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Other states have set their own advisory levels lower than the EPA's, but it is not yet clear whether the military will follow them. The Minnesota Department of Health set guidance levels of 35 ppt and 27 ppt for PFOA and PFOS, respectively. New Jersey officials created a 40-ppt advisory and have since recommended lowering it to 14. But at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, the Air Force is using the EPA's guideline as it tests private wells near the base for contamination, a spokesman said Friday. | {
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Sauber has announced another new recruit with the addition of former Haas strategist Ruth Buscombe as strategy engineer.
Since being taken over by Longbow Finance in July, Sauber has moved to expand its team following years of financial uncertainty. Nicolas Hennel de Beaupreau was confirmed as head of aerodynamics during the Italian Grand Prix weekend, and now Buscombe - who was chief race strategist at Haas earlier this season - has also joined the Swiss team.
"The Sauber F1 Team is pleased to confirm the appointment of Ruth Buscombe as new Strategy Engineer," Sauber said in a statement. "The 26-year old Briton will start to work for the Sauber F1 Team from the Malaysian Grand Prix onwards. Buscombe has worked for the Scuderia Ferrari F1 Team, as well as recently for the Haas F1 Team."
Buscombe was part of the Haas team which impressed with strong results during its opening two races, with Romain Grosjean finishing sixth in Australia and then fifth in Bahrain.
Sauber is currently 11th in the constructors' championship having yet to score a point this season. Felipe Nasr recently pinpointed this weekend's Singapore Grand Prix as a test of the team's recent upgrades which have been introduced since the summer break.
2017 F1 driver line-ups so far
F1i Classic: 'Gentleman Jo' Bonnier
Silbermann says ... A letter to Chase Carey
Estimated F1 driver salaries for 2016
Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter | {
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This week's Fun Art Friday is The War Doctor, portrayed by John Hurt in the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special, The Day of the Doctor.
I am a huge Doctor Who fan. I watched reruns of the Tom Baker and Peter Davidson eras on PBS as a kid and rediscovered the series when it came back with Christopher Eccleston. So, I was pretty excited to be around for the 50th anniversary. But, I was skeptical. Rumors were flying around about no previous Doctors being involved, that they were going to mess with the regeneration order, and that, as the crazy fans are want to scream, Steven Moffat had messed everything up.
Instead, we were given a great episode with a solid story that hearkened to the past and resolved plotlines from the present. Plus, there in the middle of it all was this new incarnation of the Doctor and he was so great I wish we could have more of him. Getting John Hurt to play him was genius, he fit the role perfectly.
So, I decided to draw him! I didn't try to go too realistic. I wanted to draw him in my cartoon style and have to say I'm pretty pleased with the results. So much so, that I may do the rest of the Doctors down the line! So stay tuned for more, Whovians! I did the side profile thing as a sort of portrait study, but I'm thinking about trying a full body animated pose at some point.
As always, thanks for stopping by and make sure to check out all my previous Fun Art Fridays and my comic, Chronicle! If you like what you see here, please share it on social media and spread the word!
(**And, yes, that special appearance at the end of The Day of the Doctor kicked me right in the nostalgia so much I may have had a happy tear or two.**) | {
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Stay on Top of Emerging Technology Trends Get updates impacting your industry from our GigaOm Research Community
Roku is working with investment banks to prepare a confidential IPO filing, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The Journal noted that Roku could raise as much as $150 million by going public, but added that there is no word on the timing of such a filing or the valuation Roku may be looking for.
Roku disclosed a $25 million round of financing earlier this week, and the company’s CEO Anthony Wood told the Information a few weeks back that his company had $190 million in revenue in 2013. The company has said that it has sold more than 10 million players in the U.S. since its launch.
Roku is currently embarking on two major bets that could determine the company’s success with investors if and when it goes public. It partnered with TV makers Hisense and TCL to bring a line of Roku-powered TV sets to market, and it has been working hard to strike deals with app publishers to get a share of any ad or subscription revenue they are making on the platform. Wood told the Information that Roku could make more money with services than with ads within the next 12 to 18 months.
With an IPO on the table and a new infusion of $25 million in the bank, I expect Roku to spend heavily on marketing in stores as well as through billboards and maybe even TV ads this holiday season. Roku is facing increased competition from Google and Amazon, and it will have to prove to investors that the company can still grow its traditional device business, and score in the TV space, even as it competes with Chromecast, Fire TV and Android TV. | {
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Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Anna Soubry says MPs deserted new party
Change UK has lost six of its 11 MPs following a disappointing performance in last month's EU elections, when it failed to get a single MEP elected.
The party announced that a new party leader, Anna Soubry, had been elected.
She said she was "deeply disappointed" that Heidi Allen, Chuka Umunna, Sarah Wollaston, Angela Smith, Luciana Berger and Gavin Shuker had left.
The departing MPs said they would be "returning to supporting each other as an independent grouping of MPs".
Change UK - formerly known as the Independent Group - was formed earlier this year by MPs who quit Labour and the Conservatives.
It pledged to push for any Brexit deal negotiated by the government to be voted on at a referendum - or "People's Vote" - in which it would campaign for the UK to remain in the EU.
But in last month's European Parliament elections, it gained only 3.4% of the vote.
A joint statement from the six outgoing members said their priority was now "to provide collegiate leadership to bring people together in the national interest".
"We know the landscape will continue to shift within the political environment and have concluded that by returning to sit as independents, we will be best placed to work cross-party and respond flexibly.
"We wish our colleagues well as they continue to build Change UK."
In a personal statement, former Labour MP Mr Umunna called for the "Remain forces" in Parliament to "work even more closely together", especially at the next general election, and urged them to "regroup and consolidate activity to maximise our impact".
"The movement built around Change UK has an important role to play in this," said Mr Umunna. "However, whilst I believe it should carry on as an organisation, I do not believe Change UK should carry on in its current form.
"This has put me in a fundamentally different place not only to other Change UK parliamentary colleagues, but also its activists and candidates who should be free to take the party in the direction they wish."
'Roll up our sleeves'
Former Conservative Ms Soubry, who has taken over from Ms Allen as leader, said she was disappointed the split had come "at such a crucial time in British politics".
"Now is not the time to walk away, but instead to roll up our sleeves and stand up for the sensible mainstream centre ground which is unrepresented in British politics today."
She said the party was "as determined to fix Britain's broken politics as we were when we left our former parties".
BBC political correspondent Ben Wright said there had "clearly been turmoil in the party's ranks for number of weeks".
"It has been obvious that there was an internal disagreement over where the party should be positioning itself, what its long term tactics should be, whether it should be cosying up to the Lib Dems or maintaining itself as an independent party," he said.
"Change UK was being squeezed by the other parties campaigning for Remain and didn't keep the momentum going that it had earlier in the year when it launched."
Skip Twitter post by @ChrisLeslieUK Changing the established broken politics was never going to be easy. But I’m determined to stand up with #ChangeUK and fight for the mainstream centre ground values that led me to leave @UKLabour only a few months ago. I’m proud of our achievements & I’m in it for the long haul. — Chris Leslie (@ChrisLeslieUK) June 4, 2019 Report
After the split was announced, Change UK sent an email to members, appealing for their "help and support going forward".
It added: "While British politics slips into chaos around us, now is the time to stand firm in our beliefs and champion the mainstream centre ground values we articulated when we left our former parties in the first place."
'Door is open'
The outgoing leader of the Liberal Democrats, Sir Vince Cable, said it was "not at all surprising" that the party had split, but his "door was always open" if they wanted to join his instead.
He told the BBC he had heard "rumours" and it would be "ideal" if the departing MPs became Lib Dems, but said: "I don't want to comment on that before there is any official announcement."
Sir Vince added: "I don't want to gloat over their failure. It was a failure, but we have got to move on and I want to be positive about it.
"I am simply acknowledging the fact they have tried this project, they are brave people, they broke away from their parties and they deserve credit for that, but setting up a new centre party in the British centre doesn't work." | {
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Area 51 has been ground zero for conspiracy theorists for decades.
Flying saucers. Bug-eyed aliens. Staged moon landings.
The government hasn't helped alleviate speculation –- it doesn't even acknowledge that the military outpost exists. If it did, it would be deep in the Nevada desert about 100 miles outside of Las Vegas.
But now, National Geographic is providing the public with a rare glimpse inside the clandestine site. It recently published never-before-seen, declassified photos from 1963 of a military plane crash and its coverup by the government, according to its website.
"Area 51 was created so that U.S. Cold Warriors with the highest security clearances could pursue cutting-edge aeronautical projects away from prying eyes," National Geographic said. "During the 1950s and '60s Area 51's top-secret OXCART program developed the A-12."
Made by Lockheed Corp., the A-12 was a precursor to the SR-71 Blackbird spy plane. The futuristic-looking jet could tear through the skies at more than 2,200 mph at 80,000 feet.
Check out the photo above and here to see the A-12 without its ominous black paint. Instead, its silver titanium shines bright under the desert sun -- a stark contrast to the A-12 in front of the Science Center at Exposition Park.
RELATED:
NASA posts archived photos on Flickr
Pentagon weapons buyer quietly visits California to discuss bomber planes
Pentagon seeks mini-weapons for new age of warfare
-- W.J. Hennigan
Twitter.com/wjhenn
Photo: Lockheed's A-12 at Area 51. Credit: Roadrunners Internationale via Pangloss Films | {
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Miguel Hernandez, right, an immigrant rights activist, stands among anti-immigration activists outside of the U.S. Border Patrol station in Murrieta Calif., on Monday. (Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images)
The White House signaled Monday that it expects to deport most of the unaccompanied minors entering the country illegally across the southern border, employing the strongest rhetoric to date to indicate that an influx of thousands of Central American migrants will not be tolerated.
The tougher tone came a day before Obama administration officials were expected to ask Congress to authorize new measures, including more than $2 billion in emergency funds, that would expedite the legal processing of the more than 52,000 children and 39,000 families apprehended this year.
Officials said the request is separate from statutory changes that the administration is also seeking to make it easier to deport children back to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, where most of the influx has originated.
The moves come as President Obama attempts to stem an escalating border crisis that has caught the administration unprepared as he gets ready to announce potentially broad changes to U.S. immigration policies. The administration’s rhetoric has upended traditional political alliances on the issue, drawing rebukes from Democratic allies and advocates who fear that the children will be returned to violent and impoverished countries.
More than 100 immigrants rights activists, including some undocumented children who arrived in the country recently, marched outside the White House gates Monday in protest of the administration’s deportation policies.
Immigration advocates are urging President Obama to come up with another solution beyond sending young children back into their home countries. The demonstration comes as an influx of Central American children are crossing into the United States. (Theresa Poulson/The Washington Post)
White House press secretary Josh Earnest emphasized that the administration is committed to abiding by the law in dealing with the minors, saying each will have a chance to make a case for legal protections in immigration court.
But Earnest said that “it’s unlikely that most of the kids who go through this process will qualify for humanitarian relief, which is to say that most of them will not have a legal basis . . . to remain in this country.”
House Republican leaders, including Speaker John A. Boehner (Ohio), said they would reserve judgment on the administration’s fiscal request until they see the details.
Felix Browne, a spokesman for Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R), said that the increased funding is a “step in the right direction” if it beefs up border patrols, adding that Perry has warned Obama for years about the need to step up enforcement efforts in the region.
Obama is set to visit Dallas and Austin this week for a series of Democratic fundraisers, and he will talk about the economy at another event in Austin. But aides said the president will not visit the border in the Rio Grande Valley region, where most of the children and families are arriving, because he already has been fully briefed on the situation.
“This is not about optics. This is about solving a serious problem facing our country,” Browne said in an e-mail. “A trip by President Obama to see firsthand the humanitarian and national security crises unfolding in the Rio Grande Valley would be a valuable experience and help convey to the American people that he is truly committed to securing our nation’s border.”
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), who last week toured a Border Patrol facility in McAllen, Tex., said in a speech on the Senate floor Monday that Obama “would prefer to hang out with campaign donors and other political supporters” rather than get a firsthand view of the border.
During his briefing, Earnest noted that officials from the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and the Department of Health and Human Services have visited the region.
“The president’s well aware of what’s happening along the southwest border,” Earnest said. “It’s my view — and I don’t think that this is unreasonable — that those who share the president’s concern about this situation will be supportive of ensuring that the administration has the resources necessary to deal with the situation.”
The fiscal request will not include details about other measures that the administration said last week it would pursue, according to administration officials and lawmakers. The administration has told Congress that it wants statutory changes to make it easier to return children to Central America.
Under anti-human-trafficking laws signed by President George W. Bush in 2008, unaccompanied minors from non-contiguous countries are afforded greater legal protections than those who arrive illegally from Mexico or Canada. They are usually placed in the care of relatives, but many do not show up for their court hearings, which are routinely delayed for more than a year because of backlogs, officials said.
Democrats have balked at rolling back those protections. Late last week, 225 organizations led by the American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to Obama warning that eliminating those safeguards could ultimately jeopardize the children’s lives.
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), who helped write a comprehensive immigration bill that passed the Senate last year, said he would support providing the administration with additional fiscal resources.
He cautioned, however, that he has “serious concerns about rolling back or diluting any domestic legal requirements specifically designed to protect due process and prevent human rights violations.”
Obama told advocates in an emotional meeting at the White House last week that he is resolute in the need to deter child migrants because of the dangers involved in the journeys from their home countries. Some have reportedly died or been abused by smugglers en route.
But Wendy Young, executive director of Kids in Need of Defense, which connects unaccompanied children with lawyers, said that what the White House has “failed to recognize is that this is more of a refugee movement than an immigration wave.”
“So far what we’re hearing from them is deter, detain and deport, and what I haven’t heard from them at all is protection,” she said. “I frankly find it perplexing that they’ve opened this Pandora’s box on themselves because immigration is an issue that has united the Democratic Party. So why they want to pick a fight with their own party on the Hill — I don’t get it.” | {
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Beloved actress Valerie Harper, who won fans' laughter through her role on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and later their sympathy with her multiple bouts with cancer, has died.
She was 80.
"My beautiful caring wife of nearly 40 years has passed away at 10:06am, after years of fighting cancer," her husband, Tony Cacciotti, said in a message posted on Facebook."She will never, ever be forgotten. Rest in Peace, mia Valeria."
The actress will be best remembered as the funny, brash Rhoda Morgenstern, who was a perfect complement to the innocent, perpetually cheerful lead character of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" from 1970 to 1977. Harper's sidekick character was so popular, it was spun off into "Rhoda," which ran from 1974 to 1978.
Valerie Harper and Mary Tyler Moore in RHODA. CBS Photo Archive / Getty Images
She also had a successful 32-show run on NBC's "Valerie" in 1986-87.
The venerable actress had four Emmy statutes on her mantle — three for best supporting actress in a comedy for "Mary Tyler Moore" in 1971, 1972 and 1973; and then for best lead actress in a comedy for "Rhoda" in 1975. Harper was nominated four other times.
In recent years, she's been one of America's most well-known cancer survivors, battling lung cancer since 2009 and brain cancer since 2013.
Cacciotti announced on Facebook last month that he had decided not to move his wife into hospice care despite recommendations from doctors.
"I have been told by doctors to put Val in Hospice care and I can't [because of our 40 years of shared commitment to each other] and I won't because of the amazing good deeds she has graced us with while she's been here on earth," he wrote in a post.
"We will continue going forward as long as the powers above allow us, I will do my very best in making Val as comfortable as possible."
Despite her many health battles, Harper remained in the public spotlight, doing her best to bring more awareness to cancer research. She competed on Season 17 of "Dancing with the Stars" in 2014.
"I was supposed to be gone before last Easter," she cheerfully told "Today" in April 2014. "What I have is un-curable and terminal, but guess what — not today!
Just after her brain cancer diagnosis became public, Harper told fans that health scares were a reminder to forget about what-ifs and focus on the what's-nexts of life.
"Forgiving is giving up the wish that things could have been different. They weren't. That's the past. Let it go. I have cancer," Harper told "Today" show host Savannah Guthrie.
"It's in my brain ... What are you gonna do about it?" Harper said. "I've had such a great run, Savannah. I'm going on 74. I want people to be less afraid. You know, that's ... that's really I guess why I'm sharing it." | {
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Promising Support
A small study was recently conducted to get an idea for how Americans feel about a universal basic income (UBI), a no-strings-attached, unconditional income given to individuals. The survey of 500 people was conducted by 50+1 Strategies and David Binder Research on behalf of the Economic Security Project. The results of the survey showed that 46 percent of respondents were in favor of the idea, along with 35 percent opposed and 19 percent undecided.
There has been a strong uptick in conversations about UBI recently, especially in the wake of some high-profile tests of the program being announced in Canada, Kenya, and Finland, among other places. Some experts even see the shift to UBI as an inevitability. “There is a pretty good chance we end up with a universal basic income, or something like that, due to automation,” tech industry titan Elon Musk has said. “Yeah, I am not sure what else one would do. I think that is what would happen.”
As robots and artificial intelligence (AI) get better at performing tasks formerly reserved for humans, the threat of mass job loss grows. Outsourcing jobs overseas was a major talking point in the past presidential election in the United States, and the current president-elect is promising to bring those companies back to the country. However, with increasing automation, those companies many not have as many jobs to offer.
The debate has even gotten to the point where the sitting president of the United States was asked in an interview about the potential for a UBI system. “Whether a universal income is the right model — is it gonna be accepted by a broad base of people? — that’s a debate that we’ll be having over the next 10 or 20 years,” Obama noted.
The Devil in the Details
The beginnings of that debate are already forming, and breaking down the numbers generated by the survey unveils some very interesting thoughts surrounding the issue.
Once respondents were given some specifics on the policy, support eroded. The aspects that were least favorable included not having the money tied to work, full autonomy with regard to how the money is to be spent, and that the funds for the program would come from tax revenue.
Some critics of UBI cite the inciting of laziness as a major argument against it. As Misha Chellam of the startup-training company Tradecraft explains to CNBC, “The laziness argument is one that has hamstrung welfare and safety net efforts for decades.” However, empirical evidence that welfare programs promote laziness simply does not exist.
Further support for UBI could hinge on how it is presented. The survey found that referring to the program as “social security for all” was received more favorably than when it was called universal basic income. However it is framed, UBI must be carefully considered as a realistic way to deal with the massive unemployment on the horizon due to the rise of automation. | {
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– Det låter fantastiskt, det här är vad jag alltid har drömt om och jobbat för, säger en lycklig Hansen till SVT Sport.
– Jag är i chock just nu tror jag, jag vet inte vad jag ska känna, det är otroligt.
Javascript är avstängt Javascript måste vara påslaget för att kunna spela video Läs mer om webbläsarstöd Webbläsaren stöds inte SVT stödjer inte uppspelning i din webbläsare. Vi rekommenderar därför att du byter till en annan webbläsare. Läs mer om webbläsarstöd Timmy Hansen skriker rakt ut efter världsmästartiteln. Foto: Sören Emmervall
Via ett fantastiskt avslutningsvarv i semifinalen av Andreas Bakkerud lade norrmannen upp det för en rysaravslutning i Rallycross-VM:s sista tävling.
Segern gjorde att han fick stå i pole position i finalen där värsta konkurrenten Timmy Hansen startade som tvåa.
Timmys första seger
I starten tog de båda första-och andraplatsen men det ändrades kort därefter. Timmy Hansen kom fel i en kurva och hamnade i väggen. Där och då var han inte bättre än femma och i det läget inte världsmästare.
Men Hansen stod för en stark upphämtning och när Timo Scheider snurrade kunde Timmy Hansen glida förbi och lyckades till slut bli fyra.
För Bakkerud hade det behövts en seger men en miss från norrmannen gjorde att han inte blev bättre än tvåa.
De båda hamnade på samma poäng, 211, men Hansen vann tack vare fler delsegrar – minsta möjliga marginal alltså.
Efter tävlingen lämnade Bakkerud in en protest mot Timmy Hansens körning i kurvan men protesten avslogs.
Erikssons andra raka seger i RX2
Det var första gången Timmy Hansen vann titeln. I totalställningen blev Andreas Bakkerud tvåa och Kevin Hansen, Timmys bror, trea.
Oliver Eriksson fortsätter att dominera instegsklassen RX2. För andra året i rad vinner Eriksson mästerskapet och visar att han är en man för större uppgifter.
– Klart att jag vill köra VM Supercar. Det finns styrningar ute i världen, säger Eriksson till SVT Sport. | {
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Decades of research substantiate the devastating effects of social isolation. Loneliness is equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day and increases the risk of death by 26-45%, which is on par with risk factors such as high blood pressure, obesity, and lack of exercise.
Learn more: How to integrate psychosocial risk factors into ongoing care
Isolation is not only unnerving, it is also widespread. Cigna's recent survey of 20K+ people revealed 46% of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone. Although striking, this finding is not surprising to those following former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy, who has argued for years that the scale and impact of this issue make it an epidemic.
How leading organizations are addressing the loneliness epidemic
In many ways, the United States is behind compared with other parts of the world. Australia formed the Coalition to End Loneliness in 2016 and the United Kingdom appointed a minister for loneliness earlier this year. While little attention has been paid to social isolation in U.S. policy, some leading organizations are taking steps to address it among their patients—particularly among senior populations. Here are three things we've learned from them that you can apply to your target populations:
1. Screen for social isolation.
Since isolation can be a taboo topic, few patients will be forthcoming. In response, the integrated health plan and care delivery system CareMore appointed its first "Chief Togetherness Officer," who created the Togetherness Program targeted at senior patients.
To start, CareMore accepted 300+ self-referrals made in the first six months and began screening senior patients for loneliness during appointments. For at-risk patients, CareMore staff use regular phone conversations and home visits to discuss standard topics related to medications and driving habits. CareMore also organizes informal social hubs at clinics to facilitate interpersonal relationships (e.g., workout classes, connection to community organizations during the holidays).
2. Connect patients to virtual networks.
Online communities in health care are not new. However, virtual networks are rarely used in U.S. health care to help people overcome physical remoteness and stigma. The United Kingdom has several anti-loneliness programs, including the Silver Line Helpline, a free and confidential call center for people aged 55+ to discuss anything they wish. Many of the callers are simply looking for a human connection, even if they might not admit it.
Given the stigma around loneliness, most calls focus on trivial things. Because of this, helpline workers are trained to recognize signs of social isolation and may offer resources, such as the Silver Line Friend program, which connects callers to volunteers to talk with or write letters to. Today, the helpline receives around 10,000 calls per week.
3. Create regional networks through partnerships.
Partnerships between businesses and entities can serve as the eyes, ears, and potential support system for people suffering from social isolation. For instance, ElderCare of Alachua County (a 501c3 entity owned by University of Florida Health) partnered with the City of Gainesville to open the ElderCare Senior Recreation Center.
The ElderCare Senior Recreation Center is a 17,000 square-foot recreation and activity center that offers educational seminars, physical fitness classes, structured artistic and cultural activities, and social and volunteer events for local seniors. These programs foster belonging among senior patients so that they feel a sense of social connection. Further, ElderCare of Alachua County uses the recreation center to address wellness needs of Gainesville's broader senior population.
Tomorrow's challenge is today's loneliest population: Young adults
Initiatives combating social isolation in the United States tend to focus on the senior population. Unsurprisingly, most of today's provider innovation has been restricted to organizations with Medicare Advantage contracts. Few providers have focused on the loneliest population: 18- to 22-year-olds. While typically a low-risk population, young adults experience rates of loneliness and social isolation far higher than any other age group according to Cigna's recent survey.
Some design firms are working with hospitals to create common areas and group rooms within the hospital to promote positive interactions among young patients with behavioral health needs. However, rarely do interventions go beyond in-house treatment to combat social isolation.
If your organization is doing something innovative to address social isolation, we'd love to hear from you! Please email Clare Wirth at [email protected].
Next, learn how to promote health and happiness at work
Programs aimed at promoting healthy habits among employees are likely to lead to improved employee engagement and productivity—but they're unlikely to reduce the total cost of care. To do that, you'll need to take a population health approach.
Download the Infographic | {
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Manu Dibango, the afro-jazz great behind hits including “Soul Makossa,” died Tuesday morning (March 24) from COVID-19, the BBC and AFP report. He was 86. “A voice raises from far away,” a statement on his Facebook page began. “It is with deep sadness that we announce you the loss of Manu Dibango, our Papy Groove.” There will be a private funeral service before a tribute is held “when possible,” according to the statement.
Born in Cameroon, Dibango attended high school in France, where he picked up the saxophone, as well as playing piano and vibraphone. His career spanned more than six decades, including work with Fela Kuti, Peter Gabriel, and Herbie Hancock. “African music was in a museum for a long time,” he told The New York Times in 1995. “People said ‘Africans have rhythm in their blood, everybody’s a musician down there.’ But the music stayed behind the tom-tom. It did not open itself up to the world. Africa only came to the world through its past, never its present.”
Dibango helped change the perception of African jazz and open it to a global audience. He soundtracked several French films and scored UK chart hits with songs such as “Abele Dance.” Written as the B-side to a song for the 1972 African Cup of Nations football tournament, “Soul Makossa” paired Dibango’s vocals with a funky sax line. After winning favor with New York DJs, it became a global success.
A take on the song’s hook, “ma-mako, ma-ma-sa, mako-mako ssa,” appeared in Michael Jackson’s “Wanna Be Starting Something”; Dibango later sued and won an out-of-court settlement after Jackson admitted to interpolating the lyric. Legions more artists sampled or interpolated “Soul Makossa,” including Kanye West (“Lost in the World”), JAY-Z (“Face Off”), and Public Enemy (“Can’t Truss It”), as well as other Dibango songs such as “Ceddo” (the Chemical Brothers’ “Battle Scars”) and “Weya” (Afrika Bambaataa and Soulsonic Force’s “Renegades of Funk”). | {
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OreImo‘s Ruri Gokou nickname Kuroneko literally means black cat in English, so why not have her wear a bikini with a black cat motif? Wave seems to think it’s a great idea because they are making her wear this look as their latest Beach Queen.
This 1/10 scale PVC figure measures in at approximately 155mm and is sculpted by Chizuru. She is wearing a black cat ears headband and tail along with a two-piece bikini which is of course colored black to really show off that black cat motif. She also comes with an optional towel and an embarrassed face.
This Beach Queen is scheduled for release August 2014 and you can now have her pre-ordered via Hobby Search for 4,320 yen.
Read more on figures here on SGCafe!
Also join in on the community’s discussions at http://forums.sgcafe.com
Leave a comment | {
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What are some good tools for growing your social media presence? | {
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President Macky Sall expected to win second term after two opposition leaders are barred from running in the election.
Dakar, Senegal – Polls have opened in Senegal‘s presidential election, the first since a 2016 referendum approved a cut in presidential mandates from seven to five years.
At least 6.5 million Senegalese registered to take part in the poll, which will be open from 08:00 GMT until 18:00 GMT on Sunday.
The electoral commission has set up about 15,000 voting stations across the West African country of 15 million people.
President Macky Sall, who is seeking a second and final term in office, became the frontrunner after two of Senegal’s most well-known opposition leaders were barred from running in the election.
The former mayor of the capital, Khalifa Sall, who is not related to the president, is serving a five-year jail term on corruption charges, while Karim Wade, son of the country’s former leader Abdoulaye Wade, has gone into exile in Qatar after serving half of a six-year jail term for corruption.
Both deny the charges, which they say are politically motivated.
Vote counting will start shortly after the polls close with provincial results released by February 26 and official final results not later than March 1.
Speaking after casting his vote at a polling station in his home town of Fatick, Sall said “This voting day is a very important moment for the democratic cycle. It is an illustration of popular sovereignty. I’m asking you to accomplish your duty as citizens in peace and calm in order to decide what we will do over the next five years.”
At a recent campaign rally in Dakar, Sal said: “Victory in the first round is indisputable.”
A candidate must secure more than 50 percent of the votes to be declared the winner. If no contestant has garnered that, a runoff between the two leading candidates will be held on March 24.
Presidential candidate Ousmane Sonko said after casting his ballot in Ziguinchor, Casamance, that “It is time for Senegal to turn the page”.
“I hope that tonight this page will be turned. We hope that we will be the winner of this election but if it isn’t the case, and if the election is conducted with transparency, I will congratulate the winner. But if the election is not transparent, without doubt, we will contest it, because the meaning of an election is democracy, transparency and freedom.”
The election period has been relatively peaceful but Amnesty International said at least two people have been killed in campaign-related incidents since February 4.
In Dakar’s Medina neighbourhood, a short distance from the city centre, voters had started lining up long before sunrise.
At a polling station in the Alasane Ndiaye Allo primary school, Mousse Cisse said voting was proceeding smoothly.
“Everything is going well. I will vote then go back home to wait for the result,” the 45-year-old trader added, as more people trickled into the polling station at Alasane Ndiaye Allo primary school.
Few steps away, dressed in a white traditional dress, Rosso Ba said she had waited for two hours to cast her ballot.
“I want a positive change in my country. I want change to happen without any violence after the election,” the 55-year-old told Al Jazeera. | {
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Chelsea have suspended four people from attending their matches, pending further investigations into allegations of racial abuse directed towards Manchester City’s Raheem Sterling.
The incident occurred during City’s 2-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge on Saturday.
A statement published on the club’s website read: “Chelsea has suspended four people from attending matches pending further investigations into allegations regarding the behaviour of supporters towards Raheem Sterling during our match against Manchester City on Saturday.
“Our investigations into this matter are ongoing. We are fully supporting the police investigation and any information we gather will be passed on to them.
“Chelsea finds all forms of discriminatory behaviour abhorrent and, if there is evidence of ticket holders taking part in any racist behaviour, the club will issue severe sanctions, including bans. We will also fully support any criminal prosecutions.”
City applauded the approach taken by Chelsea following the incident. “Manchester City welcomes Chelsea’s decision to issue suspensions to the individuals who verbally abused Raheem Sterling,” a statement read.
“The club and Raheem are fully engaged with Chelsea and the investigating authorities as they continue to examine the events in question. Manchester City and Raheem are committed to working with all relevant parties and organisations to support the objective of eradicating racism from the game.” | {
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John Francis Beech had a date with destiny last summer. He counted down the days on a calendar in his garage, crossing out each day leading to the final Sunday in July, on which he'd scrawled the word "OUT." But first he had one last bit of business, one final appointment to keep.
On July 17, Beech, a 53-year-old retired Coors manager, drove to Laradon Hall in north Denver. He'd called a few days earlier to arrange a meeting with Annie Green, the acting director of Laradon, a nonprofit that operates an alternative school and other programs for people with developmental disabilities. Beech had never met Green, but he explained on the phone that he was planning to leave his entire estate to Laradon. He was a member of a local Elks club, he added, which had adopted Laradon as its primary charity.
Green readily agreed to see him. But then she was unexpectedly called away by a death in her family. Although she tried to cancel all her appointments, Beech showed up on July 17 anyway. He handed a large white envelope to the receptionist and asked that it be delivered to Green.
Laradon's director found the envelope in her mailbox when she returned to work four days later. On the back, in handwritten block letters, were six words: WAIT UNTILL YOU HEAR FROM CORONER. And below that, in parentheses: PLEASE DONT CALL EVERYTHING IS OK.
Despite the plea to wait, Green opened the envelope. Inside was the original of Beech's Last Will and Testament, which left all his worldly goods to Laradon Hall.
The envelope contained keys to Beech's house in Lakewood and instructions about selling the house and its contents, closing his bank account and collecting funds owed to him by a bail bondsman and others. There was also a check made out to Laradon for $100,000 and dated August 1 — two weeks after the day Beech delivered the documents.
Having ignored the first message on the envelope, Green disregarded the second, too. She would later claim to have left voice-mail messages for Beech twice over the next two days, to thank him for his startling generosity — and to see if everything was indeed okay. But Beech didn't call back, and Green apparently made no further efforts to contact him.
The postdated check went into a safe at Laradon.
On August 1, the day the check became negotiable, Lakewood police officers entered Beech's house, not far from the Bear Creek Golf Course. They'd been summoned there by a neighbor, who'd complained of the smell of death seeping from the property.
Taped to Beech's front door was a handwritten note: COME BACK ON THE 1ST THANKS. Inside, taped to a hallway wall, was another note, affixed like a warning sign: STOP CALL THE CORONER THANKS.
Beech's body was inside a white van parked at the far edge of the back yard. He'd rigged up a hose from the exhaust and tried to shield the apparatus from neighbors' view with a blue tarp. He'd left his wallet, keys, car titles, a copy of the will and other documents neatly arranged on a kitchen table. It was a very polite suicide, designed to do minimal damage to the value of his house and possessions and generate the least fuss possible. But there was no note explaining why — just stop call the coroner thanks.
Investigators snapped pictures of the scene, including the garage calendar showing the countdown that ended with "OUT" on July 27. But receipts found in the house indicated Beech was still alive on the evening of July 28; he'd apparently purchased additional materials for his death rig that day, then treated himself to a banana split at a Sonic drive-in. At some point in the early hours of July 29, he died from carbon monoxide inhalation.
Beech had a mother, three sisters and a brother. The news of his death left them and other relatives reeling in shock and bewilderment. Jack, as he was known to his younger siblings, had always been the family's pillar of strength — the oldest, the most confident, the one who was the life of the party. He collected beautiful cars and performed magic tricks in bars; he had money, globe-trotting adventures and lots of girlfriends. He'd never shown signs of depression and, as far as they knew, had never been treated for mental illness. He'd never talked about suicide around them — except to express outrage when an old friend took his own life in 2007. Why, Jack had seethed, didn't the guy come to him for help?
But Jack was also an extremely private person. He'd disappear for weeks on a trip or something, then abruptly resurface. The family knew there were parts of his life he simply didn't share with them, and maybe not with anyone. "If you needed help, he'd give you the shirt off his back," says his brother, David Beech, a news director for a television station in Reno, Nevada. "But if you tried to help him with anything, he'd refuse. He was like a father; he was our father."
Carole Shultz, one of Beech's sisters, had talked to him frequently last summer, right up until two weeks before he died. "He was calling me all the time," says Shultz, an airline employee who lives in Golden. "He would latch on to certain people. You wouldn't see him for months, then he'd show up and hang around until four in the morning. The last conversation we had, Jack's phone died. He had to get more minutes, and then he left a long, long message about all kinds of stuff. But it was nothing special."
Searching for answers, the siblings pored over the copy of Jack's will left on the kitchen table. The document contained several peculiar requests. No obituary or memorial service, and the crematorium was instructed to dispose of his ashes. (Jack had once watched a neighbor get evicted, Shultz recalled, and was horrified to see the urn containing the tenant's husband's ashes lying in the street.) Beech had designated the director of Laradon Hall as his executor and asked her not to inform the Elks chapter in Evergreen of his death for six months.
Why not tell the Elks? And what was the connection to Laradon? Jack Beech had a developmentally disabled half-sister, ten years his junior, but she'd never received any services from the organization. Shultz and Dave Beech decided to pay a visit to Laradon Hall to see if they could obtain his ashes — and to find out what the people there knew about their brother.
They met with Annie Green on August 6. Accounts of what was said during the meeting vary. Laradon's attorneys maintain that Green disclosed that she'd received a $100,000 check from the deceased, but his siblings say she failed to mention the donation; they claim they only found out about it from the register of Jack's checkbook. It's clear, though, that Green showed them the envelope Jack Beech had left for her, and that the words on that envelope — WAIT UNTILL YOU HEAR FROM CORONER — deeply troubled her visitors.
The Beech siblings say they're not upset that Jack decided to leave his estate to Laradon Hall. They wonder, though, how anyone could have seen those words and not respond in some way — arrange for a welfare check, maybe, call 911 or the lawyer listed on the will, a suicide hotline, somebody.
"If my brother was killed in a car wreck and decided to do this with his money, we'd have been so happy for Laradon," says Dave Beech. "We'd be sitting around saying this was so typical of Jack and so wonderful. But under these circumstances, this is very difficult for us. They had warning signs on one hand and dollar signs on the other. If you ignore the warning signs, what should be the consequences?"
Two weeks after the meeting with Green, members of the Beech family filed objections in Jefferson County's probate court, seeking to prevent Laradon from collecting Jack's estate. In effect, the family contends that the organization had advance notice of Jack's suicide plans but did nothing to intervene because it stood to benefit from his death. In court filings, their attorney has scolded Laradon for rushing to get Green appointed as the estate administrator, knowing a challenge to the will was pending, and for the unusual timing of the cashing of the $100,000 check — which was deposited in a bank not on August 1 but on August 6, approximately thirty minutes after Green's meeting with the Beech family ended. Laradon shouldn't profit from its conduct, Beech's family insists, any more than a scheming heir should be allowed to benefit from bumping off an aged uncle.
"They should have nothing," says Shultz. She believes that Laradon, an organization that frequently deals with children and adults who have mental-health issues, has no excuse for ignoring what she regards as an obvious cry for help. "They should have known what the words meant," she adds. "They should be held to a higher standard."
Through her lawyers, Green declined to comment on the case. Laradon has issued a written statement expressing sympathy for the family but denying any responsibility for Beech's death: "Laradon had no knowledge that Mr. Beech intended to take his own life. It is Laradon's intention to continue honoring Mr. Beech's memory and his decision to benefit Laradon."
