needs to be modified to use a mocked version of Redux store, so that the store exposes a getActions method.
Verifying the sequence of actions dispatched to the store
This type of assertions is useful especially for more complex async flows. It also provides a clear overview of the expected behaviour of the app in the tested scenario, serving as documentation.
Finding the balance
Introduction of this type of integration tests should not mean skipping unit tests. Most parts, and especially the logic-heavy parts of the application (like reducers or selectors in a Redux app) still require to be thoroughly unit-tested. The pyramid still applies! However, integration tests are a valid addition to the testing toolbox that should help building a healthy test suite that causes as little pain as possible and allows for more confident deployments.
The subject of software testing is one of the most opinionated in the industry. When reviewing this article, one of my colleagues pointed by to an article titled “Integrated tests are a scam”. Some of the points the author makes are valid, but things are not so black-and-white in my opinion. What do you think?
If you enjoyed this story, we recommend reading our latest tech stories and trending tech stories. Until next time, don’t take the realities of the world for granted!Few television shows have been as loudly or consistently praised for the quality and authenticity of its costumes, sets and props as AMC’s Mad Men. Now in its fifth season, the show continues to go to great efforts to source appropriate accessories to showcase a hyper real version of New York in 1966.
This obsession with historically accurate physical culture extends to the wrists of the characters, and for years watch fans have eagerly paused DVDs on partially blurred wristshots of Don Draper and his co-workers. The ability to accurately identify a watch from 50 paces (or a blurred screengrab) is a highly prized skill among watch fans. James Enloe, founder of Watches In Movies (the premier watches on screen website), attributes the desire for fans to identify watches as an extension of watchnerds' passion, and an important way to show off their otherwise esoteric knowledge. Of Mad Men, Enloe suggests that the there’s a double appeal for fans; “It makes for good watching simply for the ‘did they get it right?‘ factor. Are the watches worn proper for the period, or did something more modern slip in that shouldn’t have been there?” Today we’d like to take a closer look at some of the lesser stars of Mad Men: Four watches used in the most recent season.
Derek Dier, owner of Watches to Buy, received a call from Ellen Freund, the prop-master for Mad Men, a scant 24 hours before shooting was about to start. She needed a watch, not just any watch – she needed Don Draper's watch.Ms. Chiwy is shown atop an airplane in this photograph, believed to have been taken in the summer of 1945. (Courtesy of Martin King)
For decades, stories circulated among veterans and historians about an African nurse who tended to wounded and dying American soldiers in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge, the bloody campaign through the Ardennes in the winter of 1944-1945 that became the last major German offensive of World War II.
“Band of Brothers,” the 2001 TV war drama based on historian Stephen E. Ambrose’s best-selling book, referenced a nurse from Congo. But no such nurse was identified and celebrated until nearly seven decades after the war — when the Belgian king granted a knighthood, and the U.S. government awarded a high civilian honor, to Augusta Chiwy.
Ms. Chiwy (pronounced she-wee), 94, died Aug. 23 at a nursing home in Brussels. The cause was a heart attack, said her son, Alain Cornet. She was credited with ministering to hundreds of men during the Battle of the Bulge, so named for the brief and ultimately unsuccessful German penetration of Allied lines.
As a volunteer nurse — amid unremitting shelling and in sub-zero temperatures, with inadequate food and little rest — Ms. Chiwy was said to have helped rescue the injured, dressing their wounds, bathing them and boiling snow for water. On Christmas Eve, she nearly lost her life when a bomb hit her makeshift aid station in the besieged town of Bastogne.
“A black face in all that white snow was a pretty easy target,” she once said, remarking on her survival through the battle. “Those Germans must be terrible marksmen.”
Ms. Chiwy is honored by the U.S. Army in Brussels in 2011. (Yves Logghe/AP)
Augusta Marie Chiwy was born June 3, 1921, in Mubavu, an East African village that became part of a Belgian colony and that is now located in Burundi. Her father was a white Belgian veterinarian and her mother was African.
Ms. Chiwy moved to Belgium as a girl, trained as a nurse in the city of Leuven (Louvain in French), and arrived in Bastogne to spend the holidays with her father just as the Germans launched their attack through the Ardennes forest in eastern Belgium on Dec. 16, 1944. It would be one of the costliest engagements of World War II, with more than 80,000 American and 100,000 German casualties.
Bastogne, located at a major road junction, was surrounded during the battle. Ms. Chiwy joined the skeletal and beleaguered medical operation there led by a U.S. Army physician, Jack Prior. “He told me that he had no one left,” Ms. Chiwy once recalled in an interview with Public Radio International, “that his ambulance driver had been killed.”
For much of her life, Ms. Chiwy spoke little about the carnage that she witnessed, according to her son. Her story was documented in large part by Martin King, a Scottish historian and co-author with Michael Collins of the book “Voices of the Bulge: Untold Stories From Veterans of the Battle of the Bulge.”
Prior recounted his wartime service in a written account that has been published online. He recalled the contributions of two nurses — one, a Belgian named Renee Lemaire, and another he identified as “a native of the Belgian Congo.”
“They played different roles among the dying,” Prior wrote. “Renee shrank away from the fresh, gory trauma, while the Congo girl was always in the thick of the splinting, dressing, and hemorrhage control. Renee preferred to circulate among the litter patients, sponging, feeding them, and distributing the few medications we had (sulfa pills and plasma). The presence of these two girls was a morale factor of the highest order.”
Some white soldiers reacted negatively to the prospect of a black woman providing intimate care. One man, King said, suffered from severe frostbite and asked Prior not to allow the black nurse to touch him.
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“Fine,” Prior replied, according to King’s account. “Die, then.”
On Christmas Eve, Ms. Chiwy and Prior were invited to step out of their aid station.
“A bottle of champagne was opened,” Ms. Chiwy recalled. “A glass was passed around. And I do not know whether he finished filling the glass, but we heard something coming screaming towards us. And then a big bang! And all of the windows were blown out.”
A bomb had hit the aid station, killing 30 of the approximately 100 wounded soldiers, according to King. Lemaire perished in the blast. Years later, Prior told ABC News that he collected her remains and gathered them in a white parachute that Lemaire hoped to fashion one day into a wedding dress.
After the bombing, Ms. Chiwy followed Prior to another clinic, where she continued providing medical care until mid-January 1945, when Prior and his unit moved out of Bastogne.
Ms. Chiwy worked as a nurse for some years after the war. She was married to Jacques Cornet, who died two decades ago. Survivors include two children, Alain Cornet of Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium, and Christine Cornet of Grez-Doiceau, Belgium; five grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.
King, the historian who publicized Ms. Chiwy’s story, is a son, husband and father of nurses and told The Washington Post in an interview that he was intrigued by the reference in “Band of Brothers” to the African battlefield aide. After an 18-month search, he said, he located Ms. Chiwy in a Belgian retirement community.
She became the subject of a biography by King — “The Forgotten Nurse” (2011) published in French and Dutch — and the documentary film “Searching for Augusta” (2014).
“What I did was very normal,” Ms. Chiwy said when she was honored in 2011. “I would have done it for anyone. We are all children of God.”
Prior, the Army physician, became a pathologist in Syracuse, N.Y. A daughter, Anne P. Stringer, said in an interview that her father told his children about an African nurse who had so valiantly assisted him during the war. “He said that he would never forget her courage,” said Stringer, who traveled to Belgium in recent years to meet Ms. Chiwy. “She was only 23.”
Prior died in 2007. Until then, he and his former nurse exchanged greetings at Christmastime, a period that coincided with the anniversary of their survival at Bastogne. He kept her letters in a trunk along with a bayonet and wartime mail from his mother. Along with her letters, Ms. Chiwy sent Belgian chocolates.When writing about money laundering laws, I’ll sometimes highlight gross abuses by government and I’ll periodically make the usual libertarian arguments about privacy.
But I mostly focus on how the laws simply don’t make sense from a cost-benefit perspective. Anti-money laundering laws and regulations impose large burdens on the private sector, which creates disproportionate hardship for the poor. Yet there’s no evidence that the laws actually hinder criminal activity, which was the rationale for imposing the laws in the first place.
I have the same attitude about the War on Drugs. Yes, I get upset that people are mistreated and it irks me as a libertarian that people aren’t free to make their own choices (even if they are dumb choices) about what to put in their bodies.
But what really gets me angry is the absurd misallocation of law enforcement resources. Consider this info from a recent WonkBlog column in the Washington Post about the ever-expanding efforts of government to harass drug users.
Federal figures on drug arrests and drug use over the past three decades tell the story. Drug-possession arrests skyrocketed, from fewer than 200 arrests for every 100,000 people in 1979 … hovering near 400 arrests per 100,000 people … despite the tough-on-crime push that led to the surge in arrests in recent decades, illicit drug use today is more common among Americans age 12 and older than it was in the early 1980s. Federal figures show no correlation between drug-possession arrests and rates of drug use during that time.
But here’s the part that should upset all of us, even if we don’t like drugs or even if we think they should be illegal.
Instead of focusing on the fight against crimes that actually have victims (such as robbery, murder, rape, assault, etc), the government is squandering an immense about of time, energy, resources, and money on drug arrests.
…arrests for drug possession continue to make up a significant chunk of modern-day police work. “Around the country, police make more arrests for drug possession than for any other crime,” the report finds, citing FBI data. “More than one of every nine arrests by state law enforcement is for drug possession, amounting to more than 1.25 million arrests each year.” In fact, police make more arrests for marijuana possession alone than for all violent crimes combined.
That last sentence is breathtaking. Does anyone think that busting potheads is more important than fighting genuine crime?
Do you want an example of law enforcement resources being misallocated?
Well, this story from New Hampshire tells you everything you need to know.
… an 81-year-old grandmother had been growing … the plant as medicine, a way to ease arthritis and glaucoma and help her sleep at night. Tucked away in a raspberry patch and separated by a fence from any neighbors, the plant was nearly ready for harvest when a military-style helicopter and police descended on Sept. 21. In a joint raid, the Massachusetts National Guard and State Police entered her yard and cut down the solitary plant … authorities are using budgeted funds, prior to the end of the federal fiscal year Saturday, to gas up helicopters and do flyovers … “Is this the way we want our taxpayer money spent, to hassle an 81-year-old and law-abiding patients?” Cutler said.
Gee, I don’t know about you, but I’ll sleep more comfortably tonight knowing that lots of taxpayer money was squandered to seize a pot plant from this dangerous granny!
Still not convinced that law enforcement resources aren’t being wasted? And still not upset that lives are being disrupted and harmed by a heavy-handed government.
Then consider this horror story from Reason:
James Slatic, a California medical marijuana business owner, found out all his family’s bank accounts had been seized by the government one day in January when his 19-year-old daughter tried to buy lunch at the San Jose State University cafeteria and her card was declined. Slatic’s wife tried to transfer money to their daughter, figuring she had simply overdrawn her account, as teenagers are wont to do, but her account wouldn’t work, either. What the Slatics soon learned was the San Diego police had frozen all of their bank accounts: $55,258 from Slatic’s personal checking and savings account; $34,175 from his wife Annette’s account; and a combined $11,260 from the savings accounts of their two teenage daughters, Penny and Lily … The Slatics’ crimes? None. Or at least, the San Diego District Attorney’s Office hasn’t charged them with any in the nine months since it seized their accounts.
His business also was shut down, which wasn’t good news for him or his employees that are now out on the street.
The trouble for James Slatic began five days before his family’s accounts were frozen, when around 30 San Diego police officers and DEA agents raided Slatic’s medical marijuana business, Med-West Distribution, and seized nearly $325,000 in cash from a safe … The raid was a crushing blow to Slatic – not to mention his 35 employees, who lost their jobs and benefits without notice.
Here’s a video detailing this disgusting abuse by government.
There is some good news. Voters in several states voted last week to decriminalize pot.
And for those who worry that legalizing marijuana will be a gateway to decriminalizing harder drugs, I encourage you to read this Cato Institute study on what happened after Portugal legalized all drugs early last decade.
This first appeared at the author's website.One of the most well-known Islamic websites in the West is operated by a gentleman by the name of Masud Ahmed Khan (http://www.masud.co.uk/). Khan’s site provides a rich repository of insightful articles by English-speaking Muslim intellectuals such as T.J. Winter and Nuh Keller. I have great reverence for Winter and Keller as both have played an instrumental role in enabling young Muslims to rediscover the power, beauty, and sublimity of Islam; indeed the title of my website was inspired by Winter’s invocation of Shakespeare’s famous adage, “Blood is No Argument.” I regard Professor Winter as among the most important and influential thinkers in modern Islam. Keller himself is the translator of an oustanding compendium of Islamic law, entitled, “Reliance of the Traveller,” from which I have derived considerable benefit.
Without wanting to revive the rather tiresome controversy regarding “Salafi” and “madhabi” Islam, I would like to say a few words about an issue of the highest practical significance insofar as it pertains to questions of Islamic tolerance and unity. The controversy between Salafi and madhabi Islam is arguably the most divisive internal conflict within Western Islam; thankfully it remains a largley intellectual (i.e. non-violent) conflict, but nonetheless engenders profound feelings of enmity between the two camps. Among both Salafi and madhabi Muslims there exist very devout and committed Muslims who, in my mind, embody the highest moral principles of modern Islam. Thus, what I wish to say applies exclusively to what I will term “partisan Salafis” and “partisan madhabis.” In spite of the wealth of valuable information Khan’s website provides, the articles contained therein are frequently employed as intellectual weapons by partisan madhabis who are fond of branding Ibn Taymiyyah, his students, and essentially all Salafi Muslims as misguided. Unfortunately, many of Keller’s essays, along with other writers on Khan’s site, include explicit negative references about Ibn Taymiyyah, Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya, and their “Salafi” successors, which has a very divisive effect among Muslims today. My intention here is to present a balanced picture, to show that both sides must be circumspect in condemning their detractors in such categorical language; even more, neither partisan Salafis nor madhabis should disparage the great scholars of pre-modern Islam, of which Imam Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyyah are undoubtedly two. Bear in mind that I make no attempt here to address any particulars of Islamic theology and doctrine, which are highly complex issues that have been the source of controversy going back to medieval Islam, and beyond. They are outside the compass of my understanding.
I have made my strong opposition to partisan Salafi Islam known in several public posts (see “False Conservatism and the Case for Moderation“) and thus my loyalties are emphatically not partial to any one side. Nevertheless, it seems to me that on ritual matters of Islamic jurisprudence the positions of Salafi Muslims, who draw from all four schools of Islamic law, are often better supported by textual evidence and legal reasoning than their madhabi counterparts who insist upon adhering to a single school of jurisprudence–the rational basis for rigid adherence to one school has never made sense to me. In my mind, the main criticism that may be made against partisan Salafism is that it insists that its positions on Islamic law and doctrine are the only correct ones and consequently tends to be highly intolerant of views that depart from its framework, particularly on issues such as understanding God’s Attributes and Islamic fiqh. Moreover, partisan Salafis appear to have a rather antiquated understanding of the Islamic penal code (i.e. death penalty, blasphemy laws, punishment for theft, etc.), not recognizing that practices that had a normative character in the pre-modern world make little sense to apply in the modern context, even from the vantage point of conservative Islamic law. Although these are major defects in my mind, Salafis often have noble and endearing traits. Perhaps if Salafism exhibited a greater degree of tolerance and employed a more flexible jurisprudence, it would stand as a formidable intellectual force within modern Islam. It remain on the fringes of contemporary Islamic thought largely on account of self-inflicted wounds, it seems to me. But what of their madhabi counterparts? My strong belief is that partisan madhabis manifest characteristics that are altogether identical to the partisan Salafis they denounce.
Not satisfied with the hysterical denunciations of Nuh Keller on several prominent Salafi websites, I spent many long hours in the university library as an undergraduate researching Ibn Taymiyyah, Imam Ghazali, Asha’rite theology, and related issues. What I discovered was rather astonishing: I learned that the views of respected Western scholars on Islam were literally the mirror opposite of those espoused by Keller and other contributors to Khan’s site (see below for documentation). In short, these scholars argued that Imam Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyyah were essentially mirror reflections of one another and that neither subscribed to Asha’rite theology; this near-wholesale rejection of Asha’rite thought was thought to represent the proper position of classical Islam in the minds of Western scholars. Indeed, I presented my findings to Keller by way of Masud Ahmed Khan in an e-mail several years ago, but did not receive a response. My genuine love and esteem for Keller notwithstanding, it is undeniable that partisan madhabis, many of whom attend Zaytuna Institute seminars and cite the authority of Keller, Winter, Hamza Yusuf, Imam Ghazali, Imam Nawawi and others, insist that madhabi Islam and Ashar’ite thought represents “traditional Islam as practiced by every Muslim scholar going back to the Prophet (sws),” or some variation thereof. Moreover, they are quick to brand any and all Salafi Muslims as misguided, heterodox, and even “modernist” in their approach to Islam.
Unfortunately, most of these partisans have not undertaken anything approximating an impartial survey of Islamic history and theology; rather, they uncritically recite what Keller, God bless him, and others have written, in a manner altogether similar to partisan Salafis who champion the incendiary essays found on Salafi websites. In short, partisan madhabis maintain that Ibn Taymiyyah’s scholarship was rejected by the consensus of the classical Muslim scholars and that Ash’arite (and to a lesser extent Muturdi) theology represent the orthodox formulation of Islamic doctrine. In so doing, partisan madhabis have adopted a “my scholar is better than yours attitude” vis-a-vis Imam Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyyah, thereby perpetuating the rather shameful habit of treating Muslim scholars like football teams. It is important to note that Hamza Yusuf and Zaid Shakir have consistently come to Ibn Taymiyyah’s public defense and, so far as one can tell, have never uttered an unkind word about him. Hamza Yusuf has consistently shown himself to be a man of the highest moral courage, someone committed to Muslim unity in the most profound sense of the term; a sample of his views of Ibn Taymiyyah may be found in this video lecture. Furthermore, consider the following quote by his dear friend and colleague at Zaytuna College, Zaid Shakir. In his essay, “The Changing Face of Secularism and the Islamic Response,” Shakir writes:
In the West, we will have to prevent the emerging “Traditionalist-Salafi” division from becoming a fundamental, irreconcilable split. One way to do this is to define Ahli al-Sunnah w’al-Jama’ah as broadly and as inclusively as possible, instead of the narrow, exclusive definitions, which dominate current discourse. One such definition is provided by Tahir al-Bagdadi (d. 429 AH) in his book, al-Farq bayn al-Firaq(The Difference Between the Sects). He mentions Ahl al-Sunnah w’al-Jama’ah as being comprised of eight basic groups. These groups accommodate all of the orientations, which serve as the basis for the thought of informed Traditionalists and Salafis.
In light of the foregoing, it is clear that Hamza Yusuf and Zaid Shakir have explicitly distanced themselves from a narrow conception of madhabi Islam. Where, then, is the evidence that the views of partisan madhabis do not align with objective Islamic scholarship and history? Below I’ve provided a small sample of my research. Note that the quotes that follow issue from the most authoritative sources on Islam: George Makdisi, William Montgomery Watt, Henry Laoust, Donald Little, and Ignaz Goldziher. Only the latter may be construed as having anything approximating an anti-Islamic bias–I believe this was Edward Said’s position who seemed to dismiss virtually every Western scholar on Islam and the Arab people as one given to the “Orientalist” enterprise. Notwithstanding Said’s cynicism, I regard these scholars as fair and impartial authorities–far more impartial than partisan Salafis and madhabis who have strong incentive to ignore evidence that upset their respective positions.
Consider first Keller’s position in juxtaposition to Makdisi and Donald Little. Keller writes:
“By the standards of all previous Ahl al-Sunna scholars, it is clear that despite voluminous and influential written legacy, ibn Taymiya cannot be considered an authority on tenents of faith (‘aqida), a field in which he made mistakes profoundly incompatible with the beliefs of Islam, as also with a number of his legal views that violated the scholarly consensus (ijma) of Sunni Muslims.”
Citing the Hanafi scholar Muhammad Zahid al-Kawthari, Keller again writes:
“Whoever thinks that all the scholars of his time joined in a single conspiracy against him from personal envy should rather impugn their own intelligence and understanding, after studying the repugnance of his deviations in beliefs and works, for which he was asked to repent time after time and moved from prison to prison until he passed on to what he’d sent ahead.”
Now contrast Keller’s stance with Professor Donald Little’s view on the attitude of classical Muslim historians toward Ibn Taymiyyah (emphasis added):
“Without exception, all of the historians, no matter what their position, training, and specialization show a distinctly favorable attitude toward Ibn Taymiyyah’s words and deeds. So far as has been determined, only al-Dhahabi, Ibn Rajab, and Ibn Hajar record anything at all which might be construed as an uncomplimentary interpretation of Ibn Taymiyyah’s character and activities, and the instances of this are rare even with these three authors. Al-Dhahabi, in fact, speaks of him as farid al-‘asr’, ‘the like of whom he had not seen.”
“For example, Al-Dhahabi claims that the Shaykh (Ibn Taymiyyah) had partisans from ‘the Ulama and virtuous persons among the army and the amirs, the merchants and notables (kumara), and that all the common people loved him because he stood up for their welfare, night and day, by his tongue and his pen…..Who were these enemies? In this particular instance, they were obviously other Syrian Ulama who were jealous of Ibn Taymiyyah’s prestige with the ranking Mamluk office of Syria…As for other groups or classes of enemies, Ibn Kathir specifies the fuqaha, who, he says, were jealous both of Ibn Taymiyyah’s prestige and his piety…Nor is it difficult to understand the envy and jealously attributed to his Ulama colleagues. Not only did he move in powerful company and influence the leaders of the state, his opinions were widely sought and forcefully expressed.”
On the question of Islamic doctrine, Keller states the following regarding Ashar’ite thought:
The Ash‘ari school and Maturidi schools have represented the ‘aqida or “tenets of belief” of the majority of Sunni Muslims for more than a thousand years.”
However, George Makdisi, “acknowledged on a world-wide scale as one of the greatest Arabists and Islamicists of his generation” presents a view altogether different. Consider several excerpts (emphasis added):
In this paper I hope to show also that from Shafi’i and Ibn Hanbal to Ghazzali and Ibn Taimiya, a traditionalist religious movement, fundamentally Islamic, fought for the catholicity of Islam against the elitist exclusivism of kalam, first in its Mu’tazilite, then in its Ash’arite versions.
How then did we arrive at the notion that Ghazzali was an Ash’arite theologian? The notion was conceived in the nineteenth-century studies, especially in that of von Mehren, based on the Tabyin of the Ash’arite propagandists Ibn ‘Asakir.”
I am aware that this conception of Ghazzali as a Shafi’ite without being an Ash’arite will come as a surprise to many. However, we are brought to it not only by Ghazzali’s own words, which should be sufficient, but also by the attitude of Subki as well as that of Ibn Taimiya.
To sum up: the place of Ash’arism in the historical development of Muslim theology has been allotted an exaggerated importance. Whenever this happens in the writing of history, something else is sure to suffer in the process. And the loss, in the final analysis, is our own. The place of traditionalism in the history of Muslim religious thought has been minimized, and its importance overlooked.
Consider W.M. Watt’s position (emphasis mine):
It was only with the growth of interest in Hanbalism stimulated by Henri Laoust that this identification [of the dominance of Asharitie thought] was seen to be inadequate. Under the inspiration of Laoust, George Makdisi published an article in 1962 entitled ‘Ashari and the Asharites in Islamic Religious History’. In this he called attention to the fact that Western Islamists had relied almost exclusively on Asharite sources. This began with the publication in London in two volumes (1842, 1846) of ash-Shahrastani’s work on sects and religion, Kitab al-milal wa-n-nihal, followed by its translation into German in 1850/I. This was a balanced scholarly work and rightly had an immense influence on Western thinking about Islam, but it was not without some bias in favour of Asharism…[thus] the importance of Ash’arites had been exaggerated and the contribution of the ‘traditionalist’ overlooked. This conclusion is in the main to be accepted.”
That is, Little, Makdisi, and Watt present view of Islamic history that directly undercuts Keller’s position. The two viewpoints stand in irreconcilable contradiction. One may argue that these scholars represent voices of an older generation of Orientalists that were bent upon demonstrating that Islam was given to anti-intellectualism. However, the weakness of this argument is four-fold: first, it is a matter of common knowledge that Makdisi is the author of the two most important books on Islam’s contribution to humanism, the university system, and its profound effect on the intellectual development of European thought. See The Rise of Humanism in Classical Islam and the Christian West (1990) and earlier The Rise of Colleges: Institutions of Learning in Islam and the West (1981). Indeed, Keller and others often cite Makdisi’s authority favorably in their published works. Second, W.M. Watt is considered the precursor to John Esposito and others, and regarded even by committed Muslims as among the most balanced Western voices on Islam. One may even say Watt’s books are written with a subtlety and exactitude that leaves the work of his successors appearing rather amateurish. Third, even if it is conceded that these voices were working in pursuit of “culture and imperialism,” as Said was wont to say, it does not follow that their findings are flawed. One must substantively and comprehensively refute their scholarship, which has not been tried, let alone done, to my knowledge. Forth, Makdisi himself states that in advancing his position on Imam Ghazali and his rejection of Ashar’rite theology, he is challenging the conventional view put forth by his Orientalist predecessors. Makdisi is quite emphatic about this point.
I suspect that partisan madhabis will regard my criticism of Khan and others as a show of irreverence. But I hope it is not perceived that way. God is my witness that I love Nuh Keller, but I happen to strongly disagree with his non-conciliatory view of Ibn Taymiyyah and his students, particularly in light of the overwhelming historical evidence that supplants his well-intentioned position. One of the reasons, it seems to me, that many young Muslims have become disabused of religion is because they are taught, either explicitly or implicitly, to keep silent when faced with a genuine dilemma as to what their conscience demands and what they are told by their religious elders. But how can one be asked to abdicate one’s common sense in a false showing of respect and piety? Indeed, the greater show of disrespect, in my mind, would be to remain quiescent while allowing intellectual confusion to pervade within oneself.
Thus the question that must be put to Khan and others is that, if one is so sure that Ibn Taymiyyah was misguided, and that Asharite thought is the proper articulation of traditional Islamic doctrine, why have the most authoritative and impartial sources on Islam said the exact opposite? (See below for more detailed quotes). Do those who dismiss Ibn Taymiyyah and his students as heretical figures have an intellectually robust response to their findings? Perhaps most importantly, will the partisans in the mahabi community cease in their disparagements of Ibn Taymiyyah and those who choose not to follow the precise contours of Asharite theology? Indeed, the absence of tolerance in modern Islam is a two-way street and cannot be laid exclusively at the feet of partisan Salafis; both sides are to blame in equal, or comparable, measure.
My decision to present this research publicly was prompted by a very practical consideration: to quell yet another source of unnecessary internal controversy within contemporary Islam. The present controversy has resulted in a sharp ideological divide among Muslims as evidenced by the abundance of Salafi and madhabi websites devoted to partisan denunciation, and counter-denunciation. Regrettably, it must be said that partisan madhabis suffer from the very attitude of condescension and self-adulation that they rightfully condemn in their Salafi counterparts. Why contemporary Muslims are so bent upon creating infinite sectarian division, I cannot understand. A slight show of tolerance and open-mindedness would have a highly restorative effect upon the world Muslim community.
I end with several additional quotations from the scholars I reference above:
Taken from George Makdisi’s paper, “The Non-Ash’arite Shafi’ism of Abu Hamid Al-Ghazzali“:
“In this paper I hope to show also that from Shafi’i and Ibn Hanbal to Ghazzali and Ibn Taimiya, a traditionalist religious movement, fundamentally Islamic, fought for the catholicity of Islam against the the elitist exclusivism of kalam, first in its Mu’tazilite, then in its Ash’arite versions. Shafi’i had inaugurated this anti-kalaam movement and given it its religious manifesto. Ibn Hanbal followed him carrying the message through to victory. Learned advocates among the Muslim intellectuals sustained the movement’s momentum down through the centuries, with Ibn Hazm, Ghazzali, and Ibn Taimiya being perhaps the most famous among them. These jurisconsult-theologians, in spite of their many differences of opinion, have surprisingly many thoughts and traits in common, including their attitude towards kalam-theology, and their profound admirations for the Fathers of Islam (Salaf), especially Shafi’i and Ibn Hanbal.
“To my knowledge, Ghazzali never once refers to himself as an Ash’arite. Indeed, all signs indicate a different direction. It does not help to say that Ghazzali never once denied affiliation with Ash’arism; for it may also be said that he never affirmed such an affiliation. On the contrary, there is a good reason to doubt it.”
“How then did we arrive at the notion that Ghazzali was an Ash’arite theologian? The notion was conceived in the nineteenth-century studies, especially in that of of von Mehren, based on the Tabyin of the Ash’arite propagandists Ibn ‘Asakir.”
“I am aware that this conception of Ghazzali as a Shafi’ite without being an Ash’arite will come as a surprise to many. However, we are brought to it not only by Ghazzali’s own words, which should be sufficient, but also by the attitude of Subki as well as that of Ibn Taimiya. We are convinced by Subki’s less than enthusiastic attitude towards Ghazzali, by his thinly veiled criticism of the Ihya, by the capital fact that he refuses to accord to the Iqtisad the qualification of a work on theology according to the method of the theologians of kalam…It is precisely for this attitude towards kalam that Ghazzali was attacked by the theologians of Ash’arite kalam and it is for this attitude that the Hanbalite Ibn Taimiya defended him against them
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. We were happy to see so many questions being answered through our platform, allowing for hackers to more effectively seek help and address issues. One potential area for improvement we noticed was having to explicitly start a help session — people often began to type their questions without doing so, thus causing them to have to resend their messages once they did start their session. Because having to explicitly start chats is different from the flow users are accustomed to in a chat setting, we hope to improve this in future iterations and enable users to send messages at any time.
On the other end, we were also able to observe how staff interacted with the help sessions. While they generally responded promptly, there were stretches where no staff was manning the sessions, and thus users’ questions were not answered. In the future, we may suggest to hackathon staff to choose one person whose designated role is to keep an eye on the bot, or to use the bot to notify staff whenever new help sessions are created.
Feedback
After the hackathon, we sent out a poll to participants asking them to describe their experiences using the bot. Although we had plenty of contact and feedback from hackathon staff, we wanted to see how the actual users liked the bot. We sent the following question and waited for the responses to roll in:
“Thanks for coming to YHack! We hope you had a great time. Please let us know what you thought about using the Messenger bot by rating us from 1–5 below (1 — not useful at all, 5 — extremely useful) and sending any comments our way — any feedback would be greatly appreciated!”
In the end, we had 96 of our users respond:
Our final average rating was 3.646 — it seemed that most users enjoyed using the bot and felt that it added to the hackathon experience. Reading through more detailed user feedback, we were also happy to see that people had a great time interacting with our bot, with many citing the bot as a quick and easy way to get help.
In the future, we hope to improve how we gather feedback by building a more formalized process, potentially linking to a custom survey after users rate their experience. Adding a way for participants to leave feedback at all times could also lead to more users leaving feedback whenever they run into an issue or bug. Additionally, many hackathons send out a post-hackathon survey to their attendees. Adding a section in this survey about our Messenger bot might improve the quality of the feedback we receive as well. Since the hackers will already be reflecting on their hackathon experiences while answering questions, it’s likely that they’d be able to provide more concrete and detailed examples of how they used the bot and what they thought about it.
Acknowledgments
Thank you for reading about our experience — we hope you found our insights interesting! In future blog posts, we’ll take deeper dives into the different areas of our bots and walk through their development and iteration processes. We’d also like to extend special thanks to the YHack staff for allowing us to pilot our hackathon platform at their hackathon. They were extremely supportive of our platform and accommodating of our (many) questions and concerns, and we are grateful to them for the time and effort they spent publicizing our bot to hackathon participants. Lastly, we’d like to thank all of the YHack participants for serving as our pilot users — we’ve received a ton of data and feedback that we’re excited to integrate into the next iteration of our platform.
If you run a hackathon (or other event) and are interested in a chatbot, let us know! Email us at [email protected] to learn more about the custom services we offer.Syrian regime jets risked an aerial confrontation with US warplanes on Saturday after flying over a battleground city in northern Syria despite warnings that bombing there could lead to American forces opening fire.
The US scrambled its own jets on Thursday after Assad regime aircraft dropped bombs on Kurdish forces in the city of Hasakah, dangerously close to US commandos operating on the ground.
The incident ended without shots being fired but the Pentagon warned that similar bombing raids could lead to US jets shooting down the Syrians. "The Syrian regime would be well advised not to interfere with coalition forces or its partners," a spokesman said.
It is believed to be the closest that American aircraft have come to opening fire on regime jets in the crowded skies above Syria.
Damascus appeared to be probing the limits of the American warning on Saturday as its air force flew more sorties over Hasakah, where regime troops are battling against US-backed Kurdish forces.
It was not clear whether the regime aircraft dropped bombs or not during the mission.
The rising tensions between the US and Syria came as Turkey's prime minister said his country intended to play a "more active" in the conflict in Syria.
“Turkey will be more active in the Syria issue in the coming six months as a regional player. This means to not allow Syria to be divided on any ethnic base; for Turkey this is crucial,” Binali Yildirim said.
Mr Yildirim also said Turkey was prepared to see Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian regime leader, play a role in the country's interim leadership as part of a political transition but must play no part in its future.
Turkey's promise to assert itself appears to have been prompted by fears that Kurdish groups were gaining too much power in northern Syria and may encourage Kurds in Turkey to rise up too. "It is clear that the regime has understood the structure Kurds are trying to form in the north (of Syria) has started to become a threat for Syria too," Mr Yildirim said.
Turkey's anxieties mean its interests are at least temporarily aligned with the Assad regime's, as both sides try to prevent Kurdish power from growing.
Fighting between Syrian government forces and Kurdish fighters from the People's Protection Units (YPG) intensified on Friday and Saturday inside Hasakah.
The clashes threaten to escalate into a full blown war between Kurds and the regime, which would open yet another new front in already fiendishly complex war.
Pro-government media said there had been preliminary meetings to try to organise a truce, in what some interpreted as a sign of the regime's unwillingness to fight against yet another enemy.Skip to comments.
More top McCain-Palin aides come out supporting her.
Politico ^ | 11/7/08 | Jonathon Martin
Posted on by Paul R.
... The Republicans who worked most closely with Palin the ones who were with her from when she first walked into that swooning Ohio basketball arena in August until she walked off the stage after McCains concession speech in Phoenix Tuesday are now having their say in that conversation.
And they want it known that theyre sick of Sarah Palin being dragged through the mud.
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com...
TOPICS:
Extended News
Front Page News
News/Current Events
Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS:
2008
mccain
palin
I did a quick search & didn't see this article posted, even though it's a bit old. Very interesting info...
To: Paul R.
I personally think that the bad mouthing of Sarah Palin is being done by undercover demo-rats.
by 2 posted onby Dustbunny (Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged. The Gipper)
To: Paul R.
McCains is looking worse every day he remains quiet.
To: icwhatudo
“McCains is looking worse every day he remains quiet” McCain will be on Leno Monday night. Do you think he will be asked this question? I think so. And he should defend her profusely.
To: icwhatudo
McCains is looking worse every day he remains quiet. Yep.
Man, he really just dropped right off the face of the earth, didn't he?
To: Paul R.
If it was prev. posted I say more the better.
She is the rightful heir to lead Reagan-conservatism, and I'd bet Mike Pence would concur.
To: Dustbunny
I personally think that the bad mouthing of Sarah Palin is being done by undercover demo-rats. --- I agree.
To: icwhatudo
McCains is looking worse every day he remains quiet. If he's allowing/ordering his underlings to "take out" Palin in a way that doesn't come back on him, then he's scum. If he knows the charges aren't true, and allows them to continue, then he's scum.
by 8 posted onby scott7278 (It's going to be a rough four years on the good ship Obamapop.)
To: jla
Thanks - I thought it a bit odd no one had picked this up sooner, but, then, FR was down for a spell... I sure would like to see the real source of this garbage I.D.’d. I’ve seen a couple MSM reports reporting it as straight up fact & no retractions yet. If McCain is going to be on Leno, he HAS to put a harpoon in this.
by 9 posted onby Paul R. (We are in a break in an Ice Age. A brief break at that...)
To: Paul R.
“And they want it known that theyre sick of Sarah Palin being dragged through the mud.” That’s good to read, & thanx for posting this article.
by 10 posted onby Sun (Pray that God sends us good leaders. Please say a prayer now.)
To: chief_believer
I’m sick of RINO’s — this is what our “big tent” philosophy has gotten us. Palin saved McCain from being a national laughingstock; he shouldn’t have to be asked a question about it to give an answer. Palin also saved us; we can say that 57,000,000+ didn’t buy the hype of Obama.
by 11 posted onby scott7278 (It's going to be a rough four years on the good ship Obamapop.)
To: Paul R.
I think this was a deliberate attempt to disgrace Sarah Palin after McCain lost. It was also done by the NeoCons on his staff (after all, who other than NeoCons would have worked for him). They probably assumed that they were doing both McCain and other Republicans a service by attempting to disgrace a Conservative like Sarah Palin. Actually, they have only angered and enthused the supporters of which I am one - Major!
To: Paul R.
Hmmmm, so the so called Bush aides are not afraid to speak on the record... Puts that rumor to rest.... So who are the ‘ridiculing radicals’?
by 13 posted onby Just mythoughts (Isa.3:4 And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them.)
To: Deagle
Actually, they have only angered and enthused the supporters of which I am one - Major!
To: Paul R.
Republicans in general, IF they rediscover their ‘nads ought to make an example of that puke Carl Cameron who gleefully leaped into the ‘Trashing Palin Festival’ on FOX and make it known that he is persona non grata at ANY GOP function, that NO interviews will be granted to him, that he will won’t even be allowed to float in the punch bowl, he’ll have to stink in a little pile outside, looking in. Now if Carl were to name his sources and identify who his fellow pukes are who were so eager to trash Governor Palin, maybe we might start getting somewhere.
by 15 posted onby mkjessup (0bama the President-elect? 'Reverend' Jeremiah Wright IS a prophet: God has just damned America.)
To: jla
Sarah Palin and Mike Pence should be the team in 2012.
To: timestax
To: Paul R.
You know, this stuff (and more*) would provide an excellent opportunity for McCain to blast the MSM, without doing the “woe is me, we can’t win because of the MSM” complaint. Instead, he can be the knight that he was too much of in the campaign, but here he can be outraged at a smear, and it’d be appropriate to be so. I was just reading on another thread, that Newsweek reports Palin supposedly wouldn’t appear at a rally with John Sununu, because he’s pro choice — the problem with that being that “John Sununu has a 100 percent pro-life rating from the National Right to Life Committee.” http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2128553/posts And just WHO is stupid?
by 18 posted onby Paul R. (We are in a break in an Ice Age. A brief break at that...)
To: timestax
Oh Yea! Don’t forget Piper is running in 2048! Heh...
To: Paul R.
But she also wound up appealing less to supporters of Hillary Clinton and skeptics of President Bush than McCain aides had hoped; Oh, and why would that be? The 24 hour MSM slander machine put into action to misinform the idiots that believe the crap the MSM says! That's why!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John RobinsonBy Travis M. Smith—
A six-inch water pipe busted under a Tarleton State parking lot on Wednesday afternoon, causing thousands of gallons of water to begin shooting out of cracks in the asphalt in front of Bender Hall. Parking lot P-11, reserved for faculty and staff, had noticeable areas where the water pressure was pushing up the asphalt.
Tarleton students Katy Reynolds and Shavon Cashion were some of the first to notice the busted pipe.
“We were walking back to our cars, and there was water coming out of the ground,” Cashion said. “Within the five minutes we were here, we noticed sections of the ground coming up really high, and then the ground started to separate more.” Cashion said that she tried to call the campus police but did not get an answer.
“By the time the workers got out here, the center section had raised at least an inch and a half or two,” Reynolds said.
The two said they were standing in the middle of the parking lot, looking at the water shooting out of the cracks, when a maintenance employee told them to “get out of there, because it [the parking lot] could blow-up.”
A Tarleton State project manager was on scene and said that, while he hasn’t looked at the drawings yet, he believes the source of the leak to be one or two busted six-inch water lines. A crew will have to dig up the parking lot in order to repair the broken pipes. All water traveling to the area, including water to the west end of the library, Davis Hall, Bender, and Ferguson, was turned off by 6:00 p.m., and all cars were moved. A contractor was contacted to begin repairs.
The leak was fixed and water turned back on yesterday evening. Some parking lot repair will have to be done today in P-11, but no closing is expected.
This morning, a team of workers can be seen standing in the crater in the parking lot, mending the damages where the pipe burst.More Than Anarchy in the UK: 'Social Unrest' and its Resurgence in the Madoffized Society
by Lee F. Monaghan and Micheal O'Flynn
University of Limerick; Open University Ireland
Sociological Research Online, 17 (1) 9
<http://www.socresonline.org.uk/17/1/9.html>
10.5153/sro.2608
Abstract
Sudden explosions of street violence and disorder tend to evoke simplistic responses. Echoing Victorian moralising and condemnation of urban street fighting at the end of the nineteenth century, politicians depicted England's August 2011 riots as'mindless criminality'. Critical of such rhetoric, we maintain that the recent riots should not be misrecognised through the class politics of the advantaged. Instead, we locate this unrest in a larger historical, social, economic and political context. This context includes the progressive predominance of finance capital in the post-1970s era and related neoliberal policy agendas and ideological forms. We posit that neoliberal transformations in the economy and society have undermined many young people's capacity to lead useful and meaningful lives, and that the potential for hopelessness, resentment, frustration and outbursts of anger has significantly increased as a consequence. We argue that the alienation of young people today cannot be separated from forms of accumulation that depend on massive debt-expansion. Neither can it be separated from the proliferation of related practices and institutional supports that enable this expansion, further accelerating the deterioration of already disaffected young people's prospects and futures. We refer to the enabling elements of this process as 'Madoffization' at a time when ponzi finance has made economic collapse and ongoing social unrest inevitable.
Keywords: Neoliberal Riots, Madoffization, Financialization, Debt-Expansion, Scapegoating
Introduction
The Madoffized Society
As stated in this journal's call for a rapid response to the recent'social unrest' - 'riots' - in England during August 2011, political and media reactions were relatively simple. In his Downing Street statement on the riots in London and other cities, Prime Minister David Cameron immediately remarked: 'Let me, first of all, completely condemn the scenes that we have seen on our television screens and people have witnessed in their communities... This is criminality, pure and simple, and it has to be confronted and defeated' ( Cameron, 2011 ). Much of the resultant discourse had little concern with understanding and explaining socially censured action within its social, historical, economic and political context. Yet, in the absence of such knowledge - which, we would stress, is not the same as condoning violence in the streets - public and policy discourse will remain impoverished while punitive reactions will largely be misplaced and disproportionate. The conditions will also remain for ongoing social unrest in what we call the Madoffized society.Madoffization is a neologism that we use when seeking to make sense of and critique the fictions and consequences of financial capitalism ( Monaghan and O'Flynn, forthcoming ). Bernard L. Madoff is our obvious referent here. Madoff was a powerful Wall Street financier who will live on in infamy. The discovery of Madoff's $65 billion ponzi scheme, during the 2008 banking crisis, was met with widespread, if superficial, condemnation. However, we contend that Madoff represents something much more significant than a 'rotten worm' in an otherwise 'healthy green apple' ( �i�ek,�2009 : 36). While Madoff's crime was outrageous, his fraud cannot be understood in isolation from the institutions, practices and imperatives of contemporary financial capitalism. Madoff built his scheme on top of a ready-made support structure, which also facilitated�the largest wave of accounting or 'control fraud' ( Black, 2005 ) in history, triggering the inevitable implosion of�financial systems�across the world. The scale of Madoff's deception was in large part a measure of the deregulated, desupervised and criminogenic environment that was designed to facilitate the expansion of finance, insurance and real estate (the so-called FIRE sector). When set against this, Madoff's scheme�appears as�the tip of an iceberg of financial deception. Finance capital created Madoff in its own image. The dominance of finance capital - wherein debt-expansion is prioritised as a means of accumulation - necessitates mass deception, secrecy and silence, obfuscation and, eventually, scapegoating. Such practices are commonplace in countries that prioritise the interests of finance capital, such as the USA and Britain. We�call this�Madoffization. We suggest that societies are Madoffized�not only�in the sense that they are dominated by 'ponzi finance' ( Rasmus, 2008 ), but also in the sense that�they�prioritise forms of accumulation that make deception, economic collapse and social unrest inevitable.�
2.2 In extending our thinking to the 2011 riots we obviously go beyond surface events. Similarly, in their qualified discussion on the riots, Graham and Annette Scambler (2011) underscore the relevance of financial capitalism and 'class understood in a classic Marxian sense [as] a prepotent objective force' (3.1, emphasis in original). What we call Madoffization emerged in the post-1970s era as a response to historically transmitted contradictions and (temporary) attempts by segments of the ruling class to'resolve' crises, notably through what is commonly termed 'neoliberalism'. Neoliberalism is a contested concept which, for Hillel Ticktin (2009), dignifies the undignified with a name, though the concept has proven useful for those seeking to critique the prevailing system. As David Harvey (2005) explains, neoliberal ideology valorises so-called free markets and trade, privatisation, de-regulation, financialization and so forth. Distinguishing between ideology and practice, Harvey critiques neoliberalism with its indefensible 'defence' of unfettered freedoms and what that perversely implies through neoliberalisation (for example, the freedom of corporations to viciously exploit workers). Neoliberalisation took a particularly strong foothold in Britain and the USA in the 1980s, notably via the policies of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, justified in the name of 'trickle down economics' where wealth 'generated' by the 'top' supposedly benefitted all. Yet, this resulted in growing inequality, alongside the're-legitimation of inequality and inequity' (Scambler and Scambler, 2011: 2.2, emphasis in original).
2.3 What we call Madoffization is not synonymous with neoliberalisation, though they do share a close symbiotic relationship. Neoliberalisation has provided the conditions under which Madoffization has been able to grow in size and consequence, which, in turn, has dialectically furthered and reinforced the broader redistributive class project which was hitherto justified by neoliberal ideology. The expansion of Madoffization, with its criminogenic tendencies and�shameless institutionalisation of greed, was supercharged following the deregulation and desupervision of financial markets from the 1980s onwards. Other 'enablers' (Rasmus, 2009: 39) and stimulants have included developments in the forces of production (computer technology, notably the internet that supports instant global trading) and capitalism's finance and'securitization revolution' in 'commodity money forms' and 'intermediaries' (e.g. Credit Default Swaps, Structured Investment Vehicles, Hedge Funds) (Rasmus, 2008: 26). The invention of myriad financial instruments increased the tendency towards speculative as well as super-speculative (ponzi) activity, and ultimately financial instability. As explained by Jack Rasmus (2008), when critically extending the theories of Hyman Minsky and Karl Marx to the deepening global crisis, the FIRE sector became the engine-room of ponzi finance wherein it was assumed that wealth could be made outside of real production. Culminating in an 'epic recession' (Rasmus, 2009), this fictitious 'wealth creation' consisted of banks and other creditors lending vast amounts of interest-bearing money that was then pumped into rising (overinflated) assets, in the expectation of securing future returns (note, in particular, the housing bubble and the toxic aftermath). For Rasmus, finance capital achieved dominance in a context where 'the drive for profitability amidst systemic counter-pressures reducing profitability' (2008: 7) underpinned the acceleration of ponzi speculation in the twenty-first century. While we lack space to discuss the temporal development of Madoffization, Rasmus offers important insights when describing the massive acceleration of financially destabilising speculation from 2000 onwards, as market participants sought super-profitable returns � basically, a free lunch (Hudson, 2010) - quickly and without producing anything.
2.4 The Madoffized society entails, as part of a zero-sum game, the rapid accumulation of fantastic wealth and extension of command for a nomadic 'cabal' of financiers, CEOs and other elites 'that comprises the hard core of the capitalist executive' (Scambler and Scambler, 2011: 2.3). This cabal, as with their aristocratic and robber baron predecessors (Varul, 2011), prioritise private interests over public interests: short-term parasitic concerns that are deceptively rationalised through what Michael Hudson (2010: 424) terms 'junk economics' and accounting (also, Black, 2005; Hudson, 2012). Madoffization is parasitic because it comprises fictitious capital (expanding claims on wealth), which Marx incorrectly believed would increasingly become subordinate to the real economy as it developed and shed its feudalistic ties to the rentier class (Hudson, 2010). In the current phase of financialization � where neoliberal ideology is thoroughly discredited - subjugated populations are experiencing massive dispossession and structural violence. This is through government imposed austerity, as states shore up banks and the insolvent FIRE sector more generally. For Hudson (2010), if left unchecked, this is the regressive route towards 'debt peonage', privatised asset grabs at fire sale prices and 'the tollbooth economy' which destroys countless people's lives. The most pernicious effects will, of course, be structured according to age, ethnicity in interaction with social class, gender and locality etc.
2.5 Elites benefitting from this extractive system seek to perpetuate it, but, as with the classic ponzi scheme that entails robbing Peter to pay Paul, it is highly unstable. Exponentially rising debt - an 'overhead' of 'anti-wealth' in Hudson's (2010) terms - is unserviceable. The result is a solvency crisis, currently at the sovereign level after banks unloaded their toxic debts onto the public, and what can only amount to temporary remedial interventions as evidenced by the ongoing Eurozone debacle. These are the cold and hard conditions under which countless people are struggling, becoming increasingly angry and are protesting. Encouragingly, many young people in the UK appear to be 'politically conscious', as suggested by emerging research on the riots (Younge, 2011). However, even if the disadvantaged are not overtly class conscious � many may be dazed and confused given the vicious workings of 'the shock doctrine' (Klein, 2007) � what we have described above are the political economic conditions under which the dispossessed, humiliated and indignant are acting out their frustrations. Such (joint) actions unfold in ways that make sense to people in their contexts of everyday life, including, for some disaffected youth, 'trickle down looting'.
2.6 As should be clear, then, we would locate social unrest, and 'right minded' condemnation, within the historically unfolding structures of capitalism and neoliberal exacerbation of inequalities and inequities that prevail in the Madoffized society. Our central contention is that the 2011 'neoliberal riots' (Wall, 2011) and other manifestations of dissent should not be obscured or misrecognised through the class politics of the advantaged. While dominant discourse on the riots was deceptively simple, making sociological sense of such reactions, and, indeed, the historically unfolding conditions under which these events and discourses emerged, is a more complex yet necessary task.
2.7 The following is structured as such. First, we note that facile establishment reactions to street violence among British youths are recurrent under oppressive capitalist conditions, and why the Madoffized society is prone to a resurgence of mass unrest. In response to deceptive claims emanating from political elites and mainstream media, we will then elaborate upon why we think the 2011 riots should not be misrecognised as 'pure and simple criminality'. Instead, we posit that neoliberal transformations in the Madoffized society have undermined many young people's capacity to lead useful and meaningful lives, and that the potential for hopelessness, resentment, frustration and outbursts of anger has significantly increased as a consequence. The predictable result is a tinderbox, ready to explode.
Locating Social Unrest and Establishment Reactions
Obviously there are people in this city, sadly, who are intent on violence, who are looking for the opportunity to steal and set fire to buildings and create a sense of mayhem, whether they're anarchists or part of organised gangs or just feral youth frankly, who fancy a new pair of trainers. (Leadly, 2011)
While our sociological attention goes beyond surface events, those events shortly preceding the 2011 riots deserve recognition. We acknowledge that the original event that sparked the unrest in Tottenham � the police shooting of an unarmed black youth, Mark Duggan - had significance for many people who initially took to the streets ( Younge, 2011 ). The attempted cover-up (the police falsely claimed Duggan had shot at them) was widely understood as part of an ongoing pattern of discrimination, as was the treatment of those protesting the killing afterwards. These events played a role in igniting the rioting, arson and looting among young people who already felt a generalised sense of humiliation and anger. Yet, prominent public figures ignored or obscured such basic concerns. Kit Malthouse, deputy mayor of London and chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority, condemned the city's disturbances as such:This non-explanation � youths causing disturbance because there are youths that are intent on causing disturbance � was the standard non-explanation. Indeed, commentators attempting to look beyond the simplistic and pejorative descriptions of 'feral youths', 'yobs' or'mindless thugs' were routinely dismissed as apologists for rioting and lawlessness. During a BBC ( 2011 ) television interview, journalist Darcus Howe stated that the disturbances were entirely predictable to anyone looking at what was happening to youths, particularly black youths, with a discerning eye. The interviewer misrecognised Howe's statement to mean that he was condoning rioting, and subsequently sought to discredit him: 'you are not a stranger to riots yourself, are you Mr. Howe? You have taken part in them yourself'. The reference was to Howe's participation in demonstrations, which were dealt with heavy-handedly by the police, nothing more. Howe was attempting to give voice to the daily humiliations and sense of desperation that was building among many black youths, and marginalised white youths. The unwillingness of the BBC news presenter to listen respectfully to Howe was obvious.
3.2 Official interpretations and responses to social unrest involving 'disaffected youths' have changed relatively little in the last hundred years or so. No motive is sought beyond the assumed short-term entertainment of'mindless thugs'. While the 'rampant consumerism' observed during England's 2011 riots may have been novel, there is nothing new about urban street violence alongside state condemnation. Social unrest was in fact a central political concern in the last decades of the nineteenth century in Victorian England, especially in impoverished areas of Manchester and Salford where so-called'scuttlers' fought in the streets. To Victorian conservatives, these 'feral youths' were nothing more than 'ruffians', 'brutes', 'barbarians','savages' and 'juvenile terrorists' who had to be disciplined as such (Davies, 2011). When Justice Wills sentenced one scuttler in 1887, he claimed that they had 'no other motive than a ferocious love of fighting' (ibid.). Since there was no cause other than 'evil intent', the only remedies that came to mind were of the punitive variety.
3.3 As in Victorian England, today's caricature of the 'thug' serves an ideological function; it is part of the arsenal of apologetics necessarily assembled in defence of the arrangements that reproduce and exacerbate inequality, inequity and alienation. When speaking publicly about the 2011 riots, Conservative politicians and their allies appeared unable to even consider anything other than 'law and order' solutions to the'mayhem'. Yet, amidst historical continuity in how elites have reacted and continue to react to violent street disturbances, it is important to recognise changing conditions underlying the 2011 riots. For one thing, there is little industry left in Britain following waves of marketization that sought more easily exploitable pools of reserve labour and resources in developing nations. Capitalism's Golden Age (from the end of the Second World War to about 1970) is but a memory, and Britain's reinvigorated and re-legitimated class (caste) system is riddled with deep and mounting contradictions, disaffection and structured conflict that is amplified by the callous prioritisation of (financial)'markets' over people. The off-shoring of production has meant that large segments of Britain's former working-class, who may have otherwise laboured in the real economy, have been condemned to a life on ever-diminishing state 'welfare' and associated surveillance. This is the increasingly hopeless, frustrating and degrading context wherein disaffected young people have become marks for Victorian style moralising and disproportionate punitive sanctions when they 'overstep' boundaries.
3.4 In such a context, and with the benefit of emerging empirical evidence (Younge, 2011), we consider Cameron's immediate condemnation and depiction of the riots as simplistic and deceptive. Such reactions prevail in the Madoffized society. As with Madoff, who was jailed for 150 years when his ponzi scheme imploded, those directly and indirectly involved in the 2011 riots served as sacrificial lambs. This is easier and more politically expedient than tackling broader structures and practices that underpinned the unrest. Misleading attributions of blame - the scapegoating of young disaffected people - obscures the deep structural causes for historically unprecedented inequality and conditions for escalating mass unrest. Such generative mechanisms, we would argue, cannot be reduced to class alone (ethnicity and racism are also extremely significant alongside various micro-sociological dynamics, such as the search for edgework thrills). Nonetheless, these mechanisms include an ongoing and ever more blatant dispossession of the masses by a transnational capitalist cabal - a 'feral overclass' (Scambler and Scambler, 2011: 2.5) - that engages in 'predation, fraud and thievery' through financial means (Harvey, 2005: 161). This class, rather than explicitly assuming political leadership, has largely been aided and abetted by'sincere' political elites who are likely blinded by ideology or incompetent to judge the workings of a financial system where obfuscation through junk economics helps create a chimera of respectability. However, as recently observed elsewhere in Europe under the shadow of Goldman Sachs, this class has secured political leadership outside of democratic processes (Foley, 2011).[1] This does not bode well for those at the bottom of the 'pyramid' (e.g. marginalised black youths), who are increasingly excluded, humiliated and criminalised.
Criminality, Pure and Simple? A Madoffized Ruse!
Britain's politicians and the neoliberal commentariat were almost uniform in their reproduction of simplified pejorative labels and 'explanations' for the 2011 riots. This was coupled with a strict avoidance of considering the possibility that the emotions expressed by large numbers of youths on the streets, their attitude to authority, to both public and private property, to the police, to their own communities and to their own futures, had anything at all to do with the ongoing impoverishment of their society. When addressing his audience, Howe ( BBC, 2011 ) insisted that we must do more: consider the social environment alongside the lives and feelings of young people. This is precisely what official opinion and political spin avoid at all costs, paralleling ponzi-scheming and capitalist cartels that require 'walls of silence' ( van de Bunt, 2010 ). Unsurprisingly, hegemonic 'explanations' for the unrest obscured or simply ignored the broader context: reinvigorated relations of class and command, escalating poverty, discrimination and the return to mass unemployment.
4.2 So shallow and reactionary have been the accounts of rioting proffered by politicians and the mainstream press that some very unlikely public figures, such as comedian Russell Brand, felt it necessary to intervene, and attempt to provide some context and possible explanations. Brand (2011) complained that official opinion was doing no more than telling people what they already knew � that the actions of rioters were 'unacceptable' and 'unjustifiable' � and that it was now time to 'work out why so many people feel utterly disconnected from the cities they live in'. After noting the policies and consequent socio-economic conditions that have left many young people with a lack of direction, with restricted access to education, 'a weakened family unit, no money and no way of getting any', Brand remarked: 'if we don't want our young people to tear apart our communities then don't let people in power tear apart the values that hold our communities together'. Yet, Brand was like a lamb bleating in the desert � as far as influencing policy goes, his legitimate concerns could only fall on deaf ears as politicians did not want to consider causes, just as those regulators who could have apprehended Madoff earlier repeatedly covered their ears and looked away (Markopolos, 2010). For the politicians contemplating the 'looting' in the UK, the only thing to be discussed was the severity of the punishments to be issued to young people rather than punishing financiers who have done an exemplary job in looting the real economy. Two young men, for instance, received four year jail sentences for seeking to provoke rioting via Facebook � punishments were severe and not even restricted to those directly involved.
4.3 In an interview shortly after these events, filmmaker Ken Loach described this reaction as the 'ruling class cracking the whip' � the pejorative references to'mindless yobs' providing the apparent justification (Cohrane, 2011). Against the backdrop of wall-to-wall elite opinion, Loach sought to highlight the almost complete absence of any kind of voice from the youth in the areas where rioting broke out. As with the nineteenth century scuttlers, the youths involved in the 2011 riots were simply demonized. In consequence the possibility that the street disturbances could have deeper systemic and historically transmitted origins was never raised or seriously explored. In contrast, Loach claims there are 'underlying factors' involved that are 'plain for anyone with eyes to see'. Top of Loach's list is the legacy of Thatcher's assault on occupational communities, that is to say, the neoliberal policies of previous decades which destroyed the kinds of work that could have given young people a future. Traditionally the processes of gaining a trade had something of a ritualistic content, providing many young people with opportunities for meaningful community attachment and respect. That world, however, was shattered
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-1-1-1-5-a-a-b] Descendants of Marie Luise v Hannover
m. Maximilian Pz v Baden [1-1-4-2-1-b-b-a, below] 1-1-1-1-5-a-a-b-(a) Descendants of Berthold Mkgf v Baden
m. Theodora of Greece [above] X. [680-693, above] 1-1-1-1-5-a-a-b-(b) Descendants of Marie Alexandra v Baden
m. Wolfgang Pz v Hessen [1-1-1-1-4-a-e-f-b, above] X. [see above] 1-1-1-1-5-a-a-c] Children of Alexandra v Hannover
m. Friedrich Franz IV GHz v Mecklenburg-Schwerin [1-1-4-2-1-b-f-d-a, below] X. [Friedrich Franz V ErbPz v Mecklenburg-Schwerin] (*1910) X. [Christian Ludwig Pz v Mecklenburg-Schwerin m. Barbara v Preussen [above]] X. [580-587, above] X. [Anastasia v Mecklenburg-Schwerin m. Friedrich Ferdinand Pz v Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg [1-1-3-2-3-b-b-a, below]] 764. Elisabeth v Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (*1945) m. Ferdinand Heinrich Pz v Ysenburg-Büdingen [below] 765. Johann Georg Pz v Ysenburg-Büdingen (*1976) m. Stefanie Bittner 766 Anna Carolina v Ysenburg-Büdingen (*2010) 767. Ludwig Ferdinand Pz v Ysenburg-Büdingen (*1979) 768. Irene v Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (*1946) 769. Margaretha v Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (*1948) 770. Sibylla v Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (*1955) m. Dieter Franz 771. Frithjof Franz (*1981) 772. Philipp Franz (*1986) 773. Johanna Franz (*1983) 1-1-1-1-5-a-b) Descendants of Friederike v Hannover
m. Alfons Frhr v Pawel-Rammingen X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-[6] Descendants of Augustus D Sussex X. [Issue of marriage contracted in violation of the Royal Marriages Act] 1-1-1-1-[7] Descendants of Adolphus D Cambridge
m. Augusta v Hessen [1-1-3-3-4, below] 1-1-1-1-7-a. Descendants of George 2 D Cambridge X. [Illegitimate issue, born before marriage] X. [Legitimate issue extinct 1933] 1-1-1-1-7-b. Descendants of Augusta Pss Gt Britain
m. Friedrich Wilhelm GHz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz [1-1-3-3-3-a, below] 1-1-1-1-7-b-a) Descendants of Adolf Friedrich V GHz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz
m. Elisabeth v Anhalt [1-2-2-1-2-b-a-e, below] 1-1-1-1-7-b-a-a] Children of Marie v Mecklenburg-Strelitz
m1. Georges C Jametel m2. Julius Pz v Lippe X. [Georges C Jametel] 774. Isabelle Jametel (*1964) m. Jean Francois Perochon 775. Zoee Perochon (*2000) X. [Ernst August Pz v Lippe] X. [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens] 776. Ernst August Pz v Lippe (*1952) m. Marie Benedicta von Magnis 777. Maria Donata v Lippe (*1982) 778. Marie Stephanie v Lippe (*1949) m1. Nikolaus v Itzenplitz m2. Wulf Frhr v Schimmelmann 779. Georg Friedrich v Itzenplitz (*1972) 780. Marie Sophie v Itzenplitz (*1975) 781. Marie Christine v Lippe (*1959) m. Peter Jacubowsky 782. Maximilian Jacubowsky (*1986) 783. Julius Jacubowsky (*1991) 784. Victoria Jacubowsky (*1984) X. [Illegitimate issue] X. [Marie Augusta v Nemerow m. Karl Barton gt v Stedman] 785. Ralph Barton gt v Stedman (*1933) 786. Gloria Barton gt v Stedman (*1964) 787. Stephanie Barton gt v Stedman (*1968) m. Frank Bastian 788. Andreas Bastian (*2002) 789. Robert Bastion (*2004) 790. Johanna Bastian (*1995) 791. Carolin Bastian (*1997) X. [Elisabeth Caroline v Lippe ] m. Ernst August Pz v Solms-Braunfels [1-2-8-1-3-a-d-b-a, below] 792. Maria Angela v Solms-Braunfels (*1940) m. Werner Zawade 1-1-1-1-7-b-a-b] Descendants of Jutta v Mecklenburg-Strelitz
m. Danilo K Montenegro X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-7-c. Descendants of Mary Adelaide Pss Gt Britain
m. Franz Hz v Teck [1-1-2-2-5-a-a, below] 1-1-1-1-7-c-a) Descendants of Adolphus Cambridge 1 M Cambridge 1-1-1-1-7-c-a-a] Descendants of George Cambridge 2 M Cambridge 1-1-1-1-7-c-a-a-(a) Children of Lady Mary Cambridge
m. Peter Whitley 793. Charles Whitley (*1961) m. Diana Hewitt 794. Sarah Whitley (*1954) m. Timothy Felton 795. Emily Felton (*1985) 796. Chloe Felton (*1987) 1-1-1-1-7-c-a-b] Descendants of Lady Mary Cambridge
m. Henry Somerset D Beaufort X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-7-c-a-c] Descendants of Lady Helena Cambridge
m. John Gibbs X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-7-c-b) Descendants of Alexander Cambridge 1 E Athlone
m. Alice Pss Gt Britain [1-1-1-1-4-a-d-b, above] X. [428-447, above] 1-1-1-1-7-c-c) Descendants of Mary v Teck
m. George V K Gt Britain [1-1-1-1-4-a-a-a, above] X. [SOV-65, above] 1-1-1-1-[8] Descendants of Charlotte Pss Royal Gt Britain
m. Friedrich I Kg v Württemberg [1-2-8-1-1, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-[9] Descendants of Elizabeth Pss Gt Britain
m. Friedrich VI Ldgf v Hessen-Homburg X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-1-[10] Descendants of Mary Pss Gt Britain
m. William 2 D Gloucester [1-1-1-2-1, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-(2) Descendants of William 1 D Gloucester 1-1-1-2-[1] Descendants of William 2 D Gloucester
m. Mary Pss Gt Britain [1-1-1-1-10, above] X. [see above] 1-1-1-2-[2] Illegitimate issue of William 1 D Gloucester X. [Incapable of inheriting] 1-1-1-(3) Descendants of Henry D Cumberland X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-(4) Descendants of Augusta Pss Gt Britain
m. Karl II Hz v Braunschweig [1-2-7-1, below] 1-1-1-4-[1] Descendants of Karl Georg KPz v Braunschweig
m. Friederike v Nassau [1-1-2-1-2, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-[2] Descendants of Friedrich Wilhelm Hz v Braunschweig 1-1-1-4-2-a. Descendants of Karl III Hz v Braunschweig X. [Illegitimate issue] 1-1-1-4-2-a. Descendants of Wilhelm Hz v Braunschweig X. [Illegitimate issue] 1-1-1-4-[3] Descendants of Auguste v Braunschweig
m. Friedrich I Kg v Württemberg [1-2-8-1-1, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a. Descendants of Wilhelm I Kg v Württemberg
m1. Charlotte v Bayern
m2. Ekaterina of Russia [1-2-8-1-8-h, below]
m3. Pauline v Württemberg [1-1-2-2-5-d, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-a) Descendants of Karl I Kg v Württemberg
m. Olga Nikolaievna of Russia [1-2-2-1-1-e-g, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-a-b) Descendants of Marie v Württemberg
m. Alfred Gf v Neipperg X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-a-c) Descendants of Sophie v Württemberg
m. Willem III K Nederlands [1-1-2-1-1-a-a, below] X. [Issue extinct 1884] 1-1-1-4-3-a-d) Descendants of Katharina v Württemberg
m. Friedrich Pz v Württemberg [1-1-1-4-3-b-a, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-d-a] Descendants of Wilhelm II Kg v Württemberg
m1. Marie v Waldeck-Pyrmont [1-1-1-4-3-b-d-b-c, below]
m2. Charlotte v Schaumburg-Lippe [1-1-3-3-1-b-b-d, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-d-a-(a) Descendants of Pauline v Württemberg
m. Friedrich Fst v Wied [1-1-2-1-1-b-b-a, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-d-a-a-[a] Children of Hermann ErbPz v Wied X. [Friedrich Wilhelm Fst v Wied m1. Guda v Waldeck-Pyrmont [958, below] m2. Sophie Charlotte v Stolberg-Stolberg [3600, below]] 797. Alexander Pz v Wied (*1960) 798. Carl Fst v Wied (*1961) Isabelle v Ysenburg 799. Maximilian Pz v Wied (*1999) 800. Freidrich-Wilhelm Pz v Wied (*2001) 801 Louise v Wied (*2004) 802. Wolff Heinrich Pz v Wied (*1979) 803. Christina v Wied (*1970) m. Wolf Eckhart Frhr v Gemmingen-Hornberg 804. Alexander Frhr v Gemmingen-Hornberg (*2000) 805. Philipp Frhr v Gemmingen-Hornberg (*2002) 806. Juliana v Gemmingen-Hornberg (*1997) 807. Emily v Gemmingen-Hornberg (*1998) 808. Metfried Pz v Wied (*1935) 809. Christian Pz v Wied (*1968) m.Sibylle Garbe 810. Ferdinand Pz v Wied (*2003) 811. Leopold Pz v Wied (*2005) 812. Alexander Pz v Wied (*2007) 813. NN.Pz v Wied (*2010 814. Magnus Pz v Wied (*1972) m. Marie-Therese Schroth 815. NN v Wied 816. NN v Wied 817. Osterlind v Wied (*1939) m. Werner v Klitzing 818. Kaspar v Klitzing (*1973) 819. Sophie v Klitzing (*1965) m. Rüdiger Mackenthun X. [Adoptive issue] 820. Georg Mackenthun (*2002) 821. Elizabeth Mackenthun (*2001) 822. Cosima Mackenthun (*2004) 823. Franziska v Klitzing (*1966) m. Alexander Gf v Lambsdorff 824. Viktor Gf v Lambsdorff (*1998) 825. Helena v Lambsdorff (*1997) 826. Valeska v Klitzing (*1970) m. Albrecht v Harnier 827. Friedrich v Harnier (*2001) 828. NN. v Harnier (*2005) 829. Philippa v Harnier (*2003) 830. NN v Harnier (*2009) 1-1-1-4-3-a-d-a-a-[b] Children of Dietrich Pz v Wied 831. Maximilian Pz v Wied (*1929) 832. Ulrich Pz v Wied (*1931) 833. Wilhelm Pz v Wied (*1970) m. Clara Elizabeth Makepeace-Massingham 834. Freidrich Pz v Wied (*2001) 835. George Pz v Wied (*2004 836. Marie v Wied (*1973) m. Friedrich ErbPz v Württemberg [1892, below] 837. Wilhelm Pz v Württemberg (*1994) 838. Marie Amelie v Württemberg (*1996) 839. Sophie Dorothee v Württemberg (*1997) X. [Ludwig Eugen Pz v Wied] 840. Karl Eduard Pz v Wied (*1968) 1-1-1-4-3-a-e) Descendants of Auguste v Württemberg
m. Hermann Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach [1-2-7-4-1-b-b, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-a] Descendants of Wilhelm Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-a-(a) Descendants of Hermann Gf v Ostheim X. [Issue extinct 1943] 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-b] Descendants of Bernhard Gf v Crayenberg X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-c] Descendants of Pauline v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach
m. Carl August ErbGHz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach [1-1-2-1-1-a-c-a, below] 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-c-(a) Children of Wilhelm Ernst GHz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach
m1. Karoline Reuss-Greiz [1-1-2-2-2-b-a-c, below]
m2. Feodora v Sachsen-Meiningen [1-1-3-1-1-c-a-c-c, below] X. [Carl August ErbPz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach] 841. Michael Benedikt Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1946) 842. Leonie v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1986) 843. Elisabeth v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1945) m. Mindert Dederick de Kant 844. Beatrice Marie v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1948) m. Martin Davidson 845. Bettina Davidson (*1979) X. [Bernhard Friedrich Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach] 846. Wilhelm Ernst Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1946) 847. Georg Constantin Pz v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1977) m 848. Desiree v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1974) m. Florian Gf v Hoensbroech [3086, below] 849. Philipp-Benedikt Gf v Hoensbroech (*2002) 850. Friedrich-Johannes Gf v Hoensbroech (*2004) 851. Franziskus-Leonhard Gf v Hoensbroech (*2006) 852. Katharina Feodora v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (*1943) m. Emmanuel Joseph Pz v Hohenzollern [below] 853. Carl Pz v Hohenzollern (*1970) 854. Eugenia v Hohenzollern (*1969) m. Alexander Sautter X. [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens] 855. Jörg Brena (*1921) 856. Ariane Brena (*1954) 857. Cornelie Brena (*1955) m1. Thomas Landsberg m2. Dietmar Berron-Brena 858. Friedemann Landsberg (*1977) X. [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens] 859. Leonard Brena (*1986) 869. Kaija Landsberg (*1978) 861. Isabel Brena (*1959) X. [Sophie v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach m. Friedrich Günther Fst v Schwarzburg [1-2-2-1-2-b-a-f-a, below]] 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-d] Descendants of Olga v Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach
m. Leopold Pz v Isenburg 1-1-1-4-3-a-e-d-(a) Descendants of Wilhelm Karl Pz v Isenburg X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-b. Descendants of Paul Pz v Württemberg 1-1-1-4-3-b-a) Descendants of Friedrich Pz v Württemberg
m. Katharina v Württemberg [1-1-1-4-3-a-d, above] X. [797-840, above] 1-1-1-4-3-b-b) Descendants of August Pz v Württemberg X. [Illegitimate issue] 1-1-1-4-3-b-c) Descendants of Charlotte v Württemberg
m. Mikhail Pavlovich of Russia [1-2-8-1-8-d, below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-a] Descendants of Elisaveta Mikhailovna of Russia
m. Adolphe GD de Luxembourg [1-1-2-2-1-a-a, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b] Descendants of Ekaterina Mikhailovna of Russia
m. Georg Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz [1-1-3-3-3-b, below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b-(a) Descendants of Georg Alexander Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b-a-[a] Children of Georg Alexander Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz
m1. Irina Mikhailovna Raievsky
m2. Charlotte v Österreich [below] X. [Georg Alexander Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz m. Ilona v Österreich [3705, below]] 862. Borwin Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1956) m. Alice Wagner 863. Alexander Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1991) 864. Michael Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1994) 865. Olga v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1988) 866. Elisabeth Christine v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1947) m. Alhard Frhr v dem Bussche-Ippenburg-Kessell 867. Gabriel Frhr v dem Bussche-Ippenburg-Kessell (*1983) 868. Ricarda v dem Bussche-Ippenburg-Kessell (*1978) 869. Elisabeth v dem Bussche-Ippenburg-Kessell (*1979) 870. Marie Katharine v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1949) m. Wolfgang v Wasielewski 871. Alexander v Wasielewski (*1983) 872. Marie Natalie v Wasielewska (*1981) 873. Irene v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1952) m. Constantin Harmsen 874. Maximilian Harmsen (*1982) 875. Moritz Harmsen (*1985) 876. Carl Gregor Pz v Mecklenburg-Strelitz (*1933) m. Maria Margarete v Hohenzollern [2549, below] X. [Helene v Mecklenburg-Strelitz m. Hassan Kamil] 877. Sheila Kamil (*1958) 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b-a-[b] Children of Catherine v Carlow
m. Vladimir Emanuelovich ks Galitzin X. [Nikolai Vladimirovich ks Galitzin] 878. Andrei Nikolaievich ks Galitzin (*1949) m. Christine Elizabeth Markgraf 879. Aleksandr Nikolaievich ks Galitzin (*1957) m1. Kelly Dempers m2. Kelly Davies 880. Lukas ks Galitzin (*1999)21 881. Sarah Galitzina (*1987) 883. Natasha Galitzina (*1994) 883. Stephanie Galitzina (*1997) 884. Petr Nikolaievich ks Galitzin (*1958) m. Susanne Phillips 885. Daniel ks Galitzin (*1993) 886. Christiane Galitzin (*1990) 887. Serenity Galitzina (*2000) 888. Marina Nikolaievna Galitzina (*1962) m. Kurt Classen 889. Nicholas Classen (*1990) 890. Georgia Classen (*1994) X. [Georgi Vladimirovich ks Galitzin] 891. Aleksandr Georgievich ks Galitzin (*1945) m. Rohays Butter [4261, below] 892. Sascha Galitzina (*1989) 893. Nadezhda Galitzina (*1990) 894. Georgi Georgievich ks Galitzin (*1946) X. [Illegitimate issue] 895. Dmitri ks Galitzin (*1986) 896. Caroline Georgievna Galitzina (*1944) m. Jonathan Hazell 897. Alexander Hazell (*1969) 898. Larissa Hazell (*1967) 899. Ekaterina Georgievna Galitzina (*1964) m. Nicholas Laing 900. George Augustus Grant Laing (*2004) X. [Emanuel Vladimirovich ks Galitzin] 901. Nikolai Emanuelovich ks Galitzin (*1944) 902. Aleksandr Nikolaievich ks Galitzin (*1973) 903. Mikhail Nikolaievich ks Galitzin (*1980) 904. Tanya Nikolaievna Galitzina (*1977) m. Daniel Scott 905. Anastasia Scott(*2005) 906. Mikhail Emanuelovich ks Galitzin (*1949) m. Giselle /Hartman/ 907. Emanuel Emanuelovich ks Galitzin (*1951) m. Penelope Allen [4178, below] 908. Michael Emanuelovich ks Galitzin (*1993) 909. Victoria Emanuelovna Galitzina (*1985) 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b-a-[c] Children of Marie v Carlow
m1. Boris Dmitrievich ks Galitzine m2. Vladimir Petrovich Kleinmichel 910. Natalie Borisovna Galitzina (*1920) m. Nigel Heseltine 911. Elisabeth Heseltine (*1939) m1. Graham Nesbitt m2. Michael Ward 912. Catherine Ward (*1968) 913. Natalia Ward (*1969) 914. Sophie Vladimirovna Kleinmichel (*1930) m. Philip Goodman 915. Mary Goodman (*1959) m. Edward Leigh 916. Benedict Leigh (*1988) 917. Nicholas Leigh (*1994) 918. Theodore Leigh (*1997) 919. Natalia Leigh (*1985) 920. Tamara Leigh (*1987) 921. Marina Leigh (*1990) 922. Catherine Goodman (*1961) 923. Elizabeth Goodman (*1964) m. David Jones 924. Michael Jones (*1998) 925. Augustine Jones (*2000) 926. Anastasia Jones (*2002) 927. Sophie Goodman (*1965) 928. Xenia Goodman (*1969) m. Marc Daniel Wiehe X. [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens] 929. Alexander Wiehe (*1998) 1-1-1-4-3-b-c-b-(b) Descendants of Helene v Mecklenburg-Strelitz
m. Albrecht Pz v Sachsen-Altenburg [1-1-2-2-2-a-a-a, below] X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d) Descendants of Pauline v Württemberg
m. Wilhelm Hz v Nassau [1-1-2-2-1-a, below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a] Descendants of Nikolaus Pz v Nassau 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a-(a) Descendants of Georg Gf v Merenberg 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a-a-[a] Children of Georg Gf v Merenberg 930. Elisabeth v Merenberg (*1941) m. Enno v Rinteln 931. Alexander v Rinteln (*1966) 932. Georg v Rinteln (*1970) m. Olivia Minninger [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens 933. Gregor v Rinteln (*1972) m Jane Gfn zu Bentheim-Tecklenburg-Rheda-Prill 934. Frederick v Rinteln 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a-a-[b] Children of Olga v Merenberg
m. Michel Tarielovich Loris-Melikov 935. Aleksandr Mikhailovich Loris-Melikov (*1926) 936. Mikhail Aleksandrovich Loris-Melikov (*1964) 937. Ann Aleksandrovna Loris-Melikov (*1959) m. Marc Moos 938. Alain Moos (*1984) 939. Dominique Aleksandrovna Loris-Melikov (*1961) 940. Nathalie Aleksandrovna Loris-Melikov (*1962) m. Johan Dierbach 941. Sophie Dierbach (*1997) 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a-(b) [Illegitimate issue, legitimatio per matrimonium subsequens] = Sophie Nikolaievna m. Mikhail Mikhailovich Of Russia {Below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-a-(c) Descendants of Alexandra v Merenberg
m. Massimo de Elia X. [Issue extinct] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-b] Descendants of Helene v Nassau
m. Georg Viktor Fst v Waldeck-Pyrmont [1-1-2-2-4-d-a, below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-b-(a) Descendants of Friedrich Fst v Waldeck-Pyrmont
m. Bathildis v Schaumburg-Lippe [1-1-3-3-1-b-b-e, below] 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-b-a-[a] Children of Josias Fst v Waldeck-Pyrmont
m. Altburg v Oldenburg [below] 942. Wittekind Fst v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1936) m. Cecile von Goëss-Saurau 943. Carl Anton ErbPz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1991) 944. Josias Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1993) 945. Johannes Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1993) X. [Margarethe v Waldeck-Pyrmont] m. Franz August Gf v Erbach-Erbach 946. Eberhard ErbGf v Erbach-Erbach (*1958) m. Alexandra Reuss-Köstritz [1537, below] 947. Georg Albrecht Gf v Erbach-Erbach (*1989) 948. Konrad Gf v Erbach-Erbach (*1991) 949. Felicitas v Erbach-Erbach (*1987) 950. Alexandra v Erbach-Erbach (*1955) m. Ulrich Bugiel 951. Moritz Bugiel (*1984) 952. Clemens Bugiel (*1988) X. [Alexandra v Waldeck-Pyrmont] m. Botho Pz v Bentheim-Steinfurt [below] 953. Georg Viktor Pz v Bentheim-Steinfurt (*1950) m. Madeleine-Rose Gerdes 954. Maximilian Pz v Bentheim-Steinfurt (*1986) 955. Wolfgang Pz v Bentheim-Steinfurt (*1952) m1. Karin Moser m2. Sissy Böhm 956. Benedikt Pz v Bentheim-Steinfurt (*1995) 957. Ingrid v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1931) 958. Guda v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1939) m1. Friedrich Wilhelm Fst v Wied [above] m2. Horst Dierkes X. [797-801, above] 959. Vicco Dierkes (*1970) 960. Christian Dierkes (*1974) 1-1-1-4-3-b-d-b-a-[b] Children of Max Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont 961. Friedrich Karl Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1933) 962. Caroline v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1960) m. Cord Georg Hasselmann 963. Wolf Hasselmann 964. Anne Hasselmann 965. Donata Hasselmann 966. Juliane Hasselmann 967. Donata v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1961) m. Markus Conrad 968 Carlotta Conrad 969. NN Conrad 970. NN Conrad 971. NN Conrad 972. Juliane Bathildis v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1962) m1. Gerhard Kappe m2. Stephan Hobe 973. Georg Viktor Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1936) m. Margarete von Klitzing 974. Christian Ludwig Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1967) m. Camilla Barbara von Holck 975. Christian Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1998) 976. Viktor Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*2000) 977. Casimer Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*2002) 978. Moritz Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*2006) 979. Wolrad Pz v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1974) 980. Friederike v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1963) m. Michael Paar 981. Georg Philipp Paar (*1992) 982. Maximilian Paar (*1994) 983. Dorothea Paar (*1995) 984. Barbara v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1965) m. Christian Düsel 985. Alexander Düsel (*1991) 986. Dominik Düsel (*1993) 987. Katharina Düsel (*1996) 988. Marie Luise v Waldeck-Pyrmont (*1930) m. Albrecht Fst v Castell-Castell 989. Alexander ErbGf v Castell-Castell (*1954) 990. Conradin Gf v Castell-Castell (*1984) 991 Gustav Gf v Castell-Castell (*2003) 992. Johann Gf v Castell-Castell (*2005) 993. Dorothea Richiza v Castell-Castell (*1985) 994. Georg Gf v Castell-Castell (*1956) 995. Jacob Gf v Castell-Castell (*1984) 996. Anton Gf v Castell-Castell (*1988) 997. Franz Gf v Castell-Castell (*1991) 998. Johanna Franziska v Castell-Castell (*1985) 999. Emilie v Castell-Castell (*1995) 1000. Ferdinand Gf v Castell-Castell (*1965) m. Marie Gabrielle v Degenfeld [4402, below] 1001. Carl Gf v Castell-Castell (*2001) 1002. Benedicta v Castell-Castell (*2003) 1003. Leontina v v Castell-Castell (*2006) 1004. Floriana v Castell-Castell (*2008) 1005. Philippa v Castell-Castell (*1952) m. Michael Pz v Salm-Salm 1006. Constantin Pz v Salm-Salm (*1980) m. Friederike Stephanie Gumberz von Rhonthal 1007. Caspar Pz v Salm-Salm (*2010) 1008. Carlotta v Salm-Salm (*2009) 1009. Felix Pz v Salm-Salm (*1981) 1010. Christina v Salm-Salm (*1978) Raphael Gf von Hoensbroech 1011. Gabriel Gf von Hoensbroech (*2004) 1012. Florentin Gf von Hoensbroech (*2005) 1011. Jacobus Gf von Hoensbroech (*2006) 1014. Balthasar Gf von Hoensbroech (*2009) 1015. Marie Anne v Salm-Salm (*1986) 1016. Antonia v Salm-Salm (*1987) m. Clemens Emanuel von Mirbach-Harff 1017. Cecily v Salm-Salm (*1989) 1018. Johanna v Castell-Castell (*1952) m. Johannes Pz v Lobkowicz 1019. Nikolaus Pz v Lobkowicz (*1978) m. Theresa Achammer 1020. Johanne Pz v Lobkowicz (*2010) 1021. Maximilian Pz v Lobkowicz (*1982) 1022. Wenzel Pz v Lobkowicz (*1986) 1023 Marie Sophie v Lobkowicz (*1980) 1024. Lioba v Lobkowicz (*1985) m. Christian Schneider 1025. Nepomuk Schneider (*2009) 1026. Philomena-Sophie Schneider (*2008) 1027. Agnes v Lobkowicz (*1992) 1028. Ida v Lobkowicz (*1996) 1029. Stephanie v Castell-Castell (*1966) m. Georg Gf v Khevenhüller-Metsch 1030. Hemma v Khevenhüller-Metsch (*1994) 1031. Teresa v Khevenhüller-Metsch (*1996) 1032. Marie v Khevenhüller-Metsch (*
|
ivery car, officials said.
The female driver was on the phone when the accident occurred about 12:30 p.m., according to Joe Tursi, manager of the Federal Auto Body shop nearby.
"It looked like both people weren't paying attention," Tursi said.
The driver remained at the scene, where a crowd gathered and began hectoring her about being on the phone.
"She had to answer a lot of questions from people who weren't in law enforcement," Tursi said.
The postman was taken to Flushing Hospital, fire department officials said. His condition was not immediately known.Yesterday, I received an email which has now become the 'big Villa news' of the day. Some other blogs such as MOMS, AVF and TVB have joined up after receiving this email, to create another 'Open Letter'. The general gist of it is that Villa fans will not enter their seats until after the 8th minute of gameplay during the coming Liverpool match in protest to Lerner's ownership and the bad football being played by the team. I've included the original email from the 'nameless hero' who decided to start this movement.
--
Hello!
I would like to suggest a protest that all Villa fans can easily join in with, I am a long time reader of your website but I rarely (if ever) comment, however the current state of our club has driven me to share with you guys an idea me and my mates came up with after the Leicester debacle.
I would like to see a change in manager and I think another manager would do a better job. Certainly the players aren't playing for him and the football is dire beyond belief.But changing a manager will only paper over the cracks the real problem is Randy Lerner. My idea for protesting against both the current manager and the owner is to stay in the concourse for the first 8 minutes of the match. This represents the 8 years of Randy, the un-watchable football, and what the future holds if there is no change - both in terms of management and ownership (or at least investment).
I can't bring myself to stay away from Villa Park however for the first time in 5 years I missed a home cup game against Blackpool when I refused to go because the football is so bad. But I think that this is a protest that everyone can take part in and will make a big statement - if anyone is going to listen or anyone at the club cares is a different matter, but I care and my club is being destroyed by the manager and the chairman. For what it's worth I'm not a 'booer' and I will be 100% behind the team (unlike those who jump out of their seat and flap their arms around and shout at every missed placed pass/bad touch and then sit in silence the rest of the time) for the 82mins I'll be there, I just feel so helpless about the state of my club and I don't know what else to do about it.
I would like it if you didn't name me but if you think that this idea is any good and you would join in or promote it then please post it so more Villa fans can hear about it. I'm sending this message to all of the Villa sites I read regularly (and some I found on newsnow) and please feel free to pass it round to more if you agree.
--
Weird one this. I feel as though I've got a duty to type this up as an unbiased news post, but I've got so many feelings that I can't help but share on this issue. If you want to follow the protest and are going down to the game, you should stand on the concourse until the 8th minute has passed, then you should fully support the team. You should also share the letter I have posted above.
I've been writing a piece that should come out shortly, It's about why things could be so much worse for AVFC. Clubs like Cardiff, Blackpool, Newcastle and to a lesser extent Manchester City all have terrible ownership, Lerner has nothing on that. Not a spot. This is a man who paid a premium to get Villa into Euro competitions, a man who respected the history of Aston Villa by renovating the Holte Pub. Randy Lerner is not a villain, but a Villan. A Villan who is tired of owning the club and now wants to leave, he is trying to sell the club but no-one wants to buy. That means he isn't morally obligated to spend a penny on us, but he still has! Players have come in over the Summer and look to be coming in now. Lerner hired Tom Fox (who doesn't come cheap) to renovate the team and it's future. Lerner is looking to sell AVFC in the best state possible.
It's already a toxic environment at Villa. Lambert looks lost and bereft of confidence, the players seem unhappy because they can't score and morale between fans, players and management looks to be an all time low. A protest might create a terrible situation for the players because at the end of the day, I believe they are at-least trying to be the best they can be. Booing and protests won't change their mental state and will likely in-fact make it worse. Would you believe the rich men on the pitch who roll over at the faintest touch need to be molly coddled? Yes, yes they do. Tactics do not mean everything, for gods sake in the early days of Football they played a 2-1-8 formation and had the same results we have now! It's all about teamwork, chemistry, motivation and desire. Not one person can teach that.
I've been reading a lot of books about the history of Football and fans never came to see a team win. That was just a bonus to the fact they got to go down to Villa Park with their mates and get away from life. They got to talk, sing, cheer. Somehow, we lost our way, we booed bad players instead of encouraging them, we stopped singing when we went a goal down, we started focusing on results rather than the spectacle. We lost our way, globally, as football fans and it wasn't until I went to a Baseball game in New York that I realised this. The Mets were losing, but the fans just cracked open beers and talked. The game was the background to their social event and sporting spectacle.
It's been a tough few years, no-one can deny that. I support the protest, but I'm not sure that I support its reasons. I've been a paying fan and I've tried to spend every penny I earn on following the club and I fully recognise that paying fans of the club should have a voice, but when does that voice become a voice of reason rather than a voice of entitlement?Let’s ask Guido Menzio, who perhaps knows something about random. Here is one of his papers, with Mikhail Golosov (pdf):
We propose a new business cycle theory. Firms need to randomize over firing or keeping workers who have performed poorly in the past, in order to give them an ex-ante incentive to exert effort. Firms have an incentive to coordinate the outcome of their randomizations, as coordination allows them to load the firing probability on states of the world in which it is costlier for workers to become unemployed and, hence, allows them to reduce overall agency costs. In the unique equilibrium, firms use a sunspot to coordinate the randomization outcomes and the economy experiences endogenous and stochastic aggregate fluctuations.
In other words, by coordinating with each other, if only implicitly, employers make the firing threat more fearful. You don’t have to interpret this paper literally as an entire explanation for cyclical unemployment, only that it may have something to do with the story.
And here is his about to appear JPE piece with Greg Kaplan (pdf):
We propose a novel theory of self-fulfilling unemployment fluctuations. When a firm increases its workforce, it increases the demand facing other firms—as employed workers spend more than unemployed workers—and decreases the extent of competition facing other firms—as employed workers have less time to search for low prices than unemployed workers. In turn, the increase in demand and the decline in competition induces other firms to hire more labor in order to scale-up their presence in the product market. The feedback between employment and product market conditions generates multiple equilibria—and the possibility of self-fulfilling fluctuations—if the differences in the shopping behavior of employed and unemployed workers are large enough. Empirical evidence on spending, shopping and prices paid suggests that this is the case.
In general, not enough popular macro discourse asks the question of how much of the cycle results from self-fulfilling prophecies. Furthermore what does that imply for policy? yes, “confidence” can be important, but confidence in what exactly?In the wake of Wednesday night's shooting attack in Tel Aviv's Sarona Mall, Israeli politicians, foreign diplomats, and civilians alike returned to the open air market on Thursday, June 9. Credit: YouTube/Israel Defense Forces
AMID the tragedy of the terror attack in Tel Aviv that claimed four lives emerged a miracle: An Israeli man who was shot in the head twice stayed conscious throughout the ordeal and survived, according to a report.
Asaf Bar and his girlfriend were enjoying an evening at the Max Brenner cafe before two Palestinian men from the West Bank went on a rampage while laughing, The Jerusalem Post reported.
“They were there eating a breakfast meal, and the perpetrator, the first thing he did was to shoot two bullets at Asaf,” said Bar’s dad, Avner, the paper reported.
“I feel like [my] boy is here as a gift from God,” said Mr Avner, who recounted the harrowing experience along with Asaf’s sister, Dana.
Avner, who rushed to the hospital from his home in the northern city of Haifa — about an hour’s drive away — said his son is speaking and can move all his body parts, though one bullet remains lodged in his head, reports the New York Post.
“[Asaf] saw the two terrorists and they were laughing. In his description he said they were wearing suits — this was at the table next to them,” the dad said. “In photographs [the terrorists] are seen getting up, taking a step, and aiming a gun half a meter away from Asaf.”
“It was a miracle that he came out of this,” he added.
The Bar family was still reeling from the death of Asaf’s mum less than a month ago.
“He (Asaf) was just starting to live his life again when something like this happens,” Mr Avner said.
A woman who was sitting at the Benedict restaurant when bullets flew said the attackers looked like two “wealthy Italian businessmen in fancy suits and skinny ties,” The Jerusalem Post reported.
Margalit Bergman returned to the scene of the bloodshed on Thursday at the urging of her friends, who said it might help her deal with her trauma.
“We heard one shot and then they [the gunmen] stood up and started shooting at everyone, we ran the other way as fast as we could, but it’s all luck, it’s all fate that I’m still alive,” she said.
Ms Bergman, who raced toward the nearby Defence Ministry headquarters, hoping to find armed soldiers, said the shooters were not dressed as ultra-Orthodox men, as had been reported.
“They were wearing these nice, shiny suits with ties and suitcases. They looked like they were foreign businessmen coming to buy up the Sarona Market,” she said.
The four Israelis killed in the attack have been identified as Michael Feige, 58, a professor at Ben-Gurion University; Ido Ben Ari, 42, a Coca-Cola executive who had served in the Israeli army’s elite Sayeret Matkal unit — and whose wife was injured; Ilana Naveh, 39, a mum of four celebrating her birthday; and Mila Mishayev, 32, who was waiting for her fiance.
Sixteen other people were wounded, three of whom remained in critical condition, the Times of Israel reported.
One of the attackers was wounded by a security guard and was being treated at a hospital. The other Palestinian was caught.
The two men, both in their 20s, used crudely improvised weapons in their assault, indicating that a militant organisation was not involved, Israeli security officials said.
Ahmad Mussa Mahmara, the father of one of the attackers, said his son has two uncles serving life sentences in Israeli prison.
“We didn’t expect this. My son is young and has been in Jordan for the past four years, and just came here for the past five months. He does not have any political affiliation,” Mr Mahmara said.
Hamas, the Islamic militant group that rules Gaza, praised the attack but did not claim responsibility.
Hamas official Mushir al-Masri called the shootings a “heroic operation” and the group later issued an official statement promising the “Zionists” more “surprises” during Ramadan.
Islamic Jihad, another militant group, said the attack was a “natural response” to Israel’s “brutal actions” against Palestinians — but also did not claim responsibility.
Meanwhile, Israel deployed hundreds of troops to the West Bank and imposed sweeping restrictions on Palestinian movement Thursday in response to the attack at the upscale Sarona Market.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with his Security Cabinet, including new Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman, the head of an ultranationalist party known for his hard-line views toward the Palestinians.
Lieberman visited the site of the shooting and had a cup of coffee in a local cafe.
“I do not intend to speak and detail the steps we intend to take, but I am sure that I have no intention to stop at words,” he said.
Authorities also suspended tens of thousands of special permits given to Palestinians to visit Israel during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The Israel Defense Forces also said it had frozen work permits for 204 of the attackers’ relatives, and was preventing Palestinians from leaving and entering the West Bank village of Yatta, the attackers’ home village.
This story first appeared in the New York Post.Today’s All-New Inhumans #11 sees the mutant Frenzy laying it thick on the Inhuman Crystal, in a rather Larry Wilmore fashion. “Keeping in one hundred” in this case involves making allusions between the fate of the mutants and the Jewish holocaust. Does that count under Godwin’s Law? I forget.
So, yes, mutants are still pretty angry that there’s a big cloud of Terrigen mist floating around the world, killing and sterilising mutants as the M-Pox. And no one’s managed to do anything about it really, not even, you know, weather controlling Storm. And yes, the mutants blame the Inhumans, such as in A-Force #9…
And the US government may be looking for a cure for the Terrigen Mist – but seem more up for weaponising it to fight mutants, over in Uncanny Avengers #14.
So, you know, it’s not good. But could All-New X-Men #13 help at all? Featuring Bobby Drake, the young Iceman brought from the past to the present, and now outed as a young gay man, on the pull in the nightclubs of Miami, have a solution?
Especially when he meets another young man called Romeo.
Do we have to remind everyone that Romeo And Juliet is the tale of star-crossed lovers, from different, opposing families at war with each other, a relationship doomed to tragedy but worth taking the risk over?
Because Romeo… …is an Inhuman.
Break out the Dire Straits!
All-New X-Men #13, All New Inhumans #11, A-Force #9 and Uncanny Avenrgs #11 are all published by Marvel Comics today.
About Rich Johnston Chief writer and founder of Bleeding Cool. Father of two. Comic book clairvoyant. Political cartoonist.
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None foundBy Aleem Maqbool
BBC News, Gwadar
There has been an insurgency in Balochistan for more autonomy The threats to Pakistan's future do not just come from the recent wave of militant attacks, but also from discontent in communities around the country. Gwadar is almost as remote a town in Pakistan as you can get. On the coast of the country's largest province, Balochistan, close to the Iranian border, it is nearly 2,000km (1,250 miles) from the capital, Islamabad. Down on the shabby beaches, people earn a living the way they have done for generations, fishing and boat-building. It might, at first, feel like it is a world away from the violence elsewhere. But trouble's simmering here too. 'Fight for rights' In a small, dark, compound, we met members of various separatist groups - the Baloch National Front, Balochistan Republican Party and Balochistan Liberation Army. The Pakistani government doesn't do anything for us... nobody cares
Shaukat,
Gwadar fisherman We hear their grievances, and their threats. "What else do we have left," says Rehman Arif, of the BRP, "except our guns, and to fight for our rights? "This region of Balochistan, which has seen civilisation for thousands of years, is being oppressed by Pakistan. We're ready to accept assistance from anyone in our fight. We appeal to India for help." This public plea for help from the country's sworn enemy will alarm Pakistanis. So too might the fact that almost everyone we came across in the town supported moves for their province to break away from Pakistan. "The Pakistani government doesn't do anything for us," says Shaukat, a fisherman. "They only work for themselves. We just labour hard, but nobody cares," he says, before wading into the water and clambering onto his boat for another long day at sea. Poverty here, and right across the province of Balochistan, is on the rise. It is, once again, stirring decades-old feelings of resentment towards the country's establishment. Many Baloch feel they have been cheated, and that while Pakistan plunders their local resources, like natural gas, coal and copper, local people remain poor. "We've got nothing," says Tariq Ashraf, a businessman in Gwadar's old quarter. "You can see all the children, look at them, look at the dirt, look at the houses. The politicians just give us promises." Resentment The Prime Minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, has a new promise, and he has come to Gwadar to make it. He tells us his government will develop the port, and bring business and jobs here, for the people of Balochistan. Haji Saleh Muhammed says jobs don't go to locals "They were not given their rights for the last 62 years [since the creation of Pakistan], therefore we have launched a package with the title 'Aghaze Huqooq-i-Balochistan' [The beginning of the rights of the people of Balochistan]. That is why I am here." And it is not just the prime minister. The entire cabinet flies in for, among other things, a meeting on a ship in Gwadar Port. It was meant to provide a boost to the area, and help attract investment. However, the sight of huge government convoys and reports of the millions of rupees of expenditure on the cabinet meeting did not impress some. Many in Gwadar supported the separatist's call for a strike. Even with new development projects there is resentment. Many here feel that any benefits that development brings will leave the area. By chance, not far from the port, clutching a folder, we find Haji Saleh Muhammed. "I am from Gwadar, I am a port crane operator," he says. He opens the file, that he says he always keeps with him, to show us his qualifications and certificates, received during 12 years working in Dubai. "I came back to work in my city, but they have brought people from outside. Karachi people are working here, I am just sitting around. "Gilani says jobs will come here, but most will go to outsiders." On the beach, we even found a policeman who said the poverty and injustice had got so bad, he would lay down his life for Baloch independence. Last chance Prime Minister Gilani reiterated to us his assertion that there was considerable evidence that India is already supporting the Baloch separatists, but accepted that the region had been neglected by Pakistan in the past. However, he also insisted that the general picture is much better than it appears. "Balochs are patriotic, 99.9% support Pakistan. There are maybe a handful of people who are towing the foreign agenda of somebody else - we are negotiating with them," he says. "The time will come when the people themselves will realise that we are on the right path, and they will start supporting us." Mr Gilani's going to have to work fast here, because it feels like the last chance people are going to give the politicians to reduce poverty and inequality. If they fail, Balochistan could quite easily become a focal point in Pakistan's destabilisation.
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StumbleUpon What are these? E-mail this to a friend Printable versionBe happy now because tomorrow you are dying (Spice, K2) published by Tylenol with MDMA
Writer Rating: 3.2000
Posted on 2017-04-04
Writer Description: For when you have pain in both your body and soul. Directions: Take two, and call me a few hours later to talk about how we don't hang out enough
This writer has written 9 articles.
Marijuana is an interesting drug. It’s mostly harmless. People under twenty one shouldn’t be consuming it recreationally because there can be some negative long term effects on the developing brain, and I’d advise anyone who has issues with schizophrenia or bipolar in their family history from consuming it because of it’s ability to activate a psychotic and/or manic episode. Other than that, go ahead. I’d personally advise edibles because smoking it isn’t necessarily the best for your lungs. There’s an argument for smoking because it’s easier to control your dosage… but that’s for another day.
Synthetic marijuana on the other hand is something completely different. It goes many names. Spice, K2, Scooby Snax, relaxing potpourri. You’re able to smoke it, and it won’t show up in a drug test. That seems pretty cool huh? I say this as a professional: I’d rather see you smoking crack cocaine than Spice. Spice is the most bizarre recreational substance I’ve ever encountered. While it’s based off synthetic cannabinoids, and an assortment of mystery ingredients thrown in for ‘flavor’, its effects are quite closer to the fictional Substance D. For those who haven’t read A Scanner Darkly,
“Substance D. “D” is dumbness, and despair, desertion-desertion of you from your friends, your friends from you, everyone from everyone. Isolation and loneliness… and hating and suspecting each other, “D” is finally death. Slow death from the head down. Well… that’s it.”
It is not the same as marijuana. Spice is pulled from an alternate reality where Reefer Madness actually makes sense. It’s dreadful when I have a client who cannot stop abusing it. They’re nothing short of volatile; they have an inability to commit to any kind of treatment and every time they try to sober up again they look like they’re closer and closer to death. Watching someone deep into a heroin addiction is less unsettling. A heroin addict at least looks neutral when they’re strung out. Someone hitting the spice hard is terrifying
My first experience with it was when I was still in college. There were cool designer drugs being sold at sleazy gas stations and porno shops like Molly’s Plant Food, which was an MDMA analog, and Xannies which were quite literally catnip pills. There was also the first generation of publicly available spice. The first generation was interesting, I even tried it and while it didn’t feel as good as marijuana I was okay with it. A friend of mine, Derek, was more into it than me. He had chronic pain issues from an unknown disorder, and the spice would make it so he wouldn’t feel any pain. Marijuana wasn’t strong enough, and he stayed away from painkillers so I didn’t think much about it. The first generation was banned and another took its place. He kept smoking away, and one night he offered it to me so I gave it a try. Jesus Fucking Christ it was the worst experience of my life. I swore to never smoke it again, but thought if other people wanted to do that it’s up to them. It’s their life.
Then I watched Derek’s health decline. It started with the narcoleptic episodes. He’d be doing something like playing his Xbox 360, and would pass out. His hand would be on the controller, and his character would be constantly running into a wall. He’d come to around 20 minutes later and continue like nothing happened. As time went on, he changed. When he was high, he wasn’t any more fun to be around. There was this anger that came with it, and it would radiate out and kill any positive vibes around him. Communication would be grunts and stares. Then he’d smoke more and pass out. This at the time was an isolated incident. I barely heard anything more about it until later in life when I got into the substance abuse field. Here’s three case studies:
· Lewis was my first spice client. In his words, “I’m a former crackhead, but I still use spice.” As we were talking, I asked him why he had a cast on his arm. He told me when he was out panhandling on the median of a busy road. He smoked some spice, forgot where he was, and ended up walking into traffic and getting hit by a car. He later self-discharged from the facility before he could be set up with more services. Months later he requested to be admitted to my unit again. When I met with him, he was shivering in 90 degree weather. His eyes were sunken in, and he didn’t even recognize me. He was transferred to a Crisis Stabilization Unit later that night because he wanted to end his own life. He told a member of the staff, “I can’t live without spice, and I can’t live with it either.” I don’t know where he is now.
· If I needed to find Daniel in the community, I’d drive around and look for guys passed out on the sidewalk. He had pretty severe sunburns from lying on the ground all day, as well as scraped skin as his buddies would attempt to drag him into the shade. He was stuck in a cycle where He’d ‘lose’ his wallet. He would need help getting a new EBT card and ID. He’d swear he’s getting off spice and going back to school. This was every week that I had the pleasure of working with him.
· Ahab is my favorite. The poor kid had a traumatic brain injury when he was a teenager, and according to his family he stopped maturing at that point. He was older than me but had the mind of a 15 year old. When he was introduced to spice, any potential he had left went down the drain. He was in and out of jail for trespassing in the same area. I took the time to map out his arrest locations and he was trespassed fifteen times from trying to spend his time in the same spot smoking spice. His hobbies were smoking spice and chronic masturbation. He literally had no filter and would say whatever came to mind. He had no ability to keep a conversation on a single topic, and was highly suggestible. I watched the nurse have some fun with that. He constantly had issues with others and needed to be redirected daily. Psychotropic medication curbed his violent aspects, but he was resistant toward taking it in the first place. During a time where he was refusing his meds he picked a fight with a guy twice his size, and was hospitalized from how badly he was beaten. He was convinced he won that fight. He’s been in and out of jail, and inmates win every fight they participate in, no matter the outcome. That may have some influence, but you could see the pride he had in his eyes when he talked about ‘winning’ that fight while barely being able to open his swollen eyes
For those who think I’m scare-mongering, I say you need to see the population abusing it. I believe it’s possible to live a successful life with most drugs involved, but not spice.
“Spray a bug with a toxin and it dies; spray a man, spray his brain, and he becomes an insect that clacks and vibrates about in a closed circle forever. A reflex machine, like an ant. Repeating his last instruction.”
Do not smoke spice, don’t let your friends do spice. Do something better and more productive, like shooting up heroin.Advertisement
This colourful map of London reveals how vast swathes of the capital are dominated by certain nationalities in a city where one in three people are now born abroad.
Residents originally from India dominate ten of the capital's 32 boroughs while Londoners born in Nigeria, Poland, Turkey and Bangladesh have the highest numbers in at least three areas each.
In some areas including Westminster, Kensington and Chelsea and Brent more than half the population born abroad, according to figures from the Mayor of London's Data Store.
This year London’s population reached an all time high of 8.6million with two million more people moving to the city in the past two decades, many of them from abroad.
The 8.6million population of London is its peak since the previous record, in 1939, before the devastation of the Second World War but more than 2.2million Londoners left for a new life in the surrounding counties or the suburbs over the next 50 years.
Picture of London: This map shows the largest foreign born populations in London by borough, with people from India being the dominant nationality in ten areas
Breakdown: This shows the largest foreign-born populations in each borough and the percentage of the population born abroad
Then and now: London's previous population peak of 8million came in 1939, on the eve of war with Germany (left in Lincoln's Inn), until this year (right) after a surge pushed the population to 8.6million
Statistics show London's inner boroughs have a far higher immigrant population than its outer boroughs and there is also a clear trend of people of certain nationalities moving to boroughs already heavily-populated by their fellow countrymen.
TOP TEN COUNTRIES BY BIRTH IN LONDON OTHER THAN THE UK Population in London India 267,000 Poland 135,000 Pakistan 113,000 Bangladesh 126,000 Ireland 112,000 Nigeria 99,000 Sri Lanka 86,000 Jamaica 75,000 United States 71,000 Kenya 63,000 Total population in London today Est. 8,600,000
Brent and Haringey have the highest proportion of foreign-born residents at 53.3 per cent, followed by Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster, on 51.8 per cent and 50.9 per cent respectively, according to the Mayor of London's Data Store.
Between 1939 and 1991, London lost one quarter of its population 2.2 million people as residents started a new life outside the capital.
Today around 267,000 of Londoners were born in India, 135,000 from Poland, 113,000 from Pakistan, 126,000 from Bangladesh and 112,000 from Ireland.
Of the total three million non-British residents 40 per cent were from Europe, 30 per cent from the Middle East and Asia, 20 per cent from Africa and 10 per cent from America or the Caribbean.
Explaining the growth in population Professor Michael Batty, from University College London, told the BBC: 'It went down from about 8m to 6.6m over a period of about 30 years and the main reason was suburbanisation - suburban growth, people getting cars, changing transport and also slum clearance'.
He said the huge growth over the last decade'relates to international migration'.
Experts believe that the number of foreign-born people living in London will outnumber native Britons by 2031, based on predictions from the 2011 census.
The immigrant population of the capital will reach at least five million by 2031 - having more than doubled from one million in 1971 to three million in 2011, when the last census was carried out.
The rise of non-British born Londoners will take the city's total population to more than 10 million in 2031 and 11 million in 2041.
But while the city's immigrant population will continue to rise sharply in the coming decades, the number of British-born people will continue to slowly decline.
In 1971 this figure was at more than six million but this is likely to sink below five million in the coming decades.
Growth: 200 years ago London had one million residents, which peaked in 1939, but then London lost one quarter of its population 2.2 million people as residents started a new post-war life outside the capital
Analysis of the last census also revealed that more than 600,000 white British Londoners left the capital in a decade. Between 2001 and 2011 the level reached 620,000.
It is the equivalent of a city the size of Glasgow – made up entirely of white Britons – moving out of the capital. It also means that white Britons are now in a minority in the country’s largest city.
White Britons now make up 45 per cent of the population, compared with 58 per cent in 2001.
