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Kan ikke klippe fire på en time
Udviklingen vækker også bekymring ude i salonerne.
Simone Krog Debel er uddannet frisør og arbejder i Salon Side Cut i Aabenraa, og hun synes, at det er en forkert udvikling, at der er blevet flere frisører, som ikke er uddannet.
- Vi bruger fire år på at tage en uddannelse. Kriterierne for at blive uddannet frisør i Danmark er rigtig høje. Så det, at man bare kan gå ind i en salon og begynde at klippe og tage penge for det, er rigtig skræmmende, siger hun.
Hos Salon Side Cut tager man 200 kroner for en herreklip.
- Jeg skal jo også have min løn. Vi skal betale strøm, vand og varme. Vi skal være medlem af en overenskomst. Jeg kan jo ikke stå og klippe til 100 kroner pr. herrekunde. Så kommer jeg til at slide mig selv ihjel, for så skal jeg klippe fire herrekunder på en time. Og en herreklip tager altså 30 minutter, siger hun.
De vælger bare en anden end mig
Frisørelev Anne Snerling mærker helt konkret udviklingen på egen krop.
- Jeg kan mærke, når jeg er på arbejde, at der er mange, som ikke vil klippes hos mig som elev, men som går over til de ufaglærte, siger Anne Snerling. | {
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La meilleure saga de l’été ne se déroule pas sur les écrans de TF1, mais dans les couloirs du Média. Proche de La France insoumise, la web-télé lancée au début de l’année, avec de grandes ambitions journalistiques, a profité des vacances pour se déchirer à la vue de tous, sur les réseaux sociaux et dans les journaux. Alors que la reprise de la diffusion est prévue le 17 septembre et que la rédaction a fait sa rentrée lundi dans ses locaux de Montreuil (Seine-Saint-Denis), la tension n’est pas retombée entre les trois cofondateurs : d’un côté, Sophia Chikirou, l’ex-directrice de la communication de Jean-Luc Mélenchon, qui a quitté la structure à grand fracas avec plusieurs proches ; de l’autre, le psychanalyste Gérard Miller (qui n’a pas souhaité répondre) et le producteur Henri Poulain, qui tentent tant bien que mal de sauver la baraque. La crise a atteint un point culminant depuis que ces deux derniers ont, selon nos informations, adressé le 14 août, au nom du Média, une «mise en demeure» à leur ancienne associée.
Déclaration de guerre et moyen de pression, le courrier exige que Sophia Chikirou rembourse un paiement effectué le 25 juillet par le Média, via la société de production qui lui est liée. D’un montant de 64 000 euros, il a bénéficié à Mediascop, la société personnelle de la communicante. La mise en demeure demande également que Chikirou renonce au règlement, non effectué, d’une autre facture, cette fois d’un montant de 67 000 euros, émise le 27 juillet. Surtout, la missive est assortie d’une menace qui révèle l’état de la relation entre les cofondateurs : si Chikirou, redevenue une dirigeante active de la France insoumise en vue des élections européennes de 2019, ne donne pas suite à ces requêtes d’ici le 31 août, Miller et Poulain envisagent de déposer une plainte contre elle pour «abus de biens sociaux».
Contactée par Libération, Sophia Chikirou parle de «manœuvre grossière». «Cette lettre consiste à nier l’intervention de Mediascop entre septembre 2017 et juillet 2018. Toutes les pièces prouvant la mauvaise foi et l’hypocrisie de Miller et Poulain sont entre les mains de mon avocat. Elles démontrent que, dès octobre 2017, un prévisionnel réalisé par Anaïs Feuillette [compagne de Miller, ndlr] prévoit une dette de 80 000 euros envers Mediascop.»
Guerre de com
Révélée par Mediapart, l’embrouille a éclaté fin juillet, après que Chikirou, alors toujours présidente de la société de production du Média, a validé les deux paiements en question, au profit de son entreprise personnelle. L’un des deux a été réglé par chèque ; l’autre, sous forme de virement, a été bloqué par la banque. Ils étaient censés rémunérer des prestations de production, de communication et de direction, dont certaines assurées par Chikirou elle-même. C’est peu dire que la nouvelle, dans un contexte de fragilité financière pour le jeune Média, est mal passée. Chikirou étant à l’émission et à la réception des factures, le conflit d’intérêts semble patent et motive le soupçon d’abus de bien social aux yeux de Miller et Poulain. Ces derniers s’interrogent sur la réalité de certains services facturés.
Ils reprochent à leur ancienne partenaire, qui clamait selon eux travailler bénévolement, d’avoir été mis devant le fait accompli. Faux, rétorque Chikirou : «Tout le monde au Média était informé de ces prestations». Et de faire valoir que la société de production personnelle d’Henri Poulain, StoryCircus, a elle-même bénéficié de contrats avec le Média pour plus de 140 000 euros. «C’est du délire complet», réagit auprès de Libération l’intéressé, qui explique avoir facturé pour 84 000 euros (un chiffre détaillé sur le site Arrêt sur images) et avoir fait valider le tout par Chikirou. «Poulain parle en hors taxe dès qu’il s’agit des factures de StoryCircus mais en TTC pour celles de Mediascop», réagit cette dernière. «Nous publierons dans quelques jours des copies des livres de comptes», réplique Poulain. Guerre de com…
Dans le camp Chikirou, on goûte peu que le travail fourni soit contesté : «Regardez ce qu’elle a fait en six mois, dit Alexis Poulin, chroniqueur au Média. Elle a levé plus de deux millions d’euros, recruté 19 000 socios, diffusé un journal télévisé quotidien, lancé un magazine papier… Elle a fait un super boulot de chef d’entreprise.» Et le contributeur occasionnel d’ajouter, façon kamikaze : «On est en train de se faire avoir par une équipe de branques, qui n’a aucune stratégie, aucun plan. Leur seul discours, c’est : Sophia a fait de la merde, à nous de faire désormais.» Dans le viseur, la journaliste Aude Lancelin, qui a pris la tête de la rédaction, soutenue par Miller et Poulain. «Elle a fédéré une partie de la rédaction avec une partie des cofondateurs, qui se sont sentis dépossédés de leur influence sur le Média, contre Sophia, peste un journaliste proche de Chikirou, sous couvert d’anonymat. Aude Lancelin est un monument de suffisance, qui a toujours pensé être au-dessus de nous tous.» Des accusations balayées par l’intéressée, qui assure n’avoir jamais voulu une fonction dirigeante avant la crise. Si l’ambiance est aussi pourrie, c’est parce que le conflit n’est pas seulement d’argent, mais aussi d’ego, d’idées, d’ambitions. D’un camp à l’autre, les invectives fusent comme rarement.
Temps court
Chez les anti-Chikirou, on ne cesse de renvoyer au management de la communicante, qui s’est retirée après avoir été violemment critiquée par une partie de l’équipe lors d’un séminaire brûlant début juillet. «C’est la solitude de Sophia qui nous a séparés, balance Henri Poulain. Elle ne sait pas partager le pouvoir. Elle a une manière d’être au quotidien presque néolibérale, presque macroniste. Elle ne comprend pas qu’un journaliste puisse avoir besoin de trois jours pour écrire un article, elle a un goût démesuré pour le temps court et elle part du postulat qu’elle aurait fait mieux. Elle est capable de sacrifier les gens et le réel pour sa cause. Et sa seule cause, c’est Sophia Chikirou.» Aude Lancelin abonde : «Au fil du temps, il y a eu des cris, des pleurs, des portes qui claquent. Sophia est impulsive et vient du monde du militantisme, où compte l’allégeance. Avec les journalistes ça passait mal.»
«A la fin, c’était vraiment horrible, embraye la reporter Virginie Cresci. Elle nous hurlait dessus, nous montait les uns contre les autres. Cela fonctionnait comme dans un parti politique… Et on faisait un journal télévisé sans moyens, médiocre. On le savait tous, personne n’était content.» Long format imposé par l’ex-patronne du Média, le «JT» quotidien, qui s’apparentait plus à de la radio filmée et consumait les énergies, a rapidement montré ses limites, faute de temps pour réaliser les sujets le remplissant. Il a vite été décrédibilisé par l’énonciation en avril d’une fausse nouvelle concernant un blessé grave à Tolbiac. Même les partisans de Chikirou en conviennent, à l’image d’Alexis Poulin : «Il faut revoir le format.» Mais c’est une erreur pour eux de le supprimer, comme Aude Lancelin l’a rapidement décidé. «Le JT est notre promesse éditoriale de base aux socios : une autre hiérarchie de l’information tous les soirs», s’inquiète un journaliste proche de Chikirou. Pour lui, l’arrivée de Lancelin aux commandes signe la prise de pouvoir «des ultragauchistes tendance Julien Coupat, attirés par le communautarisme». Sophia Chikirou déplore que certains membres de la rédaction émettent des revendications identitaires : «Lors du séminaire, certains "racisés", comme ils se définissent eux-mêmes, ont porté des accusations de racisme contre les républicains, dont je suis.» Pour avoir tenu un discours semblable dans la presse, le journaliste Serge Faubert a écopé d’un avertissement disciplinaire lundi. «Tout cela est un rideau de fumée, s’agace Henri Poulain. Sophia dresse un storytelling pour faire croire que la crise est politique.» Sur ce sujet, pas facile d’y voir clair…
Il est cependant une certitude : quelques mois après un lancement non dénué d’arrogance, l’effet d’image pour le Média est terrible. La nouvelle direction croit néanmoins à des lendemains qui chantent. Aude Lancelin promet pour le 17 septembre de l’actualité quotidienne, mais aussi de l’investigation, de la critique des médias, de nouvelles émissions, avec des titularisations et «trois ou quatre recrutements» dans la rédaction. «Cette crise est l’occasion de repartir sur des bases saines», dit-elle, donnant rendez-vous dans six mois : «S’il n’y a pas d’amélioration, je remettrai mon mandat en jeu.» Quant à Henri Poulain, il estime que «le Média va bénéficier du départ de Sophia Chikirou. Un bouchon de suspicion disparaît». Comprendre que l’ombre de La France insoumise s’éloigne avec elle, redonnant à la web-télé des gages de crédibilité journalistique. Il n’y a plus qu’à espérer, pour l’avenir économique du Média et ses salariés, que la communicante n’emmène pas trop de socios dans son sillage…
A lire aussi : Crise au Média : mise au point de Gérard Miller et Henri Poulain | {
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Check out BBC Nature's Wildlife Photoographers of the Year winners, their pictures are goddamned awe-inspiring.