Just how Beech arrived at his final decisions may never be known. Suicide is rarely a straightforward affair. People thinking about killing themselves don't always exhibit obvious symptoms of depression or despair. They're not all recluses or mental patients with a long history of self-destructive behavior. Some are even the life of the party.
But experts say that potential suicides often signal their intentions — sometimes to strangers. Many suicides are preventable, if people only pay attention. And Jack Beech, in his own tricky way, showed many of the classic signs of suicide well before the night he ended it all.
Friends remember Beech as a loner, a maverick, a dancer to that different drum. He even had his own arrangements with the time-space continuum: There was clock time, and there was Beech time, meaning he could be relied on to show up for dinner a couple of hours later than he said he would. He entered people's lives at unexpected times and vanished just as abruptly. For Beech, if life was worth living, it was worth living fast.
Born in Akron, Ohio, the son of an over-the-road trucker, Jack came to Colorado in 1964, at the age of nine, after his parents' marriage unraveled. His mother, Elizabeth Malonson, brought him and his younger siblings to live with their cousins; at one point, there were nine kids in the same house, scrambling for attention.
Jack made friends with a boy down the block whose uncle had helped launch Estes Rockets, the local catalogue company that spread propulsion technology to thousands of astronaut wannabes. You could find the Beech house on the Fourth of July by following the explosions and clouds of smoke generated by a neighborhood war of revolution, waged with pop-bottle rockets and Roman candles, firecrackers and other flying engines of destruction.
At Lakewood High, Beech got interested in shop, filmmaking and music — especially Elvis and the Beatles. He would one day take a trip to England chiefly so he could visit the street crossing featured on the cover of Abbey Road. He bought a baby grand piano from a Denver hotel because John Lennon was said to have played on it. But his most consuming and lasting passion, even greater than his obsession with the Fab Four, involved the internal combustion engine.
"Jack loved cars," his brother says. "But cars didn't always love him back."
"His first car was a Camaro Z28," adds Shultz. "He had it for one weekend, then crashed it at Colfax and Kipling. My first car, he test-drove it for me — and crashed it two blocks from our house."
Beech took up skydiving at one point, and broke a leg. Being a daredevil was not, it seems, his true calling.
In 1974 he joined Coors, right out of high school. It was a decision he never regretted. He stayed with the company for twenty years, rising to middle management and fixing up and selling rental properties in his spare time. He also bought and restored classic cars — a '57 Chevy, a '72 Stingray, a '63 Rolls-Royce, a Mercedes 500 SL, a slew of 'vettes and Beetles — that he kept immaculately maintained. In his thirties, he branched into limos; wearing a chauffeur's cap, he'd score prime parking at clubs and sports arenas, then ditch the cap, crawl into the back and emerge with his buddies, a mysterious VIP with his own entourage.
He learned simple magic tricks as a way of overcoming his shyness in social situations, particularly with women. He was a tall, lanky, handsome man who seemed to get more attractive as he matured. Yet many of his relationships with the opposite sex didn't last as long as a tank of gas.
That was apparently by design. The pain of his own parents' divorce and subsequent breakups among other friends made a lasting impression on him. "He decided at a young age that he would never have kids and never get married," says Shultz. "He did have a lot of girlfriends, though. He hit on every single friend I've had in my life."
At parties, when people started pulling out pictures of their children, Beech would offer to show them "his kids" — and produce a snapshot of baby goats. Or maybe they'd like to admire his Pride and Joy; he kept a picture of the two household cleaners in his wallet, too. Corny stuff, but it was a way of needling the insufferably proud parents around him. Yet for a guy who had no interest in having children of his own, he spent a great deal of time playing with and bragging about his sisters' kids.
"The John I knew loved life," says Earbie Hurd, who began as Beech's supervisor in the Coors can plant and became one of his closest friends and an occasional roommate. "He had tons of friends. He was open and honest, and if you'd met him, you'd think he was the happiest guy in the world."
One night years ago, when Hurd was renting part of Beech's house, he came home from work and found Beech grinding up worms. He'd been trimming old trees at one of his properties that day, Beech explained, and found a nest of baby birds in one of the downed branches. He fed them worms until he could get the nest back into the tree.
Other people's lives revolve around their families. Beech had his work, his cars, and the easy laughter and short-fused romances one finds in bars — and if all that wasn't enough, there was the occasional impulsive trip to Jerusalem or Paris or some damn place. But then the work went away. In 1994 Beech took a buyout from Coors; he was not yet forty, and suddenly had time on his hands.
For a while he found diversion — and a surprising amount of success — in the casinos of Black Hawk. He told his brother that he'd developed a system for the slots. When Dave told him he was full of BS, Jack pulled out a wad of tax forms, the kind casinos issue when paying out five-figure jackpots. "Tell me how much BS this is," he said.
Jack explained that he would hit the casinos on Sunday night — when, he claimed, some slots were "looser" in order to meet the required percentage of payouts for the week. Sometimes he would lose, of course, but relatives say his picture showed up frequently in casino ads, clutching a big check. "One time he was down at this one machine and played until he felt he broke even," Dave Beech recalls. "As he was walking out the door, he put a buck and a quarter into a progressive slot — and walked away with $89,000."
Lucky Jack plowed his winnings into rental properties in Golden and Denver. He owned several duplexes and apartment buildings over a period of years, but dealing with demanding and irresponsible tenants wore him down. After he discovered one unit had been converted into a paintball range by the occupant, he decided to get out of the business. He sold off the properties and was once more at loose ends.
He took exotic jobs for a few weeks or months at a time. He didn't need the money, he told his siblings; he just wanted to find out what the business was like, maybe start one of his own. He worked as an exterminator and for a crime-scene cleanup operation. He even took off for a coal mine in Wyoming.
"He'd get bored," says Dave Beech. "Looking back on it now, I wonder if he was manic-depressive. He was so restless. He worked at a coal mine because he wanted to drive the train that loads and unloads the coal."
As his fiftieth birthday loomed, Beech decided that he wanted to ride a bicycle across America. He rode from Denver to Chicago, down to Florida, back through Texas, then abruptly stopped in New Mexico, got on a bus and came home. He never explained why he didn't finish the trip.
Last spring he was talking about buying a garage and detailing cars; he paid enough for his own vehicles' care that he figured there must be money in it. But first he wanted to visit the Henry Ford Museum and a car auction in the upper Midwest. On May 1, his 53rd birthday, his sister Carole left a phone message for him.
"He didn't call me back for three days," she says. "And that's how we found out he was in trouble."
Jack told her he had just spent several days in jail in Battle Creek, Michigan. He was facing a felony charge. He didn't believe he'd done anything wrong, and he was absolutely furious about it.
The way Jack told the story, the whole thing was crazy and unjust. He was minding his own business, heading down the road in the clunky white van he used for long trips because he could sleep in back, when the cops pulled him over for — get this — driving too slow. A flimsy pretext, maybe, for stopping a van with out-of-state plates, but what can you do?
They asked to search, and he said okay, forgetting about the handgun wrapped in a coat under the seat. Years before, Beech had been mugged at gunpoint in Las Vegas, an experience that convinced him to bring a weapon along whenever he went on the road with cash in his pocket. The gun wasn't even loaded, he told Shultz, but that didn't make any difference to the Michigan gendarmes. They charged him with violating local conceal-carry laws and tossed him in the pokey.
He had a couple thousand dollars in cash when they arrested him. The bail was three thousand, more than that of some of the wife-beaters in the same jail. He had lots of cash in Colorado, but all his contact numbers were on his cell phone, which they'd taken away from him. And the local bail bondsmen — get this — wouldn't take a collect phone call! So he spent several days in the tank, doing magic tricks and making new friends, until he found a bondsman who would answer the phone and could be persuaded that Jack Beech, a high roller and man of property, was good for a measly grand or two.
It was insane, really — but not the only time Beech would find himself oddly pinched for cash. He'd also had trouble buying a new pickup truck. Most of his money was tied up in fixed investments, so he went to his bank for a loan. He had a million dollars in certificates of deposit at that bank, he told his sister, but they turned him down anyway, saying he didn't have enough liquidity. He was livid about that, but even more burned about the arrest. It meant several trips back to Michigan for hearings and a possible felony conviction.
Shultz wonders if the arrest could have been a "trigger event" for her brother, the kind of traumatic experience that sends a potential suicide into a downward spiral. Beech had a court date in Michigan on August 5, a week after his death. In the written instructions he left at Laradon, he asked Green to call the bail bondsman and collect $500 of his money before that date.
But Susan Harris, the family's attorney in the probate case, says it's likely that Beech would have received nothing worse than a fine and probation for the gun charge. And parts of his plan were apparently already in motion before his arrest. He had first visited Laradon Hall in February, five months before he left the package for Green; he'd told the receptionist his name and informed her that he was planning to give all of his money to Laradon. The receptionist noted that he was wearing an Elks shirt. The development coordinator was away from her desk at the time, and Beech left without talking to anyone else. The will that Green eventually received was executed in March — several weeks before his trip to Michigan.
Doing a little estate planning is not in itself evidence of suicidal thinking; still, in such matters, context is critical. A list of common warning signs prepared by the Colorado Office of Suicide Prevention includes "giving away favorite possessions," "inappropriate goodbyes" and "reckless actions." It also mentions "verbal behavior that is ambiguous or indirect," such as talking about going away for a long time. ("Wait until you hear from coroner" would probably be considered less ambiguous than the list's examples.) But while Beech was able to hide his intentions from almost all of his family and friends, at least one person had picked up warning signs from him for years.
"John was the sweetest man I ever knew — and the most complicated," says Linda Allen, a former girlfriend. "I don't know if he was ever diagnosed, but you could tell that he was bipolar. He would be on top of the mountain, and then he'd fall to the bottom. He talked to me a lot about suicide."
A psychic and "spiritual counselor," Allen has occasionally consulted with police and claims to have predicted several cataclysmic events, including the September 11 attacks. But Beech remained an enigma to her throughout a sporadic romance that stretched over seven years. The pair met in 1999, when one of Allen's clients introduced Beech to her at a party at Allen's house.
"He kept asking me, 'Did we meet before?'" Allen recalls. "And I finally told him, 'We did, but not in this lifetime.'"
The two soon became frequent traveling companions. It was different from Beech's other, brief relationships with women; Allen was nine years older than he was, and Beech seemed to genuinely enjoy talking about spiritual matters with her. "We took 27 trips together," Allen says. "Mexico, Las Vegas, everywhere. We spent a lot of time out of town, and he was wonderful. But when we came back, he was a different person. He never drank around me. When he'd leave me, he'd go on binges, and nobody would hear from him."
Beech downplayed his drinking to her. But his absences became more prolonged — two weeks, then three, then four. After they'd been seeing each other for a year, he admitted that he went through bouts of depression. "I've even fantasized about taking myself out, and you with me," he said, then quickly added that he would never do any such thing.
On another occasion, after Allen hadn't heard from Beech for six weeks, she finally got him on the phone. He told her he'd been in bed.
"At two in the afternoon?" she asked.
"For the past six weeks," he told her. "I can't get up. I hurt all over."
Allen urged Beech to see a doctor about his depression. But he had a deep-rooted aversion to doctors and medication. He told her he had checked into an institution for a few weeks in his thirties, when he still worked at Coors, because of the death of a girlfriend and pressure at work — and he wasn't eager to repeat the experience. He took greater comfort in his church, the Mile Hi Church of Religious Science. Religious Science doesn't have the same harsh attitude toward medicine and psychiatry as Christian Science — or Scientology, with which it's frequently confused — but it does preach the healing of the sick through the power of the Universal Mind, which is God.
Beech's cousin, Scott Malonson, says that Jack had very strong opinions about psychiatric drugs. Beech let Malonson stay with him in his house in Conifer in 2001, at a time when Malonson was taking antidepressants and recovering from a battle with non-Hodgkins lymphoma and the end of his first marriage. "He looked at my pills and said, 'You really don't need to be taking that stuff,'" Malonson recalls. "He always gave the impression that he was strong in mind, that he could rise above things."
One time when he was out with Allen, Beech drove by his church to show it to her. They sat quietly in the parking lot for a while, and then he asked, "Do you think God forgives you if you take your own life?"
Allen didn't know what to say. She talked about life being a precious gift. "He laid his head on the steering wheel and just cried," she recalls. "He stayed with me a couple of days after that. I tried to get him to move in with me. Maybe people is what he needed."
But Beech wasn't interested in living with anyone, much less marriage; he told her that there was no marriage he knew of that had worked. Allen may have been one of his lifelines, but he reached out to her less and less. Months went by without any word from him, then an entire year. When he resurfaced, they were still friends, but that was all.
The last time Allen saw him was in December 2007. He called out of the blue and dropped by for fifteen minutes. He complained about losing his hair — he'd skipped several family events, including weddings, because he refused to take off his baseball cap — and announced that he wasn't drinking anymore.
"It was like he was saying goodbye," she says. "When he left my house that night, I knew I would never see him again."
Allen sent him a copy of her just-published book, The Night of the Witching Moon. It was returned as undeliverable; he'd moved from Conifer to Lakewood without telling her. When she heard of his arrest a few months later, she wrote to him, offering to help. She received no response.
But Beech still thought about her. He started crossing off days on his calendar on June 23 — Linda Allen's birthday.
He told his real-estate agent that his balding pate, speckled with hair plugs, was the result of chemotherapy, and that he was thinking about selling his house and "moving on." In the last weeks of his life, he spent a great deal of time painting the house. He seemed quite pleased with the results.
A smiling, friendly demeanor doesn't preclude suicide, notes Bill Porter, a clinical psychologist and the director of mental-health services for the Cherry Creek School District.
"In many cases, people relate that the person was relatively happy," he says. "There's a conflict between the part that wants to live and the part that wants to die, and that conflict has been resolved."
The package Beech left at Laradon in July may well have been his last effort to test the world and see if anyone was paying attention. "People who are suicidal will run up the flag to see what people do," Porter says. "On very few occasions do they not give some kind of sign. Unfortunately, people don't know what to do with it."
Laradon Hall was named after Larry and Donald, the severely retarded sons of Joe and Elizabeth Calabrese. The Calabreses were appalled at the way children like their own were routinely institutionalized, so in 1948 they set up a boarding and day school on Federal Boulevard for the developmentally disabled. Through hard work, determination and luck, the school flourished. Elizabeth Calabrese went on the popular television show Queen for a Day to publicize the cause; Frank Sinatra, Bette Davis, Jack Benny and other celebrities raised money and brought the checks to north Denver.
In 1950, the Colorado Elks designated Laradon as the fraternal organization's "major project." It's remained that way ever since; although the Elks' contributions amount to only a small percentage of Laradon's $11 million annual budget, several Elks sit on the board of directors of the parent nonprofit, the Laradon Hall Society for Exceptional Children and Adults.
After Joe Calabrese died, in 1986, the organization went through a rocky transition period. (A 1988 Westword article reported on morale and money issues, feuding directors and staff.) Laradon is now is a much more complex entity than the boardinghouse the Calabreses started sixty years ago; it offers a range of programs, including adult employment and residential services, and is currently in the process of expanding its school at 5100 Lincoln Street.
Annie Green has worked at Laradon since the turmoil of the 1980s. She'd served as Laradon's acting director for only a short time last summer when Jack Beech left his package for her. The previous director had resigned effective in early July, and a new one was hired in the fall. Green, who was a candidate for the top job, is now Laradon's deputy director, in charge of development and fundraising. At the heart of the battle over Beech's estate is his family's belief that Green should have looked at one particularly large and unusual gift more carefully.
Elizabeth Malonson, Jack's mother, initially questioned whether her son had been of sound mind when he prepared the will. Those claims have since been dropped. What remains is what's known as a "public policy" claim — basically, that Laradon shouldn't profit from the will when it received such a glaring warning of suicide and made so little effort to save its donor.
Questioned by Malonson's attorneys, Green conceded that she'd never received an original will from a donor before; usually, nonprofits are notified of such bequests by estate attorneys after the donor's death. She said she found the package "odd" but not alarming, and suggested that the language about the coroner could mean that the man had a terminal illness.
Green's attorneys have maintained that she had no way of knowing that Beech was in imminent danger of suicide. They say Laradon is just trying to honor Beech's will, that he clearly wanted his modest estate — which had dwindled to around $250,000 at the time of his death, including the check and property — to go to help Laradon's clients.
But Malonson's attorney, Susan Harris, says the message Beech left for Green was unmistakable. "The only people he revealed his suicide plan to was Laradon Hall," she says. "There's no note that says, 'I'm going to commit suicide,' but there's a lot of indications. Who gives their house keys and financial information to a perfect stranger? He writes about the coroner, about where to find his car titles — and here's a postdated check for $100,000. One of the classic signs of impending suicide is the property giveaway.
"Laradon Hall deals with the mental-health issues of the clients it serves," Harris continues. "They have psychologists on board, all kinds of mental-health professionals. They do assessment; they do treatment. But they never tried to save him. They didn't contact him. They didn't call a hotline. They didn't talk to one of their own psychologists. They stuck the check in their safe."
Green apparently did mention the unusual bequest to the chair of Laradon's board of directors, John Amen, at a regularly scheduled board meeting shortly after she received the package. But Amen, a state officer in the Elks, didn't know John Beech, and the conversation didn't lead to any followup.
Whether the family can keep Laradon from collecting the estate may be decided at a hearing in Jefferson County probate court next month. Harris acknowledges that there isn't much precedent for holding a nonprofit accountable for a suicide, particularly if that organization had no professional or medical relationship with the deceased.
"We have no case like it anywhere in the country," she says. "Here you have an omission to act, with the knowledge that you may benefit from a person's death. What incentive do you have to try to prevent that from happening? The fact is, it's so easy to call and ask for a welfare check."
Scott Malonson thinks he knows why his cousin chose to take his package of keys and instructions to a complete stranger. "If he had gone to family, we would have intervened," he says. "I would have said, 'Dude, what are you doing?'"
Schultz believes her brother was too afraid of the social stigma associated with mental illness to confide in his family; shame might also explain his request not to inform the Elks of his death for six months. On Jack's refrigerator, she found one of Ashleigh Brilliant's "Pot-Shots," clipped from the newspaper, which asks, "Why does society punish us so severely for trying to escape from ourselves?"
After he learned of Beech's death, Scott Malonson volunteered to put together a memorial DVD. He assembled dozens of photographs of Jack, from childhood to baseball-cap-affixed middle age, into a montage with music: "If I Dream," by Elvis, "In My Life" and "Let It Be," by the Beatles. He spent four days on the project and finished it in a state of physical and emotional exhaustion. But he knew he had to do it for Jack.
"If you knew him, you have something he gave to you," he says. "Whether he helped you with something, taught you something, showed you some magic, there's a piece of him in you. He gave something to everyone he met — friendship, a smile, something."
Beech gave Laradon Hall everything he had left. The nonprofit has a policy of acknowledging donations in writing, but Laradon never sent Jack Beech a thank-you note for his generous check.
"There has never been one admission from them," says Dave Beech, "that maybe, just maybe, they did something wrong."
To see a clip of John Beech's memorial video, go to westword.com. Contact the author at [email protected]. | {
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Editorial: Why We’ll Never Have The Perfect Phone
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So you’re waiting for that perfect phone, it’s bound to happen sooner or later right? An OEM will finally bow to consumer demand and make a phone with all those features that we want at a reasonable price and in doing so conquer the market. Wrong.
In a recent Discuss feature we asked you, “What’s the One Thing You Want to See on Your Next Phone?” Hundreds of answers later and it became apparent that many people expect too much from OEMs. Some of the answers we received did indeed fall within the realms of plausibility as far as the technology goes. However, the vast majority will not see a phone for many years due to a simple eternal factor, companies desire large and long term profits. We often forget that as power users we do not make up the vast majority of the market and our desires greatly differ from those of the average user. We are generally more hungry for battery life and storage, and as such these may take little priority when developing new models. The features that do take priority are those that are set to make the most money, these include but are not limited to: size, shape and numbers. Whilst many of us would prefer to sacrifice some precious millimetres in exchange for a higher capacity battery, for many users it is the look of a device that draws them in. Shape is obviously dictated by fashion trends set by the larger OEMs or based upon gimmicks (i’m looking at you LG G flex). And finally, we arrive at numbers. Big numbers, the bigger the better, right? By this I am referring to of course the specs, which whilst not being as impressive once you fully understand them, make a big difference to the lay person’s purchasing decision. These are often twisted to better facilitate the sales pitch.
The image here is taken from the specs page of a current flagship and shows a common problem with how the average user sees a phone before purchasing. “402 hours” of battery life? That’s almost 17 days, that’s about the same as my old Nokia!” This of course is inevitably followed by great consternation just a day or so later. The majority of readers here will realize that it is in fact the number above this which is the significant factor here. 2840 mAh seems like far less by comparison and will likely require charging each night with moderate to heavy usage depending on factors such as screen size, processor and even network strength. Whilst OEMs can still project this façade, they are far less likely to give a significant leap in battery capacity. The same can be said for processors, as when people go in to a store looking for a new phone, it is not the make or model of a processor they hear, it is cores. Octo-core? That means it must be good, sold!
It is in manufacturers’ best interests to create a phone that can be beat the following year. If it is in theory possible to place 512 GB of internal storage in our mobile devices, why hasn’t it been done? There are multiple reasons for this, the first being cost, as it still remains very expensive to buy this size of storage from manufacturers. Cost aside however, we currently live in a world where a phone with 128 GB of internal storage is considered significant. Any company would hesitate to leap to 512 GB when 256 GB can be used in several years and still be a major promoting factor and then make a further leap several years after that. Finally storage has become a controversial subject of late, many flagships have seen SD card support disappear in a bid to promote higher internal storage models of devices and cloud storage services.
It is commonly stated that “perfect is the enemy of good enough”, by which in this instance it is meant that in the search for this hypothetical perfect phone we can easily become distracted from that which we already have. It is human nature to desire more. I sit here looking at the phones on my desk, the latest addition features a 5.7 inch display, dual sim capability, a Snapdragon 801 and a 3000 mAh battery. It meets my every need, however I can immediately bring to mind a small list of things that I would change about it if I could. I also firmly believe that if I were given these features another list would come to mind in a never ending cycle. We should of course always strive for progress, but for now we still have some great technology in our hands. We may never see that perfect phone, but we will see some great devices along the journey.
“The flagship is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of code spilled by all those OEMs and developers so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a market. Think of the endless features claimed by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel, forced upon the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings.”
– Carl Sagan (of course, I could be paraphrasing here)
Which features do you think OEMs could release now that would still meet their interests? Leave a comment below! | {
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In San Francisco, the centre of the US tech revolution, restaurant workers are lobbying for a minimum wage increase. In response, a conservative lobby group that campaigns on behalf of the restaurant industry threatened to replace the workers with iPads.
Restaurant workers already claim food stamps at twice the rate of the rest of the US population because their wages are so low. Because of this, after they fall prey to the march of the tablets, America's waiters and waitresses could be the subjects of yet another social experiment: in a recent thought-bubble, Google engineer and activist Justine Tunney suggested last month that food stamps should be replaced with Soylent, a grey nutritional slurry mooted as a total meal replacement, to keep poor Americans "healthy and productive".
Soylent was rapidly accepted by the Silicon Valley technorati, who backed the project's Kickstarter to the tune of $1m. They consume it as an exercise in minimalist purity: "what if you never had to worry about food again?" Really, we're looking at the creation of two worlds – and that's theirs. In ours, we'll never have to worry about food again either, because we'll be gulping down mandatory tasteless nutrition sludge we didn't want, after being forced out of a job by a tablet computer.
Justine Tunney (@JustineTunney) Give poor people @soylent so they can be healthy and productive. If you're on food stamps, maybe you're unhealthy and need to eat better.
This conflict – between consumers of technology and the geeks who pull us forward into uncharted sociocultural territory – is starting to become more pointed. We trained ourselves to value Facebook’s "open society" without privacy; we accepted the furtive mobile phone check as appropriate punctuation for a face-to-face conversation; we even put up with 3D cinema for a time. But this is too much.
Now the blowback has arrived. The first signs of the emerging tech utopia we were always told about don't look so great if you can't code. Instead, it's hard to escape the feeling that we're set to fall into obnoxious technological traps predicated on the easy abandonment of basic human experiences like eating or working.
The Soylent slurry, which bypasses the tactile experience of eating, isn't that far away conceptually from Google Glass, which projects data from apps directly onto the retina. And the cherished pantheon of Glass Explorers, the software developers who test drive Glass outside the hermetic confines of Google’s product labs, behave in a similar way to Soylent evangelists.
Soylent, the crowdfunding-backed food substitute. Photograph: Julio Miles/Soylent
There are surveillance cameras everywhere, but the operators are operating them remotely; Google Glass straps the CCTV to the operator's face. This was made very real during the saga of Sarah Slocum, who was attacked in a San Francisco bar for wearing Glass. "You're killing the city," a woman said to Slocum before the attack, rehearsing the theme that tech workers are ruining San Francisco's culture. "I wanna get this white trash, this trash on tape", Slocum replied as she had Google's designer frames ripped off her face in the middle of filming.
People's distaste for Glass isn't primarily about privacy, any more than attacks on Google buses in the Bay Area are about road usage. Nor are they a "neo-luddite" fear of disembodied technological encroachment. The backlash against Glass is the implied rejection of the kind of casual sociopathy which leads a person to become a surveillance camera, to put a computer between themselves and their every interaction with other people. The philosophy of Glass is inward looking. It improves the life of the wearer at the expense of those around them.
The shared norms that govern human interaction are fragile enough without that kind of constant interference. We know that, because of the outrage over Facebook’s latest entry into this technological carnival of horrors: the "emotion contagion" experiment, which manipulated the news content certain users saw to toy with their emotions.
In response to the outrage, Duncan Watts, a researcher for Microsoft, wrote that:
Remember: the initial trigger for the outrage over the Facebook study was that it manipulated the emotions of users. But we are being manipulated without our knowledge or consent all the time – by advertisers, marketers, politicians – and we all just accept that as a part of life. The only difference between the Facebook study and everyday life is that the researchers were trying to understand the effect of that manipulation.
In Watts' strange logic, we are manipulated and studied secretly, and resign ourselves to it. In other words, we already agreed to the experiment writ large merely by using Facebook (or for that matter, by being alive in a space where an advertisement is posted). But we don't want it to be too obvious, or we get mad.
"Would you prefer a world in which we are having our emotions manipulated, but where the manipulators ignore the consequences of their own actions?" Watts asked. But to whose benefit?
A divide is growing between the people who wholeheartedly embrace a radically new, radically self-centred vision of human life, and the people who do not. The internal lives of the tech elite, centred on the labour-saving innovations of Silicon Valley, are at odds with semi-atavistic conceptions of how people interact. Traditions and shared values are redundant, inefficient, and must be optimised out of existence.
The backlash against this world is democracy manifesting itself; a tacit rejection of the ideological assumptions underpinning the personal tech revolution. People want to define the structure of their own lives, and Silicon Valley's myriad product lines are an unwelcome intrusion into the way we live and interact with one another – and even the way we eat, sleep and procreate.
A simple fact remains: there is something intrinsically repellant about a world in which our food, jobs and personal relationships are replaced by digital proxies in the name of ultra-efficient disruption. The geeks, with their ready willingness to abandon social norms, are pulling us toward a utopia nobody wants. | {
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If asked "think of five musicians with their own clothing lines," rattling off a few names -- a Rihanna here, a Pharrell there, Madonna, Kanye -- would be an all-too-easy task. But there's a budding line of products that alt-R&B turned pop star The Weeknd is lending his name to: PAX's tobacco and marijuana vaporizers.
The San Francisco-based brand has announced its collaboration with the Toronto singer, born Abel Tesfaye. The product, named The Madness Tour Limited Edition PAX 2 (because PAX will also be an official co-sponsor of his current North American "The Madness" Fall tour), is branded with Weeknd's trademark "XO" logo and the device powers on to the tune of his Hot 100-topping "The Hills." The $325.00 vaper will be sold alongside the tour's merchandise at each concert.
"Abel is arguably the most relevant musician today," says PAX Chief Marketing Officer Richard Mumby. "He has a strong appreciation for design, so we thought it was a great fit to extend his aesthetic perspective to the PAX device. This is an exciting and unique way to showcase the PAX brand in a new way."
He Earned It: The Weeknd Dominates People's Choice Awards Music Nominations
Mumby believes marijuana-related endorsement deals will join the ranks of fragrances, liquor brands, headphones and fashion lines, that PAX has been "approached for years by artists from a number of genres." Though this PAX 2 is the first complete collaboration they've partnered with a musician on, adding that it is "certainly not the last!"
In September Snoop Dogg announced and unveiled that he is the co-founder of the new marijuana-devoted company and website MerryJane.com, described the online "the encyclopedia to the cannabis world" during TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco.
"We're providing the industry with something that's void right now," Snoop said then. "We are the information hotline for cannabis. We are what's missing."
What has really been missing, though, are modern-day pop musicians willing to align themselves with a product that's a bit hazier than obvious go-to money-makers like apparel or beverages. The Weeknd is the first young chart-topper to not only sing about using weed and such, but to then sign on the dotted line to push a luxe product that ports it.
The Weeknd Tops Hot 100; Adele No. 1 Next Week?
The question is who's next. Stars like Rihanna have several lyrics about smoking, however even she hasn't been bold enough to endorse any weed-connected product. But as more states legalize marijuana (though not in Ohio), making it more socially acceptable, expect for big acts to join the fray. PAX held 2015 after parties at Outside Lands in San Francisco and Voodoo Festival in New Orleans with Toro y Moi and Gorgon City respectively.
"We have more exciting artist collaborations in the works," adds Mumby. "Music will continue to be an important part of the PAX brand story. We'll continue to grow our presence at music festivals in bigger and more integrated ways throughout this year." | {
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It's unclear what San Francisco's asking price would be in a trade, but Kaepernick certainly would have to sign for less than what the 49ers are scheduled to pay on his current deal if he were cut. Would the Jets be willing to part ways with draft picks — they only have six this season, including one in each of the first four rounds — or wait for Kaepernick to be released before making a move? | {
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Simon Tolkien is the grandson of JRR Tolkien and a director of the Tolkien Estate. He studied Modern History at Trinity College, Oxford and went on to become a London barrister specializing in criminal defense. He left the law to become a writer in 2001 and has written five novels which mine the history of the first half of the last century to explore dark subjects – capital punishment, the Holocaust, the London Blitz and the Battle of the Somme. He is now working on a book about American volunteers who sacrificed so much for their ideals in the Spanish Civil War. | {
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Trump organization executive, Michael Cohen, tells CNN's Briana Keilar there is no shake-up in Donald Trump's campaign despite announcing Kellyanne Conway as the new campaign manager and Steve Bannon as chief executive. | {
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The federal government announced a plan earlier this week to impose a carbon tax on provinces, like Saskatchewan, that are not instituting some form of carbon pricing.
CBC Saskatchewan gathered opinions on opposite sides of the issue. Read another side here.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau must be tired of making reasoned "hold out the carrot" appeals to the Saskatchewan Party's backward leadership. On Oct. 23, the federal government announced it's imposing a carbon tax on my coal-fired, climate-changing province.
Saskatchewan Premier Scott "The Sequesterer" Moe refuses to embrace the federal plan. In fact, he launched a legal challenge this year with the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal. The judiciary won't rule on the issue until spring 2019. It's like the long wait for season eight of Game of Thrones.
Tight budget squeezed province
Stuck in the middle of this protracted fight are Saskatchewan's residents. It doesn't help that my provincial government issued a belt-tightening 2017 budget.
It was so stringent that it left our restaurant sector hungry due to the industry now being included in the six per cent provincial sales tax. I know of two established restaurants in rural southwest Saskatchewan that have either changed hands or closed their doors.
An early October drive from Wakaw to Melfort on Highway 41 revealed miles and miles of canola and grain crops that remained un-harvested. While Saskatchewan's mining sector has recovered, the oil and gas sector did not rebound as quickly in 2017 as it did in Alberta.
The Royal Bank's 2019 economic forecast is a respectable 2.8 per cent growth for Saskatchewan but that gain is offset by weakness in the labour market.
'Ineffective carbon sequestration'
SaskPower, a Crown corporation, is engaged in a controversial carbon sequestration project, Boundary Dam 3, in southern Saskatchewan. It's both an economic failure and a technology mismatch, according to British economist Gordon Hughes, who prepared a 2017 report for the Global Warming Policy Foundation.
Hughes's report recommended much cheaper and much cleaner natural gas for electricity generation instead of dirty coal and ineffective carbon sequestration.
The $1.5-billion price tag for the retrofitted power plant has caught the attention of Cathy Sproule, the provincial NDP energy critic, who called it a "colossal economic failure." You know the free enterprise Sask. Party is losing ground when a leftie MLA can point to the party's lack of business acumen.
Saskatchewan's decision to go it alone — arrogantly bypassing the federal government's environmental policy wonks — has already proved costly. If only Moe could sequester the $1.5-billion loss to taxpayers.
'Gutless leaders playing politics with our energy policies'
Alberta's flip-flopper Premier Rachel Notley abandoned her support for the carbon plan this summer during her snit over the botched Trans Mountain pipeline project. In early October, Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister defiantly rejected the carbon tax plan for a perfect prairie apocalyptic trifecta.
To his credit, Trudeau has bent over backwards to accommodate Alberta's oil and gas sector. He even picked up the tab for their $4.5-billion pipeline, which has come to a grinding halt due to a recent federal judicial ruling. Is the pipeline purchase reconciliation to Albertans for Papa Trudeau's disastrous early 1980s National Energy Program?
I never thought I'd hear myself utter the words, 'I miss the moderating influence of Ralph Klein.'
What annoys this Saskatchewan resident is the vile practice of gutless leaders playing politics with our energy policies. For generations, Western premiers have successfully played the Western Alienation Game with mixed results.
Ralph Klein was the most vocal grandstander of them all. After living in Alberta for seven years, I never thought I'd hear myself utter the words, "I miss the moderating influence of Ralph Klein."
As a Western Canadian, I'm currently alienated from Central Canada, but not for the reasons you would think. It's Ontario Premier Doug Ford's affinity for my incorrigible premier that raises my ire.
Ford's recent election, along with Moe's January 2018 Sask. Party leadership win, has created a perfect storm of absentee leadership that will rage for decades to come.
'A bait-and-switch distraction tactic'
Where is the middle ground on the climate file? Moe's Middle Earth approach to climate change only serves to undermine his credibility with voters.
Why not admit that our homegrown carbon capture method failed and embrace the new carbon tax as a viable compromise? Instead, Saskatchewanians' tax dollars are being squandered on legal challenges.
Sure, Moe can temporarily take Trudeau to task and vilify the federal government, but it's not a sustainable approach to an enduring problem.
Placing blame on the feds and their "job-killing carbon tax" is a bait-and-switch distraction tactic worthy of a pickpocket.
I'm tired of Moe's hypocritical posturing and his party's coal-fired rhetoric.
You had me at climate change, Justin Trudeau. My household will gain $457 in 2019 with your carbon tax rebate cheque, but I'm not in this for the rebate bucks. Like many Saskatchewanians, I want to see real action on the climate file.
This column is part of CBC's Opinion section. For more information about this section, please read this editor's blog and our FAQ. | {
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The White House acknowledged reports on Monday that outgoing President Barack Obama warned President-elect Donald Trump in November not to hire retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn as his national security adviser. But press secretary Sean Spicer downplayed Obama’s comments as “bad blood” rather than an expression of a true security concern.
“It’s true President Obama made it known that he wasn’t exactly a fan of Gen. Flynn’s,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters at his daily press briefing. “The question you have to ask yourself really is if President Obama was truly concerned about Gen. Flynn, why didn’t they suspend his security clearance which they re-approved months earlier?”
That top secret security clearance was first granted in 2012, when Flynn was nominated by Obama to be the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Obama fired Flynn in 2014, but Flynn retained the security clearance. Flynn served as an adviser to the Trump campaign, and eight days after Obama’s meeting with Trump, he was nominated by Trump as national security adviser.
Flynn resigned from that position in February after media reports revealed that he had discussed U.S.-imposed sanctions on Russia during the transition period, and had misled Trump and Vice President Mike Pence about those discussions — leading to questions about the Trump administration’s vetting process. Trump and the White House have, in turn, sought to blame the Obama administration and raise questions about the previous administration’s vetting procedures.
“Additionally, why did the Obama administration let Flynn go to Russia for a paid speaking engagement and receive a fee?” Spicer asked.
Related: Defense Department investigating Flynn’s foreign payments
In December 2015, Flynn accepted more than $45,000 from RT, the Russian government-funded TV network, to give a talk in Moscow at a black-tie dinner during which he sat next to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Story continues
Late last month, it was revealed that the Defense Department is investigating whether Flynn violated federal ethics rules by failing to report and receive prior approval to accept the RT fees.
Douglas Wise, Flynn’s former top deputy at the DIA, told Yahoo News he was stunned when he found out that Flynn had accepted money from a propaganda arm of the Russian government — saying he would’ve launched an immediate investigation into his one-time boss.
“I was apoplectic,” Wise said. “Nobody would have imagined that Flynn would have taken money for the trip. I would never have thought that in a million years.”