FROM 1939 TO 2015: HOW LONDON HAS CHANGED SINCE ITS LAST POPULATION PEAK AT THE OUTBREAK OF WAR Expansion: This map shows the newly-built areas of London in 1939 in blue, mainly in London's suburbs, with the newly-built areas of London between 1992 and today in red, where expansion happened mainly in the suburbs The last time London's population peaked was in 1939, on the eve of the Second World War. But how different was the UK's capital city back then? Currently, 13 per cent of people living in the UK are London inhabitants, whereas the London population accounted for 18 per cent of the UK in 1939. At that time, London was overwhelmingly white - only 2.7 per cent had been born abroad. Today, around 37 per cent of Londoners were born abroad. In 1939, with no NHS and heavy smog, life expectancy was 62. Today, Londoners can expect to live to 82. The population pyramid shows London now has fewer teenagers and more pensioners than in 1939. There are also have more adult men, due to a'missing generation' in 1939, after the First World War. In 1939, statutory education only went up to age 14, so most of London's secondary schools had yet to be built. Before the war, only 2 per cent of people went to university and almost all of them were men. In London today, 43 per cent of people go onto university and the majority of them are women. Although the number of people working in London has not changed greatly, the industries which cater for those jobs have. In 1939, around one in three people worked in manufacturing. Now 90 per cent of these manufacturing jobs have gone and most people now work in industries that barely existed in 1939. These include 250,000 jobs in IT, with another 250,000 working in hotels and restaurants. St Paul's was the tallest building in the capital In 1939. Now St Paul's is only the 41st tallest building in the London. The tallest building is The Shard. House prices have also grown extraordinarily. In 1939, the average cost of a home was the equivalent of three years' salary; now it is around 16 years. Source: Barney StringerYou might've read some headlines today—in very reputable publications—saying that there's an internet attack underway. The biggest in history. Enough to slow down the internet. This would be exciting and scary, except it's just not true.
The entire thing sounds so dramatic—the swarming DDoS onslaught is "jamming crucial infrastructure around the world," the NYT screams from the trenches—that it sounds just plausible enough. And indeed, the combatants in question have been battling it out online: a conflict between Spamhaus, a Dutch group that tracks spammers and Cyberbunker, a Dutch hosting company accused of housing them. That's really happening: as far as we can tell, botnets acting on behalf of (or run by) Cyberbunker have been trying to crash Spamhaus for days with a strong stream of overload junk data.
And if you believe what you've been told online, their head-butting is quaking the entire web. This is it. The big one. The hacks to end all hacks, a hack attack with collateral damage that reverberates 'round the globe. But once you read beyond a few scary sentences of CYBERWEBATTACKS, you might wonder:
- Why wasn't my internet slow?
- Why didn't anyone notice this over the course of the past week, when it began?
- Why haven't there been any reports of Netflix outages, as the New York Times and BBC reported?
- Why do firms that do nothing but monitor the health of the web, like Internet Traffic Report, show zero evidence of this Dutch conflict spilling over into our online backyards?
(There would be dips and spikes in those graphs if war were being waged across the net)
Why are the only people willing to make any claims about the validity or scope of the attack directly involved: Spamhaus reps, the group's leader, and most dubiously, CloudFlare, the anti-DDoS firm Spamhaus enlisted to ward off the attack. And it's that last party that's responsible for the sky-falling internet weather report, the party that stands to profit directly from you being worried that the internet as we know it is under siege.
Hours after the Times and BBC broke the "news" of our internet's artillery wounds, CloudFlare put up a breathless blog post entitled, subtly, "The DDoS That Almost Broke the Internet." Yikes! What follows is essentially a press release that would be like a drug company telling you how horrible various diseases are, and how well their pills work against them. CloudFlare CEO Matthew Prince tells a harrowing story of warding off the internet attack after Spamhaus hired him—which is certainly true—but warns us of existential threats to the net still lurking out there, like lost Soviet nukes:
As someone in charge of DDoS mitigation at one of the Internet giants emailed me this weekend: "I've often said we don't have to prepare for the largest-possible attack, we just have to prepare for the largest attack the Internet can send without
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message more inclusive.
“He’s saying the same things, but in a more welcoming manner,” Jones said. “He’s grown and is paying attention and being responsive to feedback.”Victory made big strides in recruiting ahead of this season, signing the A-League's number one striker, Besart Berisha, from Brisbane Roar, as well as bringing Australia midfielder Carl Valeri back to Australia.
Delpierre hasn't had as much publicity as the other pair, but Finkler says the Frenchman, who has extensive experience in the German Bundesliga with VfB Stuttgart, is going to stun audiences with his commanding presence in the central defence.
"Matthieu is a very good signing, we are very lucky to get him," Finkler said. "He's got a great profile and he has settled down very well for us.
"He's a player no-one is talking about, but when the season starts they're going to start talking about him. He'll be a real star for Victory. He's a very important player and he's going to help us a lot this season, for sure."
Brazilian attacking midfielder Finkler said Delpierre would rule from the back.
"He's improving his English, as I am," Finkler said. "He loves to talk on the field and make his presence felt. That's what he wants to do. It's going to be interesting this season."
Finkler says that after qualifying for the top six in fourth place last season and not getting to the grand final, he and the rest of the Victory players had declared that result wasn't nearly good enough and were demanding much more of themselves this season.
"We definitely need to get better," he said. "Last season we didn't make the grand final, so this season we bought some quality players who played for the Socceroos and at a high club level overseas. It's a huge step for us and we've been working hard on our formation.
"We know that when we play for Victory we've got to be in finals and win trophies, so that is our aim for this season.
"We have to be better, from our goalie right through to our number nine. Everyone needs to push themselves to improve and be in the grand final. This season is very important for us as a club and as players."
Finkler revealed that after a discussion with coach Kevin Muscat it had been decided he should have more of a roving role this season, to ensure he is able to help provide the best service for Berisha.
"Bes is a very important player. He forces the opposition centre-backs to have to be very aware," Finkler said.
"He's going to be very good for us this season because it's like he can score for fun when he's on his game. He's been working very hard.
"We've changed the formation this season. I watch a lot of video and Kevin has been talking to me about having more freedom this season in the movement through the midfield area.
"I need to work closely with Bes and the other strikers, so it's a bit different. He's a genuine goal-scorer, so it's very important that I get into a good position to assist him. I want to make his job a bit easier - that's a big part of my job on the field.
"I'm happy to help the team any way I can. If it means having more freedom, that's fine, but it doesn't matter either way to me. I just want to be on the park and playing and helping the team to win trophies."
Finkler will again be a major threat to the opposition with his free kicks from just outside the penalty box. He has an uncanny knack of putting the ball in from them and the opposition goalkeeper is on high alert whenever he lines one up.
"I practice them a lot," Finkler said. "Not every session, but certainly every week. I read some statistics that in the EPL 30 per cent of the goals are from free kicks or corners.
"We need to get better on that and make sure we give ourselves every chance of scoring from set plays.
"I visualise the ball going in from free kicks. If you work hard on it at training and get good results there, then the confidence is high in games."
Victory will go to Canberra to play local side Tuggeranong United in Round of 16 FFA Cup game on Tuesday. Finkler said that while it is important to know something about the opposition, it is more important for Victory to be focused on its game.
"It's going to be an interesting game," he said. "We will have a lot of respect for them, but we have to work on our own approach before we take into account the team we're playing against.
"I'm sure the coaching staff will have some video of them to help us get ready for them and play some great football."To quote the irrepressible Sally Field, “You like me! You really, really like me!”
Well, at least 90% of y’all anyways. As of a couple of minutes ago, A Sword Into Darkness logged its 100th customer review, and it did it in the best way possible, with a short and sweet 5-star love note. THANK YOU, DEAR READERS! For those of you keeping a tally, the current count is 68 5-star reviews, 22 4-star reviews, 8 3-stars, and one each of the 2-star and 1-star variety. I’m pleased as punch about the whole thing, not because I’m that concerned about my own vanity (though I do go tee-hee and squee a little every time I get a new 4 or 5-star one in), but because I genuinely want to show folks a good time. I’ve stolen perfectly good beer money from you. You deserve to have a few hours or days of kick-ass super-sciencey fun in return.
ASID is not a perfect book. I acknowledge that, and its admitted flaws are probably what kept the gatekeepers of traditional publishing from allowing me into their club. But, I think it is a really fun book and one I hope subsequent folks will like just as well as those 90% which have so far. It’s my first book “worthy” of publication, and as a first novel, I get a by for some of its less-well-put-together elements by a lot of people, but I don’t think kindness is the sole reason I’ve got the track record I do. There are a lot of things that people think I accomplished pretty damn well.
Some commonly noted positives: I got the science right and it’s earned its bona fides as hard science fiction, with SCIENCE actually being necessary to the plot. Yes, I have a very important, very central, very unexplained macguffin in the story, but its limits are well-charted and used consistently. And as one reviewer noted, everything else is done so well, they can forgive an element or two of hand-wavium. Another positive is my true-to-life portrayal of the Navy and the military in general, as well as its interaction with corporate interests and civil government oversight. I’m glad folks recognized this, because it really was important to me (though some did note I was a bit heavy on the lingo and mil-speak). In this, I cheated a leeetle bit, in that I have a modicum of experience in those roles due to my unspecified day job. So I stole shamelessly from years of interaction with superiors, subordinates, and shipmates all.
Other elements of goodness reviewers have noted: The characters are interesting and quirky, the action scenes are clear, fast moving, and inventive, the plot is well-balanced, flowing briskly with a realistic timeline, and I had a few real surprises for readers, things they’d never seen before, but I also paid homage to a lot of classic sci-fi that preceded me, namely that of Niven, Heinlein, Weber, and Ringo, while still putting my own spin on well-used tropes. One of the biggest notes of appreciation most folks had was that the book was well-edited and professionally assembled. It does not read like a screed cobbled together in someone’s basement print shop. Apparently there is a lot of self-published work riddled with typos, and copyediting mistakes that should never have been made public. For that, I have to give credit to my own OCD and to Jeff Edwards, a true professional and a kick-ass author who has the attention to detail to save you from my usual misspelled rabmlings.
And then there’s the not-so-positives: my ten more-critical reviews. Some folks think I needed a bit more editing, less for bad copy and more to remove some meandering elements that perhaps should not have made the final cut. I’m accused of shallow characterization, but some may have had preconceptions in that regard, considering it a common element of the genre. Now, me... I like my characters, but I admit that I did not delve too deeply in their pasts or their internal lives. They grow, but this book is not about catharsis. It is a plot-driven vehicle and I think it’s a fun one, but deeper characterization is definitely a goal for the sequel. Then there’s the accusation of predictability, which I both understand and somewhat disagree with. It is a book of genre-classics, an intentional homage trying to one-up or become perhaps the definitive version of those tropes. It is recognized that there are certain expectations in the plot. As soon as a main character recognizes the potential for an alien visitation, you KNOW there is going to be an encounter, likely of the invasive kind. That is expected, anticipated, but predictable? I dunno. Recognizing that something is likely to occur, that a pleasant, fun novel like this DOESN’T end with all the protagonists dying and the antagonists upsetting the whole apple cart is not necessarily predicatability. How was the journey to that point? Was it worth the trip, even if you anticipated what the destination would look like and turned out to be right?
So, check out my reviews, and if you haven’t tried it yet, give the book a spin! It’s a whole lotta fun for less than a Venti Starbucks coffee (and not nearly as bitter).ComiConverse Admin A Super Empowered Community.
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Though nothing official has been released, Kevin Conroy now seems increasingly likely to return to reprise his role as Batman, alongside Mark Hamill as The Joker, in the upcoming Warner Brothers animated feature The Killing Joke.
IMDb.com now lists Mr. Conroy and Mr. Hamill as officially having joined the cast and the film as having officially entered pre-production. This jives nicely with a Collider report from this past July, which stated that voice work on the project had already begun.
Still, the patchy wall of silence, that surrounds the project's casting, remains in place for the time being.
MORE NEWS FROM THE WEB
Publicist Gary Miereanu of Warner Bros. Home Entertainment gave ComiConverse the following official update.
"Nothing has been officially announced regarding Batman: The Killing Joke, beyond its title and Bruce Timm's affiliation with the film."
Repeated requests for comment the actor's representatives were not returned.
There has been a certain amount of fog surrounding the project's casting, as denials from both actors have been accompanied by reports that their recording sessions were already underway.
Given the excitement surrounding the The Killing Joke's development, it would make sense for studio executives to try and keep the casting of their star voice actors quiet for as long as possible, in order to add to hype.
Only weeks ago, Conroy told a panel of excited fans at Wizard World Tulsa that neither he nor Mark Hamill had officially been offered roles in The Killing Joke; this despite numerous media reports claiming Hamill was already on board with the project.
The dark and legendary Batman story arc by Alan Moore is quickly becoming one of the most anticipated animated films in comics history, and now appears set to feature two of the most iconic voice actors in the genre.
At one time, Kevin Conroy's presence in any non-live-action Batman project would have been a near certainty; however, in recent years DC Entertainment has begun experimenting with different actors in their Batman animated features, with Jason O'Mara having now held the role in four of DC's animated films, as well as in the upcoming project Batman: Bad Blood.
It wouldn't be a forgone conclusion that the inclusion of Hamill's Joker in a major project would also mean Conroy's return as Batman. Conroy returned to his iconic role in 2014's Batman: Assault on Arkham, which was seen by many as a major studio experiment that did much to drive the creation of a live-action Suicide Squad movie. Hamill was not included in that project.
Most fans will remember the duo from their superb performances in Batman: The Animated Series, where both worked with The Killing Joke's Executive Producer Bruce Timm, as well as the various incarnations of The Justice League animated series. Animated feature films, however, have gotten significantly darker and more adult in the years since those series were at their peak. Both actors seem to have transitioned into that more adult world of storytelling, as evidenced by Assault on Arkham and other films.
Still, it would be hard to find more adult subject matter than Moore's The Killing Joke.
In October, Batman-News reported that permission had been given for the project to seek an "R" rating if the Director felt it was necessary to tell the best story.
When that story finally bursts on to our laptops and TV's, sometime in 2016, and if indeed it does include Conroy and Hamill reprising their iconic roles as Batman and The Joker, it will undoubtedly be an intoxicating mix of drama and nostalgia - with an added touch of controversy.
The Killing Joke is not without its detractors.
The major theme of interest to students of comics and storytelling will, nevertheless, likely be as follows; two actors who attracted legions of child fans with their performances in the 1990's, continue to reunite to portray more adult versions of those same characters as their core audience ages.
It's an evolution in storytelling that is extremely unique and one which has allowed both the actors and their fans to continue their journey together longer than any would have thought possible.
Its possible that The Killing Joke would be the last such project that Hamill and Conroy might have the chance to work together on.
If so, it will surely be one for the ages.
Correction: An earlier version of this story listed Mr. Gary Miereanu as a Publicist for DC Entertainment. He is, in fact, a Publicist for Warner Bros. Home Entertainment.
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(Visited 2,934 times, 1 visits today)Thanks to BOOM! Studios and their Archaia and KaBOOM! imprints for their FULL November 2013 Solicitations! Let’s get started – here’s the full scoop from BOOM!:
PROTOCOL #1
Author: Michael Alan Nelson Artist: Mariano Navarro Cover Artist: Stephane Roux $3.99
WHY WE LOVE IT: Written by Michael Alan Nelson (SUPERGIRL, HEXED) and drawn by newcomer Mariano Navarro, PROTOCOL is an action-packed espionage series with a compelling cast of young characters struggling with their transition into adulthood.
WHY YOU’LL LOVE IT: PROTOCOL is a tense thriller perfect for fans of fun spy fiction like TV’s Alias or Mission: Impossible.
WHAT IT’S ABOUT: Grabbed up by the United States government and thrown into training camps, orphans around the country have been raised to become America’s next generation of superspies. Now, as adults, they live amongst us, ready for “the family” to call them back into action.
IMAGINE AGENTS #2
Author: Brian Joines Artist: Bachan Cover Artists: (A) Khary Randolph (B – Connecting Variant) Felipe Smith (A) $3.99; (B) $0.00
YOU MAY HAVE FORGOTTEN ABOUT THEM. BUT YOUR IMAGINARY FRIEND HASN’T FORGOT ABOUT YOU. Terry and Dave must gather their wits and uncover the mystery behind Dapple’s evil plan. With the help of the toy-filled, lovable gelatin-mass, Blounder, they may just have a chance to crack the case. Unbeknownst to them, the kidnapping of Furdlegurr has put 6-year-old Elliot Fairview onto Dapple’s trail.
SONS OF ANARCHY #3
Author: Christopher Golden Artist: Damian Couceiro Cover Artist: Paul Azeceta $3.99
With the plan to transfer Kendra to a safe haven in place, Tig, Jax and the rest of SAMCRO prepare for the dangerous cross-country ride. But Griggs and the Ghost Brothers are already hot on their trail, and even worse, some of SAMCRO is beginning to question risking everything just to help the ex-porn-star daughter of a long dead member…
HIT #3
Author: Bryce Carlson Artist: Vanesa R. Del Rey Cover Artist: Ryan Sook $3.99
As the noose slowly tightens, Slater is left with a choice: Does he give in to Blair’s sadistic demands and rejoin the Hit Squad, or does he take action against the East Coast mafia to save Bonnie? But really, he doesn’t have much of a choice at all…
ROBOCOP: LAST STAND #4
Story: Frank Miller Sequential Adaptation: Steven Grant Artist: Korkut Öztekin Cover Artist: Declan Shalvey
Roaring down the burning streets of a dying city in a juiced-up cruiser, RoboCop must disappear into the night or meet his end by the onslaught of OCP officers on his tail. Barely functioning and fighting to maintain consciousness, RoboCop will need all the help he can get to survive.
3 GUNS #4
Author: Steven Grant Artist: Emilio Laiso Cover Artist: Rafael Albuquerque $3.99
The gun deal Trench and Steadman were blackmailed into facilitating has gone south, and now the two guns are caught in the crossfire of the two warring factions. Meanwhile, Joey meets up with her government handler, leveraging the stolen weapons and money into a last-ditch attempt to bring both sides to justice.
SIX-GUN GORILLA #6
Author: Simon Spurrier Artist: Jeff Stokely Cover Artist: Ramón Pérez
Blue has almost made it back to the BlisterGate in his mission to return the dying general’s love-token to his Earth-side wife. The only problem? He’ll have to cross a battlefield to get there, with both the Rebels and the BXF soldiers out to get him and no 6GG in sight.
SUICIDE RISK #7
Author: Mike Carey Artist: Elena Casagrande Cover Artist: Tommy Lee Edwards $3.99
With the Nightmare Crew’s true plan revealed, Leo Winters must test the very limits of his burgeoning power to stop them—but will using his powers play right into their hands? Or, cause an even bigger tragedy than the one Leo’s putting so much at risk trying to stop?
CLIVE BARKERS: NEXT TESTAMENT #7 CLIVE BARKERS: NEXT TESTAMENT #7 Authors: Clive Barker, Mark Miller Artist: Haemi Jang Cover Artist: Goni Montes
As Tristan and Elspeth continue their race to Providence, their new traveling companions may hold the key to the mystery of Wick’s brethren. Meanwhile, Wick’s jealousy leads to a show of force unlike any of his previous acts.
HELLRAISER: THE DARK WATCH #10
Authors: Clive Barker, Brandon Seifert Artist: Tom Garcia Cover Artist: Lorenoa Carvalho
Elliot Spencer’s last run-in with Leviathan didn’t go as planned, but the lord of the Labyrinth has no idea what his former protege has in store for him…
FANBOYS VS. ZOMBIES #20
Author: Shane Houghton Artis: Jerry Gaylord Cover Artist: Jerry Gaylord
Series Finale! “4 Stories of the Apocalypse” concludes with an alternate reality tale: What if the Wrecking Crew turned zombie at SDCC, and the scrappy creators of a comic book series called FANBOYS VS. ZOMBIES were the only humans left alive to stop them?
DEATHMATCH #12
Author: Paul Jenkins Artist: Carlos Magno Cover Artist: Carlos Magno
The final battle is here, as the two heroes left standing wage war for the fate of the universe. This is the conclusion to the vaunted superhero maxiseries from famed creators Paul Jenkins (FAIRY QUEST, INHUMANS) and Carlos Magno (PLANET OF THE APES, TRANSFORMERS).
REGULAR SHOW: SKIPS #1 Author: Mad Rupert Artist: Mad Rupert Cover Artists: (A) Mad Rupert (B) Kel McDonald (C) Mia Schwartz (D) Tessa Stone (A, B, C, or D) $3.99 WHY WE LOVE IT: No one is more mysterious in the crazy world of REGULAR SHOW than Skips, the park’s enigmatic yeti groundskeeper who always seems to know what’s going on. Finally, we get to see the world from his point of view. WHY YOU’LL LOVE IT: Because you know that REGULAR SHOW is anything but ordinary…and newcomer Mad Rupert has crafted a comic that is extraordinary. WHAT’S IT ABOUT: Pops decides to take the team on a mini-vacation for all the good work they’ve done. Little does Skips know, this vacation is not going to be a restful one…
HEROBEAR AND THE KID: THE INHERITANCE #4 Author: Mike Kunkel Artist: Mike Kunkel Cover: Mike Kunkel $3.99 Tyler learns what it means to be a hero while at the same time trying to figure out the mystery behind Von Klon. He might finally feel like he’s getting some answers, but it looks like he’s also getting more questions. A great story of a boy and his best friend overcoming the crazy obstacles that life throws at us. ADVENTURE TIME: CANDY CAPERS #5 Authors: Yuko Ota and Ananth Panagariya Artist: Ian McGinty Cover Artists: (A) Nomi Kane (B), Linda Price, (C) Larry Birdsall, (D) Mad Rupert (A, B, C, or D) $3.99 This ADVENTURE TIME whodunit continues with hilarious team-ups no one is expecting as Ooo searches for its newest hero, but is Peppermint Butler any closer to figuring out what happened to Finn and Jake? Each issue is great for fans by itself but for series readers, it’ll only be a matter of time before the truth finally comes out. REGULAR SHOW #8 Author: KC Green Artist: Allison Strejlau Cover Artists: (A) Phil Jacobson, (B) Reed Black, (C) Yumi Sakugawa, (D) Jemma Salume (A, B, C, or D) $3.99 The newest issue of this not-so-regular REGULAR SHOW comic once again takes Mordecai and Rigby on an adventure that could only be found in a comic book! A great series for fans of slacker comedy, ’80s humor, and awesome, one-of-a-kind art!
GARFIELD #19 Authors: Mark Evanier, Scott Nickelt Artist: Andy Hirsch Cover Artist: Gary Barker $3.99 Garfield and the gang have plenty to give thanks for, and we’re going to share two all-new stories this month, including the gang getting into some turkey day shenanigans, and the next chapter of the Lasagna Monster saga!
BRAVEST WARRIORS #14 Author: Joey Comeau Artist: Mike Holmes Cover Artists: (A) Tyson Hesse, (B) Kerrith Johnson, (C) Ashley Davis, (D) Matt Sheean (A, B, C, or D) $3.99 Things are never easy for the Bravest Warriors; it’s probably what makes them so gosh darn likable. This issue isn’t just another “will they, won’t they” between Beth and Chris (answer: socks), it’s another mission where the Bravest Warriors will get to bring their unique personalities together to overcome all obstacles in their way!
ADVENTURE TIME #22 Author: Ryan North Artists: Shelli Paroline, Braden Lamb Cover Artists: (A) Mike Holmes, (B) Sarah Harrocks, (C) Tessa Stone, (D) Allen Lau (A, B, C, or D) $3.99 Finn and Jake find themselves in a sticky situation when Princess Bubblegum’s experiments searching for the origin of life—specifically, her life—go horribly wrong, overcoming the Candy Kingdom! What sour weapon can the boys find that can overcome something so primordially sweet? PEANUTS #13 Authors: Charles M. Schulz, Various Artists: Charles M. Schulz, Various Cover Artist: Charles M. Schulz When it comes to winning this year’s Miss Crabby Pageant, Lucy is going all out. But with competition like Molley Volley and Crybaby Boobie, can Lucy out crabby her way to the shiny winner’s trophy? Enjoy “Miss Crabby Pageant” and many more Peanuts adventures in this latest issue, full of heart and fun galore!
STEED AND MRS. PEEL VOL. 2: THE SECRET HISTORY OF SPACE TP
Author: Caleb Monroe Artist: Yasmin Liang Cover Artist: Joseph Michael Linsner $14.99
Caleb Monroe and Yasmin Liang bring you all-new stories of the original Avengers, as the super-spy duo face a murderous conductor, crack the case of the Suicide Town, and get into a literal race against time. Collecting issues 4-7.
PLANET OF THE APES: CATACLYSM VOL. 2 TP
Authors: Corinna Bechko, Gabriel Hardman Artist: Damian Couceiro Cover Artist: Alex Ross
After the cataclysm that devastated Ape City, Doctor Zaius, his family, Cornelius, and Marcus are tasked with the difficult and often treacherous responsibility of rebuilding civilization. But what terror lies beneath the ruins? Ancient mysteries unfold and Ape City continues to crumble while Zaius’ search for answers winds its way deeper into the unknown. Collecting issues 5-8 of the critically acclaimed series.
ADVENTURE TIME VOL 2: PIXEL PRINCESS OGN
Authors: Danielle Corsetto Artist: Zack Sterling Cover Artist: Stephanie Gonzaga WHY WE LOVE IT: Our favorite princesses are getting a chance to take the main stage as they learn the importance of friendship and what it really means to wear a crown.
WHY YOU’LL LOVE IT: It’s a book about how Princesses can overcome their differences while at the same time kicking butt and taking names.
WHAT IT’S ABOUT: Princess gatherings aren’t always tea parties and doilies, there is a lot more to being a Princess that one might think. Danielle Corsetto (GIRLS WITH SLINGSHOTS) and Zack Sterling return with an adventure where some of our favorite princesses learn what it really takes to be a princess, while learning to respect each other for their unique outlooks on life.
THE JOYNERS IN 3D HC
Author: R.J. Ryan Artist: David Marquez Cover Artist: David Marquez $29.95
In mid-21st century Northern California, prosperous technology executive George Joyner stands on the brink of revolutionizing life in America (again) with his latest high-flying invention. But just as business booms, George’s private life begins to implode, with devastating consequences, for his wife Sonya, their children Rochester and Michelle, and Sonya’s ailing father, David. Brought to life in stunning anaglyph 3-D (two pairs of glasses come enclosed with each book), The Joyners in 3D details a story of personal betrayals, industrial intrigue, and sexual desire in uncompromising and visually impeccable terms. The Joyners in 3D reunites writer R.J. Ryan and Ultimate Spider-Man illustrator David Marquez, collaborators on Archaia’s acclaimed graphic novel Syndrome, for which Marquez earned a 2011 Russ Manning Award nomination.
MOUSE GUARD: LEGENDS OF THE GUARD VOL. 2 HC
Authors: David Petersen, Ben Caldwell, Eric Canete, Rick Geary, Cory Godbey, Cliff Monear, Stan Sakai, Jemma Salume, Christian Slade, Jackson Sze, Nick Tapalansky, Bill Willingham, and C. P. Wilson III Artists: David Petersen, Ben Caldwell, Eric Canete, Alex Eckman-Lawn, Rick Geary, Justin Gerard, Cory Godbey, Jemma Salume, Stan Sakai, Christian Slade, Jackson Sze, Bill Willingham, and C. P. Wilson III Cover Artist: David Petersen $19.95Several MEPs across political groups expressed their indignation at the mock hangings of six Polish MEPs which took place at the weekend in Katowice, Poland. Vice-President McGuinness informed the House that President Tajani reacted immediately, in a letter asking the Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydło to protect Polish MEPs and to ensure their security and freedom of expression.
Agenda changes
Wednesday
The Commission statement on the “Decision adopted on the Fair Taxation package II” is postponed.
A Commission statement on the “Deadly floods in Attica and disaster relief aid” is added, as the third item.
Thursday
The report on the “Mobilisation of the Contingency margin in 2017” is added to the votes.
The vote on “EU-Lebanon Agreement for scientific and technological cooperation” is postponed.
Furthermore, a report on a request to lift the immunity of Ana Gomes (S&D, PT) is put to the vote during Thursday's voting time.
Requests by committees to start negotiations with Council and Commission
Decisions by several committees to enter into inter-institutional negotiations (Rule 69c) are published on the plenary website.
If no request for a vote in Parliament on the decision to enter into negotiations is made until Thursday 24.00, the committees may start negotiations.To blog Previous post | Next post
Java version and vendor data analyzed: 2017 edition
2017 is the fifth year when we publish statistics about the Java landscape. Every year, during springtime, we dig into the data that we have gathered from the JVMs Plumbr Agents have monitored, and find out about:
which Java versions are used (is Java 6 vs Java 7 vs Java 8)
which JVMs are used (Oracle Hotspot vs OpenJDK vs Rest Of The World);
how the landscape has changed over time.
This year our conclusions are based on 1,400 different JVMs that Plumbr monitored for performance during March and April 2017. The data has been gathered from within the JVM via System.getProperty() calls with os.arch, os.version, java.version etc..
Java versions used in 2017
This is now finally the year where Java 8 became the most popular environment. Having lost last year by just a fraction of a percent, Java 8 this year had double the number of deployments than Java 7:
Notable are also the missing elements. Java 5 is gone for good and there was exactly zero early access Java 9 builds among the deployments we received data from. With the recent turmoil around its core Jigsaw module, it might be reasonable to wait until the dust has settled before jumping onto this bandwagon.
Java versions used 2013 – 2017
The picture looks more interesting if we look at the trends over the four years. Presenting the same data over the five-year period starting from 2013. As we have concluded this study now over five years using the same methodology, we see the following trends:
Number of Java 6 deployments keeps shrinking 2x each year for the fifth year in a row. Considering that Java 6 was EOL’d already in March 2013, it is definitely a good news. Java 7 usage peaked at 2014 and is also in clear decline, leaving Java 8 as the clear winner.
JVM vendors in 2017
Next analysis opens up the data we have about different JVM vendors. If you recall, Java declares a standard any vendor can decide to implement when building a Java Virtual Machine. In theory we should thus see a large variety of different JVM vendors, but in practice we have the following:
No matter how you would interpret the data, the conclusion is the same: there are two JVMs with large deployment base: Hotspot and OpenJDK.
The “Other” category consisted of five different JVMs vendors, each represented by five or less JVMs in the dataset. These vendors included Oracle JRockit, IBM J9, SAP Java Server VM, Zing and SAP VM.
If you found the data interesting, you are likely to enjoy our next week post about Java EE container statistics as well. To be notified on time, subscribe either to our Twitter or RSS feed.As creative designers, we spend entire days working in great apps like Photoshop, Sketch and SketchUp... but often find them tedious, especially with a trackpad:
Mousing across large screens to select menu items takes time, and gets fatiguing in long sessions.
Mousing across the smaller screens means cluttering your screen with menus.
Memorizing keyboard shortcuts is hard, and they're easy to forget.
Shortcuts for similar features aren't consistent across design apps.
Thimble makes selecting app buttons and menu items better: Just rest your thumb on the trackpad, and scroll to quickly open app buttons & menu items. Thimble's gesture interface can even be customized for the commands you use most often.
And! Thimble remembers your recent actions, making repetitive design steps much faster.
Still curious? Check out my blog post on making thimble.Get the biggest daily stories by email Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
BANANAS have been banned in the small coastal village of Portsoy as residents gear up for their biggest day of the year, the annual Scottish Traditional Boat Festival.
Superstitious seafarers believe the fruit brings bad luck to any voyage and so festival organisers have declared the Aberdeenshire town a banana free-zone in order to ward off any maritime misfortune.
Banana ban signs have been posted, a banana amnesty has been introduced and local businesses have come out in support of the action, with Portsoy Ice Cream removing banana-flavoured items from its range until after the event.
Roger Goodyear, chairman of the festival, said: “Bananas may be a delicious fruit but they are considered bad luck on boats.
“We want to do everything possible to make sure our 2015 festival is a success and we don’t want to take any chances.
poll loading Are you superstitious? 0+ VOTES SO FAR YES NO
"Our ban on bananas is a tongue-in-cheek nod to our seafaring heritage and is a reminder that the ocean can be a mystical, but dangerous, place and as such there are many traditional superstitions among fisher people.”
Many theories abound as to why sailors are so wary of the fruit.
One is that back in the early days of the Caribbean banana trade in the 1700s the fruit harboured dangerous spiders whose bite could be painful or even fatal.
Another theory is that in the early days of the banana trade, crews would overload the banana boats when leaving the tropics, resulting in the boats capsizing in bad weather.
Although a banana ban is now in place, there will be plenty of tempting local produce at the boat festival.In a Hong Kong hotel room in June 2013, director Laura Poitras filmed a pivotal decision in recent history: Edward Snowden’s choice to reveal an extensive network of surveillance conducted by the US government against its own citizens. Since the revelations, Snowden has ended up in Russia where he has been granted political asylum. And Poitras, who turned the footage she shot of the former NSA contractor into the documentary Citizenfour, has also moved to Europe, through fears that she might be arrested in the US.
Citizenfour concludes a trilogy of documentaries Poitras has made that show the effect of 9/11 on America and the world: the first was My Country, My Country, about life in Iraq following the US invasion in 2003; the second was The Oath, about inmates at the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. These films provide a powerful perspective on US policy in the last 13 years – in the case of Citizenfour, even some of Edward Snowden’s original detractors, like Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, came to embrace its message. Weinstein told the BBC that he found Snowden’s actions “despicable” but after seeing Citizenfour decided that he would help distribute it. And now it's a leading contender to win the best documentary feature prize at the Academy Awards.
Tom Brook reveals how Poitras helped Edward Snowden tell his story – and the dramatic fallout they both continue to face.
If you would like to comment on this story or anything else you have seen on BBC Culture, head over to our Facebook page or message us on Twitter.Asia Indonesia Cancels Bikinis for 2013 Miss World Pageant
Miss World has axed the famed bikinis from this year's pageant in Indonesia, replacing the swimsuits with conservative beach sarongs amid protests from Muslim groups.
JAKARTA — Miss World has axed the famed bikinis from this year’s pageant in Indonesia, replacing the skimpy swimsuits with conservative beach sarongs amid mounting protests from hardline Muslim groups, organizers said Thursday.
All of the more than 130 contestants will be required to wear Bali’s traditional long sarongs instead of the sexy bikinis that are historically part of the competition, said Adjie S. Soeratmadjie of the RCTI, the official broadcaster and local organizer.
The pageant will be held Sept. 28 on the resort island of Bali and in Sentul, an area near the capital, Jakarta. Indonesia is the world’s most populous Muslim country.
“There will no bikini in this year’s Miss World pageant to respect our traditional customs and values,” Soeratmadjie said, adding that the London-based Miss World Organization is on board with the decision.
“This is a sensitive issue in Indonesia. We have discussed it since last year and they have agreed,” he said.
The chairwoman of the Miss World Organization, Julia Morley, confirmed that none of the 137 contestants would wear a bikini.
“Indonesia is designing for us a very beautiful one-piece beachwear, and I’m very
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2013, using the methods described below, briefly explaining why you are a crime victim, and summarizing your views. If you wish to be heard at any future resentencing hearing the Court may schedule, you will be asked to notify the Court by a certain date (which will be set forth on the website noted above), and to briefly explain why you are a crime victim and summarize what you wish to say at the hearing. If it appears that multiple victims wish to make the same points, the Court may limit the number of victims who speak in order not to unduly complicate or prolong the resentencinghearing. The Department of Justice cannot predict when in the course of the hearing the Court will permit victims to be heard. Victims who wish to speak should therefore plan on attending and being available when the opportunity to speak arises.
Of course, the DOJ can't promise the only "complaints" heard will be those from former MF Global executive Jon Corzine, who will instead focus on singing the praises of Skilling for his phenomenal cash flow and balance sheet management skills.
Full filing below:AP Classes Are a Scam The College Board earns over half of all its revenues from the courses—and, in an uncertain environment, students keep being suckered. by JOHN TIERNEY OCT 13, 2012 U.S.
That’s a pretty strong claim, right? You bet. But why not be straightforward when discussing a scam the scale and audacity of which would raise Bernie Madoff’s eyebrows? The miscellany of AP courses offered in U.S. high schools under the imprimatur of the College Board probably started with good intentions.
From The Atlantic:By the way, I think this John Tierney of The Atlantic is a different person than the John Tierney of the New York Times, and that both are different from former Congressman John F. Tierney. (In short, there are a lot of Irishmen in American public life.)This Tierney goes on to make a number of arguments against Advanced Placement courses and tests, some plausible, some less so. He doesn’t have a lot of data one way or another, unfortunately.
I looked into the statistics on AP testing results back in 2009 for a VDARE article and concluded that diminishing marginal returns due to expansion of the number of students taking the tests hadn’t yet become a severe problem. At that point, Blue State students were getting more benefit from AP, but not enough Red State students appeared to have discovered this way to earn expensive college credits as a high school student.
I think somebody might want to reproduce my 2009 methodology with 2017 statistics to see if AP has gotten too big since I last checked.
On the other hand, I’m more of a fan of AP tests than AP courses. For example, one of my sons took a US history course that followed the AP curriculum and the class was just a forced march through memorizing a lot of facts with no time for class discussions. After the test had been taken in early May, the class experience got a lot better.
My other son went to a very good high school that doesn’t offer AP-branded courses — on the grounds that their talented teachers are better at making up their own curriculums — while encouraging students to take the AP tests. This seems to have been the best of both worlds, although it was dependent on hiring very good teachers, having very good students, and having small class sizes with lots of discussion.
As Kingsley Amis said, there’s no end to the way nice things are nicer than nasty ones.
[Comment at Unz.com]Another day, another government trying to figure out how to censor the internet. This time it’s India, where acting communications minister Kapil Sibal is meeting with officials from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Facebook to pressure them to self-censor user content, the New York Times reports. The issue is that someone wrote something mean about a politician, Sonia Gandhi, on her Facebook page.
That’s right. While other countries come up with broader excuses for trying to interfere with what people can post online — China says it’s trying to stop porn, the US says it’s trying to protect copyright holders — Sibal is openly just upset about politicians being criticized. His solution, the report says, is to have web companies use humans to monitor and delete objectionable content before it gets posted.
Since TechCrunch has lots of readers in India, and uses Facebook for comments, I guess this means Facebook would be required to decide what comments people in the country are allowed to post here? Or would TechCrunch get blocked like it is in China if there are any comments by anyone that are negative about Indian politicians? Hard to say at this point. Sibal’s effort isn’t a law.
But the government has already passed other laws recently that have successfully put pressure on web companies to self-censor. An October 2009 law requires web company executives to comply with take-down or site-blocking requests from the government or face a fine and seven years of jail. Sibal’s ministry issued a vague set of rules in April that forces web companies to delete content that politicians or citizens object to within 36 hours, and don’t provide ways for content creators to defend or appeal their actions.
There are, of course, some good reasons for the Indian government to be concerned. Online postings can worsen existing religious and ethnic tensions within the diverse country. But democracies need to let citizens speak freely in order to be understood and represented by their politicians. The internet is a vital way for this to happen. Self-interested efforts like Sibal’s today need to be fought.
Indian readers, let us know in comments if there are any campaigns against these actions that we can help promote, and I’ll update this post with links to them. In the meantime, Sonia Gandhi’s Facebook page accepts user comments, so you can go let her know how you feel there.CHENNAI: The body of a 24-year-old Tata Consultancy Services employee, reported missing since last week, was recovered near Siruseri on Saturday. It was identified as that of Uma Maheshwari of Salem, who was employed in the accounts department of TCS in Siruseri, south eastern suburb of Chennai.A passerby who experienced foul smell from a bush alerted police. Her body was sent for post-mortem to the Chengalpet Government Hospital. Police said there were no signs of a struggle and added that that they were looking into all possibilities.Uma Maheshwari, who was staying with friends near the office, did not take the cab and her mobile phone was switched off as soon as she stepped out of office on February 13, police said.Her father Balasubramanian had been staying in Siruseri since then, they said adding that they were trying to trace the call details of the woman.SCP-2223
Item #: SCP-2223
Object Class: Safe
Special Containment Procedures: SCP-2223 is to be kept on Site 08 within the confines of Security Box ███. With the exception of research purposes, SCP-2223 is to be sheathed within a sixteen (16) by sixteen (16) centimeter pincushion. The pincushion's integrity should be inspected on a bi-annual basis. Personnel who wish to handle SCP-2223 require the written permission of Lead Researcher Dr. ████████.
Addendum: Due to recent misconduct among the Foundation's leadership staff, Dr. ████████ will no longer be participating in the research of SCP-2223. The Lead Researcher role has been transferred to Dr. Vos effective immediately. Refer to 2223-I2 - Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama
Researchers are encouraged to limit physical handling of SCP-2223 directly. Tasks of direct contact should be relegated to remote-operated robots or D-Class personnel. If direct interaction is required when handling SCP-2223, researchers are required to wear three (3) centimeter thick insulated protective glove-wear that meet no less than Grade 5 Safety Standards.
Description: SCP-2223 appears to be an unremarkable seven and a half (7.5) centimeter long bone needle. The tip tapers into an exceedingly sharp point that measures ██ micrometers in diameter. The bone material that the item is comprised of has been analyzed, and has been determined to have originated from ████████████ ███████. This by itself is worthy of note due to the creature being extinct for at least ███ million years. Decommissioned files have been reopened for analysis, and past and current findings are to be referred to file SCP-████-01 [ACCESS DENIED. FILE RESTRICTED. SECURITY LEVEL 3-2223 OR HIGHER IS REQUIRED FOR ACCESS].
The point of SCP-2223 is capable of piercing most surface materials including, but not limited to: Rubber, Flesh, Bone, Wood, Stone, Iron, Steel, Platinum, and Diamond.
The anomalous properties of SCP-2223 appear when the point pierces living tissue. After contact with the tip is made past the epidermis, the cells of the tissue begin to transform around the affected area. Through a process not fully understood by researchers, the affected tissue begin to change into various colourful sewing thread fibers. The fibers match the thickness and density of the replaced tissue, replacing all living matter in the area within a matter of hours. This includes skin, muscles, ligaments, bone, circulatory and nervous systems, and even bodily fluids. All are converted into thread fibers matching its replaced matter in location and function. It is not fully understood how [DATA REDACTED] given that the properties of the replacement fibers do not (or at least should not) offer the same organic value of the tissue and fluids it has replaced. The colours of the fibers do not seem to hold any specific meaning or attribute.
This process spreads from the area at a rate that varies depending on the size and weight of the subject. Conversion continues until the entirety of the subject is comprised of the new materials. Refer to the Experiment Logs for details on organic conversion rates.
SCP-2223 was first discovered inside of a box containing similar bone needles in an abandoned ██████ retailer in ██████, ██. Analysis of the others indicated they originated from Bos taurus, and held no anomalous properties. The abandoned building was housing other anomalous items that have since been contained and cataloged. For a full list of the collected items, refer to [ACCESS DENIED. FILE RESTRICTED. SECURITY LEVEL 4-2223 OR HIGHER IS REQUIRED FOR ACCESS]. City records indicated that the property had been approved for construction in 19██, but no name had been signed with the land's lease. One elderly resident claimed to have seen a freighter truck parked in the building's front parking lot for an extended period of time sometime in 19██. The resident recalled the name on the side of the truck was marked 'The Factory - Life's Little Surprises'. It was assumed that the truck was moving items in or out of the building, though no individuals were ever seen in or around the vehicle or inside of the building. Class-A amnesiacs were administered where appropriate. The property was seized and the building has been torn down and replaced with a Foundation front operation.
The anomalous properties of SCP-2223 were discovered by Agent J████ during a routine urban investigation. Agent J████ was distracted by other artifacts while she was handling SCP-2223, during which time the point of the needle penetrated her right index finger. J████ complained of numbness in her right hand to the responding containment team, but attributed it to the effects of one or more artifacts that were improperly handled. Agent J████ followed quarantine protocol and was transferred to Site ██ for physical evaluation. About one hour into her transit, Agent J████ was alarmed and notified the medical team that green stitching had appeared around her right index finger. The path of the stitching seemed to follow along the path of affected blood vessels. Agent J████ claimed that these thread fibers had not been present mere moments before. Blood, skin, and hair samples were taken before arrival and were passed on to quarantine staff for analysis. By the time Agent J████ was handed off to quarantine staff, the entirety of her right index finger had been completely engulfed in multicoloured thread fibers. No flesh was visible above the first knuckle.
Onsite medical personnel began an immediate evaluation on Agent J████, but were unable to verify the cause of the anomaly. By this time, she had been infected for almost three hours. The spread of infection had nearly reached the agent’s wrist, and showed no signs of slowing its encroachment. Out of desperation, Agent J████ suggested the removal of her arm halfway to the elbow. After some consultation with Dr. ████████, the medical staff agreed.
[Data Expunged]
After all life signs had become unreadable, the medical staff was ordered to transfer Agent J████ over to research teams. The agent has since been reclassified as SCP-2223-A.
+ Experiment Log 1 - Experiment Log of: Dr. ████████ Date: ██/█/19██-██/█/19██ EXPERIMENT LOG-01
██/12/19██
[A recording from a mounted camera overlooking an autopsy table surrounded by researchers in medical scrubs. SCP-2223-A is lying on its back on the table. The conversion is complete on the subject.]
Dr. ████████: Now… For all intents and purposes SCP-2223-A is legally and medically dead. There is no pulse, no breathing, no heartbeat, and no brain activity. It is a corpse. What we do to it now let’s us understand what has happened here.
Off-Camera Voice, Male: I’m not doing this!
Dr. ████████: Let him go. Report his behavior to the security officer and let’s get to work.
[The autopsy begins, starting with the initial incisions. The vivisection occurs within in a timely order. The ‘flesh’ and ‘bone’ are far easier to remove than their organic counterparts. A bundle of thin multicoloured strands was present throughout the body in the shape of a circulatory system. This was determined to be the blood vessels, inside of which contained ‘blood’. All expected organs are present and accounted for. Samples are taken and stored for later study.] [After the examination is complete, Assistant Researcher Miles is near the head of SCP-2223-A and petting the ‘hair’ of the subject. The camera has left its tripod and is examining the empty body cavity of SCP-2223-A. Dr. ████████ is the voice behind the camera.] Dr. ████████: As one would expect, the converted tissue samples do not react in the same way that human tissue does. Nutrients cannot be digested and absorbed. Liquid is absorbed into the fibers, but does not travel or provide nourishment to the host. This includes all of the hormones and electrical output from the ‘brain’. From what we can observe, there is no possible method of interaction between the body and its organs. [The camera pans up to the face of SCP-2223-A. Assistant Researcher Miles' hand is in the frame. Thin, translucent lengths of threads pour down its cheeks from emptied eye sockets. The mouth of the silent subject is agape, mimicking a long-winded scream. The mouth closes, and reopens again. The recording ends.] Request filed by Dr. ████████ to obtain a pool of test subjects in order expand on the Foundation's understanding of SCP-2223's properties. Request granted.
- Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama Request filed by Dr. ████████ to oversee subject selection personally. Granted. But I want a full report on the nature of your selection by the end of the process.
- Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama [DATA EXPUNGED] EXPERIMENT LOG-05
██/2/19██ A similar effect to SCP-2223-A’s case was found to be had with plant matter. Multiple species of fauna and trees were exposed to SCP-2223 which resulted in a gradual conversion to thin threads being formed inside and around the plant. Older, larger trees took an exceptionally longer to time to convert, the longest lasting for two (2) days. Request filed by Dr. ████████ to transfer SCP-2223-E, SCP-2223-F, and SCP-2223-H into the Site's courtyard
Approval granted. - Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama EXPERIMENT LOG-06
██/2/19██ Multiple conventional surface penetration tests. All proved to be susceptible to the piercing effects of SCP-2223. No change in inorganic materials.
After testing was concluded, Assistant Researcher Dr. Âio used SCP-2223 with the intention to pierce her jade jewelry. It was discovered that SCP-2223's piercing properties do not effect jade, but rather render the anomalous traits inert. SCP-2223 does no more damage to this specific material than any other bone needle. Further research into this phenomenon is pending. Request filed by Dr. ████████ on cross-SCP tests involving SCP-2223. Granted. Each SCP chosen for testing must be approved by myself and at least one 05 member
- Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama **Addendum: Authorization withdrawn. See Incident 2223-I2. - Site Director Beatrice Rwamirama** [DATA EXPUNGED]
+ Incident 2223-I1 - Incident 2223-I1 A containment breach occurred when SCP-2223 was taken, with a collection of other items, from Foundation care. MTF units were deployed to the University of ███████ and the items were recovered. The perpetrator, Junior Researcher ████ █████, and his accomplices were all terminated at the scene. Blackout Protocol ensured media silence and amnesiacs were given to eyewitnesses of the incident. The effects that SCP-2223 had on the plant life around the area was attributed to Art Program students, which had been chemically incepted into those who were witness to the event. The plants were gradually removed through the efforts of Field Agents embedded in the university's landscaping staff. Ensuing protests were successfully ignored. Aftermath of Incident 2223-I1. Two (2) days after exposure to SCP-2223. Designated SCP-2223-I-09. Removed and neutralized on █/█/19██Pursuant to the Agreement, and following the close of the Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger, Charter will acquire approximately 1.4 million existing Time Warner Cable subscribers, increasing Charter's current residential and commercial video customer base from 4.4 million to approximately 5.7 million, and making Charter the second largest cable operator in the United States.[1] Charter and Comcast will also each transfer approximately 1.6 million customers respectively. In addition, Charter, through a tax free reorganization, will form a new holding company (New Charter) that will own 100% of Charter, and acquire an approximate 33 percent stake in a new publicly-traded cable provider to be spun-off by Comcast serving approximately 2.5 million customers ("SpinCo"). Charter will provide management services to SpinCo. In aggregate, today's announced transactions will significantly enhance Charter's scale and improve both companies geographic footprint, driving operational efficiencies for Comcast, Charter and SpinCo.
The Agreement has been approved by the Boards of Directors of both companies and Time Warner Cable's Board has consented to the Agreement as required under the Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger agreement.
The Agreement will be executed via three separate transactions, which are subject to the completion of the proposed Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger:
Comcast will divest Time Warner Cable systems serving approximately 1.4 million existing Time Warner Cable customers directly to Charter for cash. Charter expects to fund the purchase with proceeds from debt, and to have approximately a 5 times debt to EBITDA leverage ratio at closing. Comcast and Charter will transfer assets serving approximately 1.6 million existing Time Warner Cable customers and 1.6 million Charter customers in a tax-efficient like kind exchange, improving the geographic presence of both companies, leading to greater operational efficiencies, improved technology deployment and enhanced customer service. Comcast will form and spin off to its shareholders a new, independent, publicly-traded company that will operate systems serving approximately 2.5 million existing Comcast customers. Comcast shareholders, including the former Time Warner Cable shareholders, are expected to own approximately 67 percent of SpinCo, while New Charter is expected to directly own approximately 33 percent of SpinCo. SpinCo expects to incur leverage of approximately 5 times estimated pro-forma EBITDA, and New Charter will then acquire its interest in SpinCo by issuing New Charter stock to Comcast shareholders (including former Time Warner Cable shareholders). SpinCo's nine-member Board of Directors will include six independent directors and three directors designated by Charter. Comcast will hold no ownership interest in SpinCo (or Charter) and will have no role in managing SpinCo.
The transfer of systems, asset purchase and SpinCo acquisition will be valued at a 7.125 times 2014 EBITDA multiple (as defined by the parties), and Charter will make additional payments to Comcast over time as tax benefits from the asset sale are realized.
As a result of these transactions, following the completion of the merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable, Comcast's managed residential subscribers will be below 30 percent of the total MVPD subscribers in the United States, and approximately the same market share as Comcast's subscriber base after its completion of both the 2002 AT&T Broadband transaction and the 2006 Adelphia transaction – and Charter's subscriber base will increase by 1.4 million to a total of 5.7 million.
Comcast has reaffirmed that, after taking into account the transactions with Charter, it continues to expect its merger with Time Warner Cable to generate approximately $1.5 billion in operating efficiencies. Comcast shareholders will receive meaningful value with shares in New Charter, as well as new shares in SpinCo. In addition, Comcast intends to use proceeds from these transactions to reduce its debt in a leverage-neutral manner and expand its share buyback program.
"Today's Agreement follows through on our willingness to divest subscribers, while also marking an important step in our merger with Time Warner Cable," said Brian Roberts, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Comcast Corporation. "These transactions enable us to deliver meaningful value to our shareholders. The realignment of key cable markets achieved in these transactions will enable Comcast to fill in our footprint and deliver operational efficiencies and technology improvements. We look forward to working with the management teams at Time Warner Cable, Charter and the new entity to close these transactions and ensure a smooth transition for the customers and employees of all companies."
"Charter's new customers will benefit from our philosophy of providing highly valued products, featuring enhanced on-demand, interactive video and increased broadband speeds, all in a simplified package designed to provide better value and service," said Tom Rutledge, President and Chief Executive Officer of Charter Communications. "The transactions announced today will provide Charter with greater scale, growth opportunities and improved geographical rationalization of our cable systems, which in turn will drive value for shareholders and more effective customer service. And through our meaningful ownership in and board representation at SpinCo, we can help it achieve similar market share growth in the markets it serves."
The transactions are subject to a number of conditions, including the closing of the Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger, receipt of Hart-Scott-Rodino, FCC and other required regulatory approvals, Charter shareholder approval, and various other matters.
J.P. Morgan and Paul J. Taubman acted as financial advisors to Comcast and Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP and Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP are its legal advisors.
Goldman Sachs and LionTree Advisors are serving as lead financial advisors to Charter in connection with this transaction. Guggenheim Securities is also a financial advisor to Charter. BofA Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse, and Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. are also financial advisors to Charter, and together with Goldman Sachs, are leading the financing for the transaction. The law firms Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and Kirkland & Ellis LLP are also representing Charter.
Teleconference and Webcast for Financial Community
Charter and Comcast will host a conference call on Monday, April 28, 2014 at 8:00 a.m. Eastern Time (ET) related to the contents of this release.
The conference call will be webcast live via Charter's website at charter.com. The webcast can be accessed by selecting "Investor & News Center" from the lower menu on the home page. The call will be archived in the "Investor & News Center" in the "Financial Information" section on the left beginning two hours after completion of the call. Participants should go to the webcast link no later than 10 minutes prior to the start time to register.
The conference call and related materials will also be broadcast live and posted on Comcast's Investor Relations website at www.cmcsa.com or www.cmcsk.com.
Those participating via telephone should dial 866-919-0894 no later than 10 minutes prior to the call. International participants should dial 706-679-9379. The conference ID code for the call is 35997372. A replay of the call will be available at 855-859-2056 or 404-537-3406 beginning two hours after the completion of the call through the end of business on May 28, 2014. The conference ID code for the replay is 35997372.
About Comcast Corporation
Comcast Corporation (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK) is a global media and technology company with two primary businesses, Comcast Cable and NBCUniversal. Comcast Cable is the nation's largest video, high-speed Internet and phone provider to residential customers under the XFINITY brand and also provides these services to businesses. NBCUniversal operates 30 news, entertainment and sports cable networks, the NBC and Telemundo broadcast networks, television production operations, television station groups, Universal Pictures and Universal Parks and Resorts. Visit www.comcastcorporation.com for more information.
About Charter Communications
Charter (NASDAQ: CHTR) is a leading broadband communications company and the fourth-largest cable operator in the United States. Charter provides a full range of advanced broadband services, including advanced Charter TV® video entertainment programming, Charter Internet® access, and Charter Phone®. Charter Business® similarly provides scalable, tailored, and cost-effective broadband communications solutions to business organizations, such as business-to-business Internet access, data networking, business telephone, video and music entertainment services, and wireless backhaul. Charter's advertising sales and production services are sold under the Charter Media® brand. More information about Charter can be found at charter.com.
Important Information For Investors And Shareholders
This communication does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities or a solicitation of any vote or approval. In connection with the proposed transaction between Comcast Corporation ("Comcast") and Charter Communications, Inc. ("Charter"), Charter will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") a registration statement on Form S-4 that will include a proxy statement of Charter that also constitutes a prospectus of Charter, and a definitive proxy statement/prospectus will be mailed to shareholders of Charter. INVESTORS AND SECURITY HOLDERS OF COMCAST AND CHARTER ARE URGED TO READ THE PROXY STATEMENT/PROSPECTUS AND OTHER DOCUMENTS THAT WILL BE FILED WITH THE SEC CAREFULLY AND IN THEIR ENTIRETY BECAUSE THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION. Investors and security holders will be able to obtain free copies of the registration statement and the proxy statement/prospectus (when available) and other documents filed with the SEC by Comcast or Charter through the website maintained by the SEC at http://www.sec.gov. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Comcast are available free of charge on Comcast's website at http://cmcsa.com or by contacting Comcast's Investor Relations Department at 866-281-2100. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Charter will be available free of charge on Charter's website at charter.com, in the "Investor and News Center" near the bottom of the page, or by contacting Charter's Investor Relations Department at 203-905-7955.
In addition, in connection with the proposed transaction between Comcast and Time Warner Cable Inc. ("Time Warner Cable"), on March 20, 2014, Comcast filed with the SEC a registration statement on Form S-4 containing a preliminary joint proxy statement of Comcast and Time Warner Cable that also constitutes a preliminary prospectus of Comcast. The registration statement has not yet become effective. After the registration statement is declared effective by the SEC, a definitive joint proxy statement/prospectus will be mailed to shareholders of Comcast and Time Warner Cable. INVESTORS AND SECURITY HOLDERS OF COMCAST AND TIME WARNER CABLE ARE URGED TO READ THE JOINT PROXY STATEMENT/PROSPECTUS AND OTHER DOCUMENTS FILED OR THAT WILL BE FILED WITH THE SEC CAREFULLY AND IN THEIR ENTIRETY BECAUSE THEY CONTAIN OR WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION. Investors and security holders may obtain free copies of the registration statement and the joint proxy statement/prospectus and other documents filed with the SEC by Comcast or Time Warner Cable through the website maintained by the SEC at http://www.sec.gov. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Comcast are available free of charge on Comcast's website at http://cmcsa.com or by contacting Comcast's Investor Relations Department at 866-281-2100. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Time Warner Cable will be available free of charge on Time Warner Cable's website at http://ir.timewarnercable.com or by contacting Time Warner Cable's Investor Relations Department at 877-446-3689.
Shareholders of Comcast and Time Warner Cable are not being asked to vote on the proposed transaction between Comcast and Charter, and the proposed transaction between Comcast and Time Warner Cable is not contingent upon the proposed transaction between Comcast and Charter.
Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Charter and their respective directors and certain of their respective executive officers may be considered participants in the solicitation of proxies in connection with the proposed transaction between Comcast and Time Warner Cable, and Comcast, Charter and their respective directors and certain of their respective executive officers may be considered participants in the solicitation of proxies in connection with the proposed transaction between Comcast and Charter. Information about the directors and executive officers of Time Warner Cable is set forth in its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2013, which was filed with the SEC on February 18, 2014, and its preliminary proxy statement for its 2014 annual meeting of stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on April 8, 2014. Information about the directors and executive officers of Comcast is set forth in its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2013, which was filed with the SEC on February 12, 2014, and its proxy statement for its 2014 annual meeting of stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on April 11, 2014. Information about the directors and executive officers of Charter is set forth in its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2013, which was filed with the SEC on February 21, 2014, and its proxy statement for its 2014 annual meeting of stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on March 27, 2014. These documents can be obtained free of charge from the sources indicated above. Additional information regarding the participants in the proxy solicitations and a description of their direct and indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, are contained in the preliminary joint proxy statement/prospectus of Comcast and Time Warner Cable filed with the SEC and will be contained in the definitive joint proxy statement/prospectus of Comcast and Time Warner Cable and other relevant materials to be filed with the SEC when they become available, and will also be contained in the preliminary proxy statement/prospectus of Charter when it becomes available.
Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this communication regarding the proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable by Comcast and the proposed transaction between Comcast and Charter, including any statements regarding the expected timetable for completing the transactions, benefits and synergies of the transactions, future opportunities for the respective companies and products, and any other statements regarding Comcast's, Time Warner Cable's and Charter's future expectations, beliefs, plans, objectives, financial conditions, assumptions or future events or performance that are not historical facts are "forward-looking" statements made within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. These statements are often, but not always, made through the use of words or phrases such as "may", "believe," "anticipate," "could", "should," "intend," "plan," "will," "expect(s)," "estimate(s)," "project(s)," "forecast(s)", "positioned," "strategy," "outlook" and similar expressions. All such forward-looking statements involve estimates and assumptions that are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results expressed in the statements. Among the key factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements are the following: the timing to consummate the proposed transactions; the risk that a condition to closing either of the proposed transactions may not be satisfied; the risk that a regulatory approval that may be required for either of the proposed transactions is not obtained or is obtained subject to conditions that are not anticipated; the parties' ability to achieve the synergies and value creation contemplated by the proposed transactions; the parties' ability to promptly, efficiently and effectively integrate acquired operations into their own operations; and the diversion of management time on transaction-related issues. Additional information concerning these and other factors can be found in Comcast's, Time Warner Cable's and Charter's respective filings with the SEC, including Comcast's, Time Warner Cable's and Charter's most recent Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K. Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Charter assume no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements that speak only as of the date hereof.
[1]Charter customer count is based on its reporting methodologies; net additions and SpinCo on respective TWC and Comcast reporting methodologies, where there may be small definitional differences. Totals may not recalculate due to rounding.
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SOURCE Charter Communications, Inc.T-Mobile on Wednesday unveiled a bold new plan as it continues to seek out creative ways to differentiate itself from larger rivals Verizon Wireless, AT&T and Sprint. In line with reports that emerged earlier in the day, T-Mobile unveiled its new “JUMP” (Just Upgrade My Phone) initiative during a press conference in New York City. The new plan allows subscribers who pay an extra $10 per month to trade in their devices and upgrade to a new smartphone or feature phone up to twice per year for the same cost a new subscriber would pay. By contrast, carriers such as AT&T and Verizon only allow subscribers on contract to upgrade to a new device every 24 months, unless they wish to pay full price for their new handsets.
The new JUMP plan is a very smart move on T-Mobile’s part. By using some slick marketing, T-Mobile was able to assemble a terrific value-added service that is unlike anything offered by its rivals.
UPDATE: An AT&T spokesperson emailed BGR to point out that AT&T does offer discounts to on-contract subscribers. From an AT&T blog post: “Once you’ve completed six months or more of your Service Commitment, you qualify for partial discount off the full retail price when you sign a new two-year wireless agreement.” The amount of the discount seems to vary quite a bit depending on device and time left on a subscriber’s contract. The example provided to BGR is as follows: “An AT&T customer after 6 months could get an iPhone 5 16 GB for approximately $450 ($199.99 two-year price + $250 early upgrade smartphone charge), which is $200 less than the full retail price of $650. In addition, this hypothetical customer could trade in their existing iPhone 4S device and receive up to a $200 promotional credit. This means, the customer would pay $250 versus $200 if they had been eligible for a standard upgrade.”
Subscribers are still responsible for the full cost of their devices and they must trade in their current phones when upgrading, but now they are able to spread that cost between an up-front payment, a $10 monthly subscription fee, and the standard monthly payments that they are paying alongside their service plans. As a reminder, T-Mobile has done away with standard service contracts and instead allows users to pay for devices separately from their cellular service, either as one lump sum payment or spread out across 24 months.
JUMP also includes an insurance program that protects against handset malfunction, damage, loss or theft. Customers turning in damaged phones or replacing lost or stolen devices must pay a deductible, however.
“At some point, big wireless companies made a decision for you that you should have to wait two years to get a new phone for a fair price. That’s 730 days of waiting. 730 days of watching new phones come out that you can’t have. Or having to live with a cracked screen or an outdated camera,” said T-Mobile CEO John Legere. “We say two years is just too long to wait. Today, we’re changing all that with the launch of JUMP! Now, customers never have to worry about being stuck with the wrong phone. And, yes — it’s really as good as it sounds.”
The new JUMP plan is available beginning July 14th. T-Mobile’s full press release follows below.By: Michael Dao
Mass Effect 3 is not only the culmination of five years and three games’ worth of storytelling, but an experience that has set the bar in video game narrative. Mass Effect 3 does manage to do new things, and the game does manage to pull at the your heartstrings, but at the end, it also leave a lot to be desired.
Storytelling and narrative from video games has come a long way since the early days of gaming. No one would ask for the characters’ motivations in say, Pong, but in this day and age, such a critical eye is turned upon all of the latest titles. In many regards, Bioware has shown in Mass Effect 3 that they are the undisputed masters of the craft. They’ve managed to create a trilogy in which one can not help but be drawn into and not care just about the characters they control in the game, but the universe in which the characters exist, as well as all of the non player characters that also reside in it. At its best, the writing would stand up against any writing in any form of media, and at its worst, it is still competent. The voice acting is still competent, with some varied performances but is at the level that one would expect from a AAA title.
The most
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because it has no political freight. So in answer to the debate I don’t know, I really don’t know. I hope fiction gets through it alive.
Naomi Alderman
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘As a writer you need to accept that you’ll fail at some level. I do my research, I work hard, and I accept that I’ll get some things wrong’ … Naomi Alderman. Photograph: Murdo Macleod for the Guardian
Of course fiction writers can write whatever they want, no matter their backgrounds. I’ve written male characters, people older than me, people gayer than me, people who lived and died 2,000 years ago. My new novel The Power has a 21-year-old male Nigerian journalist as a viewpoint character as well as a New England politician in her 50s.
But here’s the thing: you have to try to do it well. You have to be familiar with whatever tropes might apply to your character: racist, sexist, homophobic, sizeist, ableist, antisemitic and anything else. It’s not OK, for example, to make your Chinese character shifty and inscrutable or your fat character stupid and lazy: you need to have learned enough to understand where these false ideas come from and why it’s so pernicious to replicate them. Do better. Treat your characters as human beings. Write them as people not ideas or stereotypes.
Here’s another thing – you need to accept that you’ll fail at some level, and be humble when you do. I come from the Orthodox Jewish world: I could write you an essay on the precise messages communicated by the clothing of each individual person on the Golders Green Road. I can’t do the same for people in Lagos. I do my research, I work hard, and I accept that I’ll get some things wrong. I hope people will point out my mistakes to me, and then I’ll apologise and try to do better next time. People criticising your writing is not a violation of your freedom of speech, it is a gift freely given and should be accepted with gratitude.
And if a few people decide they only want to read books about minority groups written by members of that group, I think that’s a perfectly reasonable preference. It’s not one I share, but I can certainly understand why a person might feel a rule like that would broaden and deepen their reading for a time.
No one has a right to be read. No one has a right to be above criticism. When you publish a book, you enter the ring and you’re going to take some punches. The sting when they hit tells you that you’re where you want to be.
Philip Hensher
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘An attempt to put a stop to good writing on extra-literary moral grounds is deplorable, because it might succeed’ … Philip Hensher Photograph: Eamonn McCabe for the Guardian
The only thing worth saying about the issue of cultural appropriation is that it has nothing to do with identity, and everything about quality. Good writing can do whatever it feels like doing. Bad writing can’t do anything. A bad writer can’t tell you anything about his or her own culture, let alone anyone else’s. A really good writer can throw themself into worlds they may only have glimpsed, and light them up.
There is no point in getting much exercised about very bad writing: it puts a stop to itself in time. But any attempt to put a stop to very good writing, on the grounds of prejudice, or of extra-literary moral grounds, is deplorable because it might succeed. Not everything that deserves a hearing gets that hearing.
I don’t think we should dismiss these concerns being labelled as “cultural appropriation”, however. There is something discreditable about a straight woman giving her obviously inadequate version of gay male relations, or a rich American arts graduate giving his researched version of the country of his great-grandfathers, or a middle-class Londoner explaining what it is like to be an impoverished Nigerian immigrant. There’s no doubt that prize juries have elevated such productions above the superior but disadvantaged accounts by gay male authors, Gujarati novelists, or that Nigerian immigrant himself. Those accounts may be lost forever.
Authors should try harder; the industry should try harder; and nobody should assume that any book has any kind of right to its own subject. It has to be earned, whether it is a matter of a straight white woman living in Devon writing about straight white women living in Devon, or a gay man living in Switzerland in 2012 writing about a Bengali family in Dhaka in the 1970s. I see no reason why writers should assume that any territory is theirs by inheritance. The key point is that as few extra-literary concerns as possible should stand in the way of good writers – not the claim that no one should ever write about experience not their own, nor the sustenance of ancient privileges of race, education, sexuality and class.
Anyone proposing to use “cultural appropriation” as a taboo for writers is taking action against Kim, Salammbô, The Grass Is Singing, A Bend in the River, The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman. Putting a kybosh on their future equivalents, too.
Maggie Gee
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘The freedom to inhabit different others comes at a price – humility’ … Maggie Gee. Photograph: Eamonn McCabe for the Guardian
I thought this debate – about which categories of human beings are free to write novels about which other categories of human beings – had peaked about a decade ago, ending in a decisive “no boundaries” vote. But no, the old argument is back.
Actually it’s OK that it’s back, because it’s a serious debate that can’t just be shrugged off. Writers are lucky bastards. We have the invaluable chance to make our versions of reality public, and when these versions seem false to other people who don’t have the same chance, it’s fair for us to take their point to heart.
As Lionel Shriver made light of identity, I had no choice but to walk out on her | Yassmin Abdel-Magied Read more
Why do writers write novels? On one level to have fun and feel free; but on another, to explore, to discover. One of the things we most enjoy exploring is other people’s inner worlds, and so we make characters. Every character is in a way an invention, so a “lie”; in another way, every character contains part of ourselves, but they also lead us down the mysterious passage to another life we long to understand. We feel our way into our characters until, effectively, we are them as we write them. This is very like the definition of empathy, or its German origin word, einfühlung, “feeling our way into another”. All of us in some way are trying to understand, trying to see what we hold in common. We want to avoid building a narrow fictional world peopled with characters who are vain mirror-images of ourselves, so we walk the mile of the novel in a variety of different characters’ shoes. But living through a fictional character is never as good as knowing actual joy or love, and never as bad as suffering actual pain or discrimination. With the freedom to inhabit different others, therefore, comes a price. The price is humility about what we know, a willingness to show our characters to their models and hear the critical comments they make.
Two of my novels, the political comedies My Cleaner and My Driver, had a Ugandan central character, Mary Tendo, often written in the first person. I started writing the pair of novels in Uganda and surrounded by Ugandans, but of course I was not Ugandan. When I finished, back in the UK, I showed them to writer friends I had made in Uganda, Hilda Twongyeirwe and Jackee Batanda. They critiqued my work at length, and I listened. I feel an ongoing commitment to the Ugandan Women Writers’ Association they belong to, Femrite, of which I am one of two external members.
I am just off to the Calpe conference on Gibraltar’s Neanderthals. They are the heroes of my next novel. I have 3% Neanderthal DNA, which is quite high, but that’s not the point. I believe Neanderthals are essentially like us, like me, but only by learning about how they lived, and who they were, can I make others believe that too.
Nikesh Shukla
Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘We have the right to tell stories that are different from our own backgrounds, heritages, races, if we do it responsibly’ … Nikesh Shukla. Photograph: Aria Alagha
Here are some tips for writing “the other”. Do your research. Do it properly. Make sure someone from the “other” community reads your work before it gets read by someone with publishing power. Especially if the person with publishing power isn’t from that community. Don’t get defensive if people tell you that you got it wrong. Don’t think you can hide behind “it’s fiction and I can do what I want” because that tends to err on the side of fetishisation. I think we have the right to tell stories that are different from our own backgrounds, heritages, races, if we do them responsibly. I don’t know why this is a hard thing to understand. Also, ask yourself: why am I telling this story? Why are there no stories out there written by people from that community? Did I find it easier to write about this because I filtered it through a white gaze and thus made it palatable for a largely white publishing industry? And most of all, and this bears repeating, don’t get defensive. Because you may be making a larger conversation about marginalised communities, and their ability to tell their own stories in their own voices, all about yourself.Accompanying Aelion’s Call was a new form of alternative currency which is made available during Invasions. These items, Victor’s Medals, supply a way for players to obtain unique consumables as well as extremely useful and rare items.
How are Victor’s Medals obtained?
First and foremost, a reliable method exists through the new Invasion Promo Adventures! Completion of adventures with this bonus mission attached to them will net a hefty sum of Victor’s Medals.
Along with this, additional Victor’s Medals can be obtained through a special Invasion Order Mission or can be directly purchased in-game via the Invasion tab of Skyforge’s Marketplace (N).
Victor’s Medals in Promotional Events
During our next time-limited Promotional event (codename Law and Order), you will be able to gather Victor’s Medals. These events are a great way to accumulate a huge amount of medals in a short period of time. Of course, your Victor’s Medals won’t disappear at the end of the event, so you can use them at any time to get your items from the Marketplace (N).With an elevation rise of 13,527 feet (4,123 meters), Chimborazo, is the 16th most prominent mountain in the world and the highest mountain in Ecuador. It’s the highest mountain north of Peru in South America and the highest mountain in the Americas north of Peru. Denali, North America's highest mountain, is 241 feet lower than Chimborazo.
Fast Facts: Chimborazo Elevation: 20,561 feet (6,267 meters)
20,561 feet (6,267 meters) Prominence: 13,527 feet (4,123 meters)
13,527 feet (4,123 meters) Location: Cordillera Occidental, Andes Mountains, Ecuador.
Cordillera Occidental, Andes Mountains, Ecuador. Coordinates: 1° 28' S / 78° 49' W
1° 28' S / 78° 49' W First Ascent: Edward Whymper, Louis Carrel, and Jean-Antoine Carrel, 1880.
Chimborazo is a dormant stratovolcano that last erupted around 640 AD (+/-500 years), or about 1,400 years ago. At least seven eruptions have occurred over the last 8,000 years. The volcano had a major collapse about 35,000 years ago, with major debris avalanches sweeping down the mountain and damming the Rio Chambo and forming a temporary lake.
Chimborazo has a circumference of 78 miles and a diameter of 30 miles. Its crater is 820 feet deep and has a surface diameter of 1,600 feet. Chimborazo has four major summits—20,561-foot (6,267-meter) Veintemilla; 20,702-foot (6,310-meter) Whymper, the highest point; 19,094-foot (5,820 meters) Politecnica; and 18,274-foot (5,570-meter) Nicolas Martínez, named for the father of Ecuadorian mountaineering.
While the summit of Mount Everest is the highest point on the Earth above sea level, the summit of Chimborazo is the farthest place on the surface of the Earth from its exact center, a distance of 3,968 miles (6,384.4 kilometers). It’s important to remember that the Earth is not a perfect sphere but instead bulges out at its equator. Chimborazo is only one degree south of the equator, while Mount Everest is 28 degrees north. Chimborazo’s summit is 2.1 kilometers farther from the Earth’s center than Everest.
Chimborazo’s upper elevations are covered with glaciers. The glaciers have slowly decreased in size over the last fifty years due to global warming and falling ash from the active volcano Tungurahua, which falls on the glaciers, warms in sunlight and melts the snow. The glaciers, providing water for Ecuadorians, are also mined for ice which is sold in markets.
The exact origin of Chimborazo’s name is murky. Some linguists say it combines schingbu, which means “women” in the Cayapa language, with razo, which is Quichua or “snow,” resulting in “Women of Snow.” Local natives call it Urcorazo or “Mountain of Ice,” combining the Quichua urco, meaning “mountain,” with razo, meaning “snow” or “ice.”
SAETA Flight 232, a Vickers Viscount carrying four crew and 55 passengers, disappeared on a Quito to Cuenca flight in August 1976. The crashed plane was found 26 years later in October 2002 at 18,000 feet (5,400 meters) by a team of Ecuadorian climbers on the Integral route up Chimborazo’s east side. The bodies of the 59 people were recovered.
Explorer Baron Alexander von Humboldt, Aime Goujaud AKA Bonpland, and Carlos Montufar made the first known attempt to climb Chimborazo in 1802, reaching a high point of 19,286 feet (5,878 meters) before turning around at an “insurmountable cleft” with altitude sickness. Edward Whymper, who made the first ascent of The Matterhorn, made the first ascent of Chimborazo with Italian guides Louis and Jean-Antoine Carrel up the Southwest Ridge in 1880. They were the first Europeans to summit a mountain higher than 20,000 feet. After his ascent was disputed, Whymper returned with David Beltran and Francisco Javier Campaña and climbed a new route to the summit that same year.
The worst accident in Ecuadoran mountaineering history occurred on November 10, 1993, on Chimborazo’s upper slopes. Three parties, two descending and one ascending, were on the steep snow slopes below the Veintemilla summit when the slope avalanched, sweeping and burying ten climbers—six French, two Ecuadorans, one Swiss, and one Chilean—into a crevasse at 18,700 feet. Over 20 mountain guides searched Chimbo for 10 days to recover the bodies.
Climbing Chimborazo
Chimborazo is heavily glaciated and subject to severe weather and avalanches. Most parties that attempt the mountain turn around because of heavy snow and avalanche danger. Conditions vary on the mountain depending on snow conditions. If little snow has fallen, expect sections of hard snow and ice that require frontpointing with your crampons. Heavy snow increases avalanche danger.
El Castillo Route
The El Castillo Route (Grade II/PD) is the standard normal route used by most climbers to ascend Chimborazo. The route ascends 4,250 feet (1,300 meters) up the west side of the mountain. Normal ascent time is between eight and 12 hours to the Whymper summit. The descent takes three to five hours. Route trip time is 12 to 16 hours. Start at night so most of the climbing is done before sunrise when the snow warms up and begins avalanching and rockfall danger increases. The route is usually climbed December to February and June to September.
Whymper Hut to Veintimilla
The route begins at the Whymper Hut and climbs northwest up scree and then rocky mixed terrain to a saddle above El Castillo, a prominent castle-shaped rock outcrop. This section has rockfall danger. From the saddle, climb a glacial ridge northeast and east to the Veintimilla summit. Much of the ridge is steep (30 to 40 degrees) with crevasses. This section can be very dangerous with new and soft snow on it.
On to Whymper Summit
Many climbers turn around atop Veintimilla. It is 0.6 mile (1 kilometer) from Veintimilla Summit to Whymper Summit with an elevation loss of 165 feet. It takes 30 minutes to an hour to cross the wide snow-filled basin between the two peaks, depending on snow conditions. Deep snow usually blankets the basin, which becomes a nightmare of thigh-deep slogging in the afternoon or after snowfall. Plan on doing this section early in the day when its surface is crusted.
Climbing Guides to ChimborazoI am writing you with much concern after having read of your hearing to decide whether the alternative theory of Intelligent Design should be taught along with the theory of Evolution. I think we can all agree that it is important for students to hear multiple viewpoints so they can choose for themselves the theory that makes the most sense to them. I am concerned, however, that students will only hear one theory of Intelligent Design.
Let us remember that there are multiple theories of Intelligent Design. I and many others around the world are of the strong belief that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster. It was He who created all that we see and all that we feel. We feel strongly that the overwhelming scientific evidence pointing towards evolutionary processes is nothing but a coincidence, put in place by Him.
It is for this reason that I’m writing you today, to formally request that this alternative theory be taught in your schools, along with the other two theories. In fact, I will go so far as to say, if you do not agree to do this, we will be forced to proceed with legal action. I’m sure you see where we are coming from. If the Intelligent Design theory is not based on faith, but instead another scientific theory, as is claimed, then you must also allow our theory to be taught, as it is also based on science, not on faith.
Some find that hard to believe, so it may be helpful to tell you a little more about our beliefs. We have evidence that a Flying Spaghetti Monster created the universe. None of us, of course, were around to see it, but we have written accounts of it. We have several lengthy volumes explaining all details of His power. Also, you may be surprised to hear that there are over 10 million of us, and growing. We tend to be very secretive, as many people claim our beliefs are not substantiated by observable evidence.
What these people don’t understand is that He built the world to make us think the earth is older than it really is. For example, a scientist may perform a carbon-dating process on an artifact. He finds that approximately 75% of the Carbon-14 has decayed by electron emission to Nitrogen-14, and infers that this artifact is approximately 10,000 years old, as the half-life of Carbon-14 appears to be 5,730 years. But what our scientist does not realize is that every time he makes a measurement, the Flying Spaghetti Monster is there changing the results with His Noodly Appendage. We have numerous texts that describe in detail how this can be possible and the reasons why He does this. He is of course invisible and can pass through normal matter with ease.
I’m sure you now realize how important it is that your students are taught this alternate theory. It is absolutely imperative that they realize that observable evidence is at the discretion of a Flying Spaghetti Monster. Furthermore, it is disrespectful to teach our beliefs without wearing His chosen outfit, which of course is full pirate regalia. I cannot stress the importance of this enough, and unfortunately cannot describe in detail why this must be done as I fear this letter is already becoming too long. The concise explanation is that He becomes angry if we don’t.
You may be interested to know that global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural disasters are a direct effect of the shrinking numbers of Pirates since the 1800s. For your interest, I have included a graph of the approximate number of pirates versus the average global temperature over the last 200 years. As you can see, there is a statistically significant inverse relationship between pirates and global temperature.
In conclusion, thank you for taking the time to hear our views and beliefs. I hope I was able to convey the importance of teaching this theory to your students. We will of course be able to train the teachers in this alternate theory. I am eagerly awaiting your response, and hope dearly that no legal action will need to be taken. I think we can all look forward to the time when these three theories are given equal time in our science classrooms across the country, and eventually the world; One third time for Intelligent Design, one third time for Flying Spaghetti Monsterism (Pastafarianism), and one third time for logical conjecture based on overwhelming observable evidence.
Sincerely Yours,
Bobby Henderson, concerned citizen.
P.S. I have included an artistic drawing of Him creating a mountain, trees, and a midget. Remember, we are all His creatures.
Comment on this letterSummary
I see that my design and even pictures have been stolen and put up in a shop I don't want to mention because I don't want to give them any traffic. I urge you to NOT buy it from any seller. These shops are not to be trusted. Update 16.9.18: Added case variant for a Raspberry Pi 3 with a Pi2Scart. You find the models that are different from the normal case in the Pi2Scart.zip Still a work in progress! I was tired of waiting for the SNES Mini so I decided to make my own! This is a case for the Raspberry Pi 3. It also features a fully functioning controller port for a SNES controller! The case is designed for this port: http://www.ebay.com/itm/SNES-Controller-female-connector-Socket-Vertical-Mount/152485369594?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649 If there is enough intereset I can write a guide how to hook up the port to the RPi. This design also features a PowerBlock from petrockblock and can be found here: https://blog.petrockblock.com/powerblock/
It is used for the soft power switch as well as the LED. Very handy! UPDATE 13.09.17: New files has been uploaded. There is now a lip on the top for the cover to fit in nicely. There is also a mount for a small slide switch for turning on the pi. I also added some pictures to show how everything should go together! For the slide switch I used something like this: https://www.digikey.de/product-detail/de/e-switch/EG1201/EG1901-ND/101720 For the microswitch you need one with a height of 9.5mm like the ones here:
http://katalog.we-online.de/en/em/TATV_6X6_THT_4301x6xxx7x6 Here is a quick schematic on how to hook up the controller port to the Pi. Connect them according to the diagram. I didn't draw the 5V and GND line, but you need to connect them to a 5V and GND pin on the Raspberry Pi!
After you connected the pins according to the diagram you need to install the gamecon_gpio_rpi driver through the Retropie package installer.
Then you need to add the following line to your /opt/retropie/configs/all/autostart.sh: sudo modprobe gamecon_gpio_rpi map=0,0,0,1,0,0 After that you need to configure the SNES controller like any other controller in Retropie! 09.10.2017:
Planning to do a major revamp on the design. Stay tuned! 03.11.2017:
Finally uploaded the updated files! The following things have changed: Fully working cartridge slot! The cartridge cover is not for show anymore. Also the cartridge eject button is working. For this to work I had to make the case 4mm taller and move the RPi3 down. Still working on a NFC circuit that will read the carts, as I put NFC tags inside them.
Redesigned the power button. Now it is way easier to assemble and print.
Found more or less the best matching SNES colors. If you are in Germany you can buy the following filaments
-- Main Body & Cartridges: http://3dk.berlin/de/pla/92-pla-filament-platingrau.html
-- Cover: http://shop.3d-filament.de/de/3d-druck-filament-1-75mm/pla/oem/175-pla-grau.html
-- Switches and Cartridge Cover: http://3dk.berlin/de/pla/74-pla-filament-dunkelgrau.html TODO list: Add stl files for the cartridge. I didn't design the cartridge, I only modified them. I have to talk to the creator to get the permission to upload the files here.
Done! Added the files!
. Done! Added the files! Add a version of the case to use without the PowerBlock. You will of course lose the power button functionality.
Done! Added the files!
. Done! Added the files! Try to make a front cover for the second type of SNES controller port that floats around on ebay. It has a much bigger rim so I'm not sure if I'm able to do that without modifying the port itself. Probably the top and bottom rim has to be removed.
You need to modify this type of controller port. It will fit inside the faceplate afterwards! Will try to incorporate that into the manual as well.
You need to modify this type of controller port. It will fit inside the faceplate afterwards! Will try to incorporate that into the manual as well. Add a multi-material version
Make a detailed step-by-step instruction. Especially the cartridge mechanics need some explanation. I will print the whole case again and make pictures for every step while assembling it. Almost done! You can find parts of it on the bottom of the page!
Almost done! You can find parts of it on the bottom of the page! NFC circuitry with custom made emulationstation software. I'm already working on my custom build of emulationstation that is able to read and write the NFC tags.
Done! Hardware and software are working! I can now read the tags inside the cartridges to start the game and also write to them trough EmulationStation. Putting the NFC reader into the housing is very hard though. I will try to add that to the manual as well! Sourcecode can be found here: https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/14390/nfc-enabled-emulationstation
Print Settings
Printer Brand:
Prusa
Printer:
Rafts:
No
Supports:
Yes
Resolution:
0.05 - 0.2
Infill:
20
Notes:
I oriented the stl files like they should be printed! No need to rotate them. SNES_Pi_Bottom: Supports
SNES_Pi_Top: Supports
SNES_PI_Cover: Supports
SNES_PI_Cartridge_Switch_Lever: Supports
SNES_PI_Cartridge_Insert: Supports
SNES_PI_Cart_Front and SNES_PI_Cart_Back: I suggest a brim of about 2 - 3mm to ensure the cartridge doesn't fall over. The cartridge is orientated that way because it will give a much smoother finishes than laying it flat on its back.
How I Designed This
This design is based on the design of Vitting. Thanks Vitting for letting me upload this design! His design can be found here: https://www.thingiverse.com/Vitting/designs The cartridge design is based on daftmikes cartridge which can be found here: https://www.myminifactory.com/object/mini-snes-cartridges-46438
Video
NFC in action!
Assembly Instructions
0. Stuff you need
(Not everything is included in the picture) 3D printed parts Multiple version Either print the PowerBlock or the No PowerBlock version If you don't want the SNES controller port you need to print the according faceplate Optional parts NFC antenna block, only if you want the NFC functionalit
Mechanics 3mm rod 1x 67mm 1x 42mm Switches Pushbutton 9.5mm high Small slide switch: Link SNES controller port There are two version for the port. Black one like this: Link. This one will fit with no modifications. Gray one like you see in my picture. This one has to be modified to fit. Springs 7mm x 12.5mm spring Spring wire or SS316L 24ga vaping wire Screws 2x M3 x 6mm 2x M3 x 20mm 3,2mm washers M3 nuts C 2,2mm x 13mm countersunk Zipties Piece of self-adhesive felt
Electronics 3mm red LED Raspberry Pi 3 Heatsinks 25mm 5V Fan PowerBlock (optional) NFC reader (optional): Link NFC tag sticker (optional): Link Wire in differents colors
Tools Screwdriver with different bits Scissors Box cutter Glue for plastics Hotglue gun Sanding paper Electric drill Drilling bits Soldering iron Solder
1. Assembly Cover
Cover
Reset Switch Inlay
Power Switch Inlay
Power Switch
Glue for plastics Grab your glue and put a little bit on the ridges of the reset switch portion of the cover. Then put the reset switch inlay on the cover and press it down. Put the power switch into the cover and make sure it has room to move up and down. The ridges of the reset switch have to move into the holes in the cover. You can testfit the inlay over the switch to make sure it moves all the way. After that put glue on the left and right ridges on the cover and inser the inlay. Make sure not to accidentally put glue on the switch! Your finished product should look like this! Cartridge Insert
Cartridge Block 1
Cartridge Block 2
3mm rod
Drill
Drill bits 3mm & 4.5mm
Spring wire (I used SS316L 24ga vaping wire) You need to cut a 3mm rod to about 66mm. The one I got in the picture was just a little bit too long. 66mm should be fine! Take your drill and a 3mm drill bit and make sure the hole in the cartridge insert is 3mm. The rod has to move and rotate smoothly through the hole. Test fit the cartridge insert and the rod by putten the insert into the cover and pushing the rod through the hole in the cover. If the rod doesn't go in easily you might to have to drill that hole as well. Take the two blocks and your glue. Put the glue in the designated spaces on the cover. Block 1 (the one with the ledge goes on the top (behind the cartridge insert). The ledge has to be on the top and has to be orientated to the cartridge insert. You can see the orientation in the next picture! Block 2 goes on the other spot. Orientation doesn't matter here, but make sure you put the block as far away from the cartridge slot as possible, but still inside the designated area. Otherwise the antenna might not fit. It should look like this! Now comes the fun part. Take your wire, your drill and 4.5mm drill bit and put them into the drill like I did in the picture. Make sure the wire is firm inside the chuck. Hold the wires (I suggest with some pliers) and start rotating the drill. After about 10-12 rounds you can stop. Cut the wire so that the coil looks exactly like in the picture! One side of the wire has to be longer than the other and the shorter side has to be bent into the middle of the coil. Remove the cartridge insert from the cover and testfit the spring. It should look like this! Be sure that the long end doesn't point downwards! Otherwise you won't get enough spring tension. Now fit everything on the cover. You need to have the spring on the cartridge insert and then push the rod through the holes and spring. It's a little bit tricky. You also need to make sure that the long end is pushing against Block 1 like in the picture above. Reset Switch
Reset Switch Insert Put the reset switch into the cover. Make sure the orientation is correct! The switch is slanted, you can check the corrent orientation by flipping the cover and looking at the switch from the top. Put glue on the two ridges and make sure not to get any glue onto the switch. Push the insert into the designated areas. Should look like this! Small Slide Switch
Pushbutton 9.5mm high
Hot glue gun Put the pushbotton into the hole of the reset switch insert. Make sure everything fits and then put some hot glue around the switch. Push the power switch all the way to the top (like in the picture). Take the slide switch and make sure the switch is also all the way to the top. Put a very small dab of hot glue on the switch and push it into the power switch hole. Always make sure the switch is still up! Afterwards put hot glue around the switch. If the switch is not completely inside the designated area: Don't worry! That is normal. Congratulations! You assembled the cover!
2. Assembly Top
Previously assembled cover
Top
Drill with 3mm drill bit
Red LED Push the cover into the top. It should fit quite snugly. Turn in around and put glue in all the areas I marked red in the picture. Make sure your cartridge slot works! If there is any problem you have to fix it NOW. You won't be able to remove the mechanics after this step! Should look like this! Take your drill with a 3mm drill bit and enlarge the hole in the top for the LED. DO NOT drill all the way through. Just enough for the LED to fit. You don't need to go deep for that AT ALL! Put the red LED in there, bend the leads 90° and put hot glue on there to secure the LED.
3. Assembly Front
Front
SNES Controller Port (doesn't matter which of the two)
If you don't want the SNES Controller Port you need the Front NoConnector! You also don't need the steps here and can jump the next step! If you have the grey SNES controller port you need to remove the rim from the top and bottom of the port! Check the picture to see how much you have to remove. You can use a sharp knife to remove the plastic quite easily. It should fit into the front quite well if you removed enough plastic! Be sure not to overdo it, otherwise you will have gaps! If you have the black connector you don't need to do any modifications. Grab the front and some glue. Put glue on the ridges. Put the connector inside and put some more glue on top to make sure the connector stays where it is supposed to. Done!
4. Assembly Bottom
Bottom
Raspberry Pi 3
Heatsinks
PowerBlock (optional)
PowerBlock Distancer (optional)
M3 x 6mm screws
M3 x 20mm screws
M3 nuts
3,2mm washers
Soldering iron
Solder
Drill
2mm drill bit Take your drill and a 2mm drill bit and widen the holes in the Bottom for the screws to fit more easily. By the way, you don't need the two holes in the front. I didn't use them because the screws look ugly on the front as they are seen quite easily. Here you can see the bigger holes. Take a sharp knife and remove the excess plastic from the top. Otherwise there will be a gap when you screw the Top on the Bottom. The the same steps on the Top as well. But don't drill all the way through of course! Take the Raspberry Pi 3 and put the heatsinks on there! Get your PowerBlock and remove the pin headers from the LED and Switch terminals. They have to go unfortunately, otherwise the cartridges won't fit! Put some fresh solder on the bottom and heat it put until you can pull it out with some pliers. Be careful not to damage anything! Take a M3 x 6mm screw and screw it into the four hole to pretap the holes. It makes it easier to fit the screws later (Ignore the lever mechanism in the picture). Get some M3 x 20mm screws, an M3 nut, the PowerBlock Distancer and washers. Pun them together like in the picture. I only put one washer at the very bottom. Two or three would be better! You also may need to drill the hole of the PowerBlock with a 3,2mm drill bit if the screw doesn't fit. Of course do the same for the other screw as well! Put the Raspberry Pi 3 and the PowerBlock into the case now. Use M3 x 6mm for the holes without the PowerBlock! As before: Ignore the lever. I messed up the order while doing the pictures. If you put in the lever mechanism after putting in the Pi your life will be a lot easier! I also forgot to remove the pin headers from the PowerBlock in this picture... Cartridge Switch Base
Cartridge Switch Lever
3mm rod
7mm x 12.5mm spring It is now time to assemble the lever mechanism. You need a 3mm again, but now
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charge for business. John Stokes, D.C.'s Parks and Recreation chief of staff, says officials are looking into the regulations to access the community's needs. Lauren Hoffmann, with the National Recreation and Park Association, says the organization's members have various way to go about it. "Many are finding solutions to work together, permitting the trainers and other private instructors to use public spaces rather than banning activities," she says. One shared objective that private personal trainers and parks and recreation departments are working toward: "a healthier community," she says. -Brian De Los Santos
Parker, who owns Body Inspired Fitness in Santa Monica, says her clients don't want to be inside a gym.
"People flock here from all over the world and from all over this country because of the weather, and part of that is because people want to be outdoors," she says. "We want to live a green lifestyle, and that involves not using machines — it involves being outside."
New Regulations?
But the problem is that some exercise enthusiasts bring machines and all sorts of gear to parks like these.
"Massage tables, weight equipment, even little spinning bikes we've seen in the park," says Karen Ginsberg, the city's director of community and cultural services.
Ginsberg says she wonders why trainers can't just take advantage of the huge beaches nearby.
"Santa Monica State Beach is probably one of the widest beaches on the California coast. It has plenty of space for group activities," she says.
Ginsberg is writing a slate of new regulations that could include levying higher fees on trainers, or a flat 15 percent tax on private fitness companies that operate in public spaces. The Santa Monica City Council may even consider banning classes altogether from Palisades Park.
That would suit residents like Marek Probosz just fine. He was out on a recent afternoon kicking a soccer ball with his son.
"It belongs to us, it belongs to the public," he says. "It doesn't belong to a corporation or organization which thinks, 'Oh that's great, the city made it for us, we can sell it and use it for a property.' "
Probosz says residents who come to enjoy this narrow strip of green above the ocean are being crowded out by trainers and exercise boot camps.
The Santa Monica Lifestyle
This is Santa Monica, however, where the city's motto, populus felix in urbe felici, Latin for "fortunate people in a fortunate land," translates into fitness and living a healthy lifestyle.
"I'm over 30 and I feel like I'm 17 or 18, I have energy all day long," says Lindsey Stair. She lives by Palisades Park and drags herself out of bed before work most mornings to make a 6:30 class.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Kirk Siegler/NPR Kirk Siegler/NPR
"It helps me at work all day," she says. "People tell me I have an energy, and it all comes from coming to this boot camp and being around these really cool people. It just changed my life for sure."
Stair says it's also changed the culture of parks, which she says used to be unsafe. The fitness classes and all the joggers are now outnumbering the homeless — another thing Santa Monica is well-known for.Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (CNN) Seven suspects -- all of them younger than 19 -- have been arrested in connection with a fire at a school in Malaysia's capital that claimed the lives of 21 students and two adults, state-run media outlet Bernama reported Saturday.
The suspects, who range in age from 11 to 18, were "school leavers and dropouts," Kuala Lumpur Police Chief Datuk Amar Singh Ishar Singh said Saturday during a news conference. They were arrested by Royal Malaysian Police, Bernama reported.
The investigation into the fire's cause continues, Singh said.
Witnesses reported being awoken Thursday by cries for help from inside the burning building, where children appeared trapped by metal window grills.
"I saw children kicking on the grill, but they couldn't get out. My friends and I rushed over and tried to reach them, but we couldn't get in," Shahirman Shahril told CNN.
When emergency responders arrived, "almost 90% of the building was already on fire," a fire and rescue department official told reporters.
"The firemen could hear cries for help from inside the building," spokesman Soiman Jahid said. "The first team from (the) fire station managed to save five of the children from the lower level."
Four people suffered serious injuries in the blaze. At least two other students and a member of the public were also injured, said Dr. S. Subramaniam, Malaysia's health minister.
A forensic police officer investigates burned windows at an Islamic religious school following a fire on September 14, on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Children tried to kick open window grills
Firefighters found badly burned bodies in three locations, Jahid said. Many victims found were piled on top of each other, while another was discovered in front of the main door.
"Based on my observation, the building has grills that could not be opened from inside," he said. "Because of the grills, they could not escape through the windows, except for the five students who escaped through the door and sought help from the firemen."
One of two fire exits in the building had been blocked by renovations taking place on the second floor, Jahid told CNN. Photos from the scene show fire damage to the top floor of the three-story Darul Quran Ittifaqiyah Tahfiz school.
Investigators were examining whether an electric short circuit had caused the fire, Deputy Inspector General of Police Noor Rashid Ibraham said.
Nik Azlan Nik Abdul Kadir (left), the father of one of the victims, comforts his wife outside the school in Kuala Lumpur on September 14.
Identifying the victims could take days, Subramaniam told reporters at Kuala Lumpur General Hospital.
"The bodies suffered severe burns to the point that it is difficult to confirm the identities," he said.
Norhayati Khalid was on her way to hospital to identify a body believed to be her son, 11-year-old Amin Ashraf. She'd last seen him a day earlier, she said
"I brought him some chicken floss buns, (and) my son passed me a handwritten note to say he's happy here at the school and he wants to be a 'hafiz' (someone who memorizes the Quran) so that he can take us to heaven," she told CNN.
Melted bunk beds are seen on the second floor of the Kuala Lumpur religious school that caught fire.
"We moved him here three months ago from Kelantan, and it's a popular school among the students and teachers," she said. "We didn't have to pay any school fees."
The victims were between 13 and 17 years old, Ibraham said. Asked about younger victims, he said DNA testing would be required.
Police and rescue personnel work at an Islamic religious school in Kulala Lumpur that was cordoned off after a fire on September 14.
School shouldn't have been open, official says
The building where the fire erupted was new and had been used as a religious school specializing in Quranic studies, Ibraham said.
But the school's license had been under review by authorities, and the facility should not have been in operation, said Malaysia's minister of urban well-being, housing and local government, Noh Omar.
There have been 29 similar incidents in the past involving fires at religious schools, Noh told reporters. He did not specify a timeframe.
Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak expressed his sympathy for those affected.
"Deeply saddened to hear Darul Quran Ittifaqiyah Tahfiz Center burned and that more than 20 lives were lost," he tweeted. "May their souls be blessed by Allah SWT. Al Fatihah."
Malaysian media earlier reported that 25 people were killed, 23 students and two wardens.On Tuesday the Internal Revenue Service finally said what it thinks of Bitcoin, and on first blush, it looks like it could cause hassles for some bitcoin owners.
Bitcoin, the IRS says, is property, not a currency. And as such, when you buy something with the volatile digital currency it's most likely a taxable event. The rule is spelled out in question #6 in this handy Q&A document (pdf) published by the IRS today.
*Q-6: Does a taxpayer have gain or loss upon an exchange of virtual currency for
other property?
A-6: Yes. If the fair market value of property received in exchange for virtual currency
exceeds the taxpayer’s adjusted basis of the virtual currency, the taxpayer has taxable
gain. The taxpayer has a loss if the fair market value of the property received is less
than the adjusted basis of the virtual currency. *
So under the IRS's rules, if you bought a bitcoin for $10, and then used it to buy a 1 BTC television when bitcoin was trading at $600, you need to pay a capital gain tax on the $590 difference. In other words, you now need to keep track of the value of bitcoins, in U.S. dollars, both when you acquire them and when you spend them, and report the difference on your taxes.
That sounds like a bookkeeping nightmare, but as with so many of the twists and turns that face bitcoin as it matures as a digital currency (er, property) it's also an area where new bitcoin startups could step in.
"I think this is going to create a huge opportunity for hosted wallets," says Jered Kenna, a bitcoin entrepreneur and the CEO of Moneyandtech.com. He believes that the smart bitcoin wallet makers will simply be able to add this as a service, tracking the capital gains and losses as you spend your bitcoins through the year, and maybe even issuing you a convenient 1099 at the end of the year.
Of course, bitcoin by its very nature can make it hard for the IRS to keep tabs on who is moving bitcoins. It's pretty easy to create a bitcoin address all by yourself, and that makes it tough for the taxman to figure out which bitcoin addresses belong to U.S. citizens.
On the other hand, once your address is identified, everything you do on bitcoin's public ledger – called the blockchain – can be tracked and linked to other bitcoin addresses. Which is kind of how they got Capone.0 shares Share
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Last Updated on November 3, 2018
On my swing through Western Australia, I made a stop at Purnululu National Park, home of the Bungle Bungle mountains. When I told people I was making the drive from Darwin to Perth, everyone told me I had to stop at the Bungle Bungles.
I wasn’t really prepared for how remote and hard to get to it would be. To get to Purnululu, you have to drive about three hours south of Kununurra, which is itself a day drive from Darwin. (800km/500miles) There are no real cities or towns anywhere near Purnululu. The closest thing to a settlement is the Turkey Creek roadhouse, which is nothing more than a gas station and a campsite. There is an abrigonial community near the roadhouse, but it is closed to the public.
Once you get to Turkey Creek, you are still several hours from entering the park. The day tour I took picked me up at around sunrise at 5:30am. We had a 4WD bus, similar to the sort I took on Fraser Island. Just going from the Turkey Creek roadhouse to the entrance to the park was a three hour drive, none of which was paved. From the park entrance to anything interesting in the park was another hour drive from the park gate.
The Bungle Bungles weren’t really “discovered” until the 1980’s. I put “discover” in quotes because it was known to the local aboriginals and to local ranchers, but they never thought it was a big enough deal to tell anyone about. In 80’s a television crew in a helicopter brought footage of the bee hive domes back.
The main reason why Purnululu is special is the erosional features. The Bungles aren’t a large mountain range. I’m not even sure you can call it a mountain range at all, but that is the term which is used. On the north side of the range, you can find Echnida Chasm. The chasm is just a split in the rock where it was cleaved apart. You can walk down the middle of the gap which rises up almost 100ft (30m). At some points, you have to turn sideways to get through because it becomes so narrow. After four hours of driving, Echnida Chasm was the first part of the park we visited.
After that, we packed up again and drove to the south side of the park to have lunch. It took about an hour and a half to get to the permanent camp which the tour service has in the park. We had lunch there and then went to the south part of the rang, where we were able to walk around the signature feature of the park: the Bee Hive Domes.
The bee hive domes are called that because a) they are domes and b) they are striped like a bee hive. Both of those features are fairly unique. The domes were created by erosion channels which flowed at 90 degree angles to each other. You usually only see erosion channels which are close to perpendicular to the face of a mountain, but here you see it on more than one axis. Despite how dry it was when I was there, Purnululu can experience so much rain during the wet season that they close the park.
I assumed the striping on the domes was due to different layers of sediment, but I was wrong. The bands are due to layers of microrganisms which gives the bands color. Underneath the bands, the rock is an almost white sandstone. There were a few places where the colored crust was broken off and you could see the sandstone underneath.
Also on the south side is Piccananny Creek, which is the main water channel during the wet season. It was dry when I was there, but you can see large erosional channels carved into the rock in the bed of the creek. You could also see what looked like post holes in the rock. This happens when a smaller rock gets trapped in a depression and the water swirls the rock around, scouring out a round hole.
The biggest feature in this area is Cathedral Gorge. It is an enormous water carved channel created by the creek. You can look at the walls of the gorge and see just how high the water gets during the wet season. (about 12ft/4m) The walls of the gorge are enormous and really give you the feeling of being small when you are inside.
From what I’ve seen, Purnululu is probably the premier attraction in Western Australia, however, it is so remote and hard to get to, it isn’t something I’d go out of my to see for its own sake. If you are making the trip from Darwin to Perth, however, you definitely need to stop as it will be the most incredible thing you’ll see along the way.A 47-year-old volunteer Surrey, B.C., soccer coach has been arrested in the United States after allegedly trying to meet a 12-year-old girl for sex.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement says Kuldip (Kelly) Singh Mahal crossed the border in Blaine, Wash., Tuesday afternoon and travelled to a park in Burlington, Wash. where he had arranged to meet the girl.
I'm a bit young and I want to learn some new things. I have never experienced the things I want to. — Craigslist ad from U.S. agent posing as 12-year-old girl
In documents filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle, the agency alleges Mahal answered a posting on Craigslist from an undercover agent posing as a 12-year-old girl from northwest Washington.
"In three weeks' time, the defendant went from responding to an online posting to travelling from Canada to Washington state to meet a minor for illicit sex," said Brad Bench, special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations in Seattle.
"Fortunately, he was actually communicating with an undercover HSI (Homeland Security Investigations) special agent."
Mahal is charged in the U.S. with the "attempted enticement of a minor" — an offence that carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years to life.
Sexual explicit messages and photos
Court documents allege Mahal sent multiple sexually explicit messages and photos of himself to the undercover special agent over a three-week period, even after being told he was communicating with a 12-year-old girl.
Investigators also state in the complaint that Mahal, in lengthy sexualized chats, repeatedly requested explicit pictures from the “girl.”
U.S. Homeland Security alleges Kelly Singh Mahal sent sexually explicit messages and photos of himself over a three-week period. (Shutterstock)
The court documents say Mahal, a facilities manager for a Vancouver tech firm, is also a volunteer coach for an under-16 boy's soccer team in Surrey.
U.S. investigators say the sting was initiated by Homeland Security Investigators in Blaine, Wash., to target individuals who were using Craigslist to meet minors for sex.
According to court documents, an ad was placed in the "casual encounters" section of the Vancouver personals entitled "Crazy and very young."
The text of the ad read, "I'm a bit young and I want to learn some new things. I have never experienced the things I want to, I am real and live in Burlington, Wash. I like to go to outlet stores at Tulalip!!"
The document alleges the ad was answered by a person using an anonymous Craigslist email identifying himself as "Jumbo Smith," who, investigators allege, they later identified as Mahal.
U.S. authorities say the investigation was conducted under Homeland Security's Operation Predator, an international initiative to protect children from sexual predators.
Immigration authorities say 2,300 people were arrested last year alone by special agents under the initiative, and since its inception in 2003, more than 10,000 individuals have been arrested for crimes against children.
Mahal suspended as coach
The Surrey United Soccer club announced late Wednesday it was suspending Mahal as coach.
At a hastily arranged news conference, executive director Martin Foden said that Mahal, like all club personnel, had successfully cleared a criminal record check.
Surrey United Soccer Club executive director Martin Foden says Mahal has been suspended as a coach. (CBC)
Foden said Mahal had been an exemplary soccer coach for 11 years.
"We do our normal due diligence with the 2,500 kids that go through our program," he said.
"It’s shocking to us, whether we’re involved in soccer or not involved in soccer, whenever we hear allegations like this. We’ve all been moms and dads and we need to support and protect our children."
Foden said he hoped media would not turn this into a soccer story. He said Mahal was simply a Surrey resident who happened to coach soccer.
He said the club didn't hear of the charge against Mahal until notified Wednesday by the media. Foden said the club is arranging meetings with the parents of the teams Mahal coached.UPDATE: 'Grandma Drummer' Revealed
Coalition Drum Shop YouTube
The staff at Coalition Drum Shop in La Crosse, Wis., knows her as "Mary."
According to WKBT in La Crosse, store manager Dustin Hackworth says the "grandma drummer" arrives every two months or so, sits down at a kit and starts wailing away.
"Every time she comes in, we think, 'Man, we should video tape this' and we finally did," Hackworth told the station.
Thursday night, the shop posted a clip on YouTube. Next thing you know, it had been viewed 100,000 or so times.
A key question remains unanswered: Who is she? WKBT is hoping to hear from someone who knows.
We kind of like the mystery, though.
Update On Saturday At 2:40 p.m. ET:
WKBT says it's identified the "grandma drummer" as Mary Hvizda of Onalaska. Hvizda tells the station that she's played in several bands since she was 16. (H/T to Two-Way reader Patrick Gerbus).Common sense should not be taken for granted when people are discussing nutrition. Many myths and misconceptions are being spread — even by so-called experts. Here are 20 nutrition facts that should be common sense — but aren't. Share on Pinterest
1. Artificial Trans Fats Are Unsuitable for Human Consumption Trans fats are unhealthy. Their production involves high pressure, heat, and hydrogen gas in the presence of a metal catalyst. This process makes liquid vegetable oils solid at room temperature. Of course, trans fats are more than just unappetizing. Studies show that they are unhealthy and linked to a drastic increase in heart disease risk (1, ). Luckily, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has banned trans fats as of June 18, 2018, though products manufactured before this date can still be distributed until 2020 and in some cases 2021 (3). Plus, foods with less than 0.5 grams of trans fats per serving may be labeled as having 0 grams (4).
2. You Don't Need to Eat Every 2–3 Hours Some people believe that having smaller, more frequent meals may help them lose weight. However, some studies suggest that meal size and frequency have no effect on fat burning or body weight (5, 6). Eating every 2–3 hours is inconvenient and completely unnecessary for the majority of people. Simply eat when you're hungry and be sure to choose healthy and nutritious foods.
3. Take News Headlines With a Grain of Salt The mainstream media is one of the reasons behind many circulating nutrition myths and confusions. It seems as if a new study makes headlines every week — often contradicting research that came out just a few months earlier. These stories often get a lot of attention, but when you look past the headlines and read the studies involved, you may find that they’re often taken out of context. In many cases, other higher-quality studies directly contradict the media frenzy — but these rarely get mentioned.
4. Meat Doesn’t Rot in Your Colon It’s entirely false that meat rots in your colon. Your body is well equipped to digest and absorb all the important nutrients found in meat. The protein gets broken down in your stomach by stomach acids. Then, powerful digestive enzymes break down the rest in your small intestine. Most of the fats, proteins, and nutrients are then absorbed by your body. While small amounts of protein and fat may escape digestion in healthy people, there is not much left to rot in your colon.
5. Eggs Are One of the Healthiest Foods You Can Eat Eggs have been unfairly demonized because their yolks are high in cholesterol. However, studies show that cholesterol from eggs doesn't raise blood cholesterol in the majority of people (7). New studies that include hundreds of thousands of people show that eggs have no effect on heart disease in otherwise healthy individuals ( ). The truth is, eggs are one of the healthiest and most nutritious foods you can eat.
6. Sugary Drinks Are the Most Fattening Product in the Modern Diet Excess added sugar can be detrimental to health — and getting it in liquid form is even worse. The problem with liquid sugar is that your brain doesn't compensate for the calories by eating less of other foods (9). In other words, your brain doesn’t register these calories, making you eat more calories overall ( ). Of all the junk foods, sugar-sweetened beverages are likely the most fattening.