Sumantran Tiger, I want to hug you so badly, even if it also causes me to crap myself with fear and for you to eat me like the tasty little snack that I am. You are so fresh, you amazing Island subspecies! Since there are fewer than 600 of these wonderful beasts left in the world, it is our duty to try and hug as many as possible before they're gone. Single tear. The other animal I'd really like to hug but know I'll never be able to is the mighty snow leopard. That is a CAT who lives in the SNOW. Those fuckers are magical — all hiding in caves on white-capped mountains, huddled together for warmth, being all, "CAN A BROTHER GET A COLUMBIA SPORTSWEAR JACKET UP HERE?" Also, possibly playing poker with some dogs. Hey, anything is possible, we know so little about them.
Wildlife Photos of the Year winners [BBC Nature] | {
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Dès qu’il est question de discrimination, notre société perd la tête. Elle veut voir du racisme ou du sexisme partout et ne cesse de s’imaginer qu’elle persécute les minorités.
On l’a encore vu la semaine passée quand on a appris que le très militant Tribunal des droits de la personne avait condamné l’entreprise la Vie en Rose à verser 5000 $ à Salim Kerdougli, un homme d’origine algérienne, parce qu’au moment d’un entretien d’embauche, un des recruteurs lui a demandé d’où provenait son nom de famille.
Politesse
Comme le rapportait La Presse Canadienne, l’homme s’est senti « ébranlé et déstabilisé par la question ». Il s’est senti « insulté et atteint dans sa dignité par la question ».
Houlala ! Une simple marque de courtoisie l’effraie ? Les codes les plus élémentaires de la civilité l’agressent ? Peut-être croit-il lui aussi au mythe du racisme québécois.
Rien n’est plus aimable, pourtant, que de s’intéresser au parcours d’un individu, surtout s’il vient d’ailleurs. On lui demande d’où il vient et on fait ainsi preuve d’intérêt pour son histoire. C’est ainsi depuis l’origine du monde.
Mais c’est désormais interdit.
Au nom de l’antiracisme, on s’interdira l’amabilité, tout comme au nom du féminisme radical, aujourd’hui, on ne prend plus le risque de complimenter une femme. C’est ainsi qu’on fabrique une société aseptisée, où tout le monde est invité à se taire ou à parler comme un formulaire gouvernemental standardisé, parce que tout ce qu’on dit peut être retenu contre soi.
Je l’ai dit, notre société veut voir partout des discriminations à l’endroit des minorités. À tout le moins, on veut l’en convaincre. Elle subit une propagande constante. Sans cesse, on l’accuse de racisme systémique ou de sexisme systémique.
Ce qui est particulier, ici, c’est que le délire de persécution est légitimé par les tribunaux, comme si le droit, aujourd’hui, reposait sur la sociologie victimaire pseudo-scientifique à la mode dans la gauche radicale universitaire.
On ne sous-estimera pas la portée d’un tel jugement. On ne saurait, aujourd’hui, avoir une confiance aveugle dans le système de justice. On justifie aujourd’hui un nombre incalculable de niaiseries au nom des « droits de la personne » mal compris.
Si le droit interdit aujourd’hui la courtoisie, ce n’est pas cette dernière qu’il faut abolir, mais le droit, qu’il faut changer.
De même, il faut apprendre à se méfier de ceux qui prétendent lutter contre le racisme et le sexisme en décryptant l’idéologie qui se cache derrière leurs belles paroles.
Résister
Cela dit, on l’a vu sur les réseaux sociaux, le commun des mortels s’est étouffé d’indignation en apprenant que le tribunal avait donné raison au plaignant. C’est que l’homme ordinaire a compris aujourd’hui qu’il y a un business victimaire et que les médias comme les tribunaux ont un préjugé favorable envers ceux qui se disent opprimés par la majorité.
On est même en droit de penser que l’homme ordinaire en a marre, qu’il se sent extorqué, et qu’il rêve du jour où on mettra fin au règne de la pleurniche. Mais quel politicien l’entendra ? | {
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Washington (CNN) Bernie Sanders isn't running to push Hillary Clinton to the left, the senator said on Thursday, rejecting the idea that his long shot candidacy is aimed at issues, not winning.
"This is not an education campaign. This is not a protest campaign," an animated Sanders said at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington. "This is a campaign to win."
Since announcing his campaign for president in late April, Sanders has been greeted by sizable crowds in early voting states like Iowa and New Hampshire. Though he finds himself polling far behind Clinton, Sanders has been her most potent progressive challenger so far.
But political watchers and pundits have suggested that Sanders's primary effect on the race will be to push the former secretary of state to the left on issues, not mount a credible challenge to her for the Democratic nomination. | {
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Quote Hey goats! The long awaited Mac and Linux ports are now finally availalble for everyone to enjoy. We've been working long and hard to make them happen, but now they're finally here.
The ports might still have a few issues but we will work hard to fix them asap. Please file any issues on the Steam forum or directly to our porter Ryan Gordon (@icculus) at his bugzilla.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
One of the funniest games around is now fully available and out of beta for Linux. Goat Simulator is pretty popular and for good reason, as it's just insanely stupid.Ported to Linux (& Mac) by none other than Ryan "Icculus" Gordon it promises plenty of fun. There may be a few issues here and there, but they will get fixed up.The game itself is a parody of all the "x simulator" games to come out recently and has been a bit of a runaway success itself sitting near the top of Steam's top sellers list when it came out.Check it out on Steam if you haven't already.Gameplay-wise, Goat Simulator is all about causing as much destruction as you possibly can as a goat. It has been compared to an old-school skating game, except instead of being a skater, you're a goat, and instead of doing tricks, you wreck stuff. Destroy things with style, such as doing a backflip while headbutting a bucket through a window, and you'll earn even more points! Or you could just give Steam Workshop a spin and create your own goats, levels, missions, and more! When it comes to goats, not even the sky is the limit, as you can probably just bug through it and crash the game.I saw my ex-partner play it and it actually looked quite fun to play, and I can imagine after a few drinks with friends it would get even funnier.If you have played it let us know what you think. | {
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New motor neurone brace makes 'substantial difference' Published duration 29 May 2018
media caption Philip Brindle says his quality of life has improved
A new neck brace for people with motor neurone disease (MND) makes a "substantial difference" to their quality of life, a patient has said.
The disease causes muscle wasting, eventually leaving people with the condition unable to support their head.
MND patient Philip Brindle said the collar, designed in Sheffield, "opened up opportunities that I do not think I would have had otherwise".
The device is now being used by 25 NHS Trusts, according to its designers.
MND is a progressive and terminal disease that damages the function of nerves and leads to muscle wasting and mobility problems, among other symptoms.
It affects up to 5,000 adults in the UK, according to charity the MND Association.
Dr Brian Dickie, director of research development at the association, said the collar has been "preferred by the majority of people who tried it".
image caption Mr Brindle's MND has left him unable to hold his head up independently
Mr Brindle, 72, from Chesterfield, said since he was diagnosed with MND in 2015 his head had begun to drop and he did not want to be seen in public.
"I just do not have the strength to hold [my head] up anymore and that makes life extremely unpleasant," he said.
"You can't read, you can't watch TV, you can't have a conversation with anyone and you can't eat or drink with your head in that position."
image caption The Head Up collar is made from the same material used in space suits
The new collar was designed by researchers at the University of Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam University, together with patients and clinicians at Sheffield Teaching Hospital.
It has a soft fabric base, made from a material used by NASA to make space suits, on to which a series of shaped supports can be added to provide additional stability.
Chris McDermott, professor of Translational Neurology at the University of Sheffield, said patients would previously have been given soft foam collars designed to treat sprained necks or rigid, plastic braces used for trauma victims, but would rarely wear them.
He said: "MND is an awful disease and what we need is a cure for it, but while we're waiting for a cure we have to do our best to improve the quality of the lives of people living with this condition, and this is a small part of doing that."
image caption The collar has been designed provide patients with a combination of movement and support and to replace existing models
Mr Brindle said the new collar had "freed me up to have a much more normal life". | {
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Publicités
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A cougar has been killed after it was spotted in New Westminster's Glenbrook neighbourhood on Saturday night.
The New Westminster Police Department wouldn't confirm reports that the big cat was shot by its officers, but the department posted to social media that the animal was dead.
The decision to kill the animal caused both outrage and relief from different people in the neighbourhood after the initial call came in that the animal was prowling during peak trick-or-treating hours.
Several mothers lauded the officers for making a "tough choice," to move in fast and remove the potential threat, while others decried the killing as "sad" and disrespectful to wildlife.
We were able to locate the cougar blocks from where it was first spotted. Unfortunately due to public risk it had to be destroyed. —@NewWestPD
Police confirmed the cougar was killed in the 300-block of Alberta Street just after 10 p.m. Saturday.
New Westminster police confirm the cat was killed on Alberta Street at about 10 p.m. PT Saturday night, after most trick-or-treaters had gone home. (W Kinna)
News of the animal's death drew a quick response on social media.