President-elect Trump meets President Obama at the White House, Nov. 10, 2016. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
And according to multiple reports, Obama himself warned Trump not to hire Flynn when the president-elect met with Obama at the White House on Nov. 10. The reports did not specify the nature of the president’s concerns, or if Flynn’s contacts with Russia were discussed.
The renewed focus on Flynn comes on the day former acting Attorney General Sally Yates is scheduled to appear before a Senate subcommittee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Yates — who was fired by Trump in January after refusing to defend his controversial executive order on immigration — is expected to be asked about Flynn’s ouster.
According to the Associated Press, Yates “is likely to testify Monday that she warned White House counsel Don McGahn on Jan. 26 that Flynn’s contacts — and the discrepancies between what the White House said happened on the calls and what actually occurred — had left him in a compromised position.”
Yet Flynn’s resignation did not come until Feb. 13 — nearly three weeks after Yates’ warning and three days after the Washington Post disclosed the conversations.
Earlier Monday, Trump tried to shift blame for vetting Flynn to the Obama administration via Twitter.
“General Flynn was given the highest security clearance by the Obama Administration,” he wrote. “But the Fake News seldom likes talking about that.”
General Flynn was given the highest security clearance by the Obama Administration – but the Fake News seldom likes talking about that. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 8, 2017
Trump also attacked Yates hours before her appearance on Capitol Hill.
Ask Sally Yates, under oath, if she knows how classified information got into the newspapers soon after she explained it to W.H. Counsel. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 8, 2017
“Ask Sally Yates, under oath, if she knows how classified information got into the newspapers soon after she explained it to W.H. Counsel,” Trump tweeted, setting off speculation that he might have been engaged in an attempt to intimidate or influence the testimony of a witness before Congress, which is against the law.
Questioned on Trump’s statement about Yates during Monday’s press briefing, Spicer said, “I think the tweet speaks for itself.”
Read more from Yahoo News: | {
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I was standing on a rooftop in central London on the last day of filming a crucial scene for Sherlock when I got a call offering me the role of production designer on the new series of Upstairs Downstairs BUT - I had to start the following day!
This was my introduction to the rollercoaster ride that was to take over my life for the next five months.
We pick up the story of 165 Eaton Place in September 1938 which is a great era for design - the height of art deco.
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Returning to 165 Eaton Place
As the production designer, I was very keen to utilise this in our distinction between 'Upstairs' and 'Downstairs' - the opulence and crisp elegant lines of art deco as opposed to the rougher, more textured world of the working classes.
The interior of the house is all a set and is spread between three studios at BBC Wales' new facility down in Cardiff Bay (next door to Casualty and Pobol y Cwm).
We've added a couple of extra rooms to the interior set this year and one of those is a dining room.
I enjoyed designing it as we were able to introduce some very contemporary shapes and patterns into the set. Look out for the pair of doors leading into the dining room and the floor inside.
We designed and made these ourselves - without seeming too Changing Rooms, they're all paint effect and MDF!!
The main hall is in a larger studio than the rest to allow for it to be two storeys, which helps sell the idea of it being a real house. You can follow the actors from the dining room across the hall and up the stairs to the landing and drawing room.
The decorating of these sets correctly is very important.
We must make sure that the patterns and colours look good on camera, so we co-ordinate with the costume department to make sure that the actors' outfits are complementary to the scenery and don't blend into the background.
The cost of redecorating a room could be the difference between coming in on or over budget.
Therefore I have to discuss options and themes beforehand - with the producer, director, director of photography and costume. I have to admit that I tend to get my own way most of the time!
Harry Spargo (Neil Jackson) and one of the vintage cars
Interior design is only one aspect of the job however, and as much as I like my wallpapers, we also have cars, planes, trains and buses to source as well as all the props.
I have a very good team helping me with all these as it would be an impossible task on your own - the organising of the vehicles alone is a monumental task.
The cars, for example, are mostly privately owned and are brought to set by the owners or drivers on their behalf. Due to their age some are trailered if they need to travel very far.
The aeroplane we sourced from Duxford Air Museum, who were, as always, very helpful.
It's also a big task sourcing the dressing props (what we use to make the sets look real) and action props, which are used by the actors and often described in the script which means we have to source or reproduce. We hire some, trawl round antiques markets for others, and eBay is also a good resource.
We even have some made especially - look for the special gasproof pram! It was based on a real one but there were only a few very sketchy photos that survive of it, which were sourced from the internet and some old newsreel.
Downstairs: Anne Reid as Mrs Thackeray
There is also all the food and flowers. The end products of Mrs Thackeray 's work in the kitchen need to both look good enough to serve at a royal dinner party and be authentic for the period.
Because of this a specialist TV and film food economist was hired in.
She would pre-prepare some of the food and then it would be finished in a specially-made food preparation area just outside the studio so that we could serve it piping hot straight to set!
To support her expert work, we also depended on the culinary skills of our very own Hannah Nicholson (my set decorator) who also did most of the flower arranging as well as a myriad of other things!
It was a very challenging project but with a great team behind me I think we managed to achieve something beautiful - I hope you agree.
Arwel Wyn Jones is the production designer on Upstairs Downstairs.
Upstairs Downstairs returns to BBC One and BBC One HD on Sunday, 19 February at 9.30pm. For further programme times, please see the episode guide.
Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC. | {
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The 2016 Presidential campaign officially kicked off today with Republican rubber-face Ted Cruz announcing his candidacy for president. Trolling of the 2016 election also kicked off today, as everybody noticed somebody who very much does not like Cruz had already grabbed the domain TedCruz.com.
The Washington Post reports that you'll find the official Internet home of Cruz for President at TedCruz.org, because that's the best they could do:
It's not the best domain, obviously, but the dot-com was already taken. It was originally purchased in April 2004 and was once used for a Phoenix law firm, but today, it's being used to troll Cruz, with a message about immigration.
Of course, this doesn't matter worth a damn in the grand scheme of things; as the Post notes, "According to Quantcast, the official tedcruz.org is ranked the 2,156th biggest website in the U.S. right now, while the trolling tedcruz.com is ranked 618,938th." Doesn't mean it's not a hoot, though. | {
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junemermaid03:
For my Tadashi x Elsa fic One Year (https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10842593/1/One-Year). And surely you can tell by its awesomeness that it was drawn by the stupendously talented comickergirl! weowned8000saladplates, couragedontdesertme, and shinebrightlikesparklers, what do you think? XD | {
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Wembley WW2 live bomb posed 'risk to life' Published duration 22 May 2015 Related Topics World War Two
image copyright Sergeant Rupert Frere RLC image caption A blast wall was put up around the bomb to minimise damage if it exploded
An unexploded World War Two bomb uncovered by builders near Wembley Stadium posed "a genuine risk to life", the Army has said.
The 50kg (110lb) device was removed by a specialist Army team and safely detonated.
The bomb, thought to date from the early 1940s German air raids on London, was found on Thursday.
Homes and businesses were evacuated and the Army built a blast wall around the device in case it exploded.
The device was taken away by the Royal Logistic Corps disposal teams to a safe area to be detonated in a controlled explosion.
Police confirmed it was blown up in an unspecified location in Bedfordshire shortly after 17:00 BST.
After the bomb was removed from its position near Wembley, street cordons were taken down and people were allowed back into the area.
Wembley Stadium said its weekend games would go ahead including the Championship Middlesbrough v Norwich play-off on Monday.
"This weekend's games remain unaffected and we look forward to welcoming supporters of all six Football League Play-Off finalists to Wembley", it tweeted
media caption Chief Supt Michael Gallagher on plans for the detonation of the bomb
The Army said the bomb was located about 200m (656ft) away from Wembley Stadium but there was no risk to the venue. Empire Way had been partially closed and a 400m cordon was in place while bomb disposal experts dealt with the device.
The bomb was reported at about 15:00 BST on Thursday and Met Police officers said about 300 properties had been evacuated, which included the TV studio where Britain's Got Talent is filmed.
image copyright Sergeant Rupert Frere RLC image caption The Luftwaffe Sprengbombe-Cylindrisch bomb is due to be detonated later
Ch Supt Mick Gallagher, from Brent Police, said the public had been "very mature" in its response to the bomb.
He said 70 people had spent the night in an evacuation centre and more people joined them in the morning.
"I must also thank our courageous soldiers from various Army regiments for working tirelessly for over 24 hours, using their skill and experience to safely bring this incident to its conclusion," he added.
An Army spokesman said: "This bomb is a live munition in a potentially dangerous condition so it's important that people listen to the police and evacuate their homes if asked.
"Any bomb, even under a controlled explosion, could cause significant damage to property and there is a genuine risk to life."
image copyright Sergeant Rupert Frere RLC image caption The Army said the bomb was about 200m (656ft) away from the stadium
The Met Police said it had worked with disposal experts and partner agencies "to keep disruption to local residents and businesses to an absolute minimum", while ensuring everyone's safety. | {
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This week, Coinflip Studios will launch the combat-intensive Ninja Legends for the Oculus Quest. The game features waves of enemy ninjas leaping at your face, forcing you to block and slice with katanas, staffs, and other exotic weapons.
We’ve had a chance to play the release build and wanted to talk to Coinflip about the game’s influences and development. Coinflip’s Engineer and Designer David Geisert and Lead Engineer Steven Jian shared with us some behind-the-scenes info about Ninja Legends’ anime inspirations, creating a satisfying VR slice, and which new modes may be added in the future.
Check back for our full review when the game launches on August 8. If you’re on desktop, you’ll find a little bell in the bottom right corner, use that if you want to get push notifications whenever we publish a new review!
Ninja Legends Q & A: Influences
6DOF: Which films, anime, or historical facts influenced the design of the enemies and weapons in Ninja Legends?
Coinflip: We were heavily inspired by various films to maintain a high speed of 1 vs Many combat. Ninja Assassin, Ip Man, Kill Bill, and many others served as inspiration for the base feeling for the game. Snow Crash is also an inspiration for the theme— in that book, the main character is a master swordsman in Virtual Reality. We liked the staff action in the movie Ip Man and tried to make the staff in the game behave like the way Ip Man uses it.
The rope dart is heavily influenced by Mortal Kombat, although a lot of other games have used a similar mechanic. We liked pairing it with the fist and yelling “Get over here!” while playing. The hand blast special is a mixture of the Kamehameha from Dragon Ball Z and the Rasengan from Naruto.
The giant fist concept for the gauntlets was inspired by One Piece. We wanted to make it feel like Luffy Gear 4th.
6DOF: How did you strike a balance between historical weapons/settings and a more fantastic approach?
Coinflip: We wanted to start with a solid base for the player in the real world. Then as the player progresses, they will unlock the more fanciful elements.
The first level is completely normal, with a bit of slow motion. In the second level, they have unlocked the bow special ability and the slow-motion world that comes with that. The third level has a boss with magical abilities. And then they begin to unlock more special abilities with much more magical focuses.
Ninja Legends Q & A: Challenges
6DOF: What were the challenges in making the combat feel realistic in VR?
Coinflip: Our goal was to make extremely satisfying combat and rewarding gameplay— not necessarily the most realistic combat. So this effort centered around guiding the player to make movements that feel great and giving them the feedback they expected.
One of the largest challenges is flail mitigation. We wanted to make sure the player couldn’t just flick their wrist constantly and win. We had to be very careful with our damage model and enemy design to prevent this.
Another core principle in how we designed the combat was to have the weapons always match how the player was moving. We never wanted the player to feel like they had to swing slower or hold themselves back. In many VR games, the hands will stop matching the player’s actual hand position in order to give ‘weight’ to the weapon or to show the weapon was blocked. Our game was about being the ultimate ninja warrior so we felt that would be a distraction and reduce the satisfaction of the gameplay.
Ninja Legends Q & A: Combat Complexity
6DOF: Were there any additional features you contemplated adding to the combat?
Coinflip: We built out a few features that didn’t make it into the game. There was always a difficult balance between complex combat and how distracting it would become to clearly communicate with our players.
In our earlier versions, we had directional slice indicators and explicit hit zones for enemies. We removed this because we found that players would end up just focusing on the UI instead of feeling immersed in the combat. It prevented them from moving the way they wanted to move. It was also immersion-breaking when your weapon passed through an enemy and they didn’t take damage because you missed the slice angle.
Another example is enemy blocking mechanics and creating ways for players to defeat enemy blocks. We found that this slowed down gameplay and was difficult to communicate to players. This is something we’re still exploring and may introduce with enemies in later releases!
6DOF: Any tips for facing the game’s bosses? They definitely seem to be much more difficult than the ninja rank-and-file.
Coinflip: It is much more important to be blocking in boss levels than in most of the other levels. If you don’t block the boss attacks you will lose. The bosses also have projectiles that need to be hit hard instead of just lightly blocked.
Ninja Legends Q & A: The Future of Ninja Legends
6DOF: Will the game continue to be supported after launch with any planned updates?
Coinflip: We are working on the first update already. We are taking feedback from players on what parts of the game they like and what they would like to see more of. Our current thoughts are between a stealth component with locomotion, an archery tower defense mode, and a sandbox mode where players can import their own levels, enemies, and weapons.
We would love to get feedback on which of these sounds the best, or anything else people would like to see. Our ultimate vision is for Ninja Legends to be the ultimate arcade-style ninja experience, so we are looking forward to adding in more different aspects of being a ninja.
Ninja Legends Q & A: Shouting
6DOF: Is it true that if you shout while you swing, your strikes will be more powerful?
Coinflip: Yes, but not because of the programming. It is a major part of martial arts to make sure your breathing is done properly. It is also used in movies to make sure everyone knows what actions are coming next.
We’ve always joked that we could actually implement that if we wanted since all VR headsets have a microphone but to be clear, we do not access the microphone in our game.
Ninja Legends will be coming to the Quest on August 8th, remember to check back here for our full review. This Q&A was conducted by Andrew Podolsky. | {
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Aditya Chakrabortty says that sociologists take refuge in debating quibbles instead of tackling the neoliberal economic and social disaster head-on, and that a politics professor resorted to "vein-bulging outbursts" when confronted with his arguments (The academics show their anger but they can't answer my criticism that there's too little analysis of our current crisis, 8 May).
It makes for an entertaining column, but honestly, it's less anger on our part and more a simple wish that some shades of grey could have been added. Chakrabortty complains that we don't engage beyond academia: "Confronted with the biggest crisis since the 30s, the trade body for British sociologists proudly displayed its engagement by enumerating articles in the Journal of Niche Studies." But we had already given him a list of sociologists who have published books, placed their work in sociology journals, or written newspaper and magazine articles, around the origins of the crisis and its consequences.
On the shelves of our office are books written by colleagues, with titles such as Material Markets: How Economic Agents are Constructed. And among the journals is our publication Work, Employment and Society, whose December 2011 issue was devoted to the recession, with articles on macroeconomic policy and theorising financialisation. The journal also hosted an international conference on the banking crisis in 2010.
Chakrabortty takes issue with our annual conference: "Many academics haven't begun digging into the banking crisis, but instead ploughed on with researching – to pick examples from the last British Sociological Association conference – the real-ale industry." In fact our conference, to which journalists were invited, had three main sessions, each attended by hundreds of researchers: on private equity firms; the failure of Marxism to predict the downturn; and the uncertainty created by new management models such as that at Enron.
Chakrabortty pulls us up for what he sees as a lack of "depth of research on finance", but if we want to understand the crisis fully we need to understand how organisations work, how unions function and how labour markets have developed, in addition to examining the raw figures. Sociology is tackling all of these.
I can reassure readers that sociology and the social sciences, both in the UK and US, are concerned not just with how we can clear this mess up but how we can stop it happening again. Chakrabortty is right to raise this vital issue, and to ask if more could be done. The answer to that is, of course, yes: more can be done by both academics and journalists. Academics – from sociology and other disciplines – and research funding bodies have to work together to ensure there is funding to tackle these issues in-depth.
Chakrabortty complains that we would only communicate with him by offering a broader email exchange on this issue: "Hardly the spirit of academic debate," he says. Well, why not? It's the clearest and most transparent way of having an informed conversation that might benefit all of us. We're still offering it, Aditya – you know our email address.
• Follow Comment is free on Twitter @commentisfree | {
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The Ashtray Blog has a great article on the topic here: http://goo.gl/mMREwS
Read Clive Bates' comments here: http://goo.gl/Ztd0JA
Dr. Farsalinos is as usual spot on in his critisism pointing out that the WHO apparently ignores the health of smokers: http://goo.gl/7hFT1I The WHO was also active on twitter trying to spread their propaganda after the report was released, something that I think made Dr. Farsalinos (and a lot of others) quite pissed off:
Notice the snake in WHO's logo? On Monday I introduced a counterpart to the gateway theory;
This theory should be like music in the WHOs ears. They are looking at something that not only could be a gateway out of tobacco addiction but could also make a lot less people start smoking. But instead they are doing their best to tear down this wall. They seem completely reluctant to acknowledge that the facts don't fit their precious gateway theory, so they they are now trying to change the facts by banning non-tobacco flavours, banning use in public spaces and trying to convince the public that the health benefits are not there. All of these will make vaping more similar to smoking. Think about it: If kids could only get hold of tobacco flavours, would this make it more or less likely that they switch to cigarettes? If you have to go outside to the smoking areas standing alongside smokers to be able to vape, would more or less vapers switch the wrong way? If all e-cigarettes looks like cigarettes and performs poorly, would that be good or bad for public health?
To me it looks like the WHO report is designed by Big Tobacco and backed up by Big Pharma to make sure e-cigarettes pose a health problem. All of the proposed regulations will make e-cigarettes more dangerous and the gateway theory more plausible. Because the big problem for Big Tobacco and Big Pharma today is that e-cigarettes work, and innovation will make them work even better, building an increasingly higher wall between them and their customers' money. So they've invested in a wrecking ball called WHO to tear down that wall.
Two days ago WHO released their dreaded report on E-cigarettes. There is a lot of problems with this report, and although WHOs position is not as bad as it once was there is still a lot of problems like many others have already pointed out:The WHO was also active on twitter trying to spread their propaganda after the report was released, something that I think made Dr. Farsalinos (and a lot of others) quite pissed off: http://goo.gl/NJYQ9f On Monday I introduced a counterpart to the gateway theory; "the firewall theory" . To me it sounds much more plausible that e-cigarettes act as a firewall stopping people who otherwise would have started smoking cigarettes from doing so, rather than a gateway into the deadly habit. Non-tobacco flavours are the bricks of this firewall, innovative technology that distances vaping from smoking is the mortar and it is reinforced by huge health benefits for the users and people around them.This theorybe like music in the WHOs ears. They are looking at something that not only could be a gateway out of tobacco addiction but could also make a lot less people start smoking. But instead they are doing their best to tear down this wall. They seem completely reluctant to acknowledge that the facts don't fit their precious gateway theory, so they they are now trying to change the facts by banning non-tobacco flavours, banning use in public spaces and trying to convince the public that the health benefits are not there. All of these will make vapingsimilar to smoking. Think about it: If kids could only get hold of tobacco flavours, would this make it more or less likely that they switch to cigarettes? If you have to go outside to the smoking areas standing alongside smokers to be able to vape, would more or less vapers switch the wrong way? If all e-cigarettes looks like cigarettes and performs poorly, would that be good or bad for public health?To me it looks like the WHO report is designed by Big Tobacco and backed up by Big Pharma to. All of the proposed regulations will make e-cigarettesdangerous and the gateway theory. Because the big problem for Big Tobacco and Big Pharma today is that e-cigarettes work, and innovation will make them work even better, building an increasingly higher wall between them and their customers' money. So they've invested in a wrecking ball called WHO to tear down that wall. | {
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You ahead, you know you want to.
The Holy Ark of all area beer drinkers has been caught in a web of government red tape for months now, but, hopefully, fingers crossed, Hail Mary Full of Grace, the stuff might be on shelves soon.
The backstory (according to Crain’s Cleveland Business): 12 Northeast Ohio breweries had the genius idea of putting together a 12 beer sampler of their products. The tasty collaboration was supposed to be ready for Cleveland Beer Week in October. 1,100 to 1,400 cases were put together and stored at the Heidelberg Distribution Co., ready for the greenlight.
Enter the government, state and federal, who threw up as many road blocks as a Baghdad freeway: licensing issues, tax problems, distribution concerns, the works.
Right now, the brewers are waiting for U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to sign off on the project. Then, it’s drink time.
If you’re starting to wonder whether this mad scramble was worth it, rest assured, it is. Below, the list of wonders:
The collaboration is set to include the following: smoked black lager from Thirsty Dog and Cleveland-based Indigo Imp; strong barrel aged ale, of Ohio City's Great Lakes Brewing Co. and Cleveland-based Cellar Rat; rye kolsh of Strongsville's Brewkettle and Willoughby Brewing Co.; imperial American porter, of Akron-based Hoppin' Frog and Rocky River Brewing Co.; alt bier of Cleveland-based Buckeye Brewing Co. and Berea-based Cornerstone Brewery Co.; and a wet hopped IPA, from North Olmsted-based Fatheads and Westlake's Black Box brewing companies.
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Instructions about cooking and baking are not rare in medieval manuscripts. We have already posted on this blog some medieval instructions for 'cury' and making pancakes from cookbooks or practical culinary collections. Liturgical service books, however, are probably not the most obvious sources for such notes.
The miracle of the koliva from a collection of liturgical readings (synaxaria) for Lent, Eastern Mediterranean, c. 1375–1400, Egerton MS 3157, f. 20r
One of our Byzantine Greek service books, a collection of lessons for the Saturdays and Sundays of Lent, contains a very special recipe: not only is it completely vegan, it is said to have been received directly from Heaven. The short note is preserved in a lection for the first Saturday of the Great Lent which records the miraculous revelation of the new recipe as follows.
Punishment of the “godless and traitor Julian” from the Theodore Psalter, Constantinople, 1066, Add MS 19352, f. 200r
'When the Emperor Julian, who ruled the Roman Empire after Constantine the Great, returned to his old pagan habits, he decided to defile the Great Lent of the Christians, and ordered the mayor of Constantinople to pollute all the food in the markets of the city with animal blood. While imperial soldiers were spreading blood throughout the markets of Constantinople, God sent the martyr Theodore the Younger (who died about 50 years before Julian) to the archbishop of the city to reveal to him the Emperor’s plans.'
St Theodore comes to the archbishop in a dream and tells him about koliva, Egerton MS 3157, f. 20r
'Hearing about the pollution of the food in the markets, the Archbishop was terrified and asked the saint: “So what can we eat then?” “Koliva,” replied Theodore. “What an earth is that?” asked the surprised archbishop. “Koliva is wheat kernels boiled soft and sweetened with honey, sesame seeds, almonds, ground walnuts, cinnamon, pomegranate seeds, raisins and anise.' When the archbishop inquired who is the provider of the new recipe , his visitor simply answered, 'I am Theodore the Martyr of Christ whom he has now sent to you to reveal this and provide new food for his people.'
The miracle of the heavenly food (mannah) from the Bristol Psalter, Constantinople, 11th century, Add MS 40731, f. 128r
The archbishop immediately announced the new discovery to the inhabitants of Constaninople, who successfully overcame Julian's machinations. To this day, people remember the martyr and this miracle with cooking and eating koliva.
Admittedly, the heavenly origin of koliva is often doubted. In some versions of the story, Theodore simply shares an old recipe of his home country in Pontus with the archbishop. Some say the recipe derives from the ancient Greek cult of Dionysos. Wherever it comes from, the koliva is a very tasty and entirely vegan food. As this Saturday is the anniversary of the miraculous recipe, it might be the right time to give koliva a try (see a detailed recipe here) and remember its source, the martyr and the British Library’s 14th-century manuscript that preserved its story.
Peter Toth
Follow us on Twitter @BLMedieval | {
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You're the only car on the road waits til you pass to put his flashing lights on
222 shares | {
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Another record-breaking Pride has come and gone. Hundreds of thousands filled the streets of Hillcrest for the parade, but there was one thing missing: protesters.
There is a special policed section on the parade route which is designated for protest groups, but this year that space only contained San Diego's finest standing vigilant.
Pride-goer Don Moore snapped the picture above, saying, "Out of everything I saw at pride, this year I found the protest area the most interesting: They never showed."
Some said a handful of protesters made their way to Balboa Park near the Pride Music Festival, but they weren't disruptive.
"San Diego Pride is happy to report that we are one of the only major cities without any protests or any major incidents at the parade," San Diego Pride said in a statement.
This was San Diego's 46th annual Pride weekend. It began early with the Pride of Hillcrest Block Party at 2 pm on Friday and continued into the evening after the Spirit of Stonewall Rally.
On Saturday, the Pride parade broke attendance records once again while the music festival showcased headlining musical talent across several stages.
The music continued on Sunday with rock legend Melissa Etheridge rounding out the weekend, performing her classics to energized fans.
Although the official numbers have yet to be released, San Diego Pride estimates over 300,000 people attended the parade this year with 275 marching contingents. | {
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“To Catch a Cheater” is more like it.
After making a name for himself on television for snagging would-be Internet pervs trolling for kids, NBC anchor Chris Hansen was on the receiving end of his own camera tricks.
The married NBC anchor was secretly filmed on a date with a blonde television reporter who he has been reportedly dating for the past four months, London’s Daily Mail reported.
Hansen, 51, famous for being the host of NBC’s “To Catch a Predator,” has allegedly been having a steamy affair with Kristyn Caddell, a 30-year-old local TV reporter from Florida.
Last weekend, Hansen was caught on tape taking Caddell on a romantic dinner at the exclusive Ritz-Carlton Hotel, before spending the night at her Palm Beach apartment.
Hansen, who has two sons, was caught in an undercover sting operation arranged by the National Enquirer.
A source told the supermarket tabloid that the pair met last March at a party in Palm Beach.
Caddell, who was once an intern with NBC in New York, introduced herself to Hansen and ‘there was an immediate physical attraction between them’, according to a source.
The source added: “Chris and Kristyn got on so well that she ended up going back to his room at The Colony Hotel in Palm Beach — and later boasted to pals about staying the night with him.” | {
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Conan O’Brien and his Team Coco will produce five new stand-up specials exclusively for HBO Max, the WarnerMedia streaming service that is unveiling a slew of news Wednesday at a presentation in Burbank ahead of its spring 2020 launch.
The just-announced specials include O’Brien hosting two of them, which will feature short sets from up-and-coming comics. He will also curate hourlong sets from three other comedians. In addition to the five special, HBO Max has acquired rights to a one-hour special by comedian James Veitch that Team Coco is producing.
“Partnering with our very own king of comedy for these specials was a no-brainer as we build up premium content for HBO Max,” said Kevin Reilly, chief content officer, HBO Max and president TBS, TNT, and truTV, in a release today accompanying the news. “Delivering laughs and discovering comedic talent is what Team Coco is all about.”
O’Brien and Team Coco is in the middle of a four-year all-inclusive deal with WarnerMedia that also extended his long-running late-night TBS show Conan through 2022. The pact called for the expansion of the Conan brand across platforms via the fan-centric Team Coco and Team Coco Digital Studio, and also increased TBS’ relationship with his production company Conaco Llc.
Conan, which premiered in 2010, has made featuring stand-up comics a priority. O’Brien and Team Coco have been hosting an annual pop-up comedy club, Team Coco House, in San Diego during Comic-Con.
The original specials will join HBO Max comedy content culled from some of the WarnerMedia library including from TBS, truTV, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, Crunchyroll, Rooster Teeth, Looney Tunes and others.
HBO Max Rollout: Deadline’s Complete Coverage | {
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In the box my iPhone 6 came in, there’s a small slip of paper. On one side it tells you what each of the iPhone’s five buttons are, and on the reverse it tells you how to switch it on; after that, you’re on your own. Sure, there’s an electronic manual available in PDF, HTML and iBooks formats for you to download, but that’s a far cry from the hefty instructional tomes you used to get when you bought an Apple product.
I have one for desktop Macs from 1991, a fantastic, beautiful, ring-bound thing filled with elegant, simple line drawings, crisp, smart text, and best of all, clear and unpatronizing information on how to get started with your Mac. Here’s an example:
And then on the next page, what to do when you run out of space on your desktop when using a mouse, something I remember being flummoxed by when I first used one:
There’s even information on just simply how to hold the mouse, with such rudimentary advice as to make sure the mouse cable is pointing away from you:
It’s easy to think that such drawn-out, plodding explanations—of a computer technique so basic most of us wouldn’t even think it needed explaining—are quaint. That they’re a relic. And you could make the case that an iPhone is so much more intuitive than a Mac that you can get away with telling a new owner only how to switch it on because they’ll figure the rest out themselves. But why should they?
To be sure, many people these days don’t need tuition on how to hold a mouse, and of course, in the 80s and 90s—when personal computers and the Windows, Icons, Menus and Pointers paradigm was completely new to everyone who encountered it—it was more necessary to hold users’ hands as they took their first steps in this unfamiliar territory. I still encounter plenty of people, though—some complete novices, and some who’ve been using computers for years—who would benefit from Apple’s quiet, measured guidance on concepts that, let’s face it, just are a bit abstract. Here, for example, is a clear explanation of the difference between Save and Save As—clearer, to my ear at least, than the explanation in Yosemite’s Help system, even if a user was motivated to look it up.
Even the idea of “saving” is explained, and I know from helping people get started with computers that this concept is actually quite a tricky one—and that this explanation is perfectly pitched:
Some of the other guidance, while antiquated in the specifics, is nevertheless good and valuable. Those of us who’ve been interested in—not merely users of—computers for years have a pretty good grasp of what “a megabyte” or “a gigabyte” represents, but many, probably most, computer users don’t really have a clear idea of “how much” either is. Apple was on-hand to help explain back in 1991:
It also took the time to explain why a floppy disk isn’t floppy!
The whole thing is packed with concise, well-articulated information. Here’s Apple’s friendly, human explanation of an alias, something I bet a good percentage of even modern computer users would find valuable:
There’s also a terrific tutorial taking you through the basics of editing text using a mouse and keyboard, and introducing the concepts of cut, copy and paste. What’s wonderful about it is that it doesn’t just baldly tell you how to select a word, for example, but actually steps you through the process bit at time using some real example text, ensuring you learn by doing. (Here, Apple is channeling a Chinese proverb, most often remembered as a line from Benjamin Franklin: “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”)
That attention to detail, that focus on the reader and on doing things differently according to context the better to communicate with him, is evident elsewhere too. Here, for example, is the section on using the nascent accessibility features, and though it might not be readily apparent from this photo, the text is set in a larger point size so it’s easier to read for those with visual impairments.
A calmness pervades, and an understanding that even a Mac is a complex bit of technology that some will find intimidating. I love how the section on troubleshooting starts with ‘Take your time’; if you’ve ever helped someone troubleshoot a problem with their computer, you’ll know that panic is a common reaction—and that in that panic many folks will fail to note down error messages that you can actually use to diagnose the problem.
Most of the troubleshooting advice is as applicable today as it was then; here, for example, is the timeless “have you tried turning it off and on again”, but note too that even the specific guidance to force-quit an app with Command-Option-Escape is still true over two decades later.
There’s loads more I could show you, but part of the joy of this beautiful old manual is discovering things for yourself—things you recognize, things you might never have understood, things that you forgot all about (SCSI terminators!)—so go and track one down, and remind yourself of the days when Apple took the time to explain not just how to use software’s features, but to explain some underlying concepts too. (And if you remember its audio tapes, videos and tutorial software, share your recollections in the comments below!)
I’ll leave you with the “colophon” on the back flap of the book—a flap, incidentally, that was designed to be used as a bookmark as you worked your way through the guide. I always found this kind of stuff fascinating, and now I come to rationalize it, that might be because it demystified the process of producing this perfect, finished thing I was holding in my hands, and made it seem like I might just be able to make it too. And after all, that’s what a Mac is all about. | {
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Allow me to share a story with you. You're an affluent investor who understands the concept that taking on more risk may bring higher rewards. You also understand the importance of asset allocation and not putting all of your eggs in one basket. One day, you're playing golf with a friend who keeps checking his smartphone during your round and his constant smiling is beginning to annoy you (especially after you missed that short putt on the last hole). Finally, you ask him what they're looking at on their phone.
"I'm watching this investment I have go up 25% just today. In fact, it's gone up about 50% just this month. Pretty good, huh?"
"What's the investment?" is your immediate reaction. After your friend tells you what it is, you're surprised that he was even able to invest in it. You soon learn that it's not an investment that that any of his financial advisers told him about. He also reveals that he only has a small amount of his overall portfolio in this holding, because, well, it's risky, but clearly with that risk comes sizeable reward.
This is not fiction. This occurred to a friend just recently. The investment is the Bitcoin Investment Trust GBTC. Yes, any investor can currently buy it in any of their investment accounts and no, your financial adviser is probably not going to tell you about it unless you ask.
Since its transition from an investment only for accredited investors to the OTCQ exchange (June of this year), where it can be bought and sold by the general public, the trust has ranged from $28.55 to a recent price of $51 in less than six months. The trust is simply intended to mirror the price of bitcoin, which has been on a tear as of late.
I wrote about this investment in various columns on this site in the past and earned many sneers (a nice way of putting it) from those who thought that I had lost my mind. Many of those who criticized bitcoins were those who felt that gold was a better way to gain exposure to an alternative investment. A recent column on this site discusses how bitcoin has actually been a better current investment than gold.
Full disclosure: My involvement with this investment began when I invested a recent SEP contribution into the trust, when it was only available to accredited investors and bitcoin was trading well over $600. With bitcoin on the rise and trading even at the $450 level, I still have a loss on my original investment.
However, I did this investment as an alternative investment for asset allocation purposes and committed only a small portion of my portfolio to it (less than 5%). Those investors who have financial advisers have probably had discussions with their advisers over the last few years about the merits of including alternative investments in their portfolio as a means of asset allocation. Typically, those alternative investments have been hedge funds or private-equity funds that provide little transparency about what they contain or have strategies that even your adviser will admit that he or she doesn't understand.
So, with the performance of GBTC at this point, the question I have is whether or not your financial adviser may begin bringing up the option of investing in bitcoins for your portfolio. I believe that over the next year, you'll begin to hear them doing just that, whether it's discussing GBTC or how various companies, such as established banks, are integrating bitcoin and blockchain technology into their businesses and the potential impact that will have on their bottom line and stock performance.
The question you may also ask is if they're not discussing this topic and these options with you, are they the right financial adviser for you? These are not investments for everyone, but certainly you'll be reading more and more about them over the next year and your financial adviser should be prepared to discuss and advise accordingly on them, as they are available to all investors.
Regarding my friends who were playing golf. Once it was revealed how much was made over the course of the day in GBTC, it was decided that the next hole was the 19th hole, and that my smiling friend would be buying the refreshments. I know for a fact that he used cash and not bitcoins to pay for that.
Disclosure: Tatar owns shares of GBTC. | {
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Labor groups have started moving from the University of the Philippines (UP) to Commonwealth Avenue, to stage their protest actions as President Rodrigo Duterte delivers his State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Monday.
Members of labor unions of private companies such as NutriAsia, Jollibee Foods Corporation, and Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) carried banners and placards with them, demanding government and private outfits to end contractualization.
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President Duterte has vowed to end labor-only contracting, a process where companies hire artificial workers from third-party human resource providers.
On this year’s Labor Day, the president signed an executive order against ‘endo’ or end of contracts, but critics have not been satisfied with the measure. Several labor groups said that Duterte only mislead the workers into believing that the EO will stop contractualization.
READ: Duterte signs EO vs illegal contracting
READ: Labor groups unhappy with EO on contractualization
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The question is why this is considered such a transgression. Over the past two weeks, countless reporters and commentators have documented that COVID-19 is hitting black people harder in many areas nationwide and that this is because of entrenched race-based disparities in our society. Why, then, is it so appalling that Adams did not flag this as his main message, when the message has been made so resonantly clear elsewhere?
Members of a certain highly educated cohort consider it sacrosanct that those speaking for or to black people always and eternally stress structural flaws in America’s sociopolitical fabric past and present as the cause of black ills. To mention that there are more concrete and local solutions to various things ailing black America, regardless of their origin, is traitorous—even blasphemous. Whatever the volume and rhetorical brilliance of this ideology, it is indeed an ideology. Specifically, it represents a way of thinking that has become especially popular among, for example, the black intelligentsia over the past decade or three, but has much less purchase among black people in general. The writers and thinkers give an impression that their take is simple truth, when it has actually devolved into a reflexive, menacing brand of language policing.
We have been here before. Not long ago, readers were assessing the proposition from The New York Times that American history begins not in 1776 but in 1619 when the first Africans were bought to these shores in bondage. One intent of this proposal is to discourage any sense that disparities between blacks and whites are due to some kind of black inferiority. We are to keep front and center that all black problems today can be traced to the attitudes and structures that set in starting in 1619.
Adam Serwer: The fight over the 1619 Project is not about facts
Yet we might ask what that kind of news is supposed to do for a black person having problems here in 2020 (such as, perhaps, suffering from effects of the coronavirus). A pragmatic black activism today can focus on any number of strategies, such as ending the war on drugs, transforming educational practice for poor black kids, and making long-acting, reversible contraceptives more easily available to all poor women. Notably, all of these things could happen without any particular musings about what happened in Virginia in 1619. However, among some highly educated people, this qualifies as “not getting it.” In these circles, the 1619 idea has been rapturously received, despite trenchant questions about its historical accuracy.