7. Low-Fat Doesn’t Mean Healthy The low-fat diet promoted by the mainstream nutrition guidelines seems to have been a failure. Numerous long-term studies suggest that it neither works for weight loss nor disease prevention (11, 12, 13). What's more, the trend led to a plethora of new, processed, low-fat foods. Yet, because foods tend to taste worse without the fat, manufacturers added sugar and other additives instead. Foods that are naturally low-fat — like fruits and vegetables — are great, but processed foods labeled "low-fat" are usually loaded with unhealthy ingredients.
8. Fruit Juice Isn’t That Different From Sugary Soft Drinks Many people believe that fruit juices are healthy, as they come from fruit. Though fresh fruit juice may provide some of the antioxidants found in fruit, it contains just as much sugar as sugary soft drinks like Coca-Cola ( ). As juice offers no chewing resistance and negligible amounts of fiber, it’s very easy to consume a lot of sugar. A single cup (240 ml) of orange juice contains just as much sugar as 2 whole oranges (15, 16). If you're trying to avoid sugar for health reasons, you should avoid fruit juice as well. While fruit juice is healthier than soft drinks, its antioxidant content doesn’t make up for the large amounts of sugar.
9. Feeding Your Gut Bacteria Is Critical People are really only about 10% human — the bacteria in your intestine, known as the gut flora, outnumber your human cells 10 to 1. In recent years, research has shown that the types and number of these bacteria can have profound implications for human health — affecting everything from body weight to brain function (17, 18). Just like your body's cells, the bacteria need to eat — and soluble fiber is their preferred fuel source (19, 20). This may be the most important reason to include plenty of fiber in your diet — to feed the beneficial bacteria in your intestine.
10. Cholesterol Isn’t the Enemy What people generally refer to as "cholesterol" isn't really cholesterol. When people talk about the so-called "bad" LDL and "good" HDL cholesterol, they're really referring to the proteins that carry cholesterol around in your blood. LDL stands for low-density lipoprotein, whereas HDL refers to high-density lipoprotein. The truth is, cholesterol is not the enemy. The main determinant for heart disease risk is the type of lipoproteins that carry cholesterol around — not cholesterol itself. For most people, dietary cholesterol has little or no effect on lipoprotein levels (21).
11. Weight Loss Supplements Rarely Work There are many different weight loss supplements on the market — and they almost never work. They’re claimed to lead to magical results but fail when put to the test in studies. Even for the few that work — like glucomannan — the effect is too small to really make a noticeable difference. The truth is that the best way to lose weight and keep it off is to adopt a healthy lifestyle change.
12. Health Is About More Than Your Weight Most people focus too much on weight gain or loss. The truth is that health goes way beyond that. Many obese people are metabolically healthy, while many normal-weight people have the same metabolic problems associated with obesity (, 23). Focusing just on body weight is counterproductive. It’s possible to improve health without losing weight — and vice versa. It appears that the area where fat builds up is important. The fat in your abdominal cavity (belly fat) is associated with metabolic problems, while the fat under your skin is mostly a cosmetic problem (24). Therefore, reducing belly fat should be a priority for health improvement. The fat under your skin or the number on the scale doesn't matter as much.
13. Calories Count — But You Don't Necessarily Need to Count Them Calories are important. Obesity is a matter of excess stored energy, or calories, accumulating in the form of body fat. However, this doesn’t mean you need to monitor everything that enters your body and track or count calories. Though calorie counting works for a lot of people, you can do many things to lose weight — without ever having to count a single calorie. For example, eating more protein has been shown to lead to automatic calorie restriction and significant weight loss — without deliberately restricting calories (25, 26).
14. People With Type 2 Diabetes Shouldn’t Follow a High-Carb Diet For decades, people have been advised to eat a low-fat diet with carbs making up 50–60% of calories. Surprisingly, this advice was extended to include people with type 2 diabetes — who cannot tolerate a lot of easily digestible carbs, like sugar and refined starch. People with type 2 diabetes are resistant to insulin and any carbs they eat will cause a big rise in blood sugar levels. For this reason, they need to take blood-sugar-lowering drugs to bring their levels down. If anyone benefits from a low-carb diet, it is people with diabetes. In one study, following a low-carb diet for only 6 months allowed 95.2% of participants to reduce or eliminate their blood sugar medication ( ).
15. Neither Fat nor Carbs Make You Fat Fat has often been blamed for obesity, as it has more calories per gram than protein and carbs. Yet, people who eat a diet high in fat — but low in carbs — end up eating fewer calories than people on low-fat, high-carb diets (28, ). This has conversely led many people to blame carbs for obesity — which is incorrect as well. Plenty of populations throughout history have eaten high-carb diets but remained healthy. As with almost everything in nutrition science, the issue depends on the context. Both fat and carbs can be fattening — it all depends on the rest of your diet and your overall lifestyle.
16. Junk Food Can Be Addictive In the past 100 years or so, food has changed. People are eating more processed food than ever before, and the technologies used to engineer foods have become more elaborate. These days, food engineers have found ways to make food so rewarding that your brain gets flooded with dopamine (30). For this reason, some people can completely lose control over their consumption (31). Many studies examining this phenomenon have found similarities between processed junk foods and commonly abused drugs (32).
17. Never Trust Health Claims on Packaging People are more health conscious than ever before. The food manufacturers are well aware of this and have found ways to market junk food to health-conscious people as well. They do this by adding misleading labels like "whole-grain" or "low-fat." You can find many unhealthy junk foods with these health claims, such as "whole-grain" Fruit Loops and Cocoa Puffs. These labels are used to trick people into thinking that they're making the right choice for themselves — and their children. If the packaging of a food tells you it’s healthy, chances are it isn’t.
18. Certain Vegetable Oils Should Be Avoided Certain vegetable oils — like sunflower, soybean, and corn oil — contain large amounts of omega-6 fatty acids (33). Studies suggest that a high intake of omega-6 fatty acids — relative to omega-3 — increases low-grade inflammation in your body ( ). Oils high in omega-6 may contribute to oxidative stress in some people, potentially contributing to heart disease (35, 36, 37). For this reason, it may be a good health strategy to choose vegetable oils that are relatively low in omega-6 fatty acids. These include olive oil, canola oil, and high-oleic safflower oil. This allows you to optimize your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio.
19. ‘Organic’ or ‘Gluten-Free’ Doesn’t Mean Healthy There are many health trends in the world today. Both organic and gluten-free food is becoming increasingly popular. However, just because something is organic or gluten-free doesn't mean that it’s healthy. You can make junk foods from organic ingredients just as well as non-organic ones. Foods that are naturally gluten-free are fine, but gluten-free processed foods are often made with unhealthy ingredients that may even be worse than their gluten-containing counterparts. The truth is, organic sugar is still sugar and gluten-free junk food is still junk food.
20. Don’t Blame New Health Problems on Old Foods The obesity epidemic started around 1980 and the type 2 diabetes epidemic followed soon after. These are two of the biggest health problems in the world — and diet has a lot to do with them. Some scientists started blaming these epidemics on foods like red meat, eggs, and butter, but these foods have been a part of the human diet for thousands of years — whereas these health problems are relatively new. It seems more sensible to suspect new foods to be the culprit, such as processed foods, trans fat, added sugar, refined grains, and vegetable oils. Blaming new health problems on old foods simply doesn't make sense.Former prime minister Tony Abbott immediately condemned the decision, saying he was "disappointed". Education Minister Simon Birmingham. Credit:Andrew Meares "I'm a little disappointed by it and, frankly, I am disappointed that the people who call for reform did not get behind the 2014 budget," Mr Abbott told 3AW host Neil Mitchell. Senator Birmingham's predecessor Christopher Pyne had insisted the bill - which would deregulate university fees and cut course funding by 20 per cent - would be reintroduced this year after his reforms were twice knocked back by the Senate. "With only three months left in 2015, it is necessary to give both universities and students certainty about what the higher education funding arrangements for 2016 will be," Senator Birmingham will say in a speech to the University of Melbourne.
"Therefore, today I am announcing that higher education funding arrangements for 2016 will not be changed from currently legislated arrangements, while the government consults further on reforms for the future. Former education minister Christopher Pyne. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen "Any reforms, should they be legislated, would not commence until 2017 at the earliest." Senator Birmingham said the government was "accepting reality" that the reforms would not pass the Senate in their current form. But he said the government's policies officially remain in place until cabinet decides otherwise. Senator Birmingham said that, as someone who was educated in government schools in low socio-economic areas - and whose parents never attended university - he was "resolutely committed to equitable access" to higher education.
"To those who claim consideration of reform is about ideology or privilege, you are dead wrong. I will only ever champion reforms that achieve both equity and excellence," he said. To those who claim consideration of reform is about ideology or privilege, you are dead wrong "I invite ideas and conversations about how to achieve such equity and excellence in higher education, while honestly recognising the financial limitations of taxpayers." Although the government has shelved its reforms, Senator Birmingham said Australia's higher education funding system was not perfect and needed reform. The previous Labor government's decision to uncap undergraduate numbers has not been matched by sustainable funding, he said. And it is unfair that students at TAFEs and private colleges do not receive direct federal funding and they have to pay expensive loan fees that university students do not.
This suggests the government remains in favour of its plan to extend federal funding to private colleges, TAFEs and associate degree programs. He said he hoped the debate leading up to the next federal election was based on "sensible discussions, not fear campaigns". Follow us on TwitterImage caption Wendy Mitchell lost all of her Personal Independence Payment following a reassessment
Thousands of people living with degenerative conditions - like dementia, Parkinson's and multiple sclerosis (MS) - are losing part or all of their disability benefits after being reassessed. One woman, Wendy, rejects the assessors' insinuation that her Alzheimer's is getting better.
"My life has changed. I was able to talk about anything and everything, but now I have lots of notes to refer to," Wendy Mitchell tells the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme.
It has been over 18 months since the BBC first spoke to her, for a piece about living with early onset dementia.
Around that time, Wendy was assessed for a disability benefit known as a Personal Independence Payment (Pip), which is designed to help someone living with a wide range of disabilities. She received £76.90 per week.
But one-and-a-half years later, she was reassessed - and now receives nothing.
Image copyright Wendy Mitchell Image caption Wendy with her daughter
"I got the shocking letter that I was no longer going to get any payment whatsoever and a list of all the things that I am apparently better at now than I was 18 months previously - which was ridiculous" she said.
Wendy is referring to the letters sent out after each assessment, which measure her ability to live independently across different criteria. The higher the mark, the more help the person is thought to need with a particular task.
In 2015, Wendy was given a score of two for preparing food - saying she needs "prompting from another person to prepare or cook a simple meal".
A year on and Wendy has signs around the kitchen to guide her in making a cup of coffee. And rather than cooking for herself, her daughter now prepares her meals.
During the reassessment process, however, she was given zero marks for preparing food. The assessors said: "You can prepare and cook a meal unaided."
Image caption Signs, containing QR codes, are used to help Wendy carry out daily tasks
Wendy believes the assessors "totally lacked any knowledge of dementia whatsoever".
She recently lost a first review of the Pip decision and has decided a full appeal at tribunal is probably too much to go through.
Find out more
The Victoria Derbyshire programme is broadcast on weekdays between 09:00 and 11:00 on BBC Two and the BBC News Channel.
Since the introduction of Pips in 2013, however, the number of people appealing a decision at tribunal has been rising sharply.
Overall there are now more than 6,000 full tribunals a month and in around 65% of cases the original decision is overturned by a judge.
Many of those cases are bought by people transferring across to Pip from the Disability Living Allowance (DLA), an older benefit which the government describes as outdated.
Under DLA, decisions were made by assessors working directly for the Department for Work and Pensions, whereas under Pip, decisions are made after a face-to-face assessment carried out by a health professional working for one of two private companies - Atos and Capita.
The government is in the middle of transferring everyone across from DLA to Pip.
Image caption Diane was forced to give up her car after her Pip mobility allowance was stopped
For seven years, Diane Barrett - who has Parkinson's disease - received the higher rate of both the living and mobility elements of DLA.
But after her reassessment, Diane was told her needs had changed. The amount she received for the mobility part of the allowance dropped from £57 per week to zero.
"I was absolutely gobsmacked when the letter came. Without the mobility allowance I couldn't have a car," she explains.
"It took my independence away, totally. I consider myself really independent."
Diane asked for the decision over Pip to be reconsidered, but lost a second time.
Six months later, however, she took the case to a full appeal in front of a judge. The tribunal took only 10 minutes to decide the government was wrong.
"I burst out crying," she says, "and so did my son. We were just so relieved."
Image caption Following the appeal, Diane is now back behind
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this story: http://cjky.it/1s5moc9Despite the fact that criminal sodomy hasn't been allowed in California for years and that laws regarding the subject have generally fallen out of favor across the country, a delusional California lawyer submitted a ballot initiative this week to the state's department of justice, proposing what he calls the “Sodomite Suppression Act."
The proposal, from Matt McLaughlin of Huntington Beach, calls for the execution of all Californians performing homosexual acts. McLaughlin was even kind enough to attach a $200 check to the absurd document, as if the government procedure were to double as mass-murder-for-hire.
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The lone homophobe has outlined his horrifying “bill” in seven measures, including the following tenets (obtained by the Huffington Post):
The abominable crime against nature known as buggery, called also sodomy, is a monstrous evil that Almighty God, govern of freedom and liberty, commands us to suppress on pain of our utter destruction even as he overthrew Sodom and Gomorrha. [...] Seeing that it is better that offenders should die rather than that all us should be killed by God's just wrath against us for the folly of tolerating wickedness in our midst, the People of California wisely command, in the fear of God, that any person who willingly touches another person of the same gender for purposes of sexual gratification be put to death by bullets to the head of by any convenient method. [...] This law shall be known as 'The Sodomite Suppression Act' and be numbered as section 29 in Title 3 of the Penal Code, pertaining to offenses against the sovereignty of the state. The text shall be prominently posted in every public school classroom. ALl laws in conflict with this law are to that extent invalid.
McLaughlin’s attempt to criminalize homosexuality and make sodomy punishable by death would require more than 350,000 signatures in California's next gubernatorial election, equaling 5 percent of the number of total votes. His obscene suggestion to actually murder individuals who engage in sodomy is only made more outrageous by his insistence that these "offenders" be shot in the head.
Judging by the fact that “Matt McLaughlin of Huntington Beach” has absolutely no presence on the Internet and remains virtually untraceable despite a few elusive clues, it's likely this farce will end as a meme. Still, the implications are deeply frightening.Think UN sanctions on North Korea will stop Kim Jong Un? Think again
Think UN sanctions on North Korea will stop Kim Jong Un? Think again
These latest sanctions on North Korea are being described as "by far the strongest" ever imposed.
"This will cut deep," US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley declared.
But then she said the last round, just last month, would be a "gut punch" that would put Kim Jong Un "on notice".
Instead, in the interim, he ordered another nuclear test, by far the country's strongest to date.
The previous resolution, in November 2016, was feted as "the toughest and most comprehensive sanctions regime ever imposed by the Security Council".
Since then, North Korea has successfully tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles, capable of hitting mainland United States, along with a variety of other short and medium-range weapons.
Sky News special: A new Korean war?
:: North Korea hit by new UN sanctions
We should be clear about what sanctions are, and what they are not.
Passing a resolution at the UN Security Council allows the international community, and particularly its five veto-wielding permanent members (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) to demonstrate unity, to deliver a form of collective admonishment to the state at hand.
Unfortunately the reality, as Mr Kim understands only too well, is that these countries are far from united in agreement on the way ahead.
This latest round of sanctions was only able to be passed after substantial watering down.
You could argue this is just a function of the normal negotiating process between multiple member states and compromise in this forum is inevitable.
H-bombs more lethal than atomic weapons
But on North Korea there is a fundamental difference in position between China and Russia on the one hand, and the United States and its allies on the other, which likely reassures Mr Kim that there is a limit to how far sanctions will ever be allowed to go.
He knows neither China nor Russia is prepared to push his regime to the point of collapse.
In China's case, this is driven by fears of the regional instability and refugee crisis that would follow, and the prospect of a subsequent united Korean peninsula, under the leadership of Seoul and therefore allied to the United States, across the border.
The danger of unsecured nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the failed state next door is also distinctly troubling.
Russia, which also shares a border with North Korea, is similarly unenthusiastic about the idea of losing another buffer state, and having US troops creep closer to its eastern flank.
President Putin is also deeply suspicious of anything that looks like the path to US-led regime change, and the overthrowing of leaders, however despotic, in his backyard.
Both countries are pushing their own double freeze proposal - where the US and South Korea suspend joint military exercises on the peninsula, and North Korea freezes its nuclear programme.
How advanced are N Korea's nuclear weapons?
Nikki Haley has rejected the proposal as "insulting".
What sanctions are not is a solution in themselves.
If the idea is to ratchet up the pressure incrementally until the point where Mr Kim decides to unilaterally disband his nuclear and missile programmes and call for talks, we could be in for a very long wait, during which time his scientists will be pressing ahead with all urgency to perfect their nuclear capable ICBMs.
During the 1990s, when the country was experiencing mass famine which killed up to three million of its citizens (the true number is still unknown), the regime continued to prioritise the military, under Kim Jong Il's signature 'Songun' (military first) policy.
This is what Vladimir Putin means when he says North Korea would "eat grass" before it gives up its nuclear programme. Plenty of its people have had to do so before.
If this is a choice between the survival of his regime, which he appears to believe the nuclear deterrent will secure - North Korean officials often quote the examples of Libya and Iraq as what happens to states that give up their nuclear weapons - and the further suffering of his citizens, it's hard to believe Mr Kim will choose the latter.
What seems much more likely is that he will continue testing his missiles, and we will be back here again before long.File picture shows Isma president Abdullah Zaik Abdul Rahman. An analyst from Isma-linked Institut Kajian Arus Baru Malaysia has suggested that Malays have always been ‘bullied’ by non-Malays since colonial times. — Picture by Saw Siow Feng
KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 9 — An analyst from Islamist group Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma) suggested today that ethnic Malays have always been “bullied” since colonial times by non-Malays, especially ethnic Chinese.
In an article on the group’s website, the analyst also suggested that Chinese mine owners in the 18th century were in cahoots with British invaders to “loot the riches” from Malays.
“When did the Malays bully the Chinese? Furthermore, from the facts above, it is reasonable to say that it was the Malays who were bullied from then until today.
“The question is, who are the bullied, and who are the bullies?” asked Mohd Zul Fahmi Md Bahrudin, an analyst of Malaysian history and constitution under Isma-linked Institut Kajian Arus Baru Malaysia.
The article comes ahead of the group’s president Abdullah Zaik Abd Rahman’s court case this Monday for sedition, after labelling the country’s ethnic Chinese as “intruders” who had been brought by British colonialists to oppress Malays.
Abdullah wrote on Isma’s website on May 6 that the influx of Chinese migrants into Tanah Melayu had been “a mistake” which must be rectified.
Last week, the Islamist group urged the public to gather in front of the Kajang Sessions Court in the morning of the first day of the trial, “in the name of religion and race”.
Citing literature on the subject, Zul Fahmi claimed today that Chinese mine owners had been influential with the triads, and had masterminded the intervention of British colonialists in Malay states.
He alleged that Chinese mine owners had forcibly seized mines from Malay owners, citing examples of Taiping, Kuala Lumpur and Lukut.
Zul Fahmi claimed the British had “allowed” Chinese communities to form “armed groups” to “defend” themselves from the Malays—groups of triad members who terrorised, robbed and extorted the Malays.
He also claimed the Malays were in turn forced by the British to accept non-Malays as citizens in order to get independence, and the Malays had yielded on the condition that the positions of Islam, the Malay language, the Malay rulers, and Malay’s special rights were protected.
“Today, there are some non-Malays especially their political representatives who are unashamedly challenging the social contract,” Zul Fahmi alleged.
“Did they forget the history of their ancestors? Or do they know but are ungrateful for the sacrifice suffered by the Malays?” he asked.
The Malays and Bumiputera make up the majority of Malaysia’s population at an estimated 67.4 per cent of the 28.3 million population, followed by the Chinese at 24.6 per cent, according to the most recent census at 2010.
The Chinese in Malaysia were mostly brought into Malaya from Southern China provinces such as Fujian and Guangdong by British colonists during 19th and 20th century to work in tin mines and rubber plantations.
However, Chinese settlers have also been recorded as early as the 15th century during the times of the Malacca Sultanate, even forming friendly diplomatic relations.At this stage, we are fed up with the whole thing, but at a level that transcends mere suicidal thoughts. Thus, it is actually beneficial though it seems otherwise. No longer do we look forward to anything but the complete ending of all sensations, i.e. the first taste of Nirvana. We just wish the noise in our minds would stop cold, but are unable to will this to happen. We wish the vibrations, which can be quite intense, harsh and irritating by this stage, would all go away forever. If we fail to associate the pain ending with deep insights but instead falsely associate it with changing something in our ordinary life, we are likely to wander far and wide until we come to realize the limitations of ordinary solutions.
This is the stage when people are most likely to quit their jobs or schooling out of frustration and go on a long retreat or spiritual quest. Fascination with celibacy as somehow being “a higher spiritual path” can arise. Our renunciation trip can be very disorienting to partners, particularly if we were going to the opposite extreme of intense sexuality during the stage of the Arising and Passing Away which probably occurred relatively recently, so try to be sensitive to their needs if you can. Somewhere in here, there can arise the tendency to try to get one’s life and finances in order so that one can leave the world behind for a time and have something to come back to without having to worry about such things for a while. A profound resolution to push onward can arise at this stage driven by our powerful frustration and the powerful compassion in it. We make the last push for freedom, the push against the seemingly impenetrable wall of...
MCTB 10. Re-ObservationBy Lyte
New champion select rolls out in Normal and Ranked Draft this week! We’re kicking things off in NA and Turkey, and will update all other territories as the week goes on. Missed the details? Catch up on the nitty gritty at the 2016 season hub.
New champ select brings dynamic groups along with it, meaning you can queue up with a full party in ranked, but of course, tier restrictions remain in place. Ready to hop in? Check these tips before making your first draft pick:
Select your position: Choose two positions (or fill!) for the upcoming game. You’re guaranteed to receive one of your chosen positions.
to receive one of your chosen positions. Coordinate your strategy: Before banning, everyone can indicate the champ they plan to play. Players with the last three picks each ban one champ.
Locking in now required: To keep champ select quick, every ban and pick now requires you to lock in. If you don’t, everyone’s kicked back to position select and you’ll face queue dodge penalties.
As mentioned last week, we’ll turn off Team Builder when we flip the switch to new champ select.
GLHF!Ella Minnow Pea is a 2001 novel by Mark Dunn. The full title of the hardcover version is Ella Minnow Pea: a progressively lipogrammatic epistolary fable, while the paperback version is titled Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters.[2]
Plot summary [ edit ]
The plot is conveyed through mail or notes sent between various characters. The book is "progressively lipogrammatic"—as the story proceeds, more and more letters of the alphabet are excluded from the characters' writing. As letters disappear, the novel becomes more and more phonetically or creatively spelled, and requires more effort to interpret.
The novel is set on the fictitious island of Nollop, off the coast of South Carolina, which is home to Nevin Nollop, the supposed creator of the well-known pangram, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." This sentence is preserved on a memorial statue to its creator on the island and is taken very seriously by the government of the island. Throughout the book, tiles containing the letters fall from the inscription beneath the statue, and as each one does, the island's government bans the contained letter's use from written or spoken communication. A penalty system is enforced for using the forbidden characters, with public censure for a first offense, lashing or stocks (violator's choice) upon a second offense and banishment from the island nation upon the third. By the end of the novel, most of the island's inhabitants have either been banished or have left of their own accord.
The island's high council becomes more and more nonsensical as time progresses and the alphabet diminishes, promoting Nollop to divine status. Uncompromising in their enforcement of Nollop's "divine will", they offer only one hope to the frustrated islanders: to disprove Nollop's omniscience by finding a pangram of 32 letters (in contrast to Nollop's 35). With this goal in mind "Enterprise 32" is started, a project involving many of the novel's main characters. With but five characters left (L, M, N, O, and P), the elusive phrase is eventually discovered by Ella in one of her father's earlier letters: "Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs," which has only 32 letters. The council accepts this and restores the right to all 26 letters to the populace.
Main characters in Ella Minnow Pea [ edit ]
Ella Minnow Pea [ edit ]
Ella Minnow Pea is the 18-year-old protagonist of the novel. Her name is a play on words as it sounds like the pronunciation of the letters "LMNOP", fitting with the content of the novel. She is a strong and intelligent young woman who uses her determination and persistence to survive the hardship placed on the island of Nollop by the high council. Towards the end of the novel, she is the only one in her family left on the island and is in charge of Enterprise 32. She eventually runs across a sentence in her father's farewell letter that will save the citizens of Nollop from the oppression they are experiencing, and allow her family to return to the island.
Gwenette Minnow Pea [ edit ]
Gwenette is Ella's mother and Mittie Purcy's sister. She is a very strong woman who instills the qualities of determination and hope in her daughter. Eventually, she, along with the others in her family, becomes banished to the States after her third offense.
Amos Minnow Pea [ edit ]
Amos is Ella's father. He makes liquor jugs and other ceramic vessels for a living, and he is a recovering alcoholic. The insanity of the forbidden letter laws become too much later in the story, and he returns to his old ways of excessive drinking. He also commits a third offense and is banished. His farewell letter to Ella and his wife contains the sentence that eventually frees Nollop from the rules and regulations concerning the use of restricted letters.
Mittie Purcy [ edit ]
Mittie is Ella's aunt. She is a teacher at the local elementary school. Because of her career, she finds the laws passed by the council quite difficult to follow and obey. This, in turn, creates serious problems for her. She commits her first offense while explaining to her students that 12 eggs is equal to a doZen. The laws and restrictions put on the use of language on the island create a sense of depression in her life. She, along with her daughter and Nate Warren, travels to the States to escape her daughter's death sentence.
Tassie Purcy [ edit ]
Tassie is Ella's cousin and best friend, being only a few months older. She falls in love with Nate Warren, the writer and scholar, and gets into serious trouble with the council for sending them death threats because of their new legislation. Her threats, though admirable, create much trouble for her. Nate eventually returns to the island after his banishment to rescue her from her punishment due to her rebellion of the council's laws. Her temperament is rather hot-headed, and she is quick to see the negatives of a situation.
Nathaniel Warren [ edit ]
Nathaniel Warren is a researcher who lives in Georgia and travels to Nollop when he hears about the government rulings against taboo letters. He is willing to pose as "an old family friend" of the Purcys and use his knowledge and resources to help the people of Nollop find a logical solution to the "forbidden letter fiasco." He brings to Mr. Lyttle, a council member, that the tiles falling is a result of the adhesive breaking down of the fixative holding them in place. Unfortunately, this report doesn't affect the decisions of the council, although it brings about the sentence challenge. He is later discovered to be the scholarly writer he really is and is sent back to the States. He falls in love with Tassie Purcy.
Rederick Lyttle [ edit ]
Mr. Lyttle is the high priest on the council, and he seems to be the most sensible of those on the council. Although he doesn't accept the scientific solution to the tiles falling presented by Nate Warren, he is the man who proposes the idea of the Nollopians creating a 32-letter sentence containing all the letters in the alphabet to free themselves from the regulations pertaining to the forbidden letters. Not only does he propose a challenge to find the sentence, he himself participates and searches for the sentence that will free the citizens of Nollop.
Nevin Nollop [ edit ]
He is the idolized creator of the phrase "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." The island country is named after him. A cenotaph in the center of town is dedicated to Nollop and the immortal pangram he is said to have penned. When lettered tiles begin to fall from the memorial the High Island Council believes it is Nollop from beyond the grave demanding each fallen letter be stricken from society.
Dr. Mannheim [ edit ]
Dr. Mannheim is a professor at the local university. He plays a vital role in the attempt to find a pangram that fits the qualifications set by the council (also known as Enterprise 32). He and Tom, his assistant, lead the way in finding a sentence. He manages to create a sentence that is 37 letters in length, but his quest for a 32-letter sentence is ended abruptly when he refuses banishment and is shot and killed by island officials.
Georgeanne Towgate [ edit ]
Georgeanne Towgate is a citizen of Nollop who, at first, believes strongly in following the laws set up by the council. Her view of the issue quickly changes when her family is directly affected by the law, when her son, Timmy is shipped away. Her loneliness is obvious, and she begins to slowly lose her mind as the story progresses. Towards the end of the novel, she decides to paint her entire body for fun. This act leads to lead poisoning from the paint, and she dies from the poisoning.
Major themes [ edit ]
Totalitarianism [ edit ]
One of the main themes of the story is totalitarianism, in that the government attempts to control every aspect of written communication among the citizens, even sexual relations. Once the laws begin to be passed, the people of Nollop are scared even to attempt to rebel against the council for fear of the harsh penalties. This theme is brought to the forefront in the first letter of the novel. Ella writes to Tassie saying that "in the end, our assessments and opinions counted for (and continue to count for) precious little, and we have kept our public speculation to a minimum for fear of government reprisal".[3] Ella Minnow Pea focuses on this theme when considering, "We slowly conclude that without language, without culture—the two are inextricably bound—existence is at stake".[4]
Freedom of speech [ edit ]
The novel also addresses the importance of freedom of speech. Not only are the citizens of Nollop not allowed to use certain letters, but they are not allowed to speak out about how unjust the new laws are. If they interpret this particular situation any other way besides that of the council, they will be punished. In the council's letter to the citizens, the council writes that no alternate interpretations can be made because they are considered heresy, and heresy will be punished.[5]
Good citizenship vs. freedom [ edit ]
The citizens of Nollop are torn between being good citizens by following the unjust laws or rebelling against the government by fighting for their precious freedoms. They realize that if they speak out for their freedom of speech, they will be punished. Many decide that living on the island under this tyranny is not worth it, so they rebel in order to be banished. Others rebel to stir up the emotions of the other citizens. There are many that just follow the orders of the council, but, once affected by them, decide that a change must be made. The citizens have two distinct choices: submit to the rules and live a life of misery or stand up for what is rightfully theirs and live a life of freedom.
Movie adaptation [ edit ]
In March 2016 Gold Leaf Films announced they have optioned the film rights to Ella Minnow Pea. The film was in development as of early 2019.[6]
Awards and nominations [ edit ]
Ella Minnow Pea was selected as Borders' Book of the Year.
Ella Minnow Pea was a "Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers and a Borders Original Voices pick (and a finalist for Original Voices Book of the Year), but it ranked second on the Top Ten BookSense 76 Picklist." [7]
Larson Award-winning writers Scott Burkell (script/lyrics) and Paul Loesel (composer) selected it out of many books to be produced as a musical, and got its first full production in November 2008 at the Arthur Miller Theatre on the University of Michigan campus, performed by auditioned students in the musical theater program. Anne Markt and Derek Carley starred. The full story can be read at Playbill.[8]
Translations [ edit ]
Ella Minnow Pea has been translated into French, as L'Isle Lettrée,[9] and into Italian as Lettere. Fiaba epistolare in lipogrammi progressivi.[10]
Ella Minnow Pea 2002 editionBoth Secretary of State John Kerry and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power were called into a video conference with President Obama just before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the podium at the United Nations, Breitbart reports.
In a statement to the conservative news outlet, a State Department official said both Kerry and Power met with Obama in a video teleconference and were unable to attend the speech, but not to worry -- there was a slew of other U.S. representatives present, such as Ambassador David Pressman, Alternate Representative of the United States to the United Nations for Special Political Affairs, Ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro, and Ambassador Richard Erdman, Alternate Representative to the UN General Assembly.
Yet, it's hard not to imagine that there was something more to the decision to pull out the high-ranking officials other than just extremely horrible timing, especially in light of Obama and Netanyahu's relationship that is growing colder by the day. And it's too bad Kerry wasn't there to hear the powerful speech the prime minister delivered. And maybe that was the point, as Netanyahu was less than subtle at expressing his displeasure with the Iran deal.
"Seventy years after the murder of 6 million Jews, Iran’s leaders promise to destroy my country, murder my people and the response from this body, the response from nearly every one of the governments represented here, has been absolutely nothing. Utter silence. Deafening silence," Netanyahu said, before he remained silent for a full 45 seconds to emphasize his point.
You could hear a pin drop... but Kerry couldn't.The Canadian Press
SUDBURY, Ont. -- An Election Act bribery case involving two Ontario Liberals has been adjourned to next month as the Crown attorney's future on the case appears to be up in the air.
Vern Brewer, the federal prosecutor on the case, said last month outside court in Sudbury that Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault "sought certain benefits" to run for the provincial Liberals.
Thibeault vehemently denied the allegation and noted he hadn't been charged with anything. His lawyer had said Brewer sullied his client's reputation and Thibeault was considering his legal options.
The defence lawyers for the two Liberals charged in the case say Thibeault's lawyer has been corresponding with the Public Prosecution Service of Canada about Brewer's remarks.
"Those comments were brought into question in terms of their propriety and the request in the correspondence was made with respect to the future of Mr. Brewer and the PPSC conducting this matter," lawyer Brian Greenspan said Wednesday outside court.
"It's our understanding at this stage that there may well be further exchange of correspondence that will take place and we want to be able to understand the position they're taking and evaluate what our position will be in terms of whether or not Mr. Brewer and/or the Public Prosecution Service of Canada should continue to prosecute this matter. That's still up in the air."
The issue needs to be resolved, said lawyer Michael Lacy.
"One of the cornerstones of a prosecution is an independent and objective prosecutor," he said outside court.
The charges against the two provincial Liberals, including Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne's former deputy chief of staff, stem from allegations they offered a would-be candidate a job or appointment to get him to step aside in a 2015 byelection in Sudbury for Thibeault, who was the premier's preferred candidate.
Thibeault was then the New Democrat MP for Sudbury. He ultimately won the byelection for the provincial Liberals, and then was promoted to energy minister earlier this year.
Thibeault is named in one of the charges against Pat Sorbara, who took a leave of absence from her job as Wynne's deputy chief of staff to become the Ontario Liberals' CEO and 2018 campaign director -- posts she resigned from when the charges were laid. She is alleged to have promised to get Thibeault "an office or employment" to induce him to become a candidate.
Sorbara denies the charges, as does her co-accused, Liberal fundraiser Gerry Lougheed.
The Election Act makes it an offence to offer a bribe, but not necessarily to ask for one.
Sorbara and Lougheed's case was adjourned to Jan. 18 for a judicial pre-trial, if the Brewer matter is settled. The defence lawyers are also looking for a judge from outside Sudbury to hear the case.
The PPSC said in a statement that the process of finding a judge outside Sudbury was the main reason for the adjournment, but it would not comment further.Focus: Why We Can’t Remember the Future
The basic laws of physics don’t obviously prohibit it, but the criteria for a genuine “memory” do.
iStockphoto.com/mangostock No photos of the future. Since the laws of physics could allow time to run forward or backward, it’s not obvious why time as we perceive it must move in the same direction as that required by thermodynamics (entropy always increases). But theorists propose that a proper definition of “memory” shows why we can’t “remember the future.” No photos of the future. Since the laws of physics could allow time to run forward or backward, it’s not obvious why time as we perceive it must move in the same direction as that required by thermodynamics (entropy always increases). But theorists p... Show more
iStockphoto.com/mangostock No photos of the future. Since the laws of physics could allow time to run forward or backward, it’s not obvious why time as we perceive it must move in the same direction as that required by thermodynamics (entropy always increases). But theorists propose that a proper definition of “memory” shows why we can’t “remember the future.” ×
Why can we remember the past but not the future? It might seem like a bizarre question, but it’s not obvious why our psychological “arrow of time” should move in the same direction as that dictated by the second law of thermodynamics, which implies that events unfold in the direction that increases net entropy. A report in Physical Review E suggests that these two arrows of time are forced to coincide by the constraints on what it actually means to remember something.
The fundamental laws of physics are symmetrical in time: in Newtonian classical mechanics time is in principle reversible, and in general relativity it is just a coordinate much like those of space. Given the positions and velocities of a classical system of interacting particles, the past and future can in principle each be completely calculated from the laws of physics. So predictions of the future are just as accurate as descriptions of the past—they are equally “knowable” based on the present.
The existence of an arrow of time is usually explained in terms of the thermodynamic concept of entropy. In systems of many components, it is overwhelmingly more probable that changes will occur in the direction that increases the total entropy of the universe.
How we actually perceive the flow of time is another matter. Theorists have argued that recording information always involves erasing—for example, initializing a computer memory at the start [1]. Since erasure always increases entropy [2], the psychological arrow of time aligns with the thermodynamic one.
But Leonard Mlodinow of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and Todd Brun of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles say that this argument is not quite complete. You can, in principle, get rid of any need for erasure and initialization just by remembering everything—which means that recording information in the memory is then fully reversible in time. But even in that case the arrows of time must align because, says Brun, “there is a broader principle at work.”
The researchers argue that this extra ingredient is something they call generality. They illustrate the argument with a rotating turnstile that records the passage of gas molecules from one chamber to another. The system starts with most of the molecules in the left-hand chamber, and at any instant the rotor reveals the net number that have passed from left to right since some earlier reference time. But since the system follows predictable and reversible Newtonian laws, the readout could also be interpreted as showing the number of molecules that will pass between the time of the reading and some future reference time. One can show that this would be a correct anticipation, since that number can, in principle, be calculated. “Why can’t we call that a memory of the future?” asks Brun.
The reason we cannot is that for the rotor to work as a memory of the past, the system’s state at an earlier reference time need not be precisely specified; any slight changes in the molecules’ positions at that time will not affect the readout at a later time. But equivalent small changes in the state at a future reference time—say, due to some unforeseen influence intervening—lead to inconsistencies.
To see this, recall that the molecules started mostly in the left-hand chamber and are gradually equalizing their numbers on both sides of the rotor. Imagine “running the movie backward” (according to Newtonian equations) from the future reference time to the readout time and seeing the molecules collectively move back toward the left-hand chamber. That extremely improbable event can only occur from one very specific arrangement of the molecules at the future time. If, before running time backward, you made any small changes, say, in the molecules’ positions, new collisions would occur during the time reversal that would rapidly set the system on a completely different course. The molecules would take the much more probable path of equalizing the populations and would not get close to the original state of the system at the readout time.
As Mlodinow and Brun put it, this kind of “future memory” lacks generality—a requirement that the memory accurately reflects the future state of the system regardless of unexpected events. The readout indicates a future state, but only one specific future state. They compare it to a camera that needs a different type of memory card to accommodate each photo. A real memory, they say, cannot be contingent on the system behaving a certain way.
“They have emphasized a very important problem in the meaning-of-time debate and provided an interesting solution,” says Lorenzo Maccone of the University of Pavia in Italy, who has previously considered the origin of the thermodynamic arrow of time in quantum physics [3].
But he isn’t yet persuaded by the answer, because the researchers allow the memory to track the system only in the “forward” time direction. “It seems to me that they are somehow introducing surreptitiously an arrow of time when they say that the memory tracks the system only in one direction.” But Maccone adds that “in such a difficult field, even highlighting what are the relevant questions to ask is already big progress.”
–Philip Ball
Philip Ball is a freelance science writer in London and author of Beyond Weird, a survey of quantum mechanics (University of Chicago Press, 2018).“Why?” is the question that’s been tugging on everyone’s tail. With YG’s head president, Yang Hyun Suk, already releasing an official statement explaining their truth and stance, the public is still half in doubt. Then again, who wouldn’t be doubtful when a popular girl group member was allegedly being accused of “illegally smuggling” drugs? However, it has been confirmed that prosecutors decided to “close the case”, or in other words, release Park Bom. Though the misdemeanor was deemed to be true, a judgement was made that the crime was not a matter serious enough to carry through with a charge or further investigation.
This is where the doubt begins to form.
▶ “Did prosecutors give Park Bom a leeway investigation?” ◀
Park Bom embraced suspicion when she purchased medication from the United States and brought it back to Korea.
▶ “(If there was nothing to hide) Why did Park Bom have the packages sent to her grandmother’s home address in Incheon, South Korea?” ◀
This incident all happened four years ago. In October of 2010, 2NE1’s Park Bom was struck with internal investigations with a charge of smuggling an illegal substance. Then four years later today, the same incident became reignited. “Why Park Bom” and “Why the prosecutors” are the biggest questions being asked right now. Even we, Dispatch, were not clear on those facts, either. Some things were and still are too iffy to just not doubt. With that said, we attempted to interview a line up of those who might have further information regarding this controversy, such as:
– Person A, who was also involved in the investigation at the time
– Person B, an acquaintance of Park Bom
– Person C, an affiliate of the National Tax Service
– Person D, a drug enforcement agency team member
– Others
As a result of these interviews, we found factors that Park Bom was both innocent and guilty during the whole ordeal. We unraveled the story to a representative of the crime investigation organization by creating a ‘Q&D’ (Question & Dispatch) article. The article focuses mainly on the process of why and how Park Bom purchased these drugs at the time and what matters prosecutors dealt with during the short investigation a few years back.
▶ Q1. Let’s take a look at the reasoning and process behind why Park Bom purchased these drugs. First off, why amphetamines?◀
D: During Park Bom’s high school days, she underwent a traumatic experience—she witnessed the death a very close friend right in front of her own eyes. Accordingly, Park Bom fell into a deep psychological pain and slump. She was then diagnosed with an emotional incontinence disorder where she couldn’t not control her emotions. She received psychological therapy while carrying on with medication use.
▶ Q2. Then does that mean she took the amphetamine pills as a medication for her psychological therapy? ◀
D: After the traumatic incident, Park Bom consistently and steadily received psychological therapy non-stop—it was at this time that she began being prescribed amphetamine pills and started using them. In America, this substance is a drug that is legally used for medications. Park Bom took these prescribed pills without having to worry about anything.
▶ Q3. The year 2010 is after 2NE1 debuted and was promoting in South Korea. Didn’t she receive treatment in our own country? ◀
D: Park Bom continuously and consistently received psychological treatment and therapy even in Korea. She even took medication that was prescribed to her by the Korean hospital, of course. However, the effectiveness of drugs varies for every person, and every person has their ‘own medicine’ that works better for them than others. Just like how some people react better to ‘Tylenol’ than they do to ‘Penzal’, vice versa.
▶Q4. So that’s your excuse for why she ordered amphetamines? ◀
D: Park Bom’s mother was the first to contact the hospital Bom frequented back in the States a few years back. It seems that she shared information about her daughter’s situation and that is when both the mother and the hospital came to the conclusion that Bom’s condition was getting worse. She then requested for Bom’s attending doctor to send substitute prescriptions of the medication.
▶ Q5. So are you guys saying that what CEO Yang Hyunsuk said is true, about “why would a mother knowingly offer her
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Renewable Generation Integration Study (ERGIS) analyzed a year of power grid operations at 5-minute intervals — that’s the same real-time interval used currently by grid operators.
“By modeling the power system in depth and detail, NREL has helped reset the conversation about how far we can go operationally with wind and solar in one of the largest power systems in the world,” said the Energy Department’s Charlton Clark, a DOE program manager for the study. “Releasing the production cost model, underlying data, and visualization tools alongside the final report reflects our commitment to giving power system planners, operators, regulators, and others the tools to anticipate and plan for operational and other important changes that may be needed in some cleaner energy futures.”
The study relied on a high-resolution model of the entire Eastern interconnection — which includes power traded in from Canada — and modeled more than 5,600 electricity generators and more than 60,000 transmission lines in a power system that spans the territory running from Florida to Maine, portions of Canada, and extends west as far as New Mexico. Four separate hypothetical scenarios were concocted, with varying levels of fossil fuels, wind, solar, and natural gas — including renewable energy penetration of up to 30%.
“Our work provides power system operators and regulators insights into how the Eastern Interconnection might operate in future scenarios with more wind and solar energy,” said Aaron Bloom, NREL project leader for the ERGIS study. “More importantly, we are sharing our data and tools so that others can conduct their own analysis.”
According to NREL, the findings from the ERGIS report shows that as wind and solar power generation increase:
The operation of traditional power sources (such as coal, natural gas, and hydropower) changes. Turning up or down more quickly to accommodate seasonal and daily variations of wind and solar in order to maintain the balance between demand and supply. In addition, traditional generators would likely operate for shorter periods of time as wind and solar resources meet more of the demand for electricity.
Flows of power across the Eastern Interconnection change more rapidly and more frequently. During periods of very high wind and solar generation (e.g., 40 percent or more of daily load), model regions trade frequently and in large volumes according to new net load patterns.
Regulatory changes, market design innovation, and flexible operating procedures are important to achieving higher levels of wind and solar. Looking at a year of operations at a 5-minute level, ERGIS shows that the power system can meet loads with variable resources — like wind and solar — in a variety of extreme conditions. However, technical feasibility depends on other transmission and generation operators providing the necessary ramping, energy, and capacity services; wholesale market design changes; and various capital expenditures, all of which will have financial and other implications that may need to be addressed and were outside of this study.
What’s interesting about these findings is that they appear (at time of writing, the NREL websites were having trouble, and I do not currently have access to the report in question) not to include the use of battery storage technology to mitigate any of the variance found in renewable energy generation. This further underscores the mis-truths that have been portrayed — namely, that it appears at least the eastern US power grid will be able to stand up to more fluctuations than originally suspected. Integration with battery storage will only serve to further solidify renewable energy’s position in the future energy mix.IN the battle of the codes, score this one as a significant victory to rugby league.
Sure, the Penrith players might have used - demeaned is probably a better word - women wearing nothing but their underwear to serve their drinks on Mad Monday.
But, as far as we know, they didn’t set fire to them.
You can hear the predictable yelps and screams. The bleating of those who believe we gave too much ground to the women’s rights movement when we allowed them to leave the cave unaccompanied.
“Just a bit of harmless fun.’’ ‘’Boys being boys.’’ “The women are happy to do it.’’
The same excuses, incidentally, made for the sadly dated and demeaning practice of having scantily clad women cheering on the sidelines at NRL matches. A ritual that emphasises and entrenches the ornamental place of women in the manly world or NRL.
Fortunately, most of us have moved on. We’ve grown up.
Is it time to scrap Mad Monday? Leave your comments below
We conduct public gatherings where alcohol is served, a good time is had and yet no one feels the night is incomplete without a healthy serving of dwarf flambé. We don’t generally harass blokes in wheelchairs. We don’t feel the need to have our snacks served by pretty women in their undies.
Indeed, as strange as it might seem to those who have put the madness into recent AFL and NRL Mondays, we invite women - and dwarfs and those with disabilities - along as participants, not amusements. Or they invite us.
Maybe this would take the madness out of some post-season Mondays. Replace Mad Monday with Family Monday. Bring the wives and kids. Provide a civilising influence.
Cue the cavemen again, this time with their fingers pointed at the ‘’keyboard warriors’’.
‘’But this is about the blokes who’ve gone to war together.’’ ‘’It’s about the bond you share with your teammates that no one else can understand.’’ ‘’It’s about mateship.’’
Which, the past week has revealed yet again, is self-justifying nonsense. Mad Monday is, for many, just an excuse to drink themselves into a blind stupor while finding the most bizarre way to demean and abuse others.
No, not always. Perhaps hardly ever. Certainly the media highlights the few incidents where the supposedly ‘’harmless fun’’ gets out of hand.
But those few publicised incidents betray a retrograde mentality that continues to infiltrate the ranks of top level football of different kinds.
The question is not whether a St Kilda player set fire to a dwarf. But why, at a gathering of highly paid and supposedly elite AFL players, a one-joke routine like performing dwarfs was even contemplated. Why the lingerie waitresses?
Harvey Norman, once a significant contributor to rugby league, will this season sponsor the A-League’s marquee Friday night fixture.
Harvey Norman’s managing director Katie Page, a former NRL board member, continues to support the NRL’s Women in League round. But you wonder if it is coincidental that the company has shifted its focus to the increasingly family-friendly world of football.
But you can’t kill Mad Monday. Ricky Stuart cancelled the day for his Eels, yet forward Mitch Allgood still managed to find a pub and, later, his car keys.
Sadly, his name represents the attitude to what happens on Mad Monday. Flaming dwarfs? Semi-naked waitresses? DUI?
Don’t worry about the standards the AFL and NRL and their clubs claim to represent, or the responsibilities that come with an out-sized pay cheque.
For one day of the year, it’s all good.Wolf Parade/Handsome Furs/Divine Fits member Dan Boeckner formed Operators in 2013 with New Bomb Turks/Divine Fits drummer Sam Brown and multi-instrumentalist Devojka. The band then released EP1 in 2014. Today, Operators have announced their debut album, Blue Wave, and shared its first single, "Cold Light," which you can hear above. The album is out April 1 via Last Gang Records, and it was produced by Holy Fuck's Graham Walsh (Metz, Alvvays, Viet Cong). Check out the album art below.
Operators have also announced that they'll head out on tour in support of Blue Wave. See the tour dates below, too.
In other Boeckner news, his band Wolf Parade are back after an indefinite hiatus that began in 2011. They're working on new music and will play their first shows in five years.
Operators:
02-17 Waterloo, Ontario - Starlight Social Club
02-18 Hamilton, Ontario - The Casbah
02-19 Toronto, Ontario - Call the Office
02-20 Saint Catherine, Ontario - Detour Music Hall
02-24 Saint Therese, Quebec - Cha Cha
02-25 Ottawa, Ontario - Ritual
02-26 Petersborough, Ontario - Red Dog
02-27 Kingston, Ontario- The Grad Club
03-28 Chicago, IL - Schubas
03-29 Minneapolis, MN - 7th Street Entry
03-30 Omaha, NE - Reverb Lounge
04-01 Denver, CO - Lost Lake Lounge
04-03 Spokane, WA - The Bartlett
04-04 Seattle, WA - Sunset Tavern
04-05 Vancouver, British Columbia - Fortune Sound Club
04-06 Portland, OR - Doug Fir Lounge
04-08 San Francisco, CA - Social Hall SF
04-09 Los Angeles, CA - Bootleg Theatre
04-10 San Diego, CA - Soda Bar
04-11 Phoenix, AZ - Valley Bar
04-13 Austin, TX - The Sidewinder
04-14 Dallas, TX - Three Links
04-15 Houston, TX - The Raven Tower
04-16 New Orleans, LA - Gasa Gasa
04-17 Atlanta, GA - The Earl
04-19 Washington, DC - DC9
04-21 Brooklyn, NY - Baby's All Right
04-22 Philadelphia, PA - Boot & Saddle
04-23 Cambridge, MA - Middle East Upstairs
Watch Operators perform "True" at Pitchfork Nightcap in Portland:The editorial staff of Wellesley College’s student newspaper recently wrote that anyone who dares utter a politically incorrect thought should be met with “hostility.”
The editorial started out as an explainer about why there’s not a free speech problem on their campus and that their reputation as “house flowers who cannot exist in the real world” is entirely unfair. Then things get weirder. The student editors say it’s fine to suppress and deny people the right to speak their minds if their thoughts offend others.
“We have all said problematic claims,” the editorial reads. “Luckily most of us have been taught by our peers and mentors at Wellesley in a productive way.”
If that doesn’t sound like it was ripped from a dystopian novel, what comes next is truly Orwellian: “If people are given the resources to learn and either continue to speak hate speech or refuse to adapt their beliefs, then hostility may be warranted.” In other words, if you say things some people find offensive, then there will be physical consequences.
In late March, six professors at the liberal arts college asked the school to rescind invitations to controversial speakers because they worried the invited speakers’ ideas might upset some of the students.
“There is no doubt that the speakers in question impose on the liberty of students, staff, and faculty at Wellesley,” the professors wrote in an email.
This weird interpretation of free speech — that saying offensive or politically incorrect things deprives others of rights — is not exclusive to the faculty. Here’s how the student editorial staff describes the objective of free speech: “The spirit of free speech is to protect the suppressed, not a free-for-all where anything is acceptable, no matter how hateful and damaging.”
Hoo boy.
The newspaper has since hidden the editorial behind a login page. It’s unclear if the editorial was masked by this landing page in an effort to shield it from further public scrutiny, or if this is in response to a overload of traffic.
But you can read most of the juicy bits in the screen grab below.
The Wellesley editorial advocating a hostile response to nonconformist speech seems limited access now. Grabbed:; https://t.co/GD5t4bcWg2 pic.twitter.com/dETquYo8v2 — Noah Rothman (@NoahCRothman) April 14, 2017
Calls to the Wellesley College news desk went unreturned.The Delhi Janlokpal Bill, 2015, introduced in the Assembly on November 30, has been assailed by lawyer-activists Prashant Bhushan and Shanti Bhushan, key figures in the original Janlokpal agitation, as a betrayal of the anti-corruption movement. The Bill has also been slammed by the BJP and Congress. Senior AAP leaders like Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia, and Transport Minister Gopal Rai, have, however described the Bill as being the “strongest”. Here’s how the 2015 Bill stacks up against two earlier Bills with which it is comparable — the one drawn up by the earlier AAP government in 2014, and the Uttarakhand Lokayukta Bill.
The Lieutenant Governor
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2014 Bill: “Lieutenant Governor” means the L-G, appointed by the President under Article 239, and designated as such under article 239 AA of the Constitution.
2015 Bill: “Lieutenant Governor” means the L-G of the NCT of Delhi appointed by the President under Article 239 of the Constitution, who shall act on the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers.
Definition of a government servant
2014: Those of the GNCTD cadre, placed at the disposal of other state governments or UTs, or Centre, or those from the Centre placed at the disposal of the government of Delhi.
2015: Not provided.
Definition of public servant
2014: Everyone who holds public office, including the Chief Minister, MLAs, and other politicians.
2015: Not part of definitions. Ministers maintain it includes MPs as well.
Uttarakhand Bill: CM, MLAs, everyone who holds public office.
ALSO READ: How AAP is rebutting the counters
Selection of Chairperson and members of Lokayukta
2014: Chairperson and six members, can go up to 10. Search Committee consisting of eminent persons with impeccable integrity will seek nominations for Chairperson; put it online. Search Committee will shortlist candidates and give it to the Selection Committee, which will choose the Members and Chairperson to be appointed by the President. If four Members of Selection Committee disagree, candidate will be disqualified.
2015: Chairperson and two Members, appointed on the basis of recommendation by a Selection Committee, which shall have its own procedure for selecting the Members of the Janlokpal. The process of Search Committee recommendations have been done away with.
Uttarakhand: Chairperson and 5 Members, can go up to 7. Search Committee, Selection Committee roles as in 2014 Bill; Chairperson and Members to be appointed by Governor.
Composition of Selection Committee
2014: Chief Minister, Leader of Opposition, two High Court judges, one person from among previous Lokayukta Chairpersons. Two other members chosen from among retired Chief Justices of India or retired judges of the Supreme Court, or retired Chiefs of the Army, Navy, or Air Force. CM will be Selection Committee chief.
2015: CM, Speaker of Assembly, Leader of Opposition, and Chief Justice of the High Court, who will be the Chairperson of the Selection Committee. The Committee’s recommendation shall be binding on the LG, who shall make the appointments within 30 days of receiving the recommendation.
Uttarakhand: Selection Committee consisting of CM, LOp in Assembly, two High Court judges selected by a collegium of all HC judges, one person from previous Chairpersons of Lokayukta. Two other members from among retired CJI or judges of Supreme Court, retired Service Chiefs, etc. CM will be Selection Committee chief.
Who can be Chairperson or Member
2014: Chairperson shall be a retired judge of the Supreme Court or Chief Justice of a High Court; Members should be persons of eminence and integrity with expertise in public administration, finance or investigation. A third of Members should have extensive knowledge of law; half should belong to SC/ST/OBC/Women/Minorities.
2015: Same as 2014; Members and Chairperson can’t be MP, MLA or hold an office of profit; must resign first. An important clause barring such individuals even after suspension of their activities — given their past associations — has been done away with.
Uttarakhand: Same as 2014 Bill.
Powers of Lokayukta
2014: Janlokpal shall not entertain anonymous complaints. Complaints cannot be withdrawn; tough punishment for false complaints. Video recordings will be done and made available to the public against a fee. Will investigate, punish, prosecute through special courts, issue letters rogatory. Will appoint Janlokpal investigation officers, will have reward schemes for public servants. Will have an Investigation and Prosecution wing; can search any building or premises.
2015: Can investigate anyone’s complaint of corruption in GNCTD. Punishment for false complaint is rigorous imprisonment. Matter not subject to inquiry will be one related to which any inquiry is already pending with the Lokpal constituted under the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013 (1 of 2014). Janlokpal shall also constitute a prosecution wing and appoint a Director of Prosecution.
Uttarakhand: Investigate, punish, prosecute through special courts; issue letters rogatory on pending cases; establish Investigation and Prosecution wing; appoint a Director of Prosecution.
Powers of Investigating Officers
2014: Investigation by Group A officers.
2015: Investigating Officer shall have all powers vested in a police officer while investigating offences under the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
Uttarakhand: IO will be of the rank of DSP and above
Removal of Lokayukta
2014: By the President on the recommendation of High Court after a proper inquiry on allegation of corruption.
2015: Impeachment by Assembly. Assembly has full powers to remove Lokayukta.
Uttarakhand: Removal by Governor on the recommendation of the Supreme Court
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Janlokpal Annual Report
2014: To be presented to LG; if not accepted, reasons to be given to Assembly.
2015: Annual report to government, which will be laid before the Assembly.
Uttarakhand: Annual report to Governor.Play Facebook
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New York state's top prosecutor has made inquiries into Donald Trump's nonprofit foundation after questions about impropriety.
Attorney General Eric Schneiderman revealed the inquiry on Tuesday, telling CNN that "we have been concerned that the Trump Foundation may have engaged in some impropriety," although he did not go into detail.
"We’ve inquired into it and we’ve had correspondence with them," Schneiderman said. "I didn’t make a big deal out of it or hold a press conference. We have been looking into the Trump Foundation to make sure it's complying with the laws governing charities in New York."
A source familiar with the matter later told NBC News that correspondence with the foundation began on June 9.
In response to the news, Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller released a statement calling Schneiderman "a partisan hack who has turned a blind eye to the Clinton Foundation for years and has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President."
He also called the inquiry a "left-wing hit job."
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The New York Attorney General's Charities Bureau, which oversees regulating nonprofits in the state, has asked about a $25,000 donation the Trump Foundation made in September 2013 to "And Justice for All" — a political group connected to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi.
All nonprofits are barred from making politically-related contributions.
The Trump Foundation had 20 days to answer the Charities Bureau's letter. While the Trump campaign has previously declined to comment about the case, Trump during a campaign stop Monday in Ohio dismissed questions about the contribution, according to The Washington Post.
Trump paid a $2,500 penalty for failing to disclose the gift to the Internal Revenue Service, and representatives for the Trump Organization said he also paid back $25,000 to the foundation after the media began asking questions, the newspaper reported.
Trump Foundation treasurer Allen Weisselberg wrote in a June 28 letter to the attorney general that the error was first realized in March and was a "case of mistaken identity involving organizations with the same name."
Other questions by the attorney general had to do with the Trump Foundation supposedly paying $20,000 for a six-foot-tall portrait of Trump and four separate charities reportedly claiming they never received donations that the foundation said it gifted them.
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The amounts that the foundation said it donated included a $10,000 contribution in 2008, $5,000 in 2010 and $10,000 in 2012, according to The Post, which reported about the discrepancies last week but issued an update on Tuesday noting that at least three of the charities in question did in fact receive money.
The portrait was referenced by President Barack Obama on Tuesday while he stumped for Hillary Clinton in Philadelphia.
"One candidate's family foundation has saved countless lives around the world," Obama said, referring to the Democratic presidential nominee's own charitable foundation run with former President Bill Clinton.
"The other candidate's foundation took money other people gave to his charity and then bought a 6-foot-tall painting of himself. I mean, he had the taste not to go for the 10-foot version," Obama quipped.
Schneiderman, a Democrat who has endorsed Hillary Clinton and raised money for her campaign, has previously gone after one of Trump's ventures.
In 2013, he filed a $40 million civil lawsuit against Trump University claiming the online school had fleeced would-be real estate investors.
That trial is going forward, and another fraud trial against Trump University in a San Diego court is scheduled to begin Nov. 28.With Rockstar reluctant to publish Team Bondi's next game, rumours are circulating that Brendan McNamara is in talks with George Miller's KMM studio - some employees believe that Brendan McNamara and the remainder of Team Bondi are being absorbed into KMM.
One verified source working at Dr. D, George Miller's animation studio, claimed that multiple members of Team Bondi, including Brendan McNamara himself, were seen getting a tour of the Dr D offices.
"Brendan McNamara was seen walking through the buildings of Dr. D yesterday, where Happy Feet 2 is being made," claimed our source.
According to the source this bothered some Dr. D employees, many of which were ex-Team Bondi employees.
"Because Dr. D is filled with former Team Bondi employees who left due to the abusive work conditions," the source continued, "this unexpected visit was quite... unsettling — to put it mildly."
Another verified source, from within KMM, claimed that it was broadly known within the company that George Miller himself was incredibly impressed with Team Bondi's efforts and McNamara's refusal to compromise his artistic vision in the face of deadlines.
This matches with the claims of the source at Dr. D.
"The word is going round that Team Bondi is being folded into KMM studios, Team Bondi is pretty much doomed after the scandal and can't find any new supporters, so by doing this they can hide their name."
Our source within KMM couldn't confirm whether or not this rumour had any validity, but stated they would be surprised if it wasn't true.
KMM studios is currently headed up Cory Barlog, who claimed earlier this year that he was working on a Mad Max game, to be designed in tandem with a George Miller movie based in the Mad Max universe. At the moment, however, all of Miller's resources are being moved to Happy Feet 2 to make an extremely strict deadline that many within Dr. D believe the team can't make.
For that reason, the Mad Max movie is currently on hold - so at this stage we really have no idea what KMM's Sydney studio is working on at the moment. KMM's Brisbane studio is currently working on a Happy Feet 2 video game to be released alongside the movie in November this year, but after that they're also without a project.
We're currently in contact with KMM/Dr. D in an attempt to get more details and will update as soon as we hear back.Scientists are working to pinpoint the source of a giant mass of methane hanging over the southwestern U.S., which a study found to be the country's largest concentration of the greenhouse gas.
The report that revealed the methane hot spot over the Four Corners region — where Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona meet — was released last year.
Now, scientists from the University of Colorado, the University of Michigan, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA are conducting a monthlong study to figure out exactly where it came from.
The answer could help reduce methane emissions that contribute to global warming. Here are some key things to know:
HOT SPOT
Last year's study by NASA and the University of Michigan was based on images from a European satellite captured between 2003 and 2009. They showed the methane hot spot as a red blip over the area, which is about half the size of Connecticut.
The study found the concentration of methane detected there would trap more heat in the atmosphere than all the carbon dioxide produced each year in Sweden.
Methane doesn't last as long in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, but it's far more potent for capturing heat in the short term.
POSSIBLE SOURCES
Methane occurs naturally and also is emitted by landfills and the agricultural and oil and natural gas industries.
One possible source of the hot spot is methane released from the region's coal deposits.
The releases can happen naturally, especially where coal seams reach the earth's surface. They also occur deliberately when energy companies extract methane — the primary component of natural gas — from coal beds.
The region is home to the San Juan Basin, North America's most productive area coal bed methane extraction area.
Methane also is released by coal mining and oil and gas drilling systems, and cattle produce large amounts of the gas. Scientists can pinpoint the kind of methane created by fossil fuels by looking for the presence of associated hydrocarbons.
HEALTH EFFECTS
The methane emissions pose no direct safety or health risks for Four Corners residents, although the hot spot does factor into overall global warming.
Also, methane emitted from traditional oil and gas operations usually is accompanied by hydrocarbon emissions that can create ozone, a pollutant that leads to smog and is linked to asthma and respiratory illness.
INVESTIGATING THE MYSTERY
For the next month, scientists based in Durango will fly in planes with a variety of instruments that can sense methane in the San Juan Basin. Crews in vans will follow up on their leads on the ground.
The European satellite that captured the hot spot is no longer in use, but Japan's GOSAT satellite plans to focus in on the Four Corners when it passes over the area.
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It's possible methane levels over the Four Corners have changed since 2009, said Gabrielle Petron, a scientist at the University of Colorado's Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences who is working on the latest study. Coal bed methane operations have declined since then, but oil production has increased.
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Sometimes you want to change the behavior of a function call in a Python test. Let's assume you have the following code:
# a.py from b import subfunc def func (): # do something subfunc ( 1, 2 ) # do something else # b.py def subfunc ( a, b = 1 ): # step1 # step2 # step3
You are testing the func function and would to change the behavior of step2 in subfunc without affecting step1 or step3.
Mocking: Replacement Function One way to solve this would be to mock the entire subfunc : def test_func ( monkeypatch ): def _mocked ( a, b = 1 ): # step1 # step3 monkeypatch. setattr ( 'b.subfunc', _mocked ) # do testing of func() (Note, all example code assumes that you're using pytest with the monkeypatch fixture. But you can also use other testing frameworks and the mock library instead.) But that would require you to copy the body of the function and adjust it as desired. This violates the DRY principle and could be a source of bugs (e.g. if step1 and step3 change later on).Discussions on how to reform the welfare state rarely trigger much excitement among the general public. The possibility of giving to everybody a guaranteed and unconditional basic income is, however, increasingly popular across the political spectrum.
Guy Standing, author of Basic Income, has been a front-runner of this debate, and is also a founder member of the grassroots Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN). His book offers a timely introduction for the many who have heard about basic income, but who are unsure about what exactly it is. It makes an unapologetic case for basic income and aims to convince the reader of both its utility and feasibility in our societies. It is more impressive for its comprehensive list of arguments than for the coherence of its message. Standing really has something for everyone here.
The book was clearly written with the British public in mind and this has somehow limited the strength of its argument. It is not hard, indeed, to make a case for basic income against the draconian means-testing of contemporary British social security. But Standing too easily dismisses the existing alternatives to basic income, in the form of the Germanic Bismarckian system or the Nordic Beveridgean system. He is ungenerous in his assessment of policies that managed to keep inequality comparatively low in Europe in the past. And he believes that all European systems of social security are equally doomed under global capitalism. This may well be the case, but then more is needed to show that basic income could regulate global capitalism. On this point, the book could have dialogued with Thomas Piketty’s proposals on how to reform taxation and tackle inequality by redistributing wealth, not just income.
Throughout the book, Standing is very critical of the “defenders of paternalistic social democratic welfare states”, but welcomes the basic income experiment by Y Combinator in Silicon Valley. This leaves me a bit unsure on why we should support basic income at all costs, even if it means giving up any ambition of redistributing wealth and offers little compensation to the losers of the new technological capitalism. At times, the book develops a fetish of the instrument of basic income while forgetting about the purpose – be that improving people’s lives or decreasing inequality.
One argument stands out in the book: the idea that basic income could overcome the artificial (and gendered) division between work and non-work, rewarding all activities humans would like to engage in. Little is said about how to create the preconditions for public support of basic income by challenging the common contempt for those out of work and making people embrace universalism over means-testing. To be honest, the book did not change my pessimism of the intellect about basic income, but it did help my optimism of the will in imagining progressive reforms. With all the limitations of its reasoning, it is a must-read for those who are interested in imagining the kind of world we want to live in.
Lorenza Antonucci is senior lecturer in social policy/sociology at Teesside University and the author of Student Lives in Crisis: Deepening Inequality in Times of Austerity (2016).
Basic Income: And How We Can Make It Happen
By Guy Standing
Pelican Books, 400pp, £8.99
ISBN 9780141985480
Published 4 May 2017A A
LAS VEGAS (KSNV News3LV) -- November 6th marks the anniversary of an odd incident which happened here in Las Vegas in 1993.
Even if you weren't living in Southern Vevada at the time, there's a pretty good chance you heard about "Fan Man" on the evening news.
It happened at Caesars Palace, where Evander Holyfield and Riddick Bowe were in a rematch for the undisputed heavyweight title that Bowe had won the year before.
As the seventh round got underway, a paraglider began a spiraling descent toward the ring.
Then with 1:20 left in the round, Henderson resident James Miller descended on a fan powered paraglider, and came crashing into the ropes.
The crowd didn't take kindly to the interruption one bit, and immediately started to punch and kick Miller. They beat him like a dusty rug.
Miller was knocked unconscious, then taken to the hospital where he was treated, released... and arrested on a charge of dangerous flying. But he was proud of the stunt.
"That I'm Fan Man, and I'm the man with the fan," Miller told News-3 with a grin.
Miller tried the same thing at a Broncos-Raiders game a couple of months later, but was chased away by National Guard helicopters.
He also paraglided into Buckingham Palace and spent 42 days in a British prison for it.
In 2002, suffering from a number of physical problems, Miller took his own life in the Alaska wilderness at age 38.Leo Ulloa has completed his transfer from Brighton & Hove Albion to Leicester City, after the club reluctantly agreed to sell the striker for a club record transfer fee.
The Argentine forward - who joined Albion from Almeria in January 2013 - joins the Premier League newcomers on a four-year deal.
Albion chairman Tony Bloom commented, "Initially we did not want Leo to go, but once he made it clear to us he wanted to join Leicester and play in the Premier League, it was then a case of ensuring we received our valuation.
"Leo has been tremendous for us, he has given us some truly memorable moments in the last season and a half - with his header against Nottingham Forest the pick of the bunch.
"I would like to thank him for his efforts and wish him well in the Premier League."
Ulloa hit 25 goals in 52 appearances for Albion, with last season disrupted by a foot injury during the first half of the campaign.
As well as his dramatic last-gasp winner on the final day, which clinched Albion's play-off spot last season, he hit memorable cup goals against Arsenal, on his debut, and Hull City, in last season's fifth round.
He also fired Albion into the play-offs in 2013, with his winning goal against Leeds at Elland Road - and also hit a brace in a 3-0 win over Crystal Palace in March of the same year.
Ulloa is also the only player who has scored a hat-trick at the Amex, after he smashed a treble against Huddersfield Town in February 2013.A girl eats cotton candy at a popular tourist area in Beijing. A university in northeastern China has banned students from displays of amorous affection on campus, prompting student ridicule at a time when schools are taking a more interfering role in the personal lives of students. Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI | License Photo
BEIJING, Nov. 9 (UPI) -- Administrators at a university in northeastern China are taking heat after they issued a rule banning students from holding hands or romantically feeding each other in the school cafeteria.
Jilin Construction University in Changsha was the target of ridicule after introducing rules designed to eradicate "uncivilized behavior" among students, The Independent reported.
The list of unacceptable behavior includes amorous holding of hands and wrapping of arms around a partner. Loving gestures of spoon-feeding also are not allowed, according to the new rules, and surveillance equipment was installed in order to prevent the banned behavior.
"We have cameras covering the cafeteria to ensure safety. I'm pleased as it's necessary to prevent uncivilized behavior," said one cafeteria worker.
That rule, however, has been mocked. Students have described the move as "weird."
"[We] can't help laughing. It's the 21st century. As adults, we don't dare to behave so explicitly in public places. I never see lovers feed each other rice, so the norm is unnecessary," one student said.
Teachers, however, defended the rule because "improper behavior like kissing and hugging in public places such as the subway, have been [widely] revealed by the media," according to one unnamed teacher quoted in China's New Culture View newspaper.
RELATED China files complaint with John Kerry as maritime dispute grows
Any student in a romantic relationship is to have a private conversation with an assistant teacher, who is to tell them "not to have physical contact or engage in improper behavior on campus."
Not all are condemning the rules. One Chinese social media user said the rule is a "gift from the university to single students" ahead of "Single's Day" a commercialized holiday in China that provides shopping deals for China's uncommitted singles.
But the trend of overprotective or interfering measures over students' personal choice could be on the rise.
The BBC reported on Monday a college in the northwestern city of Xian recently required female but not male students to take a chastity pledge as part of a school course.
The pledge, shared on social media in China, read, "I promise to myself, my family, my friends and my future spouse and children that I will refuse all kinds of premarital intercourse before I step into a lifelong monogamous marriage."
The pledge was condemned as sexist by some commenters.Yes, just like the millions of people who watch the “Real World” and think WTF, sometimes the cast members cringe, too.
“Oh yeah… There was one episode or two that was hard on my family, and they were just like, ‘wow,’” recalls Landon Lueck of the on-screen partying during “The Real World: Philadelphia.” “But with respect to MTV they told me that. They’ll show the highest of highs and lowest of lows and everything in between.”
That about sums up every season of the “Real World,” and the Philadelphia cast was no different. It featured a jock in M.J. Garrett, the party animal in Landon, two gay men for the first time on the “Real World” in Karamo Brown and Willie Hernandez, a developing relationship between Landon and Shavonda Billingslea, as well as Sarah Burke and Melanie Silcott.
The last episode of “Real World: Philadelphia” aired just more than 10 years ago. The seven strangers have gone from college kids to adults. They’re mothers and fathers. One still works in showbiz, recently hosting a show on the Oprah Winfrey Network. Another is a lawyer. They’re actually in the real world.
After the show
As their time on the “Real World” ended, one director told the cast the best thing they could do was return to their normal lives. Landon found out it wasn’t so easy.
He tried going back to college at the University of Wisconsin. Before the show aired, he went through his regular routine of class and going out with friends. Then September 2004 came, and everyone saw him
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eating away at her. They said yes, but pointed out she was not autistic so it did not make sense she acted like that. I said maybe and gently reminded them that not only autistics have difficulty dealing with complicated emotions.
For the rape, I just listened and added a few thoughts to help guide them in more helpful directions. They asked why she was going to this person she knew was a rapist, even if she was trying to get a confession. One then asked if the girl was dumb and thought she was in a movie going to entrap him like that. They did not understand any of her actions leading up to the rape. I interjected here to ask if her actions justified the rape and they changed tack very quickly (honestly, I was just unwilling to let any boy think an action from a girl ever justified rape – and they jumped to the same conclusion almost immediately). They said no, it was not her fault. It was the boy. They were just thinking out loud earlier and did not mean to suggest it was her fault. He hurt her and deserved to be killed (I reminded them the police exist for a reason, and to remember our society does not condone going around killing people-regardless what they do to us).
What surprised me was the next thing said. All of the students thought the rape alone was sufficient reason to kill oneself. They said they could imagine the powerlessness and pain of having something like that happen and how a person would want to not exist. They were angry at the teacher on the show for not taking it seriously when Hannah reported the specifics of the rape to him and passively sought help.
Okay…that was sort of intense a conversation for a bunch of 7th-8th graders, so I had a few questions to put things in context. I asked if they understood suicide was a permanent thing. It was ending a life. Killing one’s self. No coming back. It was not an idea to be taken lightly or to joke about. They understood that. It was actually for this reason they were confused. These students heard peers talking about how cool the show was and how “lucky” Hannah was that she just solved her problem. These autistic students thought she made a bad choice and could have gone to therapy or given the tapes to the police rather than kill herself.
I agreed with the students that suicide is literally the most extreme option and that it does not actually solve any problems. The problems and life are still there for everyone else to deal with, you just do not exist any more. They felt that suicide was not a good idea and still did not understand why friends were speaking positively about it like it was cool. I suggested that their friends either were dealing with things these students did not know about or else they could be showboating and trying to sound cool.
Apparently, that last sentence was what these students needed to hear. They could handle the fact that perhaps their peers had hard lives. They also could understand that these kids were being stupid and joking about things they didn’t know anything about.
Regardless, we all agreed suicide is not a good idea and we should go talk to out parents or school counselors if we ever have suicidal thoughts. The social worker reported to me these students had stopped talking about 13 Reasons Why afterwards. Apparently they had no more burning questions and thus were able to just let it go and move on.
Example 2 – Suicide as an Extreme Solution to a Manageable Problem
This was a tougher conversation because the student was angry at all adults when we sat down to chat. Earlier that morning this student had thrown themselves into traffic on a major thoroughfare with a hope of getting hit by a car. Fortunately the car had stopped. The parents, rather than taking this student home, delivered them to school as normal. Needless to say, this student never made it to class as they started trashing the school the second they got inside. They climbed up on things and tried to belly flop off them to harm themselves. I physically intervened to get the student into the gym and away from a crowded hallway. They ended up hanging out with me for a while on the stairs to the stage in the gym while no one was in there.
I asked what was up and I was told to “…go fuck yourself” and “shut the hell up you bitch asshole. You don’t know anything”. Clearly they were not going to talk to me. So we sat next to another for an hour or so, staring at the gym floor. Importantly, I did not pull out my phone or look at papers I had. I just sat with this student, waiting for them to be ready. Just as bored as them. Finally the student asked a loaded question: “Why do you like me. No one likes me?”.
I answered honestly, “I don’t know, I just do”. The student was confused, but knew I was telling the truth. So we sat some more. By now I had memorized every scratch and flecks on the gym floor. The student then, out of the blue, notified me they tried to kill themself by jumping into the road on the way to school. I asked where. They answered (it was a well thought out location). They recounted what happened, that they had planned it all weekend, waited until the right moment, and went for it. But failed. The student was mad it didn’t work, but not overly concerned, so I was concerned.
I asked if there was anything the student wanted to talk about, no limitations on the topic. The student said no and returned to staring at the floor. But they did not move away from me, so I stared at the floor too and waited. Probably 5 minutes later they told me they were sad or angry all the time and never had any fun. Play was not fun. Video games were not fun. Riding their bike was not fun. They had no friends. They hated school. They were mad at one parent and violently lashing out at the other one during weekend visits. They spent the weekend alternating between crying and looking for sharp things in the house to throw at this parent. The student said that it was because they were so angry and mad and sad that they wanted to kill themself to start over.
I interjected, “Start over? What do you mean?”. I had dealt with suicidal students in the past and they often did not understand the concept of death and its (as far as we know) permanence. After my question the student looked at me like I just asked directions to my own house. They told me that “suiciding myself” would start everything over. I restated that I didn’t understand how it would “start everything over, what does that mean?”.
This part scared me as I had often heard it before. The student had a belief that can be best understood by remembering how obsessed autistic kids are with Minecraft. The student believed that if they died they would “spawn” somewhere else as another person and perhaps they would be happier.
So, this student that had just made a suicide attempt believed that death was like a video game. They would just respawn somewhere else on the map and start afresh. I texted the school social worker and kept the conversation going. It was now beholden on me to help a child to understand that death is permanent. Life was not a video game. When we go, we are gone. And people are sad because of that.
I spoke to this student about reality and fantasy. We talked about his family’s religious belief system with regards to the afterlife. This student had never considered that the idea of a heaven was incongruous with their ideas of “respawing” or whatever reincarnation scenario they perceived as life after death.
This got the student thinking. They asked, “so suiciding myself is not a good idea, huh?”. I asked what they thought and the student said, “I dunno”. I asked if they wanted me to call their therapist for an impromptu conversation and the student said yes. In the time we were waiting on the therapist this student opened up about a LOT of perceived problems at home. I listened calmly and without judgment. It was clearly cathartic for the student.
I texted the psychologist, who was able to move things around and come to the school for the rest of the day to work with this student and extend upon the conversation the student and I had, which the student recounted to the psychologist so the therapist knew where to begin based on what this student comprehended from our conversation.
This student remained depressed and anxious, but at least they did not attempt anything dramatic after our little chat.
Example 3 – Slenderman and an Ominous Black Skull
This is continuing from my Slenderman post and about the student that was trying to encourage the rest of the students in the class to commit suicide. I had mentioned that this student had been talking about suicide and that was what brought the CreepyPasta connection to my attention. Everything below I pieced together from talking to this student and his peers as I never did get the whole story from the paraeducators that were present at the time this behavior emerged.
This student was outside one day and running around screaming that he was going to die and it was time. He was telling other students that they should do it as a group and he would show them how. He told them they would go to the tallest building in the city and jump off. If they survived the doctors would give them strong pain pills that they would use to overdose themselves. He took some peers up on the jungle gym and jumped off to show them how. He then climbed back up and started pushing the other students down to show them how to commit suicide.
I was talking to a teacher mentor (as this was before school) and a paraeducator brought this student into the school and said he was “not invited at school any more because he was saying inappropriate things and pushing kids”. That was all I got. My paraeducator was trying to ban this student from school, so obviously I had to intervene. The student was so upset that he ran to a corner, hung his head and started sobbing. I walked over.
I asked him what was up and he said he was sad. I said that was fine. Sad is okay. I would sit by him until he was ready to talk. I quickly set the day up with the paraeducators to teach the class and I sat by this student. After 15 minutes he started to talk.
He told me he wanted to kill himself. He could not sleep the night before because in his dreams he saw a black skull in the clouds that was seeping blood. This was an omen that he was going to be murdered. He told me he had stolen matches from his house and tried to open the knife drawer, but no one knew he had tried. He wanted to not exist any more. Everything was bad and there was no point to his existing. Death would be a good break. His family would be happy. He would no longer be a problem. He would no longer be bad.
After a few minutes of listening I asked him if he was ready to come inside so we could talk in a private spot with chairs. He said no, so we sat outside in the wind staring at the rubber chips in the play area. After a few more minutes he told me he was too sad to do anything and I just needed to let him curl up in a ball and die. I told him I was not allowed to do that, but I would walk to the other side of the play area to give him some privacy if he wanted. He wanted me to stay close because he was scared. So I stayed.
After an hour or so the student wanted to go inside and sit in a safe dark place so I said that was fine and let him. He immediately fell asleep. I took advantage of the time to talk to the school psychologist, call his parents, and communicate to the clinical psychologist associated with the district.
The next day the district sent a crisis team to work with this student. They followed him around during an extended recess and were talking to him. I had warned them to keep and eye on the school boundaries as this student was capable of bolting and taking them on a chase. He walked them out to the border of the school boundaries and started talking to them. He told them a range of stories that got the attention of the crisis team.
He told them about the time he tried to murder his little brother and the time he accidentally broke his sister’s arm with a baseball bat. He told them that he played with himself a lot and he was a devil worshiper. He also runs away from home at night.
Not one of these stories were true. Some had elements of truth that was used as a base for the lie. But he got one hell of an emotional reaction from these four adults. They were concerned about him being psychotic and dangerous. They worried about his well-being. They clearly were feeding this student’s attention seeking tendencies. And better, he was able to make up extreme stuff with his imagination and these people were believing every word he said and feeding him emotions in return. Emotional manipulation at it’s finest.
I assert he was just telling the adults what they expected to hear and he was protecting himself by not telling the truth. Kids are not going to reveal their secrets to strangers and let alone adults that are new. This student felt out these adults, saw they were hanging on every word, and he went for it. Since they were definitely giving reactions, he continued. Had the crisis team kept straight faces without giving emotional fuel to the fire, they may have at least gotten closer to the truth. Definitely this student would not have made himself out to sound like a complete psychopath to get attention.
When the district clinical psychologist came to visit, I debriefed her not on what this student had said, but that he had been emotionally playing the crisis team for chumps. He had been escalating his stories based on their reactions and she needed to keep an eye on that when she spoke to him.
The district psychologist met with this student for a few hours and then with his mother. After a few rounds of telling tall tales and getting no reaction, the student dropped his guard and just started telling the truth of the situation, which was pretty much the same as he told me. He did volunteer some information to her that he did not give me like knowing where firearms and ammunition were located in grandparent’s houses.
The consensus was that this student was not in fact suicidal. But he was well capable of it and we had to treat it as a serious situation as his plan was credible and well thought out. The student had been careful in word usage with both me and the clinical psychologist that he had, in the past, tried to kill himself, but that was when he was “very, very, very, very – 4 very’s – angry” but that right now he was only “very very – 2 very’s – angry”. He did want to commit suicide that day when talking to his friends, but that was because he was so angry at himself for being a not good friend and a bad person because he was depressed.
He notified me that he had in fact tried to severely injury (but never kill) his brother using knives and other sharp objects. He used to escape his house through his window until his parents put an alarm on it. He had tried to start the house on fire.
He did not know why he did these things, but he really wanted to at the time and then later feels guilty about it and wants to kill himself. He constantly causes himself pain to punish himself for being bad, mostly by stabbing himself on the end of his fingers with nails or pins. He also draws bloody and angry things because it lets him see what he is feeling. The picture below is God (“Heavenly Father”) killing him using every means necessary to be sure the job gets done.
He then told me he wanted to kill himself to solve these problems. I asked how it would solve them. He said, “I would be gone, and I am the problem”. I asked how that would work and he countered with a very hard, yet heartfelt question, “Dr. H. What happens when we die. Where do we go or do we just go away?”
I went over his family’s religious perspective on heaven and an afterlife. We discussed reincarnation based on the Hindu tradition (he brought it up). We discussed that reincarnation is not in any way related to respawning in Minecraft or Super Mario Bros. To this day I do not know if he truly understood death was a permanent state, or even if he was yet capable of understanding permanence of decisions. It was an important conversation nonetheless because it allowed this student an opportunity to contemplate mortality with someone there to help with context rather than doing it on his own when sad, angry, or depressed.
At that point we made a deal. We discussed how depression is not bad. Being mad at one’s self or at other people is not bad. Being anxious is not bad. Being hyper is not bad. Choosing to be naughty is the problem (and for the record this kid could be naughtier than almost any other student I ever met when he chose to). We would do the following: If he was feeling too strong an emotion and he felt out of control, he could talk to me about it. I would give him space to deal with it and then we would do work. If he was depressed he would tell me. If he wanted to kill himself he would tell me and we would talk through it together. If he was happy he similarly would tell me and we would talk through his happiness together.
I was rewarding the sharing, not the specific emotion being shared with attention; and I was doing it on purpose. Sharing became easier. The major bouts of depression dropped from weekly to biweekly to monthly. This student was functioning better. But he still had days where there was nothing he could do but feel buried by his depression and extreme anger. So I gave him space to let himself be emotional with no consequences; with the expectation that schoolwork would still be completed.
It is my true belief the clinical psychologist only got the truth from this student by being patient and completely nonplussed. In every case (and with me on many situation), this student always started with 2-3 lies to protect himself; and these were usually bombshell level whoppers calibrated Thor maximum effect. If he got a response to one of the lies, he would double down on it and make a believable narrative out of it. This freaked out a lot of people and they truly thought of him as a dangerously unstable child and in great need of institutionalization.
In reality, he is a cripplingly shy autistic child that presents like a person with borderline personality. He has too much empathy to function sometimes, particularly for injustices toward animals and disabled children. His empathy leads him to rage, which he internalizes. He shuts down and becomes self-critical (and self harming) when he makes a mistake and gets corrected in a brusque manner. He would be hyper and almost manic when he was in a good mood, drawing 20-30 amazing pictures in an hour while talking to friends and cracking jokes, then he would crash and retreat into a virtually impenetrable shell of depression and fear. Yes, when angry he was capable of violence, even extreme violence; but this was not his defining characteristic. When he was given some coping skills and a listening ear that just listen to his feelings and validate them, he became somewhat able to manage his own emotions.
Most importantly, his reported suicidal ideation went down with time, even when his depressive and manic states did not change all that much in frequency. He was developing some emotional identification and coping skills. This student just needed to have someone not judge them.
Conclusions
From an earlier post on autism and emotion:
[W]e constantly tell autistic chidden (and adults) that their emotional world is wrong. We tell them that they are broken and they need to at least act like everyone else because that is somehow “right” or “correct”. We demand they feel how we want them to; often because we are not comfortable with others feeling differently than ourselves. What should be happening is that we need to be specifically helping autistic children understand and work with their emotions. In fact, we need to do this with all children, but I will focus on autistic children as they are my future students. Despite the public perception, what I see when I see autistic individuals are very emotional people. In fact, I would say in every way other than the verbal expression of their internal state, they have a much more intimate appreciation of their emotional state than many of us do. It is not that autistic people wear their emotions on their sleeves, they don’t-but their actions are much more closely linked to their affective state than a great many people. As a concrete example, my late brother was very giggly, smiley, puckish, mischievous and silly when happy, very weepy and prone to cry when sad, and get out of his way if he was frustrated or angry. Interestingly, it was not just the angry states that left Kyle in a state where he could not function, when he was happy and puckish his life was just as disrupted as when he was angry or sad. He felt his emotions quite acutely, but he did not have the tools necessary to work within his emotions in day-to-day life. In my short time teaching I have found that it is actually quite easy to connect emotionally with the autistic kids I have worked with. They are keen to share, so long as there is no manipulation intended on my part and that I am patient with them as they work through their issues. I find if I take the time to ask the right questions and listen closely to the answers, I can actually serve as a sort of sounding board or therapist that can help my autistic students understand their emotions and not be controlled by them.
I do everything I can to follow my own advice here. For suicidal ideation and suicide attempts, I validate their emotions. I know autistics have a rich emotional life, they just sometimes lack a skill-set or toolbox necessary to express this to the rest of us. So I try to meet them halfway. I do not volunteer words or ways to express the emotion, I just express that I believe that they are feeling what they think they are. Then we work together to give these emotions names and characters that we can use to communicate.
I want autistic students to feel empowered by the knowledge of their feelings and sense of control that it brings. In short, I want them to thrive, emotionally. I want them to grow. And I want them, to be the ones making these breakthroughs, not me.by Michael D. Green
03/14/2017
In this blog post I wanted to take some time to demonstrate how to control SQL Login permissions in SQL Azure. When you create a SQL Azure Database, an admin user will be created in the SQL Azure Database. In most cases, you will not want to give normal users access to this account and you probably don’t want applications accessing your SQL Azure Database using this account.
This tutorial will assume:
You have access to an Azure Subscription
You have access to SQL Server Management Studio
You have access to a SQL Azure Database
You have the ability to log into the SQL Azure Database as the default Admin user
/* Run on the master database */ CREATE LOGIN SomeReadOnlyLogin WITH password='somepassword' GO CREATE USER [SomeReadOnlyLoginUser] FOR LOGIN [SomeReadOnlyLogin] WITH DEFAULT_SCHEMA=[dbo] GO
/* Run on each database the user will have access too */ CREATE USER [SomeReadOnlyLoginUser] FOR LOGIN [SomeReadOnlyLogin] WITH DEFAULT_SCHEMA=[dbo] GO /* Add user to the db_datareader role to restrict permissions to read only */ EXEC sp_addrolemember 'db_datareader', 'SomeReadOnlyLoginUser'; GO
/* Run on the master database */ CREATE LOGIN SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureLogin WITH password='somepassword' GO CREATE USER [SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureLoginUser] FOR LOGIN [SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureLogin] WITH DEFAULT_SCHEMA=[dbo] GO
/* Run on each database the user will have access too */ /* Create a new database role that allows users to execute stored procedures */ CREATE ROLE [db_executor] AUTHORIZATION [dbo] GO GRANT EXECUTE TO [db_executor] GO /* Add user to roles for reading, writing and executing stored procedures */ CREATE USER [SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureUser] FOR LOGIN [SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureLogin] WITH DEFAULT_SCHEMA=[dbo] GO EXEC sp_addrolemember 'db_datareader', 'SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureUser'; GO EXEC sp_addrolemember 'db_datawriter', 'SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureUser'; GO EXEC sp_addrolemember 'db_executor', 'SomeReadWriteExecuteProcedureUser';
You can find a list of built in SQL Azure roles here
You can find more information about SQL Logins in Azure here
Step 1) Open up SQL Server Management Studio and log into your SQL Azure Database as the Admin user. Navigate to the “master”, right-click and choose “New Query”.Step 2) In the Query Window, paste the following script and change the Login and password to those of your choosing:In SQL Azure, SQL Users access the Server though Logins and Logins are Server-wide.Step 3) Next, since the Using command does not work in SQL Azure, you will want to navigate to each Database on the server that you wish to give the Read Only User access to and execute the following script:Step 1) Open up SQL Server Management Studio and log into your SQL Azure Database as the Admin user. Navigate to the “master”, right-click and choose “New Query”.Step 2) In the Query Window, paste the following script and change the Login and password to those of your choosing:Step 3) Next, since the Using command does not work in SQL Azure, you will want to navigate to each Database on the server that you wish to give the READ/WRITE/EXECUTE Stored Procedures User access to and execute the following script:On 21 November The Spectator is hosting a discussion about addiction — disease or choice? — and how we should best treat it. This neatly coincides with ‘Live like a Stoic’ week (25 November–1 December), which culminates in academics and doctors discussing how far problems of everyday life can be solved by the Stoic practice of thinking rationally about them — in modern parlance ‘cognitive behavioural therapy’ — rather than by expensive medical intervention.
Stoicism was invented by Zeno, a Greek from Citium in Cyprus. In about 301 bc, he began teaching in one of Athens’ covered walkways (a stoa, whence ‘stoicism’). His work was to influence two thinkers in particular: Epictetus (c. ad 50–135), a Greek who started life as a slave and ended up leading a famous school of philosophy, consulted (we are told) by the emperor Hadrian; and the ancient world’s most famous doctor, Galen (c. ad 130–210).
Epictetus’s contribution was to insist that we should distinguish between what we can and what we cannot control. We can, he insisted, control what goes on in our head — our beliefs, motives and state of mind; but we cannot control, hard though we may try, our health, property or social standing. Happiness therefore depended not on ‘externals’ like money or society, but on our thought-processes. Think properly, control what we can control, and never come to harm. Galen had a wider vision: a balance that must be maintained between e.g. food and drink, exercise, mental state and so on, and ways of helping patients to achieve this for themselves. Both were practical thinkers, arguing that happiness was in our own hands. Not that it was easy: both insisted that one had to work hard at it by regular, disciplined reflection and action.
Coming soon: an Epicurean week? Not that Epicurus was all fun and frolics. He classified ‘desire’ into three categories: (i) natural and necessary, (ii) natural and unnecessary, and (iii) unnatural and unnecessary, and reckoned only (i) made you happy. Spoil-sport.Panasonic Corp. said Friday it will start manufacturing lithium-ion batteries for electric cars in fiscal 2019 at its plant in Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture, expanding domestic production to meet growing demand for green vehicles across the globe.
The batteries for electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids will be produced for shipment to domestic automakers, Panasonic said. The Osaka-based electronics maker is likely to spend tens of billions of yen on setting up production lines there.
The Himeji plant currently manufactures small and medium-size liquid crystal display panels for vehicles and medical equipment. To make the batteries, it will use the space left unused at the plant after withdrawing from LCD TV panel production in 2016 amid fierce production from foreign rivals.
Panasonic has been expanding its lithium-ion battery production both at home and abroad.
The Japanese electronics maker supplies lithium-ion batteries to U.S. electric-car maker and energy company Tesla Inc., and the two companies also jointly run a plant in Nevada named Gigafactory that mass-produces the batteries.
Within Japan, Panasonic already has five other lithium-ion battery production plants.
Automakers are shifting toward low-emission vehicles amid tighter emissions regulations across the globe.
The British and French governments have said they will ban sales of gasoline-driven cars and diesel-powered vehicles by 2040. China, the world’s biggest car market, is also tightening rules to push the move toward electric cars.President Obama faces an enormously difficult challenge over the next few weeks.
On the one hand, this moment is ripe for fundamental change. There is a pervasive sense that the nation is at a Sputnik moment when it either rises to face the international competition or it does not. Commissions are churning out sweeping proposals. The economy is strong enough for policy makers to think beyond the immediate crisis but not so strong that it allays the national fear of decline.
On the other hand, just as the popular longing for change is at its strongest, the political barriers preventing change are at their strongest, too. The Democrats in Congress distrust the White House and can barely work with the Republicans. Republicans are not in a mood to compromise and can barely work with the Democrats. Many in both parties are willing to wait until 2013, when their side might have more leverage. Voters are cynical about all of them and want every program cut except the ones they benefit from.
Obama’s challenge in the State of the Union address is to give voice to the inchoate longing for change, and to chart a political path through the Washington minefield so that voters and bond markets have the sense that the country is at least beginning to grapple with its problems.
To do that, the president doesn’t have to go out on a limb and embrace specific (and politically suicidal) hard choices. But he probably does have to violate some taboos, on right and left, to give people a sense that everything is now up for discussion.
Advertisement Continue reading the main storyI wanted to share another meditation method that I have found extremely helpful for a good night’s sleep or even just to relax yourself after a stressful day.
The following guided meditation involves visualizing light emitting from various parts of the body creating a sense of relaxation.
First lay down in bed in a quiet room with the lights out. Place your arms at your side and close your eyes.
We start with picking a body part that is already in a relaxed state. That could be an ear lobe, the tip of your nose or any other body part that you feel is already in a state of relaxation.
Next envision a bright speck of light glowing from this body part. The light can be any color. For me, I always tend to choose blue.
Admire how bright the light is and with your mind move the light to your feet. The light encompasses your feet and bathes in its brilliance.
Focus on this for a few more moments and then move the light up through your legs. It’s important to visualize the light glowing around every part of your legs, front and back.
After a few moments visualizing this raise the light up to your chest. As you breath in see the light dim. Exhale slowly and visualize the light becoming bright again. Repeat this for about 8 to 10 breathes.
Now move the light to your back. See the light at its most brilliant state. At this point you really start feeling that your body is in a perfect state of relaxation.
Finally, move the the light to your face and illuminate your entire body. As you breath in let the light dim and as you breath out see the brilliance of the light throughout your whole body. Again, repeat this for another 8 to 10 breathes.
Continue to breathe slowly and allow the light to fade for a few minutes, getting dimmer and dimmer as each moment passes. Clear your mind of any thoughts and allow yourself to drift off into sleep.
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Last night I downloaded Sonic Team’s Nights from PlayStation Network and began to play it. During the day I’d heard rumblings on Twitter that suggested people don’t think the game stacks up to its reputation -- that it hasn’t aged well, that it was overrated to begin with.
This is a bunch of horseshit.
I’ll admit that I wasn’t able to actually bring myself to read, for example, the Polygon review of Nights, because the subhead -- “Sega shows a loved classic plenty of respect in this remaster, but Nights doesn't stand the test of time” -- told me everything I cared to know about it. I quickly realized didn’t want to hear about why. I wanted to experience it for myself.
So I downloaded the brand-spanking new, HD port of Nights on PlayStation 3, curious to see if this was true. I’d loved the game in 1996, but things have changed a lot since then -- or so I thought, anyway. In some ways they sure have, but playing Nights reminded me that in many important ways, they have not.
I remember getting this in the mail in 1996.
I can barely describe my feelings when I first booted up the game. It was a tsunami. I was awash in nostalgia while dreading the idea that the critics might be right, and just plain tired and stressed from work and life.
A couple of hours later, I liked Nights better than I did at the time, and for what I would call more salient reasons.
To love Nights, you really have to understand its design. I was about to write that “you can say that about any game” but these days, that’s not actually true. So many of today’s games are designed to be experiences that people progress through once, and that’s the end. Understanding a game is something only its most hardcore fans can be expected to even consider.
Developers talk of signposting things for players, making things easier for them. In Nights, you can’t access the game’s final level until you get at least a C ranking on the rest of them -- something that’s not going to happen until you begin to understand the game.
At the time, people scratched their heads at the game because it wasn’t a linear platformer -- because that’s what they expected from Sonic Team, the creators of the Sonic franchise (which, back then, had only ever been presented in 2D.) If anything, I think things are even worse now, because Nights is in a real no man’s land of game design. While platformers don’t have the currency they once did, today’s mainstream games are either tightly controlled and linear or total sandboxes.
Nights is a game about risk and reward: trying to score as many points as possible by learning the best routes through its stages and using every possible second of its constantly ticking timer to your advantage. It’s a very lean, very clever design, and also an inventive one. It takes key ideas from Sonic -- speed, maneuverability, collection -- and amps them up, stripping away the rest (so much so that it’s, at first blush, confusing.)
It’s a game that grades you based on your performance, as I mentioned. If you’re not into the idea of getting better at a game that you’re playing -- practicing and improving -- well, you’re not going to be into Nights. But that’s your problem, not Nights’.
Not every game is, or should be, an endless parade of new content, and Nights only shares its secrets with you if you can figure out how to find them. Nights is a game about flow -- getting into the groove, learning to play the game, learning to get better at the game, and not wanting to do anything else.
I had to tear myself away from the controller to go to bed.
Nights also stands out simply because of how joyful it is. It's purely a game about wonder, excitement, and feeling good: beautiful dreams of flying. Aesthetically, it's unified around this, from the visuals to the music. The game also constantly tries to surprise the player, with clever and amusing ideas -- rings you can only see in a mirror, for example -- sprinkled through the levels to add pique.
Watch this video.
This game came from an era when we weren’t spoiled by the capabilities of our consoles, and developers did the best they could with what they had. So while I’m no longer amazed by the realtime environmental deformation in the Soft Museum level nor dismayed by the faked transparencies in Splash Garden, I’m still astounded at what a cohesive, evocative aesthetic package this game offers. Last night, I felt better after playing Nights than I did before playing Nights.
In fact, Nights is unique, in the true sense of the word. You hear that word a lot these days -- usually paired with an adverb, such as “very unique” or “somewhat unique”. This usually means something is very slightly inventive.
Those constructions water down the word’s primary meaning: the only one of its kind. And there is no other game like Nights. I also don’t like what they imply about creativity. There is no other game that feels like Nights, looks and sounds like Nights, or plays like Nights. For that reason alone, I think it deserves recognition and respect -- in the age of clones and endless riffs on whatever’s working this year.
If you can’t play and enjoy Nights, well, I’m sorry for you. Because it’s a taut and beautiful game -- not a flawless one, of course, but one that goes for a design you can’t find in any other game and does it extraordinarily well. It’s part of video games’ canon, and should be thought of that way, not as a quirky old game that just doesn’t make sense anymore. Its design is as solid as it was in 1996, and it still has things to teach us if we just keep our minds open.Until now most partnerships were reluctant to admit which cameras were the biggest earners, normally only releasing the information following a Freedom of Information application.
But under proposals drawn up by Mike Penning, the road safety minister, they will have to publish information to justify the use of cameras.
"For the first time people will be able to see whether their local cameras are
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rushed toward the burning building.
His security detail tried to hold him back, but the mayor heard a woman inside the blazing building yell and demanded they release him.
Eventually the detective who was trying to hold him back relented and went inside of the burning building with Booker.
"I wasn't going to let him go in, but he said, 'If I don't go in this lady is going to die,'" recalled Detective Alex Rodriguez. "I was trying to hold him by the belt to keep him from going into the fire, but he gave me an order and I complied."
Lamar Hodge, the uncle of the woman, was also in the house when the fire broke out. He was among the residents Booker and his security detail helped rescue and told NBC New York how much he appreciated their efforts.
As for Booker, "He saved my niece," Hodge said. "He's a hero."
Hodge lives in the unit below his niece and said the flames prevented her from getting downstairs and escaping the flames. When he saw Booker leave the building, he said his niece was in the mayor's arms.
Booker, a prolific social media user, tweeted late Thursday about his experience.
"Thanks 2 all who are concerned. Just suffering smoke inhalation,'' Booker tweeted. "We got the woman out of the house. We are both off to hospital. I will b ok.''
The cause of the fire is not yet known.
The mayor is known for coming to the aid of his constituents, even helping them shovel snow during a blizzard that crippled the city and Northeast in 2010.
Get the latest from NBC 4 New York anytime, anywhere. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Sign up for email newsletters here. Get breaking news delivered right to your phone -- just text NYBREAKING to 639710. For more info, text HELP. To end, text STOP. Message and data rates may apply.
Copyright Associated Press / NBC New YorkGuest Post: Same Old GOP on Climate? May 21, 2013
Last week I linked to Coral Davenport’s notable article in National Journal, “The Coming GOP Civil War on Climate Change”. I still think it’s a significant indicator that we are nearing a turning point on climate science for the Republican party.
Rob Sisson, President of ConservAmerica, an organization of Environmentally minded conservatives, agrees that the problem is urgent, and that there are those in the Republican party who recognize the problem. He sends me this in an email:
“The sand in the hour glass is slipping away from my party. If we don’t begin to lead on climate and energy issues, we will not be capable of winning national elections. We will struggle to win the hearts and minds of young voters, under the age of 30, who understand the science of climate disruption and worry about their own future. More problematic for the GOP is the awakening of pro-life, faith voters who increasingly view strong environmental protection as part and parcel of a non-hypocritical pro-life ideal.”
More and more on the conservative side know that they are as far from the mainstream on science as they are on immigration, and that an adjustment is coming.
I’ve shared it around, and I hope it will be a catalyst for more conversation on the topic at the grass roots.
Not everyone agrees with the premise. D. R. Tucker, a frequent contributor here, doesn’t hold out much hope.
D. R. Tucker is a conservative writer and blogger whose recent essay “Confessions of a Climate Change Convert” crystalized the angst of intelligent, scientifically literate conservatives who have seen their movement taken over by Rush Limbaugh sensibilities and Sara Palin science.
From D.R.Tucker:
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"It sounds delusional now," writes Drew Housman, "but at that point I considered Harvard my team."
Jeremy Lin isn't just playing well for the Knicks. He has quickly become a leader, the man talking on the court and starring in the highlights, just as the team has dramatically improved.
Somewhere Carmelo Anthony may be thinking that was supposed to be his job, and if he is thinking that, he'll have a lot in common with Drew Housman. Housman plays professionally in Israel, runs a fantastic blog and still has big NBA dreams. But what's most important today is that Housman's the speedster point guard with deep shooting range who led the Harvard basketball team -- before his friend Jeremy Lin took over by storm.
Housman tells what that felt like then, and feels like now:
I woke up to a Facebook message. “Jeremy is going OFF on the Nets!” I thought it might have been a prank, but I quickly found out that it was all true.
Jeremy Lin, my former college teammate of three years, had outplayed an NBA all star and was earning national recognition. His legend has only continued to grow. The day after he scored 38 points on Kobe and the Lakers my normal Twitter feed could have been erased. In it’s place they could have put a single, summarizing word: “LINSANITY!”
If you had told me in the fall of 2006 that Jeremy Lin was going to become the most talked about athlete in New York City I would have literally laughed in your face. As far as I was concerned he was a scrawny freshman with no jump shot who never stopped talking about how much he missed In-n-Out Burger. His game bordered on timid during preseason pickup games. I remember thinking that he needed to get mentally tougher if he was going to contribute to the team. He definitely showed some flashes of ability that first season, but nothing that made anyone say “he will set scoring records in the NBA and Madison Square Garden will chant M-V-P while he shoots free throws.” All I saw back then was someone who I would enjoy playing with and who could become a serviceable guard in due time.
It sounds delusional now, but at that point I considered Harvard my team. It was going to be the vehicle that propelled me to baskteball stardom. Hey, Jeremy wasn’t the only one with aspirations. It’s a little crazy to consider, but in 2007, I was running the show. A show that perpetually underachieved and would accomplish nothing of note, but at least I was running it.
Then, almost all at once, it became Jeremy’s squad. He became the star of the team during my injury-plagued junior year, and by my senior season he was the focal point of the entire offense. That alone made me feel a little uneasy about my situation.
And then everything came to a head after the Boston College game.
That game marked Jeremy’s first foray onto the national stage. He single-handedly dismantled Boston College, a team that had recently defeated the number one team in the country. He was sensational. This was the first case of Linsanity gripping a group of people. We jubilantly chanted his name on the shuttle ride back to campus.
There were a few clips on SportsCenter about the game. At the time, being on TV at all was the zenith of recognition for a Harvard basketball player. The team watched the clips over and over, awed that we were actually on ESPN. That one game catapulted Jeremy, however briefly, into the national consciousness. It injected the whole program with a sense of optimism.
The whole program but for one salty, bitter person: me. I did not have a good game and only played sparingly. For me, the way that game turned out made me feel as if I had been sat down, slapped in the face, and had someone tell me: “You know how you have devoted almost your entire life to basketball? There’s a chance that was a waste of time. Your team is better off without you. And oh yeah, any adulation you thought you might earn someday is all going to Jeremy Lin.”
It really felt like a midlife crisis at age 21. That’s the crazy thing about trying to pursue basketball as a career. You know pretty early on whether there is a better chance that you will be throwing alley-oops in the NBA or learning to say “please pass me the ball” in Hebrew. So it was through skeptical, resentful lenses that I viewed Jeremy’s meteoric ascent into a household name. I have watched his career advance as if I am looking at what I could have become in an alternate universe. I dislike feeling envious of a friend, but it is almost inevitable when you see someone literally living out your dream.
Thankfully, Jeremy’s recent turn toward superstardom has coincided with my ability to set aside all grudges and just enjoy the amazing spectacle along with the rest of America. This man's ability to rise to the occasion is like nothing I have ever witnessed. He is like Dwyane Wade crossed with Doug Flutie mixed with Rudy. I wholeheartedly accept that he worked his tail off and he deserves everything that is coming to him. It feels good to be able to put aside my baggage surrounding the situation and simply appreciate one of the most amazing stories in NBA history.
Many basketball players are not taking to the rise of the Lin dynasty with quite the willingness that I have. You have to possess a certain amount of hubris to make it at any level of professional basketball, which I think is why a lot of players I talk to belittle his accomplishments. They claim that they would have done just as well if given the same opportunity.
I would beg to differ. The envy surrounding Jeremy reminds me of a scene in the movie "The Social Network." There is a point where Mark Zuckerberg gets fed up with the accusations that he stole his big idea and he has to remind people that "if you had invented Facebook, you would have invented Facebook."
If you should be the starting point guard for the New York Knicks, then you’d be the starting point guard for the New York Knicks. Simple as that. Give the man his due.
But maybe it is true that there are more unearthed gems in the sports world than people realize. This whole situation has proven that the miraculous is possible. Who knows, maybe the next big story will be about the dramatic ascent of a different guard from Harvard who spent his early years toiling away in Israel. If Jeremy has taught us anything, it is that there is no reason not to dream big.A contentious decision by one of Victoria Police's most senior officers to not proceed with charges of perverting the course of justice or perjury against two policemen will be reviewed by the Office of Public Prosecutions.
Assistant Commissioner Brett Guerin ignored the recommendations of an internal police investigation when he decided not to lay the charges against the two officers, who allegedly assaulted two teenagers in 2014.
Assistant Commissioner Brett Guerin. Credit:Wayne Taylor
Mr Guerin, who is responsible for internal force watchdog the Professional Standards Command, also chose not to consult the OPP before he proceeded with assault charges against Leading Senior Constables Dennis Gundrill and Simon Mareangareu over an alleged altercation outside a Vermont convenience store.
According to correspondence obtained by Fairfax Media, the serious allegations of perjury and attempting to pervert the course of justice will be dealt with by an internal disciplinary hearing.Sentence suspended for two years, but Liu will spend at least 10 years in jail as Xi Jinping's corruption crackdown bites
A Beijing court has sentenced China's former minister of railways Liu Zhijun to death, with a two-year reprieve, for bribery and abuse of power, China's state media reported on Monday, ending one of the country's highest-profile corruption cases in years.
Liu stood trial at Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People's Court on 9 June for accepting £6m in bribes between 1986 and 2011 and using his position to help 11 people win promotions or lucrative contracts, according to the state newswire Xinhua. He had been formally accused in April.
The court also "deprived his political right for life and confiscated all his personal property", the newswire reported. Suspended death sentences in China are usually commuted to life imprisonment. The court's verdict will require Liu to spend at least 10 years in jail.
At the end of Liu's trial, which lasted three and a half hours, the former minister broke down in tears. While reading his final statement, Liu apologised for diverging from his goal of modernising the country's rail system and achieving the "Chinese dream", a slogan adopted by China's newly anointed leader, Xi Jinping. "Prosecutors said Liu had a very good attitude in confession and a strong desire to repent," Xinhua reported.
Liu, the son of a farmer in landlocked Hubei province, began his career at the ministry of railways as a low-level office worker in the early 1970s and slowly ascended through the hierarchy until he was named minister in 2003.
Liu was a driving force behind the modernisation of China's rail system, a project that included building 10,000 miles of high-speed rail track by 2020 – with a budget of £170bn, one of the most expensive engineering feats in recent history.