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/nobrains?src=hash">#nobrains</a> disguised in uniform showing <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/arrogance?src=hash">#arrogance</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/norespect?src=hash">#norespect</a> to an animal we displaced. <a href="https://t.co/yai6nQ2WJr">https://t.co/yai6nQ2WJr</a> —@Carolyn45651758
<a href="https://twitter.com/NewWestPD">@NewWestPD</a> Thanks for the fast professional response from your Members tonight They made a tough choice but the right one to protect Newwest —@eastvancity
Also, thanks to the <a href="https://twitter.com/NewWestPD">@NewWestPD</a> officer who stopped our boys to wish them happy Halloween and gave them a treat. Thanks, it means a lot. —@jenarbo | {
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I received the kindest and most touching exchange this time! My Santa sent definitely went above and beyond with my gift!!!!
Not only did I receieve floss and aida cloth but my Santa also MADE me a pattern of Granny Weatherwax from the Discworld universe!!! She is one of my top fictional idols and she's going to look AMAZING on my wall when I've finished stitching her. :)
To top it all off, my Santa also sent several delicious candy bars and folded dozens of tinee, tiny, paper origami cranes. This must have taken hours to do.
I am beyond blessed and immensely grateful for these wonderful and thoughtful gifts!!
Y'all can't even compare with my Santa! | {
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Secretary-general calls on government and voters to show restraint ahead of Monday’s poll, a day after deadly clashes.
Ban Ki-moon, the UN chief, has appealed for calm ahead of Monday’s presidential election in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), following deadly clashes in the capital, Kinshasa.
Ban warned the government on Sunday that it has “primary responsibility” for maintaining peace in the giant minerals-producing nation.
“I call on all political leaders and the people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to exercise restraint throughout the process to ensure that the elections are held in a peaceful and secure environment,” Ban said in a statement.
Three people were killed in campaign-linked violence on Saturday.
The government cancelled final rallies by opposition candidate Etienne Tshisekedi and incumbent President Joseph Kabila, citing fears of violence.
Police had stopped opposition leader Tshisekedi and his entourage from leaving Kinshasa’s N’djili airport on Saturday after his party said it would defy the ban on political rallies imposed earlier in the day.
Meanwhile, Tshisekedi called for Ban to remove the head of the UN’s 20,000-strong peacekeeping mission and replace American Roger Meece with someone “more impartial and competent”.
Tshisekedi defiant
In a second attempt to ignore the political ban, Tshisekedi called on supporters to attend a rally in Kinshasa on Sunday.
“He wants to hold a rally at the Stade des Martyrs [the city’s largest stadium] to make up for lost time,” Serge Mayamba, national secretary of Tshisekedi’s Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), told the AFP news agency.
Mayamba said the rally had been called for 3:00pm (14:00 GMT) on Sunday.
A day earlier, violence broke out when security forces used tear gas and live fire to disperse crowds. Rival factions hurled rocks at each other and gunfire was heard across town.
The run-up to DR Congo’s second election since the 1998-2003 war has been marred by opposition allegations of irregularities and concerns about inadequate preparations.
The UN secretary-general appealed to all sides to stick to the constitution and election laws.
Ban called on the rival parties to “promote democratic debate; to respect the results of the ballots; and to address any disputes that may arise, through the established mediation and legal channels”.
Under constitutional amendments signed off by Kabila this year, the presidential vote will be decided in a single round, meaning the winner can claim victory with a simple majority.
Analysts say that favours Kabila against the split opposition.
Despite a logistics operation supported by helicopters from South Africa and Angola, some observers doubt whether all ballot slips will reach the 60,000 voting stations by Monday, in a country two-thirds the size of the European Union.
Al Jazeera’s Yvonne Ndege, reporting from the capital, said, “We’ve heard complaints that many election materials have not been delivered to key areas and discovered that some polling stations still haven’t received [ballots]”.
“We would like to assure you 99 per cent of things are working perfectly, that’s our commitment to you,” Daniel Ngoy Mulunda, electoral commission chief, said on Sunday.
Kabila’s rivals say fake polling stations have been set up to allow vote-rigging, an allegation denied by the authorities.
“The opposition is diverse, to say the least, with eleven candidates from various parts of the country,” our correspondent said. “That will play into Kabila’s hand, since this is only the second democratic poll to take place is 51 years.”
“People say there’s only a certain amount of expectation you can have, with more than 31 million people taking part.” | {
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The 46th Annual PDK/Gallup Poll of the Public’s Attitudes Toward the Public Schools came out in late August, illustrating public opinions about a variety of education issues. Two of the issues the Poll addressed are the public’s lack of support for private school vouchers and its misunderstanding about the fact that charter schools cannot teach religion.
AU opposes private school vouchers for many reasons, including their failure to provide better education opportunities for students, their lack of accountability, and their ability to use taxpayer funds to teach religion, violating the principle of the separation of church and state.
According to the poll, a majority of Americans agree with AU and oppose vouchers as well. This year, 63 percent of participants opposed school vouchers, not far off from last year’s even more extreme response of 70 percent in opposition. The fact that a majority of the public do not support vouchers points out how misguided state and federal legislators really are when they push these programs.
School vouchers continue to be struck down in the courts as well: a North Carolina Superior Court recently ruled that private school vouchers violate the state constitution based on the voucher schools’ ability to discriminate based on religion while using public funds, among other reasons.
This year, the Poll asked some new questions about charter schools. It brought to light a common misconception many have about charter schools: nearly half of Americans (48 percent) believe charter schools can legally teach religion. In reality, charter schools are publicly funded and, like traditional public schools, may not teach religious doctrine and must honor the separation of church and state.
AU, therefore, takes no position on charter schools unless they improperly try to incorporate religion into the school. In fact, AU’s legal team recently called for an Arizona charter school remove religious books from its curriculum, and asked an Ohio charter school not to hold its graduation in a church.
AU will be watching this fall for any legislation that would promote religious doctrine in our public school system, whether that is allowing creationism in the classroom, encouraging school teachers and administrators to engage in prayer on public school campuses, or creating private school voucher programs.
To stay informed about potential voucher legislation in your state, sign up for AU action alerts here, and check out the State Action Center. | {
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Awesome work, but Wonder Woman is an amazon. It looks like you drew her as an average-sized female in this, but she should be as tall as Superman, or at least as tall as Batman. | {
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A man who sat in a kauri tree for nearly two weeks doesn't believe he should be prosecuted for it.
Johno Smith appeared in the Waitakere District Court for the first time on Wednesday after coming down from the tree in the West Auckland suburb of Titirangi on December 23.
He was charged with trespass after sitting in the tree for 13 days to prevent the owners, John Lenihan and Jane Greensmith, from cutting it down to make way for development.
LAWRENCE SMITH/FAIRFAX NZ Johno Smith spent 13 days up a kauri tree protesting plans by a developer cut it down.
Smith entered no plea when he appeared in front of a registrar on Wednesday morning, and will reappear on January 20.
READ MORE:
*Protesting neighbours step in to save Titirangi kauri again
*Kauri protester pleads guilty to trespassing
Outside court he said he still believed he'd done the right thing.
Peter Meecham Protester and arborist Johno Smith surveys the damage done to the Kauri Tree on a property at Paturoa Road in Titirangi, West Auckland, after it was ringbarked.
"I believe I shouldn't be here," he said. "We should have laws protecting our trees (but) we have a strong community who won't allow stuff like this to happen.
"It's not just about this tree it's about kauri trees up and down the country."
Save Our Kauri estimated the tree to be about 500 years old and has been protesting Lenihan and Greensmith's intention to chop it down since May, when another protester, Michael Tavares, sat in it for 81 hours.
He too was charged with trespass and was convicted but avoided a penalty.
Smith was forced to come down from the tree ahead of Christmas, after a group of people began ringbarking the kauri with chainsaws.
Smith said the ringbarking was the worst thing you could do to a kauri, which could die because of it.
On Tuesday police said nobody would be charged with the ringbarking because the owners had given permission for it to happen.
Smith said he wasn't surprised the owners had sanctioned the action, but only became aware of that fact recently.
Save Our Kauri are still engaged in a legal battle with Lenihan and Greensmith, and all will be in the High Court at Auckland in February for a judicial review of Auckland Council's decision to allow the tree to be felled.
It's not the first time Smith has appeared in court for his environmental beliefs.
Last year he and a group of Greenpeace protesters were ordered to pay reparations after scaling Parliament buildings to protest over climate change inaction. | {
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GOP frontrunner Donald Trump slammed Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Fox News and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) during his town hall in Bluffton, South Carolina on Wednesday morning.
“It’s been an amazing experience,” Trump said when asked how it has been on the campaign trail for the past eight months. “There’s a lot of dishonesty in politics,” Trump added. “In particular, Senator Cruz – he’ll say anything!”
Trump said Cruz has stated Trump supports Obamacare and is against the Second Amendment, both allegations Trump says are absolutely false. He vowed to repeal Obamacare and protect the Second Amendment. “Where does he come up with this stuff?” Trump questioned of Cruz.
“Cruz does lie,” he added, referencing Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) also calling Cruz a liar during the GOP primary debate last Saturday.
Trump then turned from criticizing Cruz to going after Fox News when he was asked how the media has treated him during his presidential campaign.
“I was watching Fox this morning,” Trump responded. “They have pundits on that are just one after the other, negative.”
The real estate mogul said Fox News mistreats him.
“I think Fox in particular treats me so badly, it’s incredible,” he charged. “It doesn’t matter I guess,” he added, referencing his big win in the New Hampshire primary last week and his lead in the polls. “All I can do is tell the truth.”
Earlier in the morning, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) – who is backing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush – appeared on Fox News slamming Trump.
The GOP frontrunner also responded to Graham’s criticism during the town hall.
“You have one of the worst representatives of any representative in the United States,” Trump told his South Carolina supporters at the town hall about Graham.
“I don’t think he could run for dog catcher in this state and win,” he charged. “He’s a terrible representative for this state.” | {
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Współczesne gazety stają do pojedynku o najdramatyczniej brzmiące tytuły artykułów. Sto lat temu najbardziej porywające dla Polaków były jednak nie nagłówki, a ukrywające się za nimi treści. Zmiany układu sił w całej Europie stały tak znaczące i dynamiczne, że prasa nie musiała obawiać się braku budzących emocje tematów.