We can go further back, when Barack Obama, then a presidential candidate, was roasted for supposedly condescending to a black audience in urging black men to take a larger role in rearing their children. Even though he did this with a vernacular warmth that his audience ate up with a spoon, legions of black thinkers reviled the president for addressing behavior rather than the broader causes that made counsel such as his necessary in the first place. “Barack’s been talking down to black people,” Jesse Jackson complained on a live microphone a few weeks afterward. More than a decade later, commentators were still scolding Obama for “finger-wagging” at black people instead of dwelling on root causes. | {
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Romney took to the Washington Post to decry the New START treaty currently making its way through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Rather then add substantively to the debate, the former governor trotted out the same tired arguments that treaty opponents have been bleating since Senators Kerry and Lugar began hearings over two months ago. From Senator Inhofe and DeMint to the Heritage Foundation, Republicans focused on what they view as a glaring flaw in the treaty, missile defense. They claim the treaty will severely limit the development of a U.S. missile shield, and will signal to hostile powers that America lacks the will to defend itself. There’s one problem with these claims: they are flat out wrong.
Romney’s argument follows the rich tradition driving the Republican Party right now. The tea-partiers and other fringe groups require a certain level of cocksure militarism. Just look at McCain in 2008, with his impromptu hit song "Bomb Iran" set to the tune of the Beach Boy’s "Barbara Ann." It evoked a jingoistic swagger that the Republican base ate up, akin to G.W. strutting on an aircraft carrier in his flight suit and codpiece. After all, what could be the harm in starting a third war with a far better equipped country while still hemorrhaging resources in America’s two current wars?
Numerous witnesses have repeated in SFRC hearings that the New START Treaty will not constrain missile defense in any way, shape, or form. Period. Seriously, look it up. Bi-Partisan support for the treaty makes this crystal clear. An op-ed written by under secretary of Defense for Policy and in collaboration with the under secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology & Logistics stated:
"The fact is that the treaty does not constrain the U.S. from testing, developing and deploying missile defenses. Nor does it prevent us from improving or expanding them. Nor does it raise the costs of doing so."
This doesn’t sound like the Neville Chamberlain capitulation that Mitt Romney rails about in his piece. But is it an isolated opinion? The answer is a resounding no, unless, like Romney and friends, you choose to ignore the opinions of authorities like Robert M. Gates, Adm. Mike Mullen, Hillary Clinton, or the 30 top National Security leaders that came out in support of ratifying the treaty.
In this post 9/11 world, it’s interesting how quickly certain individuals revert to a Cold War mentality. In Romney’s article, he cursorily mentions rogue nations like Iran and North Korea, and doesn’t bother to discuss terrorist groups seeking to construct a dirty bomb. Instead it’s right back to the arms-races. Romney claims that "New-START gives Russia a massive nuclear weapon advantage over the United States," noting the disparity of Russia’s arsenal of tactical nuclear weapons that currently outnumbers the United States by 10:1. He observes that while they cannot strike America "surely they can reach our allies, nations that depend on us for a nuclear umbrella."
An interesting observation. The nuclear umbrella and the security provided by the U.S. and NATO have allowed European nations to invest in social programs rather than defense. Is this in the best interest of American citizens? Representatives Barney Frank and Ron Paul noted,
"After World War II, with...the Soviet Union becoming increasingly aggressive, America took on the responsibility of protecting virtually every country that asked for it. Sixty-five years later, we continue to play that role...The nations of Western Europe now collectively have greater resources at their command than we do, yet they continue to depend overwhelmingly on American taxpayers to provide for their defense."
This doesn’t mesh with the foreign policy strategy of the former governor, who prefers to invoke a neo-Teddy Roosevelt policy that relies on the big stick, but ignores speaking softly. America should not turn its back on our allies, yet we must find another path to global security. Conveniently, the Reps’ indicated a common sense policy of protection:
"When our democratic allies are menaced by larger, hostile powers, there is a strong argument to be made for supporting them. But the notion that American taxpayers get some benefit from extending our military might worldwide is deeply flawed."
Until Mitt Romney and his obstinate brethren in Congress stop trying to score cheap political points, America’s national security continues to be put at risk. It’s time to move beyond the Cold War. The Berlin Wall fell twenty-one years ago. The Soviet Union ceased to exist nineteen years ago. Ratifying New START will not drive Russia into a headlong pursuit of nuclear hegemony; instead it will provide verifiable benchmarks for the two major nuclear powers to reduce existing stock and monitor the development of new weapons and delivery systems. Passing the treaty will not harm America’s national security. Failing to pass it will.
Citizens for Global Solutions envisions a future in which nations work together to abolish war, protect our rights and freedoms, and solve the problems facing humanity that no nation can solve alone. | {
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John Hwang is set to get his law degree from the University of Houston Law Center in May. Now if he could just find a job.
He's making cold calls. He's introducing himself to lawyers who come to the school for lectures. He's even dropped in unannounced at law firms, something he discovered is frowned upon in the white-shoe world.
As difficult as it is, Hwang is glad he's not graduating during the Great Recession, a time when summer programs were cut, law firms revoked job offers and many graduates couldn't find work. But getting a job is still a struggle, as law firms pump out more graduates than the market can absorb.
"You have to be very mentally strong," said Hwang, who has been building his legal résumé by clerking for a judge and working for a litigation firm. He compares the job hunt to the quest for matrimonial prospects: "You just need one."
Top graduates of top schools still command salaries in the $160,000 range. But for those trained outside the Ivy League and top-tier public universities, the job hunt reflects seismic changes in the industry.
Some law firms aren't as dependent on summer recruiting, preferring to focus on hiring experienced lawyers from their competitors. Others are reluctant to invest in training new lawyers who are likely to jump firms when better offers come along.
"The economics just don't work out with the summer clerkship programs," said Douglas Atnipp, co-managing shareholder of the Houston office of Greenberg Traurig. Nor is the firm matching the $150,000 to $160,000 annual salaries some of its competitors are paying.
In place of the traditional summer programs, Greenberg Traurig is looking for third-year law students to join its "resident attorney program." The pay is $85,000. Some of the lawyers are offered positions as associates after the one-year stint.
The firm is attracting good candidates through the program, said Atnipp, who is also co-chair of the firm's national energy and natural resources practice. Since launching the program in Houston, it has been adopted firmwide, he said.
Nationwide, 59.9 percent of law school graduates in 2014 were employed in long-term, full-time jobs that require passing a bar exam, according to the American Bar Association. The group, which accredits law schools, takes the measure roughly 10 months after graduation.
On the surface, that's a little better than the previous year, in which 57 percent found similar jobs. However, it also reflects the drop in the number of law school graduates from 2013 to 2014.
Summer associates
Starting in about 2008, big law firms cut back significantly on their summer associate programs, said Susan Pye, president of the Pye Legal Group recruiting firm. To fill the hiring gaps left by smaller incoming classes, many firms are relying on "lateral" hiring of established partners and associates from other firms, she said. Part of the appeal is that lawyers often bring their clients with them.
The pace of lateral hiring locally has picked up as a spate of out-of-state firms have opened offices in Houston. Earlier this year, San Francisco-based Orrick hired 22 lawyers from seven local firms. Other well-known firms have set up offices in Houston, including Chicago-based Kirkland & Ellis and Washington, D.C.-based Arnold & Porter.
Most of the new firms, however, don't have the infrastructure in place to train young associates, Pye said.
Oil prices' effects
The fall in oil prices is also affecting the ability of new lawyers to find a toehold.
Companies don't typically hire new graduates to work in-house because they want experienced lawyers, said Pye, who specializes in placing general counsel and in-house lawyers. But with the drop in oil prices, demand for in-house lawyers is down. Lawyers with two to four years of experience who would normally make the move in-house are not finding the same opportunities.
More new associates
At Vinson & Elkins, 62 new associates will join the firm this year, compared with 45 in 2015.
Why the increase? Douglas Bland, an energy transaction lawyer in Houston who is also the firm's hiring partner, said the number varies from year to year, and it's hard to know exactly why. Over the past five years, 82 percent of its summer associates accepted job offers. This year it was 87 percent.
Each year, the firm aims to hire between the upper 40s to the lower 60s, he said. But since the hiring process begins two years out, it's hard to be precise.
"We don't vary it for short-term economic factors," said Bland, who views the drop in energy prices as a hiccup and not a reason to change direction. "We're looking long-term."
Baker Botts this fall is bringing in 63 new lawyers, including 22 in Houston, said Van Beckwith, partner in charge of recruiting. That's about the same as last year. Nearly all of the new lawyer hiring comes from its summer associates program, he said.
Tough to tell
It's difficult to get a precise handle on how the law school class of 2016 is faring.
Law schools accredited by the American Bar Association are required to report the number of graduates who found jobs that require law degrees. Data for 2015 aren't due until April.
"The best we can say is that interviewing and expressions of interest is pretty robust," said associate dean for academic administration Bruce McGovern at the South Texas College of Law. McGovern also teaches corporate law and taxation.
Nazleen Jiwani, director of the career resources center at South Texas, said the key to finding a job is networking and lining up internships and jobs.
"You need to start the day you start law school," she said.
How she got her job
Tamara Sharkey, a third-year law student at the UH Law Center, didn't start job hunting immediately. But after getting her first semester grades, she turned her attention to life after law school. And her efforts paid off. Sharkey landed a job with VB Law in Houston after introducing herself to the owner who had come on campus to give a lunchtime presentation on real estate law.
Sharkey was a regular at the seminars that brought in lawyers to talk about specialties such as family law, immigration and bankruptcy. Sharkey knew she wanted a job in real estate law and after meeting and exchanging business cards, the owner told her the firm had an opening for a law clerk.
She began working for the six-lawyer firm midway through her second year. After graduation, she stays on full-time.
"I love it," she said. | {
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XPO Logistics Inc. XPO -0.07% has received offers for the truckload division of Con-way Inc., the trucking operator it is acquiring in a $3 billion deal, but the company hasn’t decided whether to sell, Chief Executive Bradley Jacobs said Wednesday.
A sale would carve out an operation with $632 million in annual revenue, about 11% of Con-way’s overall revenue, but that has seen slimmer profits this year. A truckload carrier will handle a load from a single retailer or manufacturer. That’s a relatively small portion of Con-way’s business, which is centered around handling loads for multiple customers on its trucks.
“We have made no decision yet on whether or not to keep Con-way Truckload. It’s true we have received several unsolicited inbound calls from interested buyers but we haven’t decided,” Mr. Jacobs said in an e-mail.
Mr. Jacobs said in an interview he has been approached by three interested buyers for Con-way’s truckload unit, and that he would consider selling it for a high price that would offset some of the debt XPO is taking on for the acquisition. Still, he said, there are a lot of synergies if XPO keeps the unit. “We’re keeping an open mind,” Mr. Jacobs said.
XPO shares, which reached a 2015 low of $21.62 on Sept. 28, were up more than 3% Wednesday to $29.14.
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XPO announced the purchase of Con-way in September, the latest in a series of big acquisitions that includes the purchase earlier this year of French trucker Norbert Dentressangle SA for $3.5 billion. The deals push XPO beyond its roots as an “asset-light” freight broker, where the company arranges freight transport for industrial shippers on other companies’ trucks, and into the business of operating its own trucks. Selling off Con-way Truckload would focus XPO more directly on the less-than-truckload arena, where trucks operate on shorter hauls, often in scheduled operations from distribution centers to stores.
Con-way Truckload ranks as the 20th-largest truckload carrier in the U.S., according to SJ Consulting Group, but has seen its share of the market shrink in the last two years. The unit’s revenue fell 11% in the first six months of this year and its operating earnings declined 23% to $23.6 million.
Mr. Jacobs said XPO already is looking at changes in Con-way Freight’s LTL service as the company prepares to close on the deal this quarter. He said the company is considering adding a cheaper economy service to Con-way’s premium-priced distribution service.
The premium service makes up only about a third of the total LTL market and XPO wants to introduce technology that will allow Con-way to tap the larger economy portion of the market.
Con-way recently announced a 4.9% general rate increase for its non-contract LTL service, effective Oct. 19.
—Laura Stevens contributed to this article.
Write to Paul Page at [email protected] | {
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Virtual reality and eye-tracking seem like an incredible match — for reasons I’ll illustrate below — and now HTC’s first dedicated stab at an eye-tracking headset has arrived in the US and Canada for $1,599. That’s the word from HTC’s official blog post, following an earlier release for the headset in China and Europe last month.
Why eye-tracking? As my colleague Nick explained when he tried the Vive Pro Eye in January, it not only allows you to control things in VR just by looking at them, but can also produce higher fidelity VR images with less processing power — by only rendering the parts of a scene that you’re actually looking at in high resolution, instead of wasting those resources on your peripheral vision too. It’s a technique called foveated rendering.
That’s important because it takes more processing power to render VR scenes to begin with than today’s flatscreen 3D applications and games, which has left many VR experiences looking less graphically impressive than they might otherwise be. Eye-tracking can also theoretically give you a much more compelling avatar in a virtual world when you’re interacting with other people, since it can show them where you’re actually looking even though you’ve got a headset on your face:
HTC says it’s got plugins for Unity and a wrapper that works with Nvidia to make foveated rendering easier to integrate, but these benefits won’t come entirely for free; most rely on developers building them into apps and games, and there isn’t enough reason to do that if the headsets don’t exist out in the real world.
HTC probably won’t be changing that with the relatively expensive, enterprise-focused Vive Pro Eye alone. But it might be a big enough start for optimistic developers. | {
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A fire at the Bhalaswa garbage dumping ground near Delhi has been smouldering for around three weeks.
Highlights No fire tenders, municipal authorities despite complaints by locals
Toxic smoke a setback to impact of odd-even rule on lowering pollution
Half of city's trash is dumped at Bhalaswa, near North Delhi
Toxic smoke has been emanating from the garbage dump for days.
Locals complain of an unbearable stench in the area.
Two of Delhi's three garbage landfills are on fire, filling the air with toxic smoke that is threatening to derail the best efforts of the Arvind Kejriwal government to show a decline in pollution since its Odd-Even experiment began.At Delhi's largest garbage dump in Bhalaswa, on the the city's northern border, thick smoke has been rising up steadily for the last 20 days as a mountain of trash across 40 acres burns. Across town in Okhla, fire tenders have been called in today to contain flames rising up from rotting garbage.The Delhi Pollution Control Board has issued notices to civic authorities and said in a status report that it has received many complaints from the public against the burning of garbage at landfill sites. It said the municipalities have admitted that "often burning of garbage is observed at landfill sites which is due to methane gas generation from the decomposition process of garbage".Delhi's three landfills, creaking under the weight of waste from an ever-growing population, are way past their shelf-lives and must not be used as dumping grounds any more, the board has said. The civic bodies have however said that there is no land available in Delhi for new landfills. A request for land, they have pleaded, is pending with the Delhi Development Authority or DDA.In the meantime, the anti-pollution board said, it has seen no action plans for better garbage disposal in Delhi, the world's most polluted capital.The Bhalaswa dump, which is supposed to have ceased operations 10 years ago, still serves about 50 per cent of Delhi's population, with 2,700 tonnes of garbage dumped here every day.There are at least 50 small fires here and an unbearable stench in the air. People who live close to the landfill say repeated complaints have left the state government and civic officials unmoved."I have written to the Delhi Chief Minister and all authorities possible but no one has helped... They just stamp these letters and nothing has been done," said Shamim Khan a resident of the area.Unlike Mumbai, where authorities fought hard to battle massive fires at the Deonar dumping ground earlier this year, there is no sign of such effort at Bhalaswa. No fire-tenders, no municipal authorities attempting to douse the fire. | {
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School season has started, and many parents are probably more focused on homework, clubs, and PTA meetings than “luxury activities.” Even if summer is over, however, that doesn’t mean we should stop having fun with our kids.
One meaningful way to bond (and learn) with your children is through tabletop gaming. Studies have shown that tabletop gaming helps build cognitive and social skills, as well as positive family relationships.
This Tabletop Tuesday I want to go through three age categories and discuss my favorite children’s games from the 2010 decade. Maybe you’ll see some you’re familiar with, or perhaps you’ll find something new.
Either way, I hope you’ll find a great way to bond with your children and help them grow.
Pre-School through Pre-K
A simplified version of the word association game, Concept, this version is cooperative and doesn’t require any reading skills. Instead, players work together to find as many animals that fit a specific trait shown visually on the board (e.g., number of legs, habitat, diet, etc.).
Concept Kids: Animals is excellent because of its visual style, allowing younger children to make matches solely on your words and the picture. It also proves an educational opportunity to teach them the differences in many animals.
One of many HABA games my children own, Dragon’s Breath is a combination of prediction and set collection. Players lift rings from a stack that’s holding different colored gems, and as they fall they try to collect the color they picked that round.
Dragon’s Breath helps kids learn to analyze and make guesses, as they have to pick what color gems they think will fall that round. Although competitive, it’s not aggressive, and the randomness allows all players to win a game usually.
Although I’ve warned about franchise games in the past, and others based on the Disney show have failed, Protect the Pride Lands has proven an exception. Players work together as the Lion Guard, trying to stop the “outlanders” from invading while making sure Kion reaches Pride Rock first.
As with many Disney games, the design is excellent, with miniatures that kids love. That doesn’t detract from the gameplay, as players must learn strategy and patience, as they decide which Lion Guard members to move each round.
Sometimes a good gaming night isn’t about competition or beating others but solving a mystery. In Outfoxed!, players work together to solve the mystery of who took Mrs. Plumpert’s pot pie, collecting clues and evidence before the villain escapes.
Outfoxed! is perfect for helping kids learn teamwork and deduction while working against the clock. Kids also love the design of it, from the miniature fox to the “decoder” that lets you scan for evidence.
1st through 3rd Grade
The ICECOOL series involves flicking weighted, wobbly penguin figurines around the board. Players take turns as a “hall monitor,” trying to catch the other students before they can grab fish through the doors and hallways.
These games have a lot of modular replayability, a fun theme, and some cool physics. We recommend getting both the original and the expansion, as ICECOOL2 adds new layouts and modes, room for more players, and can be used as its own game.
Another simplified version of a game for older audiences, Magic Maze Kids is a great intro game for elementary aged-kids. Players work together, controlling heroes as they explore (and escape) before the timer runs out.
Magic Maze Kids is great because the entire thing works as a growing tutorial, adding new rules as players grasp the old ones. I also love how it teaches teamwork and requires quick-thinking, pushing children to come together while beating the timer.
Rhino Hero (another HABA game) is possibly one of the biggest hits on the scene. Players take turns stacking cards and building a tower, trying to play their last card, but the Rhino Hero (and other rules) can make everything fall.
Rhino Hero can be pretty competitive for a kids game, as you force your opponent to make bad plays, but it’s also a lot of fun. It can also be mixed with the sequel, Rhino Hero: Super Battle, which adds more rules and players.
If we’re introducing kids to tabletop gaming, they’ll inevitably meet “legacy games,” board games that are used once (permanently) over multiple sessions. In this newer (and better) update to Zombie Kidz, students must defeat the undead in the halls of their school or be overrun.
As a legacy game, Zombie Kidz Evolution is designed to keep kids entrenched in its campaign, from sticker trophies to envelopes with new missions and tougher difficulties. Although I’m not usually a fan of this style (I prefer replayability), I can’t deny how this game teaches kids long-term thinking and consequences.
4th through 6th Grade
If you want a mix of dexterity as well as pattern recognition, then the Ghost Blitz series is for you. Players reveal a card with colored objects and simultaneously try to grab the correct ones, but beware – some of the cards don’t precisely match.
Ghost Blitz has numerous sequels, including Ghost Blitz 2, Ghost Blitz: 5 to 12, and Ghost Blitz: Spooky Doo, each stand-alone with new items and rules. They’re all great fun, although I think 5 to 12 was the best expansion as it upped the ante in matching and grabbing.
Sometimes players want to work together and try to beat a game through exploration and battle. In Ghost Fightin’ Treasure Hunters (GFTH), players move around the board searching for treasure, trying to evade (or defeat) ghosts before the entire place is completely haunted.
Reminiscent of other “move and action” games, like Flash Point or Maximum Apocalypse, GHTF is an excellent intro for late elementary school. Its Creepy Cellar Expansion Pack expands on the game more, giving it new life as your kids grow older.
Once more, we find a simplified version of a hit game, and it does its job quite well. Instead of an alternate, dystopian 1920s, My Little Scythe involves animal heroes embarking on a quest to be the first to earn trophies in the Kingdom of Pomme.
My Little Scythe is perfect for teaching older elementary kids turn-based strategy, as they learn to use their limited actions efficiently. It also adds a touch of RPG, which is always a plus if you want to get your kids into those later.
Almost all of the games here don’t necessarily require you to play with your kids; once they know the rules, they can play by themselves. Although great at teaching autonomy, I like games that are for the whole family.
The Family Edition of the award-winning game, a game of trivia and betting on the right answer, provides teaching opportunity and gives your kids the confidence to ask you questions. You might be surprised when they have knowledge you don’t!
These are just twelve games published over the last decade that I’ve enjoyed with my children. If you have a chance to check them out or were considering buying them, I hope they provide as much entertainment (and learning opportunities) as they did for us.
Don’t see one of your favorites? Let us know in the comments below what children’s games from the 2010s made the top of your list! | {
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A crackdown in the US is forcing technology firms to come clean about the source of the minerals used in their smartphones and electronics
Smartphone supplies (Image: Jiro Ose/Redux/Eyevine)
SMARTPHONE makers would prefer not to talk about it. The tiny components that make your phone work could contain materials that are financing a number of bloody conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The vast natural wealth of the country has helped fund decades of fighting between armed groups that has forced more than 2.75 million people from their homes, in addition to ongoing killings, torture and abductions.
Last week the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s deadline passed for 1200 US-listed companies to report on whether any metal in their microchips comes from mines controlled by these militias. But while a few, like Intel, provided independently audited reports to the SEC, the majority filed reports saying their sources of tin, tungsten, tantalum and gold – collectively known as the 3TG metals – were “DRC conflict indeterminable”.
Most, including Vodafone, Ford and Google, blamed their subcontractors’ inability to assess whether the smelters or refiners who had sold them their 3TG metals had obtained their ore from conflict-free mines certified legal by the DRC government.
DRC has vast natural supplies of the minerals needed for semiconductors and circuit boards. Tantalum is an efficient capacitor and tungsten is an ideal on-chip connector for transistors. Tin is replacing lead in solder. Gold’s high conductivity, meanwhile, makes it ideal for connector terminals (see map).FIG-mg29734801.jpg
“Illegal armed groups and criminal elements are taxing miners and engaging in serious human rights abuses, ranging from widespread sexual violence to child labour to arbitrary executions,” says Tyler Gillard, head of the OECD’s conflict minerals programme in Paris.
What makes policing it tough in DRC’s eastern Kivu region, where the majority of the mines are, is their informal nature. “They look like a scar on a hillside until you see there are people in shorts and flip-flops digging,” says Sophia Pickles of Global Witness, an NGO that tries to minimise violent conflict by revealing the economic networks behind it. “The tunnels are unsupported holes that go tens or hundreds of metres into the hillside.”
Companies have been reluctant to vet their supply chains because of cost. Some even use the argument that having to declare conflict minerals is a breach of their free speech.
The DRC government issues approved mines with controlled bags for ore which are then tagged with unique numbers. “There’s a chain of custody all the way out of the country until it gets to the smelter,” says Carolyn Duran, Intel’s conflict minerals programme manager.
The militias are changing their tactics as the controls bite, however. If DRC government auditors are seen at mines, some armed groups withdraw, says Global Witness, visiting perhaps only monthly by motorbike to extort cash from the miners. What’s more, official ore bags and tags are known to have been stolen and used illegally, says Bibi Bleekemolen at Fairphone, a company in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, that makes a conflict-mineral-free Android smartphone.
Nevertheless, the global tide is beginning to turn. Guidelines designed to minimise the use of conflict minerals, drawn up by the OECD in 2009, are to be adopted in the European Union, while China will soon introduce its own guidelines on the mines it invests in overseas. Companies should not wait for conflict mineral laws to hit statute books, says Pickles. “A responsible firm should just do it anyway.”
This article appeared in print under the headline “Blood minerals” | {
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2 Scientists, 2 Different Approaches To Saving Bees From Poison Dust
Enlarge this image toggle caption Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images
It's planting time in America. Farmers are spending long days on their tractors, pulling massive planters across millions of acres of farmland, dropping corn and soybean seeds into the ground.
Most of those seeds have been coated with pesticides known as neonicotinoids, or neonics for short. And despite attempts by pesticide makers to reduce this, some of that coating is getting rubbed off the seeds and blown into the air. That dust is settling on the ground, on ponds, and on vegetation nearby.
Honeybees and wild bees, looking for food, will encounter traces of the pesticides, and some will be harmed. They may become disoriented and bring less food back to their colony. Many may die.
Several years ago, Christian Krupke, an insect specialist at Purdue University in Indiana, became one of the first researchers to discover that rogue dust was wiping out bee colonies. At first, Art Schaafsma, an entomologist at the University of Guelph, in Canada, didn't believe it was true.
"Unfortunately — myself included — in the early days there was a lot of skepticism," Schaafsma says. He regrets that reaction now. "We do have a problem, and we've got to fix it," he tells me.
There are a lot of things that Krupke and Schaafsma disagree about when it comes to neonicotinoids. Krupke believes — while Schaafsma does not — that bees may also be harmed by exposure to smaller quantities of neonicotinoids that show up in the leaves and pollen of plants grown from coated seeds, or even in wildflowers that grow in or near fields where the crops are planted.
They do agree that the dust is a problem. They just have different ideas about how to fix it.
Schaafsma's solution is sitting in a garage on the Ridgetown Campus of the University of Guelph. It's a shiny new piece of farm equipment, a seed planter that Schaafsma has taken apart and re-engineered.
Like most modern planters, it uses air pressure to move the seeds from a storage bin through tubes and into the soil. Schaafsma points to the end of one pipe. "This is the air intake, OK? See the problem already?
That pipe is close to the ground. When a tractor pulls this planter across a field, dust will get sucked into this opening, along with air. Inside the planting mechanism, "the air is rushing past that seed, it's laden with dirt, and it's acting like a sandblaster," Schaafsma says. That dirt grinds a little bit of the neonicotinoid coating from the seed, and then carries the pesticide dust with it as it exhausts from the planter, straight up into the air.
That's normally how the planter works. But Schaafsma has made some changes on this one, outfitting it with special dust traps, similar to high-quality vacuum cleaner filters. "We're probably filtering 99 percent of what comes out of the exhaust," he says.
Schaafsma thinks that this equipment, if installed on all seed planters, would eliminate most of the risk to bees from neonicotinoid-treated seeds.
Schaafsma has been testing his theory by setting up honeybee hives near corn fields that were planted using his filter-outfitted equipment, monitoring these hives and measuring their honey production. "We just want to demonstrate that it can be done — that bees and corn can co-exist," he says.
Schaafsma wants co-existence because he wants farmers to be able to use neonicotinoid-treated seed. "I see them as valuable tools, which should be handled with care," he says.
This, however, is where Schaafsma and Christian Krupke part ways. Krupke is not convinced that farmers are getting much benefit — if any — from the seed coatings. In most cases, Krupke says, the pesticides don't appear to be worth the money that farmers are spending.
So his solution is even simpler: Stop using them so much. At the very least, he says, seed companies should give farmers the option of planting seeds without neonicotinoids on them. Right now, it's often difficult to find such untreated seeds.
This month, Krupke and some colleagues published two scientific papers with evidence to support his case. The first study, conducted by researchers at seven Midwestern universities, concluded that neonicotinoid-treated soybean seeds performed no better than untreated seeds in fending off aphids, one of the major pests that the seed treatments are supposed to control. According to the study, farmers would be better off leaving their seeds untreated, monitoring their fields, and resorting to conventional spraying of pesticides when the aphids attacked.
In another study, Krupke found that the seed treatments weren't of much benefit to corn yields, either. In some fields, pesticide-treated seed performed better, in other fields it did worse. Combining the results from all the sites, the average yield from the treated seed was about 2 percent higher, but Krupke says that difference is not statistically or economically significant — certainly not the kind of clear effect that would justify its use on nearly all the corn in the country.
Companies that sell seeds and neonicotinoid pesticides have attacked similar studies in the past, arguing that farmers clearly do see benefits from the seed treatments, because they're happy to pay for them. Other researchers, including Schaafsma, have reported that treated seed has produced higher yields, with the increase ranging from 1.5 to 5 percent.
Krupke says he'd like to do more extensive studies comparing treated and untreated seed, but companies that control the seed now are refusing to provide samples for him to use.
Krupke says that there's growing interest among farmers in plant seeds that are not treated with neonicotinoids — if only they could find such seeds.
Schaafsma, for his part, thinks it will be easier to stop dust pollution from seed planters than to convince farmers not to use pesticide-coated seeds. This is something that farmers clearly would like to do, he says, and it's technically feasible. Bayer CropScience, the big chemical company that sells most of the neonic seed coatings, has developed its own version of a dust trap that could be installed on planters.
The problem is, none of the big farm-equipment companies are offering the dust traps for sale. These companies that make planting equipment, such as Case, Kinze, and John Deere, have installed shields that direct the neonic-laden exhaust down toward the ground, rather than into the air, but Schaafsma says that's not good enough.
"The only people who don't recognize [the problem] well enough yet are the equipment manufacturers," he says. | {
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Future Energies By future energies, , , , ,
Author Read more Author Biography: Chris Rhodes. www.fresh-lands.com Professor Chris Rhodes is a writer, speaker and researcher who became involved with environmental issues while working in Russia during the aftermath... The 10 Commandments � Guidelines to Surviving in a Post Peak Oil World
By Tweet Send this article The transformation to a lower-energy lifestyle is essential and complex in the face of peak-oil. Here are a few suggestions of some of the more immediate matters.
(1) The real problem is that our society is based around the car. This is particularly so in the U.S., where it is (or has become) necessary to travel over significantly greater distances than in the U.K., and in Europe generally. Fuel is cheap in the U.S., and if it were not the economy would grind to a halt. I have toured extensively in the U.S., giving lectures on environmental subjects, and indeed when I was scheduled to cover 10 venues in 14 days (on one trip) I needed to fly between almost all of them (except in Houston where I had two engagements in the same city), and was amazed at how much competition exists between airlines with the consequence that I could cover about 1,000 miles for around £30.00 ($46.80).
The standard price would be probably four times that in the U.K., say from London to Edinburgh, which is less than 1,000 miles, but you gather my drift. As I have stressed before, in no way are cars part of the solution to the problem of sustainable living in the oil-poor era, which I predict we will see begin to emerge within about a decade from now. I have "done the math", and it seems clear enough that the massive amounts of fuel that we currently use cannot be replaced gallon-for-gallon by biodiesel, biobutanol, bioethanol or indeed biohydrogen - there just isn't enough arable land to grow the crop to make any of this stuff on a sufficient scale, certainly not if we want to keep growing food. A rise in car-share schemes would be a useful first step.
(2) That brings me onto the next vital issue - food production. All farming will necessarily become organic. At the outset, let me say that I realise that growing food organically (fertilized by plant mulch and animal manure, and without using chemical pesticides) requires more land than modern forced agriculture does. However, since the means to force it - pesticides and chemical fertilizers - are made from oil and natural gas, once these begin to deplete, then there will be no alternative. Some say that if Cuba could do it, as they did when the former U.S.S.R. curtailed their supplies of oil, fertilizer and pesticides, then so can we. This is good thinking, however, Cuban society is of the necessarily localised kind based around community farms supplying local small populations. So that's where we are heading. Rock-phosphate fertilizer is another issue, since its production appears to have also peaked and thus there is a real incentive to recycle N and P from agricultural run-off and from human and animal waste, which would also address the problem of eutrophication and algal blooms. Methods of Regenerative Agriculture and Permaculture need also to be introduced as a means for reducing the inputs of artificial fertilizers, pesticides and freshwater into farming.
(3) Many urban conurbations can only support a small number of their very large populations. A city the size of London is a good example, with around 10 million people depending on where you draw the borders, which would pose a considerable exercise in relocating most of that number since London itself has insufficient arable land for the purpose of sustaining so many.
(4) Transportation is, of course, a major issue, beyond the availability of the "car". Virtually all goods on shop shelves are imported - many from other countries, sometimes across the world, and certainly over considerable distances within these shores. Most of that will have to go, and local production will become the norm. Hence there will be an inevitable rise in local economies.
(5) This is a thorny matter, because it means that the accepted mechanisms of retail trade will need overhauling. Massive chain-retail industries, say McDonalds and many others, will have to to work on the local scale if they are to survive. Hence if we had a McDonalds in the village of Caversham, the burgers it sold would be made from locally farmed beef, not imported from Argentina, say. Everything will hence become more expensive, as the monopoly advantage of bulk-buying on an unimaginable scale will be lost. All such mechanisms rely on cheap oil and it is precisely the loss of that which we are planning for.
(6) Certainly in the U.K., once the world leader in engineering, we now manufacture relatively little because we can buy it more cheaply e.g. from China. However, the cost of imports will necessarily soar, and so if we want particular items (even cars), they will have to be made certainly within the U.K. The same argument applies for the U.S., and maybe even more so. Indeed, there is a certain joy to be had in the death of faceless corporate industries who we believe don't really care too much about individuals. Smaller local businesses do, because their livelihood depends on it. The developing world may be hard-hit, however, if the West no longer wants to buy their goods, and that development may atrophy - but it must in any case, since all of it is underpinned by the declining source of world oil supplies.
(7) It may be that the age of "consumerism" per se, is drawing to a close. This will impact on everything, and hard. We will never re-experience the oil-extravaganza of the 20th Century. Hence that kind of manufacture and supply will make its swansong. How indeed we will make anything in the future is a good question since oil and gas have served as both a basic manufacturing material and a fuel for industry. It is certain, however, that an emphasis on more essential items (warm clothes and pots and pans, say) will matter much more than devising novel gadgets for mobile-phones beyond their inaugural purpose of just talking to somebody. The entertainment industry, tourism and the service sector generally will begin to wrap-up.
(8) Having seen a huge reorganisation of education in the U.K., we will see far more, and maybe a return to some of the original technical colleges that have now become universities, and this might end much of the current pretence that the nation is better educated than ever before. With the fall of the intrinsic manufacturing industry (which was based on first coal and then oil), and high levels of unemployment in the 1980?s, a whole generation of new universities was established and a general re-jigging of the system to fit the bums-on-seats funding policy. Hence some universities will offer whatever courses can swell their entry numbers, and so we see a rise in pharmacy while the real science of chemistry has declined sharply. The title "professor" needs to be looked at too, when in some universities a professor (that's "Full Professor" in the U.S., not lecturer) may have no publications in the subject he is allegedly a professor of!
How indeed can such an individual profess? Real knowledge and real levels of literacy and numeracy should be instilled from school levels and this does not seem to be the case even though we have never had more "university graduates". Indeed some companies e.g. Zeneca, in exasperation, are now training their own staff, taking them at age 16, rather than training poorly educated graduates. This is indeed how industry used to gain its ultimately senior staff (they worked their way up), and it would avoid the mandatory "student debt" that has been enforced on the young by vastly expanding the numbers of university places but then removing the maintenance grant system, which now would be absurdly expensive for the government to fund. My novel "University Shambles" satirises some of the absurdities that have come about in the hastily expanded British university system
(9) The high-tech medical system will also be unable to survive. Most of modern medicine depends on oil and gas, at the simplest level to get hospital staff to work in the mornings. Even bandages and dressings, drugs and high-tech equipment such as heart monitors and devices to jolt an arrested heart back into life depend on oil as a manufacturing feedstock and electricity to run them. There will likely be less cosmetic surgery, and organ transplants too. The NHS in the U.K. was set-up primarily to fight infectious diseases, and this might be more effectively done working on a smaller community scale, than in confronting a highly mobile world population with the means to transport diseases too. That knowledge gained in the successful control of much infection should be prized and taught as part of the new physicianship.We may see the return of the "cottage hospital" which like a local farm, attends to the needs of a fairly small community, rather than massive city hospitals and health centres. Preventative medicine will come to the fore, since prevention is indeed much more effective (and less demanding of resources) than cure.
(10) This, the final item is a round-up of what has already been alluded to. Life will necessarily become more locally focussed. If people are unable to move around so freely, they will tend to stay where they are. A likely successful outcome for we humans in the imminent oil-poor era will be met through thinking and planning on the scale of small communities. Some regions will naturally have certain advantages over others and disadvantages too, e.g. whether there is access to transport/energy from a river or plenty of crop-land or woodland. That said, the internet should not be lost, otherwise we will become hidden from one another in small isolated community pockets, and that would be a seriously retrograde step. Optimistically, this may be a good time to think about setting up your own local business in wherever it is you choose to settle. Now that is an important choice to make, as you may find yourself stuck there if you don't like it!