Analysts say Liu's ruthless efficiency earned him the protection of higher party officials, allowing his corruption to go unchecked. He was placed under investigation in February 2011.
"The big question, of course, every time there's a big corruption scandal, is why did it take so long?" said Jean-Pierre Cabestan, an expert on Chinese politics at Hong Kong Baptist university. "This demonstrates how weak the rule of law in China is, and how personal powers and personal connections can trump all kinds of legal rules."
When a high-speed train crashed in the coastal city of Wenzhou in 2011, killing 40 people, public sentiment turned against the project – many said Chinese leaders had sacrificed too much for economic growth, leaving ordinary people behind. Liu was singled out as one of the disaster's primary culprits, and state media began to highlight his misdeeds and gloss over his decades of achievement.
Analysts have linked Liu's trial to a high-profile frugality and anti-corruption campaign spearheaded by Xi, which aims to repair the party's image in the eyes of an increasingly disillusioned populace. Xi has vowed that the campaign will target both "tigers" and "flies", referring to officials at all levels of the Communist party hierarchy.
Chinese media reports suggest the evidence laid out against Liu represented only a fraction of his malfeasance. His charges did not include assets recovered in related cases, including millions of pounds denominated in various currencies, including euros, US dollars and Hong Kong dollars.
The Beijing Times reported that investigations into Liu recovered 16 cars and more than 350 flats. He had 18 mistresses "including actresses, nurses and train stewards", the state-run Global Times reported in 2011.
"It's really a matter of how much does this really prove that Xi Jinping is serious about anti-corruption, or whether it's really more about ostentatious corrupt practices," said Steve Tsang, a professor of Chinese studies at the University of Nottingham. "And in this case, there's not enough evidence that it's about corruption itself, and not just ostentatious displays of corruption."Hillary Clinton has made it no secret that she is a friend of abortion giant Planned Parenthood. The relationship between Hillary and Planned Parenthood dates back many years and Hillary received Planned Parenthood’s (2009) Margaret Sanger Award. In 2015, Politico noted the closeness Clinton had with Planned Parenthood, writing:
But Clinton’s relationship with Planned Parenthood goes beyond a shared belief in a woman’s right to choose. The group is interwoven with a network of women’s organizations that are among her strongest backers, and Planned Parenthood leaders and activists are among her personal friends, including President Cecile Richards… Clinton’s relationship with Planned Parenthood also extends to the Clinton Global Initiative. For the past two years Planned Parenthood has been a member of CGI and in 2012 committed to train “youth peer providers” in Latin America, Africa and the U.S. on ways to promote birth control.
Planned Parenthood remains the top donor among abortion rights advocacy groups to political campaigns, and has vowed to spend $20 million to usher Hillary Clinton into the White House. Planned Parenthood supporters and former staffers are deeply embedded within the Hillary presidential campaign. They include:
Mandy Hagseth, a Hillary for America staffer in South Dakota. Hagseth was the 2015 public affairs consultant to Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota.
Kate Magsamen, who served as Hillary’s New York co-director and was the director of development for Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast (Louisiana) from May 2011 to July 2012.
Lisa Changadveja, who served as the get-out-the-vote director for the Colorado Democratic party in the 2014 election cycle and previously as deputy field director for Colorado Democrats in 2010. Most recently, she formerly served as Hillary for America’s Asian-American outreach director. From July 2011 to May of 2012, she worked as the regional field manager at Planned Parenthood Federation of America. In that position, she organized volunteers to lobby and defeat “high-priority health committee votes” in Alabama.
Richard McDaniel, who is the Primary States Regional Director for Hillary for America. McDaniel previously served as the Southern regional political director for Hillary for America. Prior to the Clinton campaign, McDaniel was the political director for Nunn for Senate and the Georgia Democratic Party. McDaniel previously worked in the D.C. area as the national organizer for SEIU and as state director in Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, and Connecticut. In 2010, McDaniel also served as Planned Parenthood Southeast’s legislative coordinator and the 2009 field director.
Mini Timmaraju, who is Hillary for America’s Women’s Outreach Director. Between 2012 and 2013, she also worked for the Director of the Office of the President at Planned Parenthood Federation of America. In addition, Timmaraju was formerly the Vice President of Public Affairs and Government Relations for Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, Inc. as well as the political director for Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas Action Fund, Inc.
Lauren Peterson, who is Hillary for America’s Director of Content and Creative. She previously served on Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Presidential Inaugural Committee, Obama for America, and was a Senior advisor and writer for Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Peterson’s duties also included speechwriter for Planned Parenthood president, Cecile Richards.
Emily Bengtson, who is Hillary’s Social Media Director and previously served as the digital state campaigns manager and digital content specialist at Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
Brenda Kole, who serves as Hillary for Iowa’s 2016 Constituency Director following her stint as scheduling director for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 campaign. She also worked on Tom Vilsack’s 2002 re-election campaign, Monica Vernon’s 2014 congressional primary campaign, and Jack Hatch’s 2014 gubernatorial campaign. Kole was also the 2008 – 2013 director of advocacy and organizing at Planned Parenthood of the Heartland and has worked for NARAL Pro-Choice America in Iowa.
Cara Ortiz, who serves as Travel Coordinator at Hillary for America and has previously been an Intern for the campaign. She has also served as Accreditation and Evaluation Intern for Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
Former Planned Parenthood staffers are not the only ones joining the Clinton race to the White House; so are allies of the abortion business such as Lily Adams, eldest daughter of Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood.
In 1988, journalist Paul Baumann prophetically penned a story about the daughter of Richards, who was not yet the CEO of Planned Parenthood. A 1988 headline, featuring a report by Baumann reads: Campaigns may be in Lily’s future. His prediction was correct. As Live Action News has previously reported, in addition to working for Hillary Clinton’s campaign, Adams has worked for pro-abortion Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) – and her father, Kirk Adams, International Executive Vice President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which is known for supporting Planned Parenthood. Lily Adams also served as press secretary for Senator Tim Kaine, now on the ticket as Clinton’s vice-presidential running mate.If scientists have been "plotting" to show evolution, they had plant the lacking link someplace. individually, i do no longer think in evolution, yet your question is a splash..erm.. perplexing. you are able to no longer probably plant fossils interior the floor like that. Too many human beings might understand. As a Creationist myself, I do have faith there have been dinosaurs on earth. Hell, i'm no longer fullyyt confident that each and each single species is extinct. human beings locate stuff interior the Amazon widely used. there's a lot of land we've yet to locate. Who says there are not dinosaurs left? And via the way, they declare the fossils to be tens of millions of years old, no longer around 6,000, lol.
brummage · 2 years ago 0 Thumbs up 0 Thumbs down Report AbuseJim Bakker dedicated most of his television program yesterday to pitching his latest line of survival food buckets, warning that opposition to President Trump is a sign that the End Times is rapidly approaching and that humanity will face “a hellish 42 months on planet Earth” when it arrives. Those who have prepared, he said, will be able to resist having to sell their souls to the Antichrist for food.
“The news is crazy,” Bakker said. “Evil, evil, evil. And how they’re trying to destroy the president and his family, God is speaking to me about it. What He is saying is He is going to send judgment and He’s going to judge some people.”
“There is coming a time when the Bible says there will be no food to eat,” he warned. “And if you do get any food, you have to sign over to the Antichrist; that means you’ve sold your soul to the devil. You say it’ll never be that evil. What’s going on right now? Half of America hates Jesus Christ. Half of America wants to destroy the president because he’s standing up to save babies, that he stands up for religious freedom and they’re making him out as the Antichrist, as an evil person!
“It’s time to be prepared because there’s coming a time when it will be too late to get ready and that’s going to be a hellish 42 months on planet Earth,” Bakker said. “The only thing that you are going to want when these times come is going to food to eat and that’s why we’ve spent our ministry, for the last years, putting together this food for survival.”President of the Conference of European Rabbis Pinchas Goldschmidt talks during an interview with Reuters in Vienna, Austria, May 31, 2016. REUTERS/Heinz-Peter Bader
VIENNA (Reuters) - Far-right parties in some European countries are winning over Jewish voters by exploiting fears about militant Islamists and mainstream parties must do much more to address Europeans' security concerns, a Jewish leader said on Tuesday.
Boosted by Europe's migrant crisis, Norbert Hofer of Austria's anti-immigration Freedom Party only narrowly lost the country's presidential election on May 22. He would have been the first far-right head of state in the European Union.
"I understand that, most probably, a not insignificant part of the (Jewish) community here voted for Hofer for the presidency," the head of the Conference of European Rabbis (CER), Pinchas Goldschmidt, told Reuters in an interview.
Goldschmidt, who is also the chief rabbi of Moscow, said he had received reports of a similar shift among French Jews towards supporting the anti-immigration National Front ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections next year in France.
"When God gave out intelligence, not everybody stood in line. And so when those parties come with a populist message to the Jews and say 'We're going to save you from the Muslims'... propaganda is effective," he added.
Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache visited the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem in April - a gesture rich in symbolism, given the Nazis' role in Austrian history and the flight or murder of most Austrian Jews following the country's annexation by Adolf Hitler in 1938.
"Not only from the Freedom Party in Austria but also from the side of, for example, the National Front in France... and also (Geert) Wilders in Holland, they all seem to want us Jews to say they are acceptable," Goldschmidt said.
Today Austria is home to an estimated 15,000 Jews and more than 500,000 Muslims.
"DANGEROUS" POPULISM
The security threat posed by Islamist militants has become much clearer after last year's Paris attacks and must be tackled, Goldschmidt said, adding that Europe's Schengen area of passport-free travel made that more difficult.
"I think that since the populist right-wing parties raised real concerns of people, unless the mainstream parties of Europe are going to address those issues, they're going to lose."
Goldschmidt, who was in Vienna for a gathering of the CER, suggested measures including the creation of a European anti-terrorism task force, improvements in border security and more effective integration of refugees.
He also condemned what he said was the tendency of far-right parties to conflate ordinary Muslims with Islamist militants.
"(The) moderate Muslim is our natural ally. They are as much the victims of radical Islamism as we Jews. It is the populism, the generalization, which is dangerous and destructive."
(reporting by Francois Murphy; Editing by Gareth Jones)GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Club Tijuana’s American presence has expanded, with US Under-20 national team left back John Requejo Jr. announcing he is the latest player from north of the border to sign for the club.
Happy to be a part of @XolosOficial looking forward to preseason ⚽️ — John Requejo Jr. (@_JR2_) May 29, 2014
Requejo Jr. also posted a photo on his Instagram page of himself in Xolos gear next to the club’s crest, while winger Paul Arriola welcomed his new teammate to Tijuana using the same social network.
The 18-year-old Carpinteria, Calif., native previously played for renowned youth outfit Real So Cal and could back up fellow American Greg Garza at left back next season, with US international Edgar Castillo set to leave the club.
Requejo joins fellow American U-20s Arriola, Amando Moreno, Alejandro Guido and Stevie Rodriguez at Club Tijuana, who have not made the signing official as yet.
Tom Marshall covers Americans playing in Latin America for MLSsoccer.com. E-mail him at [email protected] central Ohio police agencies have a beef with whoever has been stealing thousands of dollars worth of jerky from area grocery stores.
Three central Ohio police agencies have a beef with whoever has been stealing thousands of dollars worth of jerky from area grocery stores.
On Jan. 11, a man in Worthington walked out of the Kroger at 60 E. Wilson Bridge Road with a shopping cart containing an estimated $1,300 worth of candy, beef jerky and laundry detergent about 8:30 p.m.
Police reviewed security footage and matched the description of the suspect – a 6-foot white man in his 20s or early 30s and weighing about 185 pounds – to a similar case officers had seen in Marion, with a suspect matching the man's description.
Worthington police Sgt. Michael Holton said the man had been taken into custody in Marion after being found in a "drug house" and that he had been interviewed by Worthington police but did not cooperate.
Holton would not speculate whether the suspect might have been involved with other cases around the city but said his department was preparing a grand-jury case.
Holton also said crimes involving detergent, candy and beef jerky are fairly common in the area and frequently are resold at a "mom and pop" convenience store or gas station, particularly due to beef jerky's high markup.
Two other cases similar to the Worthington incident occurred at Kroger stores in Orange Township and Dublin six days later.
According to police reports, about 9 p.m., a loss-prevention officer at the Kroger at 7625 Sawmill Road in Dublin noticed a man pushing a cart loaded with beef jerky and candy out of the store's entrance. When the officer followed the man, he saw three other people putting the items into the car. The loss-prevention officer grabbed the cart and requested that one of the men follow him back into the store, but all four men jumped into the vehicle and fled.
The stolen candy and beef jerky were valued at more than $1,400.
The next day, Delaware County sheriff's deputies responded to a call for a similar incident that had occurred about 10:30 p.m. the night before. In their report, officers noted that Kroger staff informed them of hearing about the Dublin incident.
This time, three male suspects left the store with $920 worth of beef jerky, $989 in laundry detergent and $366 in candy, for a total of $2,275 worth of merchandise.
Sheriff's reports list three potential known suspects in the case from Marion and Lewis Center.
Sheriff's office spokeswoman Tracy Whited said detergent is a commonly stolen item in many jurisdictions.
"It's like baby formula. It's something that people use a lot of regularly that's not always cheap," she said.
Whited said it was more uncommon to see thefts of large quantities of beef jerky and candy.
Despite similarities in the area cases, officers from all three agencies declined to comment on links between the incidents.
ThisWeek reporter Thomas Gallick contributed to this story.13 of the 14 warmest years on record occurred this century, according to the UN.
Publishing its annual climate report, the UN's World Meteorological Organisation said that last year continued a long-term warming trend, with the hottest year ever in Australia and floods, droughts and extreme weather elsewhere around the world.
Michel Jarraud, the WMO's secretary-general, also said there had been no 'pause' in global warming, as has been alleged by climate change sceptics. “There is no standstill in global warming,” Jarraud said.
2001-2010 was the warmest decade on record, the WMO noted, and added that the last three decades had been warmer than the previous one.
The WMO reiterated its earlier finding that 2013 was the sixth warmest on record, with temperatures 0.5C above the long-term average (1961-1990). The southern hemisphere was particularly warm, its report said, with Argentina experiencing its second warmest year on record and New Zealand its third warmest.
Arctic sea ice in 2013 did not reach the record lows seen in 2012 for minimum extent in the summer, but was at the sixth lowest on record. The WMO noted all seven of the lowest Arctic sea-ice extents took place in the past seven years, starting with 2007, which scientists were "stunned" by at the time.
"Many of the extreme events of 2013 were consistent with what we would expect as a result of human-induced climate change. We saw heavier precipitation, more intense heat, and more damage from storm surges and coastal flooding as a result of sea level rise – as typhoon Haiyan so tragically demonstrated in the Philippines," said Jarraud.
Prof Sir Brian Hoskins, director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London, said: “2013 with its mixture of record warmth and extreme weather shows a now familiar mixture of natural variability and greenhouse gas induced climate change. These annual statements document a striking long term trend, and one thing is clear: that our continuing greenhouse gas emissions are a crucial driving force in the changing climate."
Next week the UN's climate science panel, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, will publish the second part in its landmark fifth report on climate change. The report is expected to warn that food yields will suffer from future heatwaves, and the natural world will suffer severe impacts if temperatures continue to rise.Women reveals how her father impregnated her FIVE times in bid to create a 'pure' bloodline as he led a double life enjoying success as MTV award-winning producer for The Fugees
Aziza Kibibi was 8-years-old when her father, Aswad Ayinde, started sexually abusing her
Ayinde, also known as Charles McGill, won an MTV award for directing The Fugees' 'Killing Me Softly'
Ayinde was recently sentenced to a combined 90 years in prison for sexually abusing Kibibi and another one of his daughters
During his years abusing Kibibi she had five children out of incest
Kibibi was eventually able to escape and now lives with her husband in East Orange, New Jersey where she runs her own baking business
Aziza Kibibi was only eight-years-old when her father - an MTV award-winning music video director - started raping her. By 10, Aswad Ayinde's lessons teaching his daughter 'how to be a woman' turned violent and his regular raping produced five children out of incest in a perverse attempt to create a 'pure' bloodline.
Ayinde, who is also known as Charles McGill and won fame after directing The Fugees' 'Killing Me Softly' video, was sentenced to 50 years in prison on July 26, finally ending Kibibi's nightmare.
The incredibly brave woman, who is now 35, married and running a promising baking business, spoke out about the traumatic childhood this week for the first time.
Nightmare: The Pennsylvania case appears to mirror the story of New Jersey woman Aziza Kibibi, pictured, whose father raped her from the age of eight, getting her pregnant five times
Kibibi told NJ.com her childhood started off relatively normal. She lived with her mother and father on the third-floor of an apartment in Paterson, New Jersey, with her Jamaican immigrant grandparents living below.
Locked up: Her father, Aswad Ayinde, now faces a combined 90 years in prison for the sexual abuses he committed against two of his daughters
Kibibi was home-schooled but still allowed to play with the neighborhood children. When her family grew to include eight children they moved into a bigger apartment in the same building.
It was when Kibibi started to mature that her father started giving her unwanted attention.
'He told me I was special. Initially, it was to teach me to be a woman,' she said. 'By the time he started having intercourse with me, he was getting more and more violent. When I would start fighting him, he would hit me. It was more about threats.'
Her father began to change, and became more controlling over the family. He moved them out of their grandparent's apartment to another house in Paterson before relocating to Eatontown in Southern New Jersey. The children were only allowed to watch a small amount of TV, and nothing that depicted traditional family life.
Modern medicine was outlawed in the house, and he actually told his wife that his relations with Kibibi were to treat her eczema.
Kibibi wasn't the only one Ayinde was having sex with. He had a mistress - a Manhattan lawyer whom he had another two children with - and was also abusing one of Kibibi's sisters.
He called himself a polygamist and a prophet. His family was allowed to pray to god but could only do so through him.
'He said the world was going to end, and it was just going to be him and his offspring and that he was chosen,' his ex-wife, Beverly Ayinde testified at a 2010 pre-trial hearing. She said he was attempting to create a 'pure' bloodline by procreating with his daughters.
When Kibibi's first child was born without defects, Ayinde took it as proof and continued to rape the girl to get her pregnant.
Damaging: Kibibi gave birth to five children by her father, and many of them inherited a rare genetic disorder due to inbreeding
Award winner: Ayinde, who is also known as Charles McGill, won fame after directing the video for 'Killing Me Softly' by The Fugees, pictured
But the following children would not be so lucky. Two further daughters born from her father would be diagnosed with phenylketonuria (PKU) a condition that prevents the body from breaking down amino acids. PKU can cause brain damage and seizures.
Dr. Anna Haroutunian, a PKU specialist who has treated Kibibi's children, said they definitely got the condition because of inbreeding.
PKU is a recessive gene, so both parents must have the gene in order for it to pass along to the child. The gene only appears at a rate of 1 in 4,000 world wide and is must lower for African-Americans. Likely Kibibi's paternal grandfather had the gene.
Better now: Since escaping her father, Kibibi has gotten her GED, married and started her own baking business
Over the years, Kibibi became obsessed with escaping. She would sleep just because her dreams were better than real life.
'I'd dream about running away. I'd dream about getting all my brothers and sisters — one of my sisters was a baby, and I was taking care of her — I'd dream about growing breasts and getting milk and running away with them somewhere,' she said.
When she was older and one of her sons fell sick, she finally got the courage to take him to the hospital since Ayinde was out of town on a business trip.
But she didn't know how to interact with the doctors and a social worker stepped in, alerting the Department of Youth a Family Services.
When Ayinde returned from his business trip he was enraged, and threatened to forcibly remove his son from the hospital.
Child services stepped in before he could do that and placed them in separate homes.
After that Kibibi, her mother and her sisters moved away from Ayinde as she attempted to get her children back.
Her performance in state-mandated courses and counseling impressed the government officials and eventually her children were returned to her.
'She has been an exceptional mother,' Haroutunian said. 'She was so attentive and patient, it's remarkable. For a young girl - with all she's had - she has been just wonderful.'
Having to fight to get her children back also empowered Kibibi, and translated to her life after abuse. She now lives in East Orange, New Jersey with her husband.
Defects: When Kibibi's first child was born without defects, Ayinde took it as a sign that he was creating a 'pure' bloodline
She went back to school for her GED and will finish her liberal arts degree from Essex County College this fall. She also runs her own baking business and plans to start a restaurant someday.
Kibibi and her sister decided to finally bring charges against their abusive father. They delayed pressing charges since they were unsure the affect it would have on the children.
She shared her story in hopes of making a difference with those in a similar situation
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been available to industries and government agencies. They have been deposited unharmed on the ocean floor (Greenpeace, 2013), and they will soon be sent to the moon (Carnegie Mellon University Moon Arts project, 2016).
Clean room environments follow strict rules: no speck of dust shall interfere in the production process.
With the Fahrenheit 2451 project, we want to make personal nanoforms available to anyone.
Zoom on a 4" Nanoform:
The personal nanoform, delivered in a see-through, shock-resistant case.
You can order today your 1" sapphire medallion or your personal nanoform (2” or 4”), or make a smaller contribution and leave your message on “La Nanoform”, a 8” Nanoform that will be stored forever in a museum.
1” sapphire medallion necklace: this tiny jewel stores a single layout up to 12,000 x 12,000 pixels composed by you, with up to 120 different pictures inside!
this tiny jewel stores a single layout up to 12,000 x 12,000 pixels composed by you, with up to 120 different pictures inside! 2” personal nanoform: this Nanoform stores up to 500 photos or documents (from 870 x 620 up to 19,000 x 14,000 pixels). A scanned hand-written sheet will be treated as an image. Some photos or texts can be visible to the naked eye.
this Nanoform stores up to 500 photos or documents (from 870 x 620 up to 19,000 x 14,000 pixels). A scanned hand-written sheet will be treated as an image. Some photos or texts can be visible to the naked eye. 4” personal nanoform: this Nanoform stores up to 2500 photos or documents (from 870 x 620 up to 26,400 x 18,700 pixels). A scanned hand-written sheet will be treated as an image. Some photos or texts can be visible to the naked eye.
this Nanoform stores up to 2500 photos or documents (from 870 x 620 up to 26,400 x 18,700 pixels). A scanned hand-written sheet will be treated as an image. Some photos or texts can be visible to the naked eye. Smaller contributions, starting at $5, buy you space on “La Nanoform”, a public 8'' Nanoform stored forever in a museum. See the rewards details in the picture below!
Your own Nanoform
Be creative! Display it anywhere in your home, hang it on the wall or set it on a shelf. Offer it to your bride, as a unique baby shower gift or for mother's day. Celebrate your family or a lost loved one by imprinting unforgettable memories.
La Nanoform : Leave your message for eternity
Take your chance to become eternal: your message or picture will be stored in a museum for milleniums.
Timeline of the project
We defined a precise plan for Nanoforms delivery, based on our experience with professional customers (government agencies and industries).
Stretch Goals
Every contribution will be useful for the project! We need $49,000 to start the production of large numbers of Nanoforms. The following contributions will be used to create new functionalities : custom design of the Nanoform's content (a big and artistic design for example), Nanoforms in color, etc.
Meet the team!
We are a multidisciplinary team of 12 persons working in Grenoble, the “French Silicon Valley”, comprised of engineers, business and communication professionals.
Fahrenheit 2451 in the press
Find some of these articles here : Ubergizmo, Journal du Geek, Geeky Gadgets, Coolthings, Storage Servers and Digital Trends!
They have their space on "La Nanoform"
We are in contact with artists who already took their place in La Nanoform :
A painting from HOPARE, a french graffiti painter, which represents Marie José Chombart de Lauwe. She was a french resistant during World War 2 and this painting was done to show that the resistants were not forgotten.
Marie José Chombart de Lauwe and Roger Bordage, two ancient resistants, in front of a painting destined to stay in La Nanoform
A painting from MarieKilly, a french painter who focuses on abstract forms to create colorful and amazing paintings
A picture of Julie Brachet's painting
Julie Brachet is a french painter which love the idea of saving her creations in a timeless support. Watch her preferred painting... and if you didn't see any sense to the picture, watch it again.
A picture of Suzel Galia's rock carving. Suzel is a french sculptor who likes to compare her work on stone with the content of a Nanoform : they are both destined to stay through time!
Find her thoughts and impressions in our interview!
Our supporters
We are proud to be supported by iskn, the Airboard and the Carnegie Mellon University!
Our partners
Labelled in July 2005, the worldwide competitiveness cluster MINALOGIC animates and structures, in Rhône-Alpes area, a major innovation and expertise space in intelligent miniaturized solutions for industry.
The Kolor Team has worked on complex image-stitching projects and has acquired great experience in solving the hardest issues. Since 2008, Kolor has also developed knowledge and experience in 360-degree video stitching. We put this unique knowledge at your disposal for your projects.
Joomeo is a storage platform that allows to share HD photos or videos in private networks with a high level of security. Joomeo developed an ultra-modern, intuitive interface for easy management of HD videos and photos.
Technical specifications
Version Française
Comment vous assurez-vous de la pérennité de vos données les plus précieuses?
Le papier s’abîme avec le temps. Les CD/DVD, clés USB et disques durs ont une durée de vie de 30 ans (au mieux), quand ils ne sont pas rayés, corrompus, démagnétisés ou rendus obsolètes par de nouveaux systèmes… Et ce qui est sur le Cloud ne vous appartient pas et peut être hacké.
Notre solution : un disque en saphir gravé au laser, conçu pour garder vos données éternellement, à travers le temps et les éléments.
Nous l’avons appelé Nanoforme.
Les photos prises dans vos moments les plus heureux, le certificat de naissance de votre enfant, vos anciennes lettres d’amour ou l’histoire de votre famille, méritent mieux que d’être stockées dans un disque dur.
Ces documents doivent être préservés dans un objet artistique et durable, qui reflète leur valeur.
Découvrez les caractéristiques fascinantes de la Nanoforme
Une nanoforme est un disque de saphir synthétique gravé au laser, contenant des données analogies dans le but de les préserver pour toujours.
Le saphir synthétique est le 2ème matériau le plus dur au monde, juste après le diamant.
L’eau, l’acide, le froid ou la chaleur (au dessus de la chaleur de la lave) ne peuvent pas détériorer la Nanoforme ou son contenu.
Regardez notre test de température, qui monte jusqu’à plus de 1300°C!
Ceci est une Nanoforme de 200mm. Elle a survécu!
« La durée de vie d’une Nanoforme est théoriquement infinie. Nous parlons de millénaires. C’est aussi révolutionnaire, dans notre époque 100% numérique, de stocker des données de manière analogique. » - Alain Rey, inventeur de la Nanoforme.
Aujourd’hui, presque tout peut s’abîmer et finir par disparaître avec le temps : pas la Nanoforme. Le temps n’altèrera pas le support (comme avec le papier) et n’effacera pas le contenu (comme avec un support numérique).
Les CD/DVD, les clés USB ou les disques durs s’abîment avec le temps et finiront par cesser de fonctionner avec votre prochain ordinateur. Le Cloud est hacké, disparaît lorsque les entreprises ferment et dématérialise vos informations.
La Nanoforme vous appartient : dans vos mains, autour de votre cou, sur votre cheminée… à vous seul d’en décider!
Nous utilisons un laser de haute précision pour graver des images et documents sur un disque de saphir. Ensuite, nous le fusionnons à un deuxième disque de saphir, et une Nanoforme est née!
(D’accord, nous avons simplifié le processus. Pour plus d’informations, descendez encore un peu!)
La quantité de documents qu’il est possible de graver est impressionnante : nous réduisons la surface de vos documents par 30 000, en gardant sa qualité et sa définition.
Sur l’un de nos prototypes, nous avons gravé les 1600 pages de « Guerre et Paix » de Tolstoï et cela n’occupe qu’une petite partie de la Nanoforme!
Comment accéder à ces données? Une gravure aussi fine créée des caractères ayant une hauteur de 10 microns : c’est plus petit que l’épaisseur d’un cheveu humain!
Vos yeux discerneront les pages de texte, mais pas le texte en lui-même. Comme il s’agit de données analogiques, il existe d’innombrables moyens de les lire :
Une loupe puissante.
Un bon appareil photo avec une lentille « macro » créera une image permettant de lire le texte!
Un microscope numérique, qui affichera les images et le texte directement sur votre ordinateur (pour une centaine d’euros).
Un scanner haute résolution.
Et beaucoup d'autres!
Le saphir est un matériau extraordinaire, dans tous les environnements.
Les documents sont réduits 30 000 fois (c’est-à-dire 170 fois dans chaque direction) et gravés entre deux disques en saphir en utilisant une technologie de photolithogravure de pointe.
Regardez notre Nanoforme retraçant la vie de Pierre Curie :
Certains des détails de cette Nanoforme sont visibles ici :
La production prend place dans une salle blanche (environnement stérile) afin que rien ne puisse interférer avec vos données - pas même une simple poussière. Les disques de saphir sont alors fusionnés l’un à l’autre (aucune colle n’est utilisée), rendant la Nanoforme inaltérable pour toujours.
Alain Rey, inventeur de la Nanoforme, dans une salle blanche
La Nanoforme créée est un magnifique objet, lisible n’importe où, n’importe quand. Une simple loupe est suffisante pour lire les données préservées dans ce véritable bijou de saphir.
Vous souhaitez le voir par vous-même? Cliquez ici, et zoomez dans une Nanoforme autant que vous le voulez.
Jusqu’à maintenant, nos Nanoformes professionnelles de 200mm ont été vendues aux industriels et à des institutions gouvernementales. Plusieurs d’entre elles ont été déposées au fond de l’océan (Greenpeace, 2013), et seront bientôt envoyées sur la Lune (Carnegie Mellon University Moon Arts project, 2016).
Les salles blanches suivent des règles de confinement très strictes : aucune poussière ne doit entrer.
Avec le projet Fahrenheit 2451, nous voulons rendre les Nanoformes disponibles pour tous.
Zoom sur une Nanoforme 50mm
Vous pouvez commander aujourd’hui votre médaillon en saphir de 25mm, votre Nanoforme personnelle (50mm ou 100mm) ou faire une contribution plus petite en laissant votre message sur « La Nanoform », une Nanoforme de 200mm qui sera stockée pour toujours dans un musée.
Médaillon en saphir de 25mm : ce petit bijou est fait pour contenir un visuel de 12 000 pixels de diamètre, avec jusqu’à 120 photos personnelles.
: ce petit bijou est fait pour contenir un visuel de 12 000 pixels de diamètre, avec jusqu’à 120 photos personnelles. Nanoforme personnelle de 50mm : cette Nanoforme peut stocker jusqu’à 500 photos et documents (de 870x620 pixels jusqu’à 19000 x 14000 pixels).
: cette Nanoforme peut stocker jusqu’à 500 photos et documents (de 870x620 pixels jusqu’à 19000 x 14000 pixels). Nanoforme personnelle de 100mm : cette Nanoforme peut stocker jusqu’à 2500 photos et documents (de 870 x 620 pixels jusqu’à 26400 x 18700 pixels).
: cette Nanoforme peut stocker jusqu’à 2500 photos et documents (de 870 x 620 pixels jusqu’à 26400 x 18700 pixels). Les contributions plus modestes, commençant à 4€, vous octroient une place sur « La Nanoform », notre Nanoforme de 200mm stockée pour toujours dans un musée. Les détails de cette récompense sont plus bas!
Votre Nanoforme personnelle
Soyez créatifs! Disposez la où vous voulez chez vous, suspendez la au mur ou placez la sur une étagère. Offrez la à votre conjoint(e), comme un cadeau éternel pour toutes les occasions. Célébrez votre famille ou un proche perdu en y gravant vos souvenirs pour toujours.
"La Nanoform" : Laissez votre message pour l’éternité
Saisissez votre chance de devenir éternel : votre message ou photographie sera stockée dans un musée pour toujours.
Fahrenheit 2451 dans la presse
Ils ont leur place dans "La Nanoform"
Nous sommes en contact avec plusieurs artistes qui ont déjà réservé leur place dans « La Nanoform ». Ils vont notamment y inclure :
Une peinture d’HOPARE, un artiste graffeur, qui représente Marie José Chombart de Lauwe. Elle était une résistante française pendant la Seconde Guerre Mondiale et cette peinture a été réalisée pour montrer que les résistants ne sont pas oubliés.
Une peinture de Julie Brachet, peintre française qui aime l'idée de conserver sa peinture préférée dans un disque de saphir afin de la faire vivre à travers le temps.
Une peinture de MarieKilly, une peintre française qui s’intéresse aux formes abstraites pour créer des peintures colorées et inspirantes.
La photographie d’une sculpture sur pierre de Suzel Galia. Suzel est une sculptrice française qui aime comparer son travail sur la pierre avec le contenu d’une Nanoforme : ils sont tous les deux destinés à perdurer à travers le temps.I follow the publication of updates for a long time, so far I have only read, but after today's announcement, I had to register and ask a few questions and say some things.. I really do not understand, or I'm stupid or something.. can someone of "responsible staff" explain to me how it is possible that the website that was founded in 2002, which has tens of thousands of users, takes 5 months (for now) to make improvements or even worse, to re-enable the old options?? How someone can afford it publications/excuses like this today and do not ask yourself does it make any sense or maybe is that okay for the users?? I would rather work nothing, than in Last.fm but it is almost the same.. As you go, the old settings will go back to 2020, and the full version of the site probably will not even reach..Quit while you are ahead. Those words can mean a lot whether you tell someone that or they tell you that. Boxing fans want to see their favorite fighters continue on so that they can no longer fight anymore. If boxing is a beautiful but brutal sport then the fans are savages with a lust for blood. Fans take no damage and are quick to criticise fighters when they decide to call it a career. On the other side, some fighters fight past when they should no longer be in the ring which shows the gentler caring side of boxing fans. There is no middle.
Former two-division world champion Rafael Marquez has decided to put a stop to his hall of fame worthy career at the age of 38. Marquez was a tremendous warrior in the ring but that time has come and gone for the old rooster. He has lost 4 of his last 6 fights with the latest being against Efrain Esquivas via 9th round TKO. Marquez has put his body through a ton of punishment after going to war on so many occasions and after seeing his last fight you could tell it was well past his time to hang up the gloves.
“It’s time to put a stop and look back at my career with my family,” said Marquez. “It’s time to accept that there are no more reasons to continue boxing. I realize that I’ve been in hard fights and it’s better to consciously make that decision with my family. It is time to say goodbye. Boxing has given me the best for my family.”Hi there Freedivers and welcome to this brand new update from Dr Otter’s riverbank freediving laboratory.
Today we’ll be looking at an ingenious little mechanism of the heart which helps with regulating blood pressure. It also turns out to be extremely important for freedivers of all shapes and sizes. It’s called the Starling Mechanism and in order to understand completely how it works, it might be useful to brush up on some of the basics of blood pressure regulation. You can find that here in this article on age related changes in freediving which deals with it in more detail.
What is the Starling Mechanism?
The Starling Mechanism is driven by stretch in the walls of the atria (the small chambers of the heart) and the ventricles (the big chambers) which is a direct measure the amount of blood that’s entering the heart from the large vessels (the superior and inferior vena cava and the pulmonary artery) which supply them. Here’s an image showing the basic plumbing of the heart, including these vessels:
Blood enters the right atrium from the body, gets pumped by the left ventricle to the lungs and returns via the left atrium. It then passes through the mitral valve into the left ventricle which pumps it back to the body. If more blood enters the heart, than usual (we’ll see some of the ways that can happen in a minute) the walls of the chambers are stretched and this can lead to inefficiency in the way that the heart expels blood.
Imagine trying to lift a 20kg steel ball from the ground to chest height once a second - difficult enough for most of us. Now imagine that the ball is a meter in diameter - although it’s the same weight, the exercise becomes much harder because the muscles you want to use are stretched past the point where they can act most efficiently. This is what we mean when we say - often in a whining sort of voice - “it’s not heavy, it’s just awkward.” It’s the same with the heart. Stretch the muscles too much and they can’t work the way they’re meant to.
To compensate for this, the Starling Mechanism determines the force that the ventricles apply to the blood as they contract which is controlled directly by the stretch of the muscle fibres:
As the diagram suggests, a greater contractile force causes more blood to be ejected from the heart. This is called an increase in the ejection fraction (the proportion of the blood in the ventricle that gets pushed out) which in turn leads to an increase in cardiac output. Overall this results in less blood left in the ventricle so that when it refills ready for the next beat, there is less stretch and more efficient contraction. In technical language we say that overfilling of the heart causes a reflex (that is, automatic) decrease in end diastolic volume (the amount of blood filling the ventricle just before it contracts on the next beat). This is how the heart regulates its own filling, and the efficiency of its own contraction from one beat to the next.
So how is the Starling Mechanism Important for Freediving?
Those of you at the front who are paying attention might have guessed this one already. Here are some of the ways that the heart can be overfilled with blood in the first place:
Excessive hydration - if you drink a lot in one go (think of Friday night at the pub perhaps) your blood volume is going to increase rapidly and, until your kidneys deal with the excess volume, your heart will be working harder, not that you’ll notice - because of the Starling Mechanism :) Poor heart function - in the later stages of heart failure the walls of the ventricles become so overstretched that they just can’t deliver enough force to get rid of the blood coming in. The Starling Mechanism compensates for a while, but in the end even that becomes ineffective. (actually you can see this if you look closely at the graph - see how the curve dips downwards at very high volumes? This is the failing point). Poor kidney function - If you don’t pee out what you drink, it stays in your blood and your heart has to deal with it. This is why people with renal failure have to watch the amount they drink. Yes, you guessed it - it’s the Mammalian Dive Reflex:
When the dive reflex kicks in, Peripheral Vasoconstriction causes blood to be shifted from the extremities (hands, feet, legs, arms, face etc) to the central organs - heart, lungs and brain. This is the equivalent of trying to fit 6L of water into a 4L container and it puts a big strain on the cardiovascular system, especially because the heart rate slows to something like 25 beats per minute at the same time.
Those of you who’ve paid attention to your heartbeat during, for example, static apnea, may be aware that it feels much stronger than usual - this is the Starling Mechanism in action, making sure that blood is pumped as efficiently as possible out of the heart so that it doesn’t fail. This ensures that all your important organs get blood at the right pressure, even though the system is overloaded. Clever or what?!
You’ve just finished reading Dr Otter’s take on the Starling Mechanism for Freediving - why not check out some of her other articles on rarely-explored aspects of Freediving right here.
Got a burning question? Contact us at [email protected] and Dr Otter will get on it right away :)In a study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from the University of Cambridge and University College London (UCL) used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to study the brain structure of almost 300 individuals aged 14-24 years old.
By comparing the brain structure of teenagers of different ages, they found that during this important period of development, the outer regions of the brain, known as the cortex, shrink in size, becoming thinner. However, as this happens, levels of myelin – the sheath that ‘insulates’ nerve fibres, allowing them to communicate efficiently – increase within the cortex.
Previously, myelin was thought mainly to reside in the so-called ‘white matter’, the brain tissue that connects areas of the brain and allows for information to be communicated between brain regions. However, in this new study, the researchers show that it can also be found within the cortex, the ‘grey matter’ of the brain, and that levels increase during teenage years. In particular, the myelin increase occurs in the ‘association cortical areas’, regions of the brain that act as hubs, the major connection points between different regions of the brain network.
Dr Kirstie Whitaker from the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge, the study’s joint first author, says: “During our teenage years, our brains continue to develop. When we’re still children, these changes may be more dramatic, but in adolescence we see that the changes refine the detail. The hubs that connect different regions are becoming set in place as the most important connections strengthen. We believe this is where we are seeing myelin increasing in adolescence.”
The researchers compared these MRI measures to the Allen Brain Atlas, which maps regions of the brain by gene expression – the genes that are ‘switched on’ in particular regions. They found that those brain regions that exhibited the greatest MRI changes during the teenage years were those in which genes linked to schizophrenia risk were most strongly expressed.
Dr Petra Vértes, the other first author, also from the Department of Psychiatry explains: "A lot of information already exists on the function of various genes: which parts of the cell they are important for, what biological processes they are involved in and which diseases they are associated with. Matching up MRI brain maps with the Allen Brain Atlas allows us to make connections between large-scale brain changes observed through MRI – such as thinning of the cortex – and the microscopic biological processes that are likely to underpin these changes and which may be compromised in certain disorders."
“Adolescence can be a difficult transitional period and it’s when we typically see the first signs of mental health disorders such as schizophrenia and depression,” explains Professor Ed Bullmore, Head of Psychiatry at Cambridge. “This study gives us a clue why this is the case: it’s during these teenage years that those brain regions that have the strongest link to the schizophrenia risk genes are developing most rapidly.
“As these regions are important hubs that control how regions of our brain communicate with each other, it shouldn’t be too surprising that when something goes wrong there, it will affect how smoothly our brains work. If one imagines these major hubs of the brain network to be like international airports in the airline network, then we can see that disrupting the development of brain hubs could have as big an impact on communication of information across the brain network as disruption of a major airport, like Heathrow, will have on flow of passenger traffic across the airline network.”
The researchers are confident about the robustness of their findings as they divided their participants into a ‘discovery cohort’ of 100 young people and a ‘validation cohort’ of almost 200 young people to ensure the results could be replicated.
The study was funded by a Strategic Award from the Wellcome Trust to the Neuroscience in Psychiatry Network (NSPN) Consortium.
Dr Raliza Stoyanova in the Neuroscience and Mental Health team at Wellcome, which funded the study, comments: “A number of mental health conditions first manifest during adolescence. Although we know that the adolescent brain undergoes dramatic structural changes, the precise nature of those changes and how they may be linked to disease is not understood.
“This study sheds much needed light on brain development in this crucial time period, and will hopefully spark further research in this area, and tell us more about the origins of serious mental health conditions such as schizophrenia.”
Video
Nodes of the adolescent brain's structural network coloured by how much they change between 14 and 24 years of age. The size of the nodes represent how well connected they are and halfway through the movie the smallest nodes are removed and only the hubs remain. The edges that are added in are the strongest connections between these hub regions and represent the brain's rich club. Credit: Kirstie Whitaker
Reference
Whitaker, KJ, Vertes, PE et al. Adolescence is associated with genomically patterned consolidation of the hubs of the human brain connectome. PNAS; 25 July 2016; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1601745113Meat and Livestock Australia is developing a digital strategy with industry to capture and use data generated through new technology.
Meat and Livestock Australia is starting a'mega data' strategy to manage digital information for the entire meat business.
MLA managing director, Richard Norton, said the 'Value Chain Digital Strategy' would be the first in Australia to deliver a range of data solutions'seemlessly' through the farm and food supply chain.
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He said farmers, meat processors, distributors and retailers each had intellectual property and could capture and use terra-bytes of data.
Mr Norton said digital data was also being generated by technology used in the MLA's own traceability and quality programs.
"We're doing lifetime traceability of close to eight million cattle slaughtered each year, let alone what goes through the sale yards and is exported live," he said.
"So the red meat industry, unlike a lot of others, through tis integrity systems is already managing mega data.
"So with the digital strategy, and it will evolve over 10 years, and all we want to do for the red meat sector or producers is deliver data for them that may increase productivity."
In launching the mega data strategy at a red producers forum in Launceston, Tasmania, Mr Norton said the MLA's National Livestock Identification Scheme could be extended from the radio frequency ear tags used to identify cattle to an electronic tracking system through to the consumer.
He said increasing automation and the use of sensors, robotics and drones could transform beef and lamb production systems and freight and logistics and consumer purchasing systems over the next ten years.
Mr Norton said the MLA strategy would help to inform commercial decisions, including capturing new market segments.
"If we're the first movers in the world, and we brand our product as high end premium product then we'll take advantage of those returns and the global consumption that is increasing around red meat, as opposed to being a commodity player," he said.By DONNA McCONNELL
Last updated at 01:05 16 April 2008
Lots of little girls grow up wanting to look just like their mother.
But when your mother is a former glamour model with a penchant for plastic surgery, it should come as no surprise that Alicia Douvall's 12-year-old daughter has asked her mother for an operation - to boost her still-developing bust.
For her 13th birthday, along with a request for some perfume and an iPhone, Alicia's pretty 12-year-old daughter has asked for breast implants.
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Mummy's little girl: Alicia Douvall with her 12-year-old daughter Georgia, who for her 13th birthday has asked for perfume, a mobile phone and breast implants like her mother's
Alicia - born Sarah Howes - is best known for her lurid kiss-and-tell stories of her liaisons with celebrities including Calum Best, Dennis Rodman, P-Diddy and Mick Hucknall.
In an interview with Closer magazine, the former Love Island contestant revealed: "Georgia wrote a little birthday wish-list for her 13th birthday later this month and on it was Kate Moss perfume, an iPhone and a boob job."
Alicia's daughter, who she describes as 'a quiet girl', harbours ambitions to become a lingerie model, which her mother supports.
However, despite bearing witness to her mother's constant enhancements to her Barbie-like figure, Alicia says she was still surprised by her daughter's birthday request.
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Plastic fanatic: Alicia has admitted to having 50 cosmetic surgery ops over the past decade
She said: "I was surprised because I didn't know she was worried about her flat chest. She's such a quiet girl, she doesn't say a lot."
But Georgia said: "I think my mum looks good. Because of her, I think it's normal to have surgery if something's not quite right."
Alicia admits to having had over 50 cosmetic surgery procedures over the past decade, and it seems her plastic surgery obsession has rubbed off on her young daughter Georgia.
Unsurprisingly, she supports her daughter's request, and is happy that she wants to surgically alter her still-developing teenage body.
Even, going so far as to say cosmetic surgery is just the modern way of taking care of your appearance.
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Boob malfunction: As well as her love of plastic surgery, former glamour model Alicia is famous for her celebrity liaisons and falling out of clubs wearing very little
She said: "My mum always taught me to take care of my appearance and that's all I've taught Georgia. Surgery's just the modern-day next level."
However, Alicia said she is insisting that her daughter waits until she's 16 for the operation.
She said: "I think a 16-year-old with a nice, sexy figure will do really well as a model as long as she's managed well.
"That's why I'm happy for Georgia to have a boob job because it will give her a career.
"She's been at a modelling agency since she was about six. She'll be more famous than Britney!"
Alicia, 28, has just returned from America where she had her 12th breast op, but, unhappy with the results, she's already planning her 13th.
The self-confessed 'pushy mum' has also changed Georgia's name to 'Destiny' to enhance her daughter's chances of showbiz success.
She says: "I wanted to call her Destiny when she was born, but my mum said it sounded like a lap dancer's name.
"But she never much liked Georgia, so we decided to change it."
However, Georgia doesn't seem so keen. She said: "I don't mind which one I'm called. It was Mum's idea."
Closer magazine is on sale nowAudio: CPR's Corey Jones Reports On Video One
Jeff Hahn bought the Video One rental store in Denver in 2009. (Corey H. Jones/CPR News) One of Denver's oldest movie rental stores is now one of the city’s last. Video One survived the rise and fall of mega chains like Blockbuster. And it's still here during the age of online streaming. But like many rental stores across the country, Video One may need to close its doors soon.
This is the kind of place that keeps the classics -- from "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" to "Ghostbusters" -- playing on a TV screen behind the front counter. And the person on duty likely knows a lot about that film you want to rent too.
Victor Ward of Denver has been a customer for years. During a recent visit, Ward picked "Birdman" from a selection of around 30,000 titles on DVD and Bluray.
“I chose to get it from here because I would rather spend my money here,” Ward said.
Ward has rented countless movies and even entire seasons of old shows like "The Twilight Zone" from Video One. He says the thought of the store shutting down troubles him.
"It’s so important that it just hurts my heart," Ward said. "It’s our history."
70-Hour Work Weeks And $300,000 To Keep Afloat
Outside Video One, near Sixth Avenue and Downing Street in Denver. (Corey H. Jones/CPR News) Jeff Hahn wants to save Video One. He’s worked there since 2001. Then, it was just another job. But it turned into something much more seven years ago, when Hahn bought Video One from the previous owner who wanted to get out.
"I’ve spent most of my adult life working in here, and it was home to me," Hahn said. "It kind of felt that I would be the only person to really keep this going."
That’s meant some 70-hour work weeks and putting nearly $300,000 into the store to keep it afloat. Hahn says the store's variety is what sets it apart from competitors.
"We’re the only place in this city that you can find the majority of what’s in here," he said. "And we don’t want to go away because that’s valuable to us."
But going away is a real possibility, as Video One is in the red. On top of fewer rentals, the store has seen a big decline in DVD sales. A lot of late fees also go unpaid.
"What we have that goes unpaid would keep us alive," Hahn said.
Adapt Or Die
Rentrak, a Portland-based media research company, has tracked video rental stores since 2008. By the end of that year, there were nearly 18,000 stores across the country. Today, it estimates fewer than 5,000 still stand. Most are small or independent businesses.
Colorado has other movie rental stores. That includes Videotique in Denver, The Video Station in Boulder and Louisa’s Movie House in Durango.
Colorado Springs, on the other hand, has none. That’s according to commercial real estate broker John Egan of NAI Highland. He once worked with Blockbuster and Hollywood Video to get prime locations. Egan says when he moved to Colorado Springs 20 years ago, corporate rental chains were everywhere.
“Now Redbox is sort of the phoenix from the ashes,” he said.
You can find rental kiosks like Redbox outside many gas stations and grocery stores. Egan says convenience and cost are key to that model since there isn’t the high overhead that comes from having an actual building. So Egan suggests that independent rental store owners diversify.
"That tenant is going to have to find some way to do other things inside that business space to make ends meet," Egan said when asked about Hahn.
A store in Fort Collins did just that. The Village Vidiot has a board and card game area. It also serves Japanese food. Video One owner Jeff Hahn is considering his options too.
“We’re at a point where we are trying to figure out whether we need to just go out of business here in the next couple of months,” he said.
But what Hahn really wants is to become a non-profit organization. That’s something Seattle-based Scarecrow Video did in 2014 after the owners decided to get rid of their collection. So the staff of movie lovers stepped in and hatched a plan to take over.
The move to a non-profit led to a lot of donations and volunteers, business manager Kate Barr says. And Scarecrow now has outreach programs that target kids and the elderly.
"We are no longer locked in the equation of videos equal sales or rentals," Barr said. "We are destroying that model. This is more about community engagement."
Barr says getting grants for a new organization has been the
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its aesthetic appeal, such a union would be a politically, strategically, and most importantly, theologically negative move for the Muslim community.
An interesting point to note here, is that whenever such a partnership is discussed amongst the Muslim community, on social media or otherwise, the Christian acceptance to such a proposal is typically taken for granted. Perhaps it is the years Muslims have spent allying with Democratic Party affiliates, LGBT rights advocates, and progressive Christian churches, groups that put on a facade of tolerance and unity, willingly teaming up with Muslims, while simultaneously lobbying for staunchly anti-Islamic ideals, and smearing the ethical assertions of the Noble Quran. In this way, it may seem refreshing to find a group that openly expresses their true feelings towards our community (White Evangelicals rate Muslims an average 37 degrees on a thermometer scale– the lowest of any religion surveyed, according to a recent poll [1]), however, let us not over-praise their honesty. Yes, they are candid about their true beliefs– but about what? About how much they loathe us and our faith? It is not merely forthrightness that should matter to us, but dignity and respect. Even beyond the question of whether these churches would even be willing to enter into an alliance with Muslims in the first place, if our reasons for avoiding affiliation with liberal and secular communities is their constant backdoor deprecation of Islam, what reason do we have for associating with conservatives who do the same?
But even assuming that there are indeed, orthodox Christian churches and groups that are open-minded enough to be willing to consider a union with similarly conservative Muslims to lobby against societal degradation, there remains the question of whether conservative Christians are even worth forming a coalition with in the first place. The reason that same-sex marriage is legal, that abortion is such a popular cause, that sexually explicit content is so ubiquitous in today’s society is because Christianity has failed, on a spectacular scale, to make any any sort of impact on American ‘values’ for the last several decades. Let there be no mistake: We are living in the age of postmodernism, a moral relativist wasteland in which anything goes, and ethics are determined not by God, but by the all-powerful zeitgeist. If we truly wish to make an impact on Western society, to renew traditional Abrahamic values in a land that has long since forsaken them, there is no bigger misstep that can be made than allying with those that helped make those values vanish to begin with.
Yet another important note to consider is the fact that Christian and Muslim social norms are not identical. In our desperation to find allies in a liberal world order that no longer values traditional sexual and gender norms, we’ve begun to whitewash the many clear and unavoidable differences between Christianity and Islam, a disturbing sign for the generations to come. For example, while the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, accepts polygamy, it is now widely loathed by Western Christians and Western society at large, and was a popular feature in polemics against Mormonism by orthodox Christians in the 19th century, and now, against Islam. Therefore, if Muslims were to attempt to defend Islam’s conception of marriage on this topic, we would almost certainly encounter vicious opposition from the Christian community in this regard. Likewise, on the issue of abortion, which certainly is a tragic crime that should be rallied against by our community, the fact remains that Islamic scholarship has traditionally held somewhat differing views on the matter than the hard-line approach favored by some modern Christian sects, particularly Catholicism, reflects which also needs to be noted and understood by our community [2].
And the situation only grows more complex still once we realize that while our position on social issues might be considered right-wing in the modern West, the Islamic stance on subjects such as access to healthcare and welfare certainly does not toe the conservative line, and to mindlessly parrot the Republican agenda on these matters would be just as much a betrayal of our religion as the liberal alliance the proposed conservative coalition seeks to avert.
However, by far the biggest problem with partnering with the Christian Right, is that a strong, unified Judeo-Christian political force focused on upholding Biblical mores simply no longer exists. Its “family values” principles have now been replaced by the conservatism of people like avowed white nationalist Richard Spencer, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, “red pill” figurehead Mike Cernovich, neoconservative hawks like Douglas Murray, and openly gay provocateur Milo Yiannopolis. If these people, these figureheads of the New Right even are Christians, it is only in the cultural sense, a postmodern interpretation of religion divorced from faith, under which they campaign against supposed threats to Western civilization. Ironically enough, the one ideal left that unites both the old and the new, the traditional and the subversive, the normative and alternate strains of conservatism, is a deep and severe hatred of Islam.
And that is precisely the issue with the very idea of ‘partnering’ politically with differing ideologies, for even if there are areas of mutual agreement and possibilities for collaboration, there will always be conflict and apprehension felt by both sides since, at their core, we are simply not the same. Islam is not liberal, it is not conservative, it is Islam, and we must be wary of attempting to corner the eternal word of God into a temporary, man-made ideological box. If we are to carve out a future for ourselves in the West, it must be with us at the helm, to uncompromisingly assert our own ethical beliefs, the only true moral framework that guides the universe and has always guided it. It was the way of the righteous before us, all the way back to the Prophets (pbut) themselves, to guide society to the right path from whatever evil had misled them before. And if there is to be any hope for the future, it must become our way as well.
And Allah knows best.
“And among those We created is a community which guides by truth and thereby establishes justice. But those who deny Our signs – We will progressively lead them [to destruction] from where they do not know.” (Quran 7:181-2)
“And leave those who take their religion as amusement and diversion and whom the worldly life has deluded. But remind with the Quran, lest a soul be given up to destruction for what it earned; it will have other than Allah no protector and no intercessor.” (Quran 6:70, part)
[1] Pew Research Center (2017). Americans Express Increasingly Warm Feelings Towards Religious Groups. The Pew Charitable Trusts. Retrieved from: http://www.pewforum.org/2017/02/15/americans-express-increasingly-warm-feelings-toward-religious-groups/
[2] For an excellent summary on the issue, see Islam and the Abortion Debate by Imam Omar Suleiman for the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research.
AdvertisementsImmigration is something of a red herring as an explanation for the British public's discontent. When the economy is growing at a healthy clip and living standards are improving, migrants are generally welcome. The real problem afflicting the UK is that incomes have stagnated for years. Households struggle under the burden of excess debt. Housing is seen as increasingly unaffordable. Although Britain's private wealth is at record levels, the gains have been unequally distributed both geographically and amongst the population.
Weak household income growth reflects Britain's miserable productivity record over recent years. The best explanation for this is that during the era of ultra-low interest rates the UK has morphed into a bubble economy. That's the type of economy which generates profits (and taxes) from shuffling around pieces of paper, but little by way of genuine value added. It is characterized by inflated asset prices, low rates of saving, the misallocation of capital, an overly large financial sector and often by increasing levels of foreign indebtedness.
Contemporary Britain ticks all these boxes. Low interest rates have pushed up house prices – London's are now among the most expensive globally. Since (some of) the public enjoys vast paper wealth, it doesn't bother to squirrel much away. The UK household savings rate, at around 4 percent of GDP, is lower than it's been for more than half a century. Low savings have been accompanied by weak investment.
Interest rates at close to zero set an inadequate hurdle for returns on capital. As a result, the economy's powers of creative destruction have been sapped and resources have been sucked into areas with low productivity, such as construction and domestic services, and away from the manufacturing and traded-goods sectors.
The financial industry is bloated, occupying a greater share of output than ever before. The total assets of the UK financial system are around 12 times the size of the economy – more than twice the level of the United States, according to the Bank of England. The spendthrift Brits have become dependent on foreign capital. A string of massive current-account deficits – a sign that Britain has been consuming more than it produces – has pushed the UK's net foreign liabilities to a record 25 percent of GDP.
Britain's bubble has resulted in disappointing productivity and wage growth. None of this bothers Londoners much since they have enjoyed the greatest increases in house prices and their incomes are boosted by the outsized financial sector - half of whose revenues are generated by the City. That probably explains why the capital voted to remain. But the rest of the country had less of an interest in maintaining the status quo.
The Brexit vote has been accompanied by a sharp fall in the British pound, rising financial-market volatility and the downgrading of the nation's credit by the rating agencies. On the stock exchange, the weak performance of UK homebuilders suggests that the British housing boom, already threatened by overbuilding in the luxury segment, may be about to burst.
The conventional wisdom is that this is unmitigated bad news. In the long run, however, these developments should be welcomed. As sterling falls and currency volatility rises, foreigners will become reluctant to fund the current-account deficit. As a result, savings will have to rise. A cheaper currency means that exports are more competitive. In theory, this means resources will be diverted away from construction towards the traded-goods sector. A higher cost of capital should improve the allocation of capital. In time, this should allow interest rates to normalize.
As the bubble deflates, Britain will become more productive, paving the way for faster income growth. Of course, there will be losers. The financial sector will probably shrink. There may be fewer opportunities to get rich quick from a career in banking. London house prices will likely decline relative to the rest of the country. But there's an upside. The City won't act as such a brain drain depriving other more genuinely productive sectors of talent. Cheaper house prices mean more affordable homes.
This change will undoubtedly inflict pain. In the long run, however, there will be more winners than losers. The country should eventually end up richer and disparities of wealth will be less extreme. John Bull probably didn't clearly envisage such an outcome when he marked his ballot paper, but in his bones he may have sensed that change was both necessary and long overdue.
Commentary by Edward Chancellor, contributor Reuters BreakingViews.
For more insight from CNBC contributors, follow @CNBCopinion on Twitter.Powerball, Mega Millions to drop Illinois due to state’s budget crisis
With a state budget approved, ticket sales for the Mega Millions and Powerball games can resume, the Illinois Lottery said Thursday. | File photo
The popular Powerball lottery and Mega Millions games will drop Illinois at the end of June without a budget agreement, Illinois Lottery officials said Thursday.
Concern over the state’s fiscal condition prompted the Multi-State Lottery Association to drop Powerball in Illinois, according to internal Illinois Lottery communications obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.
Mega Millions also plans to drop the state unless a budget agreement comes together, state officials confirmed. Without a budget in place, the state isn’t authorized to make payments to Mega Millions or the association.
Those decisions were reached at national lottery meetings held this week, Illinois Lottery spokesman Jason Schaumburg said. Illinois belongs to the Mega Millions group, and has a license to sell Powerball.
A spokesman for the Multi-State Lottery Association said the group “is focused on protecting the integrity of its games and the experience of its players.”
Greg Smith, acting director of the Illinois Lottery, called the development “disappointing.”
“The Legislature’s inability to pass a budget has led to this development and will result in Illinois Lottery players being denied the opportunity to play these popular games,” Smith said. “This is why it’s so critical the General Assembly deliver a balanced budget to the governor’s desk that he can sign.”
Schaumburg on Thursday morning confirmed that the games will be dropped absent a state budget. He said the multi-state association has had discussions since 2015 about dropping Illinois, but this is the first time the group has taken action.
“Its unfortunate. Powerball was the only thing that I would buy, because I knew that it would pay out,” said Anthony Martinez, who lives in the Logan Square neighborhood. “With the Illinois budget crisis, it’s not a guarantee that Illinois’ going to actually pay out on your lottery winnings.”
The state reported $99.4 million in Mega Millions sales and $208 million in Powerball sales within the 2016 budget year. Schaumburg said the state retains about 40 percent of that money for education funding.
Powerball is offered in 44 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Mega Millions is offered in 44 states, along with the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Shaneen Murray, a Woodlawn resident, said taking away the temptation of some of the high-profile lottery games is “not necessarily a terrible thing.”
“Maybe people can save money, or put their money toward something better,” she said.Ready to fight back? Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week. You will receive occasional promotional offers for programs that support The Nation’s journalism. You can read our Privacy Policy here. Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week.
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Karl Rove, former chief political adviser to former President George W. Bush, gestures as he addresses members of the Virginia Chamber of Commerce in Williamsburg, Va., Thursday, Dec. 2, 2010. (AP Photo/Steve Helber) Ad Policy
Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS is allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money on attack ads in battlegrounds states—without ever disclosing a single donor—because it has protected status as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization. Unlike Super PACs, which must disclose donors, Crossroads GPS and other groups don’t have to disclose because they supposedly don’t have political activity as a primary purpose, and therefore are allowed to protect their funding sources.
But this is one of the Big Lies in American politics. Of course the primary purpose of Crossroads GPS—which is run by former high-level Republican Party officials—is to influence elections. In recent months, there’s been increasing pressure on the IRS to call the bluff: Congressional Democrats wrote a letter to the agency asking it to reconsider the tax status of Crossroads GPS and other groups, and nine Republican senators quickly responded with an ominous letter to the IRS warning it not to act.
But Crossroads GPS’s decision to pull television advertising in Missouri in the wake of Republican Senate candidate Representative Todd Akin’s abhorrent comments about rape and pregnancy are (another) bold admission of why the group really exists.
Crossroads GPS is a major player in the Missouri Senate race—it has spent $5.4 million already, which more than doubles the $2.2 million spent by Akin’s actual campaign. The ads “seek to paint [Democratic candidate Claire] McCaskill as a big government-loving, tax-increasing liberal” and hit her for voting to increase the debt limit, among other things.
Under the law, Crossroads GPS and other 501(c)(4) can’t expressly advocate for or against the election of a specific candidate—it can intervene in political races “as long as its primary purpose is the promotion of social welfare” (and then no more than 50 percent of its total activities should be such interventions). Ostensibly these ads are educational—telling voters about issues at stake in a race, but not backing a particular candidate.
But after Akin made his horrific comments about “legitimate rape,” Crossroads GPS announced it was pulling all advertising. “The act speaks for itself,” Crossroads spokesman Nate Hodson said.
This obviously vitiates any argument that the ads are simply to promote social welfare—that, say, the most recent spot is simply meant to educate voters about the national debt. What has changed about McCaskill’s vote on the debt limit? Nothing. What has changed is that suddenly the Republican candidate in that race is viewed as unelectable by basically the entire political establishment—and now Crossroads doesn’t want to spend any more money there. That act speaks for itself, indeed.President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday that temporarily halted the admission of refugees, indefinitely banned the admission of refugees from Syria, and stopped citizens of several Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. The American Civil Liberties Union has already filed a legal challenge to the order.
The order is so sweeping that it also includes any green card and visa holders from these countries. So if you were a citizen of these countries (Iran, Iraq, Syria and Sudan. Libya, Yemen and Somalia) and had the bad luck of being outside of the U.S. at the time the order went into effect, you’re now barred from entering the country for at least the next 90 days. Unsurprisingly, that’s already affecting the employees of many of the largest tech companies, which tend to draw from a global talent pool.
Update (6:00pm PT): a federal court in New York has now granted an emergency stay that will allow those who landed in the U.S. with a valid visa (or are currently in transit) to enter the country and stay.
Update (8:00am PT 1/29): White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said on NBC’s Meet The Press this morning that the immigration ban “Doesn’t include green card holders going forward,” but anyone traveling back and forth between the included countries would be subject to further screening.
Update (1:45pm PT 1/29): President Trump now says that the U.S. will start issuing visas again over it has reviewed and implemented “the most secure policies over the next 90 days.” He also stressed that he has “tremendous feelings” for those involved in the crisis in Syria, that the media is reporting this whole story “falsely,” and that this is not a Muslim ban. White house cyber security Rudy Giuliani, however, earlier directly called this a Muslim ban in an interview with Fox news.
Update (4:05pm PT 1/29): Department of Homeland Security secretary John Kelly issued a release declaring that lawful permanent residents will be granted entry regardless of the terms of the orders, since it’s in the national interest.
We know that Google already recalled its employees from abroad — though chances are the alert came too late to allow anybody to travel back to the U.S. in time. “We’re concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that create barriers to bringing great talent to the U.S.,” the company wrote in an official statement. “We’ll continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere.”
Google co-founder Sergey Brin later joined the protests at SFO:
Google cofounder Sergey Brin at SFO protest: "I'm here because I'm a refugee." (Photo from Matt Kang/Forbes) pic.twitter.com/GwhsSwDPLT — Ryan Mac (@RMac18) January 29, 2017
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, too, yesterday noted in a Facebook post that he is “concerned about the impact of the recent executive orders signed by President Trump” though he also added that he was “glad” that Trump was willing “to ‘work something out’ for Dreamers” and that the President “believes our country should continue to benefit from ‘people of great talent coming into the country.’”
Facebook added in a statement today, “We are assessing the impact on our workforce and determining how best to protect our people and their families from any adverse effects.”
Microsoft told us that it is already providing legal assistance to its employees affected by this: “We share the concerns about the impact of the executive order on our employees from the listed countries, all of whom have been in the United States lawfully, and we’re actively working with them to provide legal advice and assistance.”
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella spoke out in favor of immigration in a post on LinkedIn. “As an immigrant and as a CEO, I’ve both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, and for the world. We will continue to advocate on this important topic,” Nadella said.
Nadella also shared a memo from Microsoft’s chief legal officer Brad Smith, in which Smith revealed that at least 76 Microsoft employees are affected by Trump’s order. “But there may be other employees from these countries who have U.S. green cards rather than a visa who may be affected, and there may be family members from these countries that we haven’t yet reached,” Smith added. Smith said he and Nadella would answer employee questions during a question-and-answer session on Monday.
LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner noted that many Fortune 500 companies are founded by immigrants or their children, and wrote, “All ethnicities should have access to opportunity — founding principle of U.S.” (LinkedIn was acquired by Microsoft last year.)
In a memo obtained by TechCrunch, Apple CEO Tim Cook says the company has reached out to employees affected by the order. “In my conversations with officials here in Washington this week, I’ve made it clear that Apple believes deeply in the importance of immigration — both to our company and to our nation’s future,” Cook wrote. “Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do.”
Uber CEO Travis Kalanick sent an email to his team on Saturday afternoon, noting that the order affected about “a dozen or so employees.” He also added that the company will identify and compensate drivers who may be barred from entering the US for the next 90 days pro bono “to help mitigate some of the financial stress and complications with supporting their families and putting food on the table.” It’s unclear how long it will take for Uber to identify these drivers, though. As a member of Trump’s business advisory group, Kalanick will meet with Trump next week.
You can read his full email below:
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk added his comments via Twitter late on Saturday afternoon. They were not very strongly worded.
The blanket entry ban on citizens from certain primarily Muslim countries is not the best way to address the country’s challenges — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017
Many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US. They've done right,not wrong & don't deserve to be rejected. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017
In a statement to TechCrunch, a Tesla spokesperson added, “We hope that this temporary action by the Administration transitions to a fair and thoughtful long-term policy.” A small number of Tesla employees are affected by the order.
Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen, in a message to all employees, said that “as an immigrant, US citizen and CEO, I am deeply concerned about the impact of the recent executive order restricting entry into the United States for nationals of seven countries, and I know many of you are as well.”
Twilio CEO Jeff Lawson calls the ban “fundamentally UnAmerican” in a blog post today. “Yesterday marked a solemn day for the United States, as we’ve betrayed one of our most cherished values. For over 200 years, the promise of America has been freedom from oppression and opportunity for those in need. While we’ve made mistakes along the way, we’ve always come to regret relinquishing our values to xenophobia,” Lawson writes. “Yesterday, that beacon of hope and freedom was extinguished, exactly when humanity needs it the most. Globally there are over 60,000,000 displaced people, more than any time since World War II. And today we turned our backs on them.”
Postmates says that it is matching its employees’ donations to the ACLU and International Refugees Assitance Project. “It is evident to myself and the leadership of Postmates that these policies on immigration are morally questionable due to the impact they have on the lives that have been and will be affected,” Postmates founder and CEO Bastian Lehmann writes. “We see them as contrary to the long standing precedent that the United States is a country that welcomes, values and embraces the diversity cultivated through immigration.”
In an emailed statement, Mozilla CEO Chris Beard said that he believes that “The immigration ban imposed by Friday’s executive order is overly broad and its implementation is highly disruptive to fostering a culture of innovation and economic growth.” He added the he believes that “The ban will have an unnecessary negative impact to the health and safety of those affected and their families, not to mention rejecting refugees fleeing persecution, terror and war.”
Here is Netflix CEO Reed Hastings on Facebook:
Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. Worse, these… Posted by Reed Hastings on Saturday, January 28, 2017
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff sent out the following tweet:
When we close our hearts & stop loving other people as ourselves (MK 12:31) we forget who we truly are—a light unto the nations. #noban — Marc Benioff (@Benioff) January 28, 2017
In addition, he sent the following email to all Salesforce employees:
America should not forget who we truly are — a nation of immigrants and a light unto other nations. At Salesforce, we believe in equality for all and must ensure that all people are treated fairly, regardless of race, gender identity, abilities, sexual orientation, religion or national origin.
I’ve heard from many of you who are concerned about the executive order restricting immigration from seven countries. We share these concerns and are monitoring policy and legal changes to better understand their impact and exploring the best options to respond and help.
As always, our immediate concern is our Ohana. We have confirmed with our travel partners that no employees currently traveling are in jeopardy of being unable to re-enter the United States. We will remain vigilant on behalf of all our employees and their families.
If you are currently traveling or have upcoming travel plans, and are concerned about your visa or green card status, please contact the GO Center immediately.
This is an important time for us all to be reminded that Equality is a core value at Salesforce. Regardless of changing conditions in the world around us, we will continue to be guided by this value. Salesforce welcomes all.
Mahalo,
Marc
We haven’t heard from many open source organizations, but the OpenStack Foundation published a statement on Sunday morning, pledging support for its community members.
Several major tech companies have moved to ingratiate themselves with the Trump administration in recent weeks. SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who voiced opposition to Trump during the election season, recently accepted a role advising Trump on economic policy along with Uber CEO Travis Kalanick. Oracle CEO Safra Catz took a position in the Trump transition team last month.
Oracle has yet to respond to questions about how Trump’s executive order will impact its business. We will update this post as we receive more comments and statements.
It’s worth noting that a number of other tech CEOs and luminaries have also been outspoken about the ban.
Box CEO Aaron Levie, for example, took to Twitter to voice his displeasure with the ban.
Donating to the @ACLU today. We cannot let America turn into a closed off, fearful country. We're better than this. — Aaron Levie (@levie) January 28, 2017
“We’re very much against the ban and will be working to both protect our employees but also work to make it clear that this is unacceptable and fight it however possible,” Levie also told us in an email.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey criticized the executive order and linked to a statement from the Internet Association, an advocacy group that represents many major tech companies.
The Executive Order's humanitarian and economic impact is real and upsetting. We benefit from what refugees and immigrants bring to the U.S. https://t.co/HdwVGzIECt — jack (@jack) January 28, 2017
Later in the day, Twitter also tweeted the following:
Twitter is built by immigrants of all religions. We stand for and with them, always. — Twitter (@Twitter) January 29, 2017
Dorsey is also the CEO of Square. The payments platform issued a statement noting the “contributions of our immigrant-owned small businesses” to the nation’s economy.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky offered a brief statement on Twitter that obliquely referenced Trump’s executive order:
Open doors brings all of US together. Closing doors further divides US. Let's all find ways to connect people, not separate them. — Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 28, 2017
Later in the evening, though, Chesky tweeted that Airbnb will offer free housing to refugees and others who can’t enter the U.S. because of the ban.
Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing — Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017
Red Hat offered the following as part of its statement:
“Red Hat is strong because of the thousands of diverse voices that comprise our company. Our continued work to advance the technology industry depends greatly on our ability to attract the best and brightest talent from around the world.”
Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann gave the following statement to TechCrunch:
“Inclusivity makes our company stronger, and the same is true for this country. We oppose this ban which affects many innocent people, including refugees seeking safety or reuniting with their family. We also strongly support our employees from outside the US.”
Dropbox CEO Drew Houston called Trump’s executive order “un-American.”
Executive orders affecting world's most vulnerable are un-American. Dropbox embraces people from all countries and faiths — Drew Houston (@drewhouston) January 28, 2017
Y Combinator‘s Sam Altman today also took to his blog to express his views and implore tech companies to take a public stand. “It is time for tech companies to start speaking up about some of the actions taken by President Trump’s administration,” he wrote and later on added that “if this action has not crossed a line for you, I suggest you think now about what your own line in the sand is. It’s easy, with gradual escalation, for the definition of ‘acceptable’ to get moved. So think now about what action President Trump might take that you would consider crossing a line, and write it down.”
Altman did not address the role Y Combinator partner Peter Thiel is playing in the Trump administration. Altman previously defended his decision to keep Thiel as a YC partner after calls for him to be removed from his role at YC.
AppNexus called on the President and Congress to reverse the policy.
Fog Creek CEO Anil Dash called on tech employees to pressure their bosses to take a stand on immigration. Dash published a form letter employees could send to their CEOs:
If you work in tech and your CEO was at the Trump roundtable, here is language you can send to your CEO. They need to hear you. (Please RT!) pic.twitter.com/SturouqE7m — Anil Dash (@anildash) January 28, 2017
Meanwhile, investor Chris Sacca is matching donations to the ACLU (and he has upped his offer to match donations to $75,000 now):
The @aclu took Trump to court. Let's stand with them. Reply w/ donation receipts from today & I'll match to $25k. https://t.co/0uiQPpQsyH — Chris Sacca (@sacca) January 28, 2017
Former Facebook CTO and founder of the Salesforce-acquired Quip Bret Taylor, too, is joining the ACLU donation bandwagon:
I am donating to the ACLU to fight these illegal executive orders. I still believe in the promise of America, and we will restore it. — Bret Taylor (@btaylor) January 28, 2017
Stripe CEO Patrick Collison also said he would match donations to the ACLU:
In Dec, @collision made a large donation to the ACLU—"they're going to matter". I wish I had. Will now match $50k. https://t.co/kbrh16NGV8 — Patrick Collison (@patrickc) January 29, 2017
Etsy CEO Chat Dickerson, in response to Re/Code’s Kara Swisher, said that he opposes “excluding people from US based on their nationality or religion, period.”
We are a nation of immigrants, and are stronger for it. I oppose excluding people from US based on their nationality or religion, period. — Chad Dickerson (@chaddickerson) January 28, 2017
Lyft co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green wrote a letter which went out via email to members of its service, decrying the actions and also committing to donating $1 million to the ACLU, to be provided over the course of the next four years.
We created Lyft to be a model for the type of community we want our world to be: diverse, inclusive and safe. This weekend, Trump closed the country’s borders to refugees, immigrants, and even documented residents from around the world based on their country of origin. Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyft’s and our nation’s core values. We stand firmly against these actions, and will not be silent on issues that threaten the values of our community. We know this directly impacts many of our community members, their families and friends. We stand with you, and are donating $1,000,000 over the next four years to the ACLU to defend our constitution. We ask that you continue to be there for each other – and together, continue proving the power of community. John & Logan Lyft Co-Founders
Prominent VC Fred Wilson broke a months-long silence on Trump to call out the order as “the politics of hate,” and share his commitment to making monthly contributions to the ACLU.
President @realDonaldTrump's goal with his executive orders on Friday is obvious and simple: Make America Hate Again https://t.co/gTQFUUB9Hb — Fred Wilson (@fredwilson) January 29, 2017
Atlassian co-CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes provided the following statement via email:
At Atlassian, our core values are built on openness and inclusion. We believe in creating equal opportunity and access for everyone and I stand against any action that does not support these. I am shocked and saddened by the impact these restrictions could have on, not only Atlassian employees and their families, but all citizens whose dignity is being trampled. Atlassian is proud to be a global company with employees from all over the world. We have worked hard to attract the most talented people from across the globe because we believe diversity of thought is critical to our success and helps us create the best possible products for our customers.
Intel offered the following short statement via its official policy blog. Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, a member of Trump’s manufacturing policy advisory council, offered a similarly mild statement via his personal Twitter.
We are providing support to potentially impacted employees, all of whom are in this country lawfully. As a company co-founded by an immigrant, we continue to support lawful immigration. We will continue to provide any impacted employees with Intel’s full support.
Amazon hasn’t come out with a public press statement, but it did share an email sent to all staff from its vice president of HR, Beth Galetti:
As you may have seen in the news, the administration issued an executive order yesterday that restricts entry into the United States by foreign nationals who were born in, or are citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, even if you hold dual citizenship with another country, US permanent residence status or a valid US work visa. US citizens are not impacted by this restriction, which will be in effect for an initial period of 90 days, and may be extended or expanded. From the very beginning, Amazon has been committed to equal rights, tolerance and diversity—and we always will be. As we’ve grown the company, we’ve worked hard to attract talented people from all over the world, and we believe this is one of the things that makes Amazon great—a diverse workforce helps us build better products for customers. Our immediate focus is to make sure you all have the information you need to make travel decisions in the coming days and weeks. Here’s what you need to do now if you are a citizen of any of the countries listed in the order:
• If you currently reside and/or work in the US and are present in the US today, we recommend that you refrain from travel outside of the US until further notice as you may be denied re-entry to the US for the duration of the entry restrictions; • If you currently work/reside in the US (as a green card holder or on a valid work visa such as an H, L, E, or TN) but are traveling abroad, please contact [email protected]. We are working on contingency plans for these employees and will be communicating with them directly; • If you work for Amazon in another country (and are a citizen of any of the countries listed above) and have current plans to visit the US for business or personal reasons, we advise you to cancel them until the entry restrictions are lifted. We are committed to supporting all of our employees and anyone in their immediate family who may be impacted by this order, including assistance with legal counsel and support,
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learning and long-term thinking. We need a much stronger analysis of the economic and political dynamics that have created the current moment and strategies for reversing the trend of growing inequality and right-wing backlash.
None of these things on its own will automatically end the threat of fascism, and no one person can fully engage all of these recommendations. But we must each reject the illusion that investing all our energies in the politics of presidential elections will be sufficient either. Now is the time to start preparing for a future in which whoever wins the presidency, right-wing nationalist movements will continue to threaten us. We cannot expect Hillary Clinton or the Democratic Party to do it for us.Mortal Kombat is a 1995 American fantasy action film[2] written by Kevin Droney, directed by Paul W. S. Anderson, produced by Lawrence Kasanoff, and starring Robin Shou, Linden Ashby, Bridgette Wilson and Christopher Lambert. It is a loose adaptation of the early entries in the fighting game series Mortal Kombat and the first installment of the live-action Mortal Kombat film series.
The plot of the film follows the warrior monk Liu Kang, the actor Johnny Cage, and the soldier Sonya Blade, all three guided by the god Raiden, on their journey to combat the evil sorcerer Shang Tsung and his forces in a tournament to save Earth. The film's primary source material was 1992's original game of the same title, but it was also inspired by and incorporates elements of 1993's follow-up game Mortal Kombat II.
Mortal Kombat, a Lawrence Kasanoff/Threshold Entertainment production in association with Midway Games, was filmed primarily in Los Angeles, as well as on location in Thailand, and premiered on August 18, 1995 in the United States. It received mixed reviews from the critics with praise towards its martial art sequences, atmosphere, exotic locations and production values whereas the performances were criticized along with the simple script. Its tie-in media included hit soundtracks Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Score, Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack and Mortal Kombat: More Kombat, and an animated film, Mortal Kombat: The Journey Begins.
Mortal Kombat spent three weeks as the number-one film at the U.S. box office, earning over $122 million worldwide. Threshold Entertainment followed with a 1997 sequel film, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, and created two spin-off television series, Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm and Mortal Kombat: Conquest. A Mortal Kombat film reboot was announced by New Line Cinema in 2011.
Plot [ edit ]
Mortal Kombat is a fighting tournament between the representatives of the realms of Earth and Outworld conceived by the Elder Gods amid looming invasion of the Earth by Outworld. If the realm of Outworld wins Mortal Kombat ten consecutive times, its Emperor Shao Kahn will be able to invade and conquer the Earthrealm.
Shaolin monk Liu Kang and his comrades, movie star Johnny Cage and military officer Sonya Blade were handpicked by Raiden, the god of thunder and defender of the Earth realm, to overcome their powerful adversaries in order to prevent Outworld from winning their tenth straight Mortal Kombat tournament. Each of the three has his or her own reason for competing: Liu seeks revenge against the tournament host Shang Tsung for killing his brother Chan; Sonya seeks revenge on an Australian crime lord Kano for murdering a fellow officer; and Cage, having been branded as a fake by the media, seeks to prove otherwise.
At Shang Tsung's island, Liu is attracted to Princess Kitana, Shao Kahn's adopted daughter. Aware that Kitana is a dangerous adversary because she is the rightful heir to Outworld and that she will attempt to ally herself with the Earth warriors, Tsung orders the creature Reptile to spy on her. Liu defeats his first opponent and Sonya gets her revenge on Kano by snapping his neck. Cage encounters and barely beats Scorpion. Liu engages in a brief duel with Kitana, who secretly offers him cryptic advice for his next battle. Liu's next opponent is Sub-Zero, whose defense seems untouched because of his freezing abilities until Liu recalls Kitana's advice and uses it to kill Sub-Zero.
Prince Goro enters the tournament and mercilessly crushes every opponent he faces. One of Cage's peers, Art "Kai" Lean, is defeated by Goro as well and has his soul taken by Shang Tsung. Sonya worries that they may not win against Goro, but Raiden disagrees. He reveals their own fears and egos are preventing them from winning the tournament.
Despite Sonya's warning, Cage comes to Tsung to request a fight with Goro. The sorcerer accepts on the condition that he be allowed to challenge any opponent of his choosing, anytime and anywhere he chooses. Raiden tries to intervene, but the conditions are agreed upon before he can do so. After Shang Tsung leaves, Raiden confronts Cage for what he has done in challenging Goro but is impressed when Cage shows his awareness of the gravity of the tournament. Cage faces Goro and uses guile and the element of surprise to defeat the defending champion. Now desperate, Tsung takes Sonya hostage and takes her to Outworld, intending to fight her as his opponent. Knowing that his powers are ineffective there and that Sonya cannot defeat Tsung by herself, Raiden sends Liu and Cage into Outworld in order to rescue Sonya and challenge Tsung. In Outworld, Liu is attacked by Reptile(under orders from Shang Tsung to prevent him and Cage from rescuing Sonya), but eventually gains the upper hand and defeats him. Afterward, Kitana meets up with Cage and Liu. She reveals to the pair the origins of both herself and Outworld. Kitana allies with them and helps them to infiltrate Tsung's castle while advising Liu Kang about three challenges in the castle: To face his enemy, himself and his worst fear.
Inside the castle tower, Shang Tsung challenges Sonya to fight him, claiming that her refusal to accept will result in the Earth realm forfeiting Mortal Kombat (this is, in fact, a lie on Shang's part). All seems lost for Earth realm until Kitana, Liu, and Cage appear. Kitana berates Tsung for his treachery to the Emperor as Sonya is set free, claiming that his arrogance and greed will cost him the tournament if he doesn't honor his deal. Tsung challenges Cage but is counter-challenged by Liu. During the lengthy battle, Liu faces not only Tsung but the souls that Tsung had forcibly taken in past tournaments. In a last-ditch attempt to take advantage, Tsung morphs into Chan. Seeing through the charade, Liu renews his determination and ultimately fires an energy bolt at the sorcerer, knocking him down and impaling him on a bed of spikes. Tsung's death releases all of the captive souls, including Chan's. Before ascending to the afterlife, Chan tells Liu that he will remain with him in spirit until they are once again reunited.
The Warriors return to Earthrealm, where a victory celebration is taking place at the Shaolin temple. The jubilation abruptly stops, however, when Shao Kahn's giant figure suddenly appears in the skies. When the Emperor declares that he has come for everyone's souls, Raiden declares "I don't think so," and the warriors take up their fighting stances.
Cast [ edit ]
Sandy Helberg is briefly seen in the beginning of the film as the director of Cage's latest movie. Originally, this part was to be a cameo appearance by Steven Spielberg, but scheduling conflicts forced him to back out; the "director" character in this scene still resembles Spielberg.[6]
Production [ edit ]
The Wat Ratchaburana, Ayutthaya used as the place of confrontation between Liu Kang and Raiden
The Wat Phra Si Sanphet temple was used in the opening of the film for the fight between Shang Tsung and Liu Kang's brother
Wat Chaiwatthanaram was used as the fictional temple of the Order of Light
Railay Beach was used as the entrance to Shang Tsung's fortress in his isolated island
Phra Nang beach was used for the fight between Liu Kang and Kitana
Originally based on the first game in the series, there are several notable elements that were incorporated from the second game, Mortal Kombat II (MKII). Outworld was seen in the movie, but was never mentioned in the first game (only mentioned in the video game's manual). Similarly, Shao Kahn is seen in the final scene of the movie, but was not even referenced in the first game. Jax and Kitana were introduced in the second game as well. Shang Tsung's ability to steal the souls of fallen victims—seen twice in the film—was first seen in MKII as one of his Fatalities, while his youthful appearance debuted in the second game but is seen throughout the film; according to Tagawa, this was in order to avoid the excessive makeup that would have been required to duplicate Shang Tsung's aged appearance in the first game. In his match with Reptile, Liu Kang uses his "Bicycle Kick" special move, which was first introduced in the second game, as was Reptile's ability to turn invisible. After killing Scorpion, Cage drops an autographed picture of himself near his remains, in a reference to his Friendship move in MKII. When Reptile assumes his human form, the voice of Shao Kahn - sampled directly from the second game - can be heard announcing "Reptile". The Shadow Priests, seen before the final battle, were first seen in the second game as part of two of the backgrounds.
Cameron Diaz was the original choice to play Sonya Blade but she broke her wrist before filming begun and Bridgitte Wilson replaced her last minute. Brandon Lee was the filmmakers' first choice to play Johnny Cage but his tragic death at the set of The Crow forced them to re-cast the role. Jean-Claude Van Damme was offered the role but turned it down in order to do Street Fighter and the role eventually went to Linden Ashby. Russell Wong, Dustin Nguyen, Keith Cooke and Phillip Rhee all auditioned for the role of Liu Kang.
Robin Shou said that in the original script he "was supposed to fall in love with Talisa Soto [Kitana]. I was looking forward to it, but they thought we have so much action, we don't want to add romance to it. They cut it out."[7] Also scripted but not filmed were a short battle between Sonya and Jade, another of Shang Tsung's servants, and a scene where Shang Tsung allowed the heroes a night to mourn the loss of Art Lean and bury him in the Garden of Statues, underneath the statue of Kung Lao. Originally not included in the movie, Reptile was added in response to focus groups being unimpressed with the original fights in the film.[8] Robin Shou and Paul W. S. Anderson noted that neither knew what Reptile's lizard form would look like until after filming, making the pre-fight sequence difficult to shoot.[9]
Filming began in August 1994 and ended in December 1994. The Outworld exterior scenes were filmed at the abandoned Kaiser steel mill in Fontana, California; the site is now the Auto Club Speedway. All of Goro's scenes were filmed in Los Angeles. Shooting locations in Thailand were accessible only by boat, so cast, crew and equipment had to be transported on long canoe-like vessels. Gerrit Folsom constructed an outhouse in a secluded area near the set in order to alleviate the problem of repeated trips to and from the mainland. Filming locations in Thailand include the Wat Phra Si Sanphet and Wat Ratchaburana temples. The arrival of Earth's contestants via boats, Liu Kang's meditation scene and the fight between Liu Kang and Kitana were filmed at the Railay Beach and the Phra Nang Beach, respectively. The bows of the boats were fitted with ornamental dragon-head carvings and used in the movie as the fighters' secondary transport to Shang Tsung's island from his junk.[3]
The film was originally scheduled for a May 1995 U.S. release, but was pushed back to August. According to co-producer Larry Kasanoff, this was because New Line Cinema's executives felt the film had the potential to be a summer hit.[10] It was released on October 20 in the United Kingdom, and on December 26 in Australia.
Other media [ edit ]
Mortal Kombat: The Journey Begins [ edit ]
On April 11, 1995,[11] several months before the film's release, Turner Home Entertainment and Threshold Entertainment released a tie-in animated film on VHS and Laserdisc, Mortal Kombat: The Journey Begins. It features traditional animation, motion capture and CGI to explain the origins behind some of the movie's main characters, as well as a 15-minute behind-the scenes documentary of the theatrical release. Trailers of the film was seen on the promotional screener VHS copy, and on other VHS releases from Turner Home Entertainment and New Line Home Video. The film was included on the Mortal Kombat Blu-ray released in April 2011.
The plot follows Liu Kang, Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade—also the three main characters in the live-action movie—traveling on a mysterious boat on route to the Mortal Kombat tournament. On the way they meet Raiden, who provides them with some hints about how to survive the tournament and defeat Shang Tsung and his army of Tarkatan minions. Upon arriving at the island where the battles takes place, Raiden retells the origins of Shang Tsung, Goro, Scorpion, Sub-Zero and the Great Kung Lao in between fight scenes.
Mortal Kombat: A Novel [ edit ]
A novelization of the movie by "Martin Delrio" (James D. Macdonald and Debra Doyle) was released through Tor Books. It is based on an early version of the film's script, and as such it includes several deleted or unfilmed scenes, such as a fight between Sonya Blade and Jade.
Music [ edit ]
Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Score is the instrumental score album with the music by George S. Clinton, released by Rykodisc on October 11, 1995. Mortal Kombat: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is the compilation album released by TVT Records on August 15, 1995. Original Motion Picture Soundtrack won the BMI Film & TV Awards BMI Film Music Award[12][better source needed] and went platinum[13] in less than a year reaching No. 10 on the Billboard 200.[14]
Reception [ edit ]
Box office [ edit ]
Mortal Kombat opened on August 18, 1995, and was #1 at the box office for the weekend, with $23.2 million, nearly eight times the opening amount of the only other new release that weekend, The Baby-Sitters Club. At the time, it was also the second-highest August opening after 1993's The Fugitive. The film enjoyed a three-week stint at number one, grossed $70 million domestically, and earned an estimated $122 million worldwide.[1] As of September 2016, the film sits as the fifth highest-grossing video game adaptation ever released in the US, behind Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, The Angry Birds Movie, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, and Pokémon: The First Movie.[15]
Critical response [ edit ]
Mortal Kombat received a score of 38% on Rotten Tomatoes sampled from 32 reviews, with an average score of 4.5/10. The site's consensus reads: "Despite an effective otherworldly atmosphere and appropriately cheesy visuals, Mortal Kombat suffers from its poorly constructed plot, laughable dialogue, and subpar acting."[16] Metacritic gave the film a rating of 58/100, based on reviews from 12 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[17] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale.[18]
Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly called Mortal Kombat "a contentedly empty-headed extended advertisement for the joy of joypads (filmed in cheesily ornate cinema de Hong Kong style)" and too noted how it "is notably free of blood and gore."[19] According to Stephen Holden of The New York Times, "Mortal Kombat might be described as mythological junk food. Although there is talk of the three kombatants' having to face their deepest fears to prevail, the action is so frenetic and the dialogue so minimal that the allegory is weightless."[20] Roger Ebert said he was "right in the middle" and noted that the fans might be disappointed by the film's killings being much less brutal than the notoriously violent Mortal Kombat video games.[21] Similar to Ebert, Marc Savlov from The Austin Chronicle mentioned that " It's the cinematic equivalent of cotton candy and Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots, but you may recall, you loved that stuff as a kid. I know I did" giving it a 2.5/5 star rating.[22] Laura Evenson from San Francisco Chronicle mentioned "Mortal Kombat the movie has everything a teenage boy could want: snakes that jut out of a villain's palms, acrobatic kung- fu fighting and a couple of battling babes. Everything, that is, but an interesting plot, decent dialogue and compelling acting" commenting however that it will likely become a cult classic.[23]
Kevin Thomas of Los Angeles Times gave the film a much more positive review, writing that "as impressive as the special effects are at every turn, even more crucial is Jonathan Carlson's superb, imaginative production design, which combines Thailand exteriors with vast sets that recall the barbaric grandeur of exotic old movie palaces and campy Maria Montez epics. John R. Leonetti's glorious, shadowy camera work and George S. Clinton's driving, hard-edged score complete the task of bringing alive the perilous Outworld".[24] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave it a "thumbs up" rating on Siskel & Ebert, calling it "the only half-way decent video game movie [he] has ever seen" and "a lot of fun," saying he was positively surprised by its various high quality production values, including the "often sensational" special effects, exotic locations and the cast of characters being "clearly drawn out of appealing types". Leonard Klady from Variety awarded the film a 3.5/5 stars stating that "But where others have sunk in the mire of imitation, director Paul Anderson and writer Kevin Droney effect a viable balance between exquisitely choreographed action and ironic visual and verbal counterpoint".[25] Kim Newman from Empire magazine said "By the time the big, world-saving bout comes around, it's hard not to wish that Shung Tsu would settle the fate of mankind by asking Liu Kang what the capital of Venezuela is... rather than engaging him in yet another round of supernaturally assisted dirty fighting" with a final rating of 3 stars out of 5.[26]
Legacy [ edit ]
Sequel [ edit ]
The sequel Mortal Kombat: Annihilation was released in 1997, directed by John R. Leonetti (cinematographer of the first Mortal Kombat) and starring the returning Robin Shou and Talisa Soto as well as Brian Thompson, Sandra Hess, Lynn "Red" Williams, Irina Pantaeva, Marjean Holden and James Remar. Its storyline is largely an adaptation of Mortal Kombat 3, following a band of warriors as they attempt to save Earth from Shao Kahn himself. Although the story picks up where the last film left off, most of the lead roles were recast.
In contrast to its predecessor, which was a box office success and marginally well received, Annihilation was critically panned and underperformed at the box office. As a result, development of the planned third installment halted and never progressed beyond pre-production.
Spin-off TV series [ edit ]
Two television series, the cartoon sequel Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm and the live-action prequel Mortal Kombat: Conquest, were produced by Threshold Entertainment between 1996 and 1999.
Reboot [ edit ]
In September 2011, it was reported that New Line Cinema (Mortal Kombat film rights holders), sister studio to Warner Bros. (current MK franchise holders), had hired Kevin Tancharoen to direct a new feature-length movie based on the franchise. Oren Uziel, who wrote the original short film Mortal Kombat: Rebirth, but was not involved in Mortal Kombat: Legacy, was said to return to pen the story, while no actors, nor other crew, were confirmed. Reports stated that the film would not be an extension of the game, nor of Legacy.[27]
New Line President Toby Emmerich said that the success of the video games combined with Tancharoen's vision means, "You don't have to squint too hard to see how it might make a good movie", while Tancharoen says discussions have only concerned an R-rating, with darker, brutally real martial arts.[28] Tancharoen had discussions at the 2011 Comic Con with Uziel and Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon, saying that it will be a very big origin story with the sensibility and realism of Rebirth and Legacy as opposed to the traditional Mortal Kombat mythology.[29] He said, "I've always been a fan of properties like Batman where you can expand the universe in different directions. Mortal Kombat is big enough that you can allow for multiple different kinds of storytelling."[30]
But as for its continuity with the web series, Tancharoen said "you won't have to have seen all ten episodes previously - or have played the videogame - to understand the movie."[30] Shooting was expected to begin in March 2012[29] with a budget of well under $100 million and a release date of 2013, coordinated with the next installment of the video game series being produced by the same studios.[31] It was later delayed due to budget constraints. The director started working on the second season of Legacy until problems with the movie had been sorted out. In late 2012, Warner Bros executive Lance Sloan revealed that the Mortal Kombat movie would have a budget of between $40–50 million.[32]
In October 2013, Tancharoen announced that he would not direct the film.[33] In August 2015, it was reported that James Wan had signed on to produce.[34] In August 2016, Wan told IGN that he's confirmed as the producer of the film and won't rush the film but want it heading in the right direction.[35] On November 18, 2016, Variety reports that Simon McQuoid is in talks to direct the reboot.[36] It was rumoured that the movie would have an R rating and star A-list actors, as Warner Bros. is looking to invest in the Mortal Kombat movie reboot franchise.[37] Greg Russo announced on his Twitter page that the script is complete.[38]
References [ edit ]At the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner Saturday night, the event's comedian host, Larry Wilmore, took a jab at the "old" age of Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders. "He usually goes to the White House Correspondents' early-bird dinner,” Wilmore said of the 74-year-old Vermont senator during his monologue. While it's true that Sanders is the oldest candidate in the race and that his opponent, Hillary Clinton, has all but clinched the Democratic nomination, his enthusiasm and far-left principles have endeared him to and energized voters under 30. Considering his success with this voting bloc and with so many young people "feeling the Bern," it makes sense to wonder: Is Bernie Sanders a grandfather?
Sanders hasn't talked much about his family during the campaign, but he does indeed have grandchildren, and he has quite the repertoire of family-given nicknames to prove it, including Grandpa Bernie, Grandpa Bern, and even Bernster, People reported. Although he is not related by blood to any of his seven grandchildren, Sanders is very much the family man, and not, as one lighthearted Washington Post article may lead one to believe, a "grumpy grandpa." In fact, Sanders' wife, Jane O'Meara, told People in January that one of the senator's grandsons is particularly disturbed by that media depiction.
"They said he's a grumpy grandpa. He is not! He's a fun grandpa," O'Meara, quoted Cole, then 11, as saying earlier this year.
I, for one, am with Cole on this one. Consider exhibit A:
Yes, on Halloween last year, Sanders accompanied three of his grandchildren trick-or-treating in a New Hampshire neighborhood. Sanders' only biological child, Levi, and his wife adopted the kids — Sunnee, Ryleigh, and Grayson — from China. On Halloween, the 12-, 10-, and 9-year-olds, respectively, even got the chance to join him onstage earlier in the day to wave to supporters during a town hall meeting. (Best town hall meeting ever.)
Sanders married his current wife, Jane, in 1988, and from that union gained three stepchildren. Now, he has four step-grandchildren as well. Which brings me to exhibit B:
Win McNamee/Getty Images News/Getty Images BURLINGTON, VT - MAY 26: Democratic presidential candidate U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) gathers with members of his family after officially announcing his candidacy for the U.S. presidency during an event at Waterfront Park May 26, 2015 in Burlington, Vermont. Sanders will run as a Democrat in the presidential election and is former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's first challenger for the Democratic nomination. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
That's the Bern with Dylan and Ella. In January, People's Sandra Sobieraj Westfall visited the Grandpa Bern's home in Burlington, Vermont, where Sanders happily played "Monster" with the two, growling and chasing after them, she reported.
To be clear, the home was literally "littered with evidence" that Bernie is anything but a grumpy grandpa. Behold, exhibit C, straight from People:
[A] kiddie electronic keyboard tucked beneath the kitchen counter, the pink plastic play kitchen crowding the doorway to the foyer, the swing set, baseball bats and wiffle balls on the back lawn.
Win McNamee/Getty Images News/Getty Images CONCORD, NH - FEBRUARY 09: Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and his wife Jane O'Meara watch early results with his extended family and friends at his New Hampshire Primary Night watch party to begin February 9, 2016 in Concord, New Hampshire. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Maybe Sanders does like a good early-bird special once in a while. (It's also possible that he eats at 10 p.m. every night as though he lives in Barcelona. I wouldn't be surprised, because I imagine #campaignlife to be quite hectic.) But the point is that he clearly has a reason (or seven, to be exact) to be so deeply invested in our nation's future — and that's all the more reason to lend him your ears, even if he never wins the nomination.As part of our 2018 Gameplay Updates, we’re making significant changes to how Stealth works in Heroes of the Storm. We’ve outlined those changes below, along with some reasoning and explanations behind the changes from the Live Design team.
What’s Changing and Why:
Making the decision to change the way stealth works in Heroes of the Storm wasn’t an easy decision. While we recognized that stealth Heroes in their previous incarnation did a great job of fitting the fantasy of their characters, we also identified that the stealth shimmer visual gameplay was extremely hard for a significant number of players to see, and was ultimately just an eye test for the opposing team. Previously, if the opposing team could quickly spot the enemy stealthed Hero, they gained a significant advantage while the stealthed Hero was left with very few options for counterplay. On the flip side, against a team that consistently failed to spot the shimmer, stealth Heroes could dominate the match and force players into a very passive and not-entirely-fun playstyle. Due to this, there was also a large disparity in the power level of stealth Heroes at different ranks of play. In uncoordinated Quick Match games, stealth was king. However, in high-level ranked play and esports, stealth Heroes were much weaker and hardly ever seen.
With our upcoming changes to stealth, we want to remove the “eye test” mechanic and give both stealth Heroes, and the opposing teams, a better experience in matches. Here’s how:
New Visuals: The stealth shimmer visual effect is now much easier to spot when you’re facing off against stealthed Heroes. With this change, we want to shift this power away from that ‘eye test’ and encourage more strategic use of stealth. Some important things to note are that stealthed Heroes will still be hidden on the minimap, and they still cannot be directly targeted by abilities. You must still hit them with an aimed attack if you want to break their stealth.
New “Invisible” state: If a stealthed Hero remains immobile for a short amount of time (currently 1.5 seconds) they will become “Invisible” and will not display any outline or visual effect until they move again or are revealed by dealing or taking damage. Our goal with this addition is to bring back some of the uncertainty when playing vs. stealth Heroes that we’ve lost with the more obvious stealth visual effects. If a stealth Hero maneuvers carefully and plans ahead, they could be hiding anywhere… even right next to you! To avoid some bad gameplay situations, we’ve also implemented a couple of exceptions to this new mechanic: Stealthed Heroes cannot become Invisible on active battleground locations (such as an active Volskaya Foundry capture point) and are removed from invisible if the point becomes active with them present Stealthed Heroes cannot become Invisible on Mercenary capture points once the camp has been defeated.
Changes to “Unrevealable”: Before, “Unrevealable” is a state that exists where you cannot be broken out of stealth. While in this state, we hide your stealth shimmer much like the new “Invisible” state. This mechanic exists on several Heroes, namely Valeera and Samuro, when they first enter their stealth states. Now, “Unrevealable” remains unchanged in that the Hero cannot be removed from stealth during the duration, but we do not hide the stealth visual effect. The only way to hide completely during stealth is through the new “Invisible” state. Unrevealable was implemented as a way to give a character like Valeera a chance to use her openers in combat – without it, she could be immediately broken from her stealth and lose her second set of abilities. We wanted to keep that while allowing the opposing team to keep track of her movement.
Updating Stealth Heroes:
With the easier to spot stealth visual, we’re not only hoping to alleviate the oppressive nature of stealth Heroes in Quick Match, but we’re also opening up the ability to enhance these Heroes kits and roles since a significant portion of their power no longer relies on them going unnoticed in combat. With these updates, we didn’t want to just do straight number buffs, but rather wanted to see if we could give these characters some new tools and tricks to play with. You can check out the highlights below or read the full patch notes from the PTR here.
Nova: Nova now starts with a new active (called Ghost Protocol) that she can use to immediately enter Stealth (Default Hotkey: 1) that also spawns a Holo Decoy at her location. Additionally, Nova now gains a significant movement speed boost when stealthed (currently 15%). These changes should allow Nova to position a little more aggressively and have some opportunities for escape if she is caught. The Snipe Master talent is now baseline to reward careful positioning and aim without having to sacrifice a talent tier. Holo Decoys now do a small amount of Nova’s damage baseline, and use a smarter AI system. Since Nova’s position will be much more apparent in the new system, we know that Holo Decoys would be much less effective as a confusion tool. With the new smarter clones and added damage, they might fake people out a bit more, add a bit of confusion, and can also be used to dismount enemy Heroes, prevent objective captures, etc.
Samuro: With Samuro’s update, we wanted to play up the “3-card monte” gameplay that we originally intended for this Hero. Samuro should keep his opponents guessing as to which of his images is real, then “reset” using his new Trait once he’s been discovered. To that end: Samuro can now control his positioning when making new Mirror Images with the real Samuro always spawning towards your current mouse location. This allows more aggressive and calculated plays since you have much more direct control over your positioning. Samuro can now swap positions with one of his Mirror Images using his new Trait, Image Transmission. Choosing the Illusion Master talent will now greatly reduce the cooldown of Image Transmission. We’ve shifted a significant portion of the damage dealt by Mirror Images into Samuro himself, since we want to reward players who can successfully utilize his new trait to reposition and confuse the enemy.
Zeratul: Before these changes, Zeratul was the most competitive Stealth hero in high-level play, and didn’t require as much tuning to normalize across all levels of play. However, we saw an opportunity to make some tweaks and add a couple of fun new elements to his kit: Zeratul now has the Vorpal Blade talent as a baseline ability, granting some extra mobility and letting player pull off some extra-flashy maneuvers. We’ve added a new Heroic Ability in place of Shadow Assault, Might of the Nerazim, that was designed with the goal of competing with Void Prison and playing into the technical playstyle that makes high-level Zeratul players shine: Might of the Nerazim Passive: Each time you use an ability, your next basic attack deals bonus damage. With this passive effect, Zeratul players will want to weave basic attacks in between abilities for maximum effectiveness. Might of the Nerazim Active: Your Heroic Ability button (Default: R) becomes the last active Basic Ability you used. If you Blink in, your R is now Blink. You’ll want to pay extra attention to the order in which your abilities are cast. Another Cleave is a great source of extra damage, but what if you had a second Blink to escape the fight with your life? Might of the Nerazim Storm Talent Upgrade: Might of the Nerazim resets the cooldown on ALL basic abilities when used. After choosing this, Zeratul players can weave in basic attacks between all of their abilities, press R, and do it again!
Valeera: When considering Valeera, we decided that having two sets of abilities, a number of utility openers, as well as an on-command stealth meant that she already had a lot of really cool things going on and didn’t require as much work as some of our other Heroes. However, we did feel that Valeera was likely to be the most impacted by the stealth visual change since she has melee openers and no gap-closing abilities. In order to address this, we implemented the following changes: After remaining in stealth for 3 seconds, Valeera’s openers teleport her to the enemy. With this new gap closer, opposing players are still able to see Valeera coming and react, while Valeera players can use quick maneuvers and careful positioning to still get the jump on enemies. We’ve reworked her openers from stealth to be less about stun-locking an opponent and burning them down, and more about having options to shut down enemy damage dealers. Cheap Shot: We’ve significantly reduced the stun duration, but added a blind to counter Heroes that rely heavily on Basic Attacks. Garrote: To help in shutting down Supports and Assassins that focus on casting spells, we’ve buffed the duration of Garrote’s silence effect. Assassinate: We’ve cut out some of the damage of this ability, but added an armor reducing effect. This should help Valeera take down more durable targets with the help of her team.
We hope you’ve enjoyed this detailed look at the Stealth changes we are making in Heroes of the Storm. As always, please let us know what you think in the comments below and we’ll see you in the Nexus!The most interesting thing to me about the film 12 Years a Slave is that both its director, Steve McQueen, and its lead, Chiwetel Ejiofor, are British sons of immigrant parents. I wonder how both men, being black but not having roots in America, think of and relate to the story of Solomon Northup, who was kidnapped and sold into slavery in the American South years after Britain had passed its Slavery Abolition Act.
The second most interesting thing to me about 12 Years a Slave is how few of my white friends have seen it.
One friend said he didn't want to see it while his partner was out of town—he knew it would be depressing and he wanted some support. Another told me it seemed "too brutal." Another said he plans on seeing 12 Years a Slave but hadn't yet because he's "preparing himself." Still another said she's not sure she'll ever see it because "it just seems so sad." In Entertainment Weekly, writer Anthony Breznican reported having talked to numerous Oscar voters who said they were "intimidated" by the prospect of watching the film. If the movie seems unwatchable to these people, it also seems unlikely that lots of potential audience members to their cultural and ideological right will make haste to theaters.
It's not that it really matters how many people go see 12 Years a Slave, which is performing relatively well overall despite America's squeamishness. Movie tickets are expensive, and there are other more direct and accurate ways to take in the life and times of Solomon Northup (you can read his book here for free). But that so many people in my life have found so many different reasons to avoid 12 Years a Slave stands out to me as significant, if unsurprising, in a nation that has fought tirelessly to never stand face-to-face with its past.
Earlier this year, in the course of a lawsuit, it emerged that eminent Southern hostess Paula Deen had once found inspiration for her brother's plantation wedding at a restaurant whose servers were all black men in dinner jackets:
The whole entire waiter staff was middle-aged black men, and they had on beautiful white jackets with a black bow tie. I mean, it was really impressive. [...] That restaurant represented a certain era in America
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on a moon or planet, as well as space stations in near orbit, are all in the correct planetary grid at all times. So for instance Grim Hex is now located inside the grid of the moon Yela, for the time being.
And then speaking of the all powerful object containers, we’ve also just been provided the much needed object container editing. When creating a gameplay level we build that level with a combination of assets and object containers. Originally object containers had to be built in a dedicated object container level, which unfortunately made the contents of the object container only editable in the actual object container level. Are you confused yet? In other words when designers are building levels with object containers but want to modify the contents of that object container the only way to do that is to exit the current level, open the object container level, do some tuning, save, export and leave; then they’d have to move back into the level. What the team has done now allows the designer to edit the contents of an object container, save and export; all while inside the level. This creates a much better experience for our Design team and is really going to save tonnes of time.
Now as a general approach in game development we alway try to make something once - and make it perfect. But since reality never meets expectations we’re always looking for ways to reduce the time needed in what we call the “discovery phase” of a problem. One of the hardest parts of getting a code bug is finding out what is causing it and where it’s located. So establishing tools and processes to reduce that time, not only helps get to the speedy resolution, but also gets our talented programming team back to that feature we’re all so excited to develop. So to that end we’ve reworked the handling of vehicle internal damage states to significantly easier to set up now and debug. Interior damage states will be changed based on the cumulative health of a ship. Formerly it was written in FlowGraph but now it has been integrated into the vehicle component so that it can be used in a variety of places. This new debug and set up process should do just that: help us find the problem quickly, solve it fast adn get back to feature dev time.
Now on IFCS we’ve now moved the entire Intelligent Flight Control System of our ship’s update process to batch update. Because IFCS is very isolated from the physics engine, taking in values like velocity, mass, center of mass, etc. and outputting one linear and one angular impulse there’s no reason IFCS needs to be updated in lockstep with the physics thread. This change will be much more efficient and will be eliminating a major bottleneck and hopefully allowing a larger number of simultaneous players on a server.