Na początku listopada 1918 roku odpowiedź na pytanie o odzyskanie przez Polskę niepodległości wydawała się już oczywista, nieoczywisty był ostateczny kształt terytorialny uwolnionej z rąk zaborców Ojczyzny. Szczególnie w Wielkopolsce z zainteresowaniem sięgano po teksty, które przypominały o polskości tych ziem, nawet jeśli drukowano je na dalszych stronach gazety.
Żeby Polska była Polską
W dodatku do „Kurjera Poznańskiego” z 1 listopada mowa księdza prałata Stychla umacniała przekonanie, że niemiecka pewność siebie w sprawie zajmowania cudzych terytoriów odeszła do przeszłości.
Naród polski nigdy nie wyrzekł się praw swoich. Na troje rozdarty, pod uciskiem obcych rządów, nie przestał być zwarta całością duchem i dążeniem – wołał i walczył o wolność. Świadczy o tem historja. […] Czy znajdzie się może wśród Niemców mąż rozsądny, z poczuciem honoru, któryby dla tego żywiołowego wołania o wolność polskiego narodu nie miał zrozumienia? Czy dziwić się może, że Polak wolnym być pragnie w granicach własnej ojczyzny? Dodatek do numeru 252. „Kurjera Poznańskiego”, piątek 1 listopada 1918 roku.
Rozważni, nie romantyczni
Dwa dni później na pierwszej stronie cytowanej gazety padało pytanie o to, jakie postawy wobec aktualnej sytuacji geopolitycznej będą najkorzystniejsze dla sprawy polskiej:
W chwili takiej oczy nasze zwrócone być muszą przede wszystkim ku jednej sprawie, dla nas najważniejszej, ku sprawie tworzenia państwa polskiego, wielkiego, zjednoczonego. Kiedy zewsząd potęgi przewrotu wyłaniają groźne oblicze zamętu i anarchji, polska bardziej niż kiedykolwiek musi być ostoją ładu politycznego i społecznego. I my, choć jeszcze jesteśmy poza granicami państwa polskiego, musimy bez wyjątku przejąć się temi zasadami, które chwila odrodzenia Polski nakłada na wszystkich synów ojczyzny.
Autor tekstu, wskazując na potrzebę zachowania jasności myśli politycznej i skupienia woli, pisał:
O przyszłość możemy być spokojni. Nie zepsują nam jej żadne protesty i wybuchy niemieckich agitatorów, bylebyśmy sami niekarnością i swawolą chwili jutrzenki nie opóźnili. […] Nie brak oznak, wskazujących na to, że ze strony pewnych, a nam wrogich żywiołów usiłuje się wprowadzić ferment i zaostrzyć przeciwieństwa w naszym kraju. Z ust niemieckich padły słowa prowokujące, że wspomniemy tylko słowa nacjonalisty Schlee’a w Parlamencie, grożące Polakom „krwawemi guzami”, gdyby chcieli odebrać to, co do nich należy. Musimy być przygotowani do tego, że takie próby prowokacji się powtórzą. Na wypadek taki należy nam zachować spokój i zimną krew. Prowokatorom odpłaćmy niemą wzgardą, a sami szeregujmy się karnie i solidarnie dookoła uznanych naszych władz politycznych.
Stałych czytelników „Kurjera Poznańskiego” nie mogło zatem dziwić ostrzeżenie zawarte na pierwszej stronie numeru z 5 listopada.
Krążą pogłoski, że osoby nieznane rzuciły hasło, aby w dniu 5. listopada, jako w rocznice proklamowania Królestwa Polskiego przez państwa centralne, urządzić w mieście naszem pochód czy demonstracje uliczną o charakterze polskim. Pomimo starań nie udało się stwierdzić źródła, z którego pomysł ten wypłynął. Wobec tego budzi się podejrzenie, że za całą ta sprawą kryją się czynniki prowokatorskie, liczące na łatwowierność ludzi dobrej woli, a dążące do wywołania manifestacji, któreby dały powód do wkroczenia policji i wojska. Stanowczo przestrzegamy społeczeństwo przed braniem udziału w jakiejkolwiek manifestacji ulicznej. […] Spokój i powaga – oto hasło chwili.
Zachowując spokój i powagę, Wielkopolanie nie chcieli jednak zapominać o swojej tożsamości. Poniższy tytuł z pierwszej strony kolejnego numeru „Kurjera Poznańskiego” był bowiem jedynie pytaniem retorycznym.
Odpowiedź była jednoznaczna i obszerna. Powoływała się przy tym na niemieckie dane statystyczne, tym wiarygodniejsze, że i tak poprawione na korzyść zaborcy. Wynikało z nich jasno, że niemal dwie trzecie ludności w Wielkopolsce to Polacy.
Są rzeczy tak oczywiste, że nie potrzeba nad niemi dyskutować, są fakty silniejsze nad wszystkie sztuczki dydaktyczne, przy pomocy których chciałoby się istnienie ich zakwestionować.Takim faktem oczywistym dla każdego bezstronnego jest polskość Poznańskiego. Jeżeli zatem podajemy kilka cyfr i faktów, odnoszących się do statystyki narodowościowej Wielkopolski, nie czynimy tego dla polemiki z rozmaitymi potentatami dnia wczorajszego, dla których w dzielnicy naszej istnieją tylko „wyspy polskie”, lecz dla lepszego uprzytomnienia sobie samym istotnego stanu rzeczy u nas, do czego posłużą nam mianowicie porównania z sąsiednimi dzielnicami Polski.
Wspomniane porównania dowodziły niezbicie, że Wielkopolska jest bardziej polska niż Galicja. Wniosek ten autor oparł „po poznańsku”: na skrupulatnych wyliczeniach matematycznych i analizie twardych danych.
„Poznańsko sknyra” i krakowski „centuś”
Również w Krakowie rachunki wskazywały, że Wielkopolska ma istotne znaczenie dla odzyskanej Ojczyzny, a dokładniej rzecz biorąc, dla jej budowanych w pośpiechu podstaw finansowych. Krakowski „Czas” z 1 listopada 1918 roku pisał zarówno o pilnej potrzebie stworzenia skarbu państwa, jak i o dobrym przykładzie, który Małopolsce dali mieszkańcy poznańskiego.
Wielkopolska będąca wzorem ofiarności na cele narodowe i wykazująca zawsze duże zrozumienie interesów żywotnych Polski, dała pierwsza jak najlepszy przykład i według otrzymanych wiadomości w akcyji biorą udział wszystkie instytucje bankowe i wszystkie warstwy społeczeństwa. Już z górą sto milionów marek zgłosili Poznańczycy na zasilenie skarbu polskiego drogą wewnętrznej pożyczki. Że my w Małopolsce nie pozostaniemy w tyle za Wielkopolską, wątpić ani na chwilę nie należy…
Także „Kurjer Warszawski” publikował w tych dniach ogłoszenia, zachęcające do wsparcia skarbu państwa pożyczkami lub darowiznami.
Nie brakowało w nim poza tym relacji dotyczących wszelkich zawirowań wokół formowania władz państwa. Na łamach polskiej prasy pisano o kulisach powstania rządu w Lublinie czy też perypetiach gabinetu Świeżyńskiego. Gazety we wszystkich częściach podzielonej dotąd Polski, z „Dziennikiem Poznańskim” włącznie, opisywały ukazanie się odezwy rządu Świeżyńskiego, po której rada regencyjna zmusiła radę ministrów do dymisji. Informowano o korespondencji w sprawie powrotu do kraju internowanego w Niemczech Józefa Piłsudskiego oraz spekulowano o możliwej abdykacji cesarza Wilhelma. „Dziennik Poznański” donosił ponadto, nieco wcześniej, o utworzeniu regularnej armii, drukując obwieszczenie podpisane przez radę regencyjną i pełniącego wówczas jeszcze funkcję prezydenta rady ministrów Józefa Świeżyńskiego.
My, rada regencyjna Królestwa Polskiego, postanowiliśmy i stanowimy: W związku z dekretem naszym z 12 października 1918 roku o przejściu władzy zwierzchniej nad wojskiem polskiem w nasze ręce, przystąpić do formowania narodowej armji regularnej na podstawie tymczasowej ustawy o powszechnym obowiązku służby wojskowej, którą równocześnie ogłaszamy, poruczając naszemu rządowi bezzwłoczne jej wykonanie.
Na stronice gazet nie przedostało się nawet przypuszczenie, że najsprawniejsza i najbardziej skuteczna w walce o zachowanie polskiej tożsamości armia ruszy niebawem do walki w Poznaniu i okolicach. Wydarzenia prowadzące bezpośrednio do wybuchu Powstania Wielkopolskiego miały dopiero nastąpić. | {
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Fatality! You just couldn’t match Mileena’s quick use of her Sai blades. She still has use for you though, so get that cock ready. You belong to the half-Tarkatan assassin tonight.
– Secretary Karissa
Animation by Kaeg ( https://www.patreon.com/kaeg ) and sounds by Laarel ( https://www.patreon.com/laarel ) | {
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Mr Gatward, who served with the Gordon Highlands in the 1960s, said of the other man, who served in Afghanistan: "I've been to three universities. I don't know it all but I still know a lot more than a mere corporal." | {
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Trump Now Way Out in Front in 2016 Republican Nomination Polls
In the latest national Republican nomination poll conducted by Gravis Marking for One America News Network, frontrunner Donald Trump has hit the 40% mark. The survey marks the first time since any candidate–let alone the real estate mogul–has broken above the so-called 30% ceiling pundits have pegged him at.
“It’s surprising to see how fast Donald Trump has moved up in the polls since the debate,” Robert Herring, Sr., CEO of One America News Network said in a statement. “Claims by media that Trump peaked in July have proven to be false.”
The Donald’s support has increased nearly 10 percentage points in the crowded GOP field since the previous survey released July 31. Dr. Ben Carson, another political outsider in the race who won the Post GOP Debate Poll conducted by Gravis/OANN, as reported by PPD, has increased 7 points and moved into second with 13.0%.