The real problem is that our society is based around the car. This is particularly so in the U.S., where it is (or has become) necessary to travel over significantly greater distances than in the U.K., and in Europe generally. Fuel is cheap in the U.S., and if it were not the economy would grind to a halt. I have toured extensively in the U.S., giving lectures on environmental subjects, and indeed when I was scheduled to cover 10 venues in 14 days (on one trip) I needed to fly between almost all of them (except in Houston where I had two engagements in the same city), and was amazed at how much competition exists between airlines with the consequence that I could cover about 1,000 miles for around £30.00 ($46.80).The standard price would be probably four times that in the U.K., say from London to Edinburgh, which is less than 1,000 miles, but you gather my drift. As I have stressed before, in no way are cars part of the solution to the problem of sustainable living in the oil-poor era, which I predict we will see begin to emerge within about a decade from now. I have "done the math", and it seems clear enough that the massive amounts of fuel that we currently use cannot be replaced gallon-for-gallon by biodiesel, biobutanol, bioethanol or indeed biohydrogen - there just isn't enough arable land to grow the crop to make any of this stuff on a sufficient scale, certainly not if we want to keep growing food. A rise in car-share schemes would be a useful first step.That brings me onto the next vital issue - food production. All farming will necessarily become organic. At the outset, let me say that I realise that growing food organically (fertilized by plant mulch and animal manure, and without using chemical pesticides) requires more land than modern forced agriculture does. However, since the means to force it - pesticides and chemical fertilizers - are made from oil and natural gas, once these begin to deplete, then there will be no alternative. Some say that if Cuba could do it, as they did when the former U.S.S.R. curtailed their supplies of oil, fertilizer and pesticides, then so can we. This is good thinking, however, Cuban society is of the necessarily localised kind based around community farms supplying local small populations. So that's where we are heading. Rock-phosphate fertilizer is another issue, since its production appears to have also peaked and thus there is a real incentive to recycle N and P from agricultural run-off and from human and animal waste, which would also address the problem of eutrophication and algal blooms. Methods of Regenerative Agriculture and Permaculture need also to be introduced as a means for reducing the inputs of artificial fertilizers, pesticides and freshwater into farming.Many urban conurbations can only support a small number of their very large populations. A city the size of London is a good example, with around 10 million people depending on where you draw the borders, which would pose a considerable exercise in relocating most of that number since London itself has insufficient arable land for the purpose of sustaining so many.Transportation is, of course, a major issue, beyond the availability of the "car". Virtually all goods on shop shelves are imported - many from other countries, sometimes across the world, and certainly over considerable distances within these shores. Most of that will have to go, and local production will become the norm. Hence there will be an inevitable rise in local economies.This is a thorny matter, because it means that the accepted mechanisms of retail trade will need overhauling. Massive chain-retail industries, say McDonalds and many others, will have to to work on the local scale if they are to survive. Hence if we had a McDonalds in the village of Caversham, the burgers it sold would be made from locally farmed beef, not imported from Argentina, say. Everything will hence become more expensive, as the monopoly advantage of bulk-buying on an unimaginable scale will be lost. All such mechanisms rely on cheap oil and it is precisely the loss of that which we are planning for.Certainly in the U.K., once the world leader in engineering, we now manufacture relatively little because we can buy it more cheaply e.g. from China. However, the cost of imports will necessarily soar, and so if we want particular items (even cars), they will have to be made certainly within the U.K. The same argument applies for the U.S., and maybe even more so. Indeed, there is a certain joy to be had in the death of faceless corporate industries who we believe don't really care too much about individuals. Smaller local businesses do, because their livelihood depends on it. The developing world may be hard-hit, however, if the West no longer wants to buy their goods, and that development may atrophy - but it must in any case, since all of it is underpinned by the declining source of world oil supplies.It may be that the age of "consumerism" per se, is drawing to a close. This will impact on everything, and hard. We will never re-experience the oil-extravaganza of the 20th Century. Hence that kind of manufacture and supply will make its swansong. How indeed we will make anything in the future is a good question since oil and gas have served as both a basic manufacturing material and a fuel for industry. It is certain, however, that an emphasis on more essential items (warm clothes and pots and pans, say) will matter much more than devising novel gadgets for mobile-phones beyond their inaugural purpose of just talking to somebody. The entertainment industry, tourism and the service sector generally will begin to wrap-up.Having seen a huge reorganisation of education in the U.K., we will see far more, and maybe a return to some of the original technical colleges that have now become universities, and this might end much of the current pretence that the nation is better educated than ever before. With the fall of the intrinsic manufacturing industry (which was based on first coal and then oil), and high levels of unemployment in the 1980?s, a whole generation of new universities was established and a general re-jigging of the system to fit the bums-on-seats funding policy. Hence some universities will offer whatever courses can swell their entry numbers, and so we see a rise in pharmacy while the real science of chemistry has declined sharply. The title "professor" needs to be looked at too, when in some universities a professor (that's "Full Professor" in the U.S., not lecturer) may have no publications in the subject he is allegedly a professor of!How indeed can such an individual profess? Real knowledge and real levels of literacy and numeracy should be instilled from school levels and this does not seem to be the case even though we have never had more "university graduates". Indeed some companies e.g. Zeneca, in exasperation, are now training their own staff, taking them at age 16, rather than training poorly educated graduates. This is indeed how industry used to gain its ultimately senior staff (they worked their way up), and it would avoid the mandatory "student debt" that has been enforced on the young by vastly expanding the numbers of university places but then removing the maintenance grant system, which now would be absurdly expensive for the government to fund. My novel "University Shambles" satirises some of the absurdities that have come about in the hastily expanded British university system http://universityshambles.com The high-tech medical system will also be unable to survive. Most of modern medicine depends on oil and gas, at the simplest level to get hospital staff to work in the mornings. Even bandages and dressings, drugs and high-tech equipment such as heart monitors and devices to jolt an arrested heart back into life depend on oil as a manufacturing feedstock and electricity to run them. There will likely be less cosmetic surgery, and organ transplants too. The NHS in the U.K. was set-up primarily to fight infectious diseases, and this might be more effectively done working on a smaller community scale, than in confronting a highly mobile world population with the means to transport diseases too. That knowledge gained in the successful control of much infection should be prized and taught as part of the new physicianship.We may see the return of the "cottage hospital" which like a local farm, attends to the needs of a fairly small community, rather than massive city hospitals and health centres. Preventative medicine will come to the fore, since prevention is indeed much more effective (and less demanding of resources) than cure.This, the final item is a round-up of what has already been alluded to. Life will necessarily become more locally focussed. If people are unable to move around so freely, they will tend to stay where they are. A likely successful outcome for we humans in the imminent oil-poor era will be met through thinking and planning on the scale of small communities. Some regions will naturally have certain advantages over others and disadvantages too, e.g. whether there is access to transport/energy from a river or plenty of crop-land or woodland. That said, the internet should not be lost, otherwise we will become hidden from one another in small isolated community pockets, and that would be a seriously retrograde step. Optimistically, this may be a good time to think about setting up your own local business in wherever it is you choose to settle. Now that is an important choice to make, as you may find yourself stuck there if you don't like it! future energies, , , , , More contributions 12/12/12 Peak Oil is Nonsense Because Theres Enough Gas to Last 250 Years.
05/09/12 Threat of Population Surge to "10 Billion" Espoused in London Theatre.
05/09/12 Current Commentary: Energy from Nuclear Fusion Realities, Prospects and Fantasies?
04/05/12 The Oil Industry's Deceitful Promise of American Energy Independence
14/02/12 Shaky Foundations for Offshore Wind Farms Author
Read more
By the same author �Peak Oil� is Nonsense� Because There�s Enough Gas to Last 250 Years.
Threat of Population Surge to "10 Billion" Espoused in London Theatre.
Current Commentary: Energy from Nuclear Fusion � Realities, Prospects and Fantasies?
Shaky Foundations for Offshore Wind Farms
Global Warming is No Threat?
Transition Town, Reading, Author Biography: Chris Rhodes. www.fresh-lands.com Professor Chris Rhodes is a writer, speaker and researcher who became involved with environmental issues while working in Russia during the aftermath... | {
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You can’t have a discussion about the Internet in the United States these days without encountering the term “open Internet” or “net neutrality.” In the weeks since his appointment as Chairman of the FCC, Ajit Pai has been working to rewrite Internet regulations – first by blocking a rule to protect consumer privacy from ISP snooping – and now by going after net neutrality. Pai’s latest focus is on rolling back existing net neutrality regulations – implemented by the FCC in 2015 under the Open Internet Order – and calling for “free and open Internet” principles in their place.
While the effort sounds good on its face – in fact, a “free and open Internet” is what many privacy advocates and companies (including us here at Golden Frog) have been advocating for for years – something is wrong. The “free and open Internet” Pai is describing is being grossly misrepresented. Pai has co-opted the term and twisted its meaning for his own purposes, all but rewriting the fundamental principles of the open internet in the process. His latest comments are most likely an attempt to trick the public into thinking he’s on their side – that he also wants the same Internet experience everyone has been asking for – when in reality the solution he’s presenting is far more restrictive and less open than the Internet marketplace we have today. What Pai really wants is to further decrease regulation, which will only strengthen the existing broadband duopoly and allow providers to manipulate and restrict Internet access. This would be a disaster for consumers and any providers outside the big two, moving us even further away from the open Internet we’ve been fighting for.
Below we examine the arguments being made by Pai and the dangerous way he is twisting the concept of the open Internet. We counter each point to offer insight into what’s really happening and what we need to do to move towards a real solution.
Everyone Agrees on the Principles of a Free and Open Internet
Pai Says: “The bottom line is, everyone agrees on the principles of a free and open Internet. What we disagree with is how many regulations are needed to preserve the Internet.”
Counter Argument: This statement is entirely dependant on the definition of the open Internet. The way it’s currently being used by Pai, the open Internet is not representative of principles we all agree on. What Pai is advocating for is more flawed than the existing net neutrality regulations we have in place. While deregulation in a competitive marketplace is in and of itself favorable, in a marketplace that lacks such competition light regulation is absolutely necessary. In the case of the broadband marketplace as it currently exists in the United States, there is a severe lack of competition and most providers outside the big few do not support reducing this.
Additionally, Pai is making a sweeping generalization here by encompassing “everyone.” Not “everyone” agrees with most things, and in the case of the open Internet, history has proven many are not in alignment on the issue.
The Internet Was Not Broken in 2015
Pai Says: “Number one there was no problem to solve, the Internet wasn’t broken in 2015.”
Counterargument: There are two inaccuracies here. First, if the Internet was ever “broken,” it was done long before 2015. The Internet started breaking so to speak way back in the early 2000s, when large monopolistic cable companies began lobbying the FCC to reduce regulation so they could push out small ISPs and dominate the marketplace. Secondly, the reference to 2015 and its associated Internet regulations (the Open Internet Order) is misleading. While we agree the 2015 regulations are far from ideal, they were in fact an attempt to improve the Internet marketplace and keep access open for consumers.
Title II Was Not The Right Solution to Adopt
Pai Says: “Number two, even if there was a problem, this wasn’t the right solution to adopt. […] the broadband market we have is very different from the telephone market of 1934.”
Counterargument: Ok, so we also agree that net neutrality under Title II was not an ideal solution to adopt. We’ve been saying this for years – it attempted to address a problem but did so inadequately. However, Pai’s new “open Internet” solution is not the right approach either. The only real solution here is a return to Open Access – wherein the physical infrastructure is separated from the service provider, allowing for a fully competitive marketplace with many providers and in which consumers have choice. This model is effectively used – not to mention hailed as an example – in other sectors such as public utility.
A Few of them [ISPs] are Behaving in a Way that is Anticompetitive
Pai Says: “So, it seems to me that if you have 4,462 internet service providers and if a few of them are behaving in a way that is anticompetitive or otherwise bad for consumer welfare then you take targeted action to deal with that. You don’t declare the entire market anticompetitive and treat everyone as if they are a monopolist.”
Counterargument: Although there may technically be a lot of providers in the marketplace, the reality is only a tiny fraction are able to compete (IE – Verizon, Time Warner, Comcast). The monopolistic behavior we see is perpetuated by these few huge providers whom not only dominate but also lobby to maintain and expand their control – as they’re doing now by encouraging the FCC to roll back net neutrality protections. The market is anticompetitive because of these providers – the very ones that are applying pressure to remove the regulations. When we look at the numbers, there were far more competitive ISPs prior to FCC involvement back in the 2000s than there are today.
The Real Issue (And Real Solution)
So where can we go from here? Below we outline key takeaways, and what we see as the solution.
The Meaning of Open Internet Is Changing
The term “open Internet” has been co-opted by Pai (and many others) and is being used to represent a concept that is highly divergent from its original meaning. People HAVE NOT been advocating for the “open Internet” as Pai describes it, and changing the definition will have very dangerous consequences.
If We’re Undoing Net Neutrality, We Should Revisit the Entire Conversation
The net neutrality rules put into place under the Open Internet Order in 2015 were flawed, and now that we’re changing these regulations we should push for the ideal solution instead of arguing over a flawed one. This is an opportunity for all proponents of a truly free and open Internet to speak up.
Open Access is the Solution
Open Access is the only answer – and here’s why.
Get Involved
You can make a difference here. The FCC will start collecting public comments on net neutrality on May 17, meaning you can share your voice and contribute to the conversation. We encourage you to submit comments and also contact your representative and demand a truly open Internet via Open Access. Here’s How: | {
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Mankind has developed productive forces which if put to good use could in several years time eliminate on this planet all scarcity in food supplies, housing, health services and communication. But today, these forces, this enormous productive potential, is increasingly paralyzed and destroyed by the mechanisms and internal contradictions of the capitalist mode of production.
More and more the world is being deprived of everything as it plunges into a capitalist crisis of overproduction.
By the end of 1982, unemployment figures in the major industrialized countries had broken all records since World War 2. Moreover, the rate of unemployment is still steadily increasing: a half a million more unemployed in the US in a single month.
The same record-breaking phenomenon and the same accelerating rhythm applies to business failures and countries sliding into financial bankruptcy. Famine is spreading in the underdeveloped zones of the world.
In the Eastern bloc food rationing rivals the worst years of the Second World War. And in the heartland of the most powerful country in the world, in Detroit, unemployed workers at the end of their funds line up in front of soup kitchens.
At the same time, factories are closing down or working at a steadily decreasing percentage of their capacity (70% in the US; the European steel industry is paralyzed at 50%!). Agricultural surplus is being destroyed and prices of agricultural and industrial raw materials are plummeting because there are no buyers.
In terms of future perspectives, governments have now abandoned the rhetoric of “the light at the end of the tunnel” and are now talking about “preparing for years of sacrifice and austerity”.
The reality of the crisis is more and more obvious. ‘Natural’ causes (lack of energy sources or raw materials) are not responsible for blocking the productive machinery: international traders do not know what to do with all the unsold stocks of oil and milk. It is not the lack of manpower either (educated or not): unemployment is hitting illiterate workers, workers with diplomas or without, and university graduates.
It is not a lack of technological innovation: the most advanced sectors of modern industry (electronics, computers) which were spared in the early days of the crisis are being hit now. Silicon Valley in California, the world mecca for advanced electronics, is for the first time hit by unemployment. It is not for any lack of ‘good capitalist economic policies’ either; all economic policies are failing. Reagan’s policy promising recovery through spending cuts and a balanced budget has brought neither recovery nor a balanced budget. Production has fallen in the US and the State deficit is at one of the highest points in the history of the country. Mitterand’s policy which, on the other hand, promised recovery through a rise in consumption and an increase in the State deficit has indeed inflated the deficit but industrial production has continued to decline like the workers’ standard of living. Eastern bloc state capitalism is suffocating in the swollen growth of arms production.
With each convulsion of the crisis, one thing comes clearer: the source of the paralysis of the productive forces is to be found in the world social system of production itself.
Once again in less than 50 years, mankind is living through a merciless demonstration that capitalist laws of production are historically played out.
Whether they want to or not, the exploited classes are going to have to face the issues that this bleak and frightening perspective raises.
Can there be a new period of relative ‘economic recovery’ once again as there was after the convulsions of 1967, 1970 or 1974-5? Is a genuinely communist solution to the crisis simply a utopian dream?
Can there be a short or medium-term economic recovery?
First let us see what the experts of western international economic organizations have to say. The Financial Times of November 17, 1982 reported the conclusions of the OECD’s Committee on Economic Policy concerning predictions for 1983:
“The secretariat of the organization now doubts that the prediction it made for a 2.5% increase in production in 1983 can be achieved, because of the stagnation in 1982. No growth is to be expected in Europe next year and the Japanese economy will continue its slow-down, partly caused by the agreements on export limitations. The OECD is less optimistic than Washington concerning any solid economic recovery in the US”.
Those who in principle are responsible for the functioning of the capitalist economy see no possibility for recovery in the near future. At most, some of them predict a momentary slow-down in the economic decline of the US and only in the US, just in time for the presidential elections... But judging by the present evolution of the situation even this paltry perspective seems unrealistic.
Some ‘savants’ of the decadent bourgeoisie talk about an eventual economic recovery in the ‘long-term’ but they do not know where or when or how such a recovery could happen.
This lack of any future perspective expresses the impasse of the bourgeoisie; it is forced to deal not only with the growing ineffectiveness of all its economic policies but with the accumulation of difficulties these policies have themselves produced.
As we wrote at the beginning of 1980:
“Not only have the remedies that the governments used to fight the crisis proven increasingly ineffective but the abusive use of these remedies has led to a poisoning of the patient”. (International Review no. 20, ‘The 80s: The Acceleration of the Crisis’).
The financial insolvency of the governments of Mexico, Argentina, Poland, and Zaire is not a problem ‘localized’ in the less-industrialized regions. It sanctions the failure of international capitalist policies founded on generalized deficit-spending, debts and credit.
The media talk a lot about the debts of the less-developed countries. But the estimated 500 billion dollars debt of these countries seems laughable when compared to the debts of the most powerful countries...especially the US. In this strongest industrial metropole of the world, the general economic debt from 1960--1980 multiplied by 5.4! From 1970 to 1980 the American public sector debt went from. 450 billion dollars to 1069 billion dollars; the private sector debt went from 975 billion dollars to 2840 billion dollars!
Today, more and more debts are coming due but the debtors do not have any real means of paying, no more than they had when they first began this policy of massive credits. In this situation no government cares to talk about a genuine recovery.
The Achilles heel, the congenital handicap of capitalism, is that it cannot itself create markets enough to absorb, to buy, all the potential production it is capable of bringing forth. Unlike slave societies of ancient history or feudalism when capitalism becomes historically unable to assume society’s material means of survival, it is not because of any lack in the means of production (capitalism has “too much” in a overproduction crisis) but because there are not enough paying markets.
Decadent capitalism, whose scarcity of markets has led to two world wars, whose subjection of all social life including the most advanced scientific research to the military imperative of “protecting markets” from each other; this sterile and barbarous system thought that credit could be a palliative for the chronic lack of solvent markets, especially since the end of the sixties -- in other words, since the end of the post-war reconstruction.
But the development of credit can only ease the functioning of the economy if it is accompanied from time to time by a corresponding increase in the capacity for real payment of those who have become debtors. Otherwise it merely masks the fundamental problem, delays the payment question and worsens the situation. What we have been seeing in recent years is in fact an increasing acceleration of credit while real production has slowed down and even declined.
Through the use of credit, capitalism has delayed the violent explosion of its contradictions, but it has done only that -- delayed it.
To accomplish this it has paid dearly. It has had to destroy the foundations of one of its most vital instruments, the international monetary system.
Thus, in recent years, capitalism has meticulously, step by step, created the conditions for an economic crisis which combines the characteristics of the 1929 crash with the characteristics of Germany in 1920s, when you needed a wheelbarrow full of paper money to buy a stamp.
At the end of 1982 the fear of economic collapse due to the growing number of insolvent debtors led to a wave of panic in the financial world. What is the solution they have come up with?
To stampede ahead with more of the same thing: increasing the amount of money in circulation through the International Monetary Fund, the Special Drawing Rights (reportedly 50% more!).
To prevent a financial crash, which would mark capitalism’s inability to counterbalance the lack of solvent markets through credit, through an excess of paper money, capitalism has no other solution but to produce...more paper.
For the capitalists, the problem is less and less “how to bring about a recovery” and more and more “how to avoid an uncontrollable collapse”.
This spells the end of illusion for those who believed in the purely “monetary” nature of the crisis or in the explanation of “restructuration”. The real cause of the crisis is at the heart of production relations, in the way the different classes of society work together to produce.
For the workers, capitalism has only one perspective to offer, unemployment, misery, exclusion from society. Less and less able to rule through the strength of the economy, capital rules and will rule more and more through force and terror. It is the language of “austerity”, of unemployment blackmail, of forced sacrifices.
But misery and poverty open no doors to economic recovery; on the contrary, they just further shrink the existing markets. And yet each national capital is forced by international competition to take this road.
Slowly but inexorably the collapse of capitalism is preparing enormous class confrontations. The fate of mankind rests with the outcome of these battles between capital and the world proletariat.
If one day the bourgeoisie succeeds in definitively breaking proletarian resistance and mobilizing workers into a new war, the very existence of the human species will be in question.
But if the workers of the whole world manage to engage an international struggle for the intransigent defense of their class interests, they will open the way to the only possible solution for mankind -- communism.
Communism is not a utopia; it is the only realistic solution
Because the problem is in the roots of the system, these very roots must be torn out!
Capitalist institutions, capital itself, wage-labor, the market, commodities, nations, have all become living absurdities in terms of the needs and capacities of humanity.
The basis of the laws of capitalism dates back to the end of the Middle Ages. At that time a serf with his work and the work of his whole family could scarcely feed a single member of the nobility. Today an agricultural worker in the US can feed 80 people. But just like the workers of the Renaissance, his income is not determined by his needs, or by the productive possibilities of the society as a whole but by the value of his labor power as a commodity on the market. Just as in the time of the merchants of Venice, capital produces and will always produce only as a function of the needs of its own accumulation.
When for reasons of the market this accumulation becomes impossible, capitalist production collapses, whatever the productive forces society has at its disposal, whatever the needs of mankind.
Humanity will not be able to avoid a violent, world social revolution, completely changing the organization of society from top to bottom.
Factories must be made to function only for the fulfillment of human needs; production must be distributed according to the needs and possibilities of man, and the market and wage labor must be eliminated. Mankind will have to consciously unify world production -- in a word, create socialism.
The crisis which is only at its beginnings today will by its devastation show that what seems to be a utopian dream right now is in fact the only possible way to escape from nuclear holocaust.
Each day more the economic crisis will place the burden of historical responsibility on the shoulders of the world proletariat: either break the chains of the old world or perish with it.
What point has the crisis reached?
Industrial production is at the level of 1973
For the fourth time since the beginning of the crisis at the end of the 60’s, capital is experiencing a fall in industrial growth which following the past pattern will be more profound than each previous fall.
Since 1978 industrial production has declined overall in the major western countries.
At the end of 1982, production fell to the 1973 level in most of these countries: that means to the level of 10 years ago.
Japan is now in its turn feeling the crisis: growth has continually slowed down and the fall will be all the more brutal as in 1974-5.
Unemployment accelerates
The number of unemployed and the proportions of unemployed in the active population are at the highest level since the war.
But the rate of unemployment far from slowing down has been speeding up since 1980 at an unprecedented pace.
“The bourgeoisie is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society”. (Marx and Engels, The Manifesto of the Communist Party).
The crisis is ahead of us
The unemployment rate is still far from the level of the depression in the 30’s. This should not be a “consolation” but an illustration of how far capitalism can go in this crisis if the international proletariat does not have the strength to impose its revolutionary solution.
The explosion of debts
The “solution” adopted, opening the flood gates of credit, is clearly seen in the evolution of the debt of less developed countries (it has increased fivefold in10 years).
But this is only a small part of the global debt of world capitalism.
The fall in raw materials
The crisis of overproduction is shown by a fall in demand and in the prices of raw materials especially since 1981.
For the less developed countries which are generally producers of raw materials, this means certain bankruptcy.
The fall in oil prices at a time when the crisis is deepening has destroyed the myth of the ‘oil crisis’.
The slowdown of world trade
The growth of world trade, like production, has constantly slowed down since 1977.
In 1982 the growth of international trade fell in absolute terms and faster than the volume of production. This has led to the development of protectionism.
Sources: Annual Report of the GATT 1981/2; Newsweek; OECD "Principaux Indicateurs Economiques".
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NIS America has released a new trailer for Demon Gaze II, dubbed “Unearth Asteria,” that explains the systems of the upcoming dungeon RPG.
In Demon Gaze II, players will be able to customize and assemble their party, and live and fight together alongside demons. By strengthening their bonds with the demons, the demons will in turn be strengthened. Players can also give their demons tender loving care through the “Maintenance” feature.
Demon Gaze II is due out for PlayStation 4 and PS Vita on November 14 in North America and November 17 in Europe. Read more about the game here.
Watch the trailer below. | {
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ACC Football Championship To Be Moved Out of Charlotte by Shawn Spencer
It was announced that the ACC Championship game would be moved out of Charlotte for this season. One of the options is having the highest ranked team host.
It was announced on Wednesday that the ACC Championship game would be moved out of Charlotte due to the HB2 Bill in place.
One of the options that very well may happen is that the team highest ranked by the College Football Playoff will host the championship game.
Matt Hayes, a national College Football analyst for BleacherReport presented this idea in the midst of him being bombarded by sources.
Not easy to move a football championship event in 3 months. @theACC might just go with highest-ranked @CFBPlayoff team hosts. #HB2 — Matt Hayes (@MattHayesCFB) September 14, 2016
Several other National Analysts have come alongside Hayes and said that this is the most possible resolution for the time being.
But here is my question.
What if North Carolina is the highest ranked team? What will the ACC do then?
See, my friends, sports and politics do not mix well and this is, without a doubt, going to be a mess. As a matter of fact, this could end up keeping an ACC team out of the College Football Playoff.
What if the ACC can’t come to a resolution and they decide not to have a game? What if there is not a time slot in which they can play the game before the committee decides the final four teams on that weekend?
There’s a lot that goes into this and that’s why the most possible solution is having the highest ranked team host the ACC Championship Game.
Of course, they are banking on the fact that Clemson, Florida State, or Louisville finish the highest, but if you do it that way, then I would argue that the second-highest ranked team should play in it.
For example, if Clemson finishes second in the nation while Florida State finishes sixth, but Pittsburgh wins the Coastal and finishes 19th, then FSU should be able to play in it.
This is a mess.
We will have more updates when this gets resolved. Could an ACC Championship game be coming to Clemson? Who knows? | {
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Iran says US President Donald Trump has insulted the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) by trying to use political pressures to change the policies of the Organization.
"The OPEC's basis and principle is that the oil market should not be political and that political issues should not interfere in the market so that supply and demand determines the final oil price," Iran's Petroleum Minister Bijan Zanganeh said in an interview with state television on Friday.
"But, some political measures and instabilities spark concerns in the oil market and increase price, including Trump's insulting order to some OPEC members, which is an insult to the national sovereignty of independent countries that are members of the organization," he added.
Zanganeh also noted that Trump's moves have increased the global oil prices in recent days.
Trump's order to oil producing countries to raise output "is very insulting to the people of these countries and would undermine their national sovereignty and destabilize the oil market," he said.
On Wednesday, Trump accused OPEC of driving fuel prices higher and called on the US allies inside the Organization including Saudi Arabia to pump more if they wanted Washington to continue protecting them against Iran.
"The OPEC Monopoly must remember that gas prices are up & they are doing little to help. If anything, they are driving prices higher as the United States defends many of their members for very little $'s. This must be a two way street. REDUCE PRICING NOW!" he tweeted.
Earlier, Hossein Kazempour Ardebili, Iran’s ambassador to OPEC, had warned that Trump's rhetoric could soon push up crude prices to as high as $100 per barrel.
He also noted that the world – and specifically American consumers – would eventually consider Trump blameworthy for runaway oil prices in international markets.
Trump recently said that Saudi Arabia had agreed to increase oil production by up to 2 million barrels per day (bpd) to moderate high prices. This is already seen as part of a political campaign by the US to pressure the kingdom to ramp up oil production quickly to make up for loss of Iranian barrels which the Trump administration has threatened to bring down to zero.
Saudi Arabia has acknowledged a call between King Salman and Trump but not mentioned any production targets. Oil market experts, nevertheless, have dismissed an abrupt increase in oil production. | {
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Recently by Walter E. Williams: It’s Hard To Be a Racist
President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party have led increasingly successful efforts to pit Americans against one another through the politics of hate and envy. Attacking CEO salaries, the president — last year during his Midwest tour — said, “I do think at a certain point you’ve made enough money.”
Let’s look at CEO salaries, but before doing so, let’s look at other salary disparities between those at the bottom and those at the top. According to Forbes’ Celebrity 100 list for 2010, Oprah Winfrey earned $290 million. Even if her makeup person or cameraman earned $100,000, she earned thousands of times more than that. Is that fair? Among other celebrities earning hundreds or thousands of times more than the people who work with them are Tyler Perry ($130 million), Jerry Bruckheimer ($113 million), Lady Gaga ($90 million) and Howard Stern ($76 million). According to Forbes, the top 10 celebrities, excluding athletes, earned an average salary of a little more than $100 million in 2010.
According to The Wall Street Journal Survey of CEO Compensation (November 2010), Gregory Maffei, CEO of Liberty Media, earned $87 million, Oracle’s Lawrence Ellison ($68 million) and rounding out the top 10 CEOs was McKesson’s John Hammergren, earning $24 million. It turns out that the top 10 CEOs have an average salary of $43 million, which pales in comparison with America’s top 10 celebrities, who earn an average salary of $100 million.
When you recognize that celebrities earn salaries that are some multiples of CEO salaries, you have to ask: Why is it that rich CEOs are demonized and not celebrities? A clue might be found if you asked: Who’s doing the demonizing? It turns out that the demonizing is led by politicians and leftists with the help of the news media, and like sheep, the public often goes along. Why demonize CEOs? My colleague Dr. Thomas Sowell explained it in his brand-new book, The Thomas Sowell Reader. One of his readings, titled “Ivan and Boris — and Us,” starts off with a fable of two poor Russian peasants. Ivan finds a magic lamp and rubs it, and the jinni grants him one wish. As it turns out, Boris has a goat, but Ivan doesn’t. Ivan’s wish is for Boris’ goat to die. That vision reflects the feelings of too many Americans. If all CEOs worked for nothing, it would mean absolutely little or nothing to the average American’s bottom line.
For politicians, it’s another story: Demonize people whose power you want to usurp. That’s the typical way totalitarians gain power. They give the masses someone to hate. In 18th-century France, it was Maximilien Robespierre’s promoting hatred of the aristocracy that was the key to his acquiring more dictatorial power than the aristocracy had ever had. In the 20th century, the communists gained power by promoting public hatred of the czars and capitalists. In Germany, Adolf Hitler gained power by promoting hatred of Jews and Bolsheviks. In each case, the power gained led to greater misery and bloodshed than anything the old regime could have done.
Let me be clear: I’m not equating America’s liberals with Robespierre, Josef Stalin and Hitler. I am saying that promoting jealousy, fear and hate is an effective strategy for politicians and their liberal followers to control and micromanage businesses. It’s not about the amount of money people earn. If it were, politicians and leftists would be promoting jealousy, fear and hate toward multimillionaire Hollywood and celebrities and sports stars, such as LeBron James ($48 million), Tiger Woods ($75 million) and Peyton Manning ($38 million). But there is no way that politicians could take over the roles of Oprah Winfrey, Lady Gaga and LeBron James. That means celebrities can make any amount of money they want and it matters not one iota politically.
The Occupy Wall Street crowd shouldn’t focus its anger at wealthy CEOs. A far more appropriate target would be the U.S. Congress.
Walter E. Williams is the John M. Olin distinguished professor of economics at George Mason University, and a nationally syndicated columnist. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page.
The Best of Walter E. Williams | {
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An embarrassing election night left Republicans pointing fingers at opposing factions.
Trumpers blasted Virginia's Republican gubernatorial nominee Ed Gillespie for being a bad candidate.
More establishment-aligned figures said the president left Gillespie with an impossible hand.
Republicans suffered brutal losses in Virginia — and the establishment and insurgent right are pointing fingers at who is responsible for what went wrong.
In a race that many believed would be closely contested on election day, Democratic Governor-elect Ralph Northam defeated Republican nominee Ed Gillespie by 9 points. Additionally, Republicans suffered the biggest red-to-blue turnover in the Virginia House since 1899. The election showed the potential for a massive wave election for Democrats in 2018 if the GOP doesn't manage to rectify whatever went wrong in the Old Dominion.
And Republicans have a number of ideas of what exactly went wrong.
To no surprise, the more establishment line of thought for what went wrong differed from that of the Trumpian hard right.
Bannonites: It's Gillespie
Trump forces in the party tried tapering the panic by pointing to Virginia's status as a much more blue-leaning state than places that will be up for grabs in 2018.
But they left no doubt as to who was at fault for the Tuesday disaster — Gillespie. They painted the former Republican National Committee chair as having bungled his message, coming off as inauthentic, and trying to appeal to both sides of major issues — particularly on immigration. They also pointed to other Republican candidates down-ballot, particularly the nominee for lieutenant governor Jill Vogel, and their slightly better performance than Gillespie, as proof the problem in Virginia was not Trump or the Trump message.
Vogel, they said, was much more closely aligned with the president and worked to campaign on a hardcore Trump message, coming off as much more authentic than Gillespie.
"While Jill Vogel was campaigning with Corey Stewart and Bikers for Trump, Ed Gillespie was campaigning with George W. Bush," Andy Surabian, a top aide to former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon and a member of the pro-Trump Great America Alliance group, told Business Insider. "That tells you everything you need to know about why Ed Gillespie's loss was so big."
The Bannon wing of the party took issue with the establishment pointing to their message and platform as key in Gillespie's loss. And they made sure to note that their preference in the race was Stewart, the Trumpian candidate who lost to Gillespie in the primary.
"It's the McConnell folks who gave us Ed Gillespie," Surabian said. "They were the ones who were cheering him on when he beat Corey Stewart in the primary. So it's beyond disingenuous to pin his landslide loss on the Trump movement."
Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie. Mark Wilson/Getty Images Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign adviser, pointed to the more respectable showings from Vogel and Republican Attorney General nominee John Adams as proof Trump was not to blame.
"Most devastating and revealing was that Gillespie received fewer total votes than both the GOP LG candidate and even fewer than the GOP AG candidate," he told Business Insider. "When the top of the ticket underperforms the down-ticket races, it's a sign of a candidate problem. Trump didn't have anything to do with that."
Trump himself was quick to distance himself from Gillespie after the loss.
Taking a quick break from his overseas trip to Asia, he tweeted that Gillespie "worked hard but did not embrace me or what I stand for."
Establishment: It's Trump
In turn, more establishment-aligned Republicans — and others in the party who have been skeptical of Trump — made it clear who they thought was at fault for the huge losses.
"Trump stench infiltrated the race," said Rick Tyler, communications director for Republican Sen. Ted Cruz's 2016 presidential campaign, told Business Insider. Tyler, who doesn't feel much attachment to the party's larger establishment, declined to support Trump's 2016 campaign bid.
"Eddie couldn’t make the stink go away so he ended up trying to convince people it smelled good," Tyler told Business Insider.
Gillespie tried to embrace the Trump message in the campaign's final weeks, but it did not work. Whether it was because of the message itself or, as Trump's biggest backers point to, Gillespie's lack of authenticity, is not known, though Kyle Kondik, an expert with the University of Virginia Center for Politics, told Business Insider that Gillespie and Republicans "struggled the most in the places where Trump was the biggest drag."
As a result, Tyler said candidates should do one thing in the 2018 campaign.
"Dump Trump," he said.
Josh Holmes, former chief of staff for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, pointed to the national mood as a reason for Gillespie's inability to finish closer to Northam.
"There's only so much that a guy like Ed Gillespie can do," he said. "On paper, he probably has a better suburban sprawl than most Republicans. The problem that he had and that they had down-ballot is that national current is running against them in a pretty significant way. And the issue wasn't that they didn't talk about cultural issues enough."
He criticized the notion that some have presented in the aftermath of Trump's surprising 2016 victory "that as long as you're talking about divisive social and racial issues, that somehow that benefits the Republican Party."
"That, as we saw last night, is an absolute prescription for disaster," he said. "This Bannon view of the world I think is demonstrably and now proven to be untrue."
Ralph Northam. Win McNamee/Getty Images It wasn't in the pro-Trump areas that Gillespie found himself coming up short, Holmes added.
Responding to the Bannonites who said the problem in Virginia was the messenger and not the message itself, Holmes said "you'd have to accept that Loudoun and Fairfax Counties were responsive to monuments and immigration policies."
"And if you know anything about those two counties, they are not," he continued. "They are suburban, economic, center-right voters, and the idea that they wake up every day and are concerned about whether the monument of Gen. Lee is still standing is a total fantasy."
Reed Galen, deputy campaign manager for Republican Sen. John McCain's 2008 presidential bid, told Business Insider that Tuesday should cause Republicans to "take a whole bunch of lessons," but "they won't."