We’ve talked about also making progress on this for a little bit now and we’ve now completed the new Quantum Drive 2.0. We’ve removed the old code from the previous quantum drive system that controlled things like VFXs and sound effects playback, as well as object … obstruction detection and alignment code. We’ve also move the targeting of a quantum point to the target selector on a ship so that drive now only cares about the travel point itself. This reduces complexity of the drive code and should make it run smoother. We’re doing some bug fixing as well as some features that are attached to the quantum drive, such as closing all external doors when doing a jump to help “accidents” by jumping out of a ship traveling at high fractions of the speed of light. This should all result in a smoother working quantum drive that is ready for Design and Art to really start tweaking and implementing on all the ships. It’s also ready for UI to start creating a much more realistic feel for how such an event should be handled in game - as well as a few other features like the Star Map.
Now over on the LA ship front the RSI Aurora has gone through a final art check this week. All that remains are any incoming bugs while going through design implementation, animation updating, sound effects, VFXs, etc. which this ship. And we’ve also established up to fourteen different skins for the designers to utilise as well.
The Anvil Terrapin is finalising its greybox phase which means it’s setting up the exterior hierarchy, polishing proxies, baked and migrated animations. For the interior we’ve currently polishing the geometry in the cockpit and the habitation, and now moving into final art. We’ve just handed the Terrapin over to Tech Design for their greybox setup on the ship as well.
Also now that the conversion for ships to Item 2.0 is underway it’s made sense to update our ship stats page on the website. And we’re really excited to finally be able to get to the up-to-the-minute stats for all of our ships for all you min-maxers out there. The design has now been finalised, icons finished and refined meaning, and everything’s being updated on the web as we speak. They’re being implemented onto the RSI website with more details to come in the very near future.
Now Tech Art’s roles tends to increase the closer you get to a major release and as performance begins to take priority over feature and asset development. Using a plethora of internal tools Tech Art has been reviewing the release to identify code and content fixes that would dramatically improve performance. One in particular is called “Statoscope” which plots graphs from the data logged on a “per frame” basis and, more generally, it’s the system that produces and manages that data. In essence it provides a way of recording values such as FPS, number of draw calls, etc. from Star Citizen and showing how change over the course of a play through. This really helps our development team find ways to improve performance by looking for frame time offenders.
Now Tech Animation improved the animation format that animations are saved as and then reloaded into a scene. In our worst case scenario a scene could take up to 50 minutes to load into Maya due to the amount of characters and length of the scene. But with this improvement the worse load time has been dramatically reduced by over 82%, meaning Cinematics won’t be waiting long to make quick iteration.
And over on the skinning front a female transfer mesh has been created and the male transfer mesh has been massively updated. Now these transfer meshes are used in conjunction with all of our skinning tools to automate basic skinning of all of our new characters. Tech Animators can now spend time affecting the weighting of a mesh, allowing for a higher quality and a more accurate deformation in less time.
On many of our heads we’ve run into an issue where the eyelids had some vertex normal issues which led to eyes looking pretty odd. Our Tech Art team has now identified the issue and because the vertices of the eyelids were so close together the normal would get flipped - but only on a few verts. So this has now been fixed and characters can now sleep with ease.
And speaking of characters the team here has been knocking out countless costumes for Squadron 42 and Star Citizen. Currently in production another female character is finishing up here in-game asset and will then be sent over to texturing and rigging; along with our OMC undersuits that have all finished up in-game modelling and are heading on over to texturing. The team also has several other Levski specific characters: the civilians and the miners which are currently being textured, then will head over to rigging and implementation into their final resting place in game on the great planet of Delamar.
And now in other exciting news, now that we’re in a modular armour system we’re reworking some of our legacy UEE and Pirate armour to bring them up to the quality of our current assets. This will allow them to be swappable with all those assets. We’ve officially started high poly on some of your favourites, then we’ll be moving on to the in-game modelling and texturing pass rework.
And speaking of customisation, along with the new eye options, we’ll have multitude of styles of hair coming in the upcoming releases starting with a select group for 3.0. These are in various states of production and heading towards the final finish line. We’ll have select group ready for the initial release and we can’t wait to cover up those hairless heads.
And finally we have more finished, rigged and implement characters starting with the Male Marine BDU which will make it’s appearance in several places including the bridge of the Idris. The Male Deck Crew can now safely EVA outside the ship in the vacuum of space when doing his work. And lastly the Female Light Armour has finished up her implementation pass along with the Female Explorer Flight Suit which will support her in the far reaches of the galaxy.
Well that’s about it and wraps us up here in Los Angeles. As always thank you for allowing us to create this game we’ve always dreamed about. And we look forward to giving you more updates in the near future. Have a fantastic rest of the week. We’ll see you back in Los Angeles in no time.
Back to Studio With Chris Roberts (CEO, Director of Star Citizen and Squadron 42), Erin Roberts (Studio Director). Timestamped Link.
CR: So it’ll be nice to see people hauling something other than Big Benny’s vending machines and unsuspecting NPCs as great as all those videos were, the team has worked hard to give you a proper mechanic for the 3.0 release.
ER: Yeah and cargo is just one of the many important features we’re currently working on. A lot of them like cargo and say derelict ships which is easy to see, while others like serialized variables aren’t as visible, but are just as critical to the game.
CR: Yeah no, they definitely are critical to the game because when you’re attempting to build a game as large and complex as Star Citizen, it’s essential to come up with a new way to streamline the data being transferred the server and the client.
ER: And so here to explain exactly how serialized variables will improve our networking capabilities and of course most importantly your Star Citizen experience, let's hear from Lead Network Programmer, Clive Johnson.
Behind the Scenes With Clive Johnson (Software Engineer). Timestamped Link.
Clive Johnson (CJ): My name's Clive Johnson. I work for Foundry 42 UK where I'm the lead network programmer. I'm working on Star Citizen. Today we're going to talk a little bit about serialized variables.
So what are serialized variables? Well they're not really something that you can see in the game, and ideally if everything is working the way it should then they're not something that you'd really have a need to think about, but they are the answer to a question which I think is quite important, and that's how do you network a game like Star Citizen? One of the first times I asked myself that question was shortly after I joined the company. I think my first reaction was one of sheer terror... you know, tears, panic. Once I'd kind of calmed down and the tears had stopped you do what any engineer is going to do when faced with an impossible problem. You try and break it down into smaller impossible problems. When trying to answer the question, how we network Star Citizen, one of the first things we've got to think about is exactly who’s going to do the work. Who's going to network everything we have in the game. Star Citizen itself is made up of thousands of different elements, and some of these are visible like planets and ships and players and coffee cups. In other words you don't see missions or the logic assigning out landing pads. Each of these elements is really a different type of entity, and each type might be used thousands of times throughout the game, but all the types behave in specific ways or have certain uses, and that has to be implemented in the code, and most of them need to work in both single-player, Squadron 42 and multiplayer, the Star Citizen. In other words most of them have to be networked.
So, who's going to do the work? Currently we've got about 60 engineers coding different parts of the game, but we have only six network programmers. Half of these work in Austin on back-end services, and that includes our core online services such as matchmaking or friends and player authentication. The other half is my team hear in the UK, and we focus mainly on the networking between the client and the server. So, it's kind of up to us to make sure that all the entity types are correctly networked and everything's functioning the way we'd like it to in the multiplayer game, but with 60 programmers, or thereabouts, writing new code and making new entity types. If we've only got three actually making it work in multiplayer my team needs to work about 20 times faster than anybody else. We're good, but not that good, so clearly leaving all the networking to the network programmers is not going to work.
So, what we need to do is have every engineer make sure that their own code works in multiplayer. The problem with that is that network programming is really very hard. It can take years to learn all the different ins and outs, so we need a way to simplify it, so that non specialists can learn it and everything they need to do in like just a couple of hours. What we need is an API, which stands for an Application Programmer Interface. That's really a cushion between a programmer doing the work and the problem they want to solve. The API kind of simplifies things by allowing the programmer to say exactly what it is that they want to do, but without saying how it should be done. So, you can kind of think of it like driving a car. So, obviously you've got your steering wheel and the pedals and other controls, gear stick lever … That's not how the car drives. They adjust the controls that tell the car what to do. So under the hood the driver's commands are turned into different settings for fuel/air mixture or engine timing or hydraulic pressures for brakes and power steering, and that's kind of the interface pass of an Application Programmer Interface. By building the right set of controls you can change how the API actually works without having to change the code.
So, what about driver error? Car's equipped with assisted driving. Can take action when the driver makes a mistake and possibly prevent a crash. We want the same sort of thing from the API that we're going to develop. When a program is used it actively prevents them from making mistakes that might cause bugs or negatively impact performance, but we can go a bit further though. So, currently the technology for driverless cars is being developed. When that happens the skill needed to operate a driverless car drops to just say where you want it to go, and this is what we're trying to do with our network API. [Chuckles] Serialized variables are a really big part of that, by giving our programmers a simpler model to work with they can quickly and safely network the game elements that they're working on, meanwhile those network programmers are freed up to try and ensure that the API not only works quickly and efficiently, but also it deals with all the problems that you can get while networking anything.
Before we go any further we probably need to talk about another question, and that's: How do online multiplayer games actually work? If you were to see the game's as programmers often look at it, you'd see that everything is essentially lots of tables and values. Every entity in the game has it's own table and each value corresponds to a different property of an entity. Because we need to know what each value's for, we got to give them all names. So a table has two columns, names on the left-hand side and values on the right. A row in a table is what we call a variable and that's mainly because its value can change over time. A ship might have variables for shield strength and how much fuel it's got left. Players can have variables to say whether they're running or walking. Most but not all of these variables will have an entity called a Position, and that's going to tell us exactly where they are in the game's universe. And even though we kind of need three values for coordinates in 3D space, we tend to think of a position as a single variable, because one part changes the other parts tend the change. So when an entity moves it does so, because the position variable is being changed. That, that variable is not really just keeping track of where the entity is, it's actually saying where the entity is.
Programmers can write code that looks at the values in a table that belongs to the entity. We can use those values to calculate some changes to other variables. Some of those variables might be in the same table or some might be in other tables belonging to different entities. So as the game progresses these variables are modified according to the actions of players and AI, and these changes update the graphics that you see on the screen and they can trigger particle effects and sound effects.
To make this work in multiplayer we've got to take one machine, the server, and have that make the changes to the tables, and then the server then needs to copy the modified tables to all the other machines, all the clients. It does this by sending messages over the network a bit like a group text message. And if everything works correctly, the clients and the server all have the same value in the tables, and everyone's in sync.
Now entities in our game can have dozens or even hundreds of these variables or properties. Most of them need to be kept in sync over the network. There are a few ways that we could do this. Probably the most straightforward way is every now and then just to send the state of all the tables, and that works really well for very small numbers of entities, but as the number of entities increases then the bandwidth that you're using to do that increases and if we're not careful that can cause us other problems.
You might notice that most entities in the game don't tend to do much until someone does something to them, so what we can try is not sending the table for an entity unless it is changed. For now the game code got to keep track of which entities have changed and which haven't and that can be tricky to get right. It's a manual process that the gameplay programs have to do. Getting it wrong means that in certain situations the tables for particular entities will no longer be in sync. We call that a desync, and the effects of that can range from like minor bugs that are just little annoyances to completely breaking the game. The only way to find these bugs is through lots and lots of time consuming playtesting.
Perhaps worse, we haven’t really solved the bandwidth problem either. By adding more players that means that more entities are being interacted with and having things done to them, so more tables are going to be getting updated and more messages need to be sent out over the network and the bandwidth jumps up once again. We still need to reduce this so we might notice that when an entity’s table is modified, not all of the values in it are changed. So instead of sending the whole table, we can try sending a few at a time, so we can split the table into sections and then we’re saving bandwidth by only sending a section. If one or more of the variables in it have changed, if we put variables that are likely to change together in the same section then we can save even more but now the game code has to keep track of not just modifications to entities but modifications to individual sections and that’s even harder to get right.
We also got to write some extra code to say which variables need to be put into which messages and since different types of entities have different sets of variables, they also need different sections. So this extra work has to be duplicated for every different type of entity. So the thing that really kills this plan for Star Citizen is entity components, a component is really it’s just a piece of code and some variables that implement a very specific piece of functionality. So entities get built by plugging different components together and by choosing different components that you want to plug together, that gives us different types of entities.
If you need an entity that can move around and collide with all the things, you have to give it a physics component. If your entity needs shields, give it a shield component. The number of different entity types we can build this way grows exponentially with the number of different components that we have. What also grows exponentially is the amount of networking work we’ve got to do to cover all these different entity types so clearly this isn’t really going to work for us. Our networking API has to be smarter, what we wanted were controls that were simple as those for a driverless car and what we had felt like it was as complicated as piloting a space shuttle. So that’s when we came up with serialized variables.
So with these gameplay programmers just need to write their code the way they normally would and their item variables to their components as they need them and the only extra thing they need to do is mark the variables that they want networked in a special way. That just shows that these ones are ones that need to be serialized. Serialization is a process of packing up the data in a form that’s more efficient and better suits being sent over the network or serialized to a file. This makes life so much easier for our programmers, you can see how the code on the left can be simplified and be reduced to what’s on the right. It’s really just like writing normal code and calling out which of the variables we want serialized. The program only needs to write the additional lines that you can see highlighted and appearing on the right and add them to their class definition and that tells the serialized variable system which members of the structure to watch and update.
Previously we would have needed specific functions in each class, one for net serialized for networking, full serialized for the saved game and if we wanted to talk to the persistent database we would have needed an extra function, something like persistent serialized. In these functions the game programmers would have had to manually look at the variables they wanted to serialize and write them out into the serialization stream. So, there’s lots of scope there for extra work and possible errors if they forget to add a variable.
Now when a program writes a new class, they just mark up which of the variables they want to be serialized and everything else is handled automatically and efficiently behind the scenes. That all goes through one unified system that we can profile and optimize as opposed to having to worry about optimizing literally thousands of different functions.
Once the variables have been marked there’s no need to group things into sections anymore and there’s no extra code to write. The API detects when something is modified, the value of a variable, it lets the netcode know so that can deal with it. The new API even writes the code to handle the serialization for them and this kind of level of automation not only saves us time but it eliminates human error. I mean we have a lot fewer bugs and we can just get on more quickly and more efficiently.
So because the netcode is now being told about changes to individual variables we’re on the networking side of a much clearer view of what’s actually happening in the game. So, you can kinda think of like switching to a 4K TV when all you’ve ever seen before was grainy black and white and we’re kinda using this extra information at the moment so that we only send exactly what is changed and that means that there are bandwidth update messages, the size of our update messages are now probably about as optimized as it’s possible to get.
We’re also using this information so we can profile what’s being sent by the game code, when it’s marking variables there so we can see if anyone’s hit anything particularly quickly and maybe there’s a bug in the game code that needs looking at. Really the only overall improvements we’re going to get from now on is by optimizing streams of network messages, calling out who’s sending messages at all and how often messages are being sent. We can handle all that on the network side, on netcode side.
So it’s kinda like I was saying before where we got this interface of the API that separates game code from what we need to do and we can make our changes without affecting that. While we were working on this new technology, we noticed that one of the entity types started sending about 80% less data, at first we just didn’t believe that. We were certain that the numbers had to be wrong or a bug’s throwing away most of the data, it wasn’t until we went back and we double checked everything that we really started to realize that this saving was actually real and that it’s due to the new code. That’s probably not going to be typical but it still kinda shows the difference this kind of approach can make.
That’s not entirely where the story end though because one of the other cool things about serialized variables is that they don’t just work for multiplayer and networking. Instead of sending the different tables, values and variables between just server and clients we can also store them in the database or save them to a file. That means that the with no extra effort at all the gameplay programmers can use the same serialized variables. For persistence we call them what the state events these are is in our persistent universe and we can even use them for saved games in Squadron 42.
Personally one of the best thing about serialized variables is that they’re one of the cornerstones that we’re using to build this big seamless persistent universe. Achieving it now is going to require spreading the load over multiple servers because it’s seamless we’re going to have to have these servers communicating with each other. That’s going to mean there could be a lot of servers aware of any particular entity so let’s say for example, an AI pirate. Now we don’t want all the servers trying to tell the pirate what he should be doing, cause first that would be a complete waste of computing power and the second reason is that the servers might not agree on what the AI should do next. So, we need one server that’s in charge of the AI pirate and only that server can send updates for that AI pirate entity and the other servers just listen to it.
So the trick is going to be how we decide which server gets the final say and we’re going to do that with something that we’re calling tokens. A token can only be held by one computer at a time, when a computer is finished with a token it just passes it onto the next one that wants it. By linking serialized variables and tokens together we’ll be able to transfer authority from one server to another as quickly as flicking a switch. What that means for our AI pirate is that control over it’s AI mind can pass seamlessly from one server to another and since different servers, at least initially will control different regions of space. This combination of tokens and serialized variable will allow our AI pirate and everything else to move freely through a seamless persistent universe that’s being simulated by lots of servers all working together. So hopefully you’ll agree that serialized variables are not only a key part of the current technology but are a building block for future ones. That’s really not bad for something... you’re never going to say, that’s often the reality of game development and what you see in game is just the tip of an iceberg that’s being buoyed up by a massive systems and technology all working together. You know out of sight, fingers crossed out of mind.
Outro With Chris Roberts (CEO, Director of Star Citizen and Squadron 42), Erin Roberts (Studio Director). Timestamped Link.
CR: So as you can see the serialized variable tech is an important feature for several reasons: it not only improves the games networking, but also simplifies the coding for our programmers so there will be fewer bugs going forward and the same data can be serialized over the network to the persistent database or say the state of the game meaning we have one unified way to communicate or save game state throughout everything which is important for a big, huge, universe like we’re building.
ER: Absolutely. Anyway that’s it for today’s program, but before we go we wanted to remind all backers to keep your account safe by enabling two step authentication. You can do that by visiting your account page and clicking on the security tab under settings.
CR: Yes, probably a good idea to do that, and thanks to all of our subscribers. Your continued support makes ATV, Bugsmashers, and all our programs possible.
ER: And don’t forget to tune in tomorrow for another one of our subscriber supported shows, Happy Hour Friday. This week Ben Lesnick will be playing Wing Commander III and discussing the history behind the game and its development. In mine and Chris’s case that’s a long time ago.
CR: About 24 years ago we were developing it so anyway! Time flies. Finally I’d like to thank all our backers, your support and enthusiasm for the game has made all this possible. We couldn’t do it without you.
ER: So until next week we’ll see you…
Both: Around the Verse.
CanadianSyrup Director of Transcripts A polite Canadian who takes pride in making other peoples day brighter. He enjoys waffles with Maplesyrup, making delicious puns and striving for perfection in screaming at the T.V. during hockey games. StormyWinters Director of Fiction Moonlighting as a writer in her spare time StormyWinters combines her passion for the written word and love of science fiction resulting in innumerable works of fiction. As the Director of Fiction, she works with a fantastic team of writers to bring you amazing stories that transport you to new places week after week. Sunjammer Contributor For whatever reason, this author doesn't have a bio yet. Maybe they're a mystery. Maybe they're an ALIEN. Maybe they're about to get a paddlin' for not filling one out. Who knows, it's a myyyyyyystery! Desmarius Transcriber When he's not pun-ishing his patients or moderating Twitch streams, he's at Relay pun-ishing their patience as a member of the transcription staff. Otherwise, he can be found under a rock somewhere in deep East Texas listening to the dulcet tones of a banjo and pondering the meaning of life. "If you can't do something smart, do something right." - Sheperd Book
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Massively comprehensive anthology of oft-overlooked female surrealist writers (prior favorites included here: Leornora Carrington and Ithel Colquhoun), not just in the interwar Paris of surrealism's conception but straight up through the present and virtually across the globe. In this sense, it's quite a good history of the development and spread of the surrealist movement and influence, from Martinique to Egypt (much historical and biographical information here, too), but sometimes it also seem
My mother, who often frightened me, saying she'd heard the noise of the gods' hunt, was never able to explain exactly what it was. She'd say it was those enormous, deafening noises of men and monstrous beasts that pas over the sky on a certain date of the year. When you hear them, you must lie on the ground on your stomach and plug your ears.
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Comparable to humans, other animals seem quite reasonable.
When I woke up, there were no more children. But on the carpet lay a bandaged male foot, some moldy hair, and some nuts. Children are afraid of idols.
...out there in the desert, that tall ship built entirely of most costly marble...
But the duck wanted to be eaten in the Spanish style, like a free man, and not with nettles as the donkey was suggesting.
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Massively comprehensive anthology of oft-overlooked female surrealist writers (prior favorites included here: Leornora Carrington and Ithel Colquhoun), not just in the interwar Paris of surrealism's conception but straight up through the present and virtually across the globe. In this sense, it's quite a good history of the development and spread of the surrealist movement and influence, from Martinique to Egypt (much historical and biographical information here, too), but sometimes it also seems like some depth has been sacrificed to encyclopedic reach. And, as a matter of taste, I'm much more excited by surrealist prose fiction than a lot of the automatic writing exercises and poetry (editor Penelope Rosemont's personal area of surrealist contribution-- besides this edifice, of course), that turn up here. Or even essay excerpts about (rather than) surrealist topics. Still, an excellent reference book that I will certainly pull off the shelf regularly.I find that a lot of this can run together a bit (nature of the scope and density of the material perhaps) so I've really got to take notes:Renee Gauthier :: though with only a single published dream account from 1924, I want to remember her description of the "gods' hunt", a bit of bizarre lore impressed upon her by her mother in childhood:Claude Cahun :: Born Lucy Schwob, niece of Belgian symbolist Marcel Schwob. Though an excellent writer of vignettes about classic surrealist topics like masks ("with horror you see that the flesh and the mask have become inseparable") and the dangers of objects, she is apparently best known as an early surrealist photographer, which was well backed up by a little googling. A self portrait, and a constructed scene from here Lise Deharme :: While this collection only contains a couple all-too-brief poems, Deharme was apparently a prolific writer with a number of novels to her name. I'm not sure that any have been translated from French, but if anyone has any information, I'd be thrilled. Later, also included, a quick story-sketch about Gertrude Stein.Interlude: a sort of surrealist 20 questions, wherein one player envisions an object while another attempts to guess it or discern its properties with questions like: "Is it diurnal or nocturnal?" "Is it favorable toward love?" "What crime does it correspond to?" and "On what spot of the nude body of a women would you place it?". Played this on the train with Maya with excellent results.Gisele Prassinos :: Greek composer of splendid automatic verse and prose, legendarily let into the surrealist group at age 14, in 1934. This volume includes two quick stories that tend towards the more haphazard end of surrealism, but leave me curious to find more at least.Sheila Legge :: as the "Surrealist Phantom" at the 1936 Surrealist exposition in London.Leonora Carrington :: My favorite surrealist writer ever, so I was delighted to find a short previously untranslated tale here, "The Sand Camel". One of her eerie fables of dubious moral import, this one describes two children, A and B, who live with their grandmother and build dangerous animals with advice from a crow magician. Vague, tangential resonance with, actually. I wonder if Agota Kristof came across it somewhere in its original French... Later, an excerpt from her madness-memoir Down Below, well worth reading in its own right, and some notes on magic.Ithel Colquhoun :: is represented here, but only by a few brief essays and an excerpt from her single novel which might have composed for publication elsewhere, a set of pseudo-scientific observations. They're pretty great, though, and motivated me to read my copy of Goose of Hermogenes right away. With Carrington, one of the finer novelists of the original interwar surrealism -- now if only she'd written more of them. Apparently Peter Owens published two books of her travel writing, though, and the Brooklyn Public Library has a book she wrote about occultism and the Golden Dawn (of which Crowley was a part, I think I saw an anecdote somewhere that he once tried to seduce her, which is pretty amazing to try to envision. Fitting, though -- Colquhoun eventually became a Priestess of Isis, whatever that entails.Laurence Iche :: An active member of underground surrealist groupin Vichy France. It makes sense that there would have been a surrealist resistance unsettling the power structure with weird leaflets and such, but it's still crazy to imagine publshing such things in secret during Nazi occupation. I'd be terribly curious to see more of this material, Iche's and others'.Therese Renaud and Francoise Sullivan :: leading exponents of the Quebecoise "automatist" movement in line with surrealist ideas in the latter 40s, in poetry and dance respectively. I've never heard of any such thing as any Quebecois surrealist groups, so I'll have to look up more information on the automatists.Dorothea Tanning :: Interesting greek-ish myth included here from an exhibition catalog for her new husband Max Ernst, in '49. Apparently she wrote a novel, Abyss, in 1947, happily contradicting (with Lise Deharme and probably others) the claim I'd seen that the only female surrealists to have written novels were Carrington and Colquhoun. Naturally, though, I can find out absolutely nothing about this book now. On the other hand, I've just snapped up a signed edition of her 2004 horror novel,, which sounds splendidly insane. Sadly, she died just 3 months ago, at the end of January 2012. Of course, she was 101 by then...Nora Mitrani :: I'm usually (unsurprisingly) less into the non-fiction bits here, but Mitrani is a quite brilliant essayist, turns out. Incisive sharpy-wide-angled queries into de Sade and cosmetics above others.Joyce Mansour :: Egyptian-English poet, but the barely-mentioned-in-passing 1958 story collection Les Gisants Satisfaits sounds intriguing. It's untranslated, it seems, but I know Mansour has piece in one of the Daedalus surrealism collections, so perhaps it's from this.Mimi Parent :: Another Quebecois surrealist I'd never heard about. Less of a writer, but I want to see more of her objects, very few of which seem to be online anywhere:Remedios Varo :: Originally known to me mainly for her cameo as Carmela in her real-life best friend Leonora Carrington's The Hearing Trumpet, Varo was also apparently author of "an extraordinary manuscript,: an elaborate chronicle of imaginary discoveries written in a quasiscientific style with an abundance of quotations in a humorous invented Latin, posthumously published in 1970." Unfortunately, very few of of this strange "hand-lettered limited edition" book exist; even Worldcat lists only a a single example. Quotes here, however.Nelly Kaplan :: An exciting lead on two fronts, concerning a Russian Argentine who may have run away from home at age 17, drawn to Paris because "it was built on the ruins of a temple of Isis", only to become an assistant to filmmaker Abel Gance, then get draw into surrealism by chance meeting with Breton. First, she apparently directed docs on Gustave Moreau (narrated by Breton, incidentally) and the like starting in the 60s, then a number of feature films in the surrealist spirit, if not necessarily technique or style. I must see these. Second, the longest prose fiction yet included in this collection is a terribly enticing excerpt from(Les Memoires d'une Lisuese de Draps), concerning lost blasphemous Moreau paintings, vampires, and a women seeking employment or a place to lay low at
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a limiting factor in terms of what we can deliver to downstream devices. USB-C would immediately allow us to bring an additional 2.5W into the board. As for downstream USB-C (and really by implication USB3.x) that's another thing that would need to wait for a future SoC.by linuxguyI own all of the major Raspberry Pi hardware versions that have been released. I love them all. I only have one wish. Faster I/O. Will the next hardware release address this? USB 3.0, 1Gbps NIC, faster SD card interface. Any one of these upgrades would be great. All of them? Would be awesome!See above. We know these are things people want, and I'm sure we'll address them in the future, but it's a long road to get a suitable silicon platform that integrates these features, and it's not feasible to retrofit them with external components given our level of cost sensitivity.We do have a neat software hack for higher SD card performance that we hope to roll out in the near future.by UnknownSoldierSome of us are still waiting for a low-cost 4 GB + 4 Core embedded device with a Real-Time-Clock. Are there any plans to support anything like that in the (near) future?I think the challenge here is fitting that much memory into a reasonable target price and form factor. You're talking on the order of $15-20 of DDR3L even at spot prices, and 8 PCB placements, so it's unlikely to happen at the $35 target price and credit-card form factor in the near future. 2GB might be feasible in a few years' time; between now and then you'll see us investing a lot of software work in getting the most out of the 1GB we have on Raspberry Pi 3.An RTC is a tempting addition, but the majority of our users don't need one, so we'd be burdening these users with unnecessary cost for the sake of the minority who do. We prefer to leave it to third parties to create cheap RTC add-on boards.by rkhalloranThe Pi was designed as a cheap-as-chips (pun unintended) computer for classroom education. Obviously, since then it's been put to a myriad of other uses. Which of these have struck you as the "best" or most unexpected usage outside the classroom?Well, I'm a space cadet, so the various space (or near-space) applications stand out: Dave Akerman's high-altitude balloon flights, our Astro Pi work with Tim Peake on the ISS (technically a classroom, but a rather unusual one), and various telescope projects. People using the Pi to build scientific instruments (microscopes, seismic detectors, meteor trackers, and recently a commercial DNA analyzer) are always fun.Probably my all-time favorite is the RACHEL project, which bundles a bunch of free educational and utility content (Wikipedia, Project Gutenberg etc.) onto an SD card and serves it via WiFi to people in the developing world who are beyond the current reach of the internet. It's easy to say that Project Loon, or internet.org, or simply the steady roll-out of conventional broadband access will make it obsolete in the near future, but these things always take longer than we imagine.In the meantime, World Possible are bringing some of the benefits of the internet to people who might otherwise still be waiting in 2040. Go donate!by NukenbarWhat are the challenges in bringing a lower power display (e-ink or otherwise) to market?For me the number one challenge is finding a commercial-scale, quality supplier of e-ink displays on a non-glass substrate. This should help both with cost and robustness, which are key for my imagined target market (solar powered solid-state computers in the developing world). Without a substrate breakthrough, e-ink doesn't feel compelling (pluses: power consumption, sunlight readability; minuses: refresh speed, color; neutral: cost, robustness).I had high hopes for Plastic Logic in Cambridge, but this seems not to be happening.by Joe_DragonPlans for non usb based networking?Not at present. I think this is something that will need to wait for a future SoC with a ground-up redesign, either to add on-board GigE, or some other fast interface (PCIe, USB 3.x) which could be cheaply and efficiently bridged to GigE.For a lot of use cases Fast Ethernet over USB 2.0 is actually a great solution. Every time Raspberry Pi gets mentioned on Slashdot, someone pops up in the comments to explain that USB dooms us to unstable networking, but I've never seen any evidence that this is actually a thing (even back in 2012 before Jonathan fixed our USB driver issues, and even when serving our website off a Raspberry Pi 3 cluster for this year's April Fools' Day). Superstition is a funny thing.The NAS use case does generally need faster networking, but then you also need a fast mass-storage interface (SATA, NVMe or USB 3.x again).by ArakunDid you target the credit card size from the get-go or was it more of a happy coincidence that the Pi ended up that size?We targeted the credit card size form factor from day one. Of course if you measure a Raspberry Pi against a credit card you'll see that we didn't quite hit it in either X or Y (and I would say Z ranks as a significant miss). On the flip side we did hit a nice multiple of the Lego basis unit size: that really was a happy coincidence.by ArakunTo what extent do you take power consumption into account when designing new models -- should we expect new models to continue to use more power as they get more powerful or do you plan to try to keep them below a certain level?I think we've pretty much hit the limit in terms of how much power we can dissipate on the board. I'm reluctant to add a heat sink, and certainly not active cooling. This sort of implies that we're going to need to change to a SoC on a smaller (and therefore more power-efficient) process node to get more performance. The time impact of that is one of the reasons why I say that Raspberry Pi 3 is likely to have a much longer lifetime in the market than Raspberry Pi 2 did.by CamembertSince the Pi products make computing accessible for most everyone, would it be worthwhile to develop an all-in-one Pi like the One Laptop Per Child concept?It's tempting, but there's a massive increase in engineering and business complexity associated with building a laptop versus building a Raspberry Pi. You need to know about batteries, keyboards, trackpads, hinges and display panels, and each of those needs to be sourced in a cost-effective manner, designed in, and quality controlled (batteries in particular scare the crap out of me).I think for the time being we'll leave this to the ecosystem. Pi Top, particularly their CEED product, and some of the efforts to build HDMI-connected "docks" are worth a look.by Anonymous CowardA lot of Pi users such as myself have experienced bricked SD cards after running a Pi continuously for weeks or months. SD cards, even premium ones, are not terribly robust when used to store a root file system that experiences lots of small writes. Disabling logging helps by reducing the number of writes to the card, but isn't a good solution if you need logs. Have you looked at any alternative storage options for the root file system?We do now support booting directly from USB mass storage without an SD card on Raspberry Pi 3, and on earlier models you could always load the firmware and kernel from SD but keep the root filesystem on USB. This gives you the choice of USB pen drives (not really superior to good-quality SD from a write endurance perspective but with somewhat better bandwidth), and rotating-media or solid-state drives. Western Digital have supported us with some nice cost-effective single-platter HDDs.An NFS mounted root filesystem is a good solution for some users: quite a lot of people at Pi Towers do this. Gordon recently added PXE boot support on Raspberry Pi 3, so this is another thing that can be made to work without an SD card.by ArakunDo you yourself use Raspberry Pis in your daily life and if so what for?One of the sad things for me is that even now I don't really get time to do proper creative stuff with this toy that I've been involved in creating. I do use a Raspberry Pi 3 with Kodi as a media center, and very early on I started using them as an alternative to spinning up a VM on my Windows gaming PC each time I need a local Unix box to hack on: my broadband gateway has ended up with a museum of Raspberry Pi hardware dangling off it on tiny patch cables.I still hope that one day I'll have a chance to do some serious hardware hacking with a Pi. Maybe next year...by raymorrisYou've founded multiple successful ventures related to technology. While many entrepreneurs may manage to pay their own bills working out of their garage to "own their job," you've had success beyond that, more than once. What do you think is the biggest reason your projects have been much more successful than the typical entrepreneurial venture which never grows beyond just a few people?Each time, it's been a case of good people, good luck and being in the right place at the right time.With Ideaworks we happened to be there with some pluginless (Java and Flash) 3d tech at just the point where Intel were looking for processor-intensive use cases to promote the Pentium 3. We took the money from that, hired the nucleus of a great team, and were probably the first people to realize that cross-platform portability was going to be the big challenge in native mobile game development. If anything we were a bit too early, and the challenge was staying alive while we waited for the market to mature.Podfun was actually precisely the sort of non-scaling business you talk about. In Cambridge these get called "lifestyle businesses," perhaps with a little condescension, but it paid a few of us good money for a while, and I had the chance to travel to interesting places (notably India) and meet interesting people.And then Raspberry Pi just tapped into this latent demand for something cost effective and robust that people could hack on. Pete's original Model B hardware, with Dom and Gray's firmware and board support, sold enough to let us start hiring a team, and we bootstrapped our way up with more and better hardware, a more stable and standard software environment, and so on.I still don't know anything about raising VC money and running a conventional "high growth" company: I'm much more comfortable hiring slowly, growing organically, and keeping the quality of the team insanely high. I met a guy the other day running a London-based mid-stage startup who is hiring two or three engineers a week, and I'm just like "how?" How do you grow that fast and not end up letting the suck in?by jo7hs2Any thoughts on how to address the "add-on syndrome" that plagues SBCs like the Pi products? As in the board is $35, but then after a power supply, case, SD card, wifi (if not equipped), USB hub, etc... you hit around $80-100. It makes it hard to run multiple projects at once, plus the quality of packaged hardware from retailers is often questionable at best.Steady integration of features onto the board helps: from your list we integrated WiFi onto Raspberry Pi 3, and we've had four USB ports for a couple of years now so you only need a hub if you want to attach a large number of devices, or use several high-power-consumption ones.The credibility of the $35 price point is important to us, and the goal was always to allow very cost-sensitive users (e.g. kids) to scrounge up a bare set of add-ons at very low cost: this is why we used USB and micro SD for power and storage, and made sure the device was safe to use without a case.For less cost-sensitive customers who want a reliable pre-configured kit, we've done a lot of work to try to drive cost down and quality up. This is why you've seen us do an official case, official PSU and branded SD card. We make a little money on the case to recover the cost of the injection mold tooling, but not on the PSU or SD card: they exist purely to try to flush out the low-quality ones you see in some kits, particularly on eBay. For $60 you can get a Raspberry Pi 3, and the complete set of official add-ons.by ShakaUVMHi Eben, I teach classes using the Raspberry Pi 2 (soon to be switching to 3, I hope) in a variety of contexts, such as with students wanting to learn ARM assembly and to K-12 teachers who want to do physical computing in their science classrooms. It feels to me like the RPi is focused a little too much on Python and Scratch. I understand that it's called the Pi because of Python, but ARM assembly is my favorite assembly language, and bare metal assembly in particular is just a really natural fit for physical computing due to how easy it is to turn GPIO pins on and off. But the lack of documentation for the newer Broadcom SoCs has made it difficult for my students to write bare metal projects. So this leads to my question for you: are there any plans on rolling out better documentation / support / code examples for assembly on the RPi 2 and 3? Despite this sounding like grousing, I would like to assure you that I love everything you've done with the Raspberry Pi and the notion of physical computing in general. Everyone who takes an assembly class or science technology workshop with me this year will get a free RPI3 and a bunch of sensors, wires, and motors to do hands-on, open ended projects. And I've been doing this for a while and it works really well. Thanks again for all of your vision and tireless effort you've spent in this arena.Well, first off, thank you for using Raspberry Pi in your classes. People forget that the work we do ourselves is dwarfed by the work the community does on top of the platform.If there are specific things that we've not documented well then please let us know via the contact address on the website: I'm aware that some of the "ARM local" peripherals (timers, mailboxes, interrupt routing) mapped above 0x40000000 that we added between BCM2835 and BCM2836/7 aren't as well documented as the rest of the system (for which the venerable "BCM2835 Peripheral Specification" PDF remains valid). Although a bunch of people have figured it out from our Linux kernel sources, we should probably do something about that.One of the most-grumbled-about aspects of the Pi -- the closed VideoCore firmware -- actually makes it a very benign environment for bare-metal programming, because the ARM comes out of reset with the SDRAM and video system up and running and your code pre-loaded at address zero. Imperial College do a fantastic bare-metal competition for their first year students each year, that James and Gordon have been involved in judging. The bare-metal Starfox clone with ARM software rasterization is an all-time favorite.by ralph.corderoyHow did your move from software to chip design of a graphics processor (that had an ARM added on to become the Pi) come about? Do you think more coders, especially those adept at assembler, should cross the bridge to Verilog and VHDL?I joined Broadcom as a software engineer, but was lucky to be part of a team that let enthusiastic amateurs like me hack on the chip Verilog. If you came up with something promising you could get it code reviewed by someone who actually knew what they were doing, have the rough edges knocked off, and see it taped out. This is really unusual in the industry, and was an artifact of the small integrated teams that we used to put together the various bits of IP that make up VideoCore.Most of my contributions were at the higher level (instruction set architecture and outline microarchitecture for the VideoCore IV QPUs, deferred vertex shading, the general approach to the system level on VideoCore V etc), but there are some nice little low level bits in there (8x8 intra mode selection in the video encoder, the polygon clipper state machine, the SDRAM controller ECO for 1GB support on BCM2836) with my fingerprints on them.I think it's a worthwhile set of skills to have as a software engineer, because it gives you some more appreciation for the tradeoffs that underpin your work. The best advice is to find a small, talented team doing chips or IP, be prepared to get your hands dirty and learn from the guys who've been doing this for decades.FWC is considering another bear hunt for 2016. (Photo: Andrew West/The News-Press)
Wildlife officials will use input from an ongoing series of webinars to help make their case about how a black-bear hunt could be held later this year, even as many of the questions posed come from critics.
No hunt has been approved, and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission won't receive a staff recommendation until just before a meeting June 22 and June 23 in the Franklin County community of Eastpoint.
But during a three-hour webinar Thursday, commission staff members were adamant that a hunt is among the various ways to manage the state's growing bear population and to reduce human-bear interactions. This week, webinars are scheduled for Tuesday night and Thursday.
"When we look at what FWC and partner agencies and others are doing, we're throwing everything and the kitchen sink at bears right now," Dave Telesco, commission bear-management program coordinator, said during the webinar. "We're doing education. We're trying for ordinances. We're trying to get voluntary compliance in securing trash. We're hunting and we're moving bears. And so we're basically trying to do everything that we can to reduce those conflicts and to reduce the risks to public safety."
Thomas Eason, director of the commission's habitat and species conservation division, said the agency is still formulating its recommendation, using information from last year's hunt in which hunters killed 304 bears in two days, and still taking input from different groups.
But he added that the agency can't just focus on educating people to secure trash and food when left outside and expect bears and humans not to cross paths.
"We're looking at over 200 bears that are being hit by vehicles, that means people are in those vehicles," Eason said during the webinar. "Part of the rationale behind the hunt is to help shift mortality away from things where it's impacting people negatively."
Harry Dutton, leader of the hunting and game management division, said "for a possible future hunt" officials are looking at the length and time of year for the hunt and limiting the number of permits. Also, they are looking at how check stations are monitored, rules for hunting on wildlife management areas, the prohibition on baiting bears, the use of dogs to track bears and the minimum size of bears that could be killed.
In last year's hunt, there was a 100-pound minimum as bears under that weight are considered cubs.
The two-day hunt in October was highly controversial and was the state's first black-bear hunt in more than two decades.
About 600 questions were submitted during last week's live-chat session, most from a handful of bear-hunt critics, and many were redundant as some participants came in and out during the 150-minute question and answer portion.
The webinar opened with a brief outline on the growth of the bear population in the state, a recap of the 2015 bear hunt, the latest estimates on the numbers of bears in Florida and efforts to reduce incidents involving humans and bears.
The state agency currently estimates, based upon recent surveys, 4,220 bears are in the state, up from 2,640 in 2002. The population growth has been called robust as the estimated bear count was as low as 300 to 500 in the 1970s, when bears were put on the state's list of threatened species. Bears were removed from the list in 2012.
Local government officials from Seminole, Miami-Dade and Volusia counties have voiced opposition to a repeat of the 2015 hunt.
Critics of bear hunting rattled off questions about issues such as why the state agency doesn't provide free bear-proof trash cans in areas where nuisance calls are made. Also, they raised questions about whether nuisance bears should be relocated deeper into the wilderness and into less populated areas and if the state agency is "embarrassed about the worldwide media coverage they received last year opposing the hunt?"
"FWC claims that the science is there for a hunt, but that doesn't mean that a bear hunt should or must take place," wrote Laura Bevan, a webinar participant and the regional director of the Humane Society of the United States, which opposed last year's hunt.
A few of the critics added that if another hunt is held, the state should limit bear-hunt permits to Florida residents or simply use professional hunters to manage the population and avoid a "free for all."
"Why does FWC pander to the small few 'problem people' who hate or are intolerant to bears? Why does FWC push so hard for a trophy hunt?" asked webinar participant Lee Day.
Those posing questions that favored hunting bear pushed to allow baiting and to expand the role of dogs in the hunts on certain lands larger than 50,000 acres. Also, they raised ideas about holding the hunt in the spring, excluding from the state's Sunshine Law the names of permit holders and having the hunt last longer.
This year, Florida lawmakers included $500,000 in the new state budget to reduce human-bear conflicts. A large part of the money is revenue from permits sold for the 2015 hunt. The money doesn't become available until after the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.
Read or Share this story: http://on.tdo.com/1sIR04CGoogle’s aim of making sure customers in developing markets have access to affordable smartphones has taken its first step into Europe with the launch of the first Android One phone on the continent.
The company has announced that Android One will be going on sale in Turkey thanks to a new partnership with local carrier General Mobile.
Costing around £165, the imaginatively-named General Mobile 4G will offer Android 5.1.1 Lollipop, 4G networks (the first Android One device to do so) and a 13MP camera, making it a handy proposition for many who can’t afford a high-end smartphone.
One for you?
The device itself is not a bad-looking offering, featuring a 5in HD IPS screen made with Gorilla Glass 4. On the inside, there has been a significant change, as unlike most other Android One devices that have used MediaTek processors, the Turkish device is powered by a 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 chip, backed up with 2GB of RAM.
Alongside the 13MP rear camera, there’s also a 5MP front sensor, and 16GB of internal storage to keep all your media safe.
“Our goal with Android One is to empower more people to do great things with the internet by putting a high-quality, up-to-date smartphone into their hands,” Caesar Sengupta, VP, product management, Android One said in a statement.
“Turkish creativity and innovation are already exciting, so we can’t wait to see what people do with Android One.”
Launched in June 2014, Android One aims to create cheap but high quality smartphones as part of Google’s efforts to extend its reach into developing markets. So far, it has launched in six countries – India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and the Philippines.
All Android One handsets must be at least 4.5 inches in size, have 1GB of RAM, a five megapixel front-facing camera and two megapixel front-facing sensor and quad core processor. The devices run stock Android and there is room to add market-specific features such as FM radios, MicroSD card slots and replaceable batteries.
Do you know all about the Android platform? Take our quiz!289 SHARES Facebook Twitter Linkedin Reddit
Ok, these ARKit experiments and mashups are getting darn cool. Here VR development studio Emergent linked together HoloLens and an iPhone with ARKit to turn the iPhone into a 6DOF motion tracked controller.
The tracking may be somewhat rudimentary, but it’s becoming increasingly clear the many possibilities that come with smartphones that are able to understand their position in the world. From a fusion of AR and VR to a portal into volumetric video, we’ve seen some really cool ARKit experiments, but none that have used an iPhone as a motion controller instead of a display.
Emergent has demonstrated the possibility by turning an iPhone into a motion controller for a HoloLens game. In the game the HoloLens is represented as the player’s helmet, while the iPhone is a sci-fi laser gun that’s tracked in all dimensions. Taking things a step further, the studio demonstrates how bullet laser holes can be convincingly overlaid onto objects in the environment, thanks to the devices’ ability to map the geometry of the environment.
It’s clear from the video that there’s a good deal of latency and that the precision isn’t particularly high (after all, ARKit isn’t intended for immersive experiences), and keeping the tracking systems of both HoloLens and ARKit in sync over distance and time could post a challenge. But the potential for the use-case is clear—especially as smartphones begin to hit the mainstream with more precise motion tracking instruments—a well tracked smartphone can be a flexible and widespread tool for AR and VR alike.KANPUR: When it comes to family planning and using of contraceptives, Uttar Pradesh has something to cheer as far as sterilisation is concerned because this trend had registered a growth in the last five years. Leaving behind Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, UP recorded maximum number of vasectomy and tubectomy operations in 2009. Taking a leap from 49.26 lakh sterilisations in 2004-05 to 51.50 lakh in 2009, the state has shown a rising trend in adopting sterilisation as a method of family planning.Despite availability of different methods of contraceptives, the data indicate that female sterilisation is still the most favoured one. In 2008-09, 48.70 lakh women have got tubectomy conducted with only 2.80 lakh men preferring vasectomy. According to the figures of National Family Health Survey (NFHS), only 2 per cent had undergone vasectomy in the state, including only 0.3 per cent share of Kanpur.Associate professor, surgery, Lala Lajapat Rai (LLR) Hospital GD Yadav said: "Male sterilisation is still not acceptable by the society due to myths like impotency, complications in reproductive tract and pain. Therefore, refined method of conventional vasectomy i.e. `no scalpel vasectomy' is being favoured these days."Family planning has always been associated with numerous misconceptions. One of them is its association with sterilization and birth control. The main objective of the family welfare programme is to make people adopt small family norms to stabilise the country's population. Initially, the programme adopted the model of the three child family. In the 1970s, the slogan changed to `Do ya teen bas' and in the 1980s it was `Hum Do Humare Do' (two child norm). However, at present the emphasis has been on three themes: `Sons or Daughters: two will do', `Second child after three years' and `Universal immunization'.However north Indian states still continue to have lower contraceptive prevalence rates. UP, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Orissa contribute 40 per cent to the population.Chief medical officer, Dr Ashok Mishra, said: "Many women who are sexually active avoid to become pregnant and do not use contraceptives as they depend on their partners. These women, especially married ones, are considered to have an `unmet need' for family planning. It is the `unmet need' which poses a challenge to family planning programmes.""Amongst the most common reason for unmet need are inconvenient or unsatisfactory services, lack of information, fear about side effects of contraceptives and opposition from husband or relatives," he added.According to the National Family Health Survey-3 (2005-2006), about 12.8 per cent of married women have an `unmet need' for family planning. The `unmet need' for spacing the birth was almost the same for limiting the births. The highest of 27.1 per cent `unmet need' among women below 20 years of age was for spacing the births rather than limiting the births. Relatively, it was high for women in age group of 20 to 24. Whereas, the `unmet need' for contraception among women aged 30 years and above was mostly for limiting the births.Notably, the non-prevalence of contraceptive usage was 14.1 per cent in rural areas, higher in comparison to urban areas which was only 9.7 per cent. The variation was due to education status and priority to religion. Though the NFHS-3 results predicted that current use of contraception has increased and the extent of `unmet need' has declined, states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan need a considerable improvement in family planning services.Despite the availability of different contraceptive devices since the past 10 years, family planning doesn't seem to hold significance for couples in the city. According to the district-level household survey 2007-08 here, 52 per cent are not using any method. It also came to light that 19.5 per cent of women had undergone tubectomy and 0.3 per cent men had vasectomy. Whereas 14.1 per cent men are using condoms and 2.3 per cent women IUDs.City nodal officer of State innovations for family planning services agency Rajendra Prasad Singh said: "The condition is similar in both the urban and the rural areas. The reasons for such deplorable status is that many couples are not the regular users. They frequently switch over from one device to other."Baker's dozen
What's the meaning of the phrase 'Baker's dozen'?
Thirteen or, more rarely, fourteen.
What's the origin of the phrase 'Baker's dozen'?
It's widely believed that this phrase originated from the practice of medieval English bakers giving an extra loaf when selling a dozen in order to avoid being penalized for selling short weight. This is an attractive story and, unlike many that inhabit the folk memory, it appears to be substantially true. We can say a little more to flesh out that derivation.
Firstly, the practice appears to have originated several centuries before the phrase. England has a long history of regulation of trade; bakers were regulated by a trade guild called The Worshipful Company of Bakers, which dates back to at least the reign of Henry II (1154-89). The law that caused bakers to be so wary was the Assize of Bread and Ale. In 1266, Henry III revived an ancient statute that regulated the price of bread according to the price of wheat. Bakers or brewers who gave short measure could be fined, pilloried or flogged, as in 1477 when the Chronicle of London reported that a baker called John Mund[e]w was'schryved [forced to admit his guilt] upon the pyllory' for selling bread that was underweight.
Consumer legislation has moved on. A supermarket pack of a dozen loaves now contains just 12.
Secondly, it's not quite so neat an explanation that whenever bakers sold twelve loaves they then added another identical loaf to make thirteen. They would have had just as much concern when selling eleven loaves, but there's no baker's eleven. Remember that the Assize regulated weight not number. What the bakers were doing whenever they sold bread in any quantity was adding something extra to make sure the total weight wasn't short. The addition was called the 'in-bread' or 'vantage loaf'. When selling in quantity to middlemen or wholesalers they would add an extra loaf or two. When selling single loaves to individuals they would offer a small extra piece of bread. The Worshipful Company still exists and reports that this carried on within living memory and that a small 'in-bread' was often given with each loaf.
So, that's the practice, what about the phrase? That goes back to at least 1599, as in this odd quotation from John Cooke's Tu Quoque:
"Mine's a baker's dozen: Master Bubble, tell your money."
The phrase is related to the practice described in John Goodwin's A Being Filled with the Spirit, referring back to a quotation from 1665:
"As that which we call the in-bread is given into the dozen, there is nothing properly paid or given for it, but only for the dozen."
By 1864 Hotten's Slang Dictionary gives this explicit definition for 'baker's dozen':To put it bluntly, the end goal of socialism is to socialize and democratize the means of production. This comes from the understanding that much of the injustice in this world is the result of a small class of people leveraging these means of production to exploit other people's labor, accumulating more wealth and power in the process. Many corporations are already collectively owned: they are driven by swarms of investors and bound by a ruthless competition that forces them to constantly maximize the exploitation of their workers and the environment. With nothing but atomized greed in charge, with weak regulations and no accountability, capitalism represents familiar contradictions and crisis: inequality, unemployment, bubbles and overproduction, environmental devastation, and so on. Socialism wouldn't automatically solve these problems, but it would at least provide a framework to address them, letting citizens democratically decide what to produce, how to produce it, and what to do with the surplus. Click to expand...
The rise of independent development already gives us a glimpse of a socialist future in which game makers can define their own labor practices, share revenues more equitably, and be less subservient to publishers and marketers. What is still missing, especially in the United States, are structures to support independent efforts.Indies would have major advantages in a socialist country, or even in a more easily achievable social democracy. Universal healthcare and public education would reduce the pressure to work for a company at any condition just to pay student debt and get health coverage. The possible repeal of the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare, already threatens the career of many American indie developers. Click to expand...
There's no point in socializing production without socializing distribution as well. Digital monopolies amount to little more than protocols and these protocols can be modified if they lock-in and screw over users and developers. Digital marketplaces can be democratized by instituting full revenue-sharing systems and by allowing stakeholders and end-users decide how much to reinvest in the platform. Much of the work of content filtration and ranking is already performed by the gaming communities (ratings, tagging, curating, greenlighting, etc.). To the gamer, a socialized Steam would pretty much look like the current Steam. Click to expand...
Digital games are non-rivalrous goods in that they can be easily reproduced and distributed at almost no cost. Because of their potential abundance, they are perfect candidates for decommodification. The obvious question ”how can developers make a living if their games are available for free?" has a variety of answers that intersect with all the issues presented here. Public funding for games can be conditioned to the public availability of the work (as it happens, in theory, with publicly funded scientific research); voluntary support and peer patronage can integrate forms of Universal Basic Income; a reduction of the workday would allow more time for self-motivated activities. Click to expand...
For starters, the most obnoxious byproducts of capitalist competition would disappear under socialism. In gaming, artificial scarcity measures such as preventing backward compatibility of software and hardware would disappear since they don't serve any purpose other than maximizing the publisher's profit at the expense of consumers. Intrusive DRM systems would be made obsolete by cultural commons.The exploitative design patterns of free-to-play games, borrowed directly from gambling, would likely be regulated away. Click to expand...
In conclusion, socialism is not the promise of a society free of problems and conflicts, but that of a society equipped to address these problems. Global warming will still be a huge existential threat for the human race. Abuses of power, corruption, and discrimination will definitely stick around. Fierce debates about the usefulness of space colonization or virtual reality will keep consuming us.
Gamers and game developers are a perfect constituency for the socialist project: they are good at collective problem solving, they are used to manipulate and think in systems, they enjoy agency and power. Click to expand...
Game developer in Molle Industria and associate professor Paolo Perdercini wrote this blog post about how video games would materialize under a different economic system that wouldn't be structurally determined by capitalism - i.e. socialism. Considering the fact that many of the aspects of the games industry are conditioned by capitalism such as exclusive platforms, exploitation of game developers, use of terrible outsourcing in thirdworld countries as well as manufacturing of hardware, making games development a practice for those with the proper education and access to expensive software tools, and of course unnecessary DRM practices, it makes sense to foster some sort of radical imagination that another world is possible and that things don't have to be the way that they currently are. Here are some of the points in short quotes, but they are expanded upon in the article itself. Jacobin also did an interview with Perdercini for those who are interested in reading some background explanation of his blog post.I finally figured out how to send HTTP PUT requests from QML/JavaScript, so now I’ve succeeded in making most of the Trello backend is editable! You can now do the following:
Create/rename/archive Trello projects
Create Trello tasks
Edit most of a Trello task (except for priority, tags, and checklists)
Unfortunately, there is no way to connect to Trello on a phone yet because the support has not been added to the SDK in the phone implementation (although it does work on the desktop)
I also worked on adding a UI for editing the description of a project. I’ve merged this with the Rename and Archive toolbar buttons and placed them in a Projects popover:
It’s been an exciting 4 1/2 weeks since the Ubuntu App Showdown started, and I’m proud to say that Ubuntu Tasks is almost feature complete in terms of what I wanted to get done by the App Showdown deadline. All I have left is to improve the Trello lists UI and add support for creating/renaming/deleting them and making Trello checklists editable (and probably a few other things that I haven’t thought of yet). Other than that, it’s bug fixing time! So, any bug reports would be very much appreciated!
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label because it catches people's eyes and it's the thing that allowed us to break out," says Sanderson Jones, one of the organization's founders, on a Skype call from London. "[But] by concentrating on celebrating life and talking about the things we believe in, not the things we don't believe in, suddenly you create a far larger room."
At the latest meeting God wasn't part of the service. (And yes, they call their meetings "services" and their groups "congregations.") Instead, there was a TED-style talk on the act of listening by a Berkeley psychology Ph.D., a group exercise on how to pay attention, and some awkward, coffee-fueled 11 a.m. dancing.
The godlessness might be what attracts the members, but the sense of community is what keeps them coming back.
"It's trying to find a way of getting the good things of religion, but leaving the baggage on the platform," McCoy says.
The setup is not unlike a regular church service, including a moment of silent reflection, a sermon of sorts — in previous months McCoy has taken on themes including "robots" and "smiling" — and an unabashed plea for money. The venue, usually the Humanist Hall in Oakland (though September's event will be at the Oakland Peace Center), doesn't pay for itself, says McCoy. But none of the funds go to any members or even to the umbrella organization. Each chapter is fairly autonomous, while falling under the guidance of the London team.
"People all over the world started getting in touch and saying 'We want to have a Sunday Assembly where I am,'" says Jones. "We had to work out a way to let other people do what we did, because you know, we don't want any of the ones sacrificing children and saying it was a Sunday Assembly."
East Bay meetings are the fourth Sunday of each month. August's gathering drew about 70 people. (London's last meeting had about 400.)
At the beginning of the August meeting, McCoy addresses the congregation. "Hello — welcome to Sunday Assembly!" he exclaims. "Everyone who's been before knows what we do first thing."
"Sing a song!" someone yells.
With that comes the sweet, secular sounds of "Footloose" and the collective chant of the choir: Footloose, kick off the Sunday shoes... you're burning yearning for someone to tell you life ain't passing you by.
Later, an assembly member steps to the mic for a "reading" — a passage from a TED talk given by a man who took a 17-year vow of silence. That leads directly to the lecture on listening, then a team exercise where one person talks and another tries to do nothing but listen.
At this meeting a quarter of the participants are first-timers, and others are visiting from Sacramento.
Jeff Thomas, 32, came with a small cohort preparing for the church's launch in the capital on Sept. 28. He's come to the past three meetings to get ideas for his own fledgling congregation.
"There's an active nonbeliever community in Sacramento," he says. "We expect a good turnout."
The 28th is the worldwide kickoff date for new assemblies. It's the first time Sunday Assembly will hit non-English-speaking countries: one in Berlin, and four in the Netherlands.
"We seem to have moved from a bit of a curiosity to people in policy saying, 'There's really something here,'" says Jones. He adds, "If Airbnb can create a million hotels out of people's spare rooms, we're trying to create thousands of communities from people's spare time."
The East Bay assembly grew out of a San Francisco gathering last November, when Jones and co-founder Pippa Evans led a worldwide tour promoting the organization. But difficulty finding a regular venue there led local organizers across the bay. A small group is still trying to get something started in San Francisco, but hasn't gotten enough traction, McCoy says.
Despite all the talk of community- building, not all visitors are impressed. After the listening exercise, one couple heads quietly for the door.
"There's no spirituality in this, and I don't mean God," says Dave Sammons. "It's like walking into a lecture. I want something more."
The 76-year-old retired Unitarian minister and his wife, Jan, had come to see what all the fuss was about.
"When I go into a church building I expect to feel I'm in a special place," says Jan. "I didn't feel that here."
Another turn-off: the tunes. "Footloose" just doesn't jive with everyone the way it used to. In the assembly's defense, it isn't easy to find songs that are both appropriate and not cheesy. A more significant criticism, also mentioned by the couple, is the East Bay assembly's lack of diversity: The congregation, for now, is mostly white, and seems to skew older.
Overall though, nonbelievers are just happy to have a place to belong to — and some think the fledgling movement could be a sign of things to come.
"It's already becoming a part of people's lives," says Erin Midkiff, 26, of San Francisco. "It'll be a while before there's a big enough godless community in the country, but I can see it having lasting power years from now."
Says 29-year-old Chris Berry: "When they start officiating weddings and funerals, that's how I know they've become a cultural institution."One former Cincinnati player isn't surprised about the rumors swirling that Tennessee coach Butch Jones allegedly fought and punched one of his players at Tennessee.
A Twitter handle supposedly belonging to former Bearcats kicker John Lloyd alleges that while Jones was the coach at Cincinnati between 2010-12, he assaulted players multiple times.
MORE: Dirty incidents, cheapshots, jerks give sports a black eye | Tennessee WR Pig Howard dismissed for violation of team rules
According to Gridiron Now, there is a video of Jones involved in a "physical altercation" with senior offensive lineman Mack Crowder during fall camp.
Tennessee chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek said the school was quick to investigate the accusations and all parties involved were interviewed.
"There's been a lot of rumor and misinformation on social media and message boards about an alleged incident during football practice," Cheek said in a statement, via ESPN.com. "It's not our practice to respond to rumors, but I thought it was important to let you know that we've done our due diligence and [athletics director] Dave Hart and I are very confident there was no inappropriate conduct with any players or coaches."
Jones also denied the fight rumors, calling them "absolutely ridiculous," and Vols wide receivers coach Zach Azzanni also refuted the claims that Jones was ever physical with a player.
Jones has yet to respond to Lloyd's accusations.Shortages of lethal drugs and doubts over efficacy prompt lawmakers to take fresh look at long-abandoned practices
With lethal-injection drugs in short supply and new questions looming about their effectiveness, lawmakers in some states with the death penalty are considering bringing back relics of a more gruesome past: firing squads, electrocutions and gas chambers.
Most states abandoned those execution methods more than a generation ago, in the hope of making capital punishment more palatable to the public and to a judicial system worried about inflicting cruel and unusual punishments that violate the constitution.
But to some elected officials, the shortages of lethal drugs and the recent legal challenges around them are beginning to make lethal injection seem too vulnerable to complications.
"This isn't an attempt to time warp back into the 1850s or the wild, wild west or anything like that," said the Missouri state Republican representative, Rick Brattin, who this month proposed making firing squads an option for executions. "It's just that I foresee a problem, and I'm trying to come up with a solution that will be the most humane yet most economical for our state."
Brattin said questions about the injection drugs were sure to end up in court, delaying executions and forcing states to examine alternatives. It was unfair, he said, for relatives of murder victims to wait years, even decades, to see justice served while lawmakers and judges debated execution methods.
Like Brattin, a Wyoming lawmaker this month offered a bill allowing the firing squad. Missouri's attorney general and a state lawmaker have raised the notion of rebuilding the state's gas chamber. And a Virginia lawmaker wants to make electrocution an option if lethal-injection drugs are unavailable.
If adopted, such measures could mark a return to the days of inmates being hanged, electrocuted or shot by marksmen.
States began moving to lethal injection in the 1980s in the belief that powerful sedatives and heart-stopping drugs would replace violent spectacles with a more clinical process while limiting – if not eliminating – pain.
The total number of US executions has declined from a peak of 98 in 1999 to 39 last year. Some states have turned away from the death penalty entirely; many have cases tied up in court. And those that carry on with executions find them increasingly difficult to conduct because of the scarcity of drugs and doubts about how well they work.
In recent years, European drug makers have stopped selling the lethal chemicals to prisons because they do not want their products to be used to kill.
At least two recent executions have also raised concerns about the drugs' effectiveness. Last week an Ohio inmate, Dennis McGuire, took 26 minutes to die by injection, gasping repeatedly as he lay on a stretcher with his mouth opening and closing. And on 9 January an Oklahoma inmate, Michael Lee Wilson, uttered the final words: "I feel my whole body burning."
Missouri threw out its three-drug lethal injection procedure after it found it could no longer obtain the drugs. State officials altered the method in 2012 to use propofol, which was found in the system of Michael Jackson after he died of an overdose in 2009.
The European Union threatened to impose export limits on propofol if it were used in an execution, jeopardising the supply of a common anaesthetic used in hospitals across the US.
In October the Missouri governor, Jay Nixon, stayed the execution of a serial killer, Joseph Paul Franklin, and ordered the state's department of corrections to find an alternative drug.
Days later, the state announced it had switched to a form of pentobarbital made by a compounding pharmacy. Like other states, Missouri has refused to divulge where the drug comes from or who makes it.
Missouri has carried out two executions using pentobarbital – Franklin's, in November, and that of Allen Nicklasson, in December. Neither inmate showed outward signs of suffering, but the secrecy of the process resulted in a lawsuit and a legislative inquiry.
Michael Campbell, assistant professor of criminal justice at the University of Missouri-St Louis, said some lawmakers simply did not believe convicted murderers deserved any mercy.
"Many of these politicians are trying to tap into a more populist theme, that those who do terrible things deserve to have terrible things happen to them," Campbell said.
Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Centre in Washington, DC, cautioned that there could be a backlash.
"These ideas would jeopardise the death penalty because, I think, the public reaction would be revulsion, at least from many quarters," Dieter said.
Some states already provide alternatives to lethal injection. Condemned prisoners may choose the electric chair in eight states: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. An inmate named Robert Gleason Jr was the most recent to die by electrocution, in Virginia in January 2013.
Arizona, Missouri and Wyoming allow gas-chamber executions. Missouri no longer has a gas chamber but its attorney general, Chris Koster, a Democrat, and the Missouri state senator, Kurt Schaefer, a Republican, last year suggested rebuilding one. So far, there is no bill to do so.
Delaware, New Hampshire and Washington state still allow inmates to choose hanging. The last hanging in the US was of Billy Bailey in Delaware in 1996. Two prisoners in Washington state have chosen to be hanged since the 1990s – Westley Allan Dodd in 1993 and Charles Rodman Campbell in 1994.
Firing squads typically consist of five sharpshooters with rifles, one of which is loaded with a blank so the shooters do not know for sure who fired the fatal bullet. They have been used mostly for military executions.
Since the end of the civil war, there have been three civilian executions by firing squad in the US, all in Utah. Gary Gilmore uttered his famous final words – "Let's do it" – on 18 January 1977, before his execution, which ended what amounted to a 17-year national moratorium on the death penalty.
The convicted killers John Albert Taylor in 1996 and Ronnie Lee Gardner in 2010 were also put to death by firing squad.
Utah is phasing out its use, but the firing squad remains an option there for inmates sentenced prior to 3 May 2004.
Oklahoma maintains the firing squad as an option, but only if lethal injection and electrocution are deemed unconstitutional.
In Wyoming, the Republican state senator, Bruce Burns, said death by firing squad would be far less expensive than building a gas chamber. Wyoming has only one inmate on death row, a 68-year-old convicted killer called Dale Wayne Eaton. The state has not executed anyone for 22 years.
Jackson Miller, a Republican in the Virginia house of delegates, is sponsoring a bill that would allow for electrocution if lethal injection drugs were not available.Urban and indoor farming will grow in importance as the population rises. Grove Labs is showing how engineers can tackle sustainable food and tech challenges.
Image: Grove Labs
As the population climbs toward 9 billion in 2050, the planet will need more food. As cities develop and arable land vanishes, we will have to take advantage of urban spaces. As the climate changes, we must find innovative ways to farm.
Mimicking nature with 21st century technology requires skillful engineering. Simply maintaining indoor farms is difficult — not to mention the feat of replicating sunlight or the challenge of building sensors and software to gather and analyze information about the well-being of plants.
The traditional notion of a farmer throughout the past century for most people is probably an older man, clad in overalls, driving a beat-up Ford pickup truck around his land. But that is finally beginning to change — and it has to.
"By introducing engineers and technologists, people that have worked at consumer design brands, and bringing that experience and worldview, we can make farming and food tech and ag tech sexy. Once [that] appears, it's a self fulfilling prophecy. [There will] be more engineers," said Gabe Blanchet, co-founder and CEO of Grove Labs, which has created a home aquaponics system the size of a bookshelf that has sensors and software to automatically update people of their crops' health and send the information to their smartphones.
Changing the course
Blanchet and his co-founder and CTO Jamie Byron were engineers, hard-wired at MIT to follow a path that the education system had set out for them. Like most students, they took the courses they were most interested in and selected a major from those choices. Blanchet picked mechanical engineering and Byron decided to look into a career with wind turbine technology and engineering.
Byron worked on an experimental farm in college, which led to his interest in aquaponics and growing food. He built his own system in their dorm room, which made the two realize the potential of the technology.
"Not only was this cool to do but this is something that if packaged more beautifully, and using technology to make it easier and more educational, could impact how people think about food and even about nature," Blanchet said.
They founded Grove Labs in Boston and closed on a $2 million seed round. The indoor farming product is a fairly simple aquaponics system, made for the average person to use. It's a bookshelf-sized unit that, if combined with multiple units, can allow owners to grow up to 30 to 40% of their food, including leafy greens, herbs, and crops like tomatoes and peppers. And, it's a consumer product, so it's something that can be easily integrated into a house or apartment. Pricing hasn't been announced yet.
The ecosystem is cultivated through a platform Grove Labs built. Sensors are placed throughout the unit, monitoring the fish, water, and food, and the information is sent to the owner's smartphone. From there, they can have nutrient packages or other replacements delivered.
The tech behind it is complicated. Mimicking the sun with special LED lights, a sensor system so people don't have to fiddle with their plants every day — that requires electrical engineering, algorithm developments, and hardware and manufacturing engineering, Blanchet said. Part of the software Grove Labs uses is Meteor, a full-stack Javascript framework that excels at data synchronization. They use it to monitor plants in real-time and build solutions based on what is happening in the aquaponics systems.
Currently, the team is running tests with prototypes in Boston, though the product is getting closer to being ready for launch.
"We're growing food in innovative ways," Blanchet said. "There's not too much tech to a small organic, non-technologically advanced farm in Indiana, but growing food in innovative ways requires engineering."
But the education system is siloed, Blanchet said. Asking an engineer to pick up biology or a biologist to pick up engineering is not the easiest thing in the world, but engineering education must become more multi-faceted as we move toward a technologically advanced future in every industry.
At Grove Labs, they train engineers on the job in biology and other sciences. It has been fun for the engineers on his team, Blanchet said, since in traditional schooling, biology and engineering can be at odds with one another. Blanchet said he thinks this on-the-job training will be the future, especially if things don't change in the education sphere.
"It will happen in industry because it's required to think multidisciplinary or you aren't solving a big enough piece of the pie," he said.
Farming in the future
There are a few types of systems that work for sustainable farming:
Hydroponics: Plants are grown in nutrient-rich water with some sort of culture such as gravel or sand.
Plants are grown in nutrient-rich water with some sort of culture such as gravel or sand. Aeroponics: Plants grow in an air or mist environment, without a growing medium. The roots dangle and are fed by the nutrient-rich water.
Plants grow in an air or mist environment, without a growing medium. The roots dangle and are fed by the nutrient-rich water. Aquaponics: This combines aquaculture and hydroponics. Aquatic animals excrete in the water, and the byproducts are broken down into nitrates and nitrites, which feed the plants in a hydroponic system. The water is recirculated back into the aquaculture system.
"The culture is shifting, and there's more and more awareness about agriculture — that at its core, it is just not sustainable," Blanchet said.
In Japan, the world's largest indoor farm was built in an abandoned Sony factory, where leafy greens and other plants are grown hydroponically. In an old bomb shelter underground in London, Zero Carbon Food built a giant underground farm to grow food for local restaurants. AeroFarms has built a business around helping people utilize the technology to create their own indoor aeroponics farms. And similarly, in major cities like Chicago, urban and rooftop farming allows people to take advantage of previously wasted space and generate power with solar arrays.
"Societies are going to need radically new ways to grow new food." Gabe Blanchet, Grove Labs CEO
Engineers are behind these projects, and as they grow, so will the demand for that kind of expertise. Sustainable farming "requires data and measurements," said Dennis Buckmaster, a professor in the Ag and Biological Engineering department at Purdue University. "These will be enabled only as engineers get involved to make it happen. Much of sustainability has to do with water quality, soil retention, ecosystem management, etc. The equipment we use, how we use it, how and when we irrigate (if we do), and even the algorithms to optimize crop production require engineering."
What's more, he added, is that many people don't realize the importance of managing these new technologies, whether they are large or small scale projects.
The world of food and agricultural technology is expanding rapidly in all sectors of the industry, not just farming. There are new 3D printers specifically for food; meat now grown in labs; the food delivery space has seen massive growth with startups like Caviar and Seamless; Blue Apron has people interested in cooking at home more often; platforms like Farmigo are connecting local farmers to their communities; social media is helping reduce food waste.
Blanchet was weary of confusing these types of innovations with "agricultural technology," which can include potentially dangerous technology like GMOs and biological engineering. People often lump all them together so it is in a framework they understand — like ag tech, or hardware, or software — when in reality, the nuances between the different verticals are very important.
In the short term, society needs engineers to consider urban farming and engineering and optimize outdoor farming practices, like with precision agriculture systems. In the long term, Blanchet said, "societies are going to need radically new ways to grow new food."
Luckily, engineering at its core, he added, is about solving problems by using logic. There's room in the future of sustainable farming for many types of engineers, Blanchet said, but they are united by a common understanding and ability: "to take a problem, break it down to core parts, set a plan on how to solve each one, and in sum, that will solve the big problems."
Also see:OLYMPIA, Wash. - Washington's secretary of state said Monday her office referred President Donald Trump's commission investigating alleged 2016 election voter fraud to a publicly available link of voter data, but it reiterated no private information will be shared with the panel.
Trump lost the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton in the November 2016 election. But he has alleged without evidence that up to 5 million people voted illegally.
Secretary of State Kim Wyman, speaking to reporters after returning from treatment for colon cancer, said it was "ludicrous on its face" to suggest there was widespread voter fraud across thousands of electoral districts in the United States.
Names, addresses and dates of birth of registered voters can be accessed by Trump's commission because that information is public, Wyman said. However, Wyman, a Republican, said things like Social Security numbers, driver's license numbers, phone numbers or email addresses are private and not releasable.
Trump's commission sent a letter to states last week asking for detailed information about voters. It also asked for party affiliations. But that information is not collected in Washington because voters don't register by party and the state's primary election system doesn't require a voter to choose a specific party's ballot.
Several states, including California and New York, are refusing to cooperate with the Trump commission. Others such as Texas say they can provide only partial responses based on what is legally allowed under state law, which is what Wyman is doing.
Washington Democratic Party Chairwoman Tina Podlodowski, who Wyman defeated to be re-elected as secretary of state last year, has called for Wyman to reject the request entirely, calling it a voter suppression effort. Wyman said Podlodowski was calling on her "to ignore the law."
Wyman said she was confident that any scrutiny of Washington state elections would show no problems. "I have not seen evidence of voter fraud in this state, and I have not seen evidence of voter suppression in this state," she said.EXCLUSIVE: Golden Bear contender Werner Herzog is eying an April start on Salt And Fire, his Queen Of The Desert follow-up that is generating heat for sales agent International Film Trust.
German actress Veronica Ferres (Klimt) will star in the romantic thriller about a scientist in South America who clashes with the head of the corporation responsible for an ecological disaster.
When she learns of the potential eruption of a supervolcano in the region, the scientist teams up with her nemesis to avert a global catastrophe.
Herzog wrote the script and will produce with his Queen Of The Desert collaborator and Margin Call producer Michael Benaroya alongside Nina Maag of Construction Film and Canana Films’ Pablo Cruz. CAA represents US rights.
The producers plan to shoot Salt And Fire on the Bolivian salt flats.
“I couldn’t be more pleased to be endeavouring on another journey with Werner Herzog,” said Benaroya, a backer of IFT.
“He is a truly special film-maker and person. I believe this project will exceed the high expectations that come with any film he directs.”
In an interview with Screen, Herzog confirmed the project and said: “It [Queen Of The Desert] was a very pleasant collaboration with Michael Benaroya. Michael is a young man of great human depth. It’s good to work with a man like that.”
“Veronica is a talented actress who brings integrity to every role she is in and is perfectly cast as Laura in what will be a visually stunning film,” said IFT president Christian de Gallegos.
Meanwhile, US buyers were last night circling Herzog’s Berlinale competition entry Queen Of The Desert starring Nicole Kidman, Robert Pattinson and James Franco.
The film premiered on Friday in Germany and CAA staged a screening back in Los Angeles.‘The earth in Indonesia is on fire’
Indonesia's beautiful peat swamp forests are under increased threat from unscrupulous corporations wanting to clear the land to grow cash crops. Department of Foreign Affairs, Australia under a Creative Commons Licence
Some of the most severe fires in human history are burning right now in Indonesia, creating an environmental catastrophe in a region with precious biodiversity, and putting the health of tens of millions of people at risk.
‘The earth in Indonesia is on fire. Companies destroying forests and draining peatland have made Indonesia’s landscape into a huge carbon bomb, and the drought has given it a thousand fuses,’ said Bustar Maitar, Indonesian Forest Project Leader for Greenpeace Southeast Asia.
Scientists now estimate that the fires will produce more CO 2 emissions this year than the entire United Kingdom. Many are blaming El Niño, which is bringing dry conditions through much of Southeast Asia, but the truth is that the fires are almost 100% human caused, and directly benefit 2 of the world’s biggest industries – palm oil and pulp/paper.
From green to red
According to local NGOs, before 1997 fires were rare in Riau Province, the heart of palm-oil country today.
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‘There is no natural fire there – it is all caused by people,’ said Robert Field, an Associate Research Scientist at Columbia University with expertise in Indonesian fires. ‘Fire is completely preventable.’
There’s a reason palm does not grow naturally in Indonesia. Much of Sumatra and Kalimantan are peatlands, naturally wet and swampy. Before palm arrived in Sumatra, brought as a cash crop by the Dutch, local people never planted on peat, living instead alongside rivers and on higher ground. Because palm requires dry land to grow, palm-oil plantation owners drained the peat, leaving the land in an unnaturally dry state. This dry state is a tinder box for fires.
Here’s the problem – Indonesia’s peatlands contain some of the densest carbon stock in the world. Peat forms a critical component of the natural carbon sink in Southeast Asian forests, regulating climate globally. Much like what we saw in 1991, when Saddam Hussein lit up oilfields in Kuwait which then burned for months, when a peat fires starts, it can be nearly impossible to put out.
Fire is a chief tool for clearing land to turn into corporate plantations, or for palm oil that often ends up in corporate supply chains
As Robert Field explained, ‘Water table levels [have begun] to drop and peat will begin to dry out... under these conditions there just can’t be any burning on peat.’
Palm-oil demand came from abroad. Initially, it was Europe in the early 2000s, where demand for biofuels as an alternative to gasoline expanded the market for Indonesian palm. Later, demand came from the US, where palm was seen as a quick, cheap replacement for hydrogenated oils, which were being slowly banned across the country. More recently, the driver is the growing demand for cooking oils in fast-growing China and India. Global companies that use palm oil that is likely sourced from deforestation include PepsiCo, General Mills and Kraft, as named by the US-based Rainforest Action Network.
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This is global, multibillion-dollar business, run by giant companies. On the ground, fire is a chief tool for clearing land to turn into corporate plantations, or for palm oil that often ends up in corporate supply chains.
‘We must recognize that fire is mostly caused by people,’ said Herry Purmono, scientist of forest governance at the Indonesia-based Center for International Forestry Research, and a Professor at Bogor Agricultural University. ‘Primarily, to transform land from forest to oil palm.’
Fires are probably the worst way to clear forest. But they are the cheapest, and they serve another function – a de-facto land grab. Pristine forests are difficult to convert into palm oil or pulp plantations. But recently burned forests? That’s another story.
Indonesia knew months beforehand that this would be an especially bad year for fires. Warning bells were sounded as early as March, when it became clear that we were in line for an especially strong El Niño.
‘I’m afraid that many will enjoy El Niño – because after burning they can claim the land, and then plant with acacia or palm,’ said Herry Purmono.
Despite this, efforts to take common-sense steps to mitigate fire risk – such as opening up canals that were draining peatland and strictly enforcing anti-burning bans – didn’t happen, as attested by the current massive fires spreading haze as far as Phuket, Thailand.
The victims are, not surprisingly, the poor, and locals. Pollution levels in Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau, make Beijing seem like a clean-air paradise. They hit 480 API (air pollution index) earlier this month, more than 10 times the acceptable level. The particulates being breathed by millions in Indonesia, and in neighbouring countries, could cause detrimental health effects with costs estimated in the billions by Greenpeace Southeast Asia. Already nearly 11,000 people die from pollution in Indonesia each year, much of it caused by fires. That number will likely rise.
Solutions
Much needs to be done, especially in Indonesia, to hold accountable those responsible for the fires. There were signs that the country’s new president, Joko Widodo, was taking the fires more seriously than his predecessors when he took the unprecedented step of arresting several palm-oil executives who had fires raging on their concessions.
‘The government seems to be finally beginning to move. The problems have just got so bad,’ Bill Laurance from James Cook University in Townsville, Australia, told New Scientist in an interview.
‘The actions of the Indonesian government focus mostly on fighting fire, not the underlying causes – poverty, conflict and large companies’
But this is not just an Indonesian problem. It is a global problem, connected by supply chains and transnational corporations. Any effort to stem the fires needs a stronger push for truly sustainable supply chains and accountability on the demand side as well, beyond the headline-making but ineffective zero-deforestation pledges.
‘Unilateral no-deforestation policies are not working. Companies must eliminate the economic incentive to trash forests with an industry-wide ban on trade with anyone that clears forests,’ according to Bustar Maitar.
Singapore, which as the country closest to Indonesia faces dangerous haze levels, has begun removing from its grocery stores products from companies connected to the fires. If more countries did the same, this could have a powerful effect of forcing companies to think twice before letting fires encroach on their land, or from purchasing palm oil or pulp from those companies.
Another key is restoring the ecosystem and returning Indonesia’s tropical forests to a healthy state, as they were before 1997 when fires did not occur annually. Furthermore, there needs to be a greater recognition that stopping fires is more than firefighting, but a larger social and economic problem.
‘We recognize that fire is mostly due to social politics rather than biophysical causes,’ said Herry Purmono, ‘but that the actions of the [Indonesian] government focus mostly on fighting fire, not the underlying causes – poverty, conflict and large companies.’
That means changing how we think about disasters. Billions are pouring into firefighting right now, but a lot less money is spent on ecosystem restoration and forest preservation, which could have prevented the disaster. According to Andrew Schroeder of Relief Web, which works extensively in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, this is part of a larger problem whereby development money goes to disaster recovery rather than prevention. He says that USAID spend 30 times as much on disaster relief as it does on disaster preparedness: ‘This is a longstanding issue in the industry – it is a lot harder to raise funds for things that are ongoing than for things that haven’t happened yet.’
It remains to be seen whether the tragedy taking place across Southeast Asia translates into concrete action to transform the economic incentives that drive forest fires. Until then, Indonesia will keep on burning."...it's full of stars!"
You've earned none of this!
Right up there with "Oh, there's the fuse connected to all this dynamite!"
There's no way I would have survived this music video.
Mega sporting good stores, like Sport's Authority or Dick's Sporting Goods, are a great place to go if you need to buy a major piece of exercise equipment, become confused/indecisive about what brand of basketball you should buy, or just want to feel generally lethargic and fat. It is also a gigantic death trap for a kid with undiagnosed attention deficit disorder and the coordination of newborn colt.That is why it was probably not a good idea for my mom to allow me to wander around one of these stores at the age of 13. We had gone in to buy something (probably aerobics equipment for her or ridiculous shoes I thought would make me jump higher) and I asked if I could look around. Despite the fact that Mom was normally overprotective of me to a fault, she saw no issue with allowing me to freely roam through a place that included loose pieces of metal that weighed more than I did.During my self guided tour of the facilities, my hyperactive brain became enchanted with a row of treadmills. The gleaming metal and blinking lights were like a siren's call to a boy that could easily be distracted by shiny things.I stepped onto one of the machines that happened to not be turned on...I was 13 and wanted to be the one to click the 'POWER' button and make it come to life. When I did, the screen burst with beautiful lights and colors. It then began informing me of the multiple speeds and fat burning programs that I would one day find many brilliant excuses not to do. But as a teenage boy, I was most definitely up to the challenge.I decided to start out relatively slow to make sure that I got a feel for the equipment. I clicked on the button marked 'Manual,' turned the speed up 2 notches, and pressed start...and waited......and nothing happen. I could not understand this. The machine was humming and the lights were on; it had even given me a countdown so that I could prepare for my stationary triathalon. But instead of the treadmill moving, it stayed still while the timer moved forward the the calorie counter blatantly lied to my face.In my frustration, I did what any teenage boy that grew up in the 80s did when faced with a technological impasse: I began frantically pushing all the buttons that I could find. Still, nothing happened. In an act of pure defiance I moved the knob that controlled the treadmill's speed all the way up to maximum, daring God to strike me down. Despite the fact that I should have been running at the speed of a gazelle on crack, I remained motionless.At the exact moment I was about to give up, I noticed a little piece of plastic dangling from a string. It suddenly dawned on my that in my A.D.D induced fervor to begin my indoor marathon, I had skipped a very important step in making the treadmill operate correctly.I exclaimed without a hint of irony.And yes, I actually said that out loud. I was truly excited to have found the solution to my current problem, never for one second considering the future problems (the future being in about 3 seconds) that I had created for myself. I confidently plugged in the key...and the world promptly around out and flew away from me.At this point, I'll switch to the point of view of my mother, since I honestly don't remember anything except a rush of pure fear followed by immense pain. Mom had spotted me and walked over to tell me that it was time to go. She was only a few feet away when I made my great "safety" key discovery. After I plugged it in and valiantly attempted to take my first stride, I was launched like a missile into the wall behind me. My body went horizontal and airborne at an insanely unnatural speed, slamming with one loud thud against the wall and another when I collapsed to the floor. My dignity, however, made absolutely no sound as it had completely disappeared from existence.And my loving and nurturing mom, who still to this day calls to make sure I am eating my vegetables and gets concerned when I am sick? For the first and only time I can ever recall, she openly cackled at my suffering...and I totally deserved it. While my mom could be overprotective at times, she also repaid my honesty and generally good behavior with trust and small freedoms (like the ability to wander alone in a huge sporting goods store). But no amount of good parenting can overcome the deadly combination of A.D.D., a severe lack of coordination, the and curse of being a complete spaz.by Rob Natelson
In an earlier post, I wrote that the Tenth Amendment was adopted to reinforce the legal interpretation rule providing that if you list some items in a document, this implies that other items are excluded. The Tenth Amendment clarified that the federal government enjoyed only the powers listed in the Constitution and no others.
But why should anyone think there were others? Especially if there was a legal rule of interpretation to the contrary?
The answer to that question takes us to a story known to very few – even to very few constitutional scholars.
Throughout the period of the Continental and Confederation Congresses (1776-1788), advocates of a strong central government argued that, in addition to whatever express powers Congress had received from the states, Congress also enjoyed additional “inherent sovereign authority.” This theory would allow Congress to exercise many powers not on the list granted by the Articles of Confederation.
During this period, the “inherent sovereign authority” argument was made by John Adams, Benjamin Rush, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and the Hartford Convention of
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means it’s easier on a bigger iPhone or iPad. Setting an iPad down on a crowded table “somewhere nearby” doesn’t strike me as much more precise.
A lot of tables I’ve played on in my time have graveled, rocky textures to them. Unless I’m playing on a F.A.T. Mat, or something similar, I’m not putting my lovely, scratch-able iPhone down on the table.
My issues don’t stop here, as there are a couple other weaknesses to the app. Since the most logical way to organize the panes in the app is by unit, rather than a single, dynamic dice pool (it’s a little bit of a pain to remove dice), there’s still some management to be done when managing losses – for example, when a Dire Avenger dies, their dice need to also be stored in the cup, but unlike the dice put in the cup that didn’t meet the target number, they need to not be brought out for the next roll. It seems petty, but again, you need to be making my life easier, and I’m not sure that’s what’s going on. Additionally, there’s going to be a lot of swiping through panes looking for the right unit if you aren’t running a list with lots of duplicate unit entries. And finally, the app doesn’t support variable numbers of rolls – for example, there is no “Roll d6 for the number of shots for an Exorcist, then roll that many dice” function. That’s a pretty common type of attack in the game for there to be no mechanism to support it.
But the thing that gets me the most? I just don’t understand the why. The app doesn’t get rid of the huge buckets of dice problem. If you’ve gone fully electronic having both your codex and dice app running means either two devices or flipping back and forth (and Assault Dice caused a full-on, reboot-requiring crash once during my review). I just feels like rather than helping, it’s apt to get in the way, and slow things down. The one use I can see for it is occasionally doing something like testing how the rolls for a unit “feel” when you’re away from dice (“How reliable is this really?”), but that’s a pretty small edge case.
I understand electronic dice rollers for RPGs, where there’s likely a stable number of dice you roll for a particular action. But between not being able to deal with some common circumstances (variable numbers of attacks, different target numbers, etc) and I suspect slowing things down compared to physically rolling, Assault Dice feels like a solution in search of a problem.
Overall Rating: 3/10. Nice visuals, but lacking in genuine utility.
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The Principality of Nyanworld is a colossal, cultured nation, ruled by coinaday with a fair hand, and renowned for its barren, inhospitable landscape, keen interest in outer space, and spontaneously combusting cars. The hard-nosed, hard-working, democratic, devout population of 6.061 billion Nekonauts live in a state of perpetual fear, as a complete breakdown of social order has led to the rise of order through biker gangs.
The minute, corrupt, liberal, pro-business, outspoken government, or what there is of one, prioritizes Administration, with Education and Industry also on the agenda, while Social Policy and Law & Order are ignored. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Nyanworld City. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 1.3%.
The powerhouse Nekonauty economy, worth 815 trillion nyancoins a year, is driven almost entirely by the private sector, which is broadly diversified and led by the Information Technology industry, with significant contributions from Retail, Book Publishing, and Soda Sales. Average income is an impressive 134,562 nyancoins, but there is an enormous disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 794,316 per year while the poor average 10,562, a ratio of 75.2 to 1.
Murderers and thieves claim divine inspiration to avoid prosecution, chalkboards are replaced with billboards in the classroom, school teachers check the staff room for hidden webcams before complaining about rebellious students, and wealthy parents-to-be can select their perfect baby. Crime, especially youth-related, is all-pervasive, perhaps because of the country's complete lack of prisons. Nyanworld's national animal is the nyancat, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation.
Nyanworld is ranked 845th in the world and 1st in Nyan Universe for Highest Crime Rates, with 56.14 Crimes Per Hour.Jogging Fights Beer Belly Fat Better Than Weights
Enlarge this image toggle caption Rhodes ludovic/iStockphoto.com Rhodes ludovic/iStockphoto.com
Weight training is touted as the cure for many ills. But if the goal is to lose belly fat, aerobic exercise is the only way to go, exercise scientists say.
We're not talking about muffin tops, the annoying bit of pudge that rolls over a woman's waistline and is featured in those strange Internet ads. Rather, this is gut fat lodged around internal organs, which could look like a beer belly from the outisde. It's considered a risk factor for diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.
Surprisingly little research has been done comparing the health benefits of strength training with weights to aerobic exercise such as walking. But that's just what researchers at Duke University did.
They compared changes in visceral fat – the fat that wraps around internal organs – in people who did strength training compared to a group who did aerobic exercise. They divided 198 overweight, sedentary adults into groups, with one group working out with weights three times a week for eight months. A second group jogged 12 miles a week.
The aerobic exercisers lost significant amounts of visceral fat, as well as fat around the liver. They also lost abdominal fat overall, and had improvements in liver enzymes and insulin resistance. By contrast, the people who were pumping iron lost a wee bit of subcutaneous fat, but their stats otherwise didn't improve. The aerobic training burned 67 percent more calories than resistance training. The results were published in the American Journal of Physiology.
"Resistance training is a very good way to increase lean muscle," Cris Slentz, an exercise physiologist at Duke who led the study, told Shots. "And aerobic exercise isn't." But if the goal is to lose fat, then aerobic exercise is the ticket, he said.
There's no easy way to know how much visceral fat a person has; the researchers had to put people in CT scans to measure it. But one good clue is a beer belly. And men tend to carry more visceral fat than women, Slentz says, while white people tend to have more visceral fat than African Americans. And older people tend to internalize fat, while younger people carry fat right beneath their dewy skin.During a news conference with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Trump says that the leaks that led to the resignation of Michael Flynn are illegal. (Reuters)
THE MORNING PLUM:
How far is President Trump willing to go in directing that the government’s investigative machinery be used to go after his opponents, real or perceived?
Charlie Savage and Eric Lichtblau have a good piece this morning that raises this question, by seizing on an important passage from Trump’s unhinged press conference on Thursday. Trump said this:
“I’ve actually called the Justice Department to look into the leaks. Those are criminal leaks….It’s a criminal act.”
This came in response to questions about Trump’s tweets on Thursday morning, in which he lashed out at the media and at “low-life leakers” and vowed that the latter would be “caught.” The leakers were responsible for recent revelations that have rocked his administration politically. Among them: The news that our intelligence services have established contacts between Russia and the Trump campaign and that the Justice Department warned that former national security adviser Michael Flynn misrepresented his contacts with the Russian ambassador, making him vulnerable to blackmail.
[Trump must banish Bannon — or his presidency is doomed]
Now Trump has called on the Justice Department to investigate those leakers. As Savage and Lichtblau put it:
No law forbids a president from making a criminal referral to the Justice Department, but it is unusual for a president to direct the agency to open a criminal investigation into his perceived opponents or to talk publicly about having done so. The White House, under presidents of both parties, has generally restricted direct contact with the Justice Department about prospective investigations to avoid the appearance of politicizing law enforcement. Typically, if an agency believes that classified material from its own records was improperly disclosed, it will make a referral to the Justice Department, which decides whether to open an investigation.
That bolded part captures something more significant than its deftly understated tone first indicates: Trump is directing the Justice Department to investigate his “perceived opponents.” As I have argued, this is what distinguishes Trump’s vow to go after leakers from that of his predecessors, particularly the Obama administration, which did go after them very aggressively: Trump is going after leakers who harmed him politically. (The Times piece also details other ways in which the current context is different from the Obama years.)
Now, in fairness to Trump, at his presser he argued that such leaks harm our national security, suggesting that this is why they need to be targeted. He claimed to be worried about future leaking of sensitive information amid difficult situations involving North Korea or the Middle East.
But the leaks Trump is now decrying may have helped, rather than harmed, the national interest. We would not have known what we now know about the possible contacts between Russia and the Trump campaign without them. Given that congressional Republicans are mostly resisting any serious probe into Russian meddling in the election — and into any Russia-Trump campaign contacts — it is plausible that, if Republicans have their way, we will never know what really happened. More revelations make a full accounting more likely — and make it harder for Republicans to resist one — which we need to ensure this doesn’t happen again, strengthening our democracy.
Meanwhile, given that Trump knew for three weeks about the Justice Department’s warnings about Flynn and did nothing to remove him, it’s also plausible that he would still be national security adviser if leaks had not forced the issue.
Beyond all of this, the fact that Trump directed the Justice Department to target these leaks right after they damaged him politically — and the fact that he’s stating this publicly — raises questions about how far Trump will prove willing to go in this regard later. As Susan Hennessey of the Brookings Institution recently put it, Trump’s calls for investigations into leakers seem to signal “an intention to use the pretense of leak investigations to engage in political retaliation.” This appears plausible, given not just the timing but also Trump’s already-well-established authoritarian tendencies.
[Reality will get its revenge on Donald Trump]
Finally, there’s the role of Attorney General Jeff Sessions in this mess. His Justice Department won’t say whether it’s heeding Trump’s call for leak probes. According to top Trump adviser Stephen Bannon, Sessions was deeply loyal to Trump’s agenda during the campaign. Trump’s presidency is threatened by politically damaging leaks. Trump is now openly calling on Sessions’ Justice Department to investigate those leaks. Meanwhile, the FBI itself — which is housed at the Justice Department — is investigating the contacts between Russia and the Trump campaign, and Sessions was an early and important player in the Trump campaign. But Sessions has yet to recuse himself from that probe.
How does Sessions intend to handle all of these tangled threads? Sessions’s role needs more scrutiny. And so does the unusual nature of Trump’s call for this leak investigation.
*******************************************************************
* FLYNN MAY HAVE MISLED FBI ABOUT RUSSIA CONTACT: The Post scoops the latest in the ongoing travails consuming Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn:
Flynn denied to FBI agents in an interview last month that he had discussed U.S. sanctions against Russia with that country’s ambassador to the United States before President Trump took office, contradicting the contents of intercepted communications collected by intelligence agencies, current and former U.S. officials said. Flynn’s denial to the FBI was similar to what he had told Trump’s advisers, according to the officials.
It’s unclear whether Flynn would face prosecution over this, if true, but it ensures that the press will keep pulling on this thread.
* TRUMP ANGRY AT STAFF FOR FAILING TO CONVEY HIS GREATNESS: The New York Times reports that Trump wanted to face the media himself on Thursday because he was dissatisfied with how his staffers had portrayed his White House:
For days, a frustrated and simmering president fumed inside the West Wing residence about what aides said he saw as his staff’s inadequate defense and the ineffectiveness of his own tweets. Over the objections of some top advisers who wanted to steer him away from confrontation, Mr. Trump demanded to face the media, determined to reject the narrative that his administration is sinking into chaos, scandal and incompetence.
Does Trump ever take responsibility for anything?
* TRUMP’S LAVISH HABITS COSTING TAXPAYERS MILLIONS: The Post has a great piece tallying up the costs of the first family’s travel habits:
The unusually elaborate lifestyle of America’s new first family is straining the Secret Service and security officials…and costing far beyond what has been typical for past presidents — a price tag that, based on past assessments of presidential travel and security costs, could balloon into the hundreds of millions of dollars over the course of a four-year term.
As The Post notes, Trump’s three trips to Mar-a-Lago so far may have cost $10 million. You cannot disentangle this from Trump’s use of his presidency to promote Mar-a-Lago, which sends additional cash into his own pockets.
* TRUMP FACES CRITICISM FOR PLAYING DOWN RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM: The Associated Press reports that critics are concerned that the Trump administration appears to be neglecting domestic terror threats:
A list of worldwide attacks recently released by Trump’s administration left off many that were carried out by right-wing extremists and white supremacists. And organizations that track terrorist and hate groups say the government focuses too narrowly on threats from the outside instead of adopting a broader approach.
It would be interesting to hear from career officials at the Department of Homeland Security about this.
* PENCE FACES A BIG TASK IN EUROPE: Vice President Pence is traveling to Europe this weekend, where his job will be to reassure allies of our continuing commitment to NATO, Bloomberg reports:
Pence will use an address to the Munich Security Conference on Saturday to vouch for Trump’s commitment to the trans-Atlantic partnership and the need to confront a resurgent Russia, an administration official said…At the same time, he also will repeat demands that European allies contribute more to the alliance.
The news that our intelligence services believe Russia was in touch with Trump campaign officials during the campaign won’t make his job any easier.
* TRUMP FACING A ‘CRISIS OF LEGITIMACY’: Paul Krugman takes stock of the latest turns in the Russia-Trump saga, and observes:
Trump is facing a clear crisis of legitimacy….even as the F.B.I. was creating the false appearance of scandal around his opponent, it was sitting on evidence suggesting alarmingly close relations between Mr. Trump’s campaign and Russia….How can a leader under such a cloud send American soldiers to die?…a thorough, nonpartisan, unrestricted investigation could conceivably clear the air. But Republicans in Congress, who have the power to make such an investigation happen, are dead set against it.
Of course they are. That would complicate the drive to cut taxes for the rich and decimate the regulatory state and safety net. Priorities!
* AND THE TRUMP TWEET OF THE DAY, ALTERNATE-REALITIES EDITION: Good morning, Mr. President:
Thank you for all of the nice statements on the Press Conference yesterday. Rush Limbaugh said one of greatest ever. Fake media not happy! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 17, 2017
Fortunately, Trump still has some very loyal talk radio hosts out there who are willing to continue validating and propping up his preferred alternate reality.They sit at nearly every table in Moscow's smartest restaurants, wearing designer jewellery and smiles that show they know they are the envy of every girl in Russia.
But for the wives and girlfriends of Russia's super-rich oligarchs, the good life has just got a little bit harder – thanks to a slew of books telling other women how to follow in their footsteps.
With 110 billionaires and 130,000 millionaires, oil-rich Russia now ranks only behind the United States in terms of sheer numbers of wealthy bachelors.
But competition to catch the eye of the man who already has everything is fierce, and an entire publishing industry has sprung up to teach the fairer sex how to snare an oligarch - tutoring them in everything from what clothes to wear through to strategies in the bedroom and the divorce court.
First, and most important it seems, is not to look too tarty.
In Marry a Millionaire, Russian socialites Oksana Robski and Ksenia Sobchak warn women against wearing "jeans with sequins… bare bellies, fake tans under Dolce & Gabbana leopard print tops, dark glasses at night and high-heeled boots, even if it's July".
"Without a doubt, this is the battle gear of the Ukrainian prostitute," they declare.
The mood is captured by tomes such as the groundbreaking Bitches' Table Book, published by Svetlana Kronna, which took the Russian obscenity sterva, or bitch, and turned it into a badge of honour.
A trend was born and Russia's bookshops are now lined with dozens of texts with such titles as Bitch Seeks Man and The Bitch's Beginner's Course.
The reason for the sharp-elbowed approach, according to one former oligarch hunter, is that decent men in Russia are generally thin on the ground, especially those who are both solvent and sober.
"Take 100 Russian men," explained Oksana Grussova, who spent 15 years hunting rich men, and was married to a wealthy construction magnate.
"Ten of them will be gay, 30 alcoholics, 10 drug addicts, 20 impotent, leaving a paltry 30 men.
"Now take 100 Russian women, 90 of whom will be beautiful - the race simply isn't fair."THE closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games will climax with the controlled demolition of Glasgow.
Glasgow was founded in the sixth Century, but quickly gained a bad reputation.
A games spokesman said: The place will be spectacularly razed to the ground with a million kilos of TNT. Then the wreckage will be burned with fire and salt sown on the ashes.
“The idea is that the city can then rise from the ashes like a phoenix. But probably the new version will be called something other than Glasgow.”
Glasgow teacher Nikki Hollis said: I grew up here, and while I accept that it needs to be demolished, I dont think blowing it up on TV is the right way to go about it.
It would be more respectful to detach it from the mainland under cover of darkness and send it out into the ocean to drift forevermore.March 14th, 2016
I was asked to give a talk at the Stevens Institute of Technology Computer Science Club on the topic of things that are not taught in school, but which CS students should know. I asked around a bit and got a lot of really interesting and useful feedback, leading to a long laundry list of possible topics. In the interest of time, I had to cut out a whole lot and still ended up with over 90 minutes of material. The end result is below.
The slides for this talk are also available here as well as on slideshare.
This is going to be long, and it will cover a lot of ground, and it will be completely subjective and it will be incomplete. A lot of this will also be obvious. Or perhaps only obvious in hindsight, because of course once you hear it, or you've experienced it, it's trivial to say that you've known this all along.
I will try to focus on things that I believe they do not teach you or do not stress enough in your education. Some of these things used to be taught here at Stevens; some of these things they have started to teach. Some of them they won't ever teach, because they do not fit into the academic goals of a CS curriculum nor the general concept of a university level education.
There is a discrepancy between what the industry requires or expects from academia, and what schools and universities provide. There are some things that universities are not prepared or willing to teach students simply because it does not fall within their mission, and whether or not that is Right and Good is a topic for another day. The industry, on the other hand, makes the mistake of expecting universities to churn out "programmers", ready to join the big machine and crank out code. But programming is but one aspect of all the many things that relate to "Computer Science".
The list of things I'll talk about is necessarily incomplete. I also cannot possibly actually teach you all the Things They Don't Teach You In School. But I can at least tell you what some of them are, so that you can begin to research them, to focus on them, to find out more, so that at least now you know some of the things you don't know.
And that is already one of the main lessons: Know your Unknowns. Know what you don't know. Now I'd be the last person to look favorably upon Donald Rumsfeld, but unfortunately it is his name that has become associated with this concept:
"There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don't know we don't know."
Or, perhaps phrased as the Socratic paradox: I know that I know nothing.
This is actually important and not as confusing as it may sound. And it has some interesting implications on your confidence. You may have heard of the terms "Dunning-Kruger effect" and "impostor syndrome", which are basically two sides of the same coin:
The fallacy here is that the more you know, the more you are aware of all the things you don't know, thus losing confidence and feeling like you know so much less than you actually do.
Undergrads -- by and large, anyway -- know that they don't know much. Once they graduate, however, something weird happens: with this degree in hand, they feel like they know a whole lot. Why, they even implemented Huffman compression once! They've written literally hundreds of lines of Java and even some C++, so yeah, they're "expert" or at least "strong" programmers. Right?
At this point, the ratio of the things they know they don't know versus the things they actually know is small. I.e., they think they know more than they don't know, thus developing strong confidence in their abilities.
As time goes by and you learn more and more, you also learn that there are a lot more things out there that you don't know. So even though the set of things you do know has increased, the ratio of the things you know you don't know versus those you do know has shifted. As a result, you feel like you know (comparatively) less.
We could have a full talk on just this one syndrome, but suffice it to say that it's important to have a reasonably realistic understanding of what you know and what you don't know.
Dunning-Kruger and Impostor Syndrome are entirely fascinating and have profound impact on how you approach your work, your peers. Which gets me to my next point:
Everything you do in this field ultimately boils down to solving people problems, to understanding human beings and their motivations. Somehow people in the tech world pretend that they can decouple the human component from the technical requirements or the general problem space, and that never works out.
We'll get back to this underlying concept throughout today's talk.
The reason that you attend college or any higher education is not to learn individual skills. You are here to learn concepts. To learn how to learn. You do not get a CS degree to become a programmer -- you can learn how to program yourself, in less than 24 hours, no less. (Right?)
Yes, this is how programming is done, by and large. But note that what happens in the so-called "real world" is not a good idea in school: by doing this, you are defeating the point of the exercise.
One part of the exercise is for you to do the work. When we ask you to write a program to sort an input set, then we are doing that not because we need a program to sort an input set. We are giving the assignment so that you write it, so that you get the experience of implementing the algorithm. Copy and paste driven development will rob you of this, the main objective of the assignment.
You may have heard that it takes around 10K hours to become an expert in just about anything. So you better get a head start:
If you want to get a job in that so-called real world, you better have some programming experience to show for. Academia will teach you concepts, which are important, but the overwhelming majority of jobs out there do not require an in-depth understanding of Computer Science and instead focus more on practical programming experience.
It's true that understanding the CS concepts we're teaching you here at Stevens will make you a better programmer (if that's what you want to do), but the theory is necessary, not sufficient, to becoming a good programmer, a good software engineer, or whatever it is you end up doing with this degree.
There are some things you can only learn by doing; some lessons you cannot learn in the abstract.
In CS, you learn about Operating System concepts such as virtual memory or filesystems, or perhaps distributed computing algorithms and things like the Dining Philosophers or the Thundering Herd problem. But unless you have experienced them, you do not fully understand them. Unless you have actually implemented a web server or an http client, you do not understand all the details of HTTP.
This also means that the first time you try to solve a problem, you necessarily are going to produce a a flawed, incomplete solution. As you implement your tool or program or algorithm, you are learning the many details that weren't even on your horizon when you began, so your solution is necessarily... crappy. Throw it out!
Be aware that your first solution is nothing but a prototype. A first attempt at solving the problem, used to outline the general solution and exploring the problem space. If you're fine with that, then it'll be easy to junk it and begin work on the actual solution.
(Sidenote: beware "Second System Effect" and feature creep.)
You know why prototypes are so hard? On the one hand, we are unwilling to throw away what we worked so hard on. Imagine: you spent all this time in writing a program that does what you think is necessary, and you learned all the intricate details of the problem at hand, and now you're supposed to just throw all that away?
But if you do that, you are not actually throwing away all that much. You can much more easily build a new version once you've done it the first time. Have you ever worked hard on a homework assignment and then accidentally deleted all or a big chunk of your work? Sure, it's frustrating, but what took you maybe a week to write the first time will take you only a few hours the second time, because now you much better understand the problem space.
So don't be afraid to throw away your prototype and begin work anew. Otherwise, your risk that your prototype, intended to be a temporary fix, becomes a permanent solution.
One area where this quickly becomes problematic is when you never intended the program in question to be the be-all-end-all solution. You just wanted to fix something real quick. Maybe you were paged in the middle of the night and you wanted to just solve the immediate problem and go back to bed and tomorrow morning you'll fix it the "right way", right?
There is nothing more permanent than a temporary solution. Once you have put in place a "quick fix", you are going to forget about solving the problem the right way; something else will come up to distract you, something more important (because your quick fix works, and so this particular part of your world is not on fire any more), or somebody else has already built something that depends on your "quick fix"'s particular behaviour.
You may have heard this before: if you keep trying to build the perfect system, to address all use cases, to meet all requirements, you'll never ship your product. It will never be finished.
"Worse is Better" (also called the "New Jersey style") is an important essay on software development that everybody in this field should have read. Its main point is that software does not primarily need to be "correct" to be "better". Quality does not increase with functionality, and it is often preferable to focus on delivering a "worse" product (fewer features, incomplete implementation, possibly even inconsistent design) that is simpler. (There are some parallels here to the idea of the "minimum viable product".)
Worse is better, but there's an interesting corollary:
If you have a solution that kind of "stops the bleeding"; that allows you to focus on something else; that takes away the urgency of the problem, then you are much less likely to come back to address the core problem.
A lot of software development, programming, operations etc. is done in a firefighting mode. If what you have "kind of" works, then few people will see the necessity to go back and redo the work, to do it the right way.
So even if it may seem paradoxical, sometimes it's better to object to a solution that addresses the immediate needs (ie the "quick fix", the temporary solution) in favor of solving the whole problem in the correct way.
One trick to balance "worse is better" and "perfect is the enemy of the good" is to focus on Simplicity.
Simpler code has fewer bugs. Simpler code is more readable. Simpler programs are easier to understand, easier to use. This is important in how you design your programs or APIs as well as how you write them.
The software you write should do one thing and do that thing well.
Follow the Unix philosophy. In Unix, your tools interface with one another via text streams going through stdin and stdout. This is a simple interface, and an example of "Worse is Better" -- designing pipes as passing objects would require a complex design and reduce the flexibility of those implementing new tools you haven't conceived of.
Which of course gets me to another major point:
You need to be familiar with Unix. Not just familiar, actually comfortable using it. The overwhelming majority of all internet services, including the core internet infrastructure, all run on Unix.
(Side note: Linux!= Unix)
You need to be able to operate in the Unix environment and use all the tools: sed, awk, grep, sort, uniq, and everything in between. These tools and their semantics permeate all the development tools used in software engineering, in operations, in other applications.
Here at Stevens, you can get an account on linux-lab.cs.stevens-tech.edu; if you use a Mac, live in the terminal; install NetBSD or Linux on your laptop. Don't use it as another platform to use occasionally; use it as your main, your only OS.
Know your editor. You can pick any one you like, but you need to know at least the basics of vi(1). Don't pick a trivial text editor for actual work. Know your editor. Be efficient in how to use it to write code.
Know about online references, automatic lookup of function definitions, tags files, and moving around your file without using a mouse.
Your editor is powerful. You spend the majority of your day in your editor, you should be efficient in using it. Invest the time to follow a tutorial.
When you write code, make sure you understand how to best debug your code. Most people do printf-based debugging: you write some code, you run it, it fails, you open the editor again and add a " printf('Here.
'); " statement, compile it again, run it again, and then repeat.
This is terribly inefficient. Instead, learn to use a debugger that allows you to inspect your program (either while it's running or after it has already failed by way of a core file) without having to modify it.
Debugging code is difficult. You will spend significantly more time debugging code -- yours and other people's -- than writing code. So you should be good at it! Debugging consists of the process of slowly, painstakingly, discovering what of the many things you thought were true are not. Computers are great: they do exactly what you tell them to. They do not do what you think you told them to, however. So you need to figure out what you thought was the case versus what you told the computer.