Rounding out the top five and capturing a higher percentage of the GOP vote is Texas Sen. Ted Cruz at 7.0% and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina with 5.2%. Fiorina has experienced the biggest jump moving from a previous 12th place, non-main stage debate position, into the top five. Three of the top five, namely Trump, Carson, and Fiorina, have never held office. In the latest poll, the top five candidates accounted for 75.3% of the vote, compared to 68.3% in the July 31 poll. Six candidates enhanced their result percentage (shown in green) while nine candidates dropped in their poll performance (shown in red).
When the Gravis/OANN survey is included, Trump now holds a commanding 16-point lead in the PPD average of Republican nomination polls with 26.5%.
“We’re seeing consolidation as the voters get more familiar with the candidates. Carson, Cruz, and especially Fiorina have some strong post-debate momentum,” Herring added. “Yet, we’re still very early in the process and history has proven that early leaders can fall.”
Gravis Marketing, a nonpartisan research firm, conducted a random survey of 3,567 registered voters across the U.S. regarding the presidential election. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 2%. The total may not equal exactly 100% due to rounding. The polls were conducted on August 21-22 using interactive voice response, IVR, technology and weighted separately for each population in the question presented. | {
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explains Roland Mossig (Noctua CEO).First introduced in 2005, Noctua’s NH-U12 series has won more than 600 awards and recommendations from leading international hardware websites and magazines. The NH-U12A is the latest addition to this prestigious series that has established itself as a benchmark for premium-quality quiet 120mm coolers. Thanks to its completely revised, thoroughly optimised 7 heatpipe layout, 37% more fin surface area (as compared to the NH-U12S) and a dual fan push/pull configuration that uses the new, state-of-the-art NF-A12x25 fans, the NH-U12A pushes the performance envelope in the 120mm class and can actually match or even outperform many 140mm sized coolers.At the same time, the NH-U12A offers significant advantages in RAM, case and PCIe compatibility when compared to larger 140mm class coolers: Due to its asymmetric design, it does not overhang the RAM slots on Intel LGA115x and AMD AM4 based motherboards, which ensures easy access and 100% compatibility with modules that have tall heat-spreaders. As far as case compatibility is concerned, the 158mm tall cooler is short enough to fit most modern mid- or high-end tower cases. Measuring 125mm wide (including fan and fan clips), the NH-U12A stays clear of the top PCIe slot on most standard ATX or Micro-ATX motherboards, ensuring optimum compatibility with multi-GPU setups.Topped off with the trusted, pro-grade SecuFirm2™ multi-socket mounting system, Noctua’s proven NT-H1 thermal compound and a full 6-year manufacturer’s warranty, the NH-U12A is a deluxe choice that combines top-tier performance with excellent compatibility and outstanding quietness of operation.The manufacturer’s suggested retail price is EUR/USD 99.90. The cooler is already available via Noctua’s official Amazon and eBay stores . Other sales partners will receive stock shortly.Designed in Austria, Noctua’s premium cooling components are internationally renowned for their superb quietness, exceptional performance and thoroughgoing quality. Having received more than 6000 awards and recommendations from leading hardware websites and magazines, Noctua’s fans and heatsinks are serving hundreds of thousands of satisfied customers around the globe. | {
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With all the talk of cellular handsets and multi-function devices these days, it's hard to believe that there is still even a market for land lines or VOIP services but of course you know better than that. What's perhaps more interesting than just plain old VOIP telephony and video services like Skype, would be the ability to provide access and functionality for a host of all the various media types; voice, video, text, photos, and interenet services. This is obviously what any traditional Telephony company has to compete with, when you consider the potential for the iPhone,
platform and other up-and-comers. It seems the folks at OpenPeak have had their eye on the proverbial ball for quite some time now and today they've announced they're putting a little extra muscle behind their product with Intel's new low power Atom processor under the hood.OpenPeak Inc., today announced a production-ready version of its OpenFrame™ IP media phone platform based on the low-power Intel® Atom™ processor. Designed to drive new revenues for service providers, the OpenFrame device converges voice, data, video and mobile into a single touchscreen-based home communications center that can dramatically simplify everyday family and media interactions.
With the OpenFrame IP media phone connected to the home network via a built-in WiFi/Ethernet link, consumers can use a single device to access applications such as their family calendar, e-mail, text messaging, synced address book and directory services. They also have convenient access to news, sports, weather, stock quotes and traffic, as well as the ability to make traditional or VoIP phone calls.
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There has long raged a debate about the quality of UK vs. US cover art and the different ideals behind design aesthetics in the two regions. In general, fans seem to consider the UK to be the stronger market, and for a long time they were, but it’s my feeling that in the past couple of years, thanks to publishers like Tor, Night Shade Books, Pyr Books and Orbit Books, that the US has eclipsed the UK and is generating much more interesting cover art in general. Hurley herself said, “I am told the UK market is way more stuck-up about their covers. I adore my Conan covers, but $1 says the more mainstreamy-cover sells more books.”
If this is a ‘mainstreamy’ cover, I’m not sure I like where Del Rey UK is taking the series. Still, It’s nice to see Hurley seeing a release from a major publisher. What some people might not know is that Del Rey was originally meant to publish Hurley in the US, first picking up her novel, God’s War, before, for a variety of reasons that I’m not clear on, deciding to let Hurley and the series go. It, and its edits, were then picked up by Night Shade Books.
Later in the conversation, Hurley revealed that eBooks make up 50% of her total sales, and Teresa Frohock, a fellow Night Shade Books author, revealed that a whopping 70% of her sales are eBooks. This suggests that this argument about book covers will change, or even become moot, as eBook sales, which seem less dependant on cover art and more dependant on word-of-mouth and active marketing by their authors, continue to eat up a larger share of the market. To balance that discussion, however, one reader pointed that before now Hurley’s novels were not available outside of North America, suggesting that non-US and -Canadian readers might have been turning to eBooks when they otherwise would purchase this UK edition. These are important factors to consider when contemplating Bradley P. Beaulieu’s recent departure from Night Shade Books and his announcement that he will be completely self-publishing his eBooks going forward. Also worth considering, Elspeth Cooper and Mazarkis Williams both revealed that eBooks count for less than 10% of their sales, a stark contrast to the earlier reported numbers and a reminder that cover art still plays an important role in the bookselling business… for now.
Hurley indicated to me that we might hear some news regarding her eBooks in the near future. In the meantime, Hurley’s trilogy, the Bel Dame Apocrypha is available now from Night Shade Books. | {
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KUNAO, Uttarakhand: This year’s Diwali celebrations will be very special for the 125 families of Kunao village in Uttarakhand’s Pauri district. They have electricity now, even if it has come 66 years after Independence.
The best part of the Kunao story is that the electricity victory was scripted entirely by its residents whose efforts have also included a hunger strike. It was only last month that the Uttarakhand government issued a notification removing the village from the Rajaji National Park.
The village, located on the border between the districts of Dehradun and Pauri, has now entered the modern age. Residents are busy getting their electricity connections and homes wired. Distribution of connections started last week, and about 50 households had taken a connection by Friday evening.
Beginning of a struggle
Most Kunao residents are engaged in animal rearing, and have used the area around their village as pasture for centuries. The British used to provide fee receipts of charan (grazing) and chugan (firewood collection) to Kunao villagers.
Locals also had to pay for setting up chappars (temporary dwellings). In 1983, the Rajaji National Park was created and Kunao came under the park area. And that’s when the struggle really began.
“I came to Kunao when I was a five-year-old kid. Now our fourth generation is living here and we had lost all hope after living without electricity for so many years. We are happy that our lives are now blessed with the coming of electricity. Electricity will prove a boon for the younger generation and it will help them establish cottage industry in the village,” 77-year-old Daulat Singh Aswal said.
With no electricity, the villagers had to depend on solar power to light their homes. Offering low power backup, solar lamps failed to meet the growing demand of the locals. Many villagers would recharge their cellphones in nearby Rishikesh, just 5 km away.
Hunger strike
Citing electric lights as a reason for disturbing wild animals, the forest department had not allowed the villagers this basic facility. On September 14, a crucial development took place in favour of local residents with the Uttarakhand government issuing a notification for removal of Kunao from the park area.
“We created pressure on the state government by launching a hunger strike in September last year. It was followed by a 38-day routine hunger strike by villagers in December. Besides, we also applied for our rights under the Forest Rights Act and became Uttarakhand’s first village to be covered under this Act. This helped us win this battle,” said Chandermohan Negi, the man who spearheaded the agitation.
Cricket fans and housewives are the happiest in Kunao.
“Now I can watch my favourite TV serials without bothering about the backup left,” a thrilled Santosh Devi excitedly said. Priyanshu, a 12- year- old who had shocked a local political leader during the last Assembly elections by asking when their village would get electricity, said: “ Now I can read and see cartoon films.” Describing it as a major win, social activist CP Lakhera said, “The Kunao villagers proved that you can win any battle if you are united. I was amazed by the unity of the villagers in their agitation. I salute them for their dedicated effort.”
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On a warm spring afternoon, just a few days before Holi, the 50-year-old Hyderabad native sat on a dusty plastic chair in his dark warehouse, surrounded by divinities. Hazaari said thousands make their way to Dhoolpet during the festival to find bhang, which he sells in the form of small, cake-like sweets for 50 rupees (less than one dollar) each. He instructs customers to share each piece among six people for a mild high, or among four people for a stronger effect.
“This is our culture, something passed down from our saints,” he told me, smiling beneath his white beard and weathered skin. It is not, he added, a drug, but rather an integral part of the Holi celebration—just like the practice of people washing colors (and, symbolically, their sins) off their body.
In Hinduism, bhang is associated with Lord Shiva, a popular deity who is often regarded as the religion’s supreme god. Some passages in ancient Hindu scriptures describe a plant with spiritual properties that Shiva discovered and brought down from the heavens for humans to consume. Shiva is often depicted with a chillum, or smoking pipe.