"With President Trump as the leader of the party, the GOP is beholden to his whims," he said. "Congress is now facing the idea they won’t have anything to show voters a year from now. If we know that healthcare was the number one issue in Virginia, and we learn from the Maine initiative on Medicaid expansion, Republicans are looking pretty thin. Their tax plan, regardless of reality, has already been shaped as a giveaway to the rich – that won’t help with voters, either."
He added: "Everything went wrong for Republicans last night."
But while Galen said the tax bill could be a lost cause with voters Republicans need to win back, others are certain that a win on the tax bill is exactly what the party needs. As one House GOP strategist told Business Insider, Tuesday "showed us Democrats are energized," and that "makes passing key legislation such as tax reform all the more important."
Terry Sullivan, campaign manager for Republican Sen. Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential bid, told Business Insider that it was clear to him Gillespie and Virginia Republicans got crushed because of a "toxic political environment" that is the "only thing that can explain" such a "strong prevailing wind against Republicans."
"Yesterday was absolutely all about the terrible national political environment Republicans face," he said. "Ed Gillespie was a good candidate who ran a good race against Northam, who even the Democrats admit was a terrible candidate. There is nothing on the ground that could explain the huge loss. And for Republicans to lose (at least 15 Virginia House) seats — Paul Ryan should be losing sleep over this."
Sullivan laid out the grim realities for congressional Republicans headed into 2018.
"Perhaps the single best thing that Congressional Republicans can do to prepare for the midterms is pray that Donald Trump’s Twitter account gets deleted again," he said. "And this time, permanently." | {
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This was hilarious. These two are so adorable together.
Though let's be honest. With how much of a dork she is, Rubes would be lying straight in bed, with a face red as her cape, before making a nonsensical excuse in the morning and running out due to awkwardness. | {
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Last month I found myself drenched in sweat, using all of my mental willpower to push through a 10K race (with a few choice words swirling around my head for the hill-loving course designer). While I usually forgo the hydration stations during races (I’m not much of a drinker during exercise, and never really feel the need to break up my run), this race was different.
The temperature steadily climbed into the high 80’s as the race went on, and the inclined course had me dripping with sweat, which was bringing on a headache. Every time I stopped at a station I fell back on my typical habit of avoiding sugary beverages, bypassing the neon-colored liquids filling half the cups in favor of plain old H20.
While this choice is typically a smart one (after all, liquids are a huge source of unwanted calories and sugar in the standard American diet), according to Natalie Rizzo, RD, founder of Nutrition à la Natalie, this situation turns out to be an exception to the rule.
“For any [strenuous] activity longer than 60 minutes, you’re going to want to think about a sports drink,” says Rizzo. “Gatorade — or any sports drink — was actually formulated for athletes. We think that they’re not so good for us because a lot of people drink them when their sitting at their desks or they’re not so active, and if that’s the case, yes, it's too much sugar. But sports drinks are actually good for athletes working out for longer than an hour or who are working out in extreme conditions like extreme heat.” | {
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I’ll be voting for the UK to remain part of the European in the imminent referendum.
It’s no secret that I am a staunch advocate for Scottish independence, and despite being entirely separate issues, the two are often conflated – and it isn’t immediately clear how to the two positions can be naturally compatible. This is something that few people have addressed directly, so I’m going to do so – explaining my reasons for voting ‘Remain’, with additional reference to my pro Scottish independence stance.
Before getting into the weeds, a few important things to note:
The arguments made will relate only to the current British constitutional setup. In other words, they apply to the question at hand: whether the UK should vote to Remain in the EU. If the question was solely about the membership of an independent Scotland, then things may be different. Maybe not, but that’s not something that I’m going to address in any detail.
should vote to Remain in the EU. If the question was solely about the membership of an independent Scotland, then things may be different. Maybe not, but that’s not something that I’m going to address in any detail. This is about the UK’s membership of the European Union, and has nothing to do (at least directly) with the European Convention on Human Rights, Strasbourg, or the Human Rights Act.
Reason 1: British Sovereignty
Background:
As the Leave campaign have stated, this whole debate is really about sovereignty. In other words, who holds the final say over what laws are enacted in the UK. Sadly, this is one of the most complicated parts of the issue, and also one of the most grossly over-simplified.
Those championing the Leave cause feel that increasingly the UK is subject to a barrage of new laws from Brussels which require the UK to either adopt legislation that we do not want, or prevent us from enacting the laws that we do want – and that we have to end our membership of the European Union to prevent this.
My views:
One of the key concepts underpinning much of the discussion around this issue is Dicey’s Doctrine of Parliamentary Sovereignty. Fundamentally, this is the political theory that nothing can bind the British Parliament, including Parliament itself. Practically, this is why a Labour government is not able to create laws that a later Tory government couldn’t overturn.
On the face of it, this seems like an eminently sensible thing. Parliament is a manifestation of the expressed will of the British people, and given that, they should be the only ones who hold the ultimate decision making power. This is tough to argue with in the abstract (and the academic in me resonates with such a clear principle), but it is clearly not the full story. Much in the same way that social contract theories are fascinating on their own, but have scant relation to the real world, parliamentary sovereignty does not exist in a vacuum, devoid of all other practical realities. The romantic notion of British sovereignty relies on a myopic view of the UK as the only, or most important nation in the world – one that would have made a lot more sense in the 17th Century when Dicey was kicking about than it does now.
Just as we have complete control as individuals over our actions, we do not exist in isolation, with an unfettered ability to do whatever we want, whenever we want – at least not without consequences. We retain our personal sovereignty whilst also making decisions based on influence as pressure from a variety of outside actors such as friends, family, our communities, and the law.
Currently, the British Parliament is perfectly able to comply with parts of European law that it doesn’t like, but there would of course be consequences for doing so. It may not fit Dicey’s idea of Parliamentary Sovereignty, but it doesn’t mean that British sovereignty itself is impinged. Instead, it is simply part of the reality of living in a world where you are not the only one in existence. What those talking about British sovereignty are really arguing for is the ability to remove themselves from consequences – and that’s a completely different thing entirely.
One final point to consider is that even if we do leave the EU, our other ties to the union mean that it would be impossible to avoid their influence entirely. Even if we succeed in clawing back our hallowed core of British Parliamentary sovereignty, we will be bound by other trade obligations necessary to ensure the stability of our economy. One only needs to look at Norway to see this in practice: forced for practical reasons to accept many of the European regulations, whilst having no power to influence them.
To me, this all feels akin to a stroppy teenager moving out of their parent’s house to escape rules that they perceive as unfair, only to discover that they still can’t play their music at 2am. They may finally have their sovereignty in theory, but remain unable to exercise it in the manner they want to.
How does that work with Scottish independence?
Unsurprisingly enough, as a supporter of Scottish independence, I don’t have much sympathy for arguments that are based on a notion of British sovereignty. The concept itself seems completely alien, and I don’t believe that the British Parliament is a genuine expression of the British people in Westminster; only an expression of the majority of England. For this reason, it should be immediately clear why Yes voters would struggle to get onboard with an argument rooted in that premise.
Additionally, when we look at the debate through the lens of sovereignty, it helps explain why the question of Scottish independence is completely separate from EU membership. Whilst the European Union is a political union of sovereign nation states, there is no sovereignty for Scotland as part of the United Kingdom.
Reason 2: Curtailing the excesses of individual governments
The primary driving force for the formation of the European Union was to prevent the possibility of another Nazi Germany ever taking place again on the continent, by binding the constituent countries closer together.
One of the main reasons I support the UK continuing membership of the EU is to ensure that people are protected from the excesses of any single government. This is something that applies equally to our own, and to those of other Member States. I fundamentally disagree with the premise that national governments should hold absolute power over their citizens, and the only solution to that is to be part of a supra-national community that holds its members to account on the basis of shared values – without stripping them of their ultimate sovereignty.
In situations where extreme governments come to power, the EU acts as a great balancing force, pulling all members towards the political centre. This is not a perfect solution, but acts as an effective buffer against the historical fluctuations of the domestic politics of individual countries – whilst also leaving enough room for voters to take different ideological positions.
How does that work with Scottish independence?
From the perspective of a supporter of Scottish independence, I already feel as if we are subject to the undesirable ideological position of a Westminster government that we (definitively) did not vote for. This situation doesn’t appear likely to change anytime soon, and so the EU is one of the few things that helps curtail the worst excesses of that.
Should it be the case that Scotland was a sovereign nation in its own right, I would still hold the position that we would need to be a member of a supra-national political union that would prevent against the excesses of our own government – and to help ensure that the citizens of other Member States were equally protected.
Reason 3: Free Movement of Persons
An important pillar of the EU is what is known as the the free movement of persons, but which is actually the free movement of workers. The distinction is important, as contrary to popular belief you cannot immediately go to another European country and start getting benefits. In other words, you can go and stay in Italy if you want, but you need to be pursuing an economic activity, not just living off the Italian welfare system whilst lying on a beach drinking Aperol Spritz.
After the attacks in Brussels, some took them as a reason to attack this core concept of EU membership. This was on the basis that the lack of internal borders between European countries allowed the attackers to enter into Belgium undetected, from weak external border checkpoints in places like Greece. This is undeniably a huge issue to tackle, but it should have no bearing on the debate over British membership of the European Union. Whilst the rights enjoyed by European citizens apply to those in all Member States, the single external border is separate. Known as the ‘Schengen Area’, neither the UK or Ireland are signatories to the agreement. This has led some people to state that if we leave the EU, nothing will change in terms of how we travel to countries within the EU, which simply isn’t true. Whilst it is correct that there’s unlikely to be much disruption to people going on their holidays, there are a host of rights that we enjoy as European citizens that have nothing to do with Schengen – including the right to live and work in another EU country. Rights that will be lost if we leave.
This particular point is one that genuinely perplexes me, as it isn’t just about those who have chosen to make the UK their home; it’s about the millions of British people who have exercised their Treaty rights to live abroad – including many of my own friends and family. There hasn’t been even the scantest of attempt to answer questions about what will happen to them in the event of a ‘Leave’ vote, and I think it’s a detestable way to treat people: leaving their futures hanging in limbo on the basis of a Tory party argument over British sovereignty. If anybody wants to explain how both the UK and remaining EU Member States would deal with such a huge issue – both legally and practically – please do speak up. So far the response has been nothing but a deafening silence.
To be blunt, I do not believe that immigration is a genuine problem – at least not with regards to immigration from the European Union. I believe that British emigrants enrich the cultures they move to, just as immigrants to the UK greatly enrich our own culture. We are not ‘running out of room’, or being ‘over-run’, and it is hugely ironic to hear those on welfare complaining about how ‘we will have to pay for all these fuckers coming over’. Oh, will ye, aye?
To finish, here’s a specific example of why I don’t trust the government on this issue. The Tories routinely wheel out rhetoric about how British people should come first, and that EU citizens shouldn’t have the same rights that we enjoy when they come to the UK, but this is diametrically opposed to the laws which they themselves have brought in. The simple fact is, that as a British citizen married to a non-EU partner, I have less rights than a European citizen with a non-EU partner moving to the UK. I’ve written about this in the past, but the sheer bare faced hypocrisy of Westminster on this means that I will never believe any of their hollow proclamations about protecting British interests when it comes to the freedom of movement of persons. They are the ones who have systematically eroded them, and only the EU allows some protection.
The mark of a government that truly believes its citizens should come first isn’t one that gives them less rights than the people they don’t want in the country.
How does that work with Scottish independence?
My wife and I have been treated with such contempt by the British government simply in our attempts to be together, and the law is so deliberately contradictory and unclear that it has only reinforced my desire for Scottish independence. The lack of concern for our right to family life, and the implementation of some of the harshest possible requirements on me as a British citizen to be with my wife simply solidify my desire to be disassociated from that status. As far as I am concerned, Scottish independence is the only way to escape the hypocritical immigration laws imposed by the Westminster government that are biased towards their own citizens, and that are only buffered by European freedom of movement.
Reason 4: Trade
One of the arguments from the Leave campaign is that due to the importance of the UK market, EU Member States would never stop trading with the UK, irrespective of our own membership status. As one UKIP MP stated: ‘The French aren’t going to stop us buying their wine.’. Of course, they are correct on that point, but what many fail to either understand, or choose to ignore, is that whilst we will still be able to trade with the European Union, we will do so at a huge automatic disadvantage due to the nature of EU law.
As well as the free movement of workers, another pillar of the European Union is the free movement of goods. What this means in practice is that (generally) anything made or sold in one Member State has to be accepted without discrimination. In other words, Germany can’t stop blackcurrant liquers from being imported from France for not being alcoholic enough (yep, really). To bring it home a little, EU law prevents any other Member State from adding additional taxes, fees, regulations, or any other restrictions on British products when they are brought into the country. Leaving the EU would mean that those protections would no longer apply, and British manufacturers – from the biggest to the smallest – would find themselves priced out of many important markets.
It appears that the hope is that in the event of leaving the EU, the UK would then negotiate a trade deal which would give us the same sort of protections that we currently receive. This is based on the naive view that Britain is such a vastly important market that other countries couldn’t possibly give up the chance to do business with us. The reality is that many Member States of the EU already view the UK (rightly, for many reasons) as having an inflated sense of entitlement. It is simply not plausible that we will be handed all sorts of benefits without the obligations and responsibilities of membership – not to mention unjust.
How does that work with Scottish independence?
There isn’t much in this section that is all that directly relevant to the independence discussion. One thing that I do find curious though is the number of people who voted ‘No’ to Scottish independence on the basis that there was no sound economic plan presented, that are suddenly perfectly happy to leave the European Union when the economic justification is equally – if not more uncertain. A lack of certainty in of itself isn’t really an issue for me, as there will always be unknowns during times of political change, but to use that as a justification in one debate and then have no trouble with it in another suggests that it was never really the real problem in the first place.
So, aye.
There we have it. I’m no EU apologist. From the abject failure to help the Greek people in their time of need, to the introduction of ludicrous laws such as those dealing with website cookies, there is much to be desired from the union in future. That said, there are also many positives. You might not agree with my own personal reasons for staying in, but hopefully at least consider them. The polarised, disingenuous, and often xenophobic nature of the debate has been deeply troubling, and I desperately hope that whatever way the referendum goes, that rhetoric doesn’t point towards what the future of the UK, and wider continent is going to look like.
At the end of the day, intellectually and academically I could come down on either side of the fence – far more than I ever could on the issue of Scottish independence anyway. The reasons that people will choose to either vote or remain will both be ideological, and deeply personal. These are my reasons for staying. | {
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As far as last weeks go, this one was pretty darn good. Our new puppy, Moose that we got last weekend, has impressed me and we are stoked to have him around the ranch. It’s a healthy upbringing for him to experience the guests, horses and all our other dogs and goats and chickens. | {
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The Italian ambassador to Pakistan said on Saturday that the bodies of a British and Italian climber who went missing while climbing Pakistan's "Killer Mountain" have been found.
Mountaineers Tom Ballard of the UK and Daniele Nardi of Italy were attempting a rare winter ascent of the 8,126-meter (26,660-foot) Nanga Parbat in the Himalayas. It is considered one of the hardest mountaineering feats in the world.
"With great sadness, I inform that the search for @NardiDaniele and Tom Ballard is over as...the search team have confirmed that the silhouettes spotted on Mummery at about 5,900 meters are those of Daniele and Tom. R.I.P. #NangaParbat," Italian envoy Stefano Pontecorvo tweeted.
It is understood that the bodies of the climbers are at a high altitude on Nanga Parbat's treacherous Mummery route, which has not been successfully climbed, meaning that their bodies are unlikely to be recovered.
Nanga Parbat, known as Killer Mountain
The discovery came after an extensive search by a team of Spanish climbers with the help of Pakistani mountaineer Rehmatullah Baig, who was climbing with the men before he turned back.
The search was delayed because rescue teams were forced to wait for permission to send up a helicopter after Pakistan closed its airspace on Wednesday in response to escalating tensions with India.
The two climbers were last heard from on February 24, when Nardi, an experienced climber with a high profile in Italy, called his wife.
A difficult mountain
Ballard is the son of the famed British climber Alison Hargreaves, who became the first woman to climb Mount Everest unaided in 1995. However, she died later the same year while descending from the summit of Pakistan's K2, the world's second-highest mountain.
Ballard and Nardi, right to left, were last heard from in February
The first successful winter ascent of Nanga Parbat was made in February 2016. A Polish climber died on the mountain in January 2018, but his female French climbing partner was saved by climbers who had been airlifted from K2 to conduct a daring night-time rescue mission.
In June 2017, a Spaniard and an Argentinian were killed in an avalanche while trying to reach the summit.
av/sms (AFP, Reuters)
Each evening at 1830 UTC, DW's editors send out a selection of the day's hard news and quality feature journalism. You can sign up to receive it directly here. | {
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Blockchain-powered gaming platform Unitopia has received $5 million in funding from a group of investment and financial services companies, local media outlet BiShiJie.com reported on April 22.
Unitopia — a blockchain research lab of Chinese video game developer Electronic Soul — has reportedly received a strategic investment from Shuimu Fenghua Fund, Link Hui Capital, Jun Joint Venture, Digital Chain Capital and Super Brain Fund in the amount of $5 million.
The company will purportedly use the funds to boost research and development of blockchain-based games, as well as facilitate the growth of the industry. Specifically, Unitopia aims to create a blockchain-based equivalent of digital distribution platform Steam, on which users can purchase and play video games.
Unitopia claims that all games on its platform are decentralized, with the game revenue distribution controlled using smart contracts.
Earlier in April, blockchain games developer Lucid Sight raised $6 million to expand its digital games to traditional game platforms. The company will ostensibly use the investment to launch Scarcity Engine, a software developer tool that is designed to introduce Lucid Sight’s blockchain-powered games on gaming platforms such as consoles, PCs and mobile devices.
Blockchain startup Animoca Brands announced in March that it had signed a global licensing agreement with Formula 1 to publish a blockchain game based on the world-renowned racing series. Animoca claims the blockchain game will deepen fan engagement, and that the partnership aligns with Formula One owner Liberty Media’s aim to improve fan experience via significant investments in new technology.
As for digital tokens, which circulate in gaming ecosystems, cryptocurrency indices provider AltDex launched a benchmark index for the blockchain gaming category dubbed AltDex Gaming Index. The index is designed to track cryptocurrencies and tokens of blockchain-based projects related to video games, esports, and other analogous decentralized applications. | {
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24 Abril 2014 às 16:27 Facebook
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O Tribunal Judicial de Famalicão condenou, esta quinta-feira, a 11 meses de prisão, com pena suspensa, uma mulher que era acusada pelo Ministério Público de matar o companheiro, dando-lhe com uma garrafa de vinho partida na cabeça.
A arguida acabou por ser condenada apenas pelo crime de omissão de auxílio.
A pena fica suspensa por um ano, na condição de a arguida se submeter a um tratamento às perturbações do foro psicológico de que sofre.
Nas alegações finais, o Ministério Público (MP) já tinha deixado cair a tese de homicídio, por considerar que a mulher não teve intenção de matar o companheiro, por que, segundo o procurador, nutria "um amor obsessivo".
O MP pedira a condenação em pena suspensa pelo crime de ofensa à integridade física qualificada, agravado pelo resultado (morte).
No entanto, o tribunal não deu como provadas as agressões, condenando apenas a arguida por omissão de auxílio, por ela alegadamente ter visto o companheiro no chão a esvair-se em sangue e não o ter socorrido.
Os factos remontam a 12 de maio de 2011 e registaram-se na freguesia de Castelões, Vila Nova de Famalicão, na habitação do casal, que tinham discussões frequentes derivadas dos problemas de alcoolismo de que ambos sofriam.
Segundo a acusação, a arguida, de 49 anos, agrediu o companheiro na zona do nariz com uma garrafa de vinho e depois, já com a garrafa partida, atingiu-o na cabeça, deixando-o prostrado no chão, a esvair-se em sangue.
A cena ter-se-á registado "a altas horas da noite", mas só depois das 6 horas do dia seguinte é que a arguida terá chamado os bombeiros.
Em tribunal, a arguida explicou que atirou a garrafa de vinho "para trás" quando ia a fugir das agressões do companheiro, que disse serem constantes, mas garantiu que não lhe acertou.
Acrescentou que, quando o companheiro estava estendido no chão, ainda lhe disse para ir para a cama, mas ele não acedeu, pelo que lhe colocou um cobertor por cima.
"Só quando acordei e fui à beira dele é que vi uma poça de sangue", disse ainda, sublinhando que antes "nunca" pensara que ele precisasse de ajuda.
Uma versão que não convenceu o tribunal, que a condenou por omissão de auxílio. | {
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South Asia – Japan U16 Football Tournament organized by the Japan Football Association and the Football Federation of Sri Lanka will start on 11th March 2017 with the participation of four countries including Nepal, Bhutan, Japan and Sri Lanka. The tournament will go on till 14th March where the matches are scheduled to be conducted in the league format. The winning team will gain 3 points and a tie will award a point each for the two teams.
Nepal U15, Bhutan U16, Japan U15 national team and Sri Lanka U16 will take part in the event but Japan Football Association has allowed the other teams to have maximum of 5 Under-19 players because of the standards of the players in their team as most of them play in the J-League (Premier League of Japan).
This tournament is organised under the Japanese government program “Sport for Tomorrow” and the ultimate objective of the tournament is to prepare the young squads for the upcoming SAFF Under 16 Championship and the AFC Championship. There will also be seminars conducted by the coaches of the participating teams for Sri Lankan coaches as a part of this program.
All matches will be held in Racecourse Grounds and we request all the Sri Lankan football fans to cheer and encourage the future of Sri Lankan Football.
Fixtures:
11th March 5 pm Nepal vs Bhutan Race Course Grounds
11th March 7 pm Sri Lanka vs Japan Race Course Grounds
12th March 5 pm Sri Lanka vs Bhutan Race Course Grounds
12th March 7 pm Nepal vs Japan Race Course Grounds
14th March 5 pm Bhutan vs Japan Race Course Grounds
14th March 7 pm Sri Lanka vs Nepal Race Course Grounds | {
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By nathanwisnicki In Reviews Like
THESE GUYS AGAIN. How many albums is that now? 10? Oh, seriously, 10 albums? Well, good for them (him), I guess. There aren’t many Mainstream Rock bands still going, especially on the power-pop end of things, and tune-wise they sure beat the Foo Fighters. More “fun”, as they say. “You don’t have to take them too seriously,” they say. And yeah, it’s obviously kinda silly to get worked up either way over Weezer, who remain what they’ve always been: mildly tuneful post-grunge power-pop. “So what,” right? Rivers Cuomo seems like nothing short of a nice guy who’s having fun with his hooks, and if he can keep it going this long and modest and make a living at it, more power to him.
None of which does anything to obscure what even this band’s harshest critics rarely convey explicitly, which is that this music just plain sounds hideous, and always has.
Now, I’m not gonna pretend I’ve kept up with this band. The last Weezer album I’d heard was their previous self-titled record back in ‘08 (which is actually too far removed from ninth grade to feel comfortable admitting). And yet though I couldn’t name anything they’ve done in the last several years, I do know that Weezer now have four self-titled albums distinguished by the color scheme of the cover. It’s actually an ingenious marketing strategy: every six or seven years, put a bright color on a self-titled album to give old fans a jolt of nostalgia that implies bubblegum kicks to be had. The fact that the new “white” album is the first I’ve heard since 2008’s “red” one presumably means I’m exactly the type of idiot who gets roped into 34 minutes of precious listening time by a band that literally color-codes its albums. The things I’ll chase for a little bit of color.
Yet, here’s the thing: Weezer have never been colorful. Obviously you don’t need me to tell you that the “code” remains “Pavement à la Boston by way of Cheap Trick,” and if that’s your dish, dig the fuck in. But I can’t for the life of me see why you would. Weezer’s “endearing” consistency at nerding-up the frat parties (or more likely fratting-up the nerd parties) is part of the reason people continue to give them slack, because the sound is the same as it ever was. And yet the slack is tied to the assertion that everyone respects the band’s first two albums. Which I don’t.
I’ll grudgingly concede that the “blue” debut had enough good tunes to carry it by as a family-friendly version of ‘90s indie-rock (tacked to a major-label budget). Throwing “Buddy Holly” or “Say It Ain’t So” or “The World Has Turned and Left Me Here” or “Surf Wax America” onto a ‘90s rock mix makes for a good dumb singalong when the time comes. But beyond the awkward fun-toon that was all Weezer ever comprised musically, I still couldn’t understand even from a young age why this flabby guitar sound, this club-handed drumming, this penny-candy sense of melody persisted with both mainstream attention and hip media coverage while similarly tuneful drama queens in ‘90s alt-rock like Fountains of Wayne or the Old 97s languished on the margins. Even that first Third Eye Blind album is a fount of graceful melodic ebb-and-flow compared to the cheesy basement-video-game vibe conjured by these dorks. Hell, at least Blink-182 could be funny sometimes, not to mention they could work up some tempo.
And I’ll take any opportunity I can to remind y’all that the retroactively-canonized Pinkerton is in fact a tedious hunk of dogshit, a “darker,” “more abrasive,” “unsettlingly confessional” album of self-loathing that’s actually just a juvenile and incredibly fucking boring sophomore slump with barely even any decent tunes to be found. Pinkerton can also take a lot of the blame for turning “emo” from visceral stuff like Jawbreaker, Cap’n Jazz, and Sunny Day Real Estate into putrid obnoxiousness like Panic! At the Disco, Dashboard Confessional, Fall Out Boy, and other preening idiots that filled any sane kid going to high school in the mid-‘00s with despair. (Not that those earlier bands couldn’t be pretty annoying too, but at least they knew dynamics.) To quote Dr. David Thorpe from a great 2006 evisceration of Weezer’s career: “Pinkerton represents a landmark in the current mass-media perception of ‘emo’: while bearing little resemblance to actual emo music, Pinkerton was so acutely pathetic that it managed to practically redefine the term, helping to usher in the era of emo as ‘pop-punk + whining’ that we enjoy so well today.”
We’ll brush lightly over the utter laziness of their subsequent records (my favorite factoid, which Dr. Thorpe also pointed out, is that every song on 2001’s “green” album featured a guitar solo that repeated the verse melody unembellished) and skip right to the new one. Going into a record like this is like watching a bad ‘90s horror movie: you go in hoping for some camp to laugh at, but pretty soon you realize what a tedious and depressing experience you got yourself into. Indeed, for the first three songs here I was even feeling sort of affectionate: the crunchy, stuttered pop-punk guitar hook of “California Girls” (produced and co-written, crucially I reckon, by Adele songwriter and Semisonic leader Dan Wilson) and the swaggery rant exploding into big strong singalong chorus of “Thank God for Girls” (which kinda sounds like a re-write of Ed Sheeran’s “Don’t”, of all things) both give me a rush. And there’s a flat-out gorgeous bridge in the otherwise-unlistenable “Wind In Our Sail” that’s textured and sung so carefully and touchingly (“pushing a stone up a hill, and if it rolls back down…”) that it seems to have come from a totally different song (and band); it’s the first time I’ve heard Weezer sound genuinely touching.
But from there proceeds a ghastly display of the purposely-awkward kind of corny hooks and stunted emotions that define so much post-grunge power-poppy rock. Cuomo seems to have found his commercial home embracing a beach-party rock flavor for California kids who’ll “throw you a lifeline” and “show you the sunshine”, and indeed the beach tone persists through the album. This should be fine and modest, but in Weezer’s hands it’s just too overbearingly gross-sounding to let off that easy. I was offended right from the get-go when the aforementioned “California Girls” begins: “When you wake up, cobwebs on your eyelids, stuck in rigor mortis/whoa-oh-oh-oh.” “‘Whoa-oh-oh-oh?’” Uhh…fuck you! You don’t get to just leave that thought unfinished and throw in a “whoa-oh-oh-oh” because you can’t think of another line to fit the meter! And I’ll remind you that’s one of the good songs.
Elsewhere? Well, of the 10 songs on the album, the three credited solely to Cuomo fare worst. Okay, “(Girl We Got a) Good Thing” is an airheaded pleasantry, but “Summer Elaine and Drunk Dori” is a grotesque re-write of Nirvana’s “Lithium” with a stilted archness that we shouldn’t be tolerating anymore, and the one called “Do You Wanna Get High?” is exactly as godawful as you think it is. “King of the World” (here: you’re welcome) has a frat-friendly anthem thing going on that reaffirms Patrick Wilson as one of the most flat-out incompetent drummers ever recorded on a major label, what with this attempt at a nu-metal drum hook into the choruses that instead just sort of clambers like a bunch of firewood dropped on the floor. “L.A. Girlz” is a spew of beigey guitars everywhere that feel like they’re infecting your blood. “Endless Summer” closes with a generic “confessional” acoustic guitar song about being sad in the summer.
And Cuomo’s singing…oof. Adam Levine is a bastion of soul-wrenching gravity compared to the ear-gouging falsetto Cuomo serves up in the choruses of “Jacked Up”, which is the kind of noise that should be killed with fire. Or try (or don’t) the choruses of “Wind In Our Sail”, featuring Cuomo “easing” down his reaches into the treble area in a way that’s like hearing a bad joke told poorly; it sounds like an even more horrendous version of that “We Are Young” dirge from a few years ago.
The obvious explanation for why Weezer continue to be taken seriously is because, as Rob Mitchum observed in his Pitchfork pan of Make Believe over a decade ago, Gen-Xer rock critics probably have fond memories of “slow-dancing with Ashley to ‘Say It Ain’t So’”. And that’s certainly true. But in a way,Weezer’s new status as this purposely-corny hodgepodge of rock clichés who “don’t take themselves too seriously” fits right in with the nostalgias of my own “millennial” generation, too: specifically, an imagined ‘90s adolescence nostalgic for ‘70s nostalgia for the ‘50s. It’s fitting music for those of us young’uns so terrified of expressing an actual emotion that cheesy memes and typing without punctuation is our chosen defense mechanism. (In “Do You Wanna Get High?”, Cuomo talks about meeting some seductive object of desire/fear who tempts the offer of listening to Burt Bacharach, and the intended reaction is clearly, “Burt Bacharach! That’s not what your typical frat-rock band is supposed to listen to! How endearing!”) What with the new Star Wars movie coming out, the timing for this particular brand of dinosaur nostalgia couldn’t be better, and I presume it’s why I’m still somehow made aware of the arrival of a new Weezer record while a genuinely great nostalgic bubblegum party record by, say, the Go! Team comes and goes and nobody even flinches. Airheaded ‘90s nostalgia is now in full eff-izz-ect, folks, and as usual it’s a nostalgia for all the imagined parts rather than the inaction and gloom and despair that more accurately typified those years if you had anything on your mind other than the next Friends episode. Weezer’s tunes really were “just like Buddy Holly” at the time, because in an age of brightly-colored irony that mocked mass-media notions of “authenticity,” what did it matter? To quote Mark Ames of the defunct Exile: “It was all a symptom of an age that knew it was oppressively unimaginative, was bored of itself, and was looking for its inverse to upend that boredom and frustration—but in reality, didn’t want to find its inverse, so it settled for what it always settled for: a sly, cleverly-concealed commoditized version of the very authenticity it claimed to seek.” Enter Weezer. You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here. C
Weezer, Weezer The White Album | {
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Bacon makes everything delicious, yes? And coffee makes everything exciting, yes? Put the two together and you get a caffeinated porky roller coaster in your mouth.I bought some off Amazon recently and it was like hitting two birds with one stone. Except instead of two birds it was one tasty pig and one delicious cup of coffee. | {
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It is a sorry place at which we Americans find ourselves this none-too-festive holiday season. The biggest names on Wall Street have gone to their rewards or into partnership with the U.S. Treasury. Foreigners stare wide-eyed from across the waters. A $50 billion Ponzi scheme (baited with, of all things in this age of excess, the promise of low, spuriously predictable returns)? Interest rates over which tiny Japanese rates fairly tower? Regulatory policy seemingly set by a weather vane? A Federal Reserve that can't make up its mind: Is it in the business of central banking or of central planning? And to think -- our disappointed... | {
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A top strategist at BNY Mellon said the bank is advising clients to avoid risk assets until the market figures out how the global economy will react to the coronavirus outbreak and other uncertainties.
Alicia Levine, chief strategist at BNY Mellon Investment Management, said on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" that it was difficult for investors and analysts to model the damage caused by the global health epidemic.
"The main enemy of the market right now is uncertainty, because you can't actually model this … We're telling clients to take some risk off the table because, if you think about it, there's kind of a constellation of uncertainty here," Levine said.
The epidemic is only one part of the uncertainty that is roiling markets, Levine said.
"There's the Democratic race, there's the course of the virus and what the containment efforts for this does to the economy. And I'd just like to point out that the market has gone straight down since the Fed minutes came out on February 19," Levine said.
The U.S. stock market plunged again on Thursday morning, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average finishing the day down nearly 1,200 points, or 4.4%.
Levine said that she expected the effects of the outbreak to be in the rearview mirror in six months. Art Hogan, market strategists at National Securities, agreed that the market would recover in the months ahead but that the recent highs made this sell-off more violent than in similar situations.
"I think right now what we're forgetting is we're starting this epidemic at all-time highs, so obviously the initial damage is probably going to be a whole lot more than it has been for the other 11 global health scares that we've seen over the last 20 years," Hogan said. "But I think the other important thing to note is in all those other cases, three months and six months down the road global markets were higher."
Ed Yardeni, the president of Yardeni Research, said in a note Wednesday that this was "panic attack #66" since the bull market began after the financial crisis and that this could be the one to cause the flip to a bear market. However, he said on "Squawk on the Street" on Thursday that strong actions by governments around the world to contain the outbreak could lead markets to bounce back.
"I think as we see that these government actions are working, the pandemic of fear will abate and the market will come back," Yardeni said. | {
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The Dead Linger is the definitive zombie apocalypse survival horror experience! Set in a planet-sized, procedurally generated world, survivors learn to fight, run, and survive against the never-ending and relentless zombie hordes.
I did the usual contacting of developers and got a lovely response from the developers on this one:
@gamingonlinux Yes, but we don't have an ETA just yet. — Sandswept Studios (@Sandswept) September 29, 2013
Also see:
@gamingonlinux We'll probably do a video for the Mac/Linux announcements - they'll be substantial. :) — Sandswept Studios (@Sandswept) September 29, 2013
Current Features In Alpha
Explore a planet-sized world, full of the restless undead!
Slay the undead hordes, with whatever you want!
True free-form barricading; nailing boards wherever and however you want!
Interact and explore every item, weapon, object, and building that you can see! No fake doors, no fake windows, no invisible walls.
Full multiplayer support; as many survivors as your server can handle!
Survive the apocalypse YOUR way. True multiplayer zombie survival, with a major focus on classic zombies as the core enemy!
Once purchased, all future updates are FREE!
Yes, this is the zombie survival you and your friends have been waiting for.
Lower price during Alpha!
Be part of the Sandswept Legion community; led by a dedicated development team who listen and discuss the game with the community on a daily basis!
And a whole lot more to come as we roll out updates!
Older Trailer | {
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Today on In Case You Missed It: Scientists at CERN constructed a large chamber to replicate the cloud environment before the world's Industrial Revolution got its start after 1750. The thought had been that there were far fewer clouds on Earth then, but already results are pointing to a different reality that could help guide present day modeling of global climate change.
If you want to take a peek at the continent colonizing study showing we were taught lies in history class, that's here. The toaster of your five-year-old's dreams? That's here. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd. | {
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CHICAGO (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Agriculture said on Tuesday that an internal email sent to staff at its Agricultural Research Service unit this week calling for a suspension of “public-facing documents,” including news releases and photos, was flawed and that new guidance has been sent out to replace it.
The ARS focuses on scientific research into the main issues facing agriculture, including long-term climate change. President Donald Trump has cast doubt on whether man-made climate change is real and has railed against ex-President Barack Obama’s efforts to combat it.
“This internal email was released without Departmental direction, and prior to Departmental guidance being issued,” USDA said in a statement. “ARS will be providing updated direction to its staff.”
It said peer-reviewed scientific papers from the unit should not be blocked. “ARS values and is committed to maintaining the free flow of information between our scientists and the American public.”
The original email, sent Jan. 23, said: “Starting immediately and until further notice, ARS will not release any public-facing documents. This includes, but is not limited to, news releases, photos, fact sheets, news feeds, and social media content.”
USDA officials said that after the email was sent, acting USDA Deputy Secretary Michael L. Young sent out a three-page memo to USDA agency department heads and other key agency officials outlining the interim procedures staff should follow.
A copy of the interim procedures memo, dated Jan. 23 and seen by Reuters, shows many of the steps reflect either the same or similar measures taken by the previous administration. Reuters also saw a memo, dated Jan. 22, 2009, that was sent to agency officials by former Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.
The 2017 memo, however, differs in two main areas.
It centralizes the agency’s media inquiries and social media presence through the Office of the Secretary. As part of that, the memo asks USDA agencies to “review their websites, blog posts and other social media and, consistent with direction you will receive from the Office of Communication, remove references to policy priorities and initiatives of the previous Administration.”
It also rescinds the ability of USDA agencies to close an office or notify local delegations of office closures. | {
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NAIROBI (Reuters) - The head of South Sudan’s state television has been arrested, his wife told Reuters on Saturday, after failing to carry a live broadcast of President Salva Kiir’s speech during independence day celebrations this week.