To do this efficiently, you should have a hypothesis for any problem you encounter. Do not blindly poke around and hope to find the bug: have a theory of what you think is the case, verify whether or not that is true, repeat.
Often times the first step in debugging is figuring out just where exactly in the code the bug takes place. Divide and conquer is a very effective way to find your bug. Don't randomly look here or there, but make specific, educated guesses that eliminate specific possibilities so you don't have to waste your time on chasing down dead ends.
Know how to trace the execution of a program.
Sometimes you need to debug the behaviour of a program you either do not have the code for, or where diving into the code base is just not likely to be efficient. You should be able to trace the execution of any program to track down,for example, which files are opened in which order. You may be able to use a debugger for this, too, by attaching to a running process, but you also want to be familiar with the various 'trace' tools ( strace(1) on Linux, dtrace(1) on Solaris/FreeBSD/OS X, ktrace(1) on NetBSD,...). They are your friends.
In school and in your personal projects, it's fun and exciting to try out new languages, new frameworks, new libraries. When you want to build a reliable product or infrastructure, however, "exciting" is very much the opposite of what you want. Use the most boring technology. Use what you already know by heart. More importantly:
Don't try to be clever. Clever code is complex, often complicated. Clever code is hard to debug, and often has unexpected consequences. Even if you are really proud about having written code that looks like:
print foo.join(map(lambda x: f(x), g(y)))
This becomes hard to debug or understand just a few minutes after you've closed the file.
Good code is not clever. Good code does not make the reader go "wait, what? Huh. Oh, hmm, maybe. I guess that's cool. But what if...".
Good code is easy to understand, simple. Simplify! Murder your darlings.
There's some really good advice in here. It applies to all programming, not just python. Make sure you understand the reasons behind them.
Write code that is easy to read. Readability is important because other people will have to read your code. That includes your own future self. A few days after you've written your code, you will no longer fully remember why you wrote what you wrote.
You can increase readability using a few simple rules, some of which you've probably heard before. Building software is tricky, and it requires you to be able to keep in your mind a full mental model of whatever functionality you are currently implementing. You should break your code into distinct chunks that are self-contained and not too complex.
A good rule of thumb is that if your code does not fit into a few screenfulls of your editor, it's too complex and should be refactored.
By the way, that is why it's useful to use a standardized terminal window, instead of a giant, vertical full screen window on a 30inch monitor.
Another sign that it's time to refactor is when your code falls off the side of the editor window because you are indented so far to the right that you can't get a function name in.
And renaming your functions and variables to single-characters does not count. That's a terrible idea.
Your code should be easy to read and descriptive. You are not charged per character, so don't use single-character variables or variables where you removed the vowels. Why do programmers hate vowels so much?
Name your functions after the actions they perform and the return type they have. Be consistent in naming conventions for your variables.
Once you begin giving your functions descriptive names, you also more easily discover when you are stuffing too much functionality into a single function when it should instead be multiple smaller functions. Whenever your function name contains the word "and", you probably want to break it into two separate functions.
This is tough for CS students. In most classes they are told that they should comment all their code all the time. But that's not actually a good thing, because it leads to things like:
Sure, it's superfluous, but why is this bad? Well, for one thing, comments and code are two different languages that our brain needs to switch back and forth between when we read code. This requires context switches and is difficult. Building a mental model of what a given piece of code does is difficult if you get disrupted by unnecessary and distracting comments.
But a more important aspect is that code and comments all too easily diverge over time. Suppose you encounter a bug in the code and realize it should actually be incremented by 4, not 2. You know what happens next?
People forget to update comments all the time. Now suppose you later come across this piece of code. You'd be inclined to believe that there's a bug here, since clearly x should be incremented by 2, not by 4. And so you go and change it back.
Comments are useful when they describe why the code is necessary, not what it does. If you write your code in a descriptive manner with clear function and variable names, then it'll be easy for anybody who is familiar with the problem space and the programming language to understand what it does.
So write your code such that it is self-explanatory and does not require any comments, except to explain the why.
Writing comments where useful and clear, readable code is a major help to those debugging your code later. The more you help them understand what you're doing and why
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were to tell you, for instance, that belief in free will is negatively correlated with the desire to urinate? Those are the implications of a new study published in the journal Consciousness and Cognition by Michael Ent and Roy Baumeister. They predicted—and found—that the more people felt they needed to pee, the less they believed that humans are in control of their destinies.
Whence comes such a seemingly bizarre theory about the relationship between something as mundane as bodily function and as lofty as human freedom? It’s based on a brand of psychological research known as “embodied cognition,” the primary lesson of which is that moment-to-moment states of our bodies influence how we consider about the world around us. An example of this is work by Amy Cuddy showing that “power postures” change how we come across in job interviews. Ent and Baumeister turned this approach toward the question of free will, hypothesizing that body-states could affect even abstract philosophies. When a feature of physical experience reminds subjects they are constrained by the laws of nature, Ent and Baumeister reasoned, their belief in free will should diminish.
The researchers started by contacting people with epilepsy and panic disorder. Epileptics suffer uncontrollable seizures that can come without warning; panic disorder results in recurrent attacks of intense fear and anxiety. Ent and Baumeister reasoned that, due to these daily reminders of physical limitations, these patients would have less belief in free will. Sure enough, when they compared these people’s attitudes to those of a control population, they saw significantly more skepticism among epileptics.
But this data, though intriguing, doesn’t prove unequivocally that our deepest beliefs are influenced by the states of our bodies. Instead, epileptics’ opinions could just be reflections of the fact that they actually do have less control over their actions.
To address this concern, the researchers next demonstrated that even healthy subjects have less belief in free will when they’re subtly reminded of their own physical limitations. Ent & Baumeister had people respond to a battery of questions not just about free will, but also about their current corporal desires. The desires that negatively correlated most strongly to belief in freedom were: a) the desire to urinate, b) the desire to sleep, and c) the desire to have sex. You read that correctly: when people feel stymied in their desire to sleep or to procreate, among other things, it affects their opinions on one of the most hotly debated issues of all time.
Perhaps this finding does not come as a surprise. After all, small influences in our daily lives—a complement from a friend, a criticism from a boss—have the power make our entire world seem sunny or grey. But given the ramifications that belief or distrust in free will would have on people’s life outlook (a “yea” vote gives a person carte blanche to proactively tackle life’s challenges, a “nay” stimulates a considerably more laissez-faire approach), it’s interesting to know how malleable these beliefs really are.
William James said that belief in free will comprises “the whole sting and excitement of voluntary life.” That sting and excitement may be as fleeting and ephemeral as the last bite from a bowl of Rice Crispies.Shaun Ryder, frontman of Happy Mondays and Black Grape, shares his musical milestones with Matt Everitt in a programme first broadcast in 2017.
Shaun Ryder, frontman of Happy Mondays and Black Grape, shares his musical milestones with Matt Everitt in a programme first broadcast in 2017.
Matt asks about Shaun's earliest musical passions - the Beatles, Bowie, and Buzzcocks and about his first meeting with Tony Wilson, who would help steer Shaun's band Happy Monday's to great success.
They discuss the creation of the albums that spawned songs like Step On, Hallelujah, Loose Fit and 24 Hour Party People (and talk about that movie) and his triumphant return with Black Grape.
Shaun also discusses his battles with drug abuse and how accepting his role as a national treasure has breathed new life into both the Mondays and the newly reformed Black Grape.A Brazilian judge has ordered that the passports of American swimmers Ryan Lochte and James Feigen be seized as authorities investigate their claim they were robbed at gunpoint during the Rio Games.
The office of Judge Keyla Blank confirmed the request Wednesday in a statement, but Rio police did not say whether the order was carried out.
Lochte and three of his teammates say they were robbed at gunpoint in a taxi Sunday morning as they returned to the athletes village from a party, several hours after the last Olympic swimming events were held. But police have found little evidence supporting the account, and say the swimmers were unable to provide key details in police interviews.
A police official with knowledge of the investigation told the Associated Press that police cannot find their taxi driver or witnesses. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
Lochte’s attorney, Jeff Ostrow, said there was no question the robbery happened and that Lochte had 24-hour security hired after the incident.
“This happened the way he described it,” Ostrow said.
Ryan Lochte reveals details of gunpoint robbery by Rio gang posing as police Read more
Ostrow told TMZ: “I have no information from Brazilian authorities that they want his passport.”
He said: “I’m shocked to hear that they would go to such measures in an effort to further investigate the incident as he has been nothing but cooperative with authorities, including sitting for a full interview with the tourist police, US State Department, USOC Security, FBI, and anyone else that requested to be present.”
He added: “Ryan is safely back in the United States.”
According to statements from Lochte and the United States Olympic Committee, the swimmers were returning to the athletes village by taxi after a night out at the French Olympic team’s hospitality house in the Rodrigo de Freitas area in the upscale south zone of the city. The outing was several hours after Olympic swimming ended on Saturday night at the Rio Games.
Traveling with Lochte were Gunnar Bentz, Jack Conger and Feigen. Lochte swam in two events at the Rio Games, winning gold in the 4x200m freestyle relay. He is a 12-time Olympic medallist.
The group did not call the police, authorities said, and officers began investigating once they saw media reports in which Lochte’s mother spoke about the robbery. Police interviewed Lochte and one other swimmer, who said they had been intoxicated and could not remember what type and color of taxi they rode in or where the robbery happened, the police official said. The swimmers also could not say what time the events occurred.
Later in the day, Lochte described the incident to NBC’s Today show. “We got pulled over, in the taxi, and these guys came out with a badge, a police badge, no lights, no nothing just a police badge and they pulled us over,” Lochte said. “They pulled out their guns, they told the other swimmers to get down on the ground they got down on the ground. I refused, I was like we didn’t do anything wrong, so I’m not getting down on the ground.
“And then the guy pulled out his gun, he cocked it, put it to my forehead and he said, ‘Get down,’ and I put my hands up, I was like ‘whatever’. He took our money, he took my wallet he left my cellphone, he left my credentials.”
Word of the robbery initially created confusion between Olympic and US officials. An International Olympic Committee spokesman at first said reports of the robbery were “absolutely not true”, then reversed himself, apologized and said he was relying on initial information from the USOC that was wrong.
Lochte told USA Today that he and his team-mates didn’t initially tell the US Olympic officials about the robbery “because we were afraid we’d get in trouble”.
Scott Leightman, a spokesman for USA Swimming, said the organization has no further comment and referred back to a statement issued on Sunday by the USOC that briefly described the robbery and said that all four swimmers were safe and cooperating with authorities.
The incident got attention in part because of fears around street crime at the Games. Athletes and visitors have been told to use caution around the Olympics. Street crime was a major concern of Olympic organizers, and Brazil deployed 85,000 soldiers and police to secure the Games, twice as many as Britain used during the 2012 London Olympics.
Authorities are treating the swimmers as victims and continuing to investigate, looking for security footage at the French hospitality house and nearby gas stations to build a timeline of the night. Security footage from the athletes village obtained by police shows the swimmers arriving at 6.56am on Sunday morning, the official said.
Rio police commonly struggle to obtain information while investigating street crimes in Brazil as they encounter dozens of robberies a day in the violence-ridden city and lack the resources to get to the bottom of every case. Many such crimes don’t even get reported by victims.
Fake police stops like the one reported by Lochte happen in Rio, but are not common in that area, police say. They are typically a bigger problem in the poorer cities where police are less present.
Lochte signed a statement on Monday confirming the facts he provided, his attorney said.
“Ryan was 100% cooperative and fully available when they reached out to us for an interview,” Ostrow said. He added: “It doesn’t behoove Ryan and anyone else to make up a story.”Police in Northern Ireland have discovered an arms and explosives cache thought to belong to republican dissident terrorists opposed to the peace process.
Almost half a kilogram of semtex explosive was found during a raid by armed police officers at a house in west Belfast, it was confirmed on Friday.
The security operation late on Thursday night at a house in the republican Ballymurphy district also uncovered two detonators, two handguns and 200 rounds of ammunition.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland said a 38-year-old woman and a 67-year-old man had been arrested after the searches on Ballymurphy Road.
The pair were photographed at the scene being led into a PSNI armoured vehicle dressed in white forensic boiler suits. They were taken to the serious crimes suite at Antrim police station for questioning.
A number of homes in the republican district had to be evacuated during the security operation. The PSNI said the operation was part of an investigation into “violent dissident terrorist activity.”
DCI Gillian Kearney said: “We are delighted to have removed these potentially lethal items from the streets of west Belfast. We appreciate the clearance operation which was needed to ensure everyone’s safety through the night disrupted many people’s lives, requiring people to leave their homes and inconveniencing road users.
“We would like to thank them for their patience and understanding during the operation. We will continue to work with the community to ensure we keep everyone safe.”
The capture of the weaponry, particularly the semtex, will be regarded as a major disruption to armed dissident republican activity in the greater Belfast area.
Semtex, first supplied by Muammar Gaddafi’s regime in Libya to the Provisional IRA in the 1980s, has been used in numerous terrorist atrocities and high-profile bombing attacks including the explosions that devastated part of the City of London in the early 1990s from the Bishopsgate bomb to Canary Wharf.
The discovery of the semtex will raise questions from unionist politicians about whether the Czech-made explosive came from a cache of the PIRA’s huge terror arsenal that was meant to have been decommissioned a decade ago.
The location of the weapons is also significant given Ballymurphy’s history as a republican stronghold during the Troubles. The area was the home of Gerry Adams’s family as well as the district from which many of the PIRA’s most militant fighters in the conflict emerged.
While most people in Ballymurphy are strongly pro-Sinn Féin and support the peace process there is a small network of family-related dissident republicans operating in the area.The Stack Archive
Netflix-derived algorithm tells you when your best employee is about to leave you
Thu 9 Apr 2015
A former Netflix data scientist has used the video-streaming company’s movie recommendation algorithm to develop a predictive system to let employers know when they are about to lose their most talented and productive workers.
Workday Talent Insights is a new app from Human Resources software creator Workday, and aims to use a variety of criteria to predict the departure of hard-won and hard-nurtured staff. It also provides options that companies can consider to retain valuable employees.
The software considers factors such as number of job functions, interval between promotions and length of tenure to estimate ‘corporate restlessness’. It cross-matches this information with job postings at major placement sites such as indeed.com to determine the current supply-and-demand state of the market in relation to that particular worker and his or her function within the company.
WTI was developed, ironically, by former Netflix employee Mohammad Sabah, an acquisition for Workday when his previous employer Identified was acquired by the company last February, and is based on the Netflix movie recommendation engine, which analyses a customer’s viewing history and makes recommendations for other products based on it.
Workday’s senior VP of Technology Products Dan Beck says “It’s not just a predictive model of what could happen next, but adding context, so you can then give something more prescriptive, like a recommendation,”
Opinion With an upturn in the labour market over the last 14 months, it has been a while since projects of this nature have hit the headlines. Interestingly it addresses a current concern about the perceivably unintelligent associations that many algorithms make between what we have done and what we might like to do next.
Amazon pioneered customer history analytics with a recommendation engine widely praised for its relative intelligence and profitability years before Big Data and granular analysis occupied developer zeitgeist. But advertisers seeking to precision-target users with deep analysis are beginning to encounter resistance, as evidenced by a study into the ‘creepiness factor’ of bespoke ads, conducted by a researcher at Ithaca college.
The problem seems to be one of imagination, or the habit of algorithms to look for repetitive patterns in scenarios where the variables (such as the economy, or the circumstances of the individual) change so often that one would arguably need 50-70 years of historical data to cover most of them, and correlate that insight with individual behaviour.
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Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.I’ve seen a lot of aerial photos of the city. All of them were black and white.
So I was quite surprised to come across these images recently that the Chronicle took in late 1959/early 1960. The ones you see here are scans from the original Ektachrome/Ektacolor negatives. The photographer is unknown.
All of the images are interesting, but what struck me was photo No. 25 showing Algerian Way. It’s a little road that curves from Kirby Drive to the U.S. 59 feeder. You’ll see a row of houses along that street. Of them, only one is still standing (according to Google Maps) and that’s the one closest to Kirby. The city should designate that house a protected landmark just for surviving this long.
Finally, I have to say that’s probably one of the best photos I’ve seen of Houston International Airport.
Broadway has yet to connect to the airport. No parking garages, just a mere surface lot. Toward the treeline, Glenbrook Valley is taking shape. Everything just looks so simple, you know?Getty Images
The 49ers are not kidding about due process.
According to Matt Maiocco of CSNBayArea.com, 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh just told reporters that defensive lineman Ray McDonald will accompany the team to Dallas and play this weekend against the Cowboys.
McDonald was arrested on a domestic violence charge, and Harbaugh has proclaimed emphatically that any player found guilty of such a crime would not play for him. But they’ve also given McDonald the temporary benefit of the doubt that comes from “innocent until proven guilty,” allowing him to play.
Also for the 49ers, right tackle Anthony Davis is out this week, meaning Jonathan Martin is in line to start. They’re also going to activate Alex Boone, who returned this week after a camp-long holdout.
All the shuffling up front might not matter against the Cowboys, and the constant questions about their line will continue until they can perform better than they did in the preseason.A lot of people have been writing us to know how they can catch up to FX's Justified, which we covered in depth during it's season 3 run. The thing about Justified is that it took them quite a while to find what it was about their show that was fantastic, so the first season is pretty hit and miss. It's tempting to tell people to just skip season one and start out on the fantastic season 2, but you miss some really good backstory on Boyd Crowder and Raylan's old man if you do. So, with that in mind, here is the official Bald Move recommended season one watch guide...
101: "Fire in the Hole" - Must see, obviously.
- Must see, obviously. 102: "Riverbrook" - most of this is skippable, but there are a few points addressing the overall story arc in the beginning that are pertinent.
104: "Long in the Tooth" - This does nothing to serve the main arc the show is establishing, but is my personal favorite of the "mobster of the week" story line.
105: "The Lord of War and Thunder" - Introduces Raylan's old man, Arlo, and is a must see.
- Introduces Raylan's old man, Arlo, and is a must see. 109: "Hatless" - Great episode, and introduces one of the best recurring characters, Wynn Duffy.
110: "The Hammer" - lots of good story arc in here, and it also establishes another memorable character, Judge Mike “The Hammer” Reardon.
- lots of good story arc in here, and it also establishes another memorable character, Judge Mike “The Hammer” Reardon. 111-113: "Veterns", "Fathers and Sons", "Bulletville" - Mandatory watching. The show really put the pedal to the metal with the season one story arc here.
If you want a bare bones experience, you can skip season one and jump right in to season 2. If you have five more hours to spend, take in 101, 105, and 110-113 and be very primed for the awesomeness that is season 2. Season 2, for it's part, takes a bizarre detour in epsiodes 206 and 207, which I'd almost recommend you skipping except there is some vital plot points in 207. If you watch the three episode climax of season one and still don't love Justified, I'd bail. While it gets even better in season two, I would still fear it just isn't your cup of tea.
Season 3 is entertaining as hell from start to finish, and there is no small amount of debate to be had about whether season 3 is better than season 2 or vice versa. For my money, season 3 doesn't have any missteps the way season 2 had in 206 and 207, but season 2 also had a singularly awesome villain with one of the all time great season finales.
So there you go! You have until about January 15th 2013 to catch up!The αlpha electric bike, from Pragma Industries, is another attempt at using hydrogen as a battery in transportation, but it might only make sense for fleets.
Considering its abundance in the chemical makeup of the universe, hydrogen really seems like it ought to be more of a key player in the energy transition away from the much more finite fossil fuels. But alas, it's exceedingly more complex than that, because we can't just scoop up hydrogen like we can coal. If we could, perhaps we'd all be zooming around in hydrogen fuel cell electric cars right now, as many of the hydrogen boosters predicted not that long ago.
However, as Lloyd reminds us, hydrogen isn't really an energy source, it's a battery: "That’s because you can make it in two ways: steam-methane reformation, which means that it is a fossil fuel, and the source for 95 percent of hydrogen) or electrolysis of water, which makes it essentially a battery storing electric power."
If, and it's a big if, we could couple renewable energy with hydrogen production, and if (and it's another big if) we had the infrastructure in place for consumer hydrogen filling stations, and then had affordable fuel cell electric cars readily available, then hydrogen 'batteries' could play a bigger part in transportation. However, there are some indications that some of those moves are already being made, such as this zero-carbon hydrogen fueling station that generates hydrogen onsite with excess electricity from renewable energy sources, and then dispenses to consumers just like any other gas station. There are arguments to be made for its suitability as a clean 'fuel' and equally vocal arguments against it (read the comments here or here to get a glimpse into the deep divide between the two camps).
When it comes to adapting that same technology to electric bikes, by using fuel cells fed with hydrogen and air to produce electricity (plus water and a little heat) to charge the batteries, there seems to be a resurgence of interest. The last time we covered the topic was 7 years ago, but there have been advances made over the last few years, such as this one, from Germany's Linde Group (which is a major world supplier of industrial gases, including hydrogen).
More recently, Pragma Industries, a fuel cell company, released details about its own version of a fuel cell electric bicycle, with one of the major selling points being its ability to enable a long range and a quick refueling time, which might be a big plus for fleet or commercial use. However, there's still the sticky question about where the electricity to power the electrolysis unit to produce the hydrogen comes from in the first place. If it actually takes more electricity to produce the hydrogen from the grid than it would to just charge an electric bike battery directly, and if that grid is powered mostly by fossil fuel sources, it's most likely just more convenient for the rider than it is a better clean transport option.
The Pragma Industries αlpha electric bike, which the company says is "The first commercially available electrically assisted bike with a fuel cell" and worthy of a category of its own (FC-Pedelec), integrates the company's fuel cell technology into an e-bike that has "an unrivalled range of 100km on a single charge." The αlpha has a Brose 36V electric motor rated to 250W, which is fed by a "bridging" lithium-ion battery pack with 150 Wh of capacity, which in turn is charged by the onboard 150 W PEM fuel cell. The fuel cell runs off of a 2-liter compressed hydrogen gas cylinder, which can be refilled in about 2 minutes at a filling station made by Atawey, which Pragma contrasts with the several hour process of charging a conventional e-bike battery.
The company put out the following video about its hydrogen fuel cell bike this past summer (in French, but YouTube has a decent auto-translate subtitle option):
In addition to its boast of a long range and quick refueling time, Pragma Industries also lays claim to another benefit of its technology, which is its immunity to decreased performance in cold weather. It's true that low temperatures can affect battery performance, but it's not clear to what extent an average e-bike rider would actually be affected by either very low or very high temperatures.
"Whereas battery-powered Pedelecs are adversely affected by low temperatures, Alpha2.0 provides constant range and performances in every weather conditions. Equiped with a best-in-class H2 gauge, it accurately indicates the remaining energy to the user." - Pragma Industries
There isn't a whole lot of detailed information available about the αlpha fuel cell electric bike, but the "Light mobility" page on the Pragma Industries website seems to indicate that the bike isn't targeted to individuals so much as it is to fleets:
Captive fleet operators, your battery management nightmares are over! αlpha offers a complete electric solution while eliminating batteries logistics which can be highly time-consuming and costly. Public services
Territorial staff mobility
Corporate staff mobility
Last mile delivery
Tourists rental
Bike sharing programs
If you're interested in learning more, there's a great explanation of fuel cells on the Pragma Industries website, which may not turn you into a hydrogen economy booster if you're not already in that camp, but it does offer some insight into the science and potential applications for this technology.French wine lovers have always taken their soil very seriously. But now the country's government has introduced fresh reasons for the rest of the world to pay attention to their terroir.
As industrial emissions of greenhouse gases continue to increase and concerns about climate change grow, scientists and policy wonks are searching for potential solutions.
Could part of the answer lie in the soil beneath our feet? French agriculture minister Stéphane Le Foll thinks so.
Soil stores vast amounts of carbon, far more than all the carbon in the world's forests and atmosphere combined. Plants take carbon out of the atmosphere through photosynthesis and when they die the carbon they stored is returned to the soil.
This forms part of the soil's organic matter: a mix of undecayed plant and animal tissues, transient organic molecules and more stable material often referred to as humus. It is food for organisms in the soil that play a vital role in cycling nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus.
These organisms decompose the organic material and return much of the carbon to the atmosphere leaving only a small proportion in the soil.
Over time, soil carbon capture can make a big difference
At a March 2015 conference on Climate Smart Agriculture, Le Foll proposed the ambitious target of increasing French soil carbon contents by 0.4% year-on-year ('4 pour mille'):
"A relative increase of four parts per thousand per year in the stocks of organic matter in soils would be enough to compensate for the sum of greenhouse gas emissions across the planet. On the other hand, a relative loss of four parts per thousand wouild double our emissions
"It is therefore, and this is the conclusion I want to draw, essential to protect carbon in soils and to develop mechanisms to increase soil carbon stocks and the formation of organic matter."
How France will meet the target is currently unclear but by throwing down the gauntlet Le Foll clearly wants to stimulate French farmers and researchers into action, and trigger a wider international research effort.
A 0.4% increase might not sound like a lot but, given the scale of carbon storage in soil and the fact that small increases add up over the years, meeting the target would have a significant impact on atmospheric CO 2 concentrations.
Le Foll hopes that protecting carbon-rich soils (like those in natural bogs, permanent grassland or wetlands), better use of organic manures and farming that returns more plant biomass to the soil (such as by using cover crops and ploughing their residues into the earth) together with the use of bioenergy crops such as short rotation willow coppice, can contribute towards a 40% reduction in France's CO 2 emissions by 2030.
He plans to bring forward an international programme to promote increases in soil carbon and to propose it to the UN climate talks in Paris. Such a programme would include research, innovation and engagement with farmers.
There is no doubt this is a bold move. Research has shown raising soil carbon contents is not that easy due to much of the organic matter added to soils being lost to the atmosphere as it is decomposed by soil microbes.
The benefits go way beyond carbon capture!
However, protecting the carbon we already have in our soils and just storing a little more could make a big difference. In the UK most soil carbon (by far) is found in peaty soils under bogs, followed by soils under grass, woodland and arable agriculture.
In total our soils store around 10 billion tonnes of carbon - that's about 65 times the country's annual carbon emissions. Protecting this carbon should be the first priority, then increasing the amount of carbon in our soils has the potential to suck even more CO 2 out of the atmosphere.
That means maintaining and restoring bogs, avoiding conversion of grassland and forestry to arable land, or even reconverting arable land to grassland. These measures would all have a positive effect on soil carbon stocks.
Whether all this can deliver the 0.4% increase year-on-year that the French want is open to debate. What is clear though is that not only does soil offer a way to store carbon and help mitigate climate change, carbon-rich soil has numerous other benefits.
It is more fertile and helps to promote food production, it improves soil's physical properties - protecting against soil erosion and increasing water-holding capacity - and it enhances biodiversity.
Promoting practices that increase soil carbon contents really is a win for both the soil and the climate.
John Quinton is Professor of Soil Science, Lancaster University, and Executive Editor of the Journal SOIL.
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.0 Shares
This weeks episode of Smackdown Live featured the rematch between Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens for the United States Championship. Kevin Owens not only won his title back but he also completely took out Jericho in the process.
What happened after this weeks episode of Smackdown Live (May 2nd, 2017) went off the air?
According to fans in attendance, the dark match after 205 Live was Randy Orton, AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura vs Jinder Mahal, Dolph Ziggler and Erick Rowan.
The thing that everyone is marking out about is AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamaura in the same ring together! Even if they were on the same team! The team of Nakamura, Styles and Orton would pick up the win to send the fans home happy.
Here are some photos from fans in attendance:
Dark matches are amazing. Nakamura, Styles, and Orton on the same tag team pic.twitter.com/sch3jduf7c — Ryan Fury (@Ryan2EZ) May 3, 2017
Can’t wait to see AJ vs Nakamura happen in a WWE ring.
Let us know what you think in the comment section below.The stubborn drive of OPEC is finally weaning down as the crude cartel has stated that it’s ready to talk to other producers about crashing oil prices, according to a release from an OPEC publication on Monday.
“Today’s continuing pressure on prices, brought about by higher crude production, coupled with market speculation, remains a cause for concern for OPEC and its members—indeed for all stakeholders in the industry,” the commentary in the latest OPEC Bulletin said.
Petroleum prices haven’t seen such lows in a decade. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries has kept production at all-time highs as strategy to abolish world competitors. Most notably, OPEC wanted to crush the shale boom in America.
While the bulletin is titled “Cooperation holds the key to oil’s future,” there aren’t real details to how this would play out among oil producing nation. However, OPEC did state that the market “has to be a level playing field,” and that “OPEC will protect its own interests.”
In related news, OPEC is producing at a loss, Ecuador admits.
“OPEC, as always, will continue to do all in its power to create the right enabling environment for the oil market to achieve equilibrium with fair and reasonable prices,” the article stated.
At no surprise, once OPEC announced of a potential deal, crude prices began to rebound on Monday. West Texas Intermediate crude prices rose $3.98—almost 9 percent— to $49.20 a barrel in New York. Brent crude—the international standard—was up $3.61 to $53.60.
In addition, The U.S. Energy Department cut its expectations for U.S. oil production based on lower projected output in Texas. This information mixed with the news from OPEC has given the market a slight boost investors are rallying behind.
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Venezuela has been contacting other OPEC members in pursuit of an emergency meeting with Russia for a plan to stop the global oil price mess. OPEC leaders have claimed in the past that they would only cut production if Russia and others follow suit. However, the nation, led by Vladimir Putin, has declined to lower supply.Wow. WOW, wow. I love these gifts so much. I can't even express enough gratitude.
The first package I received was Harry Potter socks! Two pairs! You know how Dumbledore says he sees himself holding a pair of wool socks in the mirror of Erised, and Harry doesn't believe him? Well, I do believe him because as I get older I get more and more desperate for socks.
I thought that would be it, but then I got another package! I'll be honest, I had no idea what it was at first. It has a snitch on it, but it took me way too long to figure out: it's a bookmark! Which is great, because when I read my HP books I usually end up using the book jackets as bookmarks and it just bends the paper and upsets me, but now I have this amazing snitch bookmark!
I thought that was it again, but then I got ANOTHER package! This one had a really nice handwritten note and 2 necklaces that my santa MADE for me!! They are potion necklaces, one is the elixir of life, and the other is felix felicis! They are beautiful and wonderful and I love them so much. My cats went nuts over this stuff. They ripped open the envelope and even bit a hole in the box the necklaces were in, so I'm wondering if these things were slathered in catnip at some point ;)
Again, I cannot say thank you enough. I am in love with everything. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!The organization, started by two young women who left New York, spotlights emerging talent in the Motor City
Paulina Petkoski, left, is founder and executive director of Playground Detroit, and Samantha Banks Schefman is the organization’s co-founder and deputy director. (Photo: Rachel Woolf / Special to The Detroit News)
Neon lights bounce off the walls. Beats pump in the background. The cocktails flow.
Elite art collectors in suits and sleek dresses may come to mind when you think of a gallery showing, but the crowd of Detroit millennials at this exhibit arrive in jeans, baseball hats and leggings.
The November pop-up event held at the retailer Detroit Is The New Black was curated by PLAYGROUND DETROIT, a creative catalyst started in 2012 by Paulina Petkoski and Samantha “Banks” Schefman. The two 30-year-old Metro Detroiters spent years in the New York arts and fashion industries and recently returned to help promote emerging Detroit artists, musicians and entrepreneurs. Now partnering with local shops and venues to host exhibitions and concerts, they plan to open their own space in Eastern Market this spring.
“We really believe in the city and the talent here,” Petkoski says. “Our work really showcases the city as a great place to live and play. It’s creating vibrancy and empowering the people that are here.”
“When you’re looking at a city that’s trying to redefine itself and going into the future, you have to support creative people — not just tech, not just automotive, not just urban farming,” she adds. “It’s really important to support artists because they’re looking at things critically, they’re offering solutions, and they’re redefining what it means to use art outside of a commercial way.”
Hailey Dukes, a contributor to Playground’s online magazine, pitched in with bartending that night. Originally from Kent, Ohio, the bubbly 25-year-old moved to Detroit two years ago for a job at Quicken Loans. Then she discovered the Detroit arts scene and left her corporate gig to work for Playground Detroit. Though just years younger, she considers Petkoski and Schefman her role models.
“They integrate the community. You can feel it,” says Dukes, scanning the room with diverse faces. “It’s non-judgmental. It’s like, come as you are, whoever you are. It’s all about the art, and it’s all about the connection.”
Many were admiring the light installations by Scott Klinker, Cranbrook Academy of Art 3D designer-in-residence, one of four artists featured that night. Admittedly on “the upper edge of the young and hip category,” the 51-year-old met Schefman a few months ago, and she asked him to be in this “Ambience” show.
“Detroit is really hitting a tipping point in terms of the creative community, and they are helping to shape it,” Klinker says in front of his circles backlit with green and orange LED lights. “They’re the young, hip, edgy side of the arts scene, and they’re creating a platform for people to show their work and connect with the community and collectors.”
David Klein Gallery director Christine Schefman, Samantha’s mom, says Playground Detroit taps into an audience that her gallery in Detroit and Birmingham doesn’t always see.
“They’re hitting a younger population and getting them excited about art, and that’s something that galleries and museums now (struggle with),” she says.
Equally important, they’re helping young artists thrive in Detroit.
Luke Mack, a Chrysler automotive designer and painter, was selected for Playground’s six-week artist residency at the Detroit incubator Ponyride, which culminated with an exhibit Friday. Left on his own, the 25-year-old from Rochester Hills says he’d be lost on how to promote his paintings.
“It’s like an artist’s dream,” he says of the doors that Playground Detroit opens. “(They’re) there to support you and get you out in the city.”
Playground in New York City
Petkoski befriended Schefman at Groves High School in Beverly Hills. The two went separate ways for college — Petkoski attended Wayne State before earning a bachelor’s degree in fashion design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, while Schefman studied at the University of Iowa before transferring to the College for Creative Studies, where she received a bachelor’s degree in metalsmithing.
In 2010, they were living in New York and reconnected. At that point, Petkoski had worked with Calvin Klein (her senior class critic), interned for Isaac Mizrahi and launched her own clothing line. During her senior class show, the Diane von Furstenberg creative director scouted her out and offered a full-time internship at $20 a day.
Meanwhile, Schefman moved to New York the week she graduated for a jewelry design job. She then met the owner of the Mike Weiss Gallery in Chelsea, who hired her as the manager in charge of sales, archiving, the website, artist communication and all odds and ends.
“I got an
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impression on the other inmates right away when you get shipped to a new place. I saw you standing there by the TV room. You noticed how all the other inmates got a bit nervous when I walked by. Even the big ones get nervous when you do shit like that. You just got to establish yourself right away. If you don’t, then inmates think they can test you.” He stared quite matter-of-factly at me; the emptiness in his eyes was unnerving.
Nike probably never envisioned a psychopathic inmate embracing their slogan 'Just Do It' in a manner quite like this.
“When I do stuff like that, inmates don’t know what to think. I’m unpredictable. Sometimes I don’t even know why I do what I do. I just do it.”
My mind was racing again. I completely agreed with his logic, albeit twisted; he had already established his dominance at this prison. He was going to score high on at least a few psychopathic traits. Nike probably never envisioned a psychopathic inmate embracing their slogan Just Do It in a manner quite like this.
“You’ve been working here for five years?”
“Yes, since I started graduate school,” I replied.
“Interviewed lots of guys, right?”
“Yes, hundreds of them.”
“Well, you ain’t never met anyone like me,” he said.
“Really? What makes you so special?”
“I’ve done shit you can’t even imagine. I’m gonna shock you like I shock everyone,” he stated calmly. “Let’s get on with it.”
Richie enjoyed doing bad things. He was only in his late 20s when I interviewed him, but he had a rap sheet like no one I had ever interviewed before. As a teenager he had committed burglary, armed robbery of banks and convenience stores, arson for hire, and all kinds of drug-related crimes from distribution to forcing others to mule drugs for him. He would force women to hide plastic baggies of cocaine in their body cavities and transport them across borders and state lines and on plane flights. One of Richie’s girls got a baggie stuck in her vagina. Richie used a knife to “open her up a bit” so he could retrieve his drugs. He said he didn’t use her again after that. When I asked him what he meant by that, he said that he didn’t use her for sex; she was too loose now, and she lost her nerve about carrying drugs.
Richie smiled as he told me a story of a prostitute he had killed for pissing him off. He actually seemed proud when he described wrapping her up in the same blanket he had suffocated her with so he could keep all the forensic evidence in one place. He put her in the trunk of his car and drove out to a deserted stretch of road bordered by a deep forest. Chuckling, he told me he was pulled over by a highway trooper because he was driving erratically as he searched for a dirt road to drive up so he could bury the body in the woods.
“So the cop pulls me over and comes up to the window and asks me if I have been drinking alcohol. I lied and said no. I told him that I just had to take a piss and I was looking for a place to go. But the cop gave me a field sobriety test anyways. I figured that if I didn’t pass the test, I would have to kill that cop. Otherwise, he might open the trunk and discover the body. The cop didn’t search me when I got out of the car, and I was carrying a knife and a handgun. I’m surprised that I passed that field test since I had had a few drinks that night. I was planning to beat the cop senseless and then I was going to put the girl’s body in the backseat of the cop’s car. Then I would shoot him in the head with his own gun and make it look like a suicide after he accidentally killed the prostitute while raping her in the backseat of his cruiser. Everyone would think it was just another sick dude.”
The irony of his latter statement was completely lost on Shock Richie.
The cop proceeded to point out a dirt road just up the way where Richie could pull over and take a piss. It was fascinating that Richie could remain calm enough not to set off any alarm bells for the cop that something was amiss. After all, Richie had a body decomposing in the trunk of the car. Yet apparently, Richie showed no anxiety in front of the cop. Most psychopaths like Richie lack anxiety and apprehension associated with punishment.
Richie turned up the dirt road the cop pointed out to him and drove in a ways. He pulled over, parked, and removed the body from the trunk.
“I had all these great plans to carry the body miles into the woods and bury it really deep so nobody would ever find it. But it’s f—ing hard to carry a body. You ever tried to carry a body?” he asked.
“No, I don’t have any experience carrying dead bodies,” I told him.
“Well, it’s a lot of work, let me tell you. So I only got about a hundred yards off the road and just into the trees before I was exhausted. Then I went back and got the shovel from the car. I started digging a huge hole.”
He looked up at me with those empty eyes and asked: “You know how hard it is to dig a hole big enough to bury a body?”
“No,” I answered, “I don’t have any experience digging holes to bury bodies.”
“Well, it’s harder than you might think.” He starts laughing. “I had all these great plans to carry her miles into the woods and dig this monster hole so nobody would ever find her.”
A couple weeks later, a couple of hikers discovered the body. Shock Richie read about it in the newspapers, but he was never charged with the murder.
Not His Brother’s Keeper
Richie admitted that he had no need for friends. He’d really never been close to anyone in his life. He preferred to do everything on his own. He also didn’t trust anyone.
I believed him. Richie had no friends in prison, he had no visitors, and all the other inmates said he could not be trusted and he knew not to trust them in return.
He had lived a life supported by crime, never had any vocational training, and never made even a passing attempt at any other lifestyle. He made most of his big scores by taking down rival drug pushers. He would set up deals in different towns and then rob and sometimes kill the other person. Richie had no fear or hesitation with killing. Richie also had more than a dozen fake names and accompanying identification.
While he was having sex with the prostitute in the living room, she said she smelled something funny.
For a long time he was a pimp. He used to corral runaways into working for him. He would get them hooked on drugs and then make them work the streets. He’d killed more than a few prostitutes. He saw people as objects, things to be manipulated; we were there just for his entertainment.
When Richie had been released the last time from prison, he was taken in by his older brother. His older brother was not a criminal. He was on the straight and narrow. After a few months of Richie bringing home prostitutes and doing drug deals at the house, his brother had told Richie he had to stop or he was going to kick him out. They argued, but Richie never tried to change his behavior. Finally, his brother had had enough. He picked up the phone to call the police to have him arrested for drug possession. “I was high,” said Richie, “but not more than usual. I got the jump on him and beat him with the phone. While he was lying there dazed on the floor, I ran into the kitchen and grabbed a knife. I came back and stabbed him a few times.” He looked up at me intently to see if I was shocked.
“Continue,” I said.
“I figured that I would make it look like somebody had come over and killed him as part of a drug deal gone bad. Then I thought that maybe I should make it look like my brother had raped one of my girls and one of them had stabbed him.” By girls he meant the prostitutes in his “stable.”
After killing his brother, he went out and partied for a day or two. Then he came back home with a prostitute whom he planned to stab, and then put the weapon in the hand of his dead brother. He was going to put them both in the basement and make it look like his brother died quickly during the fight and the girl died slowly from stab wounds.
While he was having sex with the prostitute in the living room, she said she smelled something funny.
“You ever smell a body after it’s been decomposing for a couple days?” he asked.
“No,” I replied, “I don’t have any experience smelling decomposing bodies.”
“Well, they stink. I recommend getting rid of them fast.”
After having sex, he intended to lure the girl down into the basement. But the prostitute excused herself to use the bathroom and she jumped out the window and ran away. Later that evening the police showed up at his door and asked to come inside. Apparently, the prostitute recognized that odd smell to be that of a decomposing body. She had good survival instincts.
Richie told the cops he had been away from the house partying for a few days. He didn’t know that his brother had been killed. Confessing to being a pimp and drug dealer, Richie told the officers that he owed a lot of people a lot of money. He gave them a list of a dozen or so names of potential suspects.
The police eventually arrested Richie. Through his attorney, Richie received a plea deal. He pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to many years in prison.
No More Little Richies?
Richie had a few more zingers he hit me with that day. He had indeed met my challenge. When I got home that evening, I opened a bottle of wine; it was empty before I knew it.
Richie and I have both spent the last 20 years in prison. Richie as an inmate, me as a scientist trying to understand the mind and brain of the psychopath. Richie scored in the 99th percentile on Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), the test we use to assess psychopathic traits. There are 20 psychopathic traits on the Hare PCL-R, including Lack of Empathy, Guilt and Remorse, Callousness, Irresponsibility, and Impulsivity. Richie fit the classic definition of all of those traits.
If Shock Richie’s brain has been abnormal since he was a child, is he responsible for his actions as an adult?
Richie was also the first psychopath to receive an MRI scan of his brain. Since that first MRI study my laboratory has scanned the brains of more than 3,000 other inmates, many of them psychopaths like Richie. This MRI data is the world’s largest forensic neuroscience repository and it is starting to yield some startling discoveries. We know for example, how Richie’s brain differs from the rest of us. His limbic system, the area of the brain that controls emotion and affect, is reduced in both brain structure and function. Additional research has found these same brain abnormalities in incarcerated youth with emerging psychopathic traits. Indeed, some scientists argue that emotional and behavioral antecedents to psychopathic traits can be recognized as early as age 6.
If Shock Richie’s brain has been abnormal since he was a child, is he responsible for his actions as an adult? Does Richie have the same free will as the rest of us?
Finally, the latest science of psychopaths has also illuminated a path that might remedy these problems before they even get started. Indeed, studies are showing that early treatment might prevent little Richies from ever developing.
Excerpts adapted from The Psychopath Whisperer: The Science of Those Without Conscience (Crown), by Dr. Kent Kiehl, available Apr. 22.
Contact us at [email protected], Lebanon — A Syrian pastry chef turned antigovernment activist, Bebars al-Talawy, has spent nearly three years in besieged rebel enclaves, growing ever more gaunt, exasperated and sick of the one red jacket he has worn month after month.
Yet when rebels and security forces struck a truce recently that could end the blockade trapping him in the last rebel-held district in the city of Homs, he did not feel safer or freer. Instead, he was sure it meant choosing surrender or death, calling it the start of “the final countdown to the end of my life.”
His predicament, and his disillusionment with all parties to the conflict, demonstrated the challenges of selling any peace deal in Syria, even as international officials praised the Homs truce as a step toward a nationwide agreement. Russia, the United States and Middle Eastern powers are pushing with new urgency for a political solution to the nearly five-year civil war as the Islamic State, incubated in the chaos of the multisided Syrian war, expands its reach, and hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees overwhelm Europe.
But as Mr. Talawy, 25, has said in online interviews over several years, there are deep divisions in Syria over how and whether to stop the fighting — even among the tired and hungry, even within the more moderate factions that struck the deal in the Waer district of Homs, led by local men, not foreign extremists.In the fall 2013 quarter at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Daniel Sheehan taught a class on the theories of the JFK assassination, one of the first courses of its kind ever taught. Starting with the Warren commission report and the official government position, Sheehan outlines in extensive detail the nine major theories as to who was really behind the assassination.
Online reference and syllabus materials can be found below the videos.
VIDEO LINKS
Oct. 1: The Historical Perspective
JFK #2: The Historical Perspective
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 3: Critical Thinking
JFK #3: Critical Thinking
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 8: Oswald, the Lone Gunman
JFK #4: Oswald, the Lone Gunman
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 10: Warren Commission Report
JFK #5: Warren Comission Report
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 10: Discussion
JFK #5 Discussion
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Oct. 15: Challenges to “Lone Gunman” Theory
JFK #6: Challenges to "Lone Gunman" Theory
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 17: The Later Discovered Facts That Challenge the Lone Gunman Theory
JFK #7: The Later Discovered Facts That Challenge the Lone Gunman Theory
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Oct. 22: Undisputed Facts
JFK #8: Undisputed Facts
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Oct. 24: The Still-Controversial Facts that Point Toward an Alternate Explanation
JFK #9: The Still-Controversial Facts that Point Toward an Alternate Explanation
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 24: Discussion
JFK #9 Discussion: Narrative set forth by House Select Committee on Assasinations
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 29: Select Committee on Assassination, Cuban Exiles and Organized Crime (Greg)
JFK #10: Select Committee on Assasinations (Greg Smith Lecture)
Watch this video on YouTube
Oct. 31: The Mob Killed JFK
JFK #11: The Mob Killed JFK
Watch this video on YouTube
Nov. 5: Garrison Investigation and Oliver Stone
JFK # 12: Nov. 5, Garrison Investigation and Oliver Stone
Watch this video on YouTube
Nov. 7: The Torbitt Document- Johnson, Hoover, and the F.B.I.
JFK #13: The Torbitt Document- Johnson, Hoover, and the F.B.I.
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Nov. 14: The S-Force, Santos Trafficante, and Richard Helms within the C.I.A.
JFK #14, 15: The S-Force, Santos Trafficante, and Richard Helms within the C.I.A.
Watch this video on YouTube
Nov. 19: The C.I.A. As an Institution Did It
JFK #16: The C.I.A. As an Institution
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Nov. 21: Theory #9- 7 Days in May- Joint Chiefs of Staff Coup (Nov. 21, 2013, one day before the 50th anniversary)
JFK #17: Daniel Sheehan and Alternative Theories of the JFK Assassination Nov. 21, 2013
Watch this video on YouTube
Nov. 26: Opening onto the “Rulers of the Ream” thesis
JFK #18: Nov 26 2013
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ONLINE REFERENCE MATERIAL
5 page syllabus
19 page syllabus
146 page syllabus
The Cast of Characters
Chronology
Evidence as a Multidisciplinary Subject
The Study of Politics: Logic, Approaches, Methods
JFK Conspiracy Theories at 50
Extended ChronologyCALGARY - Despite a devastating flood and some internal squabbling within the industry, tourism in Calgary was a booming business in 2013 - and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
The numbers tell the story.
As of the end of November, there were 81,033 more hotel rooms sold in 2013 than in the same period in 2012.
“If anything, all the flood did was kind of define who we were, showed what we’re capable of and went on to kind of show the nation and all in the world that Calgary’s a pretty special place,” says Cindy Ady, chief executive of Tourism Calgary.
That special place attracted 7.5 million visitors and tourism spending of $1.6 billion in 2013.
“We’re always stronger when we hunt in a pack. That’s just the truth about tourism or in the space that we sit...When we partner, we’re stronger.”
It was a tumultous year for partners in the industry even before June’s destructive flood hammered the city.
At its annual general meeting in April, Tourism Calgary reported that 5.2 million visitors spent an estimated $1.4 billion in the city in 2012. But in a speech, during that meeting, Mayor Naheed Nenshi said that “parochialism and small-mindedness” within the city’s tourism sector needed to be addressed.
Less than one week after reporting the record-breaking year, Tourism Calgary replaced its chief executive Randy Williams. The organization, in announcing Williams’ abrupt departure, said he was being replaced on an interim basis by former Alberta Tourism Minister Ady.
Then in mid-May, the Calgary Hotel Association announced it was pulling its $2.5 million annual funding for Tourism Calgary and reallocating the money to other partners. About two-thirds of the association’s 63 members voluntarily contributed to the destination marketing fund. A three-year funding agreement, which was set to expire in December, was not going to be renewed, it said.
Ady was brought in to solve that one key stakeholder issue.
“I think there’s going to be a resolution and we’re getting close... For me, it’s about when we’re all working together.... I’m feeling a positive pull in that direction. That’s my mission in life, and what I’m here to accomplish, and I think we’re in a better place today than we were yesterday,” says Ady.
“Always within this space, it’s a matter of where you focus resources and energy and how do governance structures work together. And so in Calgary we’re trying to create something much like the Travel Alberta model where we create the opportunity for it to act and react like a business and to ensure that the right resources are going to the right places.”
Jon Jackson, executive director of the Calgary Hotel Association, says the group is committed to delivering the maximum return on investment to its members with the money that they’re providing to the destination marketing fund.
“We have been having discussions about a potential long-term partnership with Tourism Calgary with the goal of ensuring both short and long-term benefits to our members, the industry at large and the city as a whole. To that, we have made an offer to Tourism Calgary towards a partnership and they are currently considering it,” he says.By: Jay Syrmopoulos | The Free Thought Project
A SECRET declassified report by then-CIA Director William Casey, titled, “Unauthorized Disclosures to the Media” proposed creating legislation that would make possession of classified information a criminal offense.
At the time that would make anyone reading a New York Times article with classified information, or WikiLeaks in the modern-era, criminally liable and able to be prosecuted by the state.
Although Casey was in favor of creating new legislation to specifically target media leaks, as well as those who come to possess those leaks (journalists or readers), he argued against utilization of the Espionage Act to prosecute leakers.
The former CIA Director reasoned that using the Espionage Act to target leakers was extreme, excessive and was akin to “driving tacks with a sledgehammer.”
While Casey acknowledged that the media was conflicted in their obligations, he conceded that it’s the job of the media to inform the public.
Ironically, despite his admission that the job of a journalist is to inform the public, he goes on to espouse a desire to see the media prosecuted for their role in publishing leaks and held in contempt if they failed to name their sources.
Ironically, as Muckrock points out, far from minimizing the potential harm of national security leaks, Casey emphasized the damage that they could do. However, none of the five examples provided by Casey in his report resulted in any actual harm. Two examples “could have” resulted in adversary adjusting their techniques, though the language implies that hadn’t happened.
A third and fourth example resulted in potential damage which forced the Agency to cut off contact with a human source lest that danger be amplified. While endangering human sources is never a good thing and disrupting HUMINT operations was unlikely to have been the intention, the report again indicates that no actual harm came to anyone. A fifth example placed someone in danger of being discovered, again a possibility which hadn’t come to pass, though it “could possibly have an adverse effect on U.S. relations” with an unknown group.
Ideally, as Muckrock notes, Casey felt that the new law should not require they demonstrate that a leak caused any actual damage to the United States. Instead, the question should be whether or not the information was passed to someone not authorized to receive it.
Although he expressed that the Espionage Act was the wrong way to go about doing so in the report, only a few months later the government successfully prosecuted Samuel Morison – setting a new precedent for decades to come.
Since then, the draconian Espionage Act has been used to target whistleblowers and leakers alike — with Obama using it to prosecute and imprison a record number of journalists’ sources — and even threaten media publishers.
The declassified report gives a clear insight into the mind of a high-level government official, in terms of how free of a press they really would really like to see in the United States.
While it was admirable that then-CIA Director Casey made clear that the Espionage Act was overkill for leakers, the idea that he wanted to create legislation for the government to have the ability to prosecute journalists for informing the American public about the extrajudicial actions of their own government – and which could likely also be used to criminalize the public – seems extremely antithetical to the First Amendment and the entire notion of a free press.
For those that don’t remember, CNN also said the same thing—that reading WikiLeaks is illegal—and this was just last year.
View full document on Scribd HERE.Overall, 2012 wasn’t a great year for fans of the Cydia store. A good chunk of the year was spent waiting for that elusive iOS 6 untethered jailbreak, which hasn’t arrived to date, and it was in 2012 that iOS users first started wondering whether there will ever be a new jailbreak. Fortunately, the pace of Cydia’s growth hasn’t seemed to slacken one bit, and new tweaks have been coming out just the way they always have. Apple paid a silent tribute to some of the best tweaks from last year by incorporating their features into iOS 6, but the tweaks that were released this year made sure that they took the game to the next level. Since some of the real gems might have slipped under your radar, here is a compilation of the best Cydia tweaks and apps that we covered in the in 2012.
Free
1. Universal Video Downloader (Lets you download any online video stream being played within any app)
2. SwipeBack (Adds a simple swipe gesture for going back one step within all iOS apps)
3. GO SMS (The famous Android messaging app came to the Cydia store this year with quick-reply notification pop-ups and beautiful themes)
4. iCleaner (Get some extra storage space on your iPhone by letting this app remove junk from the file system)
5. VSNotifications (Reads aloud entire notifications and speaks predefined text upon certain system actions)
6. 360MobileSafe (Privacy app with call blocking, anti-theft and network monitoring options)
7. SlyCam (A mini-camera within the Notification Center for covert photography)
8. Zeppelin (Use a logo of your choice in place of carrier name in the status bar)
9. NotiQuiet (Disables all notifications every time you are using select apps)
10. BrowserChooser (Set Chrome or any other iOS browser as your default choice for opening links from other apps)
11. MultiTunes (Never have your iPhone’s data wiped by iTunes accidentally ever again. This tweak makes sure you get to sync your device with as many iTunes libraries as you want.)
12. AccountChanger (Perfect for switching quickly between multiple Apple IDs in the App Store)
13. StatusBulletin (Convert banner notifications to ticker-like notifications that appear only within the status bar and show the complete content of each notification)
14. Sara (A complete Siri alternative for older iOS devices)
15. SiriToggles (Launch apps and toggle system options via Siri)
16. MusicGestures (Playback and navigation gestures for the stock Music app)
17. Overachiever (Instantly unlock all Game Center achievements for any game)
18. MissionBoard (Gesture-activated, graphical App Switcher)
19. Go Desk (Panoramic and interactive live wallpapers for iOS)
20. Custom NC Background (Set any image as the Notification Center’s backdrop)
21. Vuziq (Use any video from YouTube as a video ringtone of sorts for incoming calls)
22. SBUtility (Edit the appearance of folders, SpringBoard and icons)
23. IconRotator (Get landscape mode on the SpringBoard)
24. Plugication (Restarts music playback whenever earphones are plugged in after accidental disconnect)
25. Bars (Get a higher level of accuracy in the signal strength indicator)
26. DisableNC Switch (Prevents Notification Center from showing up while you are running full screen apps)
27. Lorem (Clear a single notification from the Notification Center rather than the whole group)
28. PersistentAssistant (With this tweak, you don’t have to hit the Siri button after each command and response)
29. Safari Download Enabler (Although this tweak is not a complete download manager for Safari, it does let users grab any file regardless of its format. The downloaded files can then be opened in iFile or with other compatible apps.)
30. SMS Stats (Tells you the total number of texts you have sent from your iPhone, and shows messaging stats for individual contacts)
31. AddNote (Quickly export text from anywhere to the stock Notes app)
32. Activoice (Launch Google Voice Search, Goggles and text search using any Activator gesture of your choice)
33. Pull to Dismiss (Quickly hide the keyboard with a simple gesture)
34. iSounds (Associate predefined or custom sounds with different system actions like system startup, app launch, etc.)
35. AppCent (View the exact download percentage of apps rather than relying on the progress bar)
36. Protect My Privacy (Whenever apps try to access your personal information, this tweak feeds them false information to protect your privacy)
Paid
1. Imperium (A beautiful App Switcher alternative with system toggles and app shortcuts)
2. Bridge (Add files to stock Music and Videos apps by downloading them directly from Mail or Safari; no need for iTunes or any other desktop tool)
3. CameraTweak (Add time-lapse, capture delay, independent focus and exposure, frame rate selection and several grid overlays in the stock Camera app)
4. AnyLock (Add app shortcuts and widgets to the lock screen)
5. Dashboard X (A platform for third-party lock screen and home screen widgets)
6. BrowseInApp (Opens external links in apps without navigating away to a browser)
7. Deck (Get a side bar filled with extra app shortcuts and system toggles on the home screen)
8. Attachments+ (Preview almost all major file types within the stock Mail app. The tweak also lets you attach files straight from iFile.)
9. Switchy (Doubles the height of App Switcher to accommodate more icons and system shortcuts)
10. Unlockize (Adds gorgeous unlocking animations to the lock screen)
11. AnimateAll (Set animated wallpapers as lock screen, home screen and/or Notification Center bacground)
12. Messages2PDF (Create a backup of all your SMS threads in the form of a PDF file that can be exported via email)
13. ImmediateSend (Tap on notification banners to reply to texts from anywhere without opening the stock Messages app)
14. Timer Options (Like Tasker for iOS; lets you schedule system actions and other tasks and can be toggled using Activator gestures)
We’re sure some of the features offered by these tweaks and apps will make their way to future updates of iOS, but there will always be something new that can be brought to the table by Cydia. Let’s just hope someone can come up with an untethered jailbreak exploit for one or more iOS 6-supported devices in the near future.
You might also want to check out our other end-of-year compilations:
150 Best Windows Apps Of 2012
35 Best Windows 8 Store Of 2012
100 Best Mac Apps Of 2012
150 Best Android Apps Of 2012
100 Best iOS Apps Of 2012
40 Best Windows Phone Apps Of 2012
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTERA worker adjusts the logo at the stand of Huawei at the CeBIT trade fair in Hanover March 15, 2015. REUTERS/Morris Mac Matzen
HONG KONG (Reuters) - China’s Huawei Technologies Co Ltd [HWT.UL], the world’s fourth-biggest smartphone maker, is ahead of schedule on smartphone shipments and will meet its 2015 target of 100 million handsets before the end of the year, according to an internal memo reviewed by Reuters.
Shenzhen-based Huawei has recorded monthly global smartphone shipments of more than 10 million every month since May, the head of the company’s consumer business, Richard Yu, wrote to staff in a memo sent on Monday.
Huawei shipped 75 million smartphones in 2014, below its original sales target of 80 million. Earlier on Monday Huawei reported a 30 percent increase in first-half 2015 revenue to 175.9 billion yuan ($28.3 billion) and said it would achieve “effective growth” in 2015.
The company had a 5.4 percent share of the global smartphone market in the first quarter of this year, a distant fourth behind Samsung Electronics, Apple Inc and Lenovo Group Ltd, according to research firm Gartner.Ferguson police haven't yet interviewed Dorian Johnson, the friend who was with Michael Brown on the night he was shot by police, Johnson's lawyer tells MSNBC's Trymaine Lee.
Freeman Bosley, Johnson’s attorney, told msnbc that the police have yet to interview Johnson. Bosley said that he offered the police an opportunity to speak with Johnson, but they declined. “They didn’t even want to talk to him,” said Bosley, a former mayor of St. Louis. “They don’t want the facts. What they want is to justify what happened … what they are trying to do now is justify what happened instead of trying to point out the wrong. Something is wrong here and that’s what it is.”
Johnson, 22, was walking with Brown in the street on Saturday when the two encountered police. Police have claimed that Brown assaulted one of the officers and reached for his gun. Johnson's story differs greatly from the police's version of events -- he says that the police told them to "get the fuck onto the sidewalk," grabbed Brown and began choking him when they didn't immediately obey, and shot Brown when the 18-year-old tried to flee.
"We wasn't causing no harm to nobody," Johnson told CBS News on Sunday. "We had no weapons on us at all. He shot again and once my friend felt that shot he turned around and put his hands in the air and started to get down, and the officer still approached with his weapon drawn and fired several more shots."
Other witnesses also said that Brown had his hands up in the air when he was shot.
In a new, lengthy interview with MSNBC, Johnson provides more detail about what happened that night. Read his full account here.COMMERCE CITY, Colo. – Axel Sjoberg, the tallest defender in MLS, may draw attention merely by virtue of his size.
But his play on the field in his second season with the Colorado Rapids is drawing plenty of attention, too.
Both literally and figuratively, the 6-foot-7 Swede has been a big part of a Rapids defense which has conceded the fewest goals in MLS (9) through 13 games this season. He set another milestone last weekend, tallying his first career goal in MLS with the game winner in a 1-0 win over the Seattle Sounders.
“I’d been waiting for quite some time,” Sjoberg said of the goal. “It was great to get it.”
It’s the latest step in a long soccer journey for the 25-year-old, who began playing soccer at the age of four with hometown club Helenelunds IK before moving on to the academy system of Djurgardens IF of the Swedish first division. After leaving Djurgarden for a brief stint with Sollentuna FF of Sweden’s Division 2 in 2010, Sjoberg found himself at a crossroads.
He explained, “I wanted to continue getting my education while playing at the same time. In Sweden, that’s not really an option with club soccer, growing up through the youth system. I finished high school and didn’t get a contract with the first team when I was 18, which was a disappointment. The decision was soccer or school. Do you put soccer on the shelf or do you continue? My dad asked me: ‘What about college [in the US]?’ I found it to be a great opportunity.”
He eventually landed at Marquette University, where he earned two team MVP awards and was named as one of the "10 best defenders in college" soccer by TopDrawerSoccer.com. After earning an invite to the MLS SuperDraft combine in 2015, he put on a display which impressed Rapids coach Pablo Mastroeni, who saw Sjoberg’s size as a backline “presence” and not a detriment.
Sjoberg was likewise grateful for the faith the Rapids displayed in drafting him, even if it meant joining a team that had finished dead last in the Western Conference race in 2014.
“It was my idea to play in MLS all along,” he said. “I knew [the Rapids] had a tough 2014, but when I met with the coaching staff I knew what they wanted to do, especially defensively. I saw it a great opportunity.”
What he’s done with that opportunity since joining the team has earned him both respect and praise from the coaching staff in Colorado.
“I think he’s very professional in the way he handles himself, both on and off the field,” Rapids assistant head coach John Spencer said. “When he’s in there he’s very dialed in and he’s been very difficult to play against. A lot of the strikers in this league will testify to that.”
Who’s the hardest to defend in MLS? For Sjoberg, it’s a matter of situation.
On set pieces, one player stood out hands down.
“[Didier] Drogba was very good,” Sjoberg said. “He’s very strong and his timing is impeccable.”
But in the open field, he noted that compact-but-speedy forwards can be a handful.
“Joao Plata, [David] Villa, and [Sebastian] Giovinco. All these guys are good with the ball and explosive; quick on the turn,” he explained. “That poses a challenge as a big guy but I’ve worked on that my entire career. So far in MLS, I think I’ve done a good job of showing I can handle those guys.”
His time in Colorado hasn’t been without its trials, however. After beginning his rookie campaign with nine starts in the Rapids’ first 14 games of 2015, a nagging knee injury at the midway point and another last place finish for the Rapids made the last part of the season a tough pill to swallow for Sjoberg.
“It was very hard for me and for the team,” he explained. “We could’ve pushed for the playoffs, but we weren’t really quite there. It wasn’t a finished product.”
But fast forward to the present, and a healthy Sjoberg has already posted 11 starts in the center of a Rapids defense which has shown to be among the league’s best, helping Colorado vault atop the Supporters' Shield standings.
“It’s great,” he said of the turnaround. “We’re very happy with the progress so far but when you do well, you’ve got to work even harder.”MINNEAPOLIS -- Last spring, when Adrian Peterson was still stung by the Minnesota Vikings' decision to fire Leslie Frazier and still unsure about his future with the team, he traveled to the Twin Cities for some rehab work following groin surgery. Peterson got to meet the Minnesota Vikings' new head coach, Mike Zimmer, and something about the coach quickly won him over.
"I have a thing about me, that I'm able to look people in the eyes and kind of get a feel for them," Peterson said. "He just came off as an honest person. Before then, all I was hearing was good things about him. But just looking at him, having that eye contact with him, I could see the fire in him. I could see the rugged [personality] in him as well, but also someone who's considerate as well. In the time I've been around him, that's pretty much how he is."
Adrian
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after a speeding minibus killed his entire flock. The family was forced to sell off their pastures. “Our life changed,” the woman says. “My father-in-law and his father before him had tended that flock. Now we get by with odd jobs in the city.”
When she finds out that there is a filmmaker in our group, she inquires about getting into acting. “I have a friend who has just graduated college,” she explains. “She doesn’t want to start from TV, but she wants to act. How can she do it?”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Aash Doogh: soup with garlic, doogh, herbs and chickpeas. Photograph: Tehran Bureau
In Kharjegil, another small village on the Asalem-Khalkhal Road, Amou Nezam’s cabin is famous for Aash Doogh: soup with garlic, doogh, herbs and chickpeas. As a side business, Amou Nezam arranges property purchases for out-of-town visitors. “I had a customer from Tehran ask me about buying property here,” says Amou Nezam. “I helped him get a 600 square meter piece of land. God be gracious, the man is an asshole. Shame on me, I made a big mistake.”
The seaside and mountain villages of north Iran have long been a popular vacation destination for city dwellers escaping traffic and pollution. The province of Mazandaran, closer to Tehran, has morphed into a land of holiday homes. “We were the primary rice producers of the country,” says a shopkeeper who is from Sari, the capital of Mazandaran. “Then we sold all the rice fields, built villas on top of them. Now, we need to import our rice.”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest The village of Kharjegil, Iran. Photograph: Tehran Bureau
Across Mazandaran, the landscape is peppered with cookie-cutter vacation towns. Mountainous Gilan province is further away from Tehran and more difficult to reach due to its winding roads, which has shielded it from tourist booms. But a new highway connecting Tehran to the provincial capital, Rasht, has improved access. Provisions like plumbing, gas and electricity - previously unavailable in remote villages - have driven up property values. The buying and selling fever has taken over. Even as we discuss the environmental hazards of construction booms, two in our own party inquire about purchasing land here.
Back in Kharjegil, Amou Nezam complains that his village is not yet on the gas grid. While the provincial government provided water systems and electricity five years ago, the lack of gas heating has kept property prices low. “Right now, a piece of land here goes for about 80 to 100,000 tomans per square meter,” says Amou Nezam. “It can increase tenfold, even twenty, if we have gas.”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Chinese-style roofs are a new aesthetic in Iran. Photograph: Tehran Bureau
As we head farther up the road, we reach Loomavesht, then Esbahooni. There were only a few wooden huts here ten years ago, dispersed across the hills. Now, dozens of concrete houses stand here displaying Chinese-style red roofs, the contemporary aesthetic of homes across the country.
Tourists come to Esbahooni for its kateh kabob - mushy northern rice with lamb kabob and fresh butter. Villagers sell their mutton and dairy to the shopkeepers, who cook the kabob and rice. A decade ago, the village consumed what it produced with little connection to the outside world. Villagers drained their sewage into cesspits and burned or composted their trash. At the restaurants, we used reusable dishes. The arrival of tourists has brought the accompanying culture of consumer goods, but there is no trash collection system in place to respond to it.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Mounting trash heaps come with the tourist boom. Photograph: Tehran Bureau
In Esbahooni, the hillsides are littered with plastic bags, empty soda bottles and junk food wrappers. Locals and homeowners toss them out and burn them whenever they collect in big heaps. On those days, the stink of burning plastic overtakes the cool air. A village council member blames the county, city and provincial governors as well as the Environmental Protection Organization. Each village has a dehyar, a council-elected leader, who serves as its provincial representative for four-year terms. Esbahooni’s dehyar only shows up in the summers with the tourist boom, the council member says.
As we drive further northwest to Astara, Ardabil and through the Arasbaran forest where old villages stand in clusters, we find the same symptoms of urbanization. The region is rich with forest wood, and villagers traditionally built wooden huts with the materials around them. These days, the lumber is shipped to Tehran, often illegally, and the houses are rebuilt with aluminum and concrete. “I miss the old house,” says an auto mechanic in Kharjegil. “It was cozy, it was easy to warm...we were told this method is healthier, more modern. Relatives kept telling us to change that old dehati [villager] house.”
Astara, farther northwest of Asalem, was once known for seaside houses with wooden windows and ceramic roofs. During the Ahmadinejad era, the state gave rural residents 8-million toman loans to refurbish their homes. The villagers tore down their homes, but couldn’t afford a complete reconstruction. As they built their new homes, they sold off chunks of their land to make way for vacation homes. The village homes are now made of aluminum and concrete slabs with no adorning facade, and sit next to luxurious vacation homes with elaborate exteriors.
I speak to a couple, villa owners, who are both doctors from Tehran with children in college. “We love this place,” the wife says. “We get away from the smoke, the pollution, the traffic.” When I ask her if she thinks their very presence is ruining the things she cherishes, she shrugs: “If we didn’t buy this land, someone else would.”
With development comes culture clash: villagers accustomed to hauling lumber with donkeys encounter Porsches in their backyard. “The man and woman showed up and I assumed they were a couple, but now he brings a different woman every week, God forgive,” a Kharjegil farmer complains. He is selling off another parcel of his land to afford the reconstruction of his home.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Sign advertises land for sale (contact phone number digitally removed}. Photograph: Tehran Bureau
“People from the village sell their property to rent a small apartment in the city. They work in construction, sometimes as laborers on the very lands they sold,” says a Lisar villager who refuses to sell the lot he inherited from his father, despite pressure from his family. He tells me of a young man who sold some property, married and moved to Tehran two years ago to work in construction. “They rented a small basement in the south of Tehran. Their bodies were found in the winter. They died of gas poisoning.”EMBED >More News Videos TSA lines at airports in Chicago and across the country are longer than ever. Now airlines are fighting back.
Security lines at airports in Chicago and across the country are longer than ever. Now airlines are fighting back.About 450 American Airlines passengers trying to fly out of O'Hare International Airport Sunday night couldn't get to the gate on time. Airport employees offered them cots to sleep on overnight."Got here two and a half hours before my flight and security took two to three (hours) to get through," said Kevin Revis, a stranded traveler."I'd never seen this before. Completely unexpected," said Adnan Ahmed, who was also stuck in Chicago.Video shot at 5 a.m. Monday shows hundreds of passengers slowly making their way through an hours-long security line in Terminal 3 at O'Hare.ABC7 Eyewitness News viewer Kim Adele Serritos shared video of lines at Midway International Airport Monday morning on the ABC7 Chicago Facebook page.American Airlines spokesperson Leslie Scott said over the next week, the company is deploying its own employees to help TSA workers with non-security functions."(They will be)standing in line, telling people to take shoes off, take electronics out and bag of liquids out," Scott said.The chronically understaffed Transportation Security Administration promises to hire 800 new screeners next month and offer more overtime opportunities for existing employees.Until the TSA can get more screeners hired and trained, travelers' only relief is the paid PreCheck program.After seeing news coverage of long lines at the airports the last couple of weeks, travelers have been flooding the eight or so Chicago area offices to get approved for TSA PreCheck. But most area locations have no appointments available for several weeks or months. It costs $85 to $100 depending on the level of clearance you apply for."We came down here to pre-enroll for TSA PreCheck. Get through the lines a little faster, hopefully," traveler Mike Mancuso said.You can show up without an appointment, but as Lorraine Boyer discovered, the wait could be several hours. She gave up."It's insane. It's ridiculous. Just pay them the overtime, get more people. Do what you have to do," traveler Lorraine Boyer said.Otherwise, airlines are recommending passengers arrive two or three hours before their flights are scheduled to depart.Travelers can download the "My TSA" app, which lets you check TSA wait times at airports around the country. It's available for download in the App store and on Google Play Airlines also asked passengers to tweet about how frustrated they are using the hashtagto put pressure on the TSA to fix this problem.Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Lutfur Rahman, the Bangladeshi mayor of Tower Hamlets, was first elected in 2010
Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has said he may send in inspectors to investigate a London borough.
Panorama has found that Lutfur Rahman, the Bangladeshi mayor of Tower Hamlets, has more than doubled funding recommended by officers for Bengali-run charities.
Opposition councillors say they believe the grants were made in return for electoral support.
Mr Rahman categorically denies the accusation.
In 2010, residents of Tower Hamlets voted in Britain's first directly elected Asian mayor.
Mr Rahman won as an independent with only 13% of registered voters.
Almost two-thirds of those who turned out to vote that day were from his own Bangladeshi community.
To win re-election in May, the mayor is expected to need a high Bangladeshi turnout again.
As a directly-elected mayor, he has executive power over the allocation of some grants to local bodies. Council officers made recommendations to the mayor based on the neediest in the borough.
Labour and Conservative opposition councillors allege that his selection of charities for grant funding in the run-up to the election was motivated by electoral advantage.
"I am pretty sure there is some quid pro quo in some of those grants decisions being made," said Labour councillor, Joshua Peck.
"Part of that is about supporting the mayor politically on the ground in the run-up to the election.
Image caption Almost two-thirds of the votes cast in 2010 were from Lutfur Rahman's own Bangladeshi community
"He doesn't have a political machine and he needs organisations… making sure the electorate turns out to vote for him."
The mayor strongly denies this but if his selection of which groups to fund was based on who he thought would get him votes, that would be unlawful.
Panorama has gained access to confidential paperwork that reveals the extent to which the mayor rejected recommendations from council officers.
They had proposed that Bengali and Somali groups receive £1.5m. But a review by Panorama of 362 grants approved by the mayor found that he increased funding to these organisations by nearly two-and-a-half times - to £3.6m.
To pay for it he used funds from the council's reserves and reduced what was left for other organisations by 25% overall.
The mayor categorically denied his allocation of grants was motivated by electoral advantage.
"It's absolutely untrue", he said. "My principle has all along been that we will distribute the money to as many organisations as possible… because they benefit the community."
In exchange for more personal power, directly elected mayors are expected to present themselves for questioning.
The mayor said he upholds the "highest standards of probity and transparency" and that the decisions have an "adequate audit trail".
But Mr Rahman declined to answer opposition questions in council meetings about his award of grants or answer questions from the special council forum that is meant to hold him to account, the Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) committee, for more than a year.
The confidential council papers provide only the barest explanation for the hundreds of changes made by the mayor to officer recommendations.
Panorama has unearthed some very serious allegations that demand an answer Eric Pickles MP, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government
The changes were described as being based on "local knowledge" and because it was "known where money needs to be redistributed".
Mr Rahman said the grants decisions were properly scrutinised.
"Three grants panels, four cabinet meetings, two O&S meetings [were attended] about the grants - a vigorous process - after which I made the final decision," he said.
"My executive members attended [two overview and scrutiny committees and] answered each and every question and gave a proper answer."
Since he became mayor, Mr Rahman has changed the grants process from one held mostly in public to one which now takes place mostly behind closed doors.
Rob Whiteman, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, told Panorama: "It's very important that the process isn't behind closed doors.
"When it is, it calls into question whether or not that process is being properly followed and whether or not the decisions are being soundly made.
"Up and down the land you will see councils very keen to ensure that their decision making in this regard, in these areas, is very much in public."
Panorama took the findings to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Eric Pickles.
"Panorama has unearthed some very serious allegations that demand an answer," he said. "I think the allegations or questions that Panorama raise are of a completely different magnitude to worries and concerns that I have with other councils."
He said he would ask his experts to review Panorama's analysis in detail and added: "If I feel the allegations that you made are substantial and serious, I will actively consider intervening.
"I have powers to put in an inspector to look at the way that the council's been run."
Panorama: The Mayor and Our Money, BBC One, Monday 31 March at 20:30 GMT and then available in the UK on the BBC iPlayer.PHILADELPHIA — MLS All-Star manager Ben Olsen has one more weapon up his sleeve when they face Chelsea on Wednesday night at PPL Park.
Michael Farfan, a star midfielder for the local MLS side Philadelphia Union, has been added to the 18-man squad and will be available for selection when MLS's best take on the European champions in the 2012 AT&T MLS All-Star Game (8:30 pm ET, ESPN2, TeleFutura, TSN/RDS).
The attacking midfielder, who has made 16 starts in this, his second MLS season, relishes the international stage. He catapulted himself onto the scene in his rookie season with a spectacular goal against Real Madrid in a World Football Challenge match last year (watch it here).
WATCH: Farfan's golazo vs. Real Madrid
At 24, Farfan will be the youngest player on the MLS All-Star roster alongside San Jose's Justin Morrow.
In other All-Star news, MLS accepted Chelsea's request to increase the number of substitutions permitted from seven to 10 per team.
Chelsea switched out all 11 starters in their opening two World Football Challenge matches against the Seattle Sounders and Paris Saint-Germain, and Blues manager Roberto Di Matteo made mention of the limited subs in Sunday's postgame press conference.
Said Di Matteo: "We won't be able to make too many changes on Wednesday so we’ll use less players in that game."
Problem solved.Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption WATCH: Electric bike takes to the skies
Flying cars are yet to take off - could bikes have a better chance?
Researchers in the Czech Republic have unveiled a 95kg (210lb) remotely-controlled bicycle that can hover a few metres above ground for five minutes.
Carrying a dummy rider, the electric prototype successfully took off, flew around and landed inside an exhibition hall in Prague.
The bike is powered by two battery-run propellers on the front, two on the back and one on each side.
The machine could help two-wheeled commuters avoid zigzagging through traffic jams - but it is not quite ready to hit the road - or the air above it - just yet.
The batteries only allow for a few minutes of flight before needing to be re-charged.
"Because the capacity of batteries doubles about every 10 years, we can expect that in the future the capacity would be enough for the bike to used for sports, tourism or similar things," said the technical director of Duratec Bicycles, Milan Duchek.
Image caption The Flyke has to have a parachute opened at all times in the air
To create the bike, Duratec worked together with two other Czech firms, Technodat and Evektor.
Bikes with parachutes
It is not the first attempt to make a bicycle fly.
In August 2009, an IT teacher John Carver from Oxfordshire constructed what he called the "Flyke" - a flying tricycle - and flew it across the UK, from Lands End to John o'Groats, for charity.
Registered with the Civil Aviation Authority, Mr Carver's machine is powered by a two-stroke twin propeller motor with a paraglider canopy.
The bike has to be refuelled about every two hours, is able to carry up to 25.4kg (56lb) of luggage, and can reach a flying speed of about 32km/h (20mph). According to Mr Carver's website, the device is now for sale.
Companies such as Para-Cycle sell similar devices as well, but a huge parachute may prove cumbersome for the city commuter.
And in the early 20th Century, among the very first "flying machines" were bicycles with wings attached to the frame - what became known as aviettes.
They did not really fly, but rather hopped above ground, or glided, having been first powered by fierce pedalling.'Can't verify signatures', 'How do we know it is the correct person'... These are a few of the excuses that LPG distributors plan to use to hold crores of customers to ransom by not delivering LPG to homes. (But won't the same 'problems' remain even if the customer picks up the cylinders at the store?)
'Can't verify signatures', 'How do we know it is the correct person'... These are a few of the excuses that LPG distributors plan to use to hold crores of customers to ransom by not delivering LPG to homes. (But won't the same 'problems' remain even if the customer picks up the cylinders at the store?)
As if the Central government’s decision to supply only six subsidised gas cylinders per family per year wasn’t enough, the LPG Distributors Federation has decided that you will have to trudge the extra mile (and back) even to get your hands on the few cylinders that you are entitled to. The federation of distributors, which caters to nearly 65 crore Indians, has suddenly decided that it won’t do doorstep deliver any more, shifting the onus of claiming cylinders on consumers, who will have to lug the heavy vessels from the agency to their homes.
The federation also threatened to go on strike on October 1 against the government’s decision to subsidise gas, on the grounds that they cannot police the multiple rate policy.
Adding insult to this injury is the specious logic that the federation has provided for suddenly washing its hands of a task on which the smooth functioning of crores of lives depends. Ironically, the federation claims that not delivering cylinders to consumers will help it curb malpractices and ensure that the six subsidised cylinders reach deserving families.
Chief of the federation Pratap Doshi said, “We have asked the government to come up with a proper distribution system. At present our deliverymen go to homes, and after dropping off the cylinder they take the signature of the consumer on a copy of the receipt. How do we know for sure that the person who signed on the receipt is the valid authority? If someone comes the next day and says that the deliverymen offloaded the cylinder at the wrong home, and claims that the signature on the receipt is not his or hers, who will be responsible?”
Other experts believe that these claims are hard to swallow, and that the real reason for discontinuation of home delivery is that distributors want to eliminate delivery men and so make profits.
According to Dr M S Kamat, honorary secretary of the Consumer Guidance Society of India, “A deliveryman gets Rs 5 per delivery. A distributor has nearly 20,000 connections. So by eliminating the deliverymen, the distributor will save Rs 1 lakh every month. The rest of their claims don’t make any sense.”
Kamat attributed the bedlam to the ambiguity inherent in regulations governing sale and delivery of gas cylinders. “The problem is that the government didn’t think things through before announcing how it would tackle such problems. The gas cylinder distributor can go ahead and claim that it gave the six cylinders to a household, and in reality there are full chances that no one would have got the cylinder. How can one check it?” he asked.
Blue book
Perhaps the distributors have forgotten that every consumer has a blue book, which provides a foolproof means of curbing malpractices and recording details on delivery and sale of cylinders to each consumer.
An activist confirmed, “Every consumer is given a blue book in which records of delivery are maintained. At any given point, if the agency feels that the consumer isn’t speaking the truth, this book can be checked.”
For this too, distributors have a ready excuse. “Many consumers do not have the book. Our deliverymen usually ask for the book when they drop off cylinders. To our surprise, many do not keep or maintain the books. We don’t want to face any sort of trouble in future for the same, and want consumers to come to our centres and collect the cylinders to avoid any confusion,” added Doshi.
Shirking duty
Advocate and consumer activist Shirish Deshpande opined that the distribution of cylinders is not a privilege or favour offered by distributors, something that can be subject to their whims. “Delivering the cylinder to a consumer is the duty of the distributor. Earlier, if a consumer ran out of gas before scheduled arrival of a new cylinder, he would be forced to collect it from the distributors’ agency. The same distributors would then warn us that carrying such cylinders is risky and illegal. How have they changed their stand all of a sudden? How has the same thing suddenly become legal? Let the distributors announce the decision publicly, and we will challenge them,” he said.
A senior officer at HPCL said on condition of anonymity, “Delivery of cylinder gas falls under the Essential Commodities Act. If the distributors are not delivering cylinders, we would talk to the state government to invoke the Essential Services Maintenance Act.”
The federation has even informed individual distributors about the plans and has sent mails to them. There are 8,000 such distributors across the country and 13 crore households will be affected by their move.
The federation is also negotiating with the government to push its demand for the implementation of a foolproof delivery system. Doshi claimed that the federation does not want consumers to be affected and hence is in talks with the Central government to brainstorm for a fresh plan. “We are negotiating with the government and expect to have a concrete strategy in place by the end of this month,” he said.
Voices
This will adversely affect me, as I am not a piped gas user. This decision will make my life difficult, as I will have to go and fetch the cylinder on my own now.
Renuka Mani (48), Shivaji Park
To go and get the cylinder from the agency is not an easy job and it’s risky too. Already prices of cylinders have been hiked and now this is a new bother.
Ramola D’souza (36), Bandra
It’s definitely going to cause inconvenience to the common man. This would also mean unemployment for the delivery boys. It will also boost the black market.
Janki Pandya (23), Vile Parle
It’s not possible to fetch the gas cylinder every month. What about senior citizens like us? How can we lift the heavy cylinder by ourselves? It is not as simple as carrying a shopping bag.
Arnaaz Turail (66), Parel
This decision is going to force people to buy the cylinders in black. So it will promote illegal practices.
H R Masani (68), Parel
I am not happy with this decision. It not only brings a lot more inconvenience our way but also robs the delivery boys of their bread and butter.
Hilla Ranji (60), ParelAdvertisement
The ultra-luxurious secret world of Russian spies living in the United States has been revealed, complete with million-dollar mansions, 'vodka parties' and sprawling estates.
The lifestyles were uncovered after President Barack Obama lifted the lid on two'spy bases' and ordered operatives out of the country as part of sanctions announced for their alleged role in hacking during the election.
Obama outlined the punishments in a statement released on Thursday, for what he said were the country's attempts to 'interfere with democratic governance' and harassment of U.S. diplomatic officials in Russia.
The President all but named Putin in his statement - saying hacking was 'ordered at the highest level'.
In the hours since the announcement, further details on the extravagant Russian compounds have emerged, after White House officials said they are:'recreational but also used for intelligence activities'.
Scroll down for video
This Maryland property is a luxurious, 45-acre compound that is located in Pioneer Point, and it has been identified as one of the potential Russian'spy bases' in the US
This map shows just how close the Russian-owned compound in Maryland is to Washington D.C. and the White House
The property is believed to have been used as a vacation spot for Russian diplomats looking to get away, though it has long been suspected to be a center of espionage
The Maryland property is a luxurious, 45-acre compound that is located in Pioneer Point, according to The Washington Post.
It is believed to have been used as a vacation spot for Russian diplomats looking to get away, though there have long been suspicions it was used for much more nefarious means as well.
The compound is just 30 minutes' drive from Washington D.C., and is believed to have been a center for espionage.
There have been suspicions about the property since it was bought by the Soviet government in 1972.
The sprawling property hosts a brick mansion that has now been converted into 12 apartments, as well as a dozen cottages, each with four apartments. In total, the compound can accommodate 40 families at a time.
Photographer Gary Landsman went inside the lavish home, snapping shots of exactly what it was like behind closed doors. The compound featured massive dining rooms, one with bright red walls, impeccably decorated lounge rooms and entertaining areas, as well as a carefully landscaped garden.
Former Russian ambassador Yuri Ushakov - who was in the position from 1999 to 2008 - and his family officially called the complex home for a time, according to Washington Life magazine. The 'dacha' as the magazine called it, also has a hunting lodge that was used to 'host special visitors'.
'No one really hunts but that's what we call it,' Ushakov told the magazine while laughing at the time of the interview.
The magazine said the compound was also home to: 'Anatoly Dobrynin, who was the Soviet ambassador during the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan administrations until he returned to Moscow in 1986.'
Photographer Gary Landsman took this picture of a bright red dining room inside the Russian-owned Maryland compound
The huge home also featured impeccably decorated lounge rooms and entertaining outdoor areas. Many of the rooms had gold-plated designs and items hanging from the walls
A dog is seen wandering through the landscaped garden outside the Maryland property. The interior of the huge home was the height of luxury for those who lived there, pictures show
Russian ambassador Yuri Ushakov, who was in his position for nine years from 1999 to 2008, is seen with a telephone from a Soviet submarine inside the Maryland mansion
Russian ambassador Yuri Ushakov (right) lived at the home for a time. He is pictured with his wife, Svetlana (left), and their 10-year-old grandson, Misha
How Russia spent YEARS tracking down and training its elite team of hackers A report released on Thursday detailed just how the Russian government was able to build its elite crew of cyber soldiers over three years. The Kremlin put the call out on Russia's most popular social media platform, Vkontakta, for coders, programmers, and other tech-smart young people to join newly-created'science squadrons', the New York Times reports. 'If you graduated from college, if you are a technical specialist, if you are ready to use your knowledge, we give you an opportunity,' one of the advertisements read. Anyone who signed up was promised 'comfortable conditions' to live in, while also being given the chance to opt out of having to enlist in the military. The newspaper reports senior Russian officials were working on the plan as early as 2013. Sergei Shoigu, the Russian defense minister is quoted by the newspaper for saying he was on a 'head hunt in the positive meaning of the word'.
It was also used for official Russian functions.
Washington Life claimed it was the location for many 'Victory Day' events - which are held to celebrate World War II.
The estate was once owned by John J. Raskob, a former executive at DuPont and General Motors.
Raskob is also the man who co-financed the construction of the Empire State Building.
When the Soviets purchased the home, there was resistance from neighbors who were fearful of 'nuclear submarines surfacing in the Chester River to pick up American secrets and defectors.'
But the Russians managed to win them over by throwing lavish dinner parties replete with 'gifts of vodka and caviar,' according to The New York Times.
When the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s, the Russian Federation bought the property for a reported $3million.
'I live down the road from them. We fish and crab with them. There's usually one that speaks English for the group,' a local resident named Bonnie Delph told the Associated Press back in 1992.
The other compound that is reported to have been shut down by the State Department is Killenworth, the Glen Cove estate once owned by George Dupont Pratt on the North Shore of Long Island.
Pratt, the third son of Standard Oil magnate Charles Pratt, lived in the 49-room mansion until his death in 1935.
The Soviet government bought the home in the 1950s.
Killenworth was used as a vacation retreat by Soviet diplomats and personnel who were stationed at the United Nations in New York.
The other compound that is reported to have been shut down by the State Department is Killenworth, the Glen Cove estate (pictured) once owned by George Dupont Pratt on the North Shore of Long Island
Pratt, the third son of Standard Oil magnate Charles Pratt, lived in the 49-room mansion (pictured in 1951) until his death in 1935. The Soviet government bought the home in the 1950s
Local council officials have said for decades they were offended that Russian diplomats were able to be based at the property (pictured) while they spied on the US
Killenworth was also used as a vacation retreat by Soviet diplomats and personnel who were stationed at the United Nations in New York
Russian activity at Killenworth has been controversial since it has long been rumored to house Soviet spies
In 1982, the local council clashed with the State Department after it banned Russian diplomats staying at the estate (pictured) from the beach as retaliation for what they said was Moscow's spying on Long Island defense industries
Local officials objected to the Soviets enjoying tax exempt status on the home, which deprived Glen Cove of revenue that it usually generated from property taxes
These data theft and disclosure activities could only have been directed by the highest levels of the Russian government. Obama accuses Putin of being behind hacking during the election
Russian activity at Killenworth has been controversial since it has long been rumored to house Soviet spies.
In 1982, the local council clashed with the State Department after it banned Russian diplomats from the beach as retaliation for what they said was Moscow's spying on Long Island defense industries, according to The New York Times.
Local officials objected to the Soviets enjoying tax exempt status on the home, which deprived Glen Cove of revenue that it usually generated from property taxes.
Some who were shocked to learn they were living near alleged spy bases angrily took to social media after the news spread on Thursday
The Glen Cove City Council angrily told the Reagan administration that it was'still offended that the Soviets are here spying and not paying taxes, and a little offended by the callousness, condescension and almost browbeating coming from Washington.'
Some have reacted angrily to the news that the American government allowed the spy bases to remain operational, without informing locals.
'Even scarier, I live down the road from the compound,' Maryland resident Billy Ross wrote.
'I've been living on Eastern Shore of Maryland for just over two years now,' Chris Sabas, who did not know about the alleged base, wrote.
'This is like 20 minutes from my house,' Julia Girasole said of the Maryland compound.
President Obama's strongly-worded statement about sanctions against Russia is his most sweeping action against the Kremlin during his eight years in officeOur Lady of Victory View Full Caption
PORTAGE PARK — Parishioners, teachers and parents at Our Lady of Victory School met Friday night to begin coming up with a plan to save the Northwest Side school.
That comes after the Archdiocese of Chicago told parishioners earlier this week the school, along with five other Catholic schools in the Chicagoland area, would likely close at the end of the year.
To remain open, the school must find a way to close its current budget deficit of $400,000.
More than 300 people packed inside the school's cafeteria Friday night to brainstorm ways to come up with alternate financing for the school.
But the parish does not have much time. When announcing the closure on Wednesday evening, Sister Mary Paul McCaughey, the archdiocese's superintendent, said any plan to save the school must be delivered to the archdiocese by the end of the month.
Many parishioners said the news came as a shock. Ald. Tim Cullerton (38th), whose family has been members of the parish for generations, said he thinks closing the school would be "devastating to the community."
"Give us some time. Give us some forewarning," Cullerton said. "It's unthinkable, from my standpoint, that there wasn't more thought put into this process.
"To give us three weeks to come up with a plan, it's just very insensitive. I think it's unfair, and I think it's wrong."
Despite the tall order, officials said people left Friday's meeting optimistic about saving the school.
Mary Beth Frystak, director of religious education at the Our Lady of Victory, said parishioners developed plans to hold fundraisers and solicit donations from community members and alumni. Frystak said the school has also approached some local businesses to help host fundraisers.
Frystak said the meeting was "very positive."
"It's not impossible, and that's what we believe," Frystak said of finding the funds to remain open. "And there is going to be a miracle here. This school is not going to close."
Our Lady of Victory School, which has been operating for more than 100 years, has been on the archdiocese's watch list for years due to budget problems and low enrollment.
But the school has seen great improvement under the new leadership of Principal Jennifer Hodge, who took over in 2012. When Hodge came to the school, 80 children were enrolled in the school, which serves kindergarten through eighth grade. That enrollment has grown to 170 students as of this week.
The archdiocese acknowledged the school's turnaround, but McCaughey told the parish the archdiocese could simply no longer subsidize the school due to its own "fiscal crisis."
The archdiocese has given the school $1.2 million since 2010, including $400,000 the past two years for its operating budget, which breaks down to more than $2,000 in subsidies per student.
But the archdiocese is cutting $10 million over two years from its school budget.
Our Lady of Victory's total operating budget is $1.1 million. With tuition of about $5,000 per year, enrollment would have to be 265 students for the school to be self-sufficient, officials said.
On Friday, parishioners discussed coming up with a three-year plan to close the school's budget gap. It will depend heavily on donations. An anonymous donor put up $80,000 already, and Frystak said the donations have been coming in since word spread of the plans to close.
Frystak said parents and teachers at Friday's meeting were optimistic the school would stay open.
"Their heads are all up pretty high tonight," she said. "I can tell you, a few nights ago it was a wake, and tonight, it's a party."
If the school does close, the archdiocese will provide students $1,000 toward tuition at another Catholic school. The physical building belongs to the parish, but the archdiocese would not allow the parish to rent the building out to Chicago Public Schools or a private charter school if it does close to prevent competition with other Catholic schools in the area.
Community members are worried about what will happen to the parish if the school does close.
"All my kids were baptized there, went to school there. My mother and father can say the same thing," said Cullerton. "I know they're not talking about closing the church down, but I don't know what kind of Catholic community it will be without a school."
Cullerton and others said they hope the archdiocese extends the deadline for the parish to come up with a plan.
McCaughey said a final decision will come by the end of January to allow parents ample time to find another school if Our Lady of Victory shuts its doors, but many parents were angered at the timing of the announcement. The deadline to apply selective-enrollment CPS schools was Dec. 15.
Other Catholic schools slated to close are St. Florian School in Hegewisch, Santa Maria Del Popolo School in north suburban Mundelein, St. Bernadette
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, by reading many times from a specific memory location, somewhere else in memory a bit may flip (a one becomes a zero, or a zero becomes a one). Our work is the first to show that Rowhammer is possible on mobile, ARM-based hardware.
Flip Feng Shui or FFS is a technique that allows for reliable exploitation of a hardware vulnerability (e.g., Rowhammer) by combining it with a memory massaging primitive (to land sensitive data on a vulnerable location). Drammer is the first to show that such deterministic Rowhammer exploitation is possible without relying on fancy memory management features. Although we focus mainly on mobile devices, this makes that Drammer comes with a wider impact; allowing FFS attacks without memory deduplication, for example.
Papers
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Drammer Test App
We developed an Android app – not yet in Google Play, but available directly – to test your device for the Rowhammer bug. The app uses a native binary for which we also released the source code. After a successful run, the app uploads anonymized output. We will use this to get a better understanding of how widespread the Rowhammer bug is. Of course, you can opt out of sharing results.
Please note the following:
Currently, when finished its hammering session, the app does not give you a nice popup that tells you whether you are vulnerable or not. We will try to add this as soon as possible. Meanwhile, you can easily spot induced bit flips by glancing over the output and looking for the obvious keyword FLIP.
. We will try to add this as soon as possible. Meanwhile, you can easily spot induced bit flips by glancing over the output and looking for the obvious keyword. Your phone might still be vulnerable, even if the app detected zero flips! There are two main reasons for this. First, our current implementation of address selection is conservative: we recently discovered that the current code is only hammering half of the rows on a Nexus 5. On your device, the DRAM geometry might be different enough for our app to completely fail selecting addresses for double-sided rowhammer. Second, the app may only have tested a very small fraction of your DRAM. Ideally, a single run takes at least an hour and scans a couple hundred of MB. The current code already tries to free as much memory as possible to hammer (affected by the aggressiveness factor), but there are probably better ways of doing this.
Hammertime simulator
We developed Hammertime, an open-source Rowhammer simulator – available on github – to foster further research on the Rowhammer bug. The simulator allows researchers and practitioners to simulate hardware bit flips in software, using bit-flip patterns (or fliptables) from a large set of DRAM chips. We plan to integrate bit-flip patterns we observed with Drammer on ARM soon.
Statistics
Not every phone is susceptible for the Rowhammer bug. For our paper, we tested 27 devices and were able to flip bits on 18 of them. In the table below, you can find statistics on devices that were tested so far.
Model #devices #vulnerable ARMv7 (32-bit) devices LG Nexus 4 1 1 LG Nexus 5 15 12 Motorola Moto G (2013) 1 1 Motorola Moto G (2014) 1 1 OnePlus One 2 2 Samsung Galaxy S4 1 1 Samsung Galaxy S5 2 1 ARMv8 (64-bit) devices HTC Desire 510 1 0 Lenovo K3 Note 1 0 LG G4 1 1 LG Nexus 5X 1 0 Samsung Galaxy S6 1 0 Xiaomi Mi 4i 1 0
We encourage everybody to try our Drammer test app and help figuring out how widespread mobile Rowhammer is. We expect, for example, that devices equipped with LPDDR4 are less vulnerable. This is because the LPDDR4 standard includes optional hardware support for the so-called target row refresh mitigation.
Demos
The first demo video shows Drammer against an unrooted LG Nexus 5 running Android 6.0.1 with the latest security patches (as of October 5, 2016).
https://www.youtube.com/embed/x6hL-obNhAw
Our second video shows a successful end-to-end exploit chain of Stagefright (to get remote code execution) in combination with Drammer (to gain root privileges). By tricking the victim into opening a malicious URL, an attacker gains remote shell access to the vulnerable device. Since the exploited mediaserver is not running with root-privileges, however, he still cannot access /sdcard, for example. The attacker then launches the Drammer exploit which does give him full control over the device.
Note that we did not write our own Stagefright exploit, but gratefully used Metaphor from NorthBit. You can find our Stagefright shellcode here (requires SELinux to be disabled). Second, in the video, we upgrade our netcat remote shell after successful Stagefright exploitation so that we can use raw input and use tab-completion. The C source and Makefile for this pty-shell are also available online.
In the Dutch television show Universiteit van Nederland, we applied the Stagefright + Drammer attack to hack a phone of somebody in the audience.
Technical Walkthrough
Drammer presents two novel contributions: 1) being able to do Rowhammer on mobile devices, and 2) doing deterministic Rowhammer exploitation without relying on fancy memory management features. What follows is a technical summary of our paper, but only if you’re interested.
1. Mobile Rowhammer Although functioning fairly well on x86, researchers have speculated that Rowhammer on ARM could be impossible. One of the main reasons being that the ARM memory controller might be too slow to induce bit flips. Not surprisingly, before Drammer, no existing work from academia or industry documents any success in reproducing the Rowhammer bug on mobile devices. The obvious first goal of our study was to find bit flips on a mobile phone. Since Rowhammer manifests itself in DRAM, existing hammer code usually consists of a small loop that 1) reads a value from memory, and 2) flushes this value from the CPU cache. Without cache flushing, the vulnerable DRAM chip would only be accessed once during the first iteration. Every subsequent access would be served from the cache. Working with an ARMv7-A CPU (the core of our poor LG Nexus 5 test phone), cache flush instructions are unavailable from user space (unlike Intel’s clflush instruction). We thus implemented a hammer function as Loadable Kernel Module. This allowed us to use the DCCIMVAC instruction (Data Cache Clean and Invalidate by MVA to PoC: mcr p15, 0, <reg>, c7, c14, 1 ). After some frustrating trial and error – do we not see any flips because of a bug in our code, is the controller really too slow, or is this DRAM chip simply not vulnerable? – we found a first flip. Later, once we established that the ‘row size’ of the Nexus 5 is 64 KB instead of 256 KB, this one flip became many… 1b. Direct Memory Access Although good for feasibility analysis, flipping bits with kernel code that requires root access is not practical for writing a root exploit. Our next goal was thus to induce bit flips from user space. After establishing that existing methods for flushing or bypassing the CPU cache do not work on ARM, we tried a new approach: using direct memory access (DMA). By design, DMA memory pages have two important properties: 1) they are marked as uncached; and 2) they are physically contiguous. The former means that any read operation from DMA memory (or any write operation to it) bypasses the CPU cache and propagates to the DRAM chip directly. The latter means that pages obtained by allocations up to a certain size (4 MB on recent Linux kernels) are guaranteed to be adjacent to each other in physical memory. DMA memory thus solves our problem of not being able to flush the CPU cache. The fact that allocated pages are physically contiguous happens to also solves another important issue. Recent kernels disabled access to /proc/self/pagemap – a special file containing the mapping of virtual to physical addresses. Without such mapping, it is hard to figure out from which ‘aggressor’ address x we should read to hammer ‘victim’ address y (x should be exactly one row above or below y to get the best chance of flipping it). If we know, however, that a chunk of memory is physically contiguous, we can compute aggressor addresses for each victim within such chunk by subtracting (or adding) the row size. 1c. Android ION Android provides DMA Buffer Management APIs through its main memory manager called ION. This allows userland apps to access uncached, physically contiguous memory and comes with all the benefits: We do not have to rely on cache flush instructions. Moreover, since we bypass the cache completely, we break any defense that relies on monitoring cache misses (e.g., ANVIL).
We do not have to rely on access to /proc/self/pagemap or transparent huge pages (which may not be enabled by default).
or (which may not be enabled by default). We do not have to rely on fancy memory management features like memory deduplication or MMU paravirtualzation for the memory massaging phase of FFS (discussed next). Although ION is specific to Android, we think that it is also possible to construct similar attacks on Linux/x86-64. We dedicate a section about this in our paper. 2. Deterministic Exploitation Armed with uncached, physically contiguous memory, our third goal is to perform memory massaging in such a way that a single bit flip allows us to gain root privileges. Similar to Mark Seaborn’s attack, we use page tables as sensitive data. By flipping a bit in a Page Table Entry (PTE), we can make that entry point to a page table. This means that the associated virtual address of that PTE is now mapped to a page table which we can use to overwrite its contents. Next, we can map any physical memory address into the virtual address range defined by the page table, including kernel memory. We can use this to search for our process’ credentials structure – the data structure that the kernel uses to keep track of a process’ uid, gid, etcetera. Finally, once found, we can modify our process’ struct cred to get root privileges. A subtle difference between the exploit from Project Zero and Drammer is determinism. Mark Seaborn sprays physical memory with pages tables and reasons that when a PTE’s physical page number changes [due to a bit flip] there’s a high probability that it will point to a page table for our process. Drammer, however, removes this non-determinism by massaging physical memory in such a way that when we flip a bit in a PTE, we make it point to its own page table. We do this by using the bit flip as addition or subtraction primitive. 2b. Flipping Bits in Page Table Entries As an example, consider a PTE that points to a page at physical address 0x1982f000. Ignoring the lowest 12 properties bits of a 32-bit PTE, this gives the bit pattern 00011001100000101111 (0x1982f000 bit shifted 12 places to the right). If a we manage to flip the lowest 1, then the new PTE becomes 00011001100000101110. This makes the PTE point to physical address 0x1982e000, showing that a 1-to-0 flip at this offset subtracts the PTE by one page. If we flip the second 1, we would end up with PTE 00011001100000101101. This corresponds to physical address 0x1982d000; exactly two pages away from the original. Flipping the third bit moves the PTE 4 pages to the left, the 4th bit allows us to move 8 pages, etcetera. With these primitives in hand, we ought to align physical memory in such a way that the physical address of an mmapped data page is exactly n2 pages ‘away’ from its page tabl. Here n is the offset of the vulnerable bit in the PTE. Continuing previous example, if n is 5 for a 1-to-0 flip, our data page should store 16 pages before the page table. And we found a way of doing exactly this 🙂 2c. Abusing the Buddy Allocator By releasing a large contiguous memory chunk and quickly re-allocating smaller ones, we can satisfy above requirements and make Drammer deterministic. The basic steps of our attack involve: Search physical memory for potentially exploitable flips (dubbed templating). After this step, we have exhausted all large contiguous chunks (of size 4 MB), but also all medium-sized chunks – say of size 64 KB. This means that there is no physically contiguous memory left that spans 64 KB or more. Release a large chunk that has an exploitable flip, but do hold the other chunks. Allocate (i.e., exhaust) all medium-sized chunks again. Since, in step 1, we exhausted all of these already, we know that the buddy allocator will split the large, vulnerable chunk that we released in step 2 and give us exactly 64 chunks of size 64 KB (64 * 64 KB = 4 MB), including a chunk with the exploitable bit. We can now release all chunks that are larger than 64 KB so that we won’t go out-of-memory in the next step. Release the vulnerable medium-sized chunk and force the OS to allocate a page table at the location of vulnerable page (the page with the exploitable bit). Map (with mmap) the appropriate other medium-sized chunk to create a page table entry that points to a page that is exactly n2 pages away from the page table. Next is hammer time! We hammer the row that holds the PTE to induce the bit flip that makes it point to its own page. We suddenly get write access to a page table and scan kernel memory by writing new PTEs. Once we find our credentials data structure, we overwrite it with zeros and get root access. 2d. Phys Feng Shui The figure below illustrates the memory massaging phase of Drammer. For more details, it’s best to have a look at the paper.
Reception
Drammer gathered extensive media coverage. The responsible disclosure process was started on July 25. In conjunction with Google, we did not publicly disclose any details about Drammer prior to the CCS conference in Vienna. Google informed their partners about this issue on October 3, 2016 and provided a patch for it in their November Android Security Bulletin.
Ultimately, CVE-2016-6728 was assigned to this issue. Our bug report and Proof-of-Concept received a reward from the Android Security Reward Program. The vulnerability was marked as Critical by Google.
Note that, although Google’s patch round from November complicates our attack, it does not eradicate it. We hope to see a more sophisticated fix soon.
Due to the nature of our attack – exploiting a hardware vulnerability – implementing such comprehensive patch is not easy. It is because of this that Google first decided to disable the ION kmalloc heap. This makes it impossible for user space applications to request guaranteed contiguous physical memory through ION. However, an attacker can still exhaust the regular system heap. He can then rely on the predictable behavior of the buddy allocator to get contiguous pages anyway. In addition, the system heap allocator allocates memory from a different pool (highmem), normally separated from that used to allocate page tables and other kernel data structures (lowmem). However, an attacker can allocate many ION chunks to deplete the highmem pool and force the buddy allocator to serve new requests from lowmem. We hope that Google soon applies more fundamental changes to the Android Linux Kernel that allows for ION memory accounting. This way, Android could limit ION allocations on a per-uid base, thwarting Drammer much more. In addition, /proc filesystem entries such as /proc/pagetypeinfo that leak the state of the buddy allocator (e.g., highmem chunks available, chunks of a given size available, etc.) should be made accessible only by root.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why the name Drammer?
Drammer (or actually DRAMMER) may be short for Deterministic RowhAMMER. However, it is also a combination of the words DRoid and hAMMER and also has the part DRAM in it. Finally, in Dutch, Drammer means nag or pusher. Take your pick!
How wide-spread is Mobile Rowhammer? How can I check whether my phone is vulnerable?
We don’t know yet, but you can help us finding out. We developed a Drammer test app for you to play with.
I have a phone with LPDDR4 memory. Am I safe against Drammer attacks?
Again, we don’t know. Chances are that your DRAM comes with the Target Row Refresh (TRR) mitigation, which makes it harder – but still not impossible, in theory – to induce bit flips. Moreover, TRR for LPDDR4 is optional, so your DRAM manufacturer may have decided to drop this technique and leave you vulnerable.
Will my device receive a patch to stop Drammer attacks?
This depends on your device’s vendor. We expect that Google’s first patch will get back ported to recent devices. Since a more comprehensive solution requires fundamental kernel changes, however, it is unlikely that such patch ever reaches existing devices. Ultimately, it is up to your device vendor to decide whether or not they will adopt proposed fixes.
I have an older phone and am unlikely to get any updates. Now what?
If you’re lucky, your device is not vulnerable for Rowhammer – did we mention our Drammer test app? If it is, you’ll have to be careful about what apps you install. Make sure that you disable the allow app installation from unknown sources feature to get the best protection.
I constantly monitor installed apps for suspicious events. Am I safe against Drammer attacks?
You’re probably hinting at recent techniques like ANVIL, [BHUSA’15], or the mitigation proposed by the Linux kernel developers. By monitoring cache misses, such mitigations can only detect Rowhammer attacks that execute many cache flushes. Unfortunately, Drammer hammers uncached (DMA) memory and thus never triggers a cache miss. In fact, we expect that no existing anomaly detection system can stop Drammer.
I want to use Drammer to root my phone. Where can I download the exploit code?
You cannot. We decided to not (yet) release the exploit. We did open source our templating code, however.The third VRLA community VR meetup happens this weekend on Saturday, August 16th. Among some 28 exhibitors, Oculus VR will be on hand to demonstrate the recently released Oculus Rift DK2, alongside Sony who will be present with the Project Morpheus VR headset. Presentations include talks on using Unity 5 and Unreal Engine 4 for virtual reality development. Tickets to the event are still available.
VRLA #3 is less than a week away! Join VRLA this Saturday, August 16th, at New Deal Studios in Los Angeles for a VR extravaganza. With 28 exhibitors, 6 presentations, and over 400 attendees, it will be the biggest VRLA event to date.
Exhibitors include:
Presentations Include:
Unity 5 and VR – Carl Callewaert
Binaural 3D audio – AJ Campbell
Getting started with VR in Unreal Engine 4 – Waqas Hussain
Realtime 3D modeling with DoubleMe – Albert Kim
Producing The Mission VR – Scott Broock
Tickets and DetailsWet fields in Canada are turning what was supposed to be a stellar crop of durum wheat into a soggy mess, much to the dismay of pasta makers.
The prospects for quality durum have been dashed by rain and snow that has delayed and even halted operations. The wheat that’s stuck outside is vulnerable to disease because of the wet conditions. The high-protein grain makes up the bulk of pasta ingredient expenses, and domestic prices have risen in the last several years after repeated harvest hurdles.
To see the pain for pasta makers, look no further than Chris Curran, the 50-year-old owner of Bagga Pasta, which annually makes 25,000 kilograms (55,000 pounds) of everything from fusilli to linguine in Victoria, British Columbia. The 20-kilogram bags of durum flour she buys now cost about C$30 ($22.44), almost double the C$16 she paid about three years ago. And because of the quality problems for this year’s crop, she’s not expecting prices to fall anytime soon.
“Instead of the price going down as I would’ve expected, it will probably remain the same,” said Curran, who added that it’s the first time in her 30 years of pasta-making that she’s seen this kind of sustained jump in costs. “We’re just a very small company trying to survive amid very high prices.”