According to Travis Smith, an expert on Hinduism at the University of Florida, cannabis is an element of the faith’s yogi or sadhu (ascetic) culture, and “part of the yogi’s toolbox.” In places like the Indian city of Varanasi, a holy spot for Hindus along the Ganges river, many sadhus smoke marijuana from chillums. The drug's psychoactive properties make people sensitive to the energies in their body, Smith explained, and facilitate meditation. He added that bhang is not particularly dangerous or habit-forming, and that its use during Holi is similar to the tradition of drinking eggnog during Christmas. “It is still considered a vice, but because of this sacred association with Shiva, it is respectable,” he said.
Not all Hindus share Smith’s view. Kamala, a 45-year-old woman selling clothes in the Dhoolpet marketplace, told me that her family doesn’t approve of the tradition, which they view as a form of drug use. The Dhoolpet neighborhood where she grew up and still lives is “painted top to bottom” during the Holi festival. But it is only during the latter part of the day—when people re-emerge from their homes wearing fresh white clothes and greeting each other—that she and her children start to celebrate. “It’s different for everybody, but this is our way of doing Holi,” she said.
When India signed a UN drug treaty in 1961, the terms gave the country 25 years to rein in cannabis use while mandating crackdowns on harder drugs like opium in the meantime. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi prohibited marijuana in 1985, though officials made an exception for bhang—“as it is not made from cannabis resin or from flowering tops.” Indian state governments now regulate the production and distribution of the substance, authorizing certain vendors, most famously the Bhang Shop in Jaisalmer, to sell their products on a small scale. But it isn’t difficult to find unauthorized bhang vendors in many cities and villages, especially around Holi and Maha Shivaratri, a festival dedicated to Lord Shiva.
Smith said that despite the widespread use of bhang, it remains part of a counterculture and is not always accepted in upper-caste families. But on a day like Holi, when the “upturning of general social norms” is encouraged, the substance is imbued with a more spiritual meaning. As one Times of India article noted in the run-up to Holi this year:
The explosion of colours is a ventilator of suppressed group or personal drives that allow temporary reversal of the rules of social engagement. Men are chased and harassed by women in villages of [Uttar Pradesh] while Brahmin elders and village heads are hounded and ridiculed, but they don’t complain. For such liberated social behaviour, intoxicants act as catalysts and enrich the expression and experience of role reversal. In the haze of a hashish smoke or headiness of bhang-laced thandai [a cold drink], and the consequent preoccupation with a higher universe, the mundane doesn’t matter so much.
As Hazaari, the bhang merchant, sees it, the intoxicant is something to be carefully enjoyed and generously shared. Each year during Holi, he gives out plates of free bhang-laced desserts at a nearby temple. “Each color on Holi has a meaning: red means happiness, white means peace,” he said. “And this bhang is God’s prasad”—a holy blessing.
We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected]. | {
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For most people, kayaking means renting a kayak and spending maybe an hour or so rowing hard, sweating a lot, and sailing it around, on some local lake or river. Then you would top it off by parking the kayak on the shore and getting a refreshing drink and maybe a tan.
But in some cases, some guys use the kayaks to explore hard to access water areas. Kayaks have the advantage of being fast water vessels and you can use them to navigate shallow waters and tight lagoons real fast.
That is exactly what the guy in our story did. He put his rowing skills to the test. When he saw an old rusted wrecked ship floating not too far from the shore, he went exploring. What did he find? See for yourself below…
1. Kayaks Are The Perfect Vessels For Exploring
Fast and agile little “boats”, kayaks can be either thrilling, or relaxing and fun, or all at once. But since they are so nimble and slender, they are certainly a very good way to navigate difficult waters and tight spaces. This makes them the perfect way to explore shallow waters and flooded areas.
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2. The Old Decrepit Ship
Somewhere off the coast of the Black Sea, on the Romanian sea shore there is a ghost of an old half sunken vessel, the Empire’s Strenght. It’s not far away from a resort called Costinesti. Looming into the distance, the silhouette of the shipwreck lures adventurers who dare to approach.
3. The Crack
A small crack on the side of the ship opens up into a hole that exposes the bowels of the ship. A regular boat can’t fit in there but this experienced kayaker navigated straight through and went inside to explore.
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As part of the Shady Records and Drew Estate collaboration to produce special cigars dedicated to the 20th anniversary of Shady Records, Eminem’s manager and label CEO Paul Rosenberg has released a special playlist. Listen to it below. | {
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I’ve found that a lot of the time, people are so eager to get into their passthrough VMs once they finish setup, that they often forget to stop and make sure everything is working correctly.
Read Also: Easy VFIO under $1,000
Hitting the ground running like this can make maintenance and optimization hard later, so I’ve put together a few tips for those just getting into their fresh Gaming VM. These tips aren’t life altering modifications but they can make your GPU passthrough setup easier to use, in the long term.
Create A Separate Game Drive
This is more “before you switch” type advice, but it can’t hurt. Pass through a dedicated drive for your Steam library and other games, separate from your VM’s boot drive.
This makes things like windows update and data corruption on the guest drive much less painful, and you will also be able to transition to and from a bare metal gaming setup if need be. In addition, when the guest is off, the hard drive is available for host use.
Expanding on the point made above, make sure to use a virtual drive image for your windows installation. This idea may be more contentious than the first, but there’s a lot of good reasons to go with an image for the boot drive over a dedicated volume.
You might be asking yourself: “why not have it on a physical drive so you can dual boot?” — and the answers, while not immediately apparent, are many:
easier backups and restores.
backups and restores. cloning and transitions to new hardware are easier
snapshots become an option, enabling rollbacks after failed updates or reconfiguration
If you’re concerned about boot times, you can always store the image on fast SSD media and you’ll hardly notice a difference. Recommended size is 40-60 gigabytes depending on what you store in it.
Back Up Your ‘Setup’ Files
On the topic of starting over, I suggest you make a folder with resources for setting up your VM from scratch again, should the first line of defense prove inadequate. Steam and device drivers are the first ones that come to mind, but others might include discord, gamepad drivers, or license keys depending on your use case.
It also doesn’t hurt to back that folder up onto a usb drive or a network share. This is especially useful for slow connections or when you’ve forgotten to switch your NIC to VirtIO mode.
Clone Your Fresh Gaming VM
Emergency situations, like your virtual machine becoming unbootable or the image becoming corrupt, are more common than most would like them to be, and can be tedious to recover from. Luckily, virt-manager comes built-in with a clone feature in case all of your other prep fails you.
Although backups/snapshots are recommended, it doesn’t hurt to have a clone of the virtual machine in case something goes really, really, wrong. Restoring from a “known working” state is easy enough and doesn’t cost too much in terms of hard drive space.
Back up Your Host Configuration Files
We’ve covered what to do in case of guest failure, but sometimes the problem comes from the host. I’m sure you’ve heard this one before, but it continues to be one of the best tips I can recommend.
When setting up GPU passthrough you edited at least 4 files, and saving the fresh and last known working copies (of e.g. mkinitcpio.conf, qemu.conf and vfio.conf ) is going to save your bacon if you change something down the road and it causes problems.
Buy Some Purpose-Built Hardware
The unfortunate reality of VFIO is that there’s a noticeable gulf between “working” and “useable” or “convenient” in a lot of cases. Some things can be fixed in software, but for fresh faces with fresh VMs, there’s no substitute for a little hardware to help smooth the transition from baremetal to VM gaming.
One of the best investments a new VFIO user can make is in a hardware KVM switch — hours of configuration and dealing with latency, corner cases and incompatibility can be avoided with these inexpensive, reliable devices. We cover how to set one of these up here.
Another community favorite comes in the form of USB sound interfaces — they’re inexpensive, plug and play, and serve as a drop in workaround for Qemu’s inadequate audio virtualization support. They range from as little as eighty cents to hundreds of dollars, but they make good VM audio as simple as plugging in a USB device.
Wrap-up
Like I said at the beginning, none of these enhancements are life changing, but they can all increase the practicality and ease of use for your VFIO experience. In aggregate, though they should make your gaming VM experience a lot better — especially in the long term.
Which tip or tips did you find most helpful? Leave your answers in the comments below
Discuss other minor tweaks that make a big difference on our Discord! | {
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India is going to fulfill the sustainable development goals before 2030.
The government claims to have reduced maternal and infant mortality rates, and under-five mortality rate, said the minister without giving any figures.
However, some of Javedkar’s claims conflict with one of a report released by the Indian government earlier this year.
In July 2019, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India released a report highlighting the gaps in achieving the key objectives of the 2030 Agenda.
Prakash Javadekar
SDG
Environment ministertoday said that India will achieve its health-related sustainability goals well in advance.“We are happy to announce that the goals set for 2030 will be achieved much earlier,” said the minister. The goal is to keep maternal mortality rate to less than 70 deaths per 100,000 live births. As per the target, under- 5 mortality should go down to 25 deaths per 1000 live births, according to the UN. And infant mortality rate should go down to zero by 2030. A release by Press Information Bureau also said that mortality of infants, mothers and children under-five is declining. “At the current rate of decline, India should able to reach itstarget (MMR-70, U5MR-25) much before the due year i.e. 2030,” said the release. These claims come two months after Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) raised doubts that India may fall short in health-related sustainable goals. This is primarily due to inadequate spending on primary healthcare infrastructure. It also cited lack of data to track the progress of SDG as one of the reasons. According to the Census in 2017, as many as 130 women died per 100,000 live births. Infant mortality and under-five mortality rate was at 33 and 39 deaths per 1,000 live births.As per CAG, spending on healthcare itself is lower than what is budgeted for. It pointed out a massive gap in proposed budget and allocated budget into sprucing up India’s healthcare. The National Health Mission was allocation 13.6% less in 2018-19 than the proposed budget, reported India spend. The states are not spending enough either. As per National Health Policy 2017’s recommendations, states should spend 8% of their budgets by 2020. As many as seven states spent anywhere between 3.29% and 5.32% between 2012-2017.Overall, India spends a mere 1.2% of its GDP on healthcare. It ranks lower than Singapore, which itself is known for its low spending on public health. | {
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India has always been rich in culture and tradition, and games have been an important part of Indian culture since forever. Be it Lord Shiv and his consort Parvati playing Pachisi, the Pandavas loosing Draupadi over a game of dice or the Mughals enjoying an afternoon of chess – games and sports have always played an important role in the history and mythology of India. Gradually the time changed and so did our sports.