Adil Faris Mayat’s arrest underscores continuing harassment of journalists in South Sudan where a four-year civil war pitting Kiir’s military against the opposition led by his former deputy, Riek Machar, is spreading and growing deadlier.
Government officials were unavailable for comment. Calls to the information minister, his deputy and the president’s spokesman were unanswered.
In 2015, five journalists were killed in the country, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Mayat, director of South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation (SSBC), was arrested on July 10 by security officials for failing to broadcast Kiir’s speech live.
The speech, on July 9, was marking South Sudan’s 6th Independence Anniversary.
According to his wife, Mayat decided against broadcasting the speech live “to avoid any technical difficulties (which) might appear during the live broadcast.”
That decision, she said, was considered by the authorities “as an insurrection, conspiracy”.
South Sudan, which won independence in 2011, plunged into civil conflict in December 2013 after a long-running political feud between Kiir and Machar, who are from rival ethnic groups.
Much of the fighting is along ethnic lines.
Mayat is being held in the capital Juba and his wife said she has not been able to see or contact him since his arrest. | {
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Get In Touch Today!
Thank you for your interest in Katy Plumbing Solutions. We can handle all your plumbing needs in the Katy, Richland, and Sugar Land area. We offer emergency service, available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, even holidays. Give us a call today. | {
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Reconstruction of the peculiar, short-faced niata cow. Credit: Jorge González, La Plata, Argentina
An international team of scientists have used the latest genetic and anatomical techniques to study the remains of a cow with a short face like a bulldog that fascinated Charles Darwin when he first saw it in Argentina 180 years ago.
The study, by an Australian and Swiss team including UNSW scientist Dr. Laura Wilson, shows the now-extinct cow was a unique breed and – unlike some bulldogs – did not suffer breathing or eating problems because of its peculiar anatomy.
The research, published in the journal Scientific Reports, could help scientists better understand how to protect threatened species.
"Very few people know that hundreds of years ago a cow with a face similar to the shape of a bulldog's existed, called the niata cow," says Dr. Wilson.
"In our study, we set out to find out more about some of the animal's anatomical and genetic characteristics. Our principal finding is that the niata was a taurine breed, unique among cattle," says Professor Sánchez-Villagra, a scientist at the University of Zurich, and co-author of the study.
Charles Darwin saw this strange animal when he visited the Argentinian Pampas and areas around Buenos Aires in the 1840s. He wrote about it and posed questions about its true nature: its anatomy, relationship to other cows, and its functioning, in view of the peculiar shape of its head. The Swiss anatomist Rütimeyer also wrote about the niata in his extensive studies of cattle.
The niata cow is now extinct, but a limited number of skeletons still exist in a few collections around the world. With new tools unavailable to the 19th century researchers, the Australian-Swiss team had the unique chance to study the niata's anatomy.
"Until this paper, no attempt to use new and useful methods to understand the anatomy and the evolution of this peculiar cow has ever been made. We used genetics, non-invasive imaging and engineering-inspired biomechanical analyses – tools unavailable at Darwin's time," says Professor Sánchez-Villagra.
The researchers confirmed Charles Darwin's suggestion that this extinct kind of cattle is a true breed, with unique cranial features.
Photo of a modern Simmentaler cow (top) in comparison to the niata cow (bottom). Credit: Kristof Veitschegger, University of Zurich
"A true breed is a kind which is preserved over time in its features and can be distinguished from other breeds – even if crosses with other breeds do occur," says Dr. Wilson.
"We now also know that the niata was a taurine breed, unique among cattle because of its short snout and underbite – an anatomy that resulted in differences in the way some of the mechanics of feeding operated."
Specifically, the anatomical analyses showed that although the face of the niata cow was shortened and there was an underbite, the nose regions of the niata were not really impacted by these changes, and the niata, in contrast to extreme cases with some bulldogs, did not suffer problems with breathing.
The researchers also used state-of-the-art computational modelling techniques to see whether the short face affected how well the niata could chew food compared to other cattle, showing that during feeding the niata experienced smaller amounts of stress on its skull bones.
Domestication has resulted in changes to the appearance of many mammals, and a large amount of variation is evident among different breeds, with crosses common, for example, between Australia's native wild dog, the dingo, and domestic dogs.
"Domestication basically mirrors what we see happening in natural selection, an observation that has fascinated and challenged scientists since Darwin," says Dr. Wilson.
"The niata cow represents an example of extinction of rare breeds. Understanding aspects of its biology allows scientists to better understand how threatened species may be supported.
"While we don't really do not know why the niata went extinct – detailed studies of its populations over time do not exist – we can make good guesses. We now know that in spite of the singularity of the niata, this cow was able to eat and live like any other cow.
"Its extinction was then not the result of being unfit – instead, its extinction in Argentina occurred in parallel with the intensification of cattle raising and with the search for the optimal breed. This meant that fewer breeds were exploited and many became extinct."
"This has happened with many species of domesticated animals, which has resulted in a decrease of genetic and morphological diversity in the animals closest to our lives," Professor Sánchez-Villagra concludes.
Explore further The startling diversity of Buša cattle
More information: Kristof Veitschegger et al. Resurrecting Darwin's Niata - anatomical, biomechanical, genetic, and morphometric studies of morphological novelty in cattle, Scientific Reports (2018). Journal information: Scientific Reports Kristof Veitschegger et al. Resurrecting Darwin's Niata - anatomical, biomechanical, genetic, and morphometric studies of morphological novelty in cattle,(2018). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-27384-3 | {
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Thursday’s is back to what it used to be. I’m glad that now I can get back in the habit of TNA Impact being on Thursday’s once again. The number one contender is set for Slammiversary, and we’re only a few weeks out. What chaotic events will happen leading up to the annual PPV showcase? Find out what happened last night, right here:
Video Package: Last week, Sting was named #1 contender to the TNA World Title. Kurt Angle returns from his vacation. Mr. Anderson has a change of heart..?
Jeff Hardy to the ring and calls out Mr. Anderson.
Anderson to the ring and he tells Hardy, “Maybe I give assists to confuse people? Maybe I did what I did because I’m an asshole?” He then makes a comment about Hardy’s appearance, and says, “We’re all assholes!”
Interrupted by AJ Styles, Ric Flair, Beer Money & Desmond Wolfe. Styles takes mic, “I just got here and I see that I have a match with you… (Hardy thinks hit’s him)” Styles acknowledges that it’s Anderson who asked for the match. “Do you know who I am?!?”
Styles takes mic, “I just got here and I see that I have a match with you… (Hardy thinks hit’s him)” Styles acknowledges that it’s Anderson who asked for the match. “Do you know who I am?!?” Anderson says, “I know who you are… Let me tell you who I am… MISTER ANDERSON, ANDERSON!!!”
Video Package: Build up to the rivalry between Jesse Neal & Brother Ray. Also the fallout that’s beginning to happen with his Team 3D partner, Brother Devon.
Non-Title Match
The Band vs. Team 3D vs. Ink Inc.
WINNERS: Ink Inc. via pin fall after Jesse Neal hits Brother Ray with a Spear
Ray was stopped by Devon from hitting Neal with a chair, distracting him.
Post match, Ray takes the mic and challenges Neal to a match, one on one, teacher vs. student. Neal accepts!
Backstage: Christy Hemme is in locker room with Kazarian who’s more confident with himself than ever thanks to one reason…
Ric Flair walks into the room to talk to Kaz about his match tonight with Jay Lethal . Flair wants Kaz to manhandle him.
. Flair wants Kaz to manhandle him. AJ Styles interrupts looking to get a few pointers for his match tonight against Anderson, but Flair sort of blows him off. AJ looks bothered by this.
Backstage: Rob Van Dam is taping up, getting ready for the show, says that he’s going to call out Sting tonight!
Jay Lethal vs. Kazarian
WINNER: Kaz via pin fall roll up with a handful of tights
Mid match, Ric Flair comes out to try and distract Lethal
Post match, Flair attacks Lethal and gets best of him for a bit till Lethal turns it around. Lethal throws Flair out of ring, and AJ Styles comes out to attack Lethal. Kaz looks like he’s going to help AJ, but instead they argue about who’s going to take Lethal out, allowing him to regroup and drop kick both men from the ring.
Backstage: Shannon Moore is shown laid out in the back with the ace of spades card laying on his back.
Video Package: Drama between Abyss, Desmond Wolfe & Chelsea. Abyss wins Chelsea’s services and last week takes his prize.
Orlando Jordan vs. Abyss with Chelsea
WINNER: Abyss via DQ after Wolfe came out and hit Abyss with a pipe
Mid match, OJ threw Abyss into Chelsea knocking her over, prompting Wolfe to come out and attack him.
Post match, two on one beat down of Abyss till Rob Terry comes out and clears house.
Video Package: The progression of Sting’s turn, and no answer as to why.
Rob Van Dam to the ring to call out sting.
Video package shows on screen of RVD’s first appearance in TNA. He beat Sting, but post match, Sting beat the crap out of him with the baseball bat.
Sting responds from up in the rafters, “It’s going to be showtime at Slammiversary!”
Video Package: Earlier, Mr. Anderson and Hulk Hogan talking about Anderson’s situation and Hulk wonders where he really wants to be. Anderson assures him that he’s had a change of heart and he’ll prove it in his match with AJ tonight.
Puppet The Psycho Dwarf from Half Pint Brawlers joins Taz & Mike Tenay on commentary. They talk about his TV show premiering on Spike soon.
Backstage: Christy Hemme is with Roxxi and they talk about her return. Hemme then lets her know that at Slammiversary, TNA management has granted her a Knockout’s Title match against Madison Rayne. Roxxi is excited beyond belief!
Knockout’s Tag Title Match
Beautiful People vs. Taylor Wilde & Sarita
WINNERS: BPs via pin fall after Lacey Von Erich locked on The Claw to Wilde and slammed her to the canvas.
Post match, Puppet leaves commentary to celebrate with the BPs, and he slaps Velvet Sky on the ass. She takes exception, and she and Madison Rayne attack him.
on the ass. She takes exception, and she and Madison Rayne attack him. As they leave, Lacey stays in the ring to check on him, and he plants a kiss on her. She likes it and they roll around the ring together.
Backstage: Jeff Hardy talks to camera about wrestling Desmond Wolfe for the first time ever.
Kurt Angle joins Taz and Mike Tenay on commentary.
Desmond Wolfe vs. Jeff Hardy
WINNER: Wolfe via pin fall
Mid match, Hardy went for Whisper in the Wind and accidentally hit the referee. In that time Wolfe grabbed what looked like a slap jack and hit Hardy with it.
Matt Morgan to the ring and he bitches about how he was attacked by Samoa Joe and it cost him the TNA Tag Titles. Now he’s even more upset because in order to get his rematch at Slammiversary, he’s got to find a tag team partner. He sees Kurt Angle still on commentary and calls him to the ring like he’s some young punk. Angle goes to the ring. Morgan talks down to him some more and attacks him. Angle tries to fight back, but security stops him.
Joe’s music hits and he comes to the ring. Morgan bails out. Joe and Angle go nose to nose, but no punches thrown.
AJ Styles vs. Mr. Anderson
WINNER: Styles via pin fall with his feet hooking the ropes.
Post match, Anderson calls for his microphone and tells Styles, “You got me at my own freaking game.” Crowd acknowledges it and Anderson attacks Styles.
Beer Money comes out to ring and numbers game gets best of Anderson until Jeff Hardy comes to ring with chair. All opponents bail out. Hardy extends a hand to Anderson and they shake.
QUICK THOUGHTS:
I’m a little baffled by this angle with Anderson and Hardy. Part of me thinks that this is all a ploy and Anderson is actually up to some big trick to lull Hardy in and then attack him later, but I’m not certain. It seems like now things are all okay between them, but we’ll see what happens around Slammiversary.
Brother Ray and Jesse Neal’s rivalry just went to the next level with the challenge for Slammiversary. The story I’m intrigued by is the relationship now between Ray and Devon. How are they going to co-exist when Ray flies off the handle like he has been the last few shows? Could this be leading up to the end of Team 3D?
AJ Styles and Kazarian are looking like they’re fighting for the attention of Ric Flair. I don’t know how much this can do for the Flair camp, but I’m hoping that it ends up with a great match between the two high fliers!
I’m wondering when they’re going to talk more about what’s going on with Samoa Joe… He was kidnapped about 3 months ago, and they’ve never acknowledged where he was or what happened to him. I’m wondering if this has to do with the fact that either Matt Morgan was involved, or that TNA creative is totally incompetent and didn’t know where to go with it, so it’s being dropped and forgotten about entirely? | {
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KIDS ARE STARVING SEND US $30 SO WE CAN BUY THEM A BIBLE
37,134 shares | {
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5.5インチタッチディスプレイやQWERTYキーボード搭載の携帯ゲーム機風デバイス
GPD WINは、携帯ゲーム機風のルックスをした超小型のWindows PC。5.5インチタッチディスプレイ（1,280×720ドット）とQWERTYキーボードを備えており、クラムシェル型の筐体が採用されている。
メーカーは中国lekaicn。クラウドファンディングの「Indiegogo」で4月から資金を募っていた製品で、最終的に目標金額の535%となる約72万ドルを集めたという。
本体の下側（キーボード部）には、十字ボタンや2つのジョイスティック、A/B/X/Yボタンなどが装備。側面にはL1/L2/R1/R2ボタンなどがある。使用スタイルも実際の携帯ゲーム機と同様で、本体を両手で持ち、左右の親指でジョイスティックなどを操作する。
また、ジョイスティックの近くにあるスライドスイッチで、操作モードを「Dinput」「Mouse」「Xinput」の3つに設定可能。Mouseモードでは、ジョイスティックでマウスカーソルとホイールボタンを操作したり、L/Rボタンで左右クリックを行なったりできる。
ゲーム機能については、エミュレータとPCゲームをサポートするといい、Indiegogo掲載の製品情報ページではSteamやアーケードゲーム、PSP、ニンテンドーDSなどのゲームがプレイ可能とされている。プレイ可能ゲームには「Galgame（ギャルゲーム）」もあり、18禁ゲームや同人ゲームのタイトルが記載されている。
本体サイズは、閉じた状態で155×96×23.5mm。重量は365g。主な仕様はAtom x7-Z8700、メモリ4GB、ストレージ64GB、無線LAN（IEEE 802.11a/ac/b/g/n）、Bluetooth 4.1、Mini HDMI、USB 3.0（Type-A/C各1基）、microSDカードスロット（最大128GB）、バッテリー容量6,900mAh。消費電力は11W、待機時消費電力は0.3W。
付属品はUSB Type-Cケーブル、ACアダプタ（5V/2.5A）、日本語マニュアル。国内での利用の可否は不明。
[撮影協力:Jan-gle 秋葉原本店] | {
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New York City will budget $250,000 to pay for abortions for low-income women who travel from other states for the procedure, The New York Times reported.
The money will be allotted to the New York Abortion Access Fund, which pays for abortions for women not covered by insurance or Medicaid, City Councilwoman Carlina Rivera, a Democrat from Manhattan, and Jennifer Fermino, a spokeswoman for Council Speaker Corey Johnson, said.
Abortion activists have lauded the move, which is believed to be the first time a city has allocated money directly for abortion procedures, according to The New York Times.
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“There haven’t been that many city and state public officials to say we should publicly fund abortions. It’s a big statement,” Aziza Ahmed, a law professor at Northeastern University, told The New York Times. “This is a culture war to some degree."
The money, which will be included in the city's 2020 budget, will pay for about 500 women to terminate their pregnancies.
The New York Abortion Access Fund has provided funds for women seeking the procedure since 2001, but this marks the first time the city has allocated money to the nonprofit.
The organization has also paid for transportation costs, and funded nearly 600 abortions last year. It is estimated that one-third of the fund's payments go to support women who come from out of state seeking abortions in New York.
The news comes amid a wave of newly-passed abortion bans and restrictions in states across the country. Alabama passed the most restrictive abortion ban, which allows no exceptions for rape or incest, although it has not taken effect. Several states have passed laws that would effectively ban abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy.
In response, other states have taken steps to strengthen their abortion protections. In New York state, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) signed a bill that decriminalizes abortion and protects access to the procedure even if Roe v. Wade is overturned. And in Vermont, Gov. Phil Scott (R) signed a bill making abortion a “fundamental right.” | {
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The neutral’s mind is a fickle place. There are all kinds of different factors that can affect one’s opinion of a team they otherwise wouldn’t have any feelings about. On Wednesday I ranked all the NFL teams by “likability,” so now I’m turning my attention to the MLB. Here’s how I think it all shakes out.
1. Kansas City Royals
Yes, yes, the team won the World Series. That should theoretically knock them down the rankings, but let’s be real: People still love the Royals. Did you see that victory parade? It really is hard not to like a team from a relatively small market like Kansas City (which is probably the best baseball town in America right now, by the way), with a payroll that’s 14th in the league, yet still manages invoke such loyalty in its fans.
2. Oakland Athletics
Michael Lewis’ Moneyball secured the A’s high spot on these rankings for the foreseeable future.
3. Pittsburgh Pirates
The team has been trending up in recent years, which most casual fans seem happy about considering the painfully long down years.
4. Cincinnati Reds
Hard not to like the oldest franchise in the league.
5. Minnesota Twins
So many years of being relatively unthreatening has turned the Twins into the team that everyone secretly wants to win
6. Milwaukee Brewers
Ryan Braun docks the Brewers a few likability points, but have you ever been to its stadium? A fun vibe with good beer. More than enough to make up for it.
7. Baltimore Orioles
Another great baseball stadium. You can also get french fries covered in crab dip there, which counts for a lot around these parts.
8. Philadelphia Phillies
Seriously, how low can you feasibly rank a franchise with the best mascot in the game?
9. Chicago Cubs
The team is good this year — very good — but even still, it’s hard work to dislike a cursed team that hasn’t won a World Series since 1908.
10. Seattle Mariners
So many years of both Ken Griffey Jr. and Ichiro Suzuki have succeeded in making Seattle a very likable team, indeed.
11. New York Mets
Every team from New York is naturally divisive. Goes with the territory. But next to the Yankees, people can’t generally seem to not mind the Mets.
12. San Francisco Giants
So many years of being good doesn’t help, but how much fun was it watching Tim Lincecum be awesome?
13. Tampa Bay Rays
WARNING: You are now entering the indifferent section of the rankings.
14. Colorado Rockies
* indifferent section *
15. Toronto Blue Jays
* indifferent section *
16. Cleveland Indians
* indifferent section *
17. Arizona Diamondbacks
* indifferent section *
18. San Diego Padres
Thanks for visiting the indifferent section of the rankings, come back and visit again soon!
19. Chicago White Sox
It’s not really their fault, but every White Sox success succeeds in making us feel bad for their poor crosstown rivals, the Cubs.
20. Texas Rangers
Regardless of your own personal opinions, politicians owning sports teams usually has a negative impact on the likability rankings, whatever side of the aisle they’re on.
21. Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
The Angels are traditionally pretty reliant on big-money free agent contracts, which is a red flag, and the name issue is a little strange, too.
22. Detroit Tigers
The franchises relative success and high-spending recently has sort of given them a Yankees-lite feel.
23. Houston Astros
The Astros are probably the most statistical-heavy team in the league, which simply turns a number of people off.
24. Miami Marlins
Jeffrey Loria is probably the most divisive owner in the league.
25. Los Angeles Dodgers
Payrolls are a big factor in the baseball likability rankings, and when you consistently have a huge one like the big-market Dodgers yet still don’t deliver titles, it doesn’t bode well.
26. Boston Red Sox
A classic success-induced fall down the rankings. Remember when all the players had beards and the stadium had the Green Monster and the legions of die-hard fans would sing to “Sweet Caroline” even when the team never won? They still have all that awesome stuff, obviously, except now the Red Sox win, too, which makes everyone else kind of jealous.
27. Washington Nationals
Bryce Harper is a divisive face of the franchise, as is Stephen Strasburg, and the wishy-washiness of D.C.’s fans rubs many people the wrong way.
28. Atlanta Braves
The self-imposed etiquette police of the league-turned worst team in the league don’t have many redeeming qualities to trade off nowadays.
29. New York Yankees
Any team that’s nicknamed “the Evil Empire” is always going to be extremely low on this list. So many World Series titles, so many home grown legend, so much money thrown the way of other teams’ best players, so much glory. And somehow, they’ve managed to stay unlikable even when the team isn’t good. They really are the worst. Well, almost…
30. St. Louis Cardinals
Do we really even need to explain this one? | {
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Dems Once Again Prove They're Out of Touch on Immigration
In the 1950s, the great neoconservative intellectual Irving Kristol acknowledged Joe McCarthy’s stark failings, but famously refused to take the side of his critics. | {
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Check out our new site Makeup Addiction
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A walk mans into a bar Dyslexia is not funny | {
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Vibrator Maker To Pay Millions Over Claims It Secretly Tracked Use
Enlarge this image toggle caption Courtesy of Standard Innovations Courtesy of Standard Innovations
The makers of the We-Vibe, a line of vibrators that can be paired with an app for remote-controlled use, have reached a $3.75 million class action settlement with users following allegations that the company was collecting data on when and how the sex toy was used.
Standard Innovations, the Canadian manufacturer of the We-Vibe, does not admit any wrongdoing in the settlement finalized Monday.
The We-Vibe product line includes a number of Bluetooth-enabled vibrators that, when linked to the "We-Connect" app, can be controlled from a smartphone. It allows a user to vary rhythms, patterns and settings — or give a partner, in the room or anywhere in the world, control of the device. (You can see a video promoting the app's features here; be advised, it is briefly not safe for work.)
Since the app was released in 2014, some observers have raised concerns that Internet-connected sex toys could be vulnerable to hacking. But the lawsuit doesn't involve any outside meddling — instead, it centers on concerns that the company itself was tracking users' sex lives.
The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Illinois in September. It alleges that — without customers' knowledge — the app was designed to collect information about how often, and with what settings, the vibrator was used.
The lawyers for the anonymous plaintiffs contended that the app, "incredibly," collected users' email addresses, allowing the company "to link the usage information to specific customer accounts."
Customers' email addresses and usage data were transmitted to the company's Canadian servers, the lawsuit alleges. When a We-Vibe was remotely linked to a partner, the connection was described as "secure," but some information was also routed through We-Connect and collected, the lawsuit says.
The unhappy users allege in their lawsuit that they never agreed to the collection of this data. Standard Innovations maintains that users "consented to the conduct alleged" — but instead of taking the case to court, the company agreed to settle.
An estimated 300,000 people bought Bluetooth-enabled WeVibes, according to court documents, and about 100,000 of them used the app.
Under the terms of the settlement, anyone who bought an app-enabled vibrator can receive up to $199 dollars; anyone who actually connected it to the app can collect up to $10,000. The actual amount paid out will depend on how many people file claims; the company estimates people who bought the app will get around $40, and people who used the app around $500.
The high-end vibrators cost between $119 and $199, if purchased through the We-Vibe website.
Standard Innovation also agreed to stop collecting users' email addresses and to update its privacy notice to be clearer about how data is collected.
In a statement, Standard Innovation called the settlement "fair and reasonable." | {
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A QUICK NOTE: This was supposed to be a single treatise on the coding and design principles that *I* think are most important for writing maintainable code. A draft of this has been on my hard drive for a long, long time and it's turning into my own great white whale. Just to get it out, I'm breaking it into pieces that will follow shortly, depending on ongoing bouts with writer's block. I'm going to intermix quick discussions of these design concepts with some case studies of systems I've built or worked with that illustrate both the positive outcome of following the principles and the pain incurred by failing to apply the principles. Some day, I'll gather the pieces back up into a single coherent article.
Enable Change or Else!
Change is a constant in an enterprise software system. A system that is expensive or risky to change is an opportunity cost to your business. Especially if you're a small company, poor code quality in your flagship product will jeopardize your company's future.
A couple of months ago I talked about my vision for creating a Maintainable Software Ecosystem in which I claimed that the single most important quality for an enterprise software system is maintainability, i.e. the ease in which a system can be modified or extended. I spent a lot of screen space talking about topics like source control, test automation, and build automation. There's a lot of supporting practices that can greatly aid in shipping working code, but I purposely put off the single most important factor — the Code! Maintainability will not happen without a commitment to quality code, now, and throughout the lifecycle of a system. I can always throw code quality to the wind and code faster now, but that slop will catch up to me or the next team in the future, and the future has a funny way of happening sooner than we expect. Besides, I've been the "next" team, and it wasn't pretty.
I spent much of the past two years at my previous job extending, restructuring, or flat out re-writing legacy code. I frequently saw my team's efforts hindered because of existing code that was poorly factored or just flat out hard to understand. We were consistently faster when we were working with the newer code that we wrote and designed inside of an Agile process than we were working with the older legacy code. Some of the disparity in productivity between new and legacy code was our familiarity with the newer code and the better build and test infrastructure of the newer code, but I'd still place much of the blame on the structural flaws of the legacy code. Ironically, and certainly not for the first time, I thought some of the biggest impediments to extending our system were directly attributable to well meaning attempts at creating extensibility in the existing code.
Extensibility yes, but how?
One solution for system maintainability is to build in "extensibility" points or use metadata-driven design approaches. It's great if the extensibility points match up well with the actual direction of the later change, but the wrong extensibility points can cause a lot of harm by making a design harder to understand or awkward to extend. David Hayden recently posted some frustrations with this style of design.
If it's true that most code spends much more time being maintained (changed) than the initial write, then it certainly behooves us to create code that can be changed. Extensibility points can certainly help, but the wrong extensibility points can also do plenty of harm, so they're not the whole answer. In My Programming Manifesto, I expressed a strong preference for creating maintainable code throughout the codebase rather than concentrating on specific extensibility points for future needs. I've always thought that the Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work is largely true because the percentages say that you simply will not be able to anticipate a great deal of the future change with consistency. Overall, odds are that the best chance for successful maintainability is in creating "malleable" code that can be easily and safely changed in unforeseen ways. Instead of focusing on future proofing code in a few "strategic" spots, concentrate on making your code easy to change as a simple matter of course.
Coder to Craftsman
When people first learn how to write code they necessarily focus on just making the code work, with little or no thought for style or structure, and certainly no thought for the future. Any particular piece of code tends to land wherever the coder happened to be working when they realized that they needed that piece of code — or wherever the RAD wizards felt like dropping the code.
I think there is an inflection point where a coder mindlessly spewing out code transforms into a thoughtful software craftsman capable of creating maintainable code. That inflection point happens the day a coder first stops, lifts his/her nose out of the coding window, and says to him/herself "where should this code go?" That might also lead to questions like "how can I do this with less code?" or "how can I write this to make it easier to understand?" or even "how can I solve one problem at a time?" The rest of a developer's career is spent pursuing better and better answers to the question "where should this code go?"
My first "enterprise-y" system was an ASP Classic web application on top of Access to track project auditing for my engineering team. If you opened up any of the early ASP scripts from that application you'd see SQL statement construction mixed with post form handling, data access and HTML creation all intermixed. Business logic happening willy-nilly at various points in the ASP page whenever I was coding away and realized I needed some logic. A lot of functionality was duplicated because each ASP page was self-contained, causing more effort to write and then change the application. The pages themselves became difficult to understand because all the code was dumped into one bucket with no rhyme or reason. Troubleshooting business logic meant sifting through a lot of unrelated http handling code. Finding data access problems meant reading through quite a bit of the html templating along the way. The code stunk and I knew it, even as a coding newbie working solo. There had to be better ways to build the application. I improved things just by creating a set of common utility subroutines that could be used to reduce the amount of duplicated code. It wasn't much, but it was a start.
The Maintainable Code Checklist
So exactly how do I know "where this code should go" for maintainability? To guide your coding and design for maintainability, I've come up with a checklist of the half dozen questions in the table below that I think should be answered in the positive. There are three major themes running through the checklist — intention revealing code, getting rapid feedback from the code, and being able to do one thing at a time. Assuming that maintainability is important to you, it's also time to talk about the design principles that provide guidance to answering this Maintainable Code Checklist. In the table below I've tried to tie the maintainability questions to some of the design principles that will guide the thoughtful developer to answers. This certainly isn't a comprehensive list, but it's a start.
Question Yes comes from… Can I find the code related to the problem or the requested change? Good Naming, High Cohesion, Single Responsibility Principle, Separation of Concerns Can I understand the code? Good Naming, Composed Method, The Principle of Least Surprise, Can You See The Flow of the Code?, Encapsulation Is it easy to change the code? Don't Repeat Yourself, Wormhole Anti-Pattern, Open Closed Principle Can I quickly verify my changes in isolation? Loose Coupling, High Cohesion, Testability Can I make the change with a low risk of breaking existing features? Loose Coupling, High Cohesion, Open Closed Principle, Testability Will I know if and why something is broken? Fail Fast
You can't help but notice that many of the principles are closely related. I think you could say that many of the principles are simply looking at the exact same problems from a different angle. Because of this, I'm going to first do a survey of the principles, then I'll try to illustrate the principles in code with some real life examples from my career.
It All Starts with Separation of Concerns
Separation of Concerns is the Alpha and Omega of design principles. No other design principle that I'm going to discuss — be it loose coupling, high cohesion, encapsulation, minimal duplication, or orthogonality — is possible without Separation of Concerns. Simply put, strive to do one thing at a time in your code. Layering. Divide and conquer. A lot of the other principles are about enabling a system to change with minimal effort and risk. Before you can even think about that, you need to be able to build the system, and then understand that code. The human mind and eye can only handle so much complexity at any one time. At a minimum, separating the traditional concerns of user interface, business logic, and data access into "layers" of the application can help minimize the complexity of any single piece of the code. The system is still as complex as it has to be, but you stand a much better chance of understanding the business rules or data access mapping in isolation than you could if it was all mixed together.
Back to my original ASP application. Like almost all ASP code circa 1998 there was no separation of concerns. Business logic, user interface presentation, and data access details were hopelessly intermingled in a single code file. It was difficult to "see" the business logic flow because it was obscured by all the intermingled html markup and ADO database manipulation. My first exposure to separation of concerns was the 3- or n-tier architectures for Windows DNA applications on Wrox's old ASPToday website (forget about the physical deployment options and let's just talk about logical layering here). At a bare minimum, layered systems should be easier to understand because you can look at presentation logic or business logic in isolation.
A couple of months ago at my previous job we were discussing the technical tasks necessary to localize the application with foreign language support. The company has essentially run out of growth room in the United States and was looking at the European market with great hope. Localizing the application, and supporting Unicode encoding for that matter, was a major opportunity for the company. One of the developers was repeating the typical opinion that localization is easy to do upfront and always much more difficult to retrofit. Sure, but in this particular case the flagship product was going to be extremely tedious to localize because they were building strings to display on the screen very deep within big stored procedures as well as the C# middle tier code. For that matter, code that created HTML text with string concatenation was intermixed with business logic. In that particular case, localization after the fact could have been made much less costly simply by a better separation of concerns. Instead of mucking around with every single area of the code, a good separation of concerns would have enabled us to focus strictly on the presentation layers to make the localization changes.
When you say layering, we probably come up with a knee jerk list:
User interface, presentation, controller logic
Business logic, rules, domain model
Database and data persistence
Service layer
Logging/auditing
Security
That's an awfully good start, but I think the layering metaphor of higher layers talking to lower layers might not fit perfectly anymore. "Concern" or "Layer" might be interpreted too coarsely. Even within a single traditional "layer," you may have finer grained areas of concern that should be separated as well. I'll discuss this more in the section about the Single Responsibility Principle.
Orthogonality
Orthogonality is more a goal than a principle. In geometry, two or more axis of movement are said to be orthogonal if a change in position on one axis does not effect the position in the other axis. If I walk north for a mile I've changed my latitude, but not my east-west longitude. The Pragmatic Programmers applied the term Orthogonality to software as:
The basic idea of orthogonality is that things that are not related conceptually should not be related in the system. Parts of the architecture that really have nothing to do with the other, such as the database and the UI, should not need to be changed together. A change to one should not cause a change to the other. Unfortunately, we've seen systems throughout our careers where that's not the case.
In essence, Orthogonality in software design is the ability to change one thing at a time. An orthogonal codebase allows different concerns to be changed independently. Another way to think about Orthogonality is that it's the ability to work in isolation with only one aspect of a system at a time.
A classic, positive example is the invention of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) in the late 90's. When I first learned how to create html websites (in Frontpage 97!), I embedded all of the style properties directly into the html. Mixing the content and the structure of the content with the formatting of the content often made large scale websites hard to maintain. Moving presentation rules into a CSS stylesheet greatly simplified the creation of the html content, while also allowing the style of the web page to be more readily changed than before. CSS started to make the formatting and content of an html page orthogonal.
In a negative example, I inherited a codebase had very poor orthogonality between the user interface and the business logic. In this case we had a significantly complex piece of code that worked through business logic to build an html response inside code. One of the significant problems with this code was that the business logic could only be tested and verified through an examination of the resulting html. Everytime we had to change the user interface, we broke all of the automated tests that were intended to test the business logic. We weren't able to change business logic easily because we had html concatenation cluttering up the business logic. The very first mistake was a failure to separate the business logic and user interface concerns (<sarcasm>another tip, when you're rewriting a bad existing system, you might not want to reproduce the existing bad design in the new programming language</sarcasm>).
So how do you make Orthogonality happen? Tune in next time — assuming that I can break through my case of writer's block. | {
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Police Scotland have rubbished claims that an official warning was issued because of fears of “threatening behaviour” from SNP supporters at the polls.
A media frenzy was whipped up this morning over allegations that the police and the Electoral Commission were expecting trouble because of an online campaign asking people to watch out for poll irregularities.
“Radical SNP activists could cause chaos at polls” trumpeted the Daily Express while the Daily Record and Daily Mail claimed the police had warned of “threatening behaviour” by SNP supporters who planned to follow ballot boxes to counting centres.
However a police spokesman said yesterday: “We have issued no warnings.”
And despite The National making that clear, broadcasters continued to claim otherwise long into the afternoon.
Similar claims were made during the Referendum, later denied by the police, that they were preparing for violence by SNP supporters. There was no trouble at the polls but the vote was followed by unionists rioting on September 19.
Yesterday’s story originated in the Guardian which claimed: “Police and election officials in Scotland have issued warnings to polling stations and local commanders after radical nationalists urged voters to photograph their ballot papers and follow ballot boxes to count centres on Thursday night.”
This was based on the launch of an online campaign urging people to watch out for irregularities at the election counts, following claims that last year’s Referendum result was fixed to favour the No vote.
Even though this was rejected by all the parties, including the SNP, a request was sent out online this week asking people to photographing their ballot papers at the polling station after checking to make sure they carried valid security markings then, if possible, follow the vans carrying the votes to the polling stations to make sure they arrived safely.
Simon Lott, a director of Glasgow-based Spectrum Systems, where the advice sheet apparently originated, told the Guardian the monitoring was intended to be peaceful and law abiding.
Despite this the paper went on to claim that both the police and the election authorities in Scotland had warned polling officials about the risk of trouble.
However while Police Scotland said they were aware of the online advice which, according to the Guardian, was called “Operation Scallop”, they denied any warnings had been issued.
Chief Superintendent Jim Baird said: “We are aware of this however we will not comment on specific details of security arrangements. I would like to take this opportunity to assure the public that appropriate policing and security arrangements will be put in place to ensure the election process runs smoothly. The safety and security of the process is a top priority for Police Scotland and we have been liaising with the Electoral Commission and returning officers and will continue to do so throughout.”
The media also picked up on the Guardian’s claim that “formal warnings” were sent by election authorities to polling officers to watch out for any “disruption” or “threatening behaviour”.
Again, while the Electoral Commission did give advice on people taking “selfies” or “boothies” in the polling stations as well as the issue of people following the vans with the ballot boxes, the guidance did not mention any risk of trouble.
The Commission’s statement read: “On the question of members of the public following the vans etc employed to deliver the ballot boxes from polling places to count centres we are aware of talk of such activity being undertaken on social media. In our view there is nothing in electoral law which prevents such activity and indeed occurs on occasion although we understand the incidence of this is rare. The question of public safety and that of the highway is of course a matter for Police Scotland to deal with.”
The Commission went on to say that the law relating to voters taking “selfies” in polling stations was complex.
“Whether an offence has been committed would depend on a number of factors, including whether the photograph was shared with others and what the photograph showed. Given the risk that someone taking a photo inside a polling station may be in breach of the law, whether intentionally or not, our advice is that you should not allow photos to be taken inside polling stations.
“Returning Officers should ensure that all polling station staff are aware of this guidance. We also suggested that Returning Officers consider displaying a notice inside polling stations to make clear that photography of any kind (including photos taken on mobile phones) is not permitted.” | {
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You must apply in person at your local DMV office. Currently, only four offices accept walk-ins as well as appointments; the rest are by appointment only. Make an appointment online or by calling the DMV at +1 (908) 264-2963
Welcome to the DMV Change of Address (COA) System.
Note: In order to complete the application, you must use the latest version of DMV’s recommended web browsers: Chrome, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, or Safari.
You can change your residence or mailing address for your California Driver License, Identification Card, vehicle, or vessel. A new driver license, identification card or registration card is not issued when changing your address. Temporary mailing addresses are not allowed.