Fungal Disease
The quality problems are coming as farmers are poised to harvest record durum supplies in Canada, the world’s top exporter of the variety. But the wet fields mean that some of the crop is damaged by the fungal disease fusarium, which can hurt yields and produce chemicals known as mycotoxins that can be poisonous for humans or livestock. With less high-quality crop available, grain companies are struggling to find enough supplies that are suitable to be milled into flour for pasta, said Jerry Klassen, a manager of Canadian operations and trading at Gap SA Grains & Produits in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Prices for high-quality durum have risen to more than C$8 a bushel, up from about C$6.50 to C$7 before the harvest, said Chuck Penner, the owner of LeftField Commodity Research in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Canada will probably see a drop in exports as overseas buyers don’t want low-quality durum, and some supplies may not even be fit to feed livestock because of fungal contamination, he said.
Other staple Canadian crops, including canola, oats and spring wheat, have also seen price gains because of harvest problems. The Canadian Pacific Railroad Ltd. this month cut its profit target for the year partly as grain shipments in western regions fell behind schedule because of the heavy rain. Light rain and a lack of cold to freeze the ground are continuing to hinder the country’s wheat and canola harvest, Commodity Weather Group said in an e-mailed report Thursday.
U.S. Output
The reprieve for flour millers may come from their southern neighbor. U.S. farmers are forecast by the government to collect the biggest durum crop in seven years. Quality issues have been limited compared with Canada, though farmers are still dealing with some fungal damage. Globally, inventories of all wheat varieties are poised to reach an all-time high, and benchmark futures in Chicago are down almost 13 percent this year.
Wheat prices have been on a decline since June, with a few small rallies in between. © Bloomberg
That’s little comfort to Canada’s growers, who were counting on a bumper harvest after warm spring weather allowed for early planting. The nation’s durum output is poised to climb 36 percent to a record 7.3 million tons after farmers boosted planting to take advantage of higher prices, the agriculture ministry said in a Sept. 28 report.
The problem is a lot of that will be what farmers have described as a “garbage” crop, because of the weather delays that left it sitting in fields, Penner said. Rain and snow have stalled the harvest for almost three weeks in Saskatchewan, where 24 percent of durum has yet to be harvested, the province’s agriculture ministry said in an Oct. 20 report. That compares with just 3 percent a year earlier. Harvest operations were also at a standstill in Alberta, where snow and frost have impacted yield and quality for crops left out in the fields, the province said in an Oct. 21 report.
“It’s quite disappointing,” said Norm Hall, a farmer and president of the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan. “There’s one thing not to grow a good crop, but when you’ve got the potential of a huge, huge good quality crop, but not to be able to get it, that’s like your dreams just get dashed.”Blender”s ray-tracing engine “Cycles” has received wide acclaim as a production rendering system, for its quality, speed and having integrated industry standard libraries.
As of today the Cycles source code license has been changed from GNU GPL to the Apache License version 2.0. This is a permissive license that allows Cycles to be linked and used with any program, including commercial software and in-house software at studios.
The design and purpose of Cycles always has been to work as an independent and reusable rendering engine. When Cycles was added to Blender two years ago, we decided to release it under GNU GPL first, specifically to ensure it would develop into a well integrated production rendering system for Blender. With that target to be established well, it”s now time to find out how Cycles could work outside of Blender too.
We hope this move would help Cycles grow as a project in the long term, as the project could attract more contributors and might be easier to use for studios under the new license. With the release of various libraries by movie studios like OpenEXR, Open Shading Language, OpenSubdiv, PTex and OpenVDB, which we use or plan to use in Blender, we also think it would be nice to contribute something back under a similar permissive license. As Cycles is reasonably stand alone and integrates many of these libraries already, it”s a good candidate to share similarly with everyone.
Note that Blender Foundation and Blender Institute remain committed to further developing Cycles as a render engine for Blender. We welcome other developers to integrate it in other applications, and especially to get involved with the Cycles development team at blender.org.
We also remain fully committed to keep Blender itself being available and developed as a GNU GPL project. For an end-user tool like Blender that gives the best protection to ensure the program remains available in a 100% free and open domain. For stand-alone libraries however, the BSD or Apache has proven to work excellently, also for Blender.
Evaluating which permissive license to use has been reviewed carefully. There”s a number of choices we could have selected as well, such as BSD or MIT. However, we already have core Cycles code under the Apache license, mostly related to BVH building and traversal, and SIMD optimizations. We also plan to integrate OpenSubdiv, wich is Apache License 2.0. Even though some of the Cycles code is under the BSD license, combined together it would be determined by the Apache license anyway, so it seems like the logical choice.
All contributors to Cycles have been contacted and have agreed on the license change. Many thanks to everyone for making it possible!
Brecht van Lommel
Ton Roosendaal
Blender Institute / Blender Foundation
Contact info:
Blender Foundation
Get Involved as developer
Image credits:
1) Blender screenshot, Cycles preview rendering and Node Shaders
2) “Power Mouse” – By www.pokedstudio.com
3) “Tears of Steel” – www.tearsofsteel.org
4) Video of Cycles in action for automotive rendering, by E-mirage
Images can be used for sharing this article, provided it mentions the credit.When it comes to the Sacramento Kings, everyone has a favorite talking point. There's Cousins-Karl, Rajon Rondo, Vlade's ballsy move to clear up space, Vivek's ownership style, and that's just scratching the surface of the last few months.
But why is nobody talking about Ben McLemore?
To be fair, McLemore hasn't done a whole lot to garner national attention. McLemore's rookie year was particularly rough, with his shooting numbers almost historically low for the amount of shots and minutes he got. He was also everywhere and nowhere on defense at the same time. He couldn't dribble the ball if it didn't involve a clear path to the hoop and he could barely finish at the rim if it didn't involve dunking.
Things changed greatly last year. McLemore came back a much more well-rounded player, having worked on all aspects of his game. His True Shooting Percentage (which takes into account 3 pointers) jumped up 7%. He got more creative around the basket: his FG% from 0-3 feet jumped from just 60% to 71.1%. Defensively, he went from a huge liability to one of Sacramento's more enthusiastic defenders, although he still lacked the experience or consistency to be considered a good defender.
Overall, McLemore's sophomore outing was a pleasant surprise for Kings fans, who finally got to see some of the promise that led to his lottery selection. His growth last year is a big reason I'm looking forward to seeing how he comes out of the gates this year, especially since the third year of a player's career is typically where you see a big leap.
McLemore's biggest problem to date has been consistency. We've seen stretches (especially last year) when he couldn't miss and would look like the second coming of Ray Allen... for a quarter. Then he wouldn't score for the next 20 minutes. If Ben can achieve that consistency and become a force on both ends for the entire time he's on the court, or at least most of the time, that's a big boost to Sacramento's productivity from an existing player. It's also a promising sign for Sacramento's long-term future, as the Kings haven't really had a hit in the lottery since DeMarcus Cousins.
There's some promising signs that Ben can make the "third-year leap". For one, he's a notoriously hard worker, even attending Summer League mini-camp this year of his own volition just to be able to work out with the guys. From what I have heard behind the scenes, he's one of the most familiar faces at the Kings' practice facility during downtime. Ben also finally has some veteran mentors to help him and learn from this year, as the Kings added guys like Marco Belinelli and Caron Butler.
I can't wait for October to get here. This has been an exciting summer for Kings fans, as the team has added talent all across the board. If Ben can make the jump himself, that puts Sacramento all the much closer to being relevant once more.Hogan’s $9 billion plan would add four toll lanes each to Maryland’s portion of the Capital Beltway and to I-270 from the Beltway to Frederick. It would also widen the Baltimore-Washington Parkway by four toll lanes. (Jose Luis Magana/AP)
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan's proposal to add toll lanes to three of the most congested highways in the Washington suburbs reaches beyond similar proposals that stalled over the years after being deemed too expensive or disruptive to adjacent communities.
Hogan's $9 billion plan would add four toll lanes each to Maryland's portion of the Capital Beltway (I-495) and to I-270 from the Beltway to Frederick. It would also widen the Baltimore-Washington Parkway by four toll lanes.
The project would be built using a public-private partnership in what Hogan (R) has said would be the largest such deal for highways in North America.
The success of Hogan's plan hinges, in part, on whether the private companies can figure out what state planners haven't been able to: how to add four cost-effective toll lanes without having to demolish dozens, and potentially hundreds, of homes and businesses.
[Maryland governor proposes adding toll lanes to relieve traffic congestion]
"They're putting a plan on the table, so I think the burden is on them to show how it would be done with the environmental and right-of-way questions we have," Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) said.
Leggett added that he welcomes any attempt to ease gridlock in the region but questions the viability of Hogan's proposal. "I just think it will be very difficult to accommodate all that," he said.
The state's own studies show that it won't be easy.
A 2004 analysis found that four additional lanes could fit on Maryland's portion of the Beltway if they were double-decked 80 feet in the air — an idea rejected as prohibitively expensive and impractical.
A 2009 look at the northern part of I-270 determined that adding four toll lanes would require razing up to 250 homes and 10 businesses — a possibility that contributed to Montgomery leaders calling for two less-disruptive, reversible lanes.
A 2012 federal and state study of how to widen the B-W Parkway by two lanes — half the width of Hogan's proposal — found that doing so would displace up to 14 homes and two businesses while increasing noise and shrinking tree buffers for nearby communities. The study also predicted a "sharp increase" in traffic, noting that a wider road would "carry more traffic, but not necessarily be less congested."
Doug Mayer, Hogan's communications director, said the governor isn't basing his four-lane plan on previous research.
"If the world only moved forward based on studies that are 10 years old, there would be no forward progress ever again," Mayer said. "... The governor believes in forward-looking, innovative ideas. That's exactly what this is."
[Hogan transportation plan refutes criticism that he ‘doesn’t sweat the big stuff’]
Maryland Transportation Secretary Pete K. Rahn said the state is keeping the proposal vague to encourage creative design bids. He said he's confident that the private sector can better minimize impacts. He pointed to Texas, where six new toll lanes were recently added to a Dallas highway without widening it. In areas where land was tight, the private partner submerged the new lanes in a canyon-like trench, with the regular lanes cantilevered over them.
"There are engineering solutions that don't mean you have to take out a hundred homes," Rahn said. "I'm hopeful those are the kind of proposals we're going to receive. If we don't receive those kinds of proposals, then we'll have to make tough decisions, but I really believe there are solutions. I know there are ways to deal with very tight rights of way."
Rahn said the plan includes expanding the American Legion Bridge, a notorious bottleneck, so motorists can remain in toll lanes between Maryland and Northern Virginia, where high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes opened on the Beltway in 2012. Like Virginia, Maryland's tolls would fluctuate based on congestion levels to keep traffic moving, but Rahn said the state hasn't decided whether its lanes would be free for carpools.
[Maryland has $100 million plan to reduce congestion, improve safety on I-270]
Rahn said the public-private partnership would minimize the financial burden to the state — similar to how Virginia added toll lanes to the Beltway, Interstate 95 and part of Interstate 66 in its Washington suburbs.
A team of companies would finance construction and pay the state an upfront fee in exchange for receiving toll revenue long-term. The state's only expense, Rahn said, would come in hiring "the very best" lawyers and financial consultants to oversee its interests in what are typically highly complex deals. He said the private companies would be on the hook for paying off the construction debt, regardless of how much toll revenue materialized.
"The state will have no risk from the standpoint of how it performs," Rahn said of the toll lanes.
The $7.6 billion public-private partnership would cover 42 miles on the Beltway and 34 miles on I-270. The bid-solicitation process is in its earliest stages.
The state's transportation authority would build and manage the 29 miles of toll lanes on the B-W Parkway, assuming that the U.S. Interior Department transfers the road to the state.
"Things have only gotten worse since those [previous] studies were conducted, and we're finding ourselves choking on traffic," Rahn said. "Something has to be done. If we're going to have an impact on this, we've got to do something big. It's the idea that big problems need big solutions."
But some experts say the logistical challenges remain big, too.
Much of Maryland's right of way for the Beltway is narrower than in Northern Virginia, where eight homes were torn down to build the I-495 HOT lanes as part of a public-private partnership. The state's initial design would have displaced more than 300 homes, a project official said.
Neil Pedersen, Maryland's highway administrator from 2003 to 2011, said the state "never really seriously studied" the double-decker option for four additional Beltway lanes because they would be too costly and noisy.
Because of limited public land along the Beltway, he said, the state focused on how to squeeze in two new carpool lanes, one in each direction.
"We were trying to develop alternatives that would stay within the existing right of way because of the impact that four lanes were expected to have outside of the right of way," said Pedersen, now executive director of the nonprofit Transportation Research Board. "There are a lot of homes right up next to the Beltway.... It's more of a challenge trying to add two additional lanes in each direction."
Much of I-270 doesn't have room without taking homes, he said.
"The existing I-270 is built up right to the edge of the right of way," Pedersen said. "Therefore, it was assumed it would be very difficult to add any additional lanes."
The studies were put on hold after the recession hit in the late 2000s, Pedersen said, and local officials didn't make either widening proposal a high priority.
The Republican governor faces a potentially tough political sell with Democratic-controlled local governments. While the state typically prioritizes megaprojects based on local wish lists, leaders in Prince George's and Montgomery counties said they first learned of Hogan's highway plan from the Sept. 21 news conference announcing it. Both counties have typically lobbied the state for transit projects, such as the light-rail Purple Line now under construction, and smaller interchange improvements.
Prince George's County Executive Rushern L. Baker III (D), who is running for his party's nomination to challenge Hogan, noted that the governor announced his highway plan "right before the 2018 election." He said Hogan could face a "backlash" from motorists being asked to pay tolls when they already pay more at the pump from a 2013 state gas tax increase intended to fund transportation projects.
"I've just never seen a project that didn't require state funding in some way, and that money has to come from somewhere," Baker said. "... The question becomes whether this is a project the governor really pushes through."
Montgomery Council member Marc Elrich (D-At Large) said he's concerned local roads won't be able to handle the additional traffic wider highways would attract. He said he wants Hogan to explain why I-
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man argument that wasn't previously made. I haven't seen any mainstream arguments that include not drinking so much and wearing more conservative clothing. I've only seen the former. But by claiming people are also calling for women to cover up, activists can negate the argument against such heavy drinking – which is the main factor in many of today's rape accusations.
Hernroth-Rothstein makes the argument that such use of a straw man hurts men and women alike. It hurts men by telling them they are just one step away at any given moment from being a predator. And it hurts women by labeling them "as victims from birth" and assuming that all women must fall in line with prevailing ideology.
"How is this the feminist view, how is this freedom, how is this progress in any way?" Hernroth-Rothstein asked.
She goes on to discuss how the same strain of modern feminism that applauds SlutWalkers also tells women how to act and what to think:
"The feminism I was trying so hard to belong to told me that I was a victim. Me? I never saw myself as a victim. Ever. Not once did it occur to me that there was something I could not do because of my gender. That is, until feminism told me that I was a slave to the patriarchy and that the men I saw as equals, fathers, brothers and friends, were always one false move away from being predators. The feminism I saw came with a built-in political ideology, and while chanting that I had to liberate myself and be free, the so-called sisterhood took it upon itself to define what a 'good woman' was, and that a conservative, religious prude like myself did not make the cut."
The modern outrage brigade has essentially become the fabricated "Good Wife's Guide" – a set of rules a woman must follow if she wants to be accepted.
Hernroth-Rothstein then hits the nail on the head by writing what the current rape culture enthusiasts are really doing.
"To me that seemed like less of a women's movement, and more of a political movement, profiting off women, and that real political issues were being called women's issues, thus making them untouchable and unfit for review or critique," she wrote. "Making it so that if I was pro-life, I automatically became anti-women, and suddenly the entire political conversation becomes infantilized and intellectually dishonest."Texas woman arrested with pistol in vagina, 29.5 grams of meth in purse, police say
Ashley Cecilia Castaneda, 31, was arrested by Waco Police with allegedly 29.5 grams of methamphetamine in her purse and a loaded.22-caliber pistol with a bullet chambered hidden inside her vagina. She was charged with possession of methamphetamine in a drug-free zone and unlawfully carrying a weapon by Waco Police, Monday, Sept. 7, 2015. less Ashley Cecilia Castaneda, 31, was arrested by Waco Police with allegedly 29.5 grams of methamphetamine in her purse and a loaded.22-caliber pistol with a bullet chambered hidden inside her vagina. She was... more Photo: Waco Police Photo: Waco Police Image 1 of / 23 Caption Close Texas woman arrested with pistol in vagina, 29.5 grams of meth in purse, police say 1 / 23 Back to Gallery
WACO, Texas — Police recovered a loaded.22-caliber pistol with a bullet chambered from the vagina of woman following a traffic stop in Waco on Monday.
Ashley Cecilia Castaneda, 31, alerted Waco Police to the contraband as she was being driven to jail Monday night after police allegedly turned up 29.5 grams of methamphetamine inside her purse, according to WFAA in Dallas.
Castaneda had been a passenger in a car pulled over for a traffic violation in west Waco. The driver of the vehicle, Gabriel Garcia, 30, was allegedly found with 2.7 grams of meth under his seat, according to WFAA.
Both subjects were charged with possession of methamphetamine in a drug-free zone; Castaneda was also charged with unlawfully carrying a weapon.The battle in May over the Syrian town of Palmyra was notable for being isis’s first major military victory against the forces of the Assad government. The Army fled, leaving the jihadis in control of sizable gas reserves, the brutal prison where thousands of Islamists and political dissidents had formerly been held (which they blew up), and the ruins of a fabled dominion that was once ruled by a queen named Zenobia, who dared to threaten the power of imperial Rome. Zenobia’s empire reached across Egypt and through much of modern-day Turkey. Her city’s remains are now in the hands of a force that wages war on civilization, both modern and ancient.
“Zenobia was esteemed the most lovely as well as the most heroic of her sex,” Gibbon wrote in an awestruck account of her brief reign. “She claimed her descent from the Macedonian kings of Egypt, equaled in beauty her ancestor Cleopatra, and far surpassed that princess in chastity and valor.” The only contemporary representation we have of Zenobia is on a coin, which makes her look rather witchlike, but Gibbon’s description of her pearly-white teeth and large black eyes, which “sparkled with uncommon fire,” cast a spell over future historians, both in the West and in the Arab world, who quarrel over nearly everything having to do with Zenobia and her confounding legacy.
She was probably in her twenties when she took the throne, upon the death of her husband, King Odenathus, in 267 or 268. Acting as regent for her young son, she then led the army in a revolt against the Romans, conquering Egypt and parts of Asia Minor. By 271, she had gained control of a third of the Roman Empire. Gibbon sometimes portrays the warrior queen as a kind of well-schooled Roman society matron. “She was not ignorant of the Latin tongue,” he writes, “but possessed in equal perfection the Greek, the Syriac, and the Egyptian languages.” Palmyra’s abundant wall inscriptions are in Latin, Greek, and an Aramaic dialect, not Arabic. But to Arab historians, such as the ninth-century al-Tabari, Zenobia was a tribal queen of Arab, rather than Greek, descent, whose original name was Zaynab, or al-Zabba. Among Muslims, she is seen as a herald of the Islamic conquests that came four centuries later.
This view, popular within the current Syrian regime, which boasts Zenobia on its currency, also resonates within radical Islamic circles. Glen Bowersock, a professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, says, “I suspect isis believes Palmyra to be somehow a distinctively Arab place, where Zenobia stood up to the Roman emperor.” Indeed, isis fighters, after seizing Palmyra, released a video showing the temples and colonnades at the ruins, a unesco World Heritage site, intact. “Concerning the historical city, we will preserve it,” an isis commander, Abu Laith al-Saudi, told a Syrian radio station. “What we will do is pulverize the statues the miscreants used to pray to.” Fighters then set about sledgehammering statues and shrines.
Zenobia’s nemesis was the Roman emperor Aurelian, who led his legions through Asia Minor, reclaiming parts of the empire she had taken. Near Antioch, she met him with an army of seventy thousand men, but the Roman forces chased them back to their desert stronghold. During the siege of the city, Aurelian wrote to Zenobia, “I bid you surrender, promising that your lives shall be spared.” She replied, “You demand my surrender as though you were not aware that Cleopatra preferred to die a queen rather than remain alive.” Zenobia attempted to escape to Persia, but was captured before she could cross the Euphrates. Palmyra was sacked after a second revolt. Aurelian lamented in a letter to one of his lieutenants, “We have not spared the women, we have slain the children, we have butchered the old men.”
Today, that dire role is being enacted by the isis invaders. They have killed scores of civilians near Palmyra and executed soldiers in its ancient amphitheatre, in order to make yet another grotesque video documenting a new age of barbarism. In a region once ruled by a strong-willed queen, women who don’t bend to ISIS’s narrow beliefs may be sold into sex slavery.
Some Arab sources adhere to the theory that Zenobia committed suicide before she could be caught. Gibbon follows Roman accounts that place her in Rome as the showpiece of Aurelian’s triumphal procession. “The beauteous figure of Zenobia was confined by fetters of gold; a slave supported the gold chain which encircled her neck, and she almost fainted under the intolerable weight of jewels,” he writes. The grand homecoming apparently elicited a snarky response from the commentariat. According to the “Historia Augustus,” Aurelian complained, “Nor would those who criticize me, praise me sufficiently, if they knew what sort of woman she was.” Instead of beheading her in front of the Temple of Jupiter, once a common fate of renegades, he awarded her a villa in Tivoli. The historian Syncellus reported that she married a Roman senator; their descendants were listed into the fifth century.
As isis occupies the ruins of Zenobia’s city, it is worth comparing the goals and the acts of this modern phenomenon with those of Palmyra nearly two thousand years ago. “It was one of the most extraordinary cities in antiquity,” David Potter, a professor of Greek and Roman history at the University of Michigan, says. “It was literally a city where East meets West.” Palmyra, which in Western portrayals comes across as a kind of desert Camelot, was a center of learning and tolerance, enriched by its exposure to the outside world, as caravans from China, India, and Arabia passed through on their way to the Roman provinces. The city reached its multicultural zenith during Zenobia’s reign; although it was a largely pagan society, Jews and Christians also formed part of the social fabric and were represented at court. Zenobia herself may have been Jewish, or a convert, several sources suggest.
Perhaps Zenobia’s ambition outstripped her resources, but the ideal of an Arab empire equal to that of Rome still animates the dreams of many. The great Arab civilization of modern time still awaits its champion, but it is the values embodied by Zenobia and her city that will be the hallmarks of its success, and not isis’s rejection of modernity, its persecution of believers in other faiths, its subjugation of women, and its abolition of history. ♦The Bank of Canada today announced that it is lowering its target for the overnight rate by one-quarter of one percentage point to 1/2 per cent. The Bank Rate is correspondingly 3/4 per cent and the deposit rate is 1/4 per cent.
Total CPI inflation in Canada has been around 1 per cent in recent months, reflecting year-over-year price declines for consumer energy products. Core inflation has been close to 2 per cent, with disinflationary pressures from economic slack being offset by transitory effects of the past depreciation of the Canadian dollar and some sector-specific factors. Setting aside these transitory effects, the Bank judges that the underlying trend in inflation is about 1.5 to 1.7 per cent.
Global growth faltered in early 2015, principally in the United States and China. Recent indicators suggest a rebound in the U.S. economy in the second half of this year, and growth is expected to be solid through the projection. In contrast, China is slowing amid an ongoing process of rebalancing to a more sustainable growth path. This has pulled down prices of certain commodities that are important to Canada’s exports. Financial conditions in major economies remain very accommodative and continue to provide much-needed support to economic activity. Global growth is expected to strengthen over the second half of 2015, averaging about 3 per cent for the year, and accelerate to around 3 1/2 per cent in 2016 and 2017.
The Bank’s estimate of growth in Canada in 2015 has been marked down considerably from its April projection. The downward revision reflects further downgrades of business investment plans in the energy sector, as well as weaker-than-expected exports of non-energy commodities and non-commodities. Real GDP is now projected to have contracted modestly in the first half of the year, resulting in higher excess capacity and additional downward pressure on inflation.
The Bank expects growth to resume in the third quarter and begin to exceed potential again in the fourth quarter, led by the non-resource sectors of Canada’s economy. Outside the energy-producing regions, consumer confidence remains high and labour markets continue to improve. This will support consumption, which will also receive a fiscal boost. Recent evidence suggests a pickup in activity and rising capacity pressures among manufacturers, particularly those exporters that are most sensitive to movements in the Canadian dollar. Financial conditions for households and businesses remain very stimulative.
The Bank now projects Canada’s real GDP will grow by just over 1 per cent in 2015 and about 2 1/2 per cent in 2016 and 2017. With this revised growth profile, the output gap is significantly larger than was expected in April, and closes somewhat later. The Bank anticipates that the economy will return to full capacity and inflation to 2 per cent on a sustained basis in the first half of 2017.
The lower outlook for Canadian growth has increased the downside risks to inflation. While vulnerabilities associated with household imbalances remain elevated and could edge higher, Canada’s economy is undergoing a significant and complex adjustment. Additional monetary stimulus is required at this time to help return the economy to full capacity and inflation sustainably to target.
Information note:
The next scheduled date for announcing the overnight rate target is 9 September 2015. The next full update of the Bank’s outlook for the economy and inflation, including risks to the projection, will be published in the Monetary Policy Report on 21 October 2015.With Kiko Alonso likely sidelined for the season with a torn ACL, the Buffalo Bills appear to be looking to a rookie to fill the sizable void.
The Buffalo News' Tim Graham reported the Bills' staff is looking at third-round pick Preston Brown to jump into Alonso's role on the weakside, according to sources.
Brown was reportedly outstanding during voluntary workouts and minicamp. According to Graham, coaches raved behind the scenes about how well Brown has practiced.
Of course, looking good without pads on during the offseason will be much different than replacing an every-down dynamo with a cult-like following.
The 6-foot-1 Brown played inside linebacker at Louisville, but he is versatile enough that the Bills used him as a nickel linebacker in offseason practices.
NFL Media's Mike Mayock said during the draft that after watching Brown's tape, "I thought he could play three downs. He's a bit of a throwback type of player."
Plays are funneled to the weakside linebacker in new coordinator Jim Schwartz's defense, so if Brown wins the starting job he will be expected to become an immediate playmaker -- consider DeAndre Levy's role with the Detroit Lions last year as a template.
Third-year veteran Nigel Bradham -- who played well in limited time as an inside linebacker last season -- and 28-year-old Keith Rivers are also in consideration for the weakside duties.
However, the Bills appear to be hoping that lightning will strike again with a rookie linebacker.
The latest "Around The League Podcast" ranked the top quarterbacks in the NFL today.(Charles Rex Arbogast/AP) (Charles Rex Arbogast/AP)
I was a high school junior when I first met him. I got pulled out of class unexpectedly to see him waiting in the hallway—Pete Carroll, national championship-winning head coach. We stood and talked there by the lockers for a few minutes. I’ll never forget that—USC’s head coach coming to recruit me at Dominguez High School in Compton in 2004. At the time, it was one of the coolest experiences of my life.
He said, "you’ve got the perfect size to be a lock-up corner." I’d never heard that before: "lock-up" corner. I made ‘lockup2006’ my email address and used it until I got to college. I didn’t end up going to USC, because my mind was already made up to go to Stanford, and there was no way I was passing up the opportunity to get a Stanford education, but I could tell then there was something that separated Carroll from others coaches who recruited me. You could feel the positive energy, how upbeat he was and how much he believed in what he was saying. He had a different aura to him.
He had some football smarts too. He knew I’d end up being a corner even though I went to Stanford to play wide receiver. Years later, after a position switch halfway through my career, he drafted me in the fifth round in 2011 as part of his second draft class. At Stanford we’d beaten USC before he left for Seattle, and one of the first things he told me was, "you’ve got one strike against you already."
The MMQB at Super Bowl XLVIII King's prediction: Peyton will win his second title Mike McCarthy's advice for John Fox, Pete Carroll Inside a day in the life of a Super Bowl player Robin Fox reflects on John Fox's recovery from heart surgery Why Peyton Manning's legacy is secure, no matter what Win or lose, Seattle will be among the NFL's elite for a long time What you don't know about the men who will decide Super Bowl XLVIII Colts TE Coby Fleener explains why players offer so little of substance The three Xs and Os themes to watch: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 I can’t imagine what life in the NFL would be like for me if he hadn’t used a third-day pick on a still-raw cornerback. I get texts from guys across the league which remind me how good we’ve got it in Seattle. They ask, "Is he really as cool as he seems?" and "I hear you guys have fun at practice?" Yes and yes. All he asks is that we be ourselves and protect the team’s reputation by not saying anything controversial.
I haven’t exactly earned straight A’s in the latter department lately, but he sees it as a learning experience, just like the games. He finds the positives when we lose, in addition to the things we can improve on. I’ve never been on a team where the coaching staff was so positive. There isn’t a lot of yelling and cursing at players. There’s no talking down to players. It’s about conversations, not aggression.
That’s why he can roll into the worst neighborhoods in Los Angeles with his foundation and actually negotiate peace between rival gangs. That actually happens, because Pete Carroll can go anywhere he wants in Southern California. In the offseason he spends a large amount of time and energy into providing a way out of gang life for the children of inner-city L.A.
Why? Why would he continue philanthropy in Los Angeles while he has no professional ties to the city? It’s not like it’s helping him recruit anymore. Whatever his motivation, it’s pure.
But he’s not coaching in the Super Bowl because he’s a nice guy. He’s here because he’s pulling off the most unique philosophy in football. Think about it. We use a power running game and press coverage—the oldest of the old school. Yet we have specialized doctors who monitor us for concussion symptoms and wrist wear that helps the team track our sleep patterns. The same coach who shows us clips of Lester Hayes and Mike Haynes playing press-man 30 years ago wants to know if we’re getting our proper REM sleep (and, in case you’re wondering, the sleep science has paid off for several guys).
Here’s a guy who’s been through everything, even getting fired twice as an NFL head coach, and he has a sense of humor about it. He’ll tell self-deprecating stories that begin, "I coached for the Jets a million years ago and they kicked me out of there before I could even get the shirt on." And you’re thinking, Man, I don’t know if I would be able tell that story.
But that’s coach. He never changes. Even this week, practice is just like it was back home because we’ve been playing championship football for him for 22 weeks now. And before that, when he finished 7-9 two seasons in a row in 2010 and 2011, coach Carroll stayed true to himself and the things he believed in, because it was finally his chance to do things his way. For a guy to come up with a philosophy and stick by it through good and bad, you’ve got to tip your hat to that.A sensor in the arm may help thousands with diabetes avoid having frequent finger prick tests.
The device, called Eversense, is slightly larger than a pill and is implanted under the skin in a five-minute procedure.
It then continuously monitors blood sugar levels from the fluid that bathes cells just below the skin and transmits the data to a smartphone.
If blood sugar levels drop too low or are too high, the patient receives an alert on their phone, so they can take insulin to reduce the levels or eat something sugary to increase them.
A sensor in the arm can help patients with diabetes by sending messages to their phones when their blood sugar is too low or high. The device, called Eversense, is slightly larger than the pill (file photo)
The device also has a vibration alert in case the phone is off or there is no signal.
It stops patients needing regular finger prick tests, which can be painful. It has been approved in Europe, but is not yet available in the UK, though it is being considered by the NHS.
A study presented recently at the Diabetes Technology Meeting in Maryland, U.S., showed it was accurate and effective when tested on 90 adults with type 1 or type 2 diabetes for 90 days.
If this type of monitoring was used more widely, it could help to reduce hospital admissions and diabetic complications, according to the charity Diabetes UK.
It is particularly useful for patients with type 1 diabetes —where the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy cells in the pancreas, which then cannot produce insulin. It affects 400,000 Britons — about 10 per cent of all adults with diabetes.
Patients with this type of diabetes currently monitor blood sugar levels by taking between four and ten finger-prick tests a day, which helps them work out how much insulin they need.
But this method only gives a snapshot of blood sugar levels at that time, so it can be difficult to tell if they are rising or falling. It means that despite regular checking, patients may still suffer attacks of hypoglycaemia — when levels drop too low, causing shakiness, sweating and confusion.
Eversense is a continuous glucose monitor. Some patients already use devices such as the FreeStyle Libre and Enlite, which work in a similar way, but these need to be replaced every seven to 14 days. In contrast, Eversense will last for 90 days before it needs replacing.
It comprises a pill-sized implant and a small, square patch stuck to the skin above the device. Patients are given a local anaesthetic in the arm. A 1cm incision is made in the skin to insert the sensor and is then closed.
The device also has a vibration alert in case the phone is off or there is no signal. It is thought to be particularly helpful for people who suffer from Type One diabetes (file photo)
‘Research shows that continuous glucose monitoring can improve overall diabetes control and reduce complications such as diabetic coma and foot amputations by reducing the amount of time someone spends with very high or very low blood sugar,’ says Simon O’Neill, director of health intelligence at Diabetes UK.
However, these devices cost several thousand pounds a year and the Eversense is likely to be similarly priced.
‘People pay for continuous monitoring devices themselves and even those who fit the criteria to have one on the NHS can find their local health authority does not fund them for everyone,’ says Mr O’Neill.
‘However, in the long term, the cost benefit could be substantial when you factor in the A&E visits and extra medical support needed when someone suffers from uncontrolled hypoglycaemia or very high sugar levels.
‘Complications can include seizures, foot disease and even amputations, which reduce mobility and quality of life.’
He says more evidence is needed about the efficacy and cost effectiveness of these devices.
‘All the systems use different methods of measuring glucose. It may be this one is more durable than other methods.’
Could adding fibre to your diet ease painful joints?
Eating more fibre may reduce the pain caused by arthritic knees.
Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine tracked 4,796 patients for eight years and found that those who ate the most fibre were 44 per cent less likely to develop severe pain and had a 24 per cent lower risk of suffering from moderate pain.
It’s thought that fibre reduces inflammation in the body, causing the patient less pain.
The findings, in the journal Arthritis Care & Research, suggested 25g of fibre a day (two cups of prunes) was enough to lower pain by a third.
The magic pen that can diagnose Parkinson's
A special pen can diagnose Parkinson's disease as it detects tremors. There is no definitive test for the disease and brain scans that can help diagnose are expensive (file photo)
Parkinson's disease could be diagnosed with the help of a special pen.
The device, known as the ManusNeuro Pen, contains sensors that analyse subtle hand movements.
The idea is that when patients use it to write, the special pen detects tremors that are a symptom of the disease, helping doctors to diagnose the illness. There is no definitive test for Parkinson’s and brain scans that distinguish it from other neurological disorders are expensive.
The pen, which is being trialled at several NHS trusts, would reduce the number of unnecessary scans and ensure that only the patients who need to see a specialist are referred, the maker says.
Heavy lifting raises the risk of retinal detachment — where a tear or hole in the retina at the back of the eye causes it to pull away.
A Swedish study of 49,321 men found those aged 50 to 59 with severe short-sightedness (a risk factor, as the retina is already stretched thinly) were seven times more at risk of detachment when heavy lifting.
Sniffer dogs used to spot bowel cancer
A major trial is under way into whether dogs can diagnose colorectal cancer.
Around 2,000 patients at Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust — some with the disease, the others otherwise healthy — will supply urine and stool samples, and doctors will test whether dogs trained by the charity Medical Detection Dogs can ‘smell’ which patients have cancer.
It is thought they can pick up on the way cancer changes cells, which subtly affects their smell.
Researchers hope this non-invasive method of diagnosis could encourage more people to be tested, which could save lives.
Previous research has found that dogs can be trained to detect prostate cancer using the same method.
New hearts grown on spinach leaves!
Scientists have used spinach leaves to grow human heart tissue.
Researchers at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in the U.S. stripped the leaves of plant cells, leaving only the vein.
They then placed human heart cells on it and found the spinach leaf vein can transport blood, oxygen and nutrients between the cells because it acts in a similar way to a human heart. The heart cells on the spinach started beating.
The scientists hope to create human heart tissue using layers of spinach leaves covered in heart cells — the tissue could then be transplanted into patients with damaged hearts.
DIY monitor keeps you out of hospital
A new system allowing patients with chronic conditions to monitor their health at home halved the number of calls to the NHS non-emergency number, 111.
It also reduced the number of lung patients’ admissions to hospital by a fifth.
Whzan Telehealth, being trialled in NHS trusts in Newcastle and the Isle of Wight, comes in a portable case and includes devices needed for testing lung function, blood pressure, pulse, urine and temperature.
The device wirelessly transmits readings to the patient’s doctor, who will contact them if a problem is spotted.
It is hoped that the technology will improve the quality of life for patients with long-term conditions, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and diabetes.2 line shayari 4 line shayari My Songs Punjabi Poetry Urdu Ghazal false ltr item M.S.ABID: URDU (SHAYARI) POETRY: Zara Sa Muskurata Hoon Udasi Rooth Jati Hai URDU (SHAYARI) POETRY: Zara Sa Muskurata Hoon Udasi Rooth Jati Hai M.S.ABID https://poetmsabid.blogspot.com/2016/02/urdu-shayari-poetry-zara-sa-muskurata-hoon-udasi-rooth-jati-hai.html https://poetmsabid.blogspot.com/ https://poetmsabid.blogspot.com/ https://poetmsabid.blogspot.com/2016/02/urdu-shayari-poetry-zara-sa-muskurata-hoon-udasi-rooth-jati-hai.html 1229197654839400037 UTF-8
Not found any posts VIEW ALL Readmore Reply Cancel reply Delete By Home PAGES POSTS View All RECOMMENDED FOR YOU LABEL ARCHIVE SEARCH Not found any post match with your request Back Home Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat January February March April May June July August September October November December Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec just now 1 minute ago $$1$$ minutes ago 1 hour ago $$1$$ hours ago Yesterday $$1$$ days ago $$1$$ weeks ago more than 5 weeks agoANCHORAGE - An Alaska woman was convicted yesterday of misdemeanor child abuse after squirting hot sauce into the mouth of her adopted Russian son as punishment in what prosecutors said was a ploy to get on the “Dr. Phil’’ TV show.
Prosecutors also said defendant Jessica Beagley, 36, of Anchorage made the 7-year-old boy stand in a cold shower when he misbehaved. Both actions were recorded on videotape.
Neither Beagley nor her husband, Gary Beagley, an Anchorage police officer, showed any emotion when the seven-person jury announced its decision. The couple walked quickly from the courtroom without responding to questions from reporters.
Jessica Beagley could face one year in jail, a $10,000 fine, and up to 10 years of probation when she is sentenced Monday, said District Court Judge David Wallace. She remains free without bail because the case is a misdemeanor.
Prosecutor Cynthia Franklin left the court without commenting.
Defense attorney William Ingaldson said his client was faced with a difficult situation dealing with a child with emotional problems when she reached out to the “Dr. Phil’’ show for help. If she hadn’t done that, she never would have been charged with child abuse, he said. “It is our feeling Jessica was doing the best she could... this is a very good, loving family,’’ Ingaldson said.
Ingaldson will request that Beagley receive no jail time.
© Copyright 2011 Globe Newspaper Company.Indiana Jones Crystal Skull Poster and Cannes Debut (Trailer)
The much anticipated Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull has it's star performer, Harrison Ford battling with a group of evil Russians hunting for a lost artifact with supposed psychic powers.
Crystal Skull made it's debut on Sunday, May 18th at the Cannes Film Festival and according to some who previewed the film, it may not have been worth the 19 year wait.
I’m not afraid at all. I expect to have the whip turned on me. It’s not unusual for something that is popular to be disdained by some people, and I fully expect it. I work for the people who pay to get in. They are my customers, and my focus is on providing the best experience I can for those people.”
Steven Spielberg and creator-producer George Lucas opted for the showy splash of the famed film festival to make their big entrance. The movie has been shrouded in secrecy until it's weekend unveiling at Cannes. Normally the film would have made the rounds with numerous press screenings but directorand creator-produceropted for the showy splash of the famed film festival to make their big entrance.
Ford had this to say about the lackluster acceptance of his latest project:
Crystal Skull has been so hotly anticipated that it will be virtually immune from critics’ opinions. The film is expected to put up blockbuster box-office numbers when it opens globally Thursday, May 22.
Check out old posters from previous Indiana Jones films and the Crystal Skull movie trailer below.
Preview movie trailer below.The earth welcomed its 7 billionth person today. Or thereabouts. In predicting the arrival of this major milestone, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) admits the margin of error could be as high as 56 million people.
The UNFPA doesn't have the technology needed to monitor the birth of every baby on the planet. But it can make an educated guess using census data, other surveys, and population registers. And with a little help from software giant SAP, it aims to provide some additional insight into the length and breadth of the world's population.
Whether the 7 billionth person arrive today or tomorrow, the bottom line is that the planet's population is growing and growing fast, and its massive size is pretty tough to wrap your head around. Using one of its business analytics tools – the Crystal Dashboard Design – SAP has compiled data from the UN Population Division, World Bank, UNESCO, and a host of regional sources to provide an interactive look at the world's population it calls 7 Billion Actions.
"We're trying to change the consciousness of how the world takes responsibility for its population," Janet Jensen, the editor of 7 Billion Actions, told Wired. "It's a call to engage people in this issue."
The site lets you drill into historical population data through a visual interface, and even look at future projections, thanks to projections from the UN Population Division. You can, for instance, compare the population across Europe and North America with the growing bubble in China. "We're trying to take the subject of the world's changing population from awareness – to insight," Steve Williams, SAP's director of corporate social responsibility told Wired.
7 Billion Actions is powerful, but it ends up inspiring more questions than it answers. What would happen if sea levels rose? What if incomes suddenly spike in India? What happens when the interiors of Africa becomes saturated with smartphones? These are all questions you begin to ponder as you browse the site.
IBM recently announced a project in tandem with the The University of Texas at Austin that aggregates the topography and flow data of local watersheds and predicts the areas that will be first and worst affected by flash-flooding. The program analyzes thousands of rivers and creeks and makes predictions up to four days in the future. It is still too early to tell if the program will be successful, but such takes on real-time analytics seems a logical next step for 7 Billion Actions and other tools like it.
Williams did note that should the two organizations continue to partner together past this project, there is an opportunity to start injecting more real-time data.There\’s no arguing who the kings of ground level viral marketing are. Daft Punk has practically written the playbook on global grassroots marketing, and today proves just how mysteriously the guys behind the masks go about teasing their global fanbase.
A mysterious account by the name “4162016211411” (an alpha-numerical code which inevitably spells out \”Daft Punk\”) posted a video to YouTube on January 1 that is now sparking widespread speculation around the renewed potential of Daft Punk reviving their Alive tour for 2017. Titled “Alive 2017,” the 51-sec. clip shows a futuristic setting on par with the enigmatic French duo’s live visuals before flashing the their moniker at the end. Its description is a recurring series of seemingly random 8-digit numbers.
Thanks to one committed and genius YouTuber, we have been given the tools to crack the code for what appears to be the entire international list of cities that Daft Punk will be hitting in 2017, which includes Paris, Amsterdam, Los Angeles, and Sydney. The time to start thinking about your travel plans is now! U.S.-based city stops are rumored to include: Miami, L.A., Chicago, Seattle, New York City, Las Vegas
While concrete proof has yet to arise, this is exactly the kind of cryptic move that we\’ve come to know of the French music electronic duo. Although it has taken 11 days to crack, the anticipation is now higher than ever. Check out the You Tube video, and comments below that seems to have cracked the code.
H/T Dancing AstroPlease enable Javascript to watch this video
A new poll just released shows Evan McMullin is now leading in Utah.
The poll from Emerson College shows the Utah native leads Donald Trump by four points, 31 percent to 27 percent, and that leaves Hillary Clinton with only 24 percent in the Beehive State.
Click here to see the full poll results from Emerson College.
The Brigham Young University graduate with an Ivy League business degree is running as an Independent for President of the United States.
"What we`ve really seen, is every poll is showing Evan McMullin going up," explained Hinckley Institute of Politics Director Jason Perry.
Despite the poll, McMullin himself is the first to admit his chances are slim. He's a relatively little-known candidate whose name doesn't appear on the ballot in a number of states.
"Yes, the odds of victory are long and difficult," McMullin said, during a speech at a press event in the Utah state capitol building on Wednesday. Local council members, mayors and state legislators stood behind him in support.
They pushed the message of voting to support principles, rather than probability.
"The question is, why would they vote for someone that is not going to win as President of the United States?" Perry rhetorically asked. "It's because they want to vote their conscious. They still want to vote for someone they believe is the best person for the job."
McMullin's campaign mentioned they'll target surrounding states like Idaho. According to Perry, if enough voters make the switch there's the possibility of an election shake-up.
"Really what he wants to do is position himself that if for some reason neither Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton are able to get 270 electoral votes, there`s some kind of chance for it to go to the House of Representatives," Perry explained. "That`s really his hope, if there is one."An investigation into
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about to change. This week is the start of a pioneering parliamentary inquiry into how best to get Britons on their bikes, building on the momentum from last summer's sporting triumphs and an energetic cycle safety campaign by the Times. All three main party leaders have signed up. Expectations are growing that Downing Street could be on the verge of making a significant commitment.
"It's all to play for," said Roger Geffen, policy director of national cycling lobby group the CTC and among those giving evidence to the all-party parliamentary cycling group (APPCG) of MPs and peers, which has organised the hearings. "The inquiry is hugely timely and hopefully it paves the way for some sort of high-level announcement from government."
The first of the inquiry's six evidence sessions starts on Wednesday, taking the views of experts, government departments, cycling luminaries such as the Olympic champion-turned bike builder Chris Boardman and members of the media, including the Guardian. It is hoped David Cameron or Nick Clegg will appear.
Ian Austin, the Labour MP for Dudley North who co-chairs the APPCG, said the plan was to turn 2012's generalised rhetorical enthusiasm into definite commitments. "We want a detailed report with some very clear recommendations, which we can then ask all the political parties to sign up to. If we can get the party leaders to commit to cycling in advance of the election we can make some real progress."
It has long been a policy truism that more cycling is good for all: carbon emissions fall, road congestion eases, people get fitter. Equally accepted is how to bring this about, using a template devised by the Dutch and Danes and tested in dozens of cities.
To get cycling mainstream, experts agree, you need wholesale investment in infrastructure, most obviously well-designed and continuous cycle lanes, separated from faster traffic by a kerb or other barrier and with cyclists offered protection at junctions. The philosophy was summed up by Enrique Peñalosa, who as mayor of Bogotá revolutionised transport in the Colombian capital: "A bicycle way that is not safe for an eight-year-old is not a bicycle way."
Without this, according to Mayne, cycling never expands beyond an intrepid core of mainly young, predominantly male riders: "The studies show you more or less never drop below 1% of people who cycle, and this can rise to maybe 5% or 6% without infrastructure. But anything more than this needs the cyclists catered for. That means high-quality lanes, probably segregated on main highways. It means speed management, massive investment in cycle parking so every cycling trip is possible. It certainly means getting hugely behind women and children cycling."
Such a commitment has been beyond the imagination, let alone daring, of successive British governments faced by a powerful and aggressive motoring lobby and a wider public who, studies show, still largely see cycling as a leisure pursuit or worse, see a bike as a child's toy.
It would require considerable investment. In a paper submitted to the inquiry, Rachel Aldred, a London academic specialising in cycling, estimated a cost of just over £1.1bn a year for cycling to even begin the process of catching up with other nations, seemingly a lot but marginal set against the £16bn cost of just one rail project, Crossrail.
"Relatively, cycling is extraordinarily cheap," said Mayne. "Cycling schemes routinely pay back their investment in one to three years. Your average road scheme pays back on paper in 20 years but usually doesn't pay back at all. You can hit your climate change targets, your health targets, everything else. It's a no-brainer."
While Britain is littered with bike lanes they are almost universally piecemeal and substandard, often just a narrow strip of paint inches from speeding traffic. London and a handful of other places, notably Brighton and Southampton, are now proposing limited Dutch-style segregated schemes. More of the same is vital, according to Mayne: "If you're given a fixed amount of money do you do one thing well or lots of things badly? You do the one thing well. If you spend every penny you've got on a high-quality segregated lane it will attract people and you can build confidence on that route."
Geffen, however, argues that even poorly designed lanes have a purpose in gradually building up cyclist levels to a point where the momentum of opinion is sufficient to begin making bold choices.
"Good infrastructure is vital but even that only goes so far," said Geffen. "At some point, if you're going to have room for all these new bikes and bikes lanes, you have to start talking about ways to reduce traffic levels. That's where delivering on cycling really gets difficult."Getty Images
In Super Bowl XLVI, the unintended use of an extra man on defense exposed a loophole that the NFL promptly closed. In Super Bowl XLVII, another loophole has been exposed.
But this one will be harder to remedy.
Facing fourth and seven from their own eight and clinging to a five-point lead, the Ravens opted to take an intentional safety. The clock showed 12 seconds at the snap, and the Ravens were able to milk eight of those ticks as punter Sam Koch moved to the back corner of the end zone.
Helping Koch delay as long as possible his exit from the field of play were multiple Ravens players who held 49ers defenders who were trying to get to Koch more quickly. And while a flag for holding inexplicably wasn’t thrown, the outcome would have been no different. Holding in the end zone by the offensive team triggers a safety, and that’s exactly what the Ravens were willing to concede.
Under the circumstances, avoiding the safety was irrelevant. Using as much time as possible was the goal.
The challenge comes from finding an acceptable way to address the situation. For a play that ends in a safety with a holding penalty committed in the end zone, the most obvious solution would be to enforce the penalty on the free kick, moving the ball from the 20 to the 10. But that won’t remedy the fact that a deliberate penalty created a strategic advantage by taking time off the clock.
So perhaps the fairest outcome would be to award the safety, and to restore the clock to the time remaining before the play in question began.
Regardless, it’s a situation that cries out for further study by the Competition Committee.
Until then, here’s NBC officiating consultant Jim Daopoulos talking about that and two other questionable calls from Super Bowl XLVII.Seahawks fans have felt a lot of emotions during the last six games, but nervous hasn't really been one of them; at least until today. Where Seattle had spent much of the previous five games taking their opponents down early and spending the remainder of those contests squishing them under their collective heel, they found that the Rams were an especially difficult bug to break.
To be honest, the Seahawks basically spotted the Rams the first half, which is a funny thing to say considering Seattle out-gained St. Louis 189-66 in the first 30 minutes. What I mean is that despite the yardage disparity, the Rams were able to transfer an average starting field position of their own 34 into two field goals while holding the Seahawks scoreless, which to my memory is the first time that's ever happened since Russell Wilson was drafted. The 'Hawks moved he ball fairly well but absorbed negative plays in crucial moments during those first two quarters, with drive-killing sacks, dropped passes, and turnovers. St. Louis couldn't do much themselves but Seattle didn't exactly make them have to, as STL's two scoring drives covered a grand total of 35 yards at 2.3 yards per play.
Normally, allowing six points in the first half is nothing to get worked up over but with Seattle's first half possessions ending: punt, turnover on downs, interception, fumble, punt, end of half -- there was cause for some low-key alarm, despite the general alacrity of a team and crowd on the precipice of wrapping up home field advantage. The defense, per usual, held up their end of the bargain, limiting the Rams to roughly three yards per play in the first half but the two field goals stood out as all three of the Seahawks' drives into Rams' territory were rendered fruitless by poor execution.
In the first instance, Luke Willson ran a four yard stop route on 4th & 5, neglecting to reach the ball across the first down marker upon contact. The next venture into the enemy half was derailed by an interception on an errant overthrow by a scrambling Russell Wilson. The final possession in plus territory ended on an inconsequential pass to Doug Baldwin as time expired after an ugly sack knocked Seattle out of field goal range. Meanwhile, St. Louis was able to capitalize on their beneficial field position, turning a drive that started at the 50 into a 33-yard Greg Zuerlein field goal and then repeated the damage after Marshawn Lynch fumbled after being caught from behind by Alec Ogletree on his own 33. All in all, it was probably the worst first half of the Seahawks' season since the last time they played the Rams. The upside was that despite all of the missed opportunities, the defending Super Bowl champions were only down by six.
The second half went more according to plan, as Seattle gained 56 of the first 50 yards* in the third quarter en route to two quick Steven Hauschka field goals, an encouraging bounce-back from his career worst performance last week. And even though the Seahawks didn't get into the end zone on those drives, and even though they remained tied with a six-win team, you could almost feel the game regressing towards the expectation most of us had for it. With the offense clicking, the defense switched gears like a bunch of guard dogs circling an intruder, waiting for their master's command to attack. And once they were given that order, there was no calling them off until all that was left of the 2014 St. Louis Rams were shoelaces and gristle. Everybody ate their fill to the tune of four sacks, seven tackles for loss, two forced fumbles, two interceptions, and 4.1 yards per play allowed.
*Not a typo
Michael Bennett again led the charge up front, collapsing the Rams line and pocketing two TFLs while opening up gaps for his contract-twin Cliff Avril as well as Jordan Hill (again), O'Brien Schofield, Bruce Irvin, and Kevin Williams -- all of whom showed up on the sack list this afternoon. The second half became a game of one-upsmanship, with Seattle's offense and defense taking turns trying to outdo one another. The first seven drives of the second half went as follows:
-Offense drives 56 yards for a field goal
-Defense forces a three-and-out on -6 yards
-Offense drives 42 yards for another field goal
-Defense forces an impressive interception by Jordan Hill
-Offense drives 54 yards, capitalizing on a long completion to Kevin Norwood with a nine-yard Marshawn Lynch touchdown that saw him go into handshake mode at the four yard line
-Defense does offense's job for them with Irvin's second pick-six of the season
-Defense teases Rams, lets them drive 74 yards before the lion's blood coursing through Earl Thomas started to boil, allowing him to make this nigh-miraculous touchdown-saving fumble at the one yard line
When the dust cleared and the pleas for mercy subsided, the Seahawks were downing out a 20-6 victory -- their sixth straight win in a month-and-a-half long stretch that saw them outscore their opponents 134-39 and out-gain them by an average of 405-220. The result of that almost unheard of streak of dominance was Seattle's second straight NFC West title (and 7th in the 13 years since realignment) as well as their second straight #1 seed (and 3rd in the last 9 seasons). Some other stuff:
-Earl Thomas was amazing today, leading the team with 12 tackles in addition to his TD-saving fourth quarter swipe. I've said it a number of times before but truly appreciating the effect Thomas has on this defense is as difficult as beating him on a go route. He is not only one of the best defensive players in the league, he is the fulcrum upon which the entire scheme balances; the epicenter of a Richter-breaking earthquake.
-Russell Wilson was not the spectacular version of himself that has astonished fans and had women in NFL cities across America springing for Seahawks-themed underwear. In fact, there were times today where he looked downright overwhelmed. He was constantly accosted by the Rams pass rush, threw under pressure as often as not, had a couple of passes get away from him, and managed just seven yards rushing. And yet, when you look at his final line of 17-25 (68%), 239 yards (9.6 Y/A), and the INT, you realize that even on his off days, Seattle's QB is going to keep his team in every single game. He finishes the season with 3,475 passing yards and 849 rushing yards. Incredible.
-In fact, in the Russell Wilson Era, the Seahawks have gone 40-13, including 4-1 in the post-season and have never lost by double digits. That's a winning percentage of 75.5% -- a number so far above the expectation of a team with a young QB that I had to triple-check it before writing it down. The crazy thing is, they can still rack up three more wins before the close of his third season.
-Michael Bennett is every bit a Pro Bowler. His effect reaches far beyond the box score, demanding double-teams that are no guarantee to stop him and that free up the rest of the pack to plug running gaps and harass opposing QBs. I imagine he is among the first people that opposing offensive coordinators account for when game-planning against the Seahawks but the thing about Bennett is that Black Santa's gonna come down your chimney whether it's Christmas or not. Better have them cookies ready.
-Paul Richardson continues to build off of his recent success, leading the team in targets (7), catches (5), and receiving yards (60) as well as 52 yards on a couple of kick returns. There were two plays he made today that stood out to me as signs of a young wide receiver beginning to feel comfortable with the pro game:
1.) A sparkling 32-yard redline catch in which he perfectly high-pointed the ball above the defender, a play reminiscent of the type the team has been missing in the absence of Golden Tate.
2.) On 3rd & 2, Preach was Wilson's first read (significant), shook his man with a sexy little shimmy and darted inside for a 16-yard gain.
If Richardson can become the guy the team envisioned him to be and do it this early in his development, we may have to readjust our expectations for his future.
-Marshawn Lynch had 96 yards from scrimmage and a teeder on just 17 touches (14 carries for 60 yards, three catches for 36). It took him a while to get going and while he failed to force his genitals upon any impressionable viewing audiences in this one, he still managed to contribute mightily to Seattle's 16 first downs.
-Robert Turbin was only a step behind Lynch and appears to be the clear-cut #2 in the pecking order moving forward, garnering 66 yards on 12 touches (11 carries for 53 yards, one catch for 13) while Christine Michael saw just one carry for two yards. On the season, Seattle's RB productivity is as follows:
~Lynch: 280 carries for 1,306 yards (4.7) plus 37 catches for 367 (9.9) for a total of 1,673 yards on 317 touches (5.3)
~Turbin: 74 carries for 310 yards (4.2) plus 16 catches for 186 (11.6) for a total of 496 yards on 90 touches (5.5)
~Michael: 34 carries for 175 yards (5.1) plus one catch for 12 (12.0) for a total of 187 yards on 35 touches (5.3)
We can quibble all we want about which guy should be where behind Lynch but my biggest takeaway from all of this is that even when Lynch is out, there is virtually no drop-off, statistically speaking. That's something to celebrate.
-The Seahawks defense has allowed 39 points over the final six games of the season. That's not even a touchdown per. They finish the year with a league-leading 267 yards per game allowed (nearly 30 yards better than second place) as well as an NFL-leading 16.5 PPG allowed. That means for the second time in a row, Seattle has led the NFL in both categories, the first time a team has ever done that. In fact, they have now led the NFL in scoring defense for an unprecedented three straight years. This really might be the greatest stretch of defense that the modern NFL has ever witnessed.
-Seattle finishes tied for the best record in the NFL for the second consecutive year. Their point-differential of +140 trails only the Patriots in that regard. They led or almost led the NFL in the following major categories:
~Overall record (T-1st)
~Conference record (T-1st)
~Point differential (2nd)
~Home record (2nd)
~Points allowed (1st)
~Yards allowed (1st)
~Rush yards (1st)
~Rush yards allowed (2nd)
~Yards per carry (1st)
~Yards per carry allowed (2nd)
~Rushing TDs (T-1st)
~Passing yards allowed (1st)
~Yards per pass allowed (T-2nd)
~Interceptions thrown (T-1st)
~Turnovers (2nd)
~Plus a litany of advanced metrics, I'm sure
In short, I don't know how many fan bases have ever been treated to such a dominant stretch of football.
There is no ceiling on this football team. There hasn't been for three straight seasons now. No matter what else happens, Seahawks fans have the luxury of knowing that their team's best game beats every other team's best game. Combine that with Seattle's nearly unmatched home field advantage and you have all the ingredients for a Super Bowl repeat. Now, that's not to get ahead of myself. I am fully aware that the Seahawks still need to win three games against presumably very good teams before we can talk about hoisting Lombardi's giant silver phallus again but the path to that most gilded of gropes is as clear as it possibly can be.
Onward. Upward. Let's fly.
Jacson on Twitter /// Cigar Thoughts hub
-A number of you have been asking me what cigar I smoke each week so I'll start listing that here. Tonight I went with an MX2 Black Label from CAO. Not recommended for beginners; this double maduro is a big ol' donkey dick of a stick with a ton of flavor and a spicy kick that takes some getting used to. A grand choice for the more leathery puffers out there, though. Cheers!BENGALURU: Former Congress leader S M Krishna, who joined the BJP on Wednesday, showered fulsome praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying India is on par with superpowers like the US and China because of his programmes. Modji has given new status to India... Today, India is on par with superpowers like United States, France, Russia and China. This has been possible because of the various programmes PM Narendra Modi has started," he told BJP workers at the state's party headquarters here.The former external affairs minister said he was "impressed with Modi's courage to carry out surgical strikes"."During my tenure as minister of foreign affairs, Pakistan never understood the kind of language we spoke. Look at the turnaround after surgical strikes. Modi's step was hailed across the world as bold and courageous," he said."Modiji answered Pakistan in the language it understands. I had the privilege to meet him and he was kind enough to explain the contours of surgical strikes."I was impressed and this was possible only because of a leader who had guts, a vision and a strategy. Today, India has become very bold in the eyes of other countries," he said.Krishna also praised Modi's demonetisation decision, saying that though it has not eradicated black money menace entirely, but has curtailed it."Demonetisation is one of the biggest economic makeover that Prime Minister thought necessary to be implemented. The black money menace has been a great curse. It was eating into the very vitals of the economy. Even though it cannot be eradicated overnight but it certainly curtailed the menace. As a Congressman, I had welcomed it," he said.He said he quit Congress because of bad treatment and the "mental torture" the party gave him."I was treated badly. All of a sudden, they dropped me from the cabinet. This is not the way you treat a veteran," he said.Krishna said he had been thinking of quitting Congress for nearly two years and thereafter he met Amit Shah, the national BJP President, which answered all his queries.Earlier, Krishna was welcomed at Bengaluru International Airport and taken to the party office situated at Malleshwaram in a rally.At the party office, he was welcomed by State BJP President B S Yeddyurappa and R Ashok among others. The former Congress leader was welcomed amid the chanting of Ganapati Mantra.God Is Not Great (sometimes stylized as god Is Not Great[1]) is a 2007 book by Anglo-American author and journalist Christopher Hitchens, in which he makes a case against organized religion. It was originally published in the United Kingdom by Atlantic Books as God Is Not Great: The Case Against Religion and in the United States by Twelve as God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, but was republished by Atlantic Books in 2017 with no subtitle.
Hitchens posited that organized religion is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children" and sectarian, and that accordingly it "ought to have a great deal on its conscience". He supports his position with a mixture of personal stories, documented historical anecdotes and critical analysis of religious texts. His commentary focuses mainly on the Abrahamic religions, although it also touches on other religions, such as Hinduism and Buddhism. The book received mixed reviews, but sold well.
Contents [ edit ]
Christopher Hitchens in 2008
Chapter One: Putting It Mildly [ edit ]
Hitchens writes that, at the age of nine, he began to question the teachings of his Bible instructor, and began to see critical flaws in apologetic arguments, most notably the argument from design.[2] He discusses people who become atheists, describing some as people who have never believed, and others as those who have separately discarded religious traditions. He asserts that atheists who disagree with each other will eventually side together on whatever the evidence most strongly supports.[3] He discusses why human beings have a tendency towards being "faithful" and argues that religion will remain entrenched in the human consciousness as long as human beings cannot overcome their primitive fears, particularly that of their own mortality. He concludes by saying that he would not want to eradicate religion if the faithful would "leave him alone", but ultimately they are incapable of this.[4]
Chapter Two: Religion Kills [ edit ]
Hitchens addresses a hypothetical question that he was asked while on a panel with radio host Dennis Prager: if he were alone in an unfamiliar city at night, and a group of strangers began to approach him, would he feel safer, or less safe, knowing that these men had just come from a prayer meeting? Hitchens answers,
Just to stay within the letter 'B', I have actually had that experience in Belfast, Beirut, Bombay, Belgrade, Bethlehem and Baghdad. In each case... I would feel immediately threatened if I thought that the group of men approaching me in the dusk were coming from a religious observance.[5]
He gives detailed descriptions of the tense social and political situations within these cities, which he personally experienced and attributes to religion. He has thus "not found it a prudent rule to seek help as the prayer meeting breaks up".[6]
He discusses the 1989 fatwa issued on author and friend Salman Rushdie by the Ayatollah Khomeini because of the contents of Rushdie's book The Satanic Verses.[7] He criticises several public figures for laying the blame for the incident on Rushdie himself. He also writes about the events following the September 11 attacks, describing how religion, particularly major religious figures, allowed matters to "deteriorate in the interval between the removal of the Taliban and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein".[8]
Chapter Three: A Short Digression On The Pig; or, Why Heaven Hates Ham [ edit ]
Hitchens discusses the prohibition on eating pigs ("porcophobia" as Hitchens calls it) in Judaism, also adopted by Islam.[9] He says that this proscription is not just Biblical or dietary. He reports that even today, Muslim zealots demand that the Three Little Pigs, Miss Piggy, Piglet from Winnie-the-Pooh and other traditional pets and characters be "removed from the innocent gaze of their children".[10] Hitchens suggests that the pork prohibition found in Semitic religions may be based in the proscription of human sacrifice, extended to pigs because of the similarities in appearance and flavor between pork and human flesh.[11]
Chapter Four: A Note On Health, To Which Religion May Be Hazardous [ edit ]
Hitchens explains how some religions can be hostile to disease treatment. He writes that many Muslims saw the polio vaccine as a conspiracy, and thus allowed polio to spread.[12] He discusses the Catholic Church's response to the spread of HIV in Africa, telling people that condoms are ineffective, which, he argues, contributed to the death toll.[13] He notes with examples that some in both the Catholic and the Muslim communities believe irrationally that HIV and HPV are punishment for sexual sin—particularly homosexuality.[14] He describes religious leaders as "faith healers", and opines that they are hostile to medicine because it undermines their position of power.[15]
He criticises the Jewish ritual of circumcision that would have him "take a baby boy's penis in my hand, cut around the prepuce, and complete the action by taking his penis in my mouth, sucking off the foreskin, and spitting out the amputated flap along with a mouthful of blood and saliva", and denounces the traditional African practice of female genital mutilation. He concludes the chapter writing of the religious "wish for obliteration"—for a death in the form of the day of the Apocalypse.
Chapter Five: The Metaphysical Claims of Religion Are False [ edit ]
Hitchens begins by saying that the strong faith that could stand up to any form of reason is long gone. He compares the popular knowledge of the world in Thomas Aquinas's time to what we now know about the world. He uses the example of Laplace—"It works well enough without that [God] hypothesis"[16]—to demonstrate that we do not need God to explain things; he claims that religion becomes obsolete as an explanation when it becomes optional or one among many different beliefs. He concludes that the leap of faith is not just one leap; it is a leap repeatedly made, and a leap that becomes more difficult to take the more it is taken: which is why so many religionists now feel the need to move beyond mere faith and cite evidence for their beliefs.
Chapter Six: Arguments From Design [ edit ]
Hitchens says that Abrahamic religions are used to making people feel like lowly sinners, encouraging low self-esteem, while at the same time leading them to believe that their creator genuinely cares for them, thus inflating their sense of self-importance. He says that superstition to some extent has a "natural advantage", being that it was contrived many centuries before the modern age of human reason and scientific understanding, and discusses a few examples as well as so-called miracles.
He discusses the design arguments, using examples such as the human body wearing out in old age as bad design. He writes that if evolution had taken a slightly different course, there would be no guarantee at all that organisms remotely like us would ever have existed.
Chapter Seven: The Nightmare Of The Old Testament [ edit ]
Hitchens lists anachronisms and inconsistencies in the Old Testament, stating that many of the "gruesome, disordered events... never took place".[17] He says the Pentateuch is "an ill-carpentered fiction, bolted into place well after the non-events that it fails to describe convincingly or even plausibly".[18] He points out that when Moses orders parents to have their children stoned to death (see also List of capital crimes in the Torah) for indiscipline (citing Deuteronomy[19]) it is probably a violation of at least one of the very commandments which Moses received from God. He notes that Moses "continually makes demented pronouncements ('He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord')."[20]
Chapter Eight: The "New" Testament Exceeds The Evil Of The "Old" One [ edit ]
On the subject of a mythical Jesus and the possibility of a historical Jesus in the Gospels, a number of sources on the Internet attribute the controversial quote "Jesus is Santa Claus for adults"' to Hitchens and God Is Not Great, but those words do not appear in this chapter or this book. Hitchens does argue that the "multiple authors—none of whom published anything until many decades after the Crucifixion—cannot agree on anything of importance",[21] "the gospels are most certainly not literal truth",[22] and there is "little or no evidence for the life of Jesus".[23] To Hitchens, the best argument for the "highly questionable existence of Jesus", however, is biblical inconsistency, explaining the "very attempts to bend and stretch the story may be inverse proof that someone of later significance was indeed born".[24]
Hitchens first connects the Book of Isaiah in the Old Testament with its prediction that "a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son" (see Isaiah 7:14), pointing out where the stories converge, Old Testament to New. Comparing the Testaments, he considers the New Testament "also a work of crude carpentry, hammered together long after its purported events, and full of improvised attempts to make things come out right". He points out that, while H. L. Mencken considered some of the New Testament events to be historically verifiable, Mencken maintained that "most of them... show unmistakable signs of having been tampered with".[25]
Hitchens also outlines the inaccuracy in Luke's attempt to triangulate three world events of the time with Jesus's birth: the census ordered by Augustus of the entire Roman world, the reign of King Herod in Judea and that of Quirinius as governor of Syria (see the Census of Quirinius). He says that there is no record by any Roman historian of any Augustan census, and that, although "the Jewish chronicler Josephus mentions one that did occur—without the onerous requirement for people to return to their places of birth", it was undertaken "six years after the birth of Jesus is supposed to have taken place". He also notes that Herod died in 4 BC, and that Quirinius was not governor of Syria during his tenure.
Hitchens refers to The Passion of the Christ as "a soap-opera film about the death of Jesus... produced by an Australian fascist and ham actor named Mel Gibson", who "adheres to a crackpot and schismatic Catholic sect". In Hitchens's view, the film attempts tirelessly to blame the death of Jesus on the Jews. He claims that Gibson did not realize that the four Gospels were not at all historical records, and that they had multiple authors, all being written many decades after the crucifixion—and, moreover, that they do not agree on anything "of importance" (e.g., the virgin birth and the genealogy of Jesus). He cites many contradictions in this area.[26]
He further contends that the many "contradictions and illiteracies" of the New Testament, while extensively covered by other authors, have never been explained except as "metaphor" and "a Christ of faith". He states that the "feebleness" of the Bible is a result of the fact that until recently, Christians faced with arguments against the logic or factualness of the Bible "could simply burn or silence anybody who asked any inconvenient questions".[27]
Hitchens points out the problematic implications of the scriptural proclamation "he that is without sin among you, let him cast a first stone" with regard to the practical legislation of retributive justice: "if only the non-sinners have the right to punish, then how could an imperfect society ever determine how to prosecute offenders?" Of the adulterous woman whom Jesus saved from stoning, the author contends that Jesus thus forgives her of sheer sexual promiscuity, and, if this be the case, that the lesson has ever since been completely misunderstood.[28] Closing the chapter,[29] he suggests that advocates of religion have faith alone to rely on—nothing else—and calls on them to "be brave enough" to admit it.
Chapter Nine: The Koran Is Borrowed From Both Jewish and Christian Myths [ edit ]
Chapter nine assesses the religion of Islam, and examines the origin of its holy book, the Quran. Hitchens asserts that there is no evidence for any of the "miraculous" claims about Muhammad, and that the Koran's origin was not supernatural. He contends that the religion was fabricated by Muhammad or his followers and that it was borrowed from other religious texts, and the hadith was taken from common maxims and sayings which developed throughout Arabia and Persia at the time. He identifies similarities between Islam and Christianity, and notes several plagiarisms of the Jewish faith.
Chapter Ten: The Tawdriness Of The Miraculous And The Decline Of Hell [ edit ]
Chapter ten discusses miracles. Hitchens says that no supernatural miracles occur, nor have occurred in history. He says that evidence of miracles is fabricated, or based on the unreliable testimony of people who are mistaken or biased. He notes that no verifiable miracle has been documented since cameras have become commonplace. Hitchens uses a specific purported miracle by Mother Teresa to show how miracles can become perceived as true, when in fact they are based on myth or falsehood.
Chapter Eleven: Religion's Corrupt Beginnings [ edit ]
Chapter eleven discusses how religions form, and claims that most religions are founded by corrupt, immoral individuals. The chapter specifically discusses cargo cults, Pentecostal minister Marjoe Gortner, and Mormonism. Hitchens discusses Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, citing a March 1826 Bainbridge, New York court examination accusing him of being a "disorderly person and impostor" who Hitchens claims admitted there that he had supernatural powers and was "defrauding citizens".[30][31] Four years later Smith claimed to obtain gold tablets containing the Book of Mormon. When the neighbor's skeptical wife buried 116 pages of the translation and challenged Smith to reproduce it, Smith claimed God, knowing this would happen, told him to instead translate a different section of the same plates.
Chapter Twelve: A Coda: How Religions End [ edit ]
Chapter twelve discusses the termination of several religions, to illustrate that some religions are not everlasting, as they claim. The religions addressed include Millerism and Sabbatai Sevi.
Chapter Thirteen: Does Religion Make People Behave Better? [ edit ]
Hitchens addresses the question of whether religious people behave more virtuously than non-religious people (atheists, agnostics, or freethinkers). He uses the battle against slavery in the United States, and Abraham Lincoln, to support his claim that non-religious people battle for moral causes with as much vigor and effect as religious advocates.
Chapter Fourteen: There Is No "Eastern" Solution [ edit ]
Hitchens dismisses the idea of seeking enlightenment through nirvana as a conceit that asks adherents to "put their reason to sleep, and to discard their minds along with their sandals"[32] in chapter fourteen, which focuses on maladaptive and immiserating Hindu and Buddhist feudalism and violence in Tibet and Sri Lanka. It touches on the lucrative careers of Chandra Mohan Jain and Sathyanarayana Raju, and details his observations of a "brisk fleecing" and the unstable devotees witnessed during the author's staged pilgrimage to an ashram in Pune, which was undertaken as part of a BBC documentary.[33] He suggests that BBC has no longer a "standard of fairness". He suggests that image of "imperial-way buddhism" is not that of the original Gautama Buddha, and looks at the Japanese Buddhists who joined the Axis forces in World War II.
Hitchens seeks to answer the question "How might one easily prove that 'Eastern' faith was identical with the unverifiable assumptions of 'Western' religion?"[34] He concludes:
It ought to be possible for me to pursue my studies and researches in one house, and for the Buddhist to spin his wheel in another. But contempt for the intellect has a strange way of not being passive. One of two things may happen: those who are innocently credulous may become easy prey for those who are less scrupulous and who seek to "lead" and "inspire" them. Or those whose credulity has led their own society into stagnation may seek a solution, not in true self-examination, but in blaming others for their backwardness. Both these things happened in the most consecratedly "spiritual" society of them all."[35]
Chapter Fifteen: Religion As An Original Sin [ edit ]
Chapter 15 discusses five aspects of religions that Hitchens maintains are "positively immoral":
Chapter Sixteen: Is Religion Child Abuse? [ edit ]
Hitchens discusses how religion has been used to cause harm to children. He cites examples such as genital mutilation or circumcision, and imposition of fear of healthy sexual activities such as masturbation. He criticizes the way that adults use religion to terrorize children.
Chapter Seventeen: An Objection Anticipated [ edit ]
Chapter seventeen addresses the most common counter-argument that Hitchens says he hears, namely that the most immoral acts in human history were performed by atheists like Joseph Stalin. He says "it is interesting that people of faith now seek defensively to say they are no worse than fascists or Nazis or Stalinists". He analyzes those examples of immorality, and shows that although the individual leaders may have been atheist or agnostic, that religion played a key role in these events, and religious people and religious leaders fully participated in the wars and crimes.
Chapter Eighteen: A Finer Tradition: The Resistance Of The Rational [ edit ]
Chapter
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energy and were less depressed."
"There are more solid studies recently that looked at people clinically diagnosed with insomnia disorder, rather than self-described poor sleepers," agreed the University of Pittsburgh's Christopher Kline, who studies sleep through the lens of sports medicine. "The results show exercise improves both self-reported and objective measures of sleep quality, such as what's measured in a clinical sleep lab."
Exercise is not quite as effective as sleeping pills, admits Arizona State University sleep researcher Shawn Youngstedt, but if you consider the potential downsides of pharmaceutically induced shuteye, the equation shifts.
"Sleeping pills are extremely hazardous," Youngstedt said. "They are as bad as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. Not to mention they cause infections, falling and dementia in the elderly, and they lose their effectiveness after a few weeks.
"It's less expensive, healthier and just as easy to exercise," he said, "and there's an added bonus: Research suggests those who are physically active a have lower risk of developing insomnia in the first place."
Helping more than insomnia
There's more good news for the 18 million Americans who struggle with sleep apnea, a dangerous disorder in which you temporarily stop breathing for up to a minute during the night. Exercise can help with that, too.
"For sleep apnea, exercise has always been recommended," Kline said, "mostly to jump-start weight loss from dieting, because those with sleep apnea are normally overweight or obese. But we did a study where the participants didn't diet, and exercise alone led to a 25% reduction of sleep apnea symptoms over a 12-week period."
"Exercise has also been shown to help with restless-leg symptoms across all age groups," Youngstedt said. Restless leg syndrome, a disorder of the nervous system, occurs when the legs -- or other parts of the body like the arms or face -- itch, burn or move involuntarily. The irresistible urge to move often happens at night, which disrupts sleep.
Finding a safe, healthy avenue of treatment for sleep disorders like insomnia, sleep apnea and restless legs is critical, these experts say, because disturbed sleep is a key risk factor for diseases and unhealthy conditions such as stroke, heart attack, high blood pressure, diabetes and obesity.
"There is large amount of literature showing that people who exercise have better sleep," Baron said. "People who exercise reported an increase in deep sleep and a decrease in the number of awakenings. Plus, people felt less depressed, and their mood was better."
Your exercise prescription
How much exercise is needed to get a good night's rest?
Most sleep studies have focused on the recommended amount : 2½ hours a week of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise, along with strength or resistance training that targets every muscle group two days a week.
Kline says "brisk walking, light biking, elliptical machine, anything that increases your heart rate so that you can still talk while exercising but have to catch your breath every few sentences or so, is considered moderate exercise."
"I think trying to do it outside is also helpful, because bright light can help promote sleep," Youngstedt added. "Light exposure helps regulate the body clock."
Other studies show that people who exercise less than the recommended amount, and those who go way beyond in time and intensity, see moderate benefits. It's only when you are training to the level of an elite athlete that exercise can actually interfere with sleep quality.
"High-level athletes, who may overtrain for a certain event, do have issues with sleep when traveling and under stress," Youngstedt said. "But for the vast majority of us, that's not a factor."
What's the best time of day to do this sleep-enhancing movement?
Experts used to say morning was best; in fact, any exercise within six hours of bedtime was strongly discouraged. On that topic, the science has changed.
"One common myth is that exercise should be avoided at night," Youngstedt said. "There are about 10% of us for whom exercise at night does disturb sleep, but I personally think that's because they aren't accustomed to it. For most of us, exercise at night, even if it ends just a couple of hours before bedtime, will help with sleep."
Busting that myth is especially helpful for those who tend to stay up later.
"Night owls have problems getting up in the morning; they just can't do it," Baron said. "Their mood and ability to apply effort just isn't there. If you're sacrificing sleep for exercise, is that a good tradeoff?"
However, one of the benefits of staying with a morning workout, she adds, is that you are less likely to cancel.
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"Morning exercisers are more consistent," she explained. "So many of us have competing demands in our day, so if we leave it to the evening, we might not follow through."
Staying the course is important to keep sleep benefits in place.
"They have to keep it up," Youngstedt said. "I think it helps to have a consistent schedule, so figure out what works best for you and then stick to it."
"If you have insomnia or sleep apnea, it's even more important to exercise," Baron said. "You will likely feel even less inclined to exercise when you're fatigued, but keep with it, because it can really help."Police arrested and charged a neighbor with unplugging a family's bounce house during a birthday party in Port St. Lucie. Image/Video used with permission. WPEC.
Port St. Lucie Police arrested and charged a neighbor with unplugging an inflatable bounce house at a birthday party in Port St. Lucie. The video of the incident went viral.
Charles Wotruba, 70, is facing charges of disorderly conduct and trespassing after his arrest on Friday.
The incident happened last month at a home on Flowermound Circle. A mother rented a princess bounce house for a party for her one-year-old daughter. She told police the inflatable began to lose air with about 10-15 kids playing inside.
The woman checked her surveillance video which showed a man had unplugged the bounce house from the wall.
Several kids had to be seen by their doctors due to the bounce house deflating on them, according to her statement to police.
The story first reported by CBS12 reporter Andrea Marvin went viral.These concerns have escalated since the government upset Beijing with its decision to block the 99-year lease of NSW power asset Ausgrid to either Chinese state-owned company State Grid, or Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong Infrastructure.
The websites in question had all been established with web addresses ending in the.au domain, which requires the owner to have an official Australian registration such as an Australian Company Number or Australian Business Numbers.
However auDA discovered the sites had been established by criminals who illegally acquired ACN and ABN details then used them to set up the sites.
The sites were related to numerous business types, but predominantly small and medium-sized businesses, with low-profile existing web presences.
Consumers were sold goods which they will never receive or were misrepresented, and credit card details were harvested.
Large-scale operation
AuDA's chairman Stuart Benjamin told The Australian Financial Review that operations of this kind usually involved one or two websites being taken down for breaching the terms of trade, so this represented a significant escalation in illegal activity.
He said the nature of the scam indicated it was a criminal endeavour with a financial motive, rather than anything related to state-based involvement or espionage.
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"What concerns us is that it appears to have been a very targeted approach," Mr Benjamin said.
"Usually it is just a mistake or a one-off case, but in this case there has been a mass registration and it is certainly the largest ever policy delete we have done."
Mr Benjamin said the investigation into the identity of the criminals was continuing, and it was yet to be determined if all of the websites had been registered by the same organised crime group.
The investigators are also reaching out to their equivalent agencies overseas to determine whether Australia had been singled out, with signs a major European nation had also been targeted.
International sensitivity
Placing the blame for such matters largely on Chinese operators can shape up as an international relations problem, and Mr Benjamin said auDA had taken steps to ensure the websites were genuinely being run from China.
He said in recent times some eastern European cyber criminals had adopted a strategy of routing their traffic through China, to try to cover their tracks.
"We don't believe that it is the Chinese government or anything like that, but we do believe that it is coming out of China in a mass wave," Mr Benjamin said.
"A number of the websites have Chinese language components; they are using Chinese-based forms and templates and also have China-based payment gateways."
He said auDA had moved to swiftly close down the sites to maintain the high regard in which the most popular Australian internet domain is held.
He said consumers had learnt to trust websites that end with.au, and while it was legitimate for overseas companies to own such addresses, it needed to carefully police improper use.NASA is considering a plan to snap a photo of the International Space Station at its most crowded. The agency hasn't made a decision yet – but maybe enough public support can convince them to take the most mind-blowing space photo of the Space Shuttle era.
During the final flight of the Space Shuttle Discovery, planned for late February or early March, the International Space Station will play host to a record number of spacecraft. Five new visitors from space agencies all over the world will be docked at the ISS, making the space station the heaviest and largest it has ever been.
This flight will the the one and only chance to capture this cosmic conference on film, before the shuttle is retired for good.
NASA officials are investigating a scheme in which one of the Russian Soyuz spacecraft would undock from the ISS to take the family portrait.
This historic photo op may require an in-flight game of musical chairs. The most reasonable plan, NASA officials decided in a meeting at Johnson Spaceflight Center, is for the Soyuz to undock, swing around the ISS so that the crew within can snap a photo, and then redock, requiring a dual-docking procedure to fit both the Soyuz and Discovery. Several different flight plans are being considered, and each one would give a slightly different view of the ISS.
The spacecraft that would gather to say cheese would hail from all over the world, including Japan’s H-II Transfer Vehicle-2, Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle-2 (named Johannes Kepler), the Italian-built Permanent Multipurpose Module (named Leonardo), the ExPrESS Logistics Carrier-4 and the Shuttle Discovery.
The procedure would be inconvenient, taking a total of 15 hours and possibly removing crew members from their posts at important moments. But the resulting photo would be one for the ages, and a fitting farewell to the Shuttle.
This wouldn't be the first time a Soyuz has played photographer for a space station. In 1995, a Soyuz undocked from the Mir space station to photograph the undocking of the Space Shuttle Atlantis (above).
Image: Nikolai Budarin, Russian Space Research Institute, NASA
Via nasaspaceflight.com
See Also:Trump Plans To Exit And “Re-Negotiate” Paris Climate Agreement
Trump sparked an outcry when announcing it was a hoax. But what exactly is the theory behind the hoax? He claimed that he would withdraw from the 2015 Paris Climate agreement to fight climate change. He claimed the Paris agreement would undermine the U.S. economy, cost U.S. jobs, weaken American national sovereignty and put the country at a permanent disadvantage to the other countries of the world.
President Donald Trump proclaimed Thursday he was withdrawing the US from the Paris climate accord, a sweeping step that fulfills a campaign promise while acutely dampening global efforts to curb global warming.
Speaking from the White House, Trump said he was open to renegotiating aspects of the agreement, which was inked under his predecessor and which all nations except two have signed onto.
But he was withering in his criticism of the pact, which he cast as a humiliating defeat for American workers that unfairly advantaged foreign countries.
“At what point does America get demeaned? At what point do they start laughing at us as a country?” Trump inquired during an afternoon event held in a sun-drenched Rose Garden.
“We want fair treatment,” Trump said. “We don’t want other countries and other leaders to laugh at us anymore.”
Republican U.S. congressional leaders backed Trump. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell applauded Trump “for dealing yet another significant blow to the Obama administration’s assault on domestic energy production and jobs.”
Donald Trump’s views on global warming have changed over the past seven years or so. Have they evolved or devolved?
His endorsement of a 2009 letter urging the U.S. government to invest in a “clean energy economy” and pass legislation addressing the “immediate challenge” of climate change, and, on the other, by his November 2012 tweet stating that “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” (Contrary to rumor, Trump did not attempt to delete that tweet year after the fact.)
Why Global Warming is real.
Rise in Sea Level: Sea level is rising in many areas of the world. This is partially attributed to the melting of ice caps and glaciers, but more to the changes in the gases contained within the sea. In the past decade, the global mean sea levels have doubled compared to the 20th-century trend of 1.6 mm per year. The global sea levels rose about 6.7 inches in the last century.
A rise is a temperature: Last year, the hottest on record for the third year in a row, was about 1.1 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial level, according to Nasa and the Met Office, boosted slightly by the natural El Nino effect. Svalbard in the Arctic has seen average winter temperatures rise by up to a staggering 11C compared to the average between 1961 and 1990. Last year, the hottest on record for the third year in a row, was, according to Nasa and the Met Office, boosted slightly by the natural El Nino effect. Svalbard in the Arctic has seencompared to the average between 1961 and 1990.
Increased C02 (Carbon Dioxide) levels: Carbon dioxide levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and otherwise, just as they have throughout geologic time. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased by about 120 part per million (ppm), most of which is likely due to human-caused CO2 emissions. The RATE of growth during this century has been about 0.55%/year.
Why Global Warming is a Hoax.
Climate Models used are Proven to be Unreliable: The climate model calculations used to predict the effect of global warming have been proven to be flawed which means that the long-term predictions that they have been making are meaningless. Some scientists even argue that any increase in global temperatures could be a natural climate shift. The climate model calculations used to predict the effect of global warming have been proven to be flawed which means that the long-term predictions that they have been making are meaningless. Some scientists even argue that anycould be a natural climate shift.
There hasn’t been any global warming since 1997: Satellites sent to space have detected no change in global warming. The sent to space have detected no change in global warming. The temperature of the planet has essentially been stagnant for 17 years. This isn’t a biased accusation either. Even the former Director of the Climate Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, Phil Jones, admits that it’s true. Since the planet was cooling from 1940-1975 and the upswing in temperature afterward only lasted 22 years, a 17-year pause is a big deal. It also begs an obvious question: How can we be experiencing global warming if there’s no actual “global warming?”
Not Enough Historical Data Available: There is no shared consensus about global warming being real among scientists. Advocates also point towards the fact that a recent gathering of 31,000 scientists in the field of environmental science couldn’t reach a consensus on whether or not global warming is real. They believe that they don’t have long-term historical climate data or the data they have isn’t clear. There isabout global warming being real among scientists. Advocates also point towards the fact that a recent gathering of 31,000 scientists in the field of environmental science couldn’t reach a consensus on whether or not global warming is real. They believe that they don’t have long-term historical climate data or the data they have isn’t clear.
Think of the world on a global scale. Until other countries like China cut down on their negative emissions then the world will be a better place. However many scientists back the fact that global warming is a hoax. So just what do you think? Fake news or real news? In recent years, global warming has been the subject of a great deal of political controversy. As scientific knowledge has grown, this debate is moving away from whether humans are causing warming and toward questions of how best to respond.
Like this: Like Loading...Sport have put together an interesting comparison between managers who have handed the most minutes to youth players over the last two seasons.
The report has compared some of the top teams around Europe, who have handed minutes to youth players in their respective domestic leagues and the Champions League, the results, are interesting.
The special one has given a total of 318 minutes to youth players over the last two seasons. The likes of Dominic Solanke, Loftus-Cheek and Andreas Christensen have all made their debuts. However, Solanke and Christensen have both been loaned out this season, to Vitesse and Borussia Monchengladbach respectively.
Chelsea were ranked behind both Bayern Munich, who gave 596 minutes to youth players, in second place and La Liga giants, Barcelona who were the clear winners with 895 minutes.
Something that Mourinho will be happy with, he has soared past Arsene Wenger in the ranking. Wenger only managed to hand 71 minutes worth of game time to youth players last season.
On another positive, he was placed ahead of his former side, Real Madrid in the rankings too. Former Chelsea boss, Carlo Ancelotti, only managed to give 61 minutes worth of game time to youngsters.TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese regulators reached breaking point in March after months of stonewalling by the country’s largest broker, which they suspected of leaking confidential information to clients ahead of share sales.
Pedestrians are reflected in a sign displayed outside a Nomura Securities branch in Tokyo, in this file picture taken May 28, 2012. REUTERS/Toru Hanai/Files
A trail of evidence in a near 2-year probe into pre-sale tip-offs, the most extensive in Japan for years, had taken investigators deep inside Nomura Securities, part of the 87-year-old group (8604.T) at the heart of Japan’s capital markets, but the firm’s top executives kept stalling, say people involved in the investigation.
In late March, bankers waiting outside the office of Shozaburo Jimi, then Financial Services Minister overseeing the regulatory agency, were startled to hear him bellow to aides: “I haven’t had one call from Nomura yet. What the hell’s going on?”
From interviews with more than a dozen bankers, regulators and lawyers with direct knowledge of the investigation emerges a picture of a reluctant watchdog roused into action in 2010 by whistleblowers with statistical evidence that the Tokyo market was rigged against share issuers and investors.
It is also a tale of a ‘too-big-to-punish’ broker - Nomura - skirting around flimsy insider trading laws, and cosy ties with longstanding clients, cemented by a culture of entertaining and gift giving that set the backdrop for sharing corporate secrets.
Nomura this month acknowledged for the first time that its employees had leaked confidential information on three separate public share offerings in 2010. On Monday, it was omitted from a list of institutions chosen by the Ministry of Finance to underwrite a government sale of around $6 billion worth of shares in Japan Tobacco (2914.T).
Nomura declined to comment on specific issues for this article, but referred to a June 8 statement it issued after Japan’s Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission (SESC) recommended fining a U.S. company for trading on non-public information about a share offering by Tokyo Electric Power (9501.T) - one of the three cases involving Nomura.
“Nomura takes this matter seriously and will implement improvement measures and disciplinary action in accordance with the results of the internal investigation and the Commission’s inspection,” the broker said then.
By the middle of 2011, the SESC had contacted the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and was poring over data that showed Nomura failed to protect sensitive information on companies planning share issues, the sources say. The showdown between the SESC and Nomura developed behind the scenes for months, according to the sources, who could not speak publicly about the matter as the probe is ongoing.
Regulators are likely in the weeks ahead to order Nomura to improve its internal controls, sources say, after finding that confidential information leaked from its syndicate desk to its institutional sales team, in breach of basic banking safeguards, and then was passed on to clients. It could even be ordered to close some operations for weeks, and regulators may flex their muscles and push for a leadership shake-up at Nomura.
In past insider trading cases, Japanese regulators have tended to slap wrists rather than go for the jugular. Under weaker insider trading rules than most developed markets, the person leaking information is practically immune from prosecution unless they trade on that inside knowledge.
But Nomura has lost a third of its market value since a first insider trading case was announced, reflecting investor worries about the impact on its business. In addition to being left off government deals, some investors may stop trading with it for a certain period in line with their own compliance rules.
“If Nomura were dropped from deals there would naturally be an impact on its business. Their reputation would take a hit and its market share would fall,” said Azuma Ohno, a brokerage analyst at Barclays in Tokyo. “There’s nothing but risk here.”
BORN AGAIN?
On April 25, investigators charged into Nomura’s offices and set up base on the 14th floor of the Urbannet Otemachi Building, a high-rise that was once a showpiece of the financial district but had earned the nickname “bubble tower” because it was finished in 1990 right after Japan’s economic bubble collapsed.
Yet even in the days after the rare escalation to an on-site investigation, SESC officials struggled to gain traction with lower-level executives who insisted there were no systemic problems. Investigators believed CEO Kenichi Watanabe and Chief Operating Officer Takumi Shibata were getting a censored version of events.
“Watanabe and Shibata are not getting straight information from the sales force, who are in their own world,” one of the sources said in early May. “Once senior management understands and reveals the bad practice, Nomura can be born again.”
In one case, when investigators identified a junior Nomura equity saleswoman in her 20s as the source of a leak on a $6 billion offering by energy firm Inpex (1605.T) in 2010, they were told by the brokerage she couldn’t answer further questions because the stress of the investigation had become too much.
The stonewalling became harder to defend after March when Chuo Mitsui Asset Trust and Banking, now part of Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings (8309.T), admitted to insider trading on Inpex and privately told regulators Nomura was the source of the leak.
That kind of leak had been widespread in Tokyo after 2008, an almost sure-fire way for funds to turn an easy bet by shorting shares and a simple way for brokers to boost commissions in a weak market. A recapitalizing boom in 2009 and 2010 in the wake of the financial crisis lit a fire under such trades. In secondary offerings, existing shareholders can see their stakes diluted as more shares come on the market.
A Reuters analysis shows shares of companies in 20 of the top 25 secondary offerings in 2010 underperformed the benchmark TOPIX index.TOPX by an average of nearly 4 times in the three weeks prior to the deal being announced. The analysis did not account for media reports that sometimes preceded announcements. That stock performance gap nevertheless equated to $16 billion in market value, hurting shareholders and increasing the issuers' cost of capital.
Related Coverage Factbox: Japan brings 5 cases in insider trading crackdown
“The market fell apart in 2008 and almost from that moment you could see the trend emerge. The companies doing the lead underwriting were suddenly under big pressure and started to cut corners,” said Nicholas Smith, Japan strategist at CLSA.
SPARKING DEBATE
A handful of global funds, upset at the damage being done to their portfolios, visited the regulator in late 2010 and urged it to take action. Indus Capital, for one, had seen its holding in Inpex decimated by the leak and ensuing sell-off.
Smith, then at MF Global, was a spark in the debate. At the request of his fund clients, he gathered data on stock underperformance ahead of offerings and published a report that for the first time revealed the scale of the problem.
The flurry of media coverage that followed was crucial in prodding the financial regulator into action, people close to its thinking say. The SESC is now under pressure to prove itself to the global financial community, and how it deals with Japan’s top underwriter will be closely watched.
Nomura isn’t the only broker ensnared in the investigation.
Nikko SMBC Securities was punished for priming its retail clients with non-public information about the share sale of its parent bank, and JPMorgan (JPM.N) was found to have leaked news of a stock offering by Nippon Sheet Glass (5202.T) to a Japanese hedge fund. Nikko has since apologized and announced steps to bolster compliance. JP Morgan, a U.S. bank, said it had not been accused of any “organizational” involvement in insider trading.
In late May and early June it emerged that investigators were looking into insider trading in two other share offerings underwritten by Nomura - by Mizuho Financial Group (8411.T) and Tokyo Electric - dashing any hopes Nomura had of ringfencing the problem around the isolated Inpex case.
“Tell me the truth!” Watanabe boomed to staff on the equity sales floor soon after the Mizuho case was announced, according to a person present. It was a key turning point: Nomura’s approach to the regulator was about to change.
COSY TIES
The probe shone a light on a hard-charging culture at Nomura that harked back to its checkered past. In 1991, Nomura and other brokers were caught compensating top clients for post-bubble investment losses, and a 2008 insider trading ring centered around a Nomura employee in Hong Kong prompted Watanabe to promise tougher internal controls.
A report by an investigative panel set up by Sumitomo Mitsui Trust to look into its compliance issues offers a window into how Nomura sales executives went about forging extremely close ties with their clients. The report, which refers to “Securities Company X” - which sources say is Nomura - contends those relationships were too close, clouding the judgment of the fund managers implicated in the probe.
The unnamed Chuo Mitsui fund manager found to have traded on inside information ahead of the Mizuho Financial offering was entertained by a sales executive of Securities Company X 39 times over a nine-month period at a total cost of 890,000 yen ($11,200) and received 320,000 yen in gifts, the report says.
In the Inpex case, the bond between broker salesperson and fund manager was so tight the two often exchanged e-mails on their personal mobile phones, and the fund manager attended the salesperson’s wedding, the report said. While the report didn’t name the brokerage employee, sources have identified her as the young woman in Nomura’s institutional sales department. Nomura has not disclosed her name.
Sources say she met the fund manager at a cafe near Chuo Mitsui’s office on June 30, where regulators believe she relayed news of the impending Inpex offering. The fund manager unloaded Inpex shares the next day. The offering was officially announced a week later.
Her knowing of the offering ahead of time would constitute a breach of the “Chinese Wall” that exists in investment banks as a safeguard against information on stock offerings and other material facts from leaking out.
The SESC has zeroed in on Nomura’s syndicate desk - which sits between sales and equity capital markets and is brought “over the wall” on deals to help gauge investor demand - as the origin of the leak to institutional sales, sources say.
MINIMISING RISK
In the face of mounting evidence, Nomura has moved quickly in recent weeks to minimize the risk of a tough penalty.
Watanabe, upset by how his compliance team had dealt with the problem, has tasked two trusted executives - Chie Toriumi and Shoichi Nagamatsu - with breaking the impasse with the Financial Services Agency (FSA), the top banking regulator which oversees the SESC, sources said.
Toriumi is known as a communicator and reports directly to Watanabe. Nagamatsu, a senior investment banking executive, was drafted in part due to his experience dealing with a scandal in the 1990s when he was a liaison to the finance ministry.
Slideshow (4 Images)
The SESC, waiting for Nomura to announce this month the findings of that internal investigation by outside lawyers, faces a balancing act between wanting to send out a tough message against insider trading and the potential consequences of sidelining a bank vital to Japan’s capital markets.
“This is a serious problem, but I’m not so sure that translates into a serious punishment,” said Yuri Yoshida, a director at Standard & Poor’s. “Besides, it would be hard to get underwriting and other deals done without going through Nomura.”Thin privilege is the huge number of troll blogs created just to make fun of this blog. It’s how willing people are to crack jokes about TiTP, and how few troll blogs there are surrounding other privilege blogs compared to this one. Note: I’m not trying to claim other privilege blogs (white privilege, etc.) don’t have trolls, or that they don’t have a legitimate cause, it just seems like people are a lot more willing to dismiss or even make fun of people who try to discuss thin privilege.
Mod response:
We do get some pretty fucking gnarly trolls around here, but actually, women of color bloggers, most of whom are just talking about their lives, receive a greater volume and nastier stuff than we do. Direct death threats, epithets which have a longer and worse history of oppression and death, some really serious shit. Some of them are stalked in person, even, and get messages detailing where they were and what they were wearing at specific times. One WOC blogger and writer I read actually had to move several states away to keep herself and her family safe. There was a very real threat to her life and well-being and the police where she was would do nothing.
-MGEarlier this week, Kid Rock announced that he’s exploring a senate bid in his home state of Michigan, energizing conservative activists who believe Rock – real name Robert James Ritchie – would easily defeat incumbent Democrat Debbie Stabenow and go on to become the first Republican to hold her seat since 1998.
But Rock isn’t the only celebrity who will be seeking a senate seat during the 2018 cycle: Olympic gold medalist and transgender activist Caitlyn Jenner has revealed during an interview with radio host John Catsimatidis that she has considered launching a run for Senate, and that she is in the process of determining her future in activism and politics, according to the Hill.
Jenner, a lifelong Republican, lives in California, where both Senate seats are controlled by Democrats. +
The term of Dianne Feinstein, the senior senator from California and, at 84, the longest-serving US senator, is up in 2018, and there’s speculation that she may not run again, given her age.
“The political side of it has always been very intriguing to me. Over the next six months or so, I gotta find out where I can do a better job. Can I do a better job from the outside? Kind of working the perimeter of the political scene, being open to talking to anybody? Or are you better from the inside, and we are in the process of determining that,” she said. "Yeah but I would look for a senatorial run,” she continued.
Jenner told CNN's Don Lemon in April she would "seriously look at a run for office."
Jenner has been a supporter of President Trump, but hit Trump earlier this year over his decision to roll back Obama-era protections for transgender students.
“I have a message for President Trump from, well, one Republican to another. This is a disaster. And you can still fix it. You made a promise to protect the LGBTQ community. Call me," she said.
Jenner has seen public opinion turn decidedly against her after narrowly escaping criminal charges in a fatal February 2015 crash. She’s still facing several lawsuits that could complicate any run for office.The world still talks about Syria as if it’s a single country, but some members of the Syrian opposition are beginning to discuss the reality that Syria today is effectively partitioned — complicating any negotiated solution to the conflict.
This frank approach was outlined in an interview last week with Samir al-Taqi, a Syrian physician who was once close to the regime but left the country two years ago and now runs his Orient Research Center, a Syria think tank, from Dubai.
Taqi offered some practical examples to illustrate the lasting effects of the conflict between the Alawite-led regime of President Bashar al-Assad and the largely Sunni opposition. It would be decades, he said, before an Alawite teacher would be comfortable giving lectures in the Sunni districts of northern Aleppo about late president Hafez al-Assad. Similarly, it would be decades before a Sunni police officer would feel safe patrolling in a Shiite or Alawite village.
What this means, said Taqi, is that any attempt to broker a diplomatic solution must begin with a cease-fire, and with combatants holding different slices of territory. The future Syria that emerges will have to be a more decentralized state, reflecting the intense feelings of communal separation and rage that have emerged over the past two years of war.
This blunt analysis is useful as the United States and Russia explore arrangements for a Geneva peace conference, perhaps in October, that might bring together the regime and the opposition for talks. “It may not be possible to reestablish a national convention based on a central state,” warned Taqi in a recent research paper. “We need... a state where all regions have a high percentage of decentralization.”
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Taqi argued that as the Alawite-led regime and the Sunni opposition hunker down in the regions they control, they are turning to external powers for their political and economic lifelines.
The Assad regime depends on its patrons in Iran and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia in neighboring Lebanon. The regime has focused on holding the strip of territory from Damascus to the Alawite homeland of Latakia in the northwest, relying on perhaps 100,000 regime troops and Alawite militiamen, plus Hezbollah fighters. This “Assad-istan” is, practically speaking, an extension of the Hezbollah-controlled Bekaa Valley.
The Sunni-led opposition is similarly turning to its regional patrons. Taqi noted that Syrian olive-oil producers moved their presses to Turkey. Likewise, the wheat harvest in northern Syria has gone to Turkey, while petroleum is being shipped to either Turkey or Iraqi Kurdistan. Economic activity in the liberated Sunni regions of southern Syria around Daraa is now linked to Jordan. Damascus isn’t the country’s economic hub any longer.
These regional players, with their own agendas, will keep pulling Syria apart until a functioning national government can be reestablished. Taqi’s point is that these regional players shouldn’t be allowed to make the situation even worse for their own selfish reasons.
“The country should enter what is similar to a quarantine until it is cured from the sectarian disease,” he wrote. “Without doing so, there would be no peace after peace... The state would dissolve for good.”
What are the chances for gradually healing sectarian divisions, in the way Taqi urged? His approach is similar to what is recommended by Gen. Salim Idriss, the commander of the moderate wing of the Free Syrian Army. But it’s in stark contrast to the views of the al-Qaeda-linked extremists who have control of much of the liberated territory. These extreme groups speak of a jihadist emirate in their regions of Syria, perhaps linked with a similar al-Qaeda mini-state in the Sunni regions of western Iraq. As for the Kurdish opposition, it favors a Kurdish canton along the lines of Iraqi Kurdistan.
The regime has seemed equally bent on division. “The manner in which the regime has responded to its opponents strongly suggests that it considers the bulk of the Syrian population and territory not even worth governing,” wrote Frederic Hof, a leading U.S.-Syria expert, in a paper published last week by the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Middle East Center. “Why else would it subject neighborhoods filled with Syrian citizens to merciless artillery shelling, aerial bombing, and missile strikes?”
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What’s happening in Syria isn’t an insurgency now but a sectarian civil war. A triumph by either side on the battlefield is the “zero solution,” said Taqi. The resolution must be political — but grounded in a realistic assessment of the difficulty in putting the pieces of Syria back together.
Read more from David Ignatius’s archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.LEH/NEW DELHI: China has reinforced its position in Daulat Bag Oldi (DBO) sector, 19km deep inside Indian territory, where they are getting regular supplies through trucks.According to reports sent to the Union home ministry, the Chinese side had adopted agressive posture during patrolling in the DBO sector, where they have picted five tents, and were refusing to end the face-off which has entered the third week.After the failed Brigadier-level meeting on Tuesday at Chashool, Indian side stepped up vigil in the area through unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) while its troops reported that supplies to the Chinese forces were being
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aten egg whites. Bake in a 350 degree Fahrehneit oven for approximately 25 minutes, or until the buns are golden brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes or until ready to serve. Transfer to a wire rack to either cool completely if you are freezing for later. Notes These buns freeze very well. After baking and cooling, transfer to a freezer bag and place in the freezer. All you need to do in the future is heat them up in the oven or microwave. You can also freeze unbaked in a single layer on a baking sheet wrapped with plastic wrap. By Claudia's Cookbook Claudia's Cookbook http://www.claudiascookbook.com/SUNRISE, Fla. – By splitting the first two games against the Florida Panthers, the Devils gained the home ice advantage.
At least that’s the way they chose to view their wasted opportunity to take control of the best-of-seven conference quarterfinal series.
“I think we would’ve taken a split coming down here,” coach Pete DeBoer said. “There are no easy matchups in the NHL playoffs. I don’t think anyone expected anyone ewas going to beat anybody in four. Now that we got a split we have to take care of business at home.”
David Clarkson said he expects the Devils to bounce back in Game 3 tomorrow night at the Prudential Center.
“Our fans have been unbelievable all season,” he said. “They’ve supported us through everything. That place is going to be rocking and we’re going to have to come out right away and play the way we finished (Game 2).”
* * *
DeBoer started the third period Sunday night with rookie Adam Henrique back between Zach Parise and Ilya Kovalchuk. Travis Zajac was moved to the third line with Alexei Ponikarovsky and Clarkson.
The moves produced two quick goals that got the Devils back in the game, but DeBoer switched back before the game was over.
“We mixed things up and got a boost,” DeBoer explained. “I don’t have an answer why we went back.”
* * *
Stephen Weiss scored Florida’s first two goals, both on power plays.
“He’s a little bit of the identity of our team, a guy that has been here the longest and a little bit of the face of the franchise from a player’s perspective,” coach Kevin Dineen said of Weiss. “I think he wasn’t happy with Game 1 with the way it went for him and instead of chirping about it he went out and did something about it.”
Weiss said: “That’s huge, especially after losing the first game. There was a lot of pressure on us to make sure we got that win and we were able to that and that’s huge going into their building.”Quote of the Day: “Opposing the status quo generates a cloak of media invisibility regardless of party or ideology.” – Steve Dasbach, co-founder, DownsizeDC.org
Lately, we’ve gotten a lot of messages accusing us of being mean-spirited Republicans. Let me be blunt in response...
We don’t like political parties. We believe that partisanship…
And we believe our job is to afflict the comfortable leadership of both parties – to speak truth to whichever POWER needs to hear it.
Of course, those criticizing us might be suggesting we have some sympathies with the GOP. Well, I ask you…
What leading Republicans do you know who would post ALL of the following new ACTION ITEMS on their blog? Frankly, the GOP is part of the problem in every one of these instances…
1. Now Playing At Security Theater: The Sting
Did you know that most terrorist plots are concocted by the FBI? Want to see the proof, and then do something about it?
Retweet: http://twitter.com/#!/DDCDispatch/status/108629637835403265
2. I rage against cuts that don’t cut
The Republican-controlled House and Democrat-run Senate haven’t really “cut” anything. One party is lying about false accomplishments, while the other is hysterical about something that doesn’t even exist. Do you want real cuts?
Retweet: http://twitter.com/#!/DDCDispatch/status/108630458501312512
3. Statism means always having to pay other people’s bills
Did the politicians steal $103 million from you so that other people could get broadband cable? Tell them to stop robbing Peter to pay Paul, and robbing you to pay both of them!
Retweet: http://twitter.com/#!/DDCDispatch/status/108631061394755584
4. Patriot Act Deployed Against Wikileaks
Even we know this is a HERESY! You might disagree. The State hates those who expose wrongdoing, and seeks to silence, even punish them. But what Republican leader would say this? Heck, what Democrat leader is defending the free press in this instance? We think the politicians need to hear from you about this. We hope you agree.
Retweet: http://twitter.com/#!/DDCDispatch/status/108631725927702528
And, to the people who’ve written us, or thought of writing us, saying we’re in the Koch brother’s pockets…
Downsize DC has never solicited Koch help
The brothers have never given Downsize DC a dime
And, borrowing from the list above, you’ve suspended deep thought, lack imagination, and bear a closed mind
We’re doing what we’ve done from day one: We’re turning to everyday people like you who will stand with us because we’ll speak the hard truth, even when it’s inconvenient.
Taking a stand for the right thing is not easy, and our ability to keep doing it requires your help. The truth is, the stands we take often cost us support. So please help us finish off this month with your financial endorsement.
Oh, and if the Koch brothers want to send us a check, we’ll gladly cash it and keep doing the work we’re doing — just more of it.
Jim Babka
President
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.
commentsTed Cruz does not like the Iran deal.
That’s an understatement.
In front of a crowd of religious voters on Friday morning, Senator Ted Cruz had some pretty extreme things to say about the Iran nuclear deal, namely, he threatened to kill Iran’s leader if he didn’t give up plans for a nuclear program.
“If the ayatollah doesn’t understand that, we may have to help introduce him to the 72 virgins,” Cruz said at the annual Values Voters summit, adding that he would rip the Iran nuclear deal “to shreds” on his first day in office.
The controversial pact reached in July was conceived by the P5+1—the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China, Russian and Germany—and the European Union to prevent Iran from securing nuclear weapons while allowing the country to have an exclusively peaceful nuclear program going forward.
Earlier in the speech, Cruz referred to President Obama as “the world’s most powerful communist” and that he should be incarcerated. He also suggested the Democratic debates be held at the Leavenworth prison, which has recently been scouted as a potential transfer point for those detained at Guantanamo.
“If they can project a rainbow on the White House, maybe they can put bars on the windows,” Cruz said.
Among Cruz’s other vows: rescinding whatever he considered to be illegal and unconstitutional executive actions, including a compete repeal of ObamaCare, demanding the Department of Justice investigate Planned Parenthood, and telling the Department of Education, which he says “should be abolished,” that Common Core, which details what students should know at the end of each grade, ends immediately.
The crowd cheered throughout.It’s the app that launched a thousand jokes about breaking the first rule of Fight Club.
Last Friday, November 6, tech blog Venture Beat posted a story about a new app that’s currently in development called Rumblr. Basically a Tinder-style service for aggro assholes who are looking for street fighting partners, “Rumblr is an app for recreational fighters to find, meet, and fight other brawl enthusiasts nearby,” according to their official site.