In a time of Play Stations, video games and gadgets, we all have almost forgotten the traditional games of India. Remember the times we couldn’t wait to come back from school so that we could go and play a couple of rounds of kith-kith (Hopscotch) with our friends?
So why not recall and replay all these traditional Indian games this summer? Here is the list of 10 such games and sports-
1. Satoliya
The game is also called Pithoo or Lagori in some parts of India. Any number of people can play it. It needs seven small flat stones; every stone size should be less than the other stone. Keep the stones on each other in decreasing size order. Hit the pile with a cloth ball from a fixed difference. Read the complete rules of the game here. You can also buy this game online.
2. Gutte
[embedvideo id=”V70P0ydBCck” website=”youtube”]
This traditional game is played by both children and adults. This simple game requires 5 pieces of small stones. You spin one stone in the air and pick other stones from the ground without dropping the stone in the air. This game can be played by any number of people.
3. Kancha
Kancha was one of the most popular games among children in the neighbourhood. It is played using marbles called ‘Kancha’. The players are to hit the selected target ‘kancha’ using their own marble ball. The winner takes all Kanchas of rest of the players.
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4. Kho Kho
It is one of the most popular tag games in India. It consists of two teams. 1 team sits/kneels in the middle of the court, in a row, with adjacent members facing opposite directions. The team that takes the shortest time to tag/tap all the opponents in the field, wins.
5. Gilli Danda
The game requires two sticks. The bigger one is called “danda” and the smaller one is called “gilli“. The player then uses the danda to hit the gilli at the raised end, which flips it into the air. While it is in the air, the player strikes the gilli, hitting it as far as possible. Having struck the gilli, the player is required to run and touch a pre-agreed point outside the circle before the gilli is retrieved by an opponent.
6. Poshampa
Two people stand with their hands locked together above their heads and sing a song. The other kids pass from under that bridge and the one who gets caught (when the hands come down like a cage at the end of the song) is out.
7. Chaupar/ Pachisi
Each player’s objective is to move all four of their pieces completely around the board, counter-clockwise, before their opponents do. The pieces start and finish on the Charkoni.
8.Kith Kith
See an open surface and a chalk to draw? Lets play Kith Kith! A popular playground game in which players toss a small object into numbered spaces of a pattern of rectangles outlined on the ground and then hop or jump through the spaces to retrieve the object. This popular game is also played in other countries and is loved by all.
9. DhopKhel
Dhopkel, a game popular in Assam is similar to Kabbadi. Dhop is the name given to a rubber ball that two teams throw across a central line into each other’s courts. Each team sends a player into the opponent’s court; the aim is to catch the ball his team throws and make his way back to his team without allowing the opponents to touch him to earn points.
10. Pallanguli
This board game with 14 cups is set out with six seeds in each cup; the players distribute these seeds into the other cups until there are no seeds left. The person who reaches two consecutive cups without seeds has to bow out of the game.
Go why not reconnect with our roots and enjoy these lesser known traditional games of India?
About the Author: Born with a hobby to travel, talk, express and write, Shreya gets to do all of that and is even paid for it! Interested in rural development and social issues, she dreams of actually bringing a change in society and writing a book of her own one day. When she is not preaching others about a better India she is busy watching movies and playing video games. Follow her on twitter: Born with a hobby to travel, talk, express and write, Shreya gets to do all of that and is even paid for it! Interested in rural development and social issues, she dreams of actually bringing a change in society and writing a book of her own one day. When she is not preaching others about a better India she is busy watching movies and playing video games. Follow her on twitter: @shreya08 | {
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Garnet Bourgaize turned 100 years old on Oct. 18, and members of the Royal Canadian Legion as well as friends and family from across Canada gathered to celebrate the Second World War veteran.
“All I can say is that it’s nice to be 100,” said Bourgaize. “I never thought I’d get to 100.”
Dozens of guests gathered at Branch 108 of the Royal Canadian Legion in Chateauguay, Que. to celebrate the beloved centenarian.
“We thought it would be a good way to recognize a person who had done a lot for us,” said President Frank Cholette.
“He was a World War II veteran, spent five years over seas between 1940-45.”
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Injured in combat, Bourgaize never let that affect his contribution to the Royal Canadian Legion. Even at 100 years old, he’s still planning on distributing poppies this coming month.
“It means a lot to me, being with other people and all that,” said the Bourgaize.
“It was important for us to recognize him, for all the contribution he’s done not only during the war but on a day-to-day basis,” said Cholette.
2:19 Montrealers mourn the loss of WWII veteran Montrealers mourn the loss of WWII veteran
His family and friends said his good health has been their greatest blessing.
“We’re so pleased, not only myself but the whole family because his mind is clear, he can eat without any difficulty, his health is very good — there’s a lot to be thankful for,” said his youngest son.
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“He’s been an active member of our branch very active you’d never say that the man is a hundred years old,” said Cholette.
People close to him say he’s been an inspiration to many, not only for his service, but his outlook on life.
“All of us should aspire to be like him,” said Cholette. “I know I do.”
“I think my favourite thing about my father is his attitude towards life, that he just enjoys it because he doesn’t criticize and put other people down,” said Leaman Bourgaize.
Bourgaize received certificates from the Prime Minister of Canada and the Governor General, the Government of Quebec, the City of Chateauguay and a Royal scroll from the Queen. | {
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There is a wonderful parallel that can be drawn between bicycles and boats, when they are both coursing along their paths, but the kinship is all the more prevalent when they are drawn from that most classical of materials: wood. Ken Piper, hailing from Australia’s capital of Canberra, has constructed what could be the finest, and most modern, example seen on the pages of Cycle EXIF.
Eucalyptus marginata is one of the most common species of Australia’s favourite tree, the Eucalypt. A versatile hardwood, it is commonly known as Jarrah, an Aboriginal word and it, along with Queensland Silver Ash, was the basis for Ken’s frame. Jarrah is the deep red-coloured wood which, because of its density, is fire resistant and ideal for outdoor use.
Ken works as a designer in the Science Department of the Australian Defence Force Academy and spent six months creating his project. He’s ridden 1500kms on it so far, describing it as a beautifully smooth and solid ride, aided by Shimano’s Di2 Ultegra groupset — the battery is hidden craftily inside the frame. Ken mounted the rear brake under the chain stays, resulting in an ultra-clean silhouette.
Ken is a daily rider, the Ash and Jarrah roadie replaces his moto two days a week as his commuter. He has built a steel-framed bicycle before, and admits that this was a lot more work but far more satisfying to ride. Built up with a Ritchey wheelset and Easton forks, it weighs in at a healthy 9.7kg. He’s already planning a second frame, which will be lighter yet and, I’ll wager, equally as magnificent.
Anyone want to place an order? | {
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UK mobile phone network O2 has signed a deal that will see free WiFi rolled out across two key areas in London, in what it’s calling “the largest free wireless hub in Europe”.
O2 has signed deals with Westminster City Council and the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea, giving residents and visitors to the area free WiFi Internet access on their mobile phones, laptops and tablets in what is being touted as a landmark deal.
The operator says the programme will run at no cost to the councils or taxpayers. The initiative underpins part of both councils’ plans to enhance the city’s digital reputation, and so that the millions of visitors have the best possible experience. The deal is particularly timely given that 2012 sees the city celebrate two major events – the Olympic Games and the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. However, the deal isn’t a temporary one for the tourists, and will offer longer-term benefits to businesses and individuals alike.
The free WiFi will be available across Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea once the Metro wireless network is installed on the streets, and it will initially be rolled out in a limited number of areas before eventually arriving everywhere across the boroughs. O2 will begin installing the network this month.
O2 WiFi launched in January 2011 with the ambition to roll out free, fast and open WiFi, via strategic partnerships across the UK. We said at the time:
“…the operator wants to differ from its rivals by offering what it calls the first ‘truly free, public Wi-Fi platform’ in the UK, making it accessible to both its customers and any other person who wishes to use it.”
“This is a landmark achievement for Westminster; Westminster welcomes over a million tourists a day, is home to 250,000 residents, employs over half a million people and sees 4,000 business starts-ups each year,” says Cllr Philippa Roe, Cabinet Member for Strategic Finance at Westminster City Council. “Next summer’s Olympic Games mean that London will be putting on the biggest show on earth and as Westminster has a starring role, visitors to London will easily be able to share their pictures and updates of the Olympic events across social networking sites.”
Councillor Nicholas Paget-Brown, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Environment at the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, added: “I am very pleased that we have been able to come to this agreement and we look forward to working with O2. Residents and visitors having free access to the latest mobile technology will help us to continue to offer value for money for residents.”
This is a major development for London, and is indicative of what the UK will hopefully start seeing across the board in the years that follow – fast, ubiquitous, public WiFi Internet access.
“This ground-breaking deal – the first of its kind in the UK – will see us deliver high quality connectivity across London in time for London 2012,” says Derek McManus, Chief Operating Officer for O2. “Our longer-term aim is to expand our footprint of O2 Wifi, which is open to everyone, and also intelligently enhance our services at street level, where people need the network the most.”
Read next: Taiwan's AU Optronics settles patent dispute with Samsung | {
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At the end of 2018, Australia became the first nation in the world to enact encryption laws requiring companies to provide access to encrypted communications. The new encryption laws, while designed to combat terrorism, cybersecurity threats and criminal activity, is extremely controversial because it would essentially allow law enforcement agencies and federal authorities to conduct surveillance on the users of any social media or online platform, even those that today are encrypted.