U.S. CITIZENS ONLY. The law requires you to update your voter registration when you move to a new permanent residence. | {
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Sources: Tesla chooses Nevada for battery factory
Scott Sonner / AP
Tesla Motors will announce Thursday that it will build its coveted $5 billion lithium battery factory in Northern Nevada and the Legislature will hold a special session next week to discuss the state's incentive package, according to a source and media reports.
The news follows the announcement from Gov. Brian Sandoval’s office about a “major economic development announcement” at 4 p.m Thursday at the Capitol Building. The release didn't explain any further details.
“I am sure it’s Tesla because why else would there be the urgency,” said a state leader who did not want to be identified because the deal has not be publicly announced.
According to a CNBC report, a source in the Nevada's governor's office said: "That's a go, but they are still negotiating the specifics of the contract." The source told CNBC it could be a week before the deal is official.
In an interview today, Sandoval said he is still meeting with Nevada legislative leaders to convene a special session. Sandoval declined to disclose any details and said an announcement would be made Thursday at a 4 p.m. in the Capitol. Asked if Tesla had a business license in Nevada, Sandoval said, "I don't know."
When asked for details, Sandoval said repeatedly: "An announcement will be made tomorrow." He did say Tesla officials will be at the news conference.
Sandoval declined to say whether he will recommend giving Tesla $50 million to help the company to build its $5 billion plant east of Reno in a development park in Storey County.
This summer, Tesla started groundwork at an industrial center outside of Reno. It did the same site work in other states, a practice that's common for the company. | {
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Zika may not be the top story on the evening news anymore, but that doesn't mean that the virus has gone away. The CDC reported 121 instances of infected people living in the United States between January and May 24th of 2017. BluSense, in fact, won a cash prize as part of USAid's Grand Zika Challenge to develop an effective way of diagnosing the problem.
Once the fingerprick has been taken and drawn up into the plastic cartridge, it is mixed with magnetic nanoparticles. The sample is then loaded into the BluSense machine, which contains a small turntable to centrifuge the sample for nine minutes. Once that's done, the blood is scanned -- amusingly, with the same sort of blue laser that you'd find in a Blu-ray player -- and a result provided.
BluSense EVP Jessie Sun says the company already has validation for its dengue-fever tests and is working with the FDA on its Zika diagnostics. Sun is confident that the company will breeze through the process, because both are diagnosed in a similar way, she says. If successful, BluSense's device will enable medical facilities to run the tests for less than $20 a patient. That's a lot less than some private Zika tests you can get, which run into the hundreds of dollars per person.
Chris Velazco contributed to this report.
Click here to catch up on the latest news from Computex 2017! | {
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Opinion
Ft Collins, CO –-(Ammoland.com)- On the subject of national border security, from a friend in the UK:
“I only wish we would also take some action to control the stream of illegal migrants flowing here, unchecked, mostly across the Channel.
Out-of-control hoards from North Africa flood through open borders of the ever-hopeless Italians, the perpetually-disorganized Spaniards, and the ‘Wine, Women and Song’ French, all en-route to the UK, and London.
UK’s pitiable ‘border control’ lacks the personnel, equipment, and mandate to aggressively guard the English Channel, and our cops simply cannot cope with the overload. Our rate of violent crime is soaring as a result, as anyone would have predicted.
Illegal immigrants arrive here on anything that floats, especially small rubber dinghies, usually at night. Our entire unguarded coast is wide open.
We citizens function, of course, as ‘useful (and disarmed) idiots,’ helplessly witnessing this cataclysmal descent of our civilization, watching as our once-great nation is sold down the river.
Our liberal media, like yours, endlessly slobbers over these illegal invaders. Curiously, they have never expressed even a hint of sympathy for us beleaguered, tax-paying, and legal UK citizens.
Your liberals are the same as ours.
Liberals actually promote illegal immigration of stagnate, unassimilable hoards that they can then lord-it-over them, and subsequently use them to terrorize the rest of us, as ‘punishment’ for not voting for them.” | {
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There are many ways for a team to get better. It can sign free agents, make trades, find discarded gems on the waiver wire and, of course, draft players. There's another way, albeit a bit old-fashioned:
A team can develop its own talent.
Remember that concept? It's a good starting point for a story about Lorenzo Mauldin, a second-year linebacker for the New York Jets.
After spending his rookie season learning the pro game as a pass-rushing specialist/linebacker apprentice, Mauldin will get a silver-platter opportunity to become an every-down player. Considering the paucity of outside linebackers on the roster, the former third-round pick doesn't have the luxury of easing into an expanded role.
The Jets need him ... NOW. You could make an argument that Mauldin will be just as important in 2016 as any player they draft in three weeks.
"We expect him to make a big jump as far as being a full-time player at outside linebacker," coach Todd Bowles said at the recent owners' meetings in Florida. "I expect him to be a major player this year."
The understated Bowles usually stays away from bold statements, but he evidently believes Mauldin has the goods. He doesn't have elite talent -- he wouldn't have lasted until the 82nd pick if he did -- but he has enough, according to the Jets. He's also hungry and hard working, attributes that allowed him to overcome a nightmarish childhood in Atlanta. We caught a glimpse of his determination and toughness last September, when he suffered a frightening concussion in the opener and returned in Week 3.
It's only a small sample size, but Mauldin demonstrated pass-rushing ability as a rookie. Used almost exclusively on passing downs, he registered four sacks, seven quarterbacks hits and 16 hurries in 212 pass rushes, according to Pro Football Focus. Extrapolating those numbers, he'd probably have eight to 10 sacks in a full-time role.
Mauldin has so much to learn that he doesn't know what he doesn't know. For one thing, he needs to develop more pass-rushing moves, according to Bowles. He needs to learn the base defense, how to drop into coverage, how to set the edge ... you get the picture.
Chances are, the Jets will draft another outside linebacker in the first few rounds, perhaps in the first round (20th overall). Even if they do, they'll still need a breakout season from Mauldin. Bowles wants to find an edge rusher (or two) who can complement the inside power of Muhammad Wilkerson, Sheldon Richardson and Leonard Williams.
General manager Mike Maccagnan drafted Mauldin with the idea that he could take a year before ascending to an every-down gig. That's how it works sometimes in the NFL; it's the patient approach. You draft, you develop and you hope they're ready when it's time.
For Mauldin, it's time. | {
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My Santa really outdid herself. She is a Boston native who is involved with the marathon and send me a running shirt as well as thunder sticks, a elephant pouch, a Boston Strong pin, and an absolutely beautiful card. I really could not believe the heartfelt generosity and commend the love for her city and what it has been through since last year's tragedy. Beyond the incredible gift she went way out of her way in putting this package together. I am a runner also and was deeply affected by the Boston marathon bombing. I am currently training for a half and I plan to wear my new shirt in my next race. I'll send a picture to my Santa. I plan to send her back a gift of items from my home in Tampa. She's really a special person.
Ps. Sorry for the late post, I had the package sent to my sisters house and didn't realize it had come. | {
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Speaking to reporters from the White House Tuesday, Press Secretary Josh Earnest suggested the 1990s, Clinton era ban on semi-automatic sporting rifles, better known as the assault weapons ban, is common sense and should be reinstated to prevent terrorism and crime in America.
"I think what the President would say based on his comments from Sunday night is that we are seeing extremist organizations, including ISIL, trying to radicalize people in the United States to essentially mimic the tactics of other mass shooters in this country. So, there certainly is a national security benefit to closing the gun show loophole or reinstating the assault weapons ban," Earnest said (bolding is mine). "There is such profound frustration on the part of the President that Congress hasn't taken common sense steps that would make it harder for those who shouldn't get guns from getting their hands on them. The suggestion is not that we can stop every incident of violence in this country but if there are some common sense things that we can do that will at least make some of them less likely, then why wouldn't we do it."
"The intensity of the President's view about the importance of us implementing some policies that make it harder for those who shouldn't be able to get their hands on guns from getting them, has not waned in it's intensity. I'm talking about common sense measures like making sure you can't avoid a background check just by purchasing the gun over the internet or even reinstituting the assault weapons ban that would prevent or at least reduce the likelihood that weapons of war end up on our streets," Earnest continued about the potential of President Obama issuing an executive order on gun control.
Earnest also pushed for universal background checks and for Congress to pass legislation banning anyone on the terrorism no-fly list from being able to purchase a firearm.
First, it should be noted the so-called Clinton era 'assault' weapons ban did nothing to reduce crime, mass shootings or radical Islamic terrorism. From The New York Times:
In the 10 years since the previous ban lapsed, even gun control advocates acknowledge a larger truth: The law that barred the sale of assault weapons from 1994 to 2004 made little difference.
It turns out that big, scary military rifles don’t kill the vast majority of the 11,000 Americans murdered with guns each year. Little handguns do.
In 2012, only 322 people were murdered with any kind of rifle, F.B.I. data shows.
The continuing focus on assault weapons stems from the media’s obsessive focus on mass shootings, which disproportionately involve weapons like the AR-15, a civilian version of the military M16 rifle. This, in turn, obscures some grim truths about who is really dying from gunshots.
Second, the "no buy, no fly" concept is a good idea in theory, but because the no-fly list is a jumbled, bureaucratic mess that strips Americans of their Second Amendment rights without due process, it fails to prevent people truly linked to terrorist organizations from purchasing a firearm.
The way some in Congress have proposed closing it would create an even bigger threat to civil liberties.
It all hinges on how you define a “suspected” terrorist. For Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., all it requires is for your name to be on a government list. She is sponsoring a bill that would prohibit anyone whose name appears on the FBI’s terror watch list from buying a firearm or an explosive while traveling in the United States.
That list, which contained 47,000 names at the end of George W. Bush’s presidency, has grown to nearly 700,000 people on President Obama’s watch. The fact that they are names, not identities, has led to misidentifications and confusion, ensnaring many innocent people. But surely those names are there for good reason, right?
Not really. According to the technology website TechDirt.com, 40 percent of those on the FBI’s watch list — 280,000 people — are considered to have no affiliation with recognized terrorist groups. All it takes is for the government to declare is has “reasonable suspicion” that someone could be a terrorist. There is no hard evidence required, and the standard is notoriously vague and elastic.
And finally, 'assault' weapons are banned in France but that didn't stop ISIS terrorists from slaughtering 130 people with bullets, grenades and suicide vests. Further, California has extreme restrictions on the types of 'assault' weapons the White House wants banned nationally. | {
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Former TVNZ Staff member, Liz Gunn, destroys Mike Hosking in her Facebook post calling on TVNZ to sack him…
I remember when I worked with him , he maintained as his mantra, with his now usual level of inordinate pride, the intended-to-be sardonic saying of Gordon Gecko in the original ” Wall St ” movie – namely , that ” Greed Is Good” . He often repeated it off air, with that faux air of Great Authority . We all thought he was joking at first, but he was serious . I started to feel nauseous as I heard it repeated on many days, and as I saw the results of such a perspective in his approach to interviewees, and in his manipulative media pronouncements -now foisted on viewers each evening at peak time, and always aimed at endorsing Neo Liberal ideology . He has maintained that dire stance throughout his career, admiring those who exhibit the most greed and reviling those who struggle under the weight and demands of the greedy few . When I left TVNZ , I left with the most profound pity for such a dessicated human , so bereft of empathy or compassion for his fellow Kiwis , especially those who are facing difficulty or , God forbid, failure . The year I did Breakfast with him , he went out of his way to undermine me in every way he could find . My goal became a very simple one…to get in early and sit quietly in that darkened studio and say a quiet resolution – a whispered prayer -asking for help so that I would never react and never never sink to his level. That I would maintain my own dignity and never let the hurts show in any overt reaction to his many attempts to humiliate and belittle . It was a year of teeth-gritting , white knuckle survival . A quiet triumph . Every day. Over the passive and overt bullying . I have never spoken of it in public until now , when it is relevant here, to the issue of the sort of man whom TVNZ have placed in such a position of influence. I used to wonder if he would ever find that point where his lust for money or power could be satiated ? If he would ever find authentic , not trumped -up happiness, on that heavy path of the pursuit of “still-more money “? And I wondered too what had shaped a man so lacking in human kindness ? I hope he can one day turn this around. He always wanted to be Paul Holmes but he never could emulate the real Paul . In spite of Paul’s self -admitted human fallibilities, Paul genuinely cared for people when he saw them suffering . He had a huge heart for Kiwis . Paul himself knew suffering. I wonder if Mike has ever allowed himself to feel that vulnerability? Do those who won’t open to their own pain , risk becoming in-suffer-able.? I do not think he is a healthy touchstone for NZ broadcasting . I hope with time and perhaps some of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, himself, he can find a more real place , a more human face , a more caring heart for his fellow Kiwis . Until then, I wish for a far more empathetic nightly host to take his place at 7 pm . I endorse this petition . Liz Gunn | {
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The first generation NSX was notable for being able to compete with European exotics of the time without the drawbacks. You could drive it every day without the worry of an engine-out service every few years. There hasn’t been another supercar like that since, and when the complex second-generation hybrid NSX was launched it looked like there might never be another serviceable supercar.
Those fears might have been for naught. The new NSX has shown itself to be capable of completing back-to-back track events without much of a fuss and comfortable enough to travel in for thousands of miles. The one question that remains is how reliable and serviceable it will be in the long-term? Luckily, we got our hands on a new NSX technical service bulletin and the related procedures which give some insight on how it compares to the old car.
Sam Smith wrote about the first-generation NSX just as the new one was set to be released. He called himself a luddite knuckle-dragger because he realized that the simplicity and reliability that made the original so good could disappear in the complex new model. Smith went on to describe the original as being “like a Civic that behaves like a period Ferrari, dresses like a runway model, and offers the ownership headache of a pair of blue jeans.”
Testing of the new NSX has already proven that at least part of his fears were unfounded. Early issues have been minimal and a recently released technical service bulletin for a thermostat issue shows us that the new NSX might not stray too far from its more pedestrians siblings when it comes to maintenance.
The TSB recognizes that some thermostats might have shipped with a faulty seal and describes the procedure and tools to replace it. The document allows for four hours to complete the replacement since it requires the removal of some of the rear bodywork to access the engine bay. This is about twice the time that is usually required for such a replacement on something like an Accord. But it's still hours less than what it would take to perform the same procedure on a front-engined luxury sedan like the Audi A8.
Acura
The actual thermostat replacement is fairly standard, but the process of accessing it is notable since it shows that Honda engineers put effort into making the service as easy as possible. The procedure starts off with draining the coolant, which is done through the two easily accessible drains under the car and are sealed by standard Honda washers that can be found on everything from the TRX250 to a CR-V.
Acura
Once the coolant has been drained, the next step is to start on the body work. The rear bumper cover, bumper beam, fender liners, and bumper side spacers must be removed because of the location of the engine. These steps are fairly simple as all of the rear body work can be removed in less than an hour.
Acura
The lower diffuser is held in by eight bolts. Once it's removed, all that's required to pull the bumper off is the removal of two bolts from inside the wheelwells on each side. The rest of the fasteners are snapped out by pulling on each corner. Once all of these pieces are removed, the entire trunk assembly can be removed with five more bolts, making the whole powertrain fully accessible.
Acura
With the trunk removed, the engine is fully in sight, but the fenders are no longer protected and could be easily broken if someone were to lean on them. Luckily, Honda sells a special platform tool that installs in place of the trunk in order to protect the rear fenders and the fully exposed powertrain as service is being completed. This tool is available to Honda dealers and even owners for about $552.
Once it's in place, replacing the thermostat is no different than replacing one on an Accord, and the NSX requires a coolant refill and bleed once complete. That specialty platform might seem a bit steep at first, but it is a multipurpose tool and a bargain, particular when compared to the single purpose specialty tools of its competitors.
I expect to see these cars with mileage exceeding 200,000, just like their first generation counterparts. Even though the car is exotic, there is nothing exotic about the maintenance or the parts involved. Time will tell if there are any common issues that pop up, but based on what I see today, second and third owners of the hybrid NSX should be able to maintain it at a minimal cost. Honda will even give access to the full service manual and its i-HDS diagnostic and programming software through its TechInfo portal for just $20 per day.
Most of all, it's just good to see that the NSX continues Honda's simple supercar maintenance tradition.
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JINDO, South Korea — No. 150, a boy, had a snaggletooth. No. 111, a girl, was wearing pink slippers, and an elastic hairband on her right wrist. No. 87 had on pajama pants with teddy bears.
No. 93 was clutching a Roman Catholic rosary in her left hand.
The descriptions, some rendered in forensic detail, are the only proof that many parents of the teenagers who died on South Korea’s doomed ferry have of their children’s fate. As bodies are recovered from the sunken ship, they are carried to shore and the process of identifying them begins — starting with the descriptions written on whiteboards in a tent set up for the grieving relatives of the students and other victims.
Eom Ji-young was one of the many mothers waiting for word of their children.
Several times an hour, she has risen from the mattress in the tent city where she has kept vigil since the ferry sank last week. Her head bowed, her shoulders slumped, Ms. Eom, 37, has walked down the road and entered the tent with the five whiteboards, searching for evidence of her 16-year-old daughter, Park Yae-ji.
New descriptions were added less often than Ms. Eom checked, but she went anyway, just to be sure.
“I can’t sleep,” she said after one visit, a school photo of Yae-ji hanging from a lanyard around her neck. “What if she comes in? What if she’s waiting for me? She’s been waiting for me all this time inside the sea, and I don’t sleep.”
As Ms. Eom has moved back and forth between the two points that have delineated the geography of her life here, her mind was on a third place, in mist-shrouded waters off the south coast of Jindo. Eleven miles offshore, teams of divers working round the clock are urgently searching the ship, which rests upside down on the seabed in dark waters at a depth of more than 100 feet.
It is slow, hard, dangerous work, yet the dive teams have been moving as quickly as possible to find and recover the bodies — to help provide relatives with closure but also to outpace decomposition, which has already begun to make identification difficult.
A vast anchorage of rescue boats and support vessels — military and civilian, barges and warships, powerboats and fishing trawlers — have convened at the site of the sinking. At the center of this constellation are two buoys marking the site of the wreck and a nucleus of rigid-hulled inflatable boats carrying divers, dozens of whom plunge into the Yellow Sea each day.
They have descended in pairs, and in shifts often lasting about 30 minutes, progressively making their way through the waters that have filled the ship’s corridors and cabins. | {
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The first gunshot didn’t faze Lenny Helbig too much. He was setting up an aerial photograph of his friend’s under-construction house, and he knew a nearby quarry was favored by local plinkers. It was the next three shots that got his attention. “I looked to my left and this woman is out on the balcony—she’s yelling ‘What the fuck are you doing, you pervert?’ I’m like: ‘Oh my god! You just fucking shot at my drone!’ ”
It was September 2014, and Lenny Helbig had become likely the first American to have his drone shot out of the air. It was brought down with a 12-gauge shotgun by Russell Percenti, who was Helbig’s friend’s next-door neighbor and the son of the woman who was shouting at him. Helbig says the drone never even flew over Percenti’s property.
The New Jersey incident would make national news, but it was only the first. Since then, drones have been very publicly shot out of the sky in Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, and most recently in a (perhaps embellished) case in Virginia. These stories are often framed as tales of normal people getting revenge on snooping tech bros—an understandable and fundamentally American reaction to a creeping surveillance society. Some who might otherwise disapprove of solving problems with firearms cheer on drone shootings, as if the shooters are brave vanguards of an anti-surveillance revolution at best, or slightly naughty at worst. Ammo companies advertise shotgun shells designed to shoot down quadcopters, a slick “Johnny Dronehunter” ad pushes shotgun silencers, and a Colorado town has attempted to offer drone hunting licenses. The Kentucky drone shooter has even inspired T-shirts and a nickname—the Droneslayer.
As a law-abiding civilian drone pilot, I don’t find these stories innocuous or amusing. Instead, like many drone pilots I know, I’m increasingly terrified that I’ll be shot at—maybe hurt or even killed—while I’m engaging in a perfectly legal activity. I’m afraid that if someone shoots my drone, I won’t be able to control it, putting other people on the ground at risk of injury, and even potentially causing a battery fire. And I’m afraid that laughing at or cheering on drone shooters normalizes a potentially deadly overreaction to scenarios that can be sorted out peacefully.
Most stories about why shooting down a drone is a bad idea focus on the legal side of things, perhaps operating under the assumption that the danger is obvious. They reiterate that the Federal Aviation Administration considers shooting at all aircraft, including drones, a hazardous action and a federal crime, and note that the owner of the drone may be able to sue for damages. The legal arguments are important. But since it seems that the public hasn’t quite grasped the danger element, I want to talk about the risk to human life that shooting at a drone presents.
The main reason that shooting at a drone is dangerous is, well, gravity. A projectile that’s fired into the air has to come down at some point, and a drone that can be shot at must by default be flying at a relatively high altitude. That’s why discharging a firearm is illegal in heavily populated areas in many cities and towns in the United States. But that doesn’t mean that shooting at a drone in a rural or suburban area is safe. People are regularly hurt and killed by falling ammunition that is shot into the sky or misses its mark. This is why hikers are advised to take extra safety precautions during hunting season. While falling ammunition has a lower velocity than that of a just-fired bullet, it’s still quite capable of killing someone, especially if it’s fired at a shallow angle—which would describe any shot someone might take at a drone.
A 1994 study from Los Angeles of 118 victims of falling ammunition found that 77 percent were hit in the head, and 32 percent of victims died. Furthermore, a 2012 nationwide study from the University of California–Davis found 252 injuries and an additional 65 deaths attributed to stray bullets between March 2008 and 2009. Unintentional deaths and injuries from falling ammunition are both global and common: A March 2016 BBC story described a series of deaths and injuries from celebratory gunfire at weddings in India while a 2015 Newsweek article described the Los Angeles’ police department’s annual struggle to keep people from shooting guns into the air for fun. (No studies currently look at the specific danger to drone pilots and bystanders from gun fire, but it would be great if a researcher took that on.)
A drone-shooting advocate or apologist might argue, “But the pilot must be far away, so this isn’t very dangerous.” Wrong. First: Distance doesn’t mean much when it comes to stray ammunition. Depending on the angle and weather conditions, a rifle can potentially send a bullet six miles away from its origin point while bullets fired from a handgun can potentially travel as much as a mile and a half. An Amish girl died in 2011 after being struck in the head by a bullet accidentally fired from a rifle 1.5 miles away.
Secondly, I suspect people assume it’s OK to shoot at a drone because they think the pilot isn’t close. Maybe they believe small drones are similar to the long-range unmanned aerial vehicles used by the military, which can be remotely piloted over Iraq or Afghanistan by pilots stationed in Nevada. The small drones I’m talking about have much shorter operating ranges: a maximum of 3.1 miles for the popular Phantom 4, dipping to less than 2 miles for these other popular models.
Furthermore, the FAA doesn’t permit drones to be flown beyond the visual line of sight. That means most drone pilots are much, much closer to their drone than 2 miles. That’s almost always the case when I fly my drone, and it was also the case with Lenny Helbig, who told me that he was only about 70 feet away from the drone when Percenti fired his last shot.
Making matters worse, drone pilots are very unlikely to be alone, as most bring along someone else to act as a spotter, to carry gear, or simply to watch. Drones also have great appeal to kids, and many children from across the age spectrum fly them, build them, or are simply fascinated by them. “I used to take my 6-year-old daughter to fly with me all the time,” Helbig told me. “She could have been shot, she could have been traumatized.” Luckily, she wasn’t there at the time of the shooting—and he now is reluctant to bring her along on his flying trips.
To recap: When someone impulsively shoots at a drone, he is shooting at a hard-to-hit flying object that is legally required to be very close to a human being, probably multiple human beings, quite possibly including children, whom the shooter cannot see clearly or even see at all.
The drone itself presents another hazard when it is shot. A falling plastic-and-metal drone can hurt someone more than a falling duck or a pheasant, and it’s very hard to control where a damaged drone will land. What’s more, most small drones use powerful lithium polymer batteries. When handled with care, these batteries are safe—but they can potentially explode and start fires if they are unexpectedly slammed to the ground. And it’s a lot easier for a drone pilot to deal with a fire if she’s not running from someone with a gun.
“Well, people shouldn’t fly over private property if they don’t want to get shot at!” a drone-shooting advocate might reply. It’s not that simple.
For starters, it can be very hard to tell whether a small flying object actually is over your property by looking at it, due to the natural depth perception limitations of the human eye. I know this because I spend a lot of time worrying about this when I’m flying my drone, as I try to avoid flying over private property or distressing anybody. Property owners face similar challenges in eyeballing where an aerial object is in relation to the ground, and unlike drone pilots, they probably aren’t looking at a screen that shows the exact location of my GPS receiver–carrying drone on the map.
This means that even though I take great pains to avoid flying over private property without explicit consent, I’m still absolutely worried about getting shot at—and I’d like to think most Americans would agree that people engaging in law-abiding, peaceful activity shouldn’t have to legitimately worry about evading hostile gunfire.
But what if you’re absolutely sure the drone is over your property? Putting aside the fact that legally speaking, it remains unclear how the “reasonable use” of airspace above one’s property applies to drones. Even in this case, most people would agree that shooting at someone you think is trespassing on your property is not an acceptable first resort—the risk of harming or killing the trespasser is too high. And most landowners should be aware that while it depends on state law, it’s usually not legal to shoot at trespassers unless you fear great bodily harm or death. Recreational drones may certainly be a nuisance or a privacy risk, but they simply don’t represent an immediate risk to bodily harm or death.
If most would agree a drone isn’t an immediate deadly threat, why do they elicit such an aggressive reaction? A lot of aspirant drone shooters seem to predicate their aggressive reaction on two things: the assumption that the absolute worst case scenario is that a plastic toy is destroyed—which I think we’ve already established isn’t the case—and that a drone pilot they perceive as close to their property must have malicious intentions. Yet, most people aren’t concerned by manned aircraft over their property, even though they contain actual people and are capable of carrying heavy telephoto lenses, unlike my drone camera, which can’t zoom.
The vast majority of hobby and professional drone pilots aren’t criminals casing homes or creeps seeking naked photos. Instead, they’re ordinary people like me, focused on innocent pursuits like taking a pretty picture of a sunset, mapping a property for real estate purposes, experimenting with camera settings, or shooting a video of a buddy doing a sick bike trick.
While it is certainly possible that someone flying a drone in the vicinity of your property is trying to do you harm, it is by far the most unlikely scenario. A drone over your property is much more likely to be piloted by some dork who wasn’t able to eyeball property limits in advance or just made a dumb mistake. A person who makes a dumb mistake or misreads property lines may very well deserve to be yelled at, or even questioned by police, but I submit he doesn’t deserve to have multiple rifle rounds shot in his direction without so much as a warning—putting him at risk of serious injury or even death. (It’s also the case that most laws treat trespassers who enter private property unknowingly quite differently from those who enter private property intentionally.)
If someone does use drone imagery or photos to invade your privacy or to otherwise harm you, there are legal means of fighting back. While each state has slightly different regulations, existing Peeping Tom and privacy laws can be applied to unwanted drone photos and videos. Privacy laws specifically pertaining to drones will doubtless be developed and refined as the technology becomes more common.
Many people are uncomfortable with drones and the privacy and surveillance issues that their use brings up—and I’m committed to finding compromises, keeping the lines of communication open, and taking public concerns seriously. But in return, I’d like drone-skeptics to understand that shooting at my drone does absolutely nothing to resolve this ongoing cultural debate. All it does is put people like me and the many law-abiding drone pilots I know at serious risk.
This article is part of Future Tense, a collaboration among Arizona State University, New America, and Slate. Future Tense explores the ways emerging technologies affect society, policy, and culture. To read more, follow us on Twitter and sign up for our weekly newsletter. | {
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The number of investigations into foreign investors allegedly illegally purchasing Australian homes has more than doubled since June, Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey says.
Mr Hockey said there were now 462 cases under investigation.
He has also confirmed six homes were now for sale because of the Government's crackdown.
"The purchase price of the properties range in value from $152,000 to $1.86 million," he said.
"Some of the five investors have purchased property with Foreign Investment Review Board approval but their circumstances have changed and they have failed to comply with the divestment requirements.
"Some have simply broken the rules."
In June the Federal Government said investigations were underway into 195 cases where foreign investment rules on residential real estate may have been breached.
The probe came a month after the Government announced plans to crackdown on rogue foreign investors amid concerns it was helping fuel property bubbles in Sydney and Melbourne.
While foreign investment laws prohibit foreign investors from purchasing existing residential real estate, they are encouraged to boost the housing supply by investing in new housing developments.
In June the Federal Government announced a grace period until November 30, in which foreign investors who had unlawfully bought established residential property would not be referred for criminal prosecution if they come forward voluntarily.
From December 1, foreign residents who unlawfully bought established property face toughed penalties of up to $127,500 or three years in prison for individuals and up to $637,500 for companies. | {
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On a freezing night in February 1967, connoisseurs of advanced music thronged to a small concert hall beneath the Wurlitzer Building in New York to hear – also, assuredly, to get an eyeful of – the cellist Charlotte Moorman. Among them were half-a-dozen conspicuous squares whom everybody pegged immediately as plainclothes policemen. The audience, and the cops, probably knew what to expect from Moorman’s rendition of Opera Sextronique: a new composition by her frequent collaborator, Korean artist Nam June Paik. Moorman took the stage wearing an electrified, flashing bikini. She played her cello with a violin in place of a bow, and then a bunch of flowers. The bikini came off and Paik affixed a pair of twirling toy propellers to the cellist’s nipples. It was only when she neared the third aria – to be executed in football helmet and jersey, but nothing below – that the police rushed the stage and bundled Moorman through the snow to a night in the cells and a charge of indecent exposure.
Moorman had already performed topless or naked in Europe, to little fuss. Photographs from Germany and Scandinavia show audiences of bourgeois concertgoers and adepts of the New Music: all relaxed, nobody agog let alone enraged, while she played works by Satie or Paik’s more antic inventions. By the mid-1960s she was well established in New York as an interpreter of John Cage, and as the energetic if unreliable organiser of a festival of experimental art and music. She’d performed her friend Yoko Ono’s famous Cut Piece, in which the audience was invited to scissor off her clothing, or as much as they dared. But with her arrest Moorman broached the mainstream. The case made her name, but arguably unmade her in the eyes of the avant-garde. She became a chat-show staple, a novelty act. Her brief, dazzling fame, her extravagance, temerity and wit – these, absurdly, are the main reasons you may not have heard of Charlotte Moorman.
By most accounts in Joan Ruthfuss’s engaging and detailed biography, Moorman was quite the charmer – maddeningly so. At home in Little Rock, Arkansas, she escaped a miserable family – dead father, drunk mother – to become a local beauty queen, but that was never going to be enough. From a snapshot of Miss City Beautiful 1952, you can guess she already viewed her lavish beauty with casual, amused detachment. Contemporaries with whom she studied music recall her as gorgeous and chaotic, given to noisy trysts in the room above the principal’s office. Or else as a garrulous nerd, “a bit of a grind”, too ardent and intense for the state-symphony circuit, not quite skilled enough at her instrument for a classical career. Ruthfuss argues persuasively that Moorman often didn’t know what to do with her energy; she was “helpless before her own irrepressible on-stage self”.
An ‘improbable life’ … Charlotte Moorman playing an ice cello in 1976. Photograph: Kaldor Public Art Project
All of these urges and accomplishments meant she badly needed New York in the 1960s. After failing to establish herself as a soloist, and earning a reputation for lateness that she could only partly counter with her Southern graces, Moorman fell in with the avant garde. The rigour and delight with which she embraced the work of composers such as Cage, Paik and La Monte Young was matched only by the awe and indulgence with which she was treated – for a time. Though Moorman was a tireless campaigner on behalf of the new music and musicians, the mostly male experimentalists quickly tired of what they viewed as indulgence, or outright narcissism, on stage. Yoko Ono aside, the Fluxus artists blanked her. Even Cage, who had been quite willing to fool about on game shows in the 1950s, balked at the extra-musical elements she smuggled into his already bustling composition 26’ 1.1499” for a String Player. She kept adding things: a foghorn, belching, a pistol shot and a second world war bomb for a cello. Jasper Johns rolled his eyes and wrote to Cage: “C. Moorman should be kept off the stage.”
Paik, however, stuck by her. Though they were probably never lovers, they developed an intellectual and onstage intimacy that looked forward to later performance art and anticipated all manner of countercultural happenings towards the end of the decade. Moorman’s body became a prop, or maybe a parallel medium, for Paik’s video art; she wore his TV Bra and played his TV Cello: cathode-ray sculptures that blurred the boundary between body and machine in the name of Paik’s fanciful but prescient notion of “tele-fucking”. In the 1970s their partnership waned, and Moorman performed increasingly stunt-like works by composer Jim McWilliams. They made cellos out of ice, which she played till they melted. Moorman and her instrument dangled from helium balloons outside the Sydney Opera House. Cellist and cello were strung aloft on trapezes at Shea Stadium, and as they swung towards each other she managed one resonant kick in its direction. By now her avant-garde festival was a regular fixture in New York, and Moorman was dodging unpaid bills and lawsuits, working her charm on mayors and funding bodies.
An “improbable” life is right, and Rothfuss recounts it well, relying on interviews and the vast archive Moorman left when she died in 1991. The other principals in her story – Cage, Paik and Moorman’s husband – are all dead, and at times Topless Cellist feels overweighted with archival detail, threatening to turn into an inventory of who performed what, when and where. But the truth is nobody else has done this scholarship, and so Ruthfuss’s is an essential volume: not just a record of a remarkable span and its rich artistic milieu, but testament also to the ways Moorman could be so easily written out of the history of the avant-garde. A few derivative sculptures and much film aside, she was mostly a conduit for the work of others – a glorious and heroically funny presence, especially, in Paik’s art. She did not connect her career to the feminist art of her era, so it is up to contemporaries such as Carolee Schneemann and Ono (who provides a foreword) to try to restate how much she inspired and infuriated.
Her final years were dismal and exemplary in equal measure. Diagnosed with breast cancer in 1979, she decreed that her illness was work, or rather a work – “a piece of sorts”. A year later, when the cancer had spread, she threw a rooftop party and performed Cut Piece for her friends. Ono and Paik, among many others, kept her afloat over the next decade, while the cancer got in her bones. Shortly before she died, she insisted on performing with Paik’s TV Cello at a gallery show devoted to her career. She plucked and sawed at her glowing instrument, told stories and joked while some friends left the room, unable to bear her decline or her daring. But Moorman simply wouldn’t give up what she called “the elegance, the drama, the seriousness of the whole thing”.
• Brian Dillon’s Objects in This Mirror: Essays is published by Sternberg Press. | {
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Japhet Amador followed up a three-homer game with his first walk-off blast in Japan to give the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles a come-from-behind 3-2 win against the Orix Buffaloes on Sunday.
The Eagles tied the game at two in the eighth thanks to Hiroaki Shimauchi’s two-run shot off Yuki Nishi (4-5), who had breezed through the first seven innings.
Amador, who went deep three times a day earlier, led off the ninth by homering on the fifth pitch he saw from Nishi for his 13th round-tripper of the season.
It was Pacific League-leading Rakuten’s third sayonara win of the season, which moved the Eagles 30 games above .500 for the first time in team history.
Rakuten has feasted on Orix this season, beating the Buffaloes for the 11th time in 13 meetings. Fourth-place Orix has lost five in a row.
Yuya Kubo (1-0) pitched a perfect ninth to record his first victory since September 2014. Eagles starter Yoshinao Kamata gave up one earned run on six hits and three walks in seven innings of work.
Nishi finished having allowed three earned runs on six hits, a walk and a hit batsman.
Marines 3, Hawks 1
At Fukuoka’s Yafuoku Dome, Chiba Lotte’s Ayumu Ishikawa (2-8) collected his first win since June 13 by holding SoftBank to one earned run on six hits in 6⅓ innings, as the Hawks’ winning streak ended at five.
Lions 9, Fighters 2
At Tokorozawa’s MetLife Dome, Seibu blew the game wide open with a pair of three-run homers by Shogo Akiyama and Takumi Kuriyama in the fifth inning against Hokkaido Nippon Ham, which lost its third straight.
CENTRAL LEAGUE
BayStars 8, Giants 6
At Yokohama Stadium, Yoshitomo Tsutsugo’s two-run jack in the ninth inning off Hayato Takagi (1-2) gave the BayStars a win over Yomiuri, which came up short despite tying the game at 6-6 with a four-run burst in the eighth.
Tigers 5, Swallows 0
At Jingu Stadium, Hanshin starter Randy Messenger (10-5) did it all against hapless Tokyo Yakult as he hit his first home run in Japan in the third inning, and struck out 12 over eight shutout frames to tie the CL lead for most wins.
Carp 12, Dragons 1
At Hiroshima’s Mazda Stadium, Akitake Okada (8-4) took a perfect game into the seventh inning against Chunichi, and the Hiroshima lineup backed him with an 18-hit barrage, moving the Carp a season-high 25 games over .500.
Before the game, Hiroshima deactivated lefty Kris Johnson, who suffered a left-hamstring injury in practice Saturday. The Sawamura Award winner will be sidelined for three weeks. | {
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