Promising “Casualty-free casual fighting for free” (which is their actual slogan, no matter how silly and impossible to guarantee that is), Rumblr will allow anyone looking for a fight to match up with similarly-minded individuals “who want to throw down,” arrange and schedule fights (or “Pussy Out,” Rumblr’s charming answer to swiping left), and even prepare for your opponents by checking out the detailed tale of the tape-style statistics in their profile. Because god forbid you go into an unsanctioned public melee ill-prepared. Fight options appear to be separated into three sections: Rumblr, RumblrHER, and RumblrGROUP, for the poly-aggro-ish amongst us.
If you just like to watch or you really, really miss the salad days of Bum Fighting or that time Logan paid indigent people to fight on Veronica Mars, though, Rumblr has you covered as well. “You don’t need to fight to use Rumblr. With Rumblr Explore, anyone can browse and attend fights close by that other Rumblr users have arranged – all for free!”
Rumblings about Rumblr quickly spread over the internet, attracting attention from outlets as wide-ranging as Complex, Dangerous Minds, The Bleacher Report, The New York Daily News, and The Daily Mail (which you could call the Rumblr of newspapers in the sense that it is ill-conceived, unnecessarily antagonistic, lowest common-denominator-appealing, and of questionably veracity).
The attention attracted a number of casual warrior hopefuls, who signed up for the chance to be given access to a beta version of the app on the Rumblr site. “More than 78,000 people have signed up for beta access, an email sent out to the lucky early-bird brawlers showed,” The New York Daily News reported yesterday. “The email also claimed to be giving away ten pairs of golden brass knuckles to ten people who tweet about the app.”
The team behind Rumblr also told the paper that they were working with the iOS store “to hash out legal issues preventing Rumblr’s approval.” They still plan to launch the beta today, November 9, at 5pm EST, though.
Whether this launch will actually be able to happen due to legal issues remains to be seen. Whether or not this is real, a Peeple-style clusterfuck, or an flat out hoax also remains to be seen. Business Insider remains dubious in their coverage, pointing out the general absurdity of the idea, the potential legal ramifications, and some of the inconsistencies in what we’ve seen from the developers so far. For example, the official site features a number of (perversely amusing) photos that claim to be from their Instagram profile, but no actual Rumblr account seems to exist. They did, however, manage to set up an official Twitter account.
We’ll find out one way or another at 5pm EST tonight. In the meantime, you can always hit up Reddit for some fascinating speculation on the subject as the world gets ready to (maybe) Rumblr.
[UPDATE: It was all just a hoax! Read about what turned out to be a creative marketing gimmick here.]
Check out these related stories:
Jack Slack: Street Fighting Roos
Someone Built a Computer Made of Punching Bags
HBO Patents Technology to Measure Punching Power and Speed During FightsThroughout 2012, The Caucus will occasionally pose five questions to individuals from across the political spectrum who have special insight into government, policy making and political combat. If there is someone you think should be interviewed, let us know in the comment section below, or send me an e-mail at [email protected].
This week’s subject is Jill Stein, a candidate for the Green Party’s presidential nomination. Ms. Stein, a former physician and teacher of internal medicine, writes and speaks about the connections between the environment and health. She ran for governor of Massachusetts in 2002 against Mitt Romney.
Q. Why are you running for president?
Michael Manning/Associated Press
A. We are in crisis and people are losing their jobs and their homes and their health care and affordable higher education and civil liberties. You name it, they are losing it. We have got a 1 percent that’s rolling in dough as much as ever and the political establishment is not fixing it. The establishment got us into this mess, in both parties. And that’s clear as day. Over 10 years, I have been a recalcitrant political challenger, a recurrent alternative that would not go away.
Q. Is your campaign trying to tap into the Occupy movement?
A. Occupy is very much a part of a broader move for democracy and economic and social justice. That is alive and well around the world. Just look at what is going on in Wisconsin which is directly linked to Occupy. It doesn’t have the name of Occupy, but they slept for three weeks in the statehouse. If that’s not Occupy, what is? The Occupy movement, beneath the surface, represents a political coming of age of a younger generation who have been on the receiving end of a generally exploitative economy. One of those groups to exploit has been young people. They have been exploited in education. The unemployment crisis hits them the hardest. They are bearing the burden for the climate disruptions that are coming down the pike.
Q. Does President Obama deserve credit for health care and other accomplishments?
A. Small time, sure. There are minor improvements. But on the other hand, he took single-payer off the table. He absolutely took a public option off the table. As we found on issue after issue — the war, reappointing George Bush’s secretary of defense, sticking to George Bush’s timeline on Iraq, expanding the war, expanding the drone wars all over the place. And how about bringing Wall Street in, the guys who created the problem, among his first appointments. It was pretty clear right then that this was going to be business as usual on steroids. We’re certainly not more secure, more equitable, more healthy or safer internationally, with what Obama has brought.
Q. What do you think of Mitt Romney?
A. He responds to his electorate. When he’s running in Salt Lake, he’s anti-abortion. When he’s running in Massachusetts, he’s pro-abortion. He responds to his electorate, broadly, except that he remains basically pro-business in a very narrow sense of the word — that is a pro-one-percent big, corporate multinational business. You know what, that’s not so different from the way Larry Summers and Tim Geithner are running the country under Barack Obama. When our governorship changed from Mitt Romney and it went directly to Deval Patrick, who is another poster child for progressive Democrats, no difference. Nothing detectable. Nothing changed in Massachusetts whatsoever.
Q. Is there a difference between the Democratic and Republican Parties?
A. You might look at one party as a rapidly sinking ship and say we’re going to vote for the other guy because the ship’s not going down so fast. We don’t like him but he’s not sinking the ship so fast. But the real question is, if both of those ships are heading for the bottom of the ocean, do you want to be on either of them? No. There’s no question about where those ships are heading if you are looking at the economy.
This interview has been edited and condensed.Metal or plastic? Ultrapixels or lasers? QHD or 1080p? It's time to choose between two of the hottest Android phones out there This is one of the big questions we find ourselves being asked by smartphone buyers — which is better, the LG G3 or the HTC One M8? Both of these high-end Android phones have captured the imagination of enthusiasts and technology fans since their announcement, and now both are widely available to buy in the U.S. So there's no avoiding the issue any longer — the Android Central editors are going to have to choose between the G3 and the M8. Join us as we break things down and make our decisions...
Physical hardware and build quality Q: Both of these devices are physically remarkable. The G3's sheer size lets it pack a 5.5-inch screen, but the HTC One M8 boasts the boasts a uniquely premium metal frame. Superficially speaking, whose design do you prefer? Alex Dobie: LG's done a fantastic job creating a 5.5-inch phone that's just as holdable and pocketable as its 5-inch competitors. But it's really tough to beat the curved metal unibody of the M8, tall and slippery though it may be. While LG's content imitating premium materials with its "metallic," rear, HTC has the real deal, and the in-hand feels is unlike any other smartphone. There are disadvantages, of course. You're never going to get wireless charging in a metal-backed phone, and HTC's solid unibody precludes any possibility of swapping your battery. But the M8's fantastic metal exterior more than makes up for this. This is almost like having to pick a favorite child. Phil Nickinson: This is almost like having to pick a favorite child. (And to sleep at night, I'd need to throw the Moto X into the mix.) For a phone of its size, the LG G3 wins out on in-hand feel. I've got small hands, so big phones have never really been my thing. But the difference between the G3 and the M8 is completely obvious. The G3 simply is easier and more comfortable hold. The M8 might look a little nicer — and I'm not convinced most civilians would be able to tell the difference between the M8's aluminum and the G3's plastic metal at a glance — but the G3 simply is easier to hang onto, full stop. The buttons on the back are still (surprisingly) easy to use. (Though HTC was right to "borrow" the Knock-On feature. The One M8 looks fantastic when sitting on a table, but the rounded body presents usability issues. Andrew Martonik: While the One M8 looks pretty — okay, absolutely — fantastic when it's sitting on a table, usability suffers somewhat with how smooth and rounded the entire body of the phone is. There's not a whole lot to grip onto, and when you add in the fact that the M8 is notably taller than the M7 and the power button is still on the top, it's a recipe for unfortunate drops. LG has done it again with the G3 when it comes to packing a gigantic screen into a phone that doesn't feel that big. Make no mistake though, this is still a huge phone. The metal-looking plastic treatment is in a different class compared to the glossy stuff covering the G2, which looks better and definitely helps you hold onto the thing. I still haven't gotten over the back buttons from a usability standpoint, but I think the G3 has the advantage here in terms of all-things-considered user experience and looks. Jerry Hildenbrand: Am I allowed to prefer the HTC One M7? I am going to have to pick the G3 here. Both phones look very similar from the back, but once in your hand the G3 just feels better. It's not the size, because both phones are a little "long-feeling" but it's the shape — especially at the very edge of the phone. There seems to be more meat to grab onto there, and I don't get the feeling that I'm going to drop the G3 like I have whenever I hold the M8. I don't think the G3 has the "perfect" design. I would have preferred a good soft-touch plastic over the faux metal thing LG has going on, and I wish the speaker placement was different, because the way I hold my phone covers the cutout on the back of the phone. But since I have to choose, I'll have to choose the G3 in this one.
Display and audio Q: The LG G3 is famed for being among the first "Quad HD" handsets to hit the market, while the M8 sticks to a 1080p display resolution. What are your thoughts on 1440p smartphone displays? Is it worth it on the G3? Or does HTC's BoomSound setup contribute to a more immersive experience? The G3's display size, not it's resolution, is what makes it great. Alex: I've said before that the G3's display size, not it's resolution, is what makes it great in my opinion. Though the 5.5-inch 1440p panel is impressive, and in some instances you can tell the difference compared to 1080p, I can't help thinking the G3 might've been a better phone overall with a lower-res screen. The occasional frame rate hiccups I'm seeing likely wouldn't affect a 1080p device, and battery life would surely be improved too. Then there's the fact that the G3's colors aren't quite as vibrant as many 1080p IPS LCDs, including the HTC One M8. The M8's screen, on the other hand, seems less compromised. It's plenty big at 5 inches, it displays colors that are bright and vivid but not excessively over-saturated, and runs just fine on a Snapdragon 801. I guess what' I'm really after is this kind of quality in something that's as easy to hold as the G3. Phil: Ask me whether I want more pixels than my eye can actually discern, or whether I want sound to sound better, I'll give you the same answer every time. Nothing beats BoomSound. It changes the way you experience videos and games on a device. I'd gladly trade pixel density — especially if the alternative means going back to a mere 1080p display — if that made it possible to sneak in those excellent front-facing speakers. The trick would be in not increasing the overall footprint of the phone. But physical limitations are what they are, at least if you want the sound quality HTC was seeking in this current iteration. Andrew: The LG G3's screen looks great, but I never found the 1080p displays in other devices (including the G2) to be lacking in any way. I notice the occasional slowdown on the G3, and it has to be at least partially related to the immense number of pixels the GPU is pushing around. I think LG could've stuck to 1080p and still offered a fantastic viewing experience, while at the same time keeping performance up. I think if the choice is between a crazy-high-density display and high-end front-facing speakers, the speakers have to win out … but then I would ask you whether or not taking up the real estate with those speakers is worth it, either. A QHD display at 5.5-inches is amazing for reading. Jerry: Most of the time, I don't see a lot of difference between a good 1080p display and the QHD display on the G3. Of course, every eye is different but it's my opinion that 1080p smartphone displays aren't ready to be put out to pasture just yet. There is one area where I see a big — and meaningful — difference. A QHD display at 5.5-inches is amazing for reading. I've not experienced any of the "sharpening" issues some complain about, and when I snuggle under the covers each night and crack open whichever eBook I'm reading at the moment (I'm trying to get through Finnegan's Wake again at the moment) that QHD display just does it for me. A 1080p display is great for reading. The G3's QHD display is downright incredible.
Buttons... Q: The G3 and M8 have wildly different button layouts. Do you like yours on the top and the side, or on the back? Alex: When I first saw the LG G2's rear buttons, my initial reaction was to assume it was a gimmick, and that LG was being different for the sake of being different. I didn't spend much time with the G2, but within an hour of using its successor, the G3, something just clicked, and back buttons started making sense. They're easy to reach, located in a natural place for left and right-handed users, and they free up space on the sides of the device. It's one of those features that sounds crazy until you try it. Within an hour of using the LG G3, back buttons just made sense. I'm not opposed to more traditional button layouts, but the power button on the M8, situated way up on the top edge of the device, is one of the more difficult to reach. Fortunately both the G3 and the M8 have ways of powering themselves on without the use of a power button. HTC calls it Motion Launch; on the G3 it's KnockOn. Phil: It's insane. It'll never work. Buttons on the back of the phone? But you know what? It works. And it works very well. Part of that is because of LG's Knock On (and Knock Code), which means you don't have to use the power button nearly as often. And, in fact, tapping the display to wake it will spoil you for just about every other device afterward. Moving the volume rocker back there along with it works fine, too. And it's important to remember that there's some added functionality — they serve as shortcuts to Q Memo and the camera. KnockOn is good, but it'll never work 100 percent of the time. Andrew: I may be forever scarred from trying to use the horribly-designed Verizon LG G2 back buttons, but I still don't get the appeal here. Sure, it lets LG make the bezels on the G3 just that much slimmer, but I still find it to be an unnecessary usability hinderance. Put the power and volume buttons on the side, make the screen 5.3-inches instead, and you'll never have a single hassle turning the phone on and off. KnockOn is good, but it'll never work 100 percent of the time. KnockOff is even more bothersome since you need a blank spot on your homescreen or to reach up to the status bar. LG, please put the buttons back where they belong. (And get off my lawn while you're at it.) Jerry: I said it with the G2, and the LG Flex, and I'll say it again — buttons on the back are tha bomb. They take a bit of getting used to, but once your brain and muscle memory is dialed in everything seems much more natural. My index finger feels at home perched on the buttons, which means adjusting the volume or using the quick shortcuts is easy for me. Having said that, when using a more traditional button placement scheme, I still prefer the power button up top. When i want to turn the screen on or off, I know where to do it from and being waaay up there on the M8 means I'm not always bumping it like I do when they are placed on the side.
Cameras and image quality Q: Let's talk about lasers and Ultrapixels. These are two handsets with very different approaches to smartphone photography. (And different Gallery and sharing experiences backing them up.) Which one have you preferred to use? The G3's camera isn't perfect, but in my view it's more balanced than the M8's. Alex: The M8's camera excels at fast exposures, as well as low-light and indoor photography. In daylight, however, that 4-megapixel ceiling starts to become an issue, as does the M8's relatively narrow dynamic range, and its tendency to capture more visible noise than I'd like. The G3's camera isn't perfect, but in my view it is much more balanced. It's great in daylight, with an auto HDR mode which engages in shots with very bright areas. And the laser-assisted autofocus and OIS+ stabilization means it also delivers good-looking low-light shots, and is quicker to focus than just about any phone camera I've used. HTC has an excellent software suite backing up its cameras — Zoe and video highlights are polished and well-executed. But until the image quality improves, I'm inclined to leave the M8 behind if I know I'm going to be taking photos. Phil: I like to think I can get a decent shot out of most smartphone cameras. And I've mostly been happy with the result of the HTC One M8, provided that I've taken the time (or had the time) to compose the shot. And that's not always possible. And I still love the idea of Zoes, though HTC managed to make a mess out of them in Sense 6, first by sticking the Zoe toggle an extra level down, and then by making them more confusing by making them even more like traditional video. (Which they always were, but whatever.) And HTC never managed to easily explain video highlights. (And where the hell is the Zoe app?) I'm just more consistent with the LG G3 camera. The app isn't the prettiest in the world, but it's plenty functional. (Odd that Photo Spheres — er, VR Panorama — disappeared, though.) And a higher resolution just gives options that a 4MP image doesn't. Andrew: The One M8 has a great camera on its own, and most people who pick one up and snap a few pics will be happy. That is, until they try the G3 and compare the photos. The G3 has all the resolution you'll need, along with OIS+ and laser autofocus. The One M8 over-processes the crap out of pictures to make up for its lack of pixels and dynamic range, still has trouble managing exposure and really falls behind in daylight situations compared to its competitors. The G3 has all the resolution you'll need, along with OIS, and while the camera app takes a little getting used to it's perfectly functional. Jerry: The G3 has a better camera, both on paper and during real-world use. But it's not the better camera for me. The M8 takes pictures faster, and the shots in dim light are better. They aren't perfect, but chances are you'll be able to whip out the M8 and grab a "good enough" picture in a dark room. I spend most of my daylight hours inside working, and spend my playtime in places like restaurants or bars or clubs where the light is low. The G3 does a better job in these conditions than most other phones, but it's not nearly as good at it as the M8 is.
Performance Q: We're dealing with two of the fastest Android phones out there right now, both running Snapdragon 801 processors with plenty of RAM. Which have you found the fastest in day-to-day use? And perhaps more importantly, how have the G3 and M8 fared in terms of battery life? Alex: The HTC One M8 is pretty much the quickest smartphone I've used to date. HTC has done an amazing job not just smoothing out animations and screen transitions, but delivering lightning-fast touch responses — a big part of what makes a phone feel fast. Over on the G3, things aren't quite so buttery. Though apps load quickly, and certain animations are as fast as on any Android phone, there's a tendency to drop frames here and there that you just don't see on the M8. LG's flagship isn't slow by any means, but it's clear the HTC One is the speedier device. As far as battery life goes, I've gotten about the same from both phones — around 16 hours of moderate-to-heavy use, hopping between Wifi and LTE. The M8 seems to give me a little more screen-on time than the G3 — though this is hard to judge as Sense has no way to directly track this stuff. For me, though, convenience factors like the removable battery and wireless charging probably make the G3 a winner on battery life, even though the performance isn't perfect all-round. The HTC One M8 is simply faster than the LG G3. Period. Phil: I don't care why. I don't care how. I don't care what runtime is being used, or whether one's on a slightly different base version of Android than another. I don't care that one has nearly a full 3 gigabytes of RAM. The HTC One M8 is simply faster than the LG G3. Period. Maybe it's because the M8 is pushing fewer pixels. Maybe the software is just better. All I know is it's faster. And at the end of the day, that's all that matters. Andrew: When it comes to software and app performance on a daily basis, nothing can seem to top the One M8 right now — the thing just flies. Whether you're jumping between a few recent apps, playing a game or just browsing the web, you're really hard pressed to find a slowdown on the M8. Battery life seems strong — and most importantly, consistent — to get me an entire day's use without hitting the 15 percent mark when I go to bed. The G3 is plenty smooth, but when you compare it to the M8 you can see there's some catching up to do. The G3, on the other hand, tends to struggle more regularly. On my Sprint G3 I notice sluggishness particularly when closing and switching apps, as I assume the system and software just can't keep up with pushing that 1440p display. Most of the experience is plenty smooth, and I think a lot of people will be happy with it, but when you compare it to the M8 you can see that the G3 has catching up to do. I also haven't had the greatest luck with battery life on the G3 as it seems to be inconsistent from day-to-day, but I have a feeling using this Sprint model and bumping between 3G and LTE so often isn't helping. Jerry: The M8 is faster. But then again, the M8 is faster than most every other KitKat phone. As much as I dislike the design choices in the exterior of the M8, the software optimization that was done just blows the rest away when it comes to raw speed while navigating through your homescreens or opening applications. The G3 isn't slow, but it has a stutter every now and then, and it clearly doesn't open applications as fast as the M8. I'm in the midst of torture-testing my G3 battery, but so far I have nothing to complain about. Once I get past 12 hours on a charge, I know the battery life is good enough for me.
Software experience Q: HTC Sense 6 and the G3's LG UI couldn't be further apart in terms of visual style, and the two software suites offer a divergent array of features, too. Who has done the best job when it comes to smartphone software? Alex: LG has made huge advances since the G2, a device which shipped with a schizophrenic, multicolored UI less than a year ago. On the G3 the whole interface seems just a little better thought-out, with greater internal consistency and a less cartoonish appearance. That said, there's still work to be done, and parts that don't quite fit into the flattened, geometric whole. HTC Sense is clearly the product of a company with design in its DNA. HTC Sense, on the other hand, is clearly the product of a company with design in its DNA. Not only is it fast, but all the individual limbs feel like they're part of a cohesive whole. Whether it's the BlinkFeed home screen reader, more basic applications like the dialer and messages apps, or the feature-packed Gallery app, everything is consistently well-designed. And for that reason I'm giving this one to HTC. Phil: LG's come a long way in the years I've been using its phones. But Sense is still better. That said, I use a third-party launcher on all my phones, so that's a wash. But Sense has a more cohesive design. It feels more natural. And, yes, it's just faster to use. LG made a point of having a sleeker and more unified software experience on the G3, and the results definitely show. Andrew: I think LG made a point to have a sleeker and more unified software experience on the G3, and the results definitely show. Not only did it ditch the on-screen menu key and some of the crazy flashy animations, but it also gave everything a clean coat of paint. Sadly there are still far too many useless features here that just keep popping up and getting in my way, and LG still needs to exercise some more restraint on its devices going forward. When it comes to non-Nexus devices, HTC still takes the cake in terms of its software experience. Not only is performance fantastic (as we talked about above), but everything looks consistent and acts just the way you expect it to. This feels like a real operating system, not just something tacked on top of AOSP, and it just keeps getting better with each iteration. Jerry: Hey LG! You know how you pared things way back for this version of your OS? Keep doing that for the next one. I've been using LG phones since LG started selling Android phones. Their UI was the worst, and it's not just me that thinks so. What they delivered on the G3 is fine, and the consumer side of me thinks it's decent. That same consumer side of me thinks that Sense 6 is better.
The bottom line Q: Here's the big question: If you could use only one of these phones for the next year, which would it be? And what's the deciding factor? Alex: This is a really tough call, but I have to fall back on the device I think provides the most enjoyable experience out of the box, and that's the HTC One M8. HTC has the best software, the fastest performance, a great-looking screen and unmatched audio capabilities. Is it a little slippery? Sure, but that's something you adjust to with time, and silver and gold variants are a little less slick than the smoother gunmetal grey M8. Beyond that, the Ultrapixel camera is this phone's only real area of weakness. It's probably the least impressive camera of the current crop of flagships, but the fact that I'm willing to put up with that should underscore how awesome the rest of the experience is. In my view it's the better of the two despite its camera, not because of it. On the LG side of the fence, the occasional software stutters are the G3's main weakness — one the manufacturer could have solved by using a standard 1080p panel, or waiting on the more powerful Snapdragon 805 processor, which is better equipped to handle a QHD display. (In fact, an S805-powered G3 is available in Korea right now, but LG says it won't release this model internationally.) I'm a big fan of the G3, and I think it's very nearly the best Android phone out there; for the moment, HTC pips it to the post. Both are really, really good phones, each with its particular flaws. But I have to pick one... Phil: And that's the question, isn't it? Which phone. The LG G3, or the HTC One M8? Both are really, really good phones, each with its particular flaws. But I have
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brates such as sea pens, animals that resemble elaborate, colourful plumes, Moran said.
Many of the species in the deep sea haven't yet been identified, so the robots will be shooting video of them, as well as collecting specimens and bringing them back to the surface. Tough ones, such as shellfish, will be grabbed by the robots' manipulator arms, while more delicate ones will be sucked into special tubes.
The mission will run 24 hours a day, although there will be times, such as when the subs travel at high speed between sites aboard the research ships Nautilus and Thompson, when online viewers won't see much. The Nautilus, operated by the U.S.-based Ocean Exploration Trust, is joining the mission for the first time. The organization is headed by Robert Ballard, who discovered the wreck of the Titanic.
This 'unidentified flying jellyfish' was observed two kilometres below the surface during Ocean Networks Canada's 2013 undersea mission. If you watch the mission online, seeing jellyfish is guaranteed, says Kate Moran, president of Ocean Networks Canada. (Ocean Networks Canada)
While live online views are always available from the undersea observatories themselves, which are equipped with cameras and high-speed internet connections, Moran says cameras on the robots offer the unique opportunity to:
View the ocean as you descend from the surface to the ocean floor.
See the entire landscape around the observatories.
Watch science and technology in action.
The robots will be connecting new instruments to the network at some sites, including:
A multi-lens camera that will shoot 3D images in Saanich Inlet, on Vancouver Island.
New sensors to measure underwater landslides in the Fraser Delta.
Microphones to detect whales and measure the noise from passing ships.
New tsunami detectors at Cascadia Basin.
Temporary sensors that aren't connected to the network will be dropped off at the Barkley observatory, where a trawler had earlier severed the internet and power connection. A replacement box to restore internet and power will be added later.
Robert Ballard, president of the Ocean Exploration Trust, talks to CBC reporter Sterling Eyford in front of the Hercules robot on the deck of the Nautilus research ship. The ship is joining the annual expedition for the first time. (Ocean Networks Canada)
The robots will also do some undersea mapping and drop off two fresh pig carcasses in the Georgia Strait for forensic research. The goal is to reveal how bodies decompose underwater – research that could be useful to police investigators when a body is pulled from the ocean.The Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta is not an ordinary balloon festival. Balloons soar above the Albuquerque landscape and delight visitors during the fall each year. The best way to attend this festival is on a great vacation to Albuquerque, New Mexico. First, find out the most interesting facts about this fiesta. Then, book one of the cheap flights to Albuquerque!
1. The Albuquerque balloon festival is a 9 day event lasting all day! Events begin as early as 5:45 am and end at 8:00 pm. During the day or night, visitors can enjoy the sights of balloons souring high above the ground.
2. Balloons are not the only thing to see at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. There are plenty of live music, food vendors, fireworks, and a one of a kind balloon glow. The Balloon glow happens at night and is a celebration of the people of the town of Albuquerque.
3. Your list of things to do in Albuquerque would not complete without the largest balloon festival in the world. Since this event only happens every October, so book your trip accordingly!
4. If you do not want to participate in the event with your balloon team, you can check out the hot air balloon rides with the Rainbow Ryders. This group of operators is the official balloon guides of the event.
5. Multiple countries participate in the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta. This event is an amazing international delight!
6. While you are visiting the balloon fiesta, stay at Old Town Albuquerque to experience another historical part of Albuquerque. This town offers a wide variety of bed and breakfast and hotels for visitors to choose from.
7. The Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta has been a part of Albuquerque traditions since 1972! After multiple years, this balloon experience has grown from 30 participants to hundreds of international participants. Ballooning is actually the worlds oldest aviation sport.In efforts to bolster its reputation as an equal opportunities employer, the Kerbal Space Centre has taken to accepting a more diverse range of Kerbonaut applicants (to the
extent that the law requires).
Willzyx, the newest recruit, did not pass basic training, not even close (due to a weight problem). He has however, been taken on as a civilian Xeno-Oceanology consultant/ occasional ballast.
MORPHOLOGY
Willzyx is based on a 'type A' 'typical' adult male killer whale. He is about 8 metres long and weighs about 7 tonnes.
WHAT FOR?
Maybe you have always wondered what it is like to run a productive space program with evil communists from the Horsehead Nebula breathing down your neck. Maybe you would just like to help Willzyx return home, to the mun, so he can dance with the other Zypods.
Willzyx in action https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nAWSKcrrTcAustin Mitchell said 'Grimsby' was "a total distortion of a wonderful little community" and suggested the Ali G star should be electrocuted.
His outspoken comments came in a review of the film for The House magazine.
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Austin Mitchell: Labour would hold Great Grimsby 'even with raving paedophile candidate'
Thoughts before going: Austin Mitchell
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In the movie, Baron Cohen plays England football hooligan and dad-of-11 Norman 'Nobby' Butcher, who lives in the Lincolnshire fishing town and whose long-lost brother is an MI6 assassin.
Mr Mitchell, who was the MP for Great Grimsby for 38 years until he stood down at the last election, said his reaction after watching the film was "furious anger".
In a reference to Baron Cohen's hit movie 'Borat', about a Kazakh journalist travelling through the United States, he said: "Why doesn't he get back to Kazakhstan and die? Being public enemy number one in Grimsby puts him in greater danger than the Kazakh accolade, which only involves hanging by his toe nails. We're more inventive than that."
He added: "It shows nothing at all of the real charm of our town, its sense of community, it's friendliness, the best fish and chips in the world at Steels, its pride, its low cost of living and all the other things that make it such a good place to live.
"We're the alternative energy capital of the world. On our new electric chair Sacha could be the first man to be executed by sustainable energy."
Grimsby was released last month to mixed reviews.Russia says it has lifted visa restrictions for tourists and businessmen from Iran as well as 17 other countries for trips to the country’s Far East.
The announcement was made by Russia’s Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev as reported by Sputnik news agency.
"I have recently approved the list of countries, whose nationals can take advantage of the preferential regime. Businessmen and tourists will not need to undergo the traditional procedure of Russian visas receipt," the Prime Minister said. It will be enough for foreigners "to enter their data on a special website in the Internet," Medvedev said.
"We are proactively forming the modern infrastructure and creating special regimes in the Far East; the law on visits to the Vladivostok free port was approved in March," Medvedev said.
Cancellation of visa procedures for tourists and businessmen "will promote growth of investment and tourist attractiveness of the Far East," the prime minister said.
The region will earn more money from tourist traffic growth, he added. Eighteen countries from various regions selected by the reciprocity principle were included into the list, Medvedev said.
"This is not because these states are situated at a closer or longer distance - we are appropriately introducing bilateral agreements on visa-free travel for those ready to use such an approach for us," he added.
According to the official site of the Cabinet, the list of 18 countries comprises Algeria, Bahrain, Brunei, India, Iran, Qatar, China, North Korea, Kuwait, Morocco, Mexico, the UAE, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Tunisia, Turkey and Japan.
Sputnik reported in late March that Iran and Russia had signed an agreement to simplify visa procedures for groups of tourists travelling between the two countries.
According to the Federal Agency for Tourism, the flow of tourists from Iran to Russia in 2016 was expected to exceed the record levels of last year, Sputnik added.
In 2016, Iran’s Vice President Es’haq Jahangiri announced that the country wanted to attract 1-2 million visitors by removing tourist visas for Russian nationals.Brwa Nouri + FÖLJ
English version: Dalkurd FF promoted to Allsvenskan
1 av 3 | Foto: TT
avFrida Fagerlund
FOTBOLL 28 oktober 2017 18:20
BORLÄNGE. 13 years ago, Dalkurd was born. Now the club are preparing for life in Swedens topflight, Allsvenskan. 1-0 against Gais means that promotion is secured.
Prior to the season Dalkurd were favourites to take home Superettan, Swedens second highest division. The table became even tighter than many had believed in advance and the battle for promotion has been tough all the way to the finish.
As late as last week, Brommapojkarna became the first team to be promoted to Allsvenskan after a 1-0 win at home to the Börlänge club. Now Dalkurd themselves join them in the country’s highest division. Saturdays win against Gais gives them a six point lead over third placed Trelleborg with only one game to play.
– It's like my brother-in-law Brwa Nouri (Östersund) said; it's unfair to my feelings to put them into words. We can go as far as possible, says Ahmed Awad.
Captain Scorer
The first half was sparse of chances, with the home team enjoying more possession in front of the seasons highest crowd of 2,740 spectators. Ahmed Awad failed to convert as Kujtim Bala crossed from the left touchline.
Gais had a similar opportunity just before halftime, but Alibek Alievs shot went high over keeper Frank Pettersson goal.
Much of the same followed in the second half. An early attack saw the ball dance around the the goaline before Gais keaper Damir Mehic cleared.
Then in the end the goal came. Captain Rawez Lawan struck in 1-0 after a silky pass från Heradi Rashidi in the 59th minute.
– Being able to give so much joy to a people so oppressed... I don't know how to describe it, Ahmed Awad.
May leave Borlänge
The scoreline stood for the rest of the match. Dalkurd will play in Allsvenskan 2018 for the first time in the clubs 13 year history.
Whether or not they continue to play at Domnarsvallen is less than certain. There has been speculation for a while that the club may move to Uppsala.
In the final round of the season they meet third place Trelleborg away at Vångavallen.
* The text is translated by Steve GavinThe Pittsburgh Penguins' development arm, Pittsburgh Arena Real Estate Development LP, is nearing its final deadline to start the first phase of development at the former Civic Arena site in the Lower Hill District.
The Penguins have until Sunday to draw down (which means to buy, sort of -- it's complicated) on the site’s first 2.14-acre parcel, the boundaries of which are yet to be determined. Pittsburgh’s Chief Development Officer Kevin Acklin said a number of issues still remain, but that the parties are engaged in good faith negotiations.
“In some cases, some of these deadlines are arbitrary,” he said. “We’ve been able to accommodate in the past certain delays when they made sense."
Councilman Daniel Lavelle, whose district includes the Hill District, said the agreement signed by the Penguins is very clear.
“If they don’t draw down on the parcel by Oct. 22, then it automatically reverts back to the city,” he said. “That is the process we should follow.”
State Sen. Wayne Fontana (D-Brookline), chairman of SEA's board, said he’s confident everyone will come together in time, but agreed it’s a hard deadline.
“And it’s a deadline that everyone is waiting to see and hear a plan that’ll revitalize that 28 acres,” he said.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has dismissed a fair housing complaint filed against the project based on preliminary development plans.
In a letter of determination received Sept. 5 by the Pittsburgh Urban Redevelopment Authority, HUD wrote “that no reasonable cause exists to believe that a discriminatory housing practice has occurred.”
However, the attorney representing the Hill District Consensus Group, which brought the complaint, was still encouraged by HUD’s decision.
“My sense is that it’s positive,” said Don Driscoll, an attorney with the Community Justice Project. “They did determine that the Community Collaboration and Implementation Plan numbers [which prescribed the project's affordability levels] would disproportionately impact black families in Pittsburgh, disproportionately exclude them.”
The land in the Lower Hill is owned jointly by the Sports and Exhibition Authority of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, or SEA, and the URA. The complaint was filed on behalf of the Hill District Consensus Group by the Community Justice Project on Feb. 29, 2016. Named as respondents were the City of Pittsburgh, the City of Pittsburgh Planning Commission, the URA and the SEA.
The complaint alleged that the project was in violation of the Fair Housing Act of 1968 because it denied housing to the Hill District’s African American residents and pointed to the preliminary land development plan (PLDP) filed for the development.
According to the complaint, the PLDP failed to meet the city’s obligation to affirmatively further fair housing. According to HUD’s website that means taking “meaningful actions” to tackle discrimination and promote “inclusive communities.”
Though unfamiliar with the administrative complaint, Executive Director of the Pittsburgh Commission on Human Relations Carlos Torres said in an interview earlier this spring, “The city has an obligation to purposely overcome patterns of segregation and the denial of access of opportunity that are part of our nation's history.”
In April, the Penguins and developer McCormack Baron Salazar filed a letter of intent for the site, proposing 20 percent of the housing on the 28-acre site be affordable to those making 60 percent of the area median income, about $32,000.
Because the median income for black families in Pittsburgh is only about $26,000, the Hill District Consensus Group alleged that the Penguins’ plan would largely exclude African Americans from accessing housing on the site, and that the respondents were failing to provide low-income housing on the site.
The respondents rejected that allegation, citing the Community Collaboration and Implementation Plan (CCIP) signed in 2014, which promised that 20 percent of the development’s housing units will be affordable. That 20 percent was broken into three groups: 15 percent would be available to those making 80 percent or more of area median income (AMI); 2.5 percent would be available to those making 70 percent AMI; and the final 2.5 percent of units would be available to those making 60 percent AMI.
In the course of its investigation of the complaint, HUD found that, disproportionately, African American renters in Pittsburgh make between 0 and 50 percent of AMI, and therefore, "African Americans would be disproportionately unlikely to afford to live at the subject property if units were rented at the minimum numbers and levels of affordability identified as'success metrics' in the CCIP,” incorporated into the preliminary land development plan.
But because a final land development plan (FLDP) has yet to be filed, HUD found that the actual level of affordable housing at the site could not be determined at this time.
Driscoll and the Hill District Consensus Group said they will continue to pursue deeper levels of affordability for the Lower Hill site. Driscoll said he wasn't sure whether that would come through the courts.
Despite HUD’s dismissal, Acklin said the city still remains vigilant on the issue of affordable housing.
“Regardless of whether HUD’s looking into it, it’s our responsibility to make sure that the development that happens here is respectful of the history of the Lower Hill,” Acklin said.
HUD's letter of determination did not reach the Community Justice Project until this week; it was sent to an old address.
The Penguins did not return repeated requests for comment.Image copyright Thinkstock Image caption Ofcom says broadband TV may one day be seen as a replacement for broadcast TV
The number of UK homes owning a TV set has fallen for the first time, as more people watch programmes on their laptops, tablets and smartphones.
Media watchdog Ofcom said TV-owning households dropped by 300,000 between the end of 2012 and the end of 2013, from 26.33 million to 26.02 million.
Nearly one million of the homes without a TV set do have internet access.
Ofcom said this indicated a trend towards using other devices to watch catch-up programmes online.
The number of households owning one or more TV sets had risen steadily every year since 1956, when figures started being collected.
The first survey found 5.7 million households - about one in three - owned a television. By the 1970s, 93% of homes were able to watch programmes.
Changing habits
As well as TV household numbers supplied by Barb, Ofcom's Infrastructure Report also cited July figures from BBC iPlayer.
These showed that 47% of that month's iPlayer requests came from tablets or mobiles, up from just 25% in October 2012.
TV ownership in the UK Year Total households Households with TV sets Percentage 2012 (Q4) 27.36m 26.33m 96.3% 2013 (Q4) 27.26m 26.02m 95.5%
Ofcom suggested that "over time, more consumers may come to regard broadband TV services as a replacement for broadcast TV".
In the 18-24 age group, 15% watch most of their television on a laptop, compared to the national average of 3%.
The report also looked at how the UK's broadband and communications networks are supporting this growth.
It highlighted how broadband speeds vary considerably, with concerns over availability a fact of life in "city not-spots" such as central London, as well as rural areas.
The average UK household or small business now downloads the equivalent of 35 feature films worth of data each month, a 77% increase on 2013.
It also uploads the equivalent of 3,500 digital photos every month.110 shares 79
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The Ariane Group has signed a new contract with the European Space Agency for a next generation rocket engine.
The contract, signed on December 14th, will see the development of the Prometheus engine, described as “a very low cost engine” and intended for launches from 2030.
The economics of space are changing with enterprises such as Rocket Labs, Space X and Aerojet Rocketdyne aiming to produce launch vehicles that lower the cost of missions. Other companies such as Relativity Space are also using additive manufacturing as part of a vision of “scaling and sustaining an interplanetary society”.
The Prometheus engine will run on liquid oxygen and methane, and is expected to cost approximately 1 million euros. This is 10 times less than current rocket engines such as the Vulcain®2.
To achieve such a cost-saving Ariane Group will use, “an entirely new approach [including] the use of innovative design and production methods and tools.” Specific details of the production techniques are still under wraps, however the company has confirmed that 3D printing will be used – with the gas generator named as one of the 3D printed components.
Testing scheduled for 2020 at DLR
The contract was signed by Daniel Neuenschwander, Director of Space Transportation at the European Space Agency (ESA), and Alain Charmeau, CEO of ArianeGroup. It covers the design, manufacturing and testing of the first two examples of the Prometheus demonstrator.
Once construction is complete the Prometheus is scheduled for testing in 2020, using the P5 test bed of the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Lampoldshausen, Germany.
The Prometheus engine marks a switch from previous propellants used by Ariane. The current liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen combination will be replaced by a mix of liquid oxygen and methane. Other changes will include the “digitalization of engine control and diagnostics, and manufacturing using 3D printing in a connected factory environment.”
Nominate the best additive innovations in the the second annual 3D Printing Industry Awards now.
To be the first with all the latest 3D printer releases, subscribe to the free 3D Printing Industry newsletter, follow us on Twitter, and like us on Facebook.Previously announced news topics
LEGACY SAVE CONVERSION CRASH/HANGUP
PS4 ONLY
PS4 Settings -> Application Saved Data Management -> Saved Data in System Storage -> Upload the SYSTEM file (Select Terraria) to the cloud or USB drive (as a backup) Delete the SYSTEM file in the System Storage (keep the USB/Cloud Backup)
Restart the game.
XBOX ONE ONLY
SENDING YOUR SAVE FILES IS A TREMENDOUS HELP (PS4 ONLY)
[email protected]
Please include your email address in the note field as well as an overview of the issue you’re encountering.
Display Settings (Cut Off UI or Black Bars)
PS4
Xbox One
CANNOT MAP ITEMS TO D-PAD
This is actually off in the default controller scheme. However, you can toggle this back on by going to the following:
Open the Menu, select the Controls option, and scroll down to "Quick Navigation"
There is an option labeled "Directional Buttons Hotbar" on PS4 and "D-Pad Hotbar" on Xbox One. To activate this option, you want to click on it and make sure the circle next to it is solid white.
and "D-Pad Hotbar" on. To activate this option, you want to click on it and make sure the circle next to it is solid white. To assign items to the D-Pad once this is done, open your inventory and select the item in game, and press the D-Pad button you want to use as a shortcut for that item
Images in the spoiler below show this process
D-Pad Mapping Instructions
HOW DO I ZOOM WITH NO TOUCHPAD ZOOMING? (PS4 ONLY)
In the current build, Zoom is accessible by going to Options and then use R2 and L2 to zoom in/out to your preference.
I SPAWNED AND MY CHARACTER IS FROZEN AND MADE OF STONE
This is certainly one of the more crazy bugs we have ever seen - however, there is a way to save your character from their stony fate:
To fix this, your character needs to be killed in game. Once you respawn, save & exit, this should clear up this bug for good on that character.
How you do this is up to you, though for those players that spawned into a giant home base where spawns are rare and you have tons of NPCs to protect you, that may be difficult.
If this is your situation, we suggest making a new world, taking that character into that new world, removing all of your armor, and letting the slime horde (or zombies at night) kill you off.
Again, after you die and respawn, things should be cleared up for that character.
HOW DO I CANCEL A BUFF/PET/ETC.?
Folks have had trouble sorting this out - so here is how to do it!
Open your inventory
Press R1 to cycle to the armor/ accessories section
Click x on the grappling hook icon 'Equipment'
At the bottom of this menu should be buff icons, highlight the one you want to cancel and click x to get rid of it.
Canceling Buffs
CONSOLE MULTIPLAYER MAP OVERWRITE WORKAROUND
Currently, there is a bug on PS4 & XB1 that can cause the host's map save to overwrite your own (causing you to lose your world in the process). Below is an update on the fix for this as well as a workaround that appears to be highly effective
We have a fix for it that was put in (although not before this RC was submitted to cert), but an intrepid dev at Pipeworks has found a workaround for people until we get that patch in:
The bug should be 100% avoidable until the patch goes in by taking the following steps: Restarting the application before joining a multiplayer game.
In other words, if you're playing already on one of your own maps and want to join a friend's game, instead of just backing out to the menu and joining from there, close Terraria completely and restart it before joining.
This should keep your existing maps from getting overwritten until the fix we have goes live
BACKING UP GAMES TO THE CLOUD ON XBOX ONE
Unlike PlayStation 4, XBox One does not allow for USB save transfers. The only option for backing up your game saves is to utilize Microsoft's Cloud storage via XBox Live. Pipeworks encourages everyone to familiarize themselves with the way to do this via the link below - just in case something bad happens to your local data.
Instructions from Microsoft on how to do this: https://support.xbox.com/en-US/games/game-setup/cloud-save-games <- This is for XBox 360
<- Instructions from Microsoft on how to do this for XBox One: https://support.xbox.com/en-US/games/game-setup/cloud-game-saves-faq
PROJECTILES ARE VANISHING
If you find that projectiles (weapon projectiles, grappling hooks, fishing lines) are going invisible, a workaround is to avoid using dyes until it can be fixed
CHESTS RAPIDLY OPENING/CLOSING
More than 100 years ago, Indianapolis built its first sewer system to carry stormwater away from streets, homes and businesses. When indoor plumbing came along, sewage lines from homes and businesses were hooked to these same sewers, combining stormwater and sewage in one pipe and sending it directly to our rivers and streams. These “combined sewers” were state of the art at the time. Most communities did not even have sewers back then.
As sanitation engineering techniques improved and the city grew, the city built wastewater treatment plants to treat the sewage. During periods of normal rainfall, the systems function properly by conveying both stormwater and sewage to wastewater treatment facilities. However, during rain events with ¼-inch of rainfall or more, the combined system can cause raw sewage to overflow, called Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs), into our streams and rivers causing a threat to public health. In the central part of Indianapolis within the combined sewer system, even a light rain storm can cause raw sewage to overflow and pollute Indianapolis waterways. Without the ability for the sewers to overflow, raw sewage would back up into people’s basements and onto streets.
In new neighborhoods today, we build separate sewers for stormwater and sewage. However, combined sewers remain in many of the city’s older neighborhoods. Raw sewage overflows are a major cause of wet-weather pollution in portions of White River, Fall Creek, Eagle Creek, Pleasant Run, Bean Creek, Pogues Run, Lick Creek and State Ditch.
Understanding Combined Sewer Overflows
Combined sewers convey both storm water and wastewater (sewage) in one piping system. Historically, more than 800 communities across the United States built combined sewers once indoor plumbing became commonplace in the late 1800s.
During normal rain events with ¼-inch of rainfall or less, the combined system capacity can become overwhelmed, resulting in a mixture of storm water and wastewater overflowing into area waterways. This is referred to as a combined sewer overflow (CSO) event, which causes a threat to public health and the environment.
Under the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Clean Water Act, Indianapolis and other combined sewer communities must develop plans to reduce these overflows to protect human health and the environment. Ignoring these problems makes it more difficult to attract new businesses, jobs and residents to our world-class city. To address CSOs, Citizens is implementing a $2 billion Long Term Control Plan that is required to be completed by 2025 under a consent decree with the EPA and the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM).
Continue to The SolutionThe 19-year-old had only just made his long-awaited comeback in last weekend's NYC clash against Canterbury. However, he again went down - without a hand laid on him - during a training session on Friday night. ''He was training with the 20s, who were training together with first grade,'' said Roosters chief operating officer of football Brian Canavan. ''He stepped off his right knee. Obviously there's a predisposed weakness there. ''We recently re-sent him back to the surgeon to get clearance and the surgeon was extremely happy. It's just one of those things, unfortunately.'' Moga was set to make Australian rugby league history later this year by becoming the first player to represent for the Junior Kangaroos in three different years. He joins a growing injury ward at Bondi Junction. NSW pivot James Maloney will miss Monday night's clash against Manly after suffering eye fractures in Origin II but is in no doubt for the decider. But there are longer term concerns, with prop Martin Kennedy expected to miss up to three months after hyperextending his knee against the Bulldogs.
And Kane Evans, denied his NRL debut last weekend because of the contentious restrictions of the second-tier salary cap, is recovering from surgery after injuring an ankle while playing for Newtown last weekend. He is expected to be sidelined for 12 to 15 weeks but said he was optimistic of playing again this year. The Roosters unsuccessfully applied to the NRL to use Evans last weekend from the interchange bench, but were told by NRL officials to use Tinirau Arona. Speaking for the first time about the cruel twists of fate, Evans said: ''I'm shattered with the injury. The club has informed me they were hoping for me to make my NRL debut. If I was to have the injury, I would rather have it from playing in the NRL.'' Obviously there's a predisposed weakness there. Roosters supremo Nick Politis blasted the red tape preventing youngsters from rising into the NRL, telling Fairfax Media last week: ''They're telling you who to pick.''
Other club powerbrokers are furious that the ARLC has chosen not to make promised changes to the second-tier cap until next year. Loading One source said it was hypocritical that the NRL had changed obstruction laws and introduced a ''no biff'' edict on violence mid-season but could not address an equally pressing issue that had arisen during the 2013 season. Canavan said the granting of a mid-season release to Brisbane-bound forward Lama Tasi had led to a shift in players ranked in the first- and second-tier salary caps and promising youngster Dylan Napa could now play in the NRL without restriction.Check out this curious 25-second time-lapse/composite video that shows every airplane that landed at San Diego International Airport on Black Friday a week ago between 10:30am and 3pm. The giant planes whiz by overhead as if they’re part of a fighter jet squadron heading off to battle — not something you’d expect to see with commercial planes at an airport. It was created by photography and film professor Cy Kuckenbaker.
He came up with the idea after seeing this composite photo that we shared a while back, created by Ho-Yeol Ryu at Hannover Airport:
Here’s what Kuckenbaker tells us about how his project came about and how it was created:
I moved to a new neighborhood in San Diego a little over a year ago that put me close to the San Diego Int. Airport. Since then I have become increasingly interested in the rhythms of the airport and the airplanes themselves. San Diego has an unusual flight path that brings the planes in low right over the center of the city and they have to drop rapidly behind a hill to make the runway. When I saw a composite still image on PetaPixel of every airplane that took off in a day from a European airport I started to wonder if I could do something similar with video.
The concept is simple: shoot the individual planes flying across a pure blue sky, then chroma key the blue out as if it’s a green or blue screen leaving only the plane behind. Then put them all together on a video timeline. I did some tests and discovered that it didn’t work well if there were trees in the edges of the frame so scouting good locations took the most time. I watched the weather for a cloudless day then sat in a park and shot every plane that flew over. I locked the camera (Canon 7D with a EF-S 17-55 f/2.8) on a tripod and shot the planes with 1080p video at 24fps with an exposure I’d tested the day before (50/s, f/13, ISO 100) that would keep the sky deep blue with no blowout for a good chroma key. To give the video a sense of temporal change as the planes fly by I did an 8 hour time-lapse under a bridge nearby shot at the same angle and composited it over the planes. Without it there’s no sense of time passing. I used an intervalometer to shoot about 800 images with the same exposure as the video. Once I had it posted as a regular video clip, I keyed the sky out of it as well. I put everything together in Adobe Premiere, which challenged my system since I needed 40 video tracks to stack all the airplane clips together. The last piece was to put a new sky back in — a still image with depth and clouds that’s panned using key frames in Premiere.
Here are three images showing the individual components that went into making the video:
The tiny plane trailing all the larger jets at the very end is a pretty funny touch.
P.S. We shared a different time-lapse video a month ago that made approaching jets look like wobbly toys in the sky. You should take a look at that one too if you liked this one.
Image credits: Video and photographs by Cy Kuckenbaker and used with permissionA few months after Hillary Clinton took over as U.S. secretary of state in 2009, a longtime associate with connections to the Clinton Foundation insisted that her senior aides give a job to an unidentified male associate.
“Important to take care of [name redacted],” Douglas Band, President Bill Clinton’s former right-hand man, wrote to Clinton aides Huma Abedin, Cheryl Mills, and Nora Toiv in an April 22, 2009, email.
“We have all had him on our radar,” Abedin responded. “Personnel has been sending him options.”
The subject line on the email read “A favor…”
The email exchanged was uncovered by government watchdog group Judicial Watch, and was the result of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. It’s the latest example of the kind of cronyism that was rife at the State Department under Hillary Clinton’s watch.
Band served as a top aide to former President Bill Clinton and assisted in creating the Clinton Global Initiative. He is also a founding partner of Teneo, a global consulting firm that obtained approval from the State Department for a paid consulting arrangement between Bill Clinton and Band.
Teneo is the same firm where Mrs. Clinton longtime right-hand woman Huma Abedin worked as a senior adviser. Abedin was advising Teneo while working as a senior Clinton aide at the State Department.
While she was secretary of state, Hillary Clinton also handpicked Teneo co-founder and CEO Declan Kelly as her economic envoy to Northern Ireland.
In a separate email exchange, Band emailed Abedin and Mills requesting help connecting Clinton Foundation mega-donor Gilbert Chagoury with the State Department’s “substance person” on Lebanon affairs. Abedin later promised to contact the “substance person” about the request.
“This is very important,” Band replied, noting the urgency of the request.
Chagoury, of course, is the wealthy Nigerian-Lebanese businessman and longtime friend of former President Bill Clinton, whose worldwide exploits were heavily documented in The New York Times bestselling book Clinton Cash, authored by Breitbart News Senior Editor-at-Large Peter Schweizer.
In 2000, Switzerland convicted Chagoury of money-laundering and “aiding a criminal organization in connection with the billions of dollars stolen from Nigeria during the [Sani] Abacha years” of military dictatorship, according to a PBS Frontline report. And despite Chagoury’s being put on the federal terrorist no-fly list, the Clinton Foundation accepted a $1 to $5 million donation from the nefarious figure. Chagoury’s company pledged $1 billion to the Clinton Global Initiative in 2009, the same year the Clinton Global Initiative awarded the Chagoury Group its annual prize for “sustainable development.”
“No wonder Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin hid emails from the American people, the courts and Congress,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement Tuesday.
Fitton asserted that Clinton and her aides violated ethics rules and may have broken the law.
“They show the Clinton Foundation, Clinton donors, and operatives worked with Hillary Clinton in potential violation of the law.”
Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @JeromeEHudson.All this time, we have may been asking the wrong question. Forget facing off a single horse-sized duck versus 100 duck-sized horses. As this intimidating new infographic shows, we’d be no match against a single duck-sized Deadpool.
Cosplayers and comics fans in the U.K. are probably familiar with Morph Costumes, the high-end costume maker that creates everything from simple face masks to giant animatronic killer robots. Now, in honor of this week’s London Comic Con, the website has created a special infographic examining which of Marvel‘s superheroes spend as much time wreaking havoc as they spend saving the Earth.
Morph Costumes’ Mark Porter explained the project:
[W]e combed through the entire Marvel database, to find out which characters are the most deadly according to the number of people they’ve killed… A lot of research went into making the piece, and we’re really proud of it.
On the site’s blog, he added, “We’ve had furious debates over this in the MorphCostumes office, pitting characters against one another in imaginary fights to the death.”
But the stats don’t lie: Wolverine, Deadpool, and The Punisher have the most kills to their names according to their research.
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game publishing ideology has erupted between the once mighty Electronic Arts and the laser-focused, unrepentant capitalism of Activision. And, as EA sheds hundreds of jobs, and more importantly dozens of projects, my worst fears are come true. The focus on scatter-shot approaches to new IPs and emphasis on driving quality over quantity is great for warming cockles in hearts, but ejaculating dozens of crappy iterations of go-to franchises has tragically triumphed as the profitable way to go.
The only way to sustain that emphasis on gamer-friendly qualities is by making a profit on the releases that do well to off-set the costs of doing business. Warden’s Keep isn’t about greedily slurping up the ignorance of gamers. It’s about funding the next Mirror’s Edge. It’s about having the resources to take chances on games that gamers love.
Have cake or eat cake. Sorry, kids, you only get to choose one, and I fear now even that choice may have been taken from our hands.
While we were all squabbling in the corner over meaningless skirmishes about DLC and dedicated servers, the war was waged on another front and it’s starting to look like we lost.
I hate to be dire, but I’ve seen 3 years of the Bobby Kotick doctrine, and if that’s what the future for companies like EA and TakeTwo and THQ is going to be then we’re going to sit back in a few years and long for the day when we got to whine about Day-1 DLC in a game like Dragon Age. Let me describe the future I see. Subscription based services married with microtransactions. Hobbled initial releases where the DLC is not just an optional quest, but key game mechanics. One-time required online authentication that prevents multi-player for used games. A virtual death of games like Mirror’s Edge, Dead Space, Ghostbusters, Brutal Legend, Borderlands or Dragon Age.
You're standing on the Titanic, and you're complaining about the color of the deck chairs.
If I sound mad, it’s because I am. It is an unfocussed rage that simmers and burns, because many of the kinds of games I adore are destined for the dust bin. And, the reality is that no one is clean in this fight. Publishers have adopted a model that is proving unsustainable to match the rising cost of development. Retailers who struggle against thin new-release profit margins have compromised the industry as a whole for their own profit. Gamers have waged their own zealot war against a changing marketplace, irresponsibly made unreasonable decisions about their entitlements and bent the rules as they see fit to get what they think they’ve got coming. Nobody comes out of this smelling like a rose.
As our well-informed forum commenter mentions in his post, the acquisition of Playfish along with the cancellation of mid-range games might as well be EA’s white flag waved in the breeze. You recall when Activision let go of Ghostbusters, Brutal Legend and the Chronicles of Riddick remake. These are exactly the kind of games that major publishers can’t afford to make any more if they can’t find a meaningful way to continue profiting beyond initial sales. These are exactly the kind of games that EA just ejected.
Let me put it this way, if having Day-one DLC in a game like Dragon Age means that Bioware gets to make the sequel, and not having it means they don’t, I will happily take the opportunity to make my informed purchasing choice and I will fold my arms and look sternly at those who gripe and complain. Drawing the line in the sand has consequences, and I’m not nearly invested enough in the ideology of consumer activism in the gaming marketplace to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
If you want an industry that can take chances. If you want an industry that can be agile and adaptable to niche demands. If you want publishers that are willing to explore new IPs and put resources behind projects like Dragon Age, then you, my stubborn and well-intentioned comrades, need to turn down the righteous fury.Let’s say you need to build a new rocket. Where do you start?
Well, what kind of rocket are you going to create? All rockets, after all, are not created equal – the world is full of a variety of rockets, all designed for different purposes.
Step One: Know What Your Rocket Needs to Do.
In order to know what kind of rocket you’re going to build, you need to know its requirements.
For the sake of this hypothetical example, let’s say the new rocket you need to build is to be designed for the purpose of human exploration of deep space. Specifically, it’s going to be the rocket that will enable human missions to Mars, far and away the most ambitious task ever undertaken in spaceflight history. A bold mission requires a bold rocket.
Step Two: Establish Mission Parameters.
Over history, there have been numerous studies of how to get to Mars, so you take the best data you can get and figure out what it takes to execute those missions. The general thinking is that you’re going to need multiple launches to carry out the mission, but even with multiple launches, there are going to be some really big pieces. You’re going to have to be able to lift at least 130 metric tons of stuff (a.k.a. payload) into Earth orbit. Many engineers think your lander may measure up to 30 feet across, so you need a payload volume big enough to carry it.
Step Three: Call in Experts.
You work with other rocket designers, in both the government and commercial spaceflight worlds. You listen to a lot of ideas. And I mean, a LOT of ideas.
Step Four: Start Drawing.
You start creating rocket designs. You work from a blank sheet of paper. In fact, you get a lot of blank sheets of paper. Reams of paper, really.
Step Five: Whittle Down the Possibilities.
The challenge, it turns out, is not to design a rocket capable of supporting human missions to Mars. The challenge is designing the BEST rocket for the mission.
And the real challenge of doing that is knowing which rocket is best. What’s the standard for “bestness” in a Mars rocket? It’s a more complex question than it might sound – it’s vital, for example, that the rocket be powerful, but the best rocket is not the one that’s most powerful. Once you have enough power, more power makes less difference.
As you probably guessed, this question is not completely hypothetical; four years ago, this exact scenario led to the birth of Space Launch System. Engineers were tasked with designing the 130-metric-ton Mars rocket described above. They called in government and industry experts. They reviewed more than 1,000 possible designs for the vehicle.
In the case of the SLS, some concepts were easy to reject: there were clearly better choices, for example, than the rocket that was too wide to fit out of the giant doors of the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center.
Three stood out – a Saturn-like large, multi-stage rocket, using the kerosene fuel that powered the moon rocket instead of the shuttle’s liquid hydrogen; a rocket built from components based on current smaller rockets, taking advantage of industry successes; and a design that would be an evolutionary step from systems used on the space shuttle. But which was best?
External constraints had to be considered – in addition to the guideline that the rocket had to support human deep space exploration, national policy said it had to use, where possible, resources from the then-about-to-end shuttle program and earlier Constellation development effort. Any of the designs could have met this guideline; NASA worked to pick the design, and then identify existing resources that could facilitate its development.
NASA chose three additional standards to measure the rockets – any qualified design would be judged by how well it met standards of safety, affordability and sustainability.
Each of the three had strengths and weaknesses; engineers studied and debated the pros and cons of each. Ultimately, while the Saturn-like rocket was a good design, the time and cost needed to design, build, and launch it was too great. The smaller-rocket-derived design, in contrast, offered development advantages over the kerosene vehicle since the existing hardware and support systems provided a head start, but its complexity counted against it in the safety measurement. If you don’t have a barge, you can get the same effect by strapping a whole lot of rowboats together, but it’s not going to be the same.
The remaining design, based on a combination of upgrades to shuttle systems and new developments, provided advantages in shortening development time and reducing costs, and offering safety advantages through the use of proven propulsion systems.
Step Six: Pick the Best Design.
And so from the thousands, one remained — the design that could not only carry out the mission to Mars, but could do so most safely, affordably and sustainably.
The lengthy journey to the launch pad had begun.
Next Time: Just What Is An SLS, Anyway?
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David Hitt works in the strategic communications office of NASA’s Space Launch System Program. He began working in NASA Education at Marshall Space Flight Center in 2002, and is the author of two books on spaceflight history.Included into the set of standard preinstalled programs in the Windows 8 operating system, the Microsoft corporation for the first time ships their own antivirus called Windows Defender. Windows Defender actually came included into this set in earlier Windows versions too, but it served as an antispyware and malware filter only. But its latest incarnation under Windows 8 in fact integrates the free antivirus called Microsoft Security Essentials which was available for free download but wasn't integrated into previous Windows versions by default.
When running with Microsoft Security Essentials/Windows Defender active antivirus, PVS-Studio may show a significant slowdown when checking C/C++ files, depending on the analysis settings and user configuration. Before starting the static analysis process itself, PVS-Studio.exe calls the external preprocessor for each of the source-code files to get a full intermediate preprocessed file, i.e. a C/C++ file including header files with expanded macros. In the Visual Studio environment, PVS-Studio can use both the native Visual C++ preprocessor cl.exe and the third-party clang.exe preprocessor shipped inside the PVS-Studio distribution. It is when using cl.exe as the preprocessor that an issue occurs. We've already posted a report on this issue to Microsoft Visual C++ support.
In particular, when using the native Visual C++ cl.exe compiler as the preprocessor on a multi-core computer (when analysis runs in several concurrent threads for several files simultaneously), we can see an induced restriction (imposed by MSE/Windows Defender, as I suspect) on CPU resource usage of total 25% which is imposed for all the cl.exe processes. What does it mean in practice? When utilizing, for instance, 4 of cl.exe processes on a 4-core computer, the maximum total load of these processes doesn't exceed 25%, i.e. each one of them will get only about 6% of CPU execution time. But we are expecting that each one of these processes should get 25% of CPU time (when there's no background CPU load, of course)! It's clear that such a slow-down of each cl.exe will cause a significant increase of analysis time for each file being checked. Our experiments have shown that this 25% restriction doesn't relate to the number of cores in the system: we observed the same 1/4 performance restriction, working on an 8-core computer, and even binding cl.exe processes to different cores didn't change anything.
In the general case, we recommend that you always should add both the analyzer unit itself (PVS-Studio.exe) and all the software utilizing it, as well as their corresponding paths (for example, devenv.exe - the main executable of the Visual Studio environment), into the antivirus's exceptions list, when running PVS-Studio static analyzer under active antivirus software. Unfortunately, adding PVS-Studio.exe (as well as devenv.exe, cmd.exe and even cl.exe itself) into MSE/Windows Defender's exceptions list or even disabling the real-time protection don't fix the issue of performance loss with the cl.exe preprocessor. Only completely disabling MSE/Windows Defender (or replacing it with a different antivirus) allows you to use 100% of CPU resources for the preprocessing purpose.
So, the question arises: how does the build of Visual C++ projects progress when using the same cl.exe directly from the Visual Studio environment? For the build to run in parallel, i.e. to have several cl.exe processes run simultaneously, you need a solution containing at least several projects. An ordinary test build of such a solution (containing 87 of Visual C++ 10.0 projects) didn't reveal any performance issues at first sight. However, adding the compilation flags /P and /c to the properties for each of these projects (i.e. for preprocessing a file into an i file without linking) had actually caused the issue described above: 8 cl.exe processes were running under 2-3% of processor load each; that is, the total CPU load didn't exceed 25% again. Thus, this proves that the performance degradation with the Visual C++ preprocessor launched together with the MSE/Windows Defender doesn't depend on how it is started and whether it is launched from the PVS-Studio analyzer, the Visual Studio environment, or even manually from a cmd file. We can only suppose that when the preprocessing mode is enabled, cl.exe generates and actively writes to the intermediate i file on the hard disk, and the antivirus doesn't like it for some reason.Holy water’s cleansing properties may be overstated, according to a recent Austrian study that found an overwhelming amount of holy water springs, and all church samples, failed to meet the “microbiological and chemical requirements of national drinking water regulations.”
Given holy water’s integral presence in religious ceremonies, its sanitation merits considerable scrutiny. Researchers at Institute of Hygiene and Applied Immunology at the Medical University of Vienna tested samples of holy water springs and water in church fonts, finding that 86 percent of springs contained bacteria commonly found in fecal matter, such as E. coli, Enterococci, and Campylobacter. As holy water is used to baptize and wet congregants’ lips, the presence of bacteria can pose serious health risks.
"We need to warn people against drinking from these sources," said Dr. Alexander Kirschner, study researcher and microbiologist at the Medical University of Vienna.
The bacteria found in holy water, if it enters a person’s bloodstream, can lead to a raft of health complications, such as diarrhea, vomiting, fever, cramping, and abdominal pain, according to the Mayo Clinic. Water drawn from springs is frequently used in human consumption, although the water is not assessed according to the same standards as regular drinking water — making it particularly susceptible to contaminated consumption.
In addition to bacteria, nitrates were also found in the researchers’ samples. Nitrates are commonly used in fertilizer for their high solubility and biodegradability, and above a certain level in water can result in nitrate toxicity — infants under 6 months old being most vulnerable because of the way in which nitrates are metabolized in young bodies. This toxicity could lead to death if untreated, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The researchers tested 21 springs and 18 fonts in total and found their samples contained 62 million bacteria per milliliter of water, rendering all water undrinkable. Even among the 14 percent of springs that met the microbiological and chemical requirements, “considering results from sanitary inspections of the water catchments, no spring was assessed as a reliable drinking water source,” the researchers wrote.
Holy water has such a sweeping presence around the world that the safety of its consumption has the research team alarmed. Awareness is the main challenge, they say. People need to question, as well as analyze, the sources of what they put in and on their bodies. Holy water’s mysticism may paint it as an inherently pure substance, but the fact is its sources aren’t held to the same standards of regular drinking water.
“We conclude that it is highly necessary to include holy springs in programs for assessment and management of water quality. Public awareness has to be raised to perceive holy springs as potential sources of illness,” the report states. “Holy water can be another source of infection, especially in hospital chapels and frequently visited churches.”
Holy water is identified as any water that has been blessed by a religious figure or member of a clergy. Numerous religions involve holy water in their practices, such as Christianity, Hinduism, and Sikhism — although many others employ the substance in some capacity.
Purifiers have made great leaps in recent decades to disinfect the water, and salt has also been used in certain concentrations to keep it hygienic. But Kirschner cautions that salt is not a reliable way to prevent infection, ABC News reports, instead suggesting priests regularly change the holy water in churches and inform congregants about holy water’s risk and the history behind their springs.
“This may represent a problem that has hitherto been underestimated,” Kirschner said, “especially in hospitals, since there a lot of people with weakened immune systems there.”
Source: Kirschner AK, Atteneder M, Schmidhuber A. Holy springs and holy water: underestimated sources of illness? Journal Of Water And Health. 2013.Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul said on Friday that the United States government spends "billions of dollars scooping up" Americans' phone records when it should be focusing more of its resources on Arabic speakers.
"We spend billions of dollars scooping up all the phone records of millions of Americans and sending them to Utah, to a multi-billion-dollar science-fiction sort of headquarters there, to house all these records, when in reality what we ought to do is maybe spend more time on people who speak Arabic, people who are looking at public avenues and public access to see who are the ones talking and might want to harm us," Paul told radio host Dave Price.
Paul made the comment in response to a question about how to prevent shootings like the one in San Bernardino, California on Wednesday. Paul's campaign did not immediately respond to BuzzFeed News on what Paul specifically meant when he said "people who speak Arabic" and " people who are looking at public avenues and public access."
Paul said in the interview that, "Sometimes, there is no answer" to the question of preventing shootings, but added that, despite being a "great advocate of privacy," he was in favor of "targeted surveillance" and the "individualized search and seizure of records" after obtaining a warrant.
"I would say that targeted surveillance — I'm not against surveillance. I'm not against looking at records," Paul said. "So if you call me up and you say, 'We have evidence that this gentleman is communicating with a guy who we know advocates for violence, and know advocates for killing Americans, and this is a radical Imam and we are watching this guy because we have suspicion,' I'm for that. And if we know that this man is talking to this person in San Bernardino, that's suspicion. Then you go to a judge."
He argued the country also needs "to control our borders," and said his Republican presidential rival Marco Rubio was "the weakest of the weak on defending the border."
"And so the thing is, is you've got people like Marco Rubio, saying, 'Oh, he's strong on national defense,'" Paul said. "Well, he's the weakest of the weak on defending the border. And if you don't defend the border, you really can't defend the country. And so we've had multiple attempts throughout a several year period to convince Marco that you've gotta defend the border if you' re gonna defend the country. And at every turn he's opposed increasing the strength of border security."We all have things that drive us mad in horror movies (Oh your brand new car magically won't start?) but what about someone who writes horror? What type of things do the creators of our favorite movies cringe at seeing on screen?
Simon Barrett definitely knows a thing or two about the horror genre -- he wrote'You're Next', and another amazing horror flick,'V/H/S-2 '. Simon was kind enough to let us in on five horribly stupid things horror movie characters do and explains why those things are so obnoxious.
Have a 'Vlog'
Maybe you don’t remember this term, “vlog.” You’re probably regarding your screen right now with a puzzled expression, pondering its vague familiarity. Maybe you have an uncomfortable feeling, like a bad memory you can’t fully recollect.
You see, in the early aughts, Hollywood discovered the concept of the internet and with it, the “vlog.” Around this time, the found footage horror subgenre went mainstream, and it became fashionable to have a character in each movie who randomly films everything happening for no good reason. Frequently this character would say things like, “This needs to go up on my YouTube channel!” or “This is the kind of stuff I need if I’m going to make it as a journalist,” thereby promptly the audience to instantly loathe them and wish for their immediate demise, which never happened because they were the character operating the camera.
The “vlogger” character has fallen out of fashion in the past couple of years, but I worry that with new video interface additions to social media, it is going to make big comeback. People in real life who film everything and address an imaginary audience when speaking into their cameras should be avoided at all cost, and why anyone would want to watch a film featuring such a character, unless its plot was a bitter character study of delusional narcissism, eludes me.
Work as a writer
Writers are boring. I can tell you this with authority because I primarily make my living now as a writer. It means that I spend most of my waking hours wearing headphones, glaring at my laptop screen and wondering if there might be some pornography on the internet I haven’t seen yet. Writers are dull, introverted, self-obsessed and make a living doing the least visually interesting thing imaginable.
So why are so many characters in horror films writers? Well, probably because horror films are written by writers who’ve led lives so sheltered that they can’t fully fathom another profession. This is known, by the way, as incredibly bad writing. Horror writers often don’t recognize how boring they are. So when conceiving a screenplay, they’ll say to themselves, ‘I know! I’m awesome, so I’ll just make the protagonist like me!’ Meanwhile, their neighbors avoid them, their children despise them, and their spouse has been sleeping with their yoga instructor for months.
Whenever I see a horror movie where the protagonist is a writer and clearly a wish fulfillment analog for the loser who wrote the script, I thrash in my seat with shame for my professional peers. That said, my next screenplay is about a financially challenged indie screenwriter who women mysteriously find sexually irresistible, and I think it’s pretty emotionally moving stuff.
Spout biographical dialogue
How many horror films have you seen where the characters are introduced en route to a remote location, and during the course of that scene they say something like, “Hey, Tom, when are you ever going to tell Cindy you like her? You guys have been working at the same bookstore together for two years. Also, I’m sick of you guys not trusting me because I tried to kill myself. Anyway, when are we getting to this house I inherited from my estranged father?”
People don’t talk like this. In this hypothetical scene, you would never say any of this to Tom, because Tom already knows all of this information. He’s either lived it, or it’s the reason he’s in the car. You’ll notice the next time you’re driving to the grocery store, you won’t say to the person next to you, “Hey, can’t wait to get to the grocery store. Planning to buy some groceries there.” You talk about other things, because the manifest never needs to be stated.
In the vast majority of horror films, the first scene a character is in will consist of them saying, “This is who I am, this is what I do, and this is why I am here.” These are all things that people almost never actually say in real life, because they are apparent. Occasionally a character will leave out a bit of information that is pointlessly withheld from the audience so it can be revealed later in a “surprise” revelation. This is the opposite of creating genuine mystery. It’s horrid.
Bicker
Horror movies are more suspenseful if the viewer is emotionally engaged on some level with the characters. It’s simple: if you identify with the protagonist, and care what happens to him or her on some level, then you’re more invested and engaged with the film, and more frightened when the protagonist is in danger.
Most horror screenwriters don’t know how to actually write interesting characters, so they approach this problem by giving all of the characters needless dramatic subplots, which causes the opposite of its intended effect while also conveniently allowing for annoying exposition (see #3). Maybe a character cheated on his girlfriend, or is planning to propose to her, or is worried they’ll break up when she goes off to college. That’s fine in a drama or comedy where the film is actually about that, but in a horror movie that’s actually about a vengeful ghost or masked killer, no one watching the film has any reason to give a fuck.
In real life, when something scary is happening, people bond together, forget their differences, and unite for the sake of survival. It doesn’t matter if you hate someone; when a building is on fire and the two of you need to get out, your personal issues are likely to be off the table.
In horror movies, though, characters almost always have personal strife with each other, and it comes up again, and again, and again, even when they’re hiding after being chased through the woods. This may be obvious, but effective drama should be organic to film’s main story, and be either part of the primary plot or inform or enhance that plot. If the main plot would be unaffected if the details of a character’s background were different, then that information shouldn’t be in the film, and any time spent on it just wastes an audience’s time and causes them to like the characters less, not more, because it’s annoying.
Pair Off to Have Sex in a Dark, Isolated Location
Actually, this is an excellent idea and it should happen in every horror movie.
If you want to see more from Simon, V/H/S-2 is available now on-demand and, of course, You're Next hits theaters August 23rd. You can also follow Simon on Twitter for, not only updates, but also top notch jokes.“I would never encourage him or push him or even recommend him to initiate any type of a carbon tax,” Cramer said in an interview. ADVERTISEMENT Cramer spoke to The Hill after a published report said he was advising Trump to endorse a carbon tax. A similar story based on that report appeared on The Hill's website. Cramer told E&E Daily that he is working on a number of white papers regarding policy recommendations to Trump. The North Dakota lawmaker has in the past floated a small fee for carbon emissions as a way to pay for research and development to make fossil fuels cleaner. However, he insisted in the interview that this would not represent a carbon tax. He also told The Hill that he won’t recommend that Trump endorse a carbon tax. Cramer is an outspoken climate change skeptic and supporter of the oil, natural gas and coal industries, owing in part to North Dakota’s position as a heavy oil and gas producer.
In the interview with The Hill, Cramer acknowedged some want to see action on climate change, but he suggested that the government must do nothing to hurt the U.S. oil and gas industry.
“The American public wants to see something done on climate change. But we don’t have to throw oil and gas and coal and fossil fuels under the bus to do that," he said. In the interview with E&E, Cramer, who described himself as a skeptic of climate change being caused by man, suggested the American public does want to see something done on the issue. “But my advice would be, while I’m a skeptic, as well, he is a product of political populism, and political populism believes that there needs [to be] some addressing of climate change," he said.
Cramer said research and development are the key to making fossil fuels cleaner, not regulations like the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, which he will relay to Trump.
“I’ve been skeptical, but I don’t resist the reality that we’re heading toward or our goal is a more carbon-constrained world,” Cramer told E&E.
“I would still tell him, ‘Yeah, we need to stop and repeal the Clean Power Plan,’” he continued. “If in fact he wants a more carbon-restrained energy policy, he ought to work with real scientists and work with Congress to come up with a better one.”
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story included incorrect information. It has been updated to reflect changes and the Cramer interview.John, the CEO of a sales organization, sent an email to Tim, an employee several levels below, to compliment him on his performance in a recent meeting. Tim did not respond to the email.
About a week later, he was in John’s office applying for an open position that would have been a promotion into a management role, when John asked him whether he had received the email. Yes, Tim said, he had. Why, John asked, hadn’t he responded? Tim said he didn’t see the need.
But Tim was wrong. John’s email deserved, at the very least, a “thank you.”
Tim didn’t get the promotion. Was he passed over solely because he didn’t thank John for the positive feedback? No. But was Tim’s lack of response one piece of the Tim puzzle that convinced John he should choose a better candidate? Undoubtedly.
Before you accuse John of being trivial or over-sensitive, before you condemn his poor hiring judgment, consider what saying “thank you” represents.
On a basic level, it communicates that you received the email. While there’s a lot of advice that discourages writing “thank you” emails because they contribute to email overload, I disagree. I answer every real email I receive because I want to avoid the recipient’s “Did Peter get my email and what’s he thinking?” angst. It takes three seconds to respond “thanks” and it completes the transaction initiated by the sender.
But an email that contains emotional content — like a compliment — deserves something longer: a real, thought-out “thank you” as opposed to a simple I-received-your-email “thank you.” When you offer a real thought-out “thank you” to someone, you’re acknowledging her effort, appreciating her thoughtfulness, recognizing her intent, and offering feedback on the impact of her actions.
Still, it’s more than that. Those things are rational, but saying “thank you” is mostly an emotional act. It connects one person to another. Saying “thank you” doesn’t just acknowledge someone’s effort, thoughtfulness, intent, or action. It acknowledges the person himself.
Acknowledging other people is a critical responsibility — perhaps the critical responsibility — of a great manager, especially in sales. Actually great manager is too high a bar. I might say it’s the critical skill of a good manager but even that’s understating it.
Acknowledging each other is our basic responsibility as human beings living in community with other human beings.
Go ahead and argue: We’re all too busy at work and in life to spend time exchanging pleasantries. If John needs so much stroking, he can’t possibly be a good CEO. He’s out of touch with the digital age where no answers are the accepted norm. If Tim is doing his work well, that’s all that matters. People are paid to do their jobs and they don’t need to be thanked. Saying “thank you” to your CEO for a nice email is nothing more than brown-nosing.
I would disagree with all those arguments. It doesn’t take long to say “thank you,” but it does take caring. John is an excellent CEO, with a staff, board, and shareholders who love him and for whom he delivers a high growth rate and excellent results. Not answering someone’s communication — text or email or phone call — is not an accepted norm, it represents a fundamental breakdown in communication about which I often hear people complain. Tim might be good at certain aspects of his job but he’s not “doing his work well,” if he’s not acknowledging the people around him. And, finally, saying “thank you” isn’t brown-nosing, it’s nice.
This all becomes more obvious if you take away the digital element. How would you feel if you complimented someone in person and he just walked away from you without saying anything? Weird, right?
Saying “thank you” — sincerely and with heart — feels good. Not just to the person receiving it, but also to the person offering it. And that’s part of work too. It’s hard to remember, as we process our hundredth email, that behind each message is a person..
Tim made a mistake by not appreciating John’s effort or acknowledging his sentiment. I don’t want to make that same mistake.
So, as we approach Thanksgiving, I want to say “thank you” to you. Each week when I sit down to write this blog, I try to express ideas and feelings that make a difference in my life and, hopefully, in yours. And doing that often leaves me feeling a little vulnerable and exposed.
But my feeling of vulnerability is always met with your compassion and engagement. The support I feel from you, my readers, is an unending source of encouragement to keep at it. It is a huge gift to me that you are interested in what I have to say and spend your valuable time reading and commenting on it. It touches me and I am so thankful for it. Thank you, and happy Thanksgiving.Pulling Gift Code Please wait a moment while we locate a unique gift code with that value.
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Jenny @ 12:32 PM It is so nice to finally be able to be heard. this should have gone up long ago.
Copyright 2018Danny Cevallos is a CNN legal analyst, criminal defense attorney and partner at Cevallos & Wong, practicing in Pennsylvania and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Follow him on Twitter: @CevallosLaw. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
(CNN) Recently, Nashville's district attorney banned prosecutors from offering female sterilization in plea deals. Believe it or not, Nashville prosecutors have offered this option four times in the past five years.
There has been public outrage at the notion that a defendant in America in 2015 would be offered a choice of sterilization as part of a plea deal.
Except, it happens all the time.
Some have claimed this practice "evokes a dark corner of American history" where the mentally ill or "deficient" were forced to undergo sterilization.
Yeah, that's true. We did that. And it was bad. Except this isn't quite that.
Danny Cevallos
Female sterilization is linked to the controversial "eugenics" movement, which advocated for the notion that the human race can be improved by selective breeding of people with superior genes.
There is even a 1927 Supreme Court case, Buck v. Bell, in which the justices ruled that a state statute permitting compulsory sterilization of the unfit and "imbeciles," "for the protection and health of the state," was constitutional. The opinion in the case is stunning, especially because the Supreme Court has never technically overruled it. But Buck v. Bell dealt with involuntary sterilization of people because of their mental disabilities, not because they were being punished for a crime.
You can hate sterilization, and the Tennessee case may have the creepy feel of the antiquated practice of eugenics, but it's not that. Present-day sterilization plea deals involve a voluntary choice of sterilization by persons accused of a crime, and for whom sterilization will be part of their punishment.
Others may argue that the Supreme Court has already spoken on the issue of compulsory sterilization as punishment, and struck it down. That's true too, sort of.
In Skinner v. Oklahoma, the Court struck down a law permitting compulsory sterilization of criminals as unconstitutional, but not because it was cruel and unusual. Instead, the law was struck down because the law was unequally applied for similar crimes.
So the question remains: Is sterilization as a punishment unconstitutional?
The Eighth Amendment provides: "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted."
Practically, however, punishments are rarely deemed cruel and unusual by the judiciary. We have executed people with hangings and by firing squad. Sterilization has to be somewhere below that, right? Ultimately, however, the constitutionality of sterilization may be a red herring in this analysis, because it appears that even if a punishment vciolates the Constitution, it is permissible, if you willingly choose it.
Suppose arguendo (for argument's sake) that sterilization is judicially labeled a cruel and unusual punishment, violating the Eighth Amendment. This is where it gets interesting: It still might be an appropriate and constitutional part of a plea deal. Shocked? You shouldn't be.
As citizens, we validly waive our constitutional rights all the time. You waive your Fourth Amendment protections against search and seizure when you answer "yes" to an officer's "Mind if I look in your trunk?" You waive your Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination when you try to explain to the detective in the interrogation room how that body got in your vehicle's trunk. So then, if we can validly waive our other constitutional rights, can we waive our Eighth Amendment rights and choose a cruel and unusual punishment, even if it would otherwise be unconstitutional? And are people outraged because this is a new step in punishment or a new frontier and a slippery slope in the world of plea deals?
Nope.
If sterilization plea deals are likely constitutional, and we've been doing it for a while, then that begs
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end of September, 2015 one of the roofs of what many years ago was a chocolate factory was covered by 1625 square meters of graffiti (that’s more than 17,000 square foot).
Calligraphy artist Pokras Lampas, best known for his Calligraphy on Girls project, has spent two days and used 730 liters of paint to create a piece of art that may be the largest calligraphy artwork ever made. The project was supported by Panasonic and Smokin’ Heroes.
More Calligraphy Graffiti
Characters By El Mac, Retna
Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe
Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber Beach Calligraphy by Andrew van der Merwe: https://www.behance.net/beachscriber
A1one, Street Calligraphy, Tehran
A1one, Street Calligraphy, Tehran: http://www.unurth.com/A1one-Street-Calligraphy-Tehran A1one, Street Calligraphy, Tehran: http://www.unurth.com/A1one-Street-Calligraphy-Tehran A1one, Street Calligraphy, Tehran: http://www.unurth.com/A1one-Street-Calligraphy-Tehran A1one, Street Calligraphy, Tehran: http://www.unurth.com/A1one-Street-Calligraphy-Tehran
Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis
Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/ Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/ Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/ Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/ Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/ Urban Calligraphy “Skyfall” feat. Simon Silaidis. http://www.urbancalligraphy.com/
Please share this page:The return of Judy Blume by Nick Davies
For the first time in more fifteen years, Judy Blume has written a novel for adults, Tara Fowler writes in an exclusive for People. The prolific author of classics such as Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, Deenie, and Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing will release her latest book in the summer of 2015.
Being published by Knopf, Blume’s new book is titled In the Unlikely Event, and it takes some cues from the author’s own childhood. Specifically, it’s set in Elizabeth, NJ in 1951 and 1952, when an unusual number of plane crashes occurred in the area—even leading to Newark Airport shutting down for almost a year after the third crash in two months happened in February 1952.
Blume, who grew up nearby and lived through the events, says in a statement on Knopf’s page for the book: “These events have lingered in my mind ever since. It was a crazy time. We were witnessing things that were incomprehensible to us as teenagers. Was it sabotage? An alien invasion? No one knew, and people were understandably terrified.”
Further details on the novel are still fairly minimal; Fowler writes that it centers on an ensemble cast of a family and their friends over the course of three generations. The Knopf page reads:
Blume uses her imagination to bring us the lives of three generations of families, friends, and strangers, who will be profoundly affected by these events, either directly or indirectly. But life goes on and Blume digs deep into her characters—we see them coping not only with grief but with first love, estranged parents, difficult friendships, familial obligations, divorce, career ambitions, a grandparent’s love, a widower’s hope, and everything in between.
Carole Baron, Blume’s longtime editor, says that “Judy has been hinting at writing this book for many years. And I think she finally got to a point in her life when she couldn’t hold on to the story any longer.” In the Unlikely Event is scheduled to publish on June 2, 2015.One of the most interesting things about Zionist ideology and history is that there is so much nonsense and claptrap that it will take a historian or serious scholar the rest of his natural life to expose them all.
Kevin Myers of the Irish Independent declared back in 2012 that “Everything people believed about Hitler’s intentions toward Britain was a myth created by Churchill.” For example, Churchill perpetuated that Hitler desired to invade Britain in 1940, but it was a total fabrication.
On the contrary, Myers declared, Hitler “admired the British Empire,” and that he “offered terms that did not involve German control of Britain. Churchill refused to allow these terms to be read to the cabinet, and they remain prudently concealed under the 100-year rule.”[1]
Myers wrote,
“Instead, Churchill’s determination to keep Britain at war turned what had been merely a continental defeat of its army into the enduring myth that in 1940, Britain faced a war for national survival.
“But the German naval leader, Raeder, had repeatedly forbidden his staff from planning an invasion of Britain. And far from wanting to continue the war, in June 1940, Hitler ordered 20pc of his army to be demobilised, in order to get the German economy going again.”
“The ‘invasion fleet’ that the Nazis began to assemble that summer was no more capable of invading Britain than it was Hawaii. It was war by illusion: its purpose was to get the British to the negotiating table.”
Myers concluded,
“Just about everything that people believed about Hitler’s intentions towards Britain in 1940 — and still believe today — was a myth created by Churchill, which he probably came to believe himself. Consider all the facts above, and then consider how that myth has endured, despite them. Makes you wonder, no?”[2]
Yeah, it should make us all wonder. What is so pathetic is that Myers got paid to say things like that, but Holocaust revisionists have been saying the same thing for the past thirty years or so and have been persecuted all across the globe! David Irving has been writing about these things since the past thirty years or so, but he always gets into trouble because he does say some uncomfortable but true things about Churchill and Hitler.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzfeNKl-SFw
Perhaps the bigger issue is that Churchill concocted lies about Hitler because he was working for the Dreadful Few. In fact, right after his father’s death, Churchill became Ernest “Cassel’s creature,” one of the most “influential Jewish moneylenders” then.[3] Once that happened, Churchill began to hate the Germans. In the process, he starved the German civilians to death and bragged about. This is Churchill at his best:
“Starve the whole population—men, women and children, old and young, wounded and sound—into submission.”[4]
Churchill got his wish:
“In December 1918 the German Board of Public Health claimed that 763,000 Germans had died because of the blockade. In April 1919 Dr. Marx Rubner claimed that another 100,000 Germans who died between April and the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in July, so the number of Germans who died from Winston Churchill’s starvation blockade most probably approximates the number of Irish who died during the Great Famine.”[5]
Churchill was obviously used by the Zionists to starve the Germans. But by 1920, he seemed to have realized there was something mendacious and pernicious about the ideology known as Zionism. He said:
“There is no need to exaggerate the part played in the creation of Bolshevism and in the actual bringing about of the Russian Revolution, by these international and for the most part atheistical Jews, it is certainly a very great one; it probably outweighs all others.
“With the notable exception of Lenin, the majority of the leading figures are Jews. Moreover, the principal inspiration and driving power comes from the Jewish leaders. Thus Tchitcherin, a pure Russian, is eclipsed by his nominal subordinate Litvinoff, and the influence of Russians like Bukharin or Lunacharski cannot be compared with the power of Trotsky, or of Zinovieff, the Dictator of the Red Citadel (Petrograd) or of Krassin or Radek — all Jews.
“In the Soviet institutions the predominance of Jews is even more astonishing. And the prominent, if not indeed the principal, part in the system of terrorism applied by the Extraordinary Commissions for Combating Counter-Revolution has been taken by Jews, and in some notable cases by Jewesses.”[6]
Yet Churchill’s real actions defeated all this great insight. In fact, he ended up joining the greatest mass murderer (Stalin) in the twentieth century in order to defeat Hitler.
In 2013, popular historian Max Hastings wrote in the Daily Mail that Churchill did summon bold lies, but those lies were good because “Churchill did it to save Britain…”[7]
You be the judge: did this man really save Britain? Britain was still paying its World War II loans in 2006—and keep in mind that the war was over in 1945.[8]
Now, what if the debt is six trillion dollars (the Iraq War)? How long will it take to pay that?
You do the math and see how generational children will have a huge burden on their shoulders. What is equally worse is that the mad man in Tel Aviv is telling us all to wage a frontal war against a decent country such as Iran.
Perhaps the Obama administration should upgrade the “chickenshit” thing.
[1] Kevin Myers, “Everything people believed about Hitler’s intentions toward Britain was a myth created by Churchill,” Irish Independent, June 19, 2012.
[2] Ibid.
[3] E. Michael Jones, Barren Metal: A History of Capitalism as the Conflict Between Labor and Usury (South Bend: Fidelity Press, 2014), 1201-1202.
[4] Ibid., 1211.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Winston Churchill, “Zionism Versus Bolshevism: The Struggle for the Soul of the Jewish People,” Sunday Illustrated Herald, February 1920.
[7] Max Hastings “Yes, they both used lies to wage war. But Churchill did it to save Britain – Blair did it to save himself,” Daily Mail, July 2, 2013.
[8] “What’s a little debt between friends?,” BBC, May 10, 2006; see also “Britain to repay £2bn First World War debt,” The Independent, October 31, 2014.We demonstrate an increase in trapping lifetime for optically trapped nanoparticles by more than an order of magnitude using feedback control, with no corresponding increase in beam power. Langevin dynamics simulations were used to design the control law, and this technique was then demonstrated experimentally using 100 nm gold particles and 350 nm silica particles. No particle escapes were detected with the controller on, leading to lower limits on the increase in lifetime for 100 nm gold particles of 26 times (at constant average beam power) and 22 times for 350 nm silica particles (with average beam power reduced by one-third). The approach described here can be combined with other techniques, such as counter propagating beams or higher-order optical modes, to trap the smallest nanoparticles and can be used to reduce optical heating of particles that are susceptible to photodamage, such as biological systems.The “Solid South’s” realignment from reliably Democratic to reliably Republican, a trend that began in the middle of the 20th Century and accelerated dramatically in the late 1990s, is virtually complete.
With Sen. Mary Landrieu’s (D-LA) ouster, Republicans now occupy all of Louisiana’s statewide offices for the first time since Union troops occupied the formerly Confederate state. In 2015, the GOP will control every U.S. Senate seat, legislative chamber, and governor’s mansion from Texas to North Carolina. The Republican ascension in the Deep South’s legislative chambers, many of which were dominated by Democrats as recently as 2010, has ensured that much of the Republican Party’s farm team will be drawn from this region of the country.
In the next decade, the South will serve as the geographic heartland of the Republican Party, in the same way that Southern New England served that role for the GOP in the 1920s. And Dixie is demanding that the party being to treat it with the importance it has earned. To that end, a bloc of Southern states is targeting the Republican primary process in order to see their influence elevated.
“Officials in five Southern states — Tennessee, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas — are coordinating to hold their primary on March 1, 2016,” Politico reported on Monday. “Texas and Florida are considering also holding a primary the same day but may wait until later in the month. Either way, March 1 would be a Southern Super Tuesday, voting en masse on the heels of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.”
Republicans from the South say their states make up the heart of the GOP and that it’s only fitting the region should have commensurate say over whom the party puts forward to compete for the White House. Proponents are already dubbing March 1 the “SEC primary,” after the NCAA’s powerhouse Southeastern Conference “We think it’s important that the next president of the United States — he or she, Democrat or Republican — come through our states and speak with our citizens about our issues,” said Mississippi Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann. “My gut feeling is this will happen, and you’ll see candidates start to spend a lot more time in the South in the next six months.”
All this strategizing about how to create a prominent position for the Southern states after the traditional early primary states vote begs the question, why does it seem as though states like Iowa and New Hampshire seem to enjoy such an unassailable position on the nominating calendar?
The place that Iowa and New Hampshire occupy in the primary process is just a fluke of history. In the wake of the bloody and shocking 1968 Democratic nominating convention, in which the Lyndon Johnson’s vice president who entered the race late and represented a pro-war wing of the Democratic Party on the decline, Democrats engaged in a primary reform process aimed at eliminating the “smoke-filled rooms” that had produced nominees in the past.
In 1972, the party settled on both the calendar and committed delegates system that we are familiar with today. Republicans essentially embraced the Democratic Party’s reforms. But the logic of these reforms appears more and more antiquated every presidential cycle. The fact that both the Democratic and Republican parties have successfully leveraged their influence to prevent these states from holding their nominating contests until after January is evidence of their decreasing influence Iowa and New Hampshire wield over the process.
The conventional wisdom among Republican grassroots voters is that this system that arbitrarily yields the Hawkeye and Granite states undue authority is, at best, an anachronism that does not do the party much service. At worst, they may even hinder the party’s ability to field a competitive nominee. Moderate, “establishment” Republicans cringe over how Iowa’s caucus system rewards unelectable candidates who enjoy the support of an enthusiastic but small base. Conservatives roll their eyes at the New Hampshire GOP’s consistent ratification of the conventional wisdom that prevails among Beltway Republicans. But the fact that these two states are increasingly in conflict with one another also suggests that they may serve to winnow the field of Republican nominees in a comprehensive fashion.
What’s more, for Republicans, a counterpunch from a bloc of Southern states aimed at challenging the conventional wisdom that emerges from New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina could be a powerful corrective force for the GOP. Democrats, too, may eventually contemplate reforms to the nominating process similar to what Republicans envision with a “Big State Tuesday,” in which Democrat-heavy states like California, Illinois, and New York coordinate their contests. It is not difficult to envision a future in which the Democratic Party’s progressive grassroots grow increasingly frustrated with their own establishment’s obsession with nominating electable candidates who routinely disappoint the left-wing base of the party.
The South’s decision to pool their clout in a single massive primary is a valuable experiment. While the results of that test are as yet unpredictable, any changes to the dated presidential nominating process are welcome.A few days ago, watchers of Internet trends noted a sudden peak in searches for the word “caliphate.” The source of interest turns out to be a reference made by Glenn Beck on his February 1st TV show. In speaking about the unfolding crisis in Egypt, Beck offered his view that a result could be “a Muslim caliphate that controls the Mideast and parts of Europe.”
Dictionary.com exists to help you learn about words. Our mission is to make sure you have the right word at the right time. Whether you agree with Glenn Beck or not, the purpose here is to provide accurate meaning of an old and out-of-use word. While Egypt captivates world media, here’s a bit of background on the word caliphate.
The definition of caliphate is “government under a caliph.” A caliph is a spiritual leader of Islam who claims succession from Muhammad. The word stems from the Arabic khalifa meaning “successor.”
Historically, caliphates are governance under Islamic law, which calls for election of leadership under Sunni practice and selection from a group of imams in the Shia tradition. The rule of law by Islamic ethics is a common thread to the governance under of a caliphate. Caliphate rule was largely symbolic, the power of local sultans and rulers handling the day-to-day operations of government.
The Ottomans, rulers of an empire centered in what is now Turkey, used the symbolism of the caliph to expand their rule in Arab countries, but it wasn’t until the late 18th century that the role of the caliph referred to political rather than spiritual leadership. When the Ottoman Empire came to an end with the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923, it was the end of the caliphate.
We’ve written about a number of words associated with Islam in order to help shed light during controversies. Read about the literal meanings of mosque, temple, and church, here. And you can get some background on Ramadan, here.
Are there other words in the news you would like us to tackle? Let us know, below.There are few comedy stars as consistently hilarious and versatile in modern day Hollywood as Ken Jeong. The man has had a meteoric rise to comedy stardom with standout performances in some of the most hilarious films and series’ in recent memory. His latest role sees him star alongside one of the world’s most iconic superstars, David Hasselhoff, in an outrageous comedy that promises even more side-splitting moments from Mr Jeong: Killing Hasselhoff. To celebrate the release which is available to download digitally now and on DVD & Blu-rayTM from October 2nd, we’re taking a look at Ken’s rise to the top of the Hollywood comedy ladder, including some of his most brazen comedy moments!
Pineapple Express (2008)
Although the role of Ken, the menacing Asian mobster in Seth Rogan’s hilarious stoner comedy Pineapple Express, may not have been the role to showcase all of Ken Jeong’s most unique qualities, it helped cement his place in the American comedy movie scene for good.
Most visible during the now infamous gang shoot out at the films climax, Ken uses his screen time well to give some memorable one-liners and also demonstrate his ability to portray a more unstable character, not to mention his kick-ass skills with an automatic weapon. From here it was clear that nothing could stop the rise of Ken Jeong!
Role Models (2008)
In the uplifting and now fondly remembered comedy Role Models, Jeong played the villainous nerd ‘King Argotron’, who has spread his dictatorship of “LAIRE” (Live Action Interactive Role-playing Explorers) far and wide over the role play community. He even lies about being ‘slain’ by the loveable Augie (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) in order to keep his coveted crown firmly on his head.
Some of the film’s most hilarious moments come from Ken Jeong at his most outrageously detestable on the battlefield, getting his chance to show how hilarious he can be in a mainstream comedy when given the chance, and also showing another side of what he’s capable of.
The Hangover series (2009 – 2013)
This will surely be seen as Ken Jeong’s breakout role, as the utterly unhinged gangster Mr. Chow, who tries to wreak havoc on a group of young men, desperately trying to piece together a wild night in Vegas. His introduction of leaping out of the boot of a car in his birthday suit onto the shoulders of Bradley Cooper has got to be one of the most memorable moments in modern comedy.
And although a naked Ken Jeong attacking three grown men with a crowbar in the middle of the desert is far from middle of the road, it is testament to his comedic capabilities to say he managed to ramp up the ‘crazy’ even more so for the two incredibly successful sequels. Too-da-loo mother******s…!
Community (2009 – 2015)
2009 proved to be a very good year for Ken Jeong, as not only did he began his journey in what would become the most successful comedy film franchise of the 21st Century, he would also begin his six-year stint in Dan Harmon’s quirky comedy series Community.
The NBC series slowly developed a cult following (much like Harmon’s latest creation Rick and Morty) and is responsible for pushing forward some of the most talented comedians and actors in Hollywood today: Donald Glover, Alison Brie, Joel McHale, Gillian Jacobs. Community focuses on a rag-tag group of adults attending a community college, with Jeong playing the unstable (to put it lightly) and unqualified Spanish teacher-turned-student, Senior Chang. Chang became one of the series’ most hilarious characters, always pushing the limits of how outrageous each episode could be. His character is also responsible for one of the first ever memes to go viral… “HAH! Gayyyyyy…”
Dr. Ken (2015 – current)
Ken Jeong’s profile has risen so much over the past few years that he has now made the jump from hilarious supporting character to loveable leading man, in his sitcom Dr. Ken, currently airing on ABC in the US. A qualified doctor himself, Jeong plays an accomplished physician (Jeong) who tries to balance his career at the hospital and a hectic family life with two kids and a wife.
In comparison to his roles in The Hangover and Community, Jeong has dialled down the crazy in this series, allowing him to display his qualities as a more middle-of-the-road doctor… but you always know that there’s a much more manic side to him ready to burst out at any given moment, which is just what he’s best at!
Killing Hasselhoff (2017)
Where do you go from leading role in a TV series I hear you ask? How’s about a leading role in this year’s most outrageous comedy film! Ken Jeong stars alongside one of the most iconic faces of all time, Mr. David Hasselhoff, in a film based around the idea of a group on celebrities (including Jeong himself) attempting to ‘off’ The Hoff for a huge pay-out. We can’t wait to see what kind of bonkers tricks Ken has got up his sleeve to get that celeb death-pool money, but from the looks of the trailer it’s going to be it’s going to be a pretty wild ride. Truly fitting for one of the industry’s most loveably OTT comedy actors!
Killing Hasselhoff is out now on digital download and on Blu-ray and DVD from 2 October 2017
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Cool Posts From Around the Web:Immanuel Kant was born in Königsberg, lived in Königsberg, and never travelled very far from Königsberg—but his mind ranged across vast territories, says Oxford philosophy professor, Adrian Moore. He selects five key texts for coming to grips with the work of "the greatest philosopher of all time."
Could you begin by saying a little bit about who Kant was?
The first thing that I want to say about Immanuel Kant is that he was the greatest philosopher of all time. That’s controversial, obviously, and other people would have different views, but in my opinion he is the all-time great.
He was a German philosopher who lived in the eighteenth century and was very much part of the Enlightenment. He was responsible for many of the main ideas that we associate with the Enlightenment, and, in particular, the idea that we should trust to no authority except our own reason, that on all the most fundamental questions about life, including questions about how we should conduct our lives, the ultimate authority was what we could glean from the exercise of our own reason.
The motto of the Enlightenment was ‘dare to be wise’ and this was a motto that was very dear to Kant’s heart. You can see why: this was an injunction to have the courage of our own convictions, the courage of our own resources, and in particular the resources of our rational faculty.
He’s usually thought of as a German philosopher, and he wrote in German. But, historically, that’s not quite accurate is it?
He was born in Königsberg in Prussia. The town itself now goes under the name of Kaliningrad, which is part of Russia. But, yes, we ordinarily think of him as a great German philosopher.
In your Five Books selection you haven’t included a biography. That’s probably no accident.
It is no accident. There are biographies of Kant. There’s one that came out not very long ago—about fifteen years ago—which I personally found an interesting read, but that’s because I have this special keen interest in Kant. (I am referring to Manfred Kuehn’s biography, simply entitled Kant: A Biography.) For most people this would not be a particularly inspiring read. Kant didn’t have a very interesting life. The biography is fascinating because of the light that it casts on his philosophical work, the actual composition of that work, and the various processes that he went through as he was producing his books; but there’s not much in the way of an external story to sustain people’s interest. He was born in Königsberg, lived all of his life in Königsberg, and—famously—never travelled very far from Königsberg. He was a confirmed bachelor and was devoted to philosophy. If you want to get a sense of Kant the man and of his life, the thing to do is to read his philosophical works rather than consult a biography. Philosophy was his life.
We’re going to begin with a book that is notoriously difficult to understand. You could genuinely spend a lifetime delving into the meaning of various sentences and arguments. The book is his first Critique, the Critique of Pure Reason (1781).
Read 1 Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant Read
This is the one book on the list that is a complete no-brainer. If you’re thinking about the five key texts for an understanding of Kant, this has got to be one of them.
I began by saying that, in my view, Kant was the greatest philosopher of all time, and I also want to say that this is the greatest philosophical book of all time. This is his masterpiece. It covers a huge amount of territory. Part of what is so impressive is the range of topics that he discusses in the course of it—although, interestingly, it doesn’t cover as much territory as he originally intended. We’ll be looking at other books in due course, and some of the material in those other books was originally going to be part of the Critique of Pure Reason. In a way, what’s going on here is that those other books contain the material that Kant himself thought was most important—the stuff that he was keenest to get to. But before he could get on to those other topics, he felt that he had to do a lot of preliminary groundwork, and that’s what you find in Critique of Pure Reason. But it turns out to be so fascinating, and has such far-reaching implications, that it has become a classic in its own right.
Is it fair to sum up this book as about the limits of what we can discover with our reason?
Yes. In a way, that’s the point. Some of the questions that Kant is particularly interested in—and that he will get on to in his later works—are questions where this issue is particularly pertinent. So, yes, Kant in this book is interested in limits. He’s interested in the limits to what we can know; he’s interested in the limits to what we can use pure reason to ascertain; he’s interested in the limits to what we can even think about. He’s interested in these limits in various different senses. On the one hand, he’s keen to approach them, to map out the limits from within by doing as much as possibly can be done through the exercise of reason; but he’s also interested in stepping up a level and looking at them from above, asking questions of principle about where these limits are to be drawn and what might lie beyond them. Of course, there’s an inevitable problem that arises there because if you’re asking questions about what lies beyond the limits of knowledge then inevitably the question arises: can you hope to know any answers to such questions? For if you claim you can, aren’t you involved in self-stultification? So, all these tensions are there throughout the Critique, and they’re part of what makes it such a fascinating read.
Kant described himself as being stirred from his ‘dogmatic slumbers’ by reading David Hume’s work. They are such completely different writers – it feels slightly surprising to think that David Hume’s highly empirical work should give rise to something which is so much more abstract and focussed on the powers of reason, rather than on the powers of observation.
That’s right. What we find in Hume is a classic commitment to empiricism. The phrase ‘empiricist’ is entirely appropriate in connection with Hume. He takes very seriously the idea that our knowledge and understanding of the world are constrained by experience. In some very deep sense, they are limited to what we can experience. The reason why Kant says that he was woken from his ‘dogmatic slumbers’ when he read Hume was that he had previously, rather unthinkingly, taken for granted that we had the intellectual resources to broach questions and consider issues that transcend experience, in just the sort of way that Hume denied was possible. It wasn’t just that. Hume had also taken his empiricism sufficiently far to call into question some of the basic ways in which we think about experience itself. This also was a bit of an eye-opener for Kant. He recognised that there were issues here that needed to be addressed.
He was very impressed by Hume’s arguments, though not actually ultimately persuaded by them, and thought that it was incumbent upon the philosophical community at large, and on him in particular, to do what he possibly could to address these arguments. So that all fed into this broad project that we’ve already described in the Critique of Pure Reason, of trying to determine just how far reason can go, determining to what extent Hume was right in saying that our understanding and knowledge are constrained by experience and to what extent he was wrong.
“This is the greatest philosophical book of all time. This is his masterpiece”
There’s a lot that Kant is prepared to accept in Hume’s empiricism. He agrees with Hume that there is a fundamental sense in which our knowledge is constrained by experience. Where he most fundamentally takes issue with Hume is that he draws a crucial distinction between—as he puts it—what we can think and what we can know. Kant’s view is that, although Hume is right with respect to what we can know (that that is constrained by what we can experience), we can think about things that transcend our experience. We can have thoughts about things that we can never hope to have any insight into, but where, nevertheless, the very process of thinking about those things can still play a significant role in our lives.
So, one striking and obvious example of this, which we will be talking about a little bit later, is the existence of God. Nobody can know that God exists, no one can hope to establish the existence of God, in Kant’s view. This is an issue that lies beyond the reach of our own experience. The various attempts that people have made to prove God’s existence were all, in Kant’s view, futile. He spends a large part of the Critique of Pure Reason laying into these attempts. But it does not follow, in Kant’s view, that the question as to whether God exists should be dismissed as meaningless. It is still a perfectly legitimate and interesting question. There is still room for us to think about God’s existence and perhaps to have faith in God’s existence. Indeed, there is one very striking sentence in the preface to the second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason where Kant describes his project as ‘denying knowledge in order to make room for faith’. So, you can see that there’s a negative project and a positive project that are intertwined. On the one hand, he is curbing our pretensions to know more than we can; but, on the other hand, he is doing so as a means of opening up the ground for the possibility of faith.
An important distinction that Kant makes is between the ‘noumenal’ world and the ‘phenomenal’ world. What exactly is going on there?
This is an absolutely crucial distinction that permeates the Critique of Pure Reason and is very relevant to all of the later work as well. Basically, it is a distinction between appearance and reality.
Many philosophers have believed that there is a fundamental distinction between appearance and reality. Kant is part of that tradition and makes a distinction between appearance and reality that is as profound as anyone’s. The way this comes about is that, in the process of exploring the scope and limits of our rational knowledge, he comes round to the view that some of what we can know through an exercise of reason can only be explained if it is due to us imposing a framework onto our experiences that is already built into our minds. An analogy that is very often used to illustrate this idea, which is in some ways a crude analogy, but in other ways, I think, a very helpful one, is that of a pair of spectacles. It’s as if we are born with native spectacles through which we see everything but, unlike ordinary spectacles, these condition what we see in a very profound way. Ordinary spectacles can literally colour what you see as well: if you’re wearing rose-tinted spectacles then everything will appear to you as having a rosy hue. For Kant it’s a bit like that, but with bells on. Among other things, he thinks that even the fact that we experience things in space and time is due to these native spectacles that we carry around with us. Space and time themselves are part of the spectacles.
“We have knowledge only of ‘phenomena’—Kant’s word for appearances; we don’t have knowledge of ‘noumena’—how things are in themselves”
This is why you get this fundamental division between appearance and reality. All that we ordinarily think about, all that we aspire to discover when we’re involved in the natural sciences, is concerned with the world of space and time and that’s the world of appearances: that’s how things look to us through the spectacles. Kant is adamant that we can never take these spectacles off. If we could take them off, then we might be able to see how things are in themselves, but that’s precisely what we can’t do, and that’s why this distinction between appearance and reality hits so hard in the Kantian system. We have knowledge only of phenomena – ‘phenomena’ is Kant’s word for appearances – and we don’t have knowledge of noumena – ‘noumena’ is the word that he sometimes uses for how things are in themselves.
This is related to what we were talking about a little earlier, because the question of whether there is a God or not is not a question about anything that’s going on within the world of space and time. However extensively you search, however closely you peer into the cracks, you are never going to find a divine being: whether there’s a God or not is a matter of how things are in themselves. It’s a matter of the world of reality, not the world of appearances. This helps to tie in with what we were saying earlier about Kant’s conviction that matters like the existence of a divine being are matters of faith, not matters of knowledge. Knowledge is restricted to the world of appearances.
Just to get this clear, somebody reading this could think that you’re discussing a psychological limit to our experience—a limit set by how our brains happen to be. Is that what Kant is saying, that we have brains that are only able to cope with things which occur in space and time and can be explained in terms of cause and effect?
We have to think of it as something even more profound than that. No doubt, there are all sorts of interesting ways in which our brains do condition how we experience things: perhaps there are differences between us and other animals so far as that goes, and perhaps there are differences between us and aliens on other planets, if there are such beings. But those are themselves matters of empirical investigation. Our brains are themselves physical objects. That’s all part of what’s going on within this spatio-temporal framework. Kant is talking about something that’s even more profound than that because the very fact that we’re seeing things in spatio-temporal terms at all is part of how we condition our experiences. It’s part of the spectacles that we’re carrying around with us. So, the brain analogy is a good one; but ‘analogy’ is the operative word here. It can at most be seen as another illustration of the idea.
And these are logical constraints on reality rather than empirical ones?
That is another important point in this connection. That’s right. Kant believes that these discoveries that he has come to about this fundamental distinction between appearance
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