Impact of the new encryption laws
Perhaps not surprisingly, both tech companies and privacy rights activists have spoken out about the new encryption laws, suggesting that they will lead to censorship, surveillance and the loss of privacy. Essentially, tech companies would become willing accomplices of the government’s surveillance operations as they go about devising ways to enable the government to snoop on everyday citizens.
It’s important to note here that the new law, even though it has been accused of being part of a “war on encryption,” is not actually anti-encryption. Even though Australian lawmakers rushed through this law at the very end of 2018, they were still smart enough to know that encryption plays a very important role in today’s social media and communications landscape. If you send a text message to someone in your network, you have a reasonable expectation that the message will not be intercepted and read by someone else. Encrypted messages are what make that possible.
So the problem is really not so much about encryption as it is about end-to-end-encryption. With encryption, a law enforcement agency can still get access to the message that you sent someone else. With end-to-end encryption, though, the story is different. In that case, only the sender and recipient can ever read the encrypted information. That’s why law enforcement agencies are so concerned – as they see it, terrorists and criminals are gravitating to end-to-end encryption services such as WhatsApp, iMessage, Wicker and Signal precisely because it enables them to hang out and send messages to each other without worries that someone might be eavesdropping on them online.
Thus, to put the new Australian encryption laws into proper context, it’s really about giving the authorities a way to access encrypted personal messages without doing away with encryption entirely. But you can see the problem here – there is no such thing as a message that is “sort of encrypted.” It’s either encrypted or its not. That’s because encryption is a mathematical concept. So that’s what is worrying privacy advocates – as soon as you make a message “sort of encrypted,” you are essentially saying that the message is not encrypted because a smart enough hacker will find a way to read that message. It’s like locking the front door to your house, but purposely leaving the back door unlocked. Someone is eventually going to figure that out and break in, right?
Tech companies asked to provide “technical assistance” to government
To prevent this from happening, the Australian government made it clear that the new law should not provide a “back door” to hackers as a result of the encryption laws. Companies, they say, should not create “systemic weakness” by creating back doors to their technology. Instead, companies should provide “technical assistance” in helping government authorities read encrypted communications. There are three levels of “technical assistance” required. The first is the most basic level – companies should provide technical information about how their products work, facilitate access to services and equipment, and generally make it possible to get access to data or information. Even most privacy advocates would probably agree to this.
But where things get a bit more opaque is with the second level of assistance required by the encryption laws. This requires tech companies to provide decryption functionality wherever technically feasible or practical. This would not apply to end-to-end encryption, because even tech companies can’t decrypt these messages. However, it could require companies to remove one or more layers of electronic protection, or to install special software (such as key logging software or screenshot software) to help intelligence and security authorities read messages as they are being created.
And, finally, there is the third – and very scary – level of assistance required by the encryption laws. This so-called technical capability notice would require tech companies to build entirely new technical capabilities that facilitate snooping and surveillance by security agencies. For example, Amazon might be asked by the government to modify its Amazon Alexa home personal assistant to record continuously, instead of when being asked to by the user. Or, it might even require companies to create a “fake” website that says it’s encrypted when it is really not.
The basic story is clear, then. The new Australian encryption laws essentially force tech companies to build all the functionality required to create a true surveillance state, all under the guise of protecting national security. In all fairness, the Australian lawmakers originally proposed 173 different amendments to the law. Apparently, something about it just didn’t feel right. But it was the end of the year, they were in a rush to get on with the Christmas holidays, and so they passed the encryption laws anyway.
The start of a new worldwide precedent?
The problem, of course, is that other nations around the world could soon follow suit, including the United States and the European Union. Already, India has proposed a new draft law that would go one step further than the Australia law – it would actually force companies like WhatsApp to break encryption entirely. The draft law was designed to enable the tracing of the originators of dangerous or unlawful content online. To make that “traceability” possible, you have to get rid of encryption. Thus, while the Australian law was really designed to take on the problem of end-to-end encryption, the new Indian draft law is designed to do away with encryption entirely. That’s getting into dangerous territory, because it would start to place countries like India into the same basket as countries like China, Russia and Turkey, all of which have banned end-to-end encryption.
As the first nation to enact #encryption laws requiring companies to provide access to encrypted communications, has Australia set the precedent? Click to Tweet
So you can see that the new Australian law has potentially set a very dangerous precedent. Some tech companies have suggested that they might pull out of Australia as a form of protest. However, quite frankly, the more dangerous scenario is that they don’t pull out of Australia. That would mean that they are willing to be complicit in the creation of a surveillance state, and are simply banking on the fact that most users won’t have any idea of what’s going until it’s too late. | {
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Microsoft released the Windows 10 October 2018 Update on October 2nd, but then quickly pulled it from access (it had not started rolling out, but was made available to non-Insiders via Windows Update). The problem was supposedly a bug that was deleting users’ Documents folders in rare but devastating cases, an issue that had been around for at least some of the RS5 development cycle according to entries in the Feedback Hub, but slipped through the cracks, apparently. It wasn’t until some tech pundits noticed Reddit complaints that Microsoft took notice.
A fix has been issued, and is now in testing via Windows Insiders, and was also pushed to those who did download from Windows Update. Much has been made about how a more robust (non Pumpkin Spice) Release Preview Ring could have flagged the problem before letting it loose in the wild, but the occurrences were rare, so while it’s possible, it’s also possible that Release Preview complaints would have been missed, too.
But the real problem here is that these missing Documents folders weren’t a bug at all, the functionality was introduced into RS5 builds *by design*. First, let’s take a look at what Director of Program Management for Windows Servicing and Delivery said about the problem, in full:
Prior to re-releasing the October 2018 Update our engineering investigation determined that a very small number of users lost files during the October 2018 Update. This occurred if Known Folder Redirection (KFR) had been previously enabled, but files remain in the original “old” folder location vs being moved to the new, redirected location. KFR is the process of redirecting the known folders of Windows including Desktop, Documents, Pictures, Screenshots, Videos, Camera Roll, etc. from the default folder location, c:\users\username\, to a new folder location. In previous feedback from the Windows 10 April 2018 Update, users with KFR reported an extra, empty copy of Known Folders on their device. Based on feedback from users, we introduced code in the October 2018 Update to remove these empty, duplicate known folders. That change, combined with another change to the update construction sequence, resulted in the deletion of the original “old” folder locations and their content, leaving only the new “active” folder intact. Accordingly, below are the issues we have identified and fixed: Using KFR the user redirected a known folder to a different drive. For example, suppose you ran out of space on your C drive. You want to save some files separate from your primary folder, so you add another drive to your system for these. You create “D:\documents” and change the location of the files known folder from the original “old” location c:\users\username\documents to D:\documents. In some cases, if the contents of c:\users\username\documents were not moved to D:\documents, then a user could also encounter this issue. When the October 2018 Update was installed the original “old” folder was deleted including the files in that folder (in this example c:\users\username\documents would be deleted; d:\documents, the new location, would be preserved). The user configured one or more of their Known Folders (Desktop, Documents, Pictures, Screenshots, Videos, Camera Roll, etc.) to be redirected (KFR) to another folder on OneDrive. For example, the user changed the location property of the documents folder from c:\users\username\documents to another folder. During this process the system prompts the user and asks if they would like to move the files to the new location. If the files were not moved and the October 2018 Update is installed the original “old” folder was deleted including the files in that folder. The user used an early version of the OneDrive client and used the OneDrive settings to turn on the Auto save feature. This feature turned on KFR for the Documents and/or Pictures folders based on the user’s choice but did not move the existing files from the original “old” location to the new location. For example, if a user turned on Auto Save for pictures the location of the Pictures folder would be changed from c:\users\username\pictures to c:\users\username\onedrive\pictures, but no files would be moved. The current version of this feature moves the files. If the files were not moved and the October 2018 Update was installed the original “old” folder was deleted including the files in that folder (in this example c:\users\username\pictures would be deleted; c:\users\username\onedrive\pictures, the new location, would be preserved).
We have fully investigated these issues and developed solutions that resolve all three of these scenarios, so the “original” old folder location and its contents remain intact.
So at some point, Microsoft decided to go ahead and delete your original \user\<username>\documents or \pictures for you if you had used KFR, without any confirmation or knowledge on your part. This was not a bug, it was a conscious decision on Microsoft’s part to delete user folders without confirmation by the user. Making matters even worse, the probable most likely scenario for lost files would be the third one, where OneDrive previously set a new autosave location, while leaving the old Pictures folder intact, and full of pictures before the OneDrive change. They decided, again by design (either that or one hand doesn’t know what the other hand is doing or has done, so much for the end of old siloed Microsoft), to delete the folder anyway.
How could Microsoft not know of this OneDrive behavior? How could they build a system that didn’t check if the folders were empty? How could they not alert users and ask explicit permission before deleting user folders, empty or not? Why weren’t Insiders not told about these changes and asked to test them?
Maybe instead of requiring Windows Insiders to rate the severity of their bugs, Microsoft should let users know when they’re messing with user content. The mind reels at the stupidity of these decisions, and Microsoft is just lucky that more people weren’t affected.
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The carbon tax proposed for Canada is a thinly disguised tax grab by the federal government. Any alternative, such as a cap and trade regime - one that also sets a carbon price - has been ignored. Any "carbon tax" is a measure that raises production costs that will either be passed on to consumers or will result in lower profits and investment and jobs. In either case, the upward shift in aggregate supply - a supply shock - will have to be compensated by increased aggregate demand, probably by government program spending. (Alternatively, corporate income taxes can be reduced parri passu with the imposition of the carbon tax, a move that would alter the composition of business taxes and be neutral in its overall effects on after-tax revenues while raising production costs.)
The carbon tax, in effect, shifts resources from the private to the public sectors. All well and good if the object is to hedge against the long-term effects of global warming, but a full evaluation of the causal chain, especially on short-run costs and distribution is needed. The costs will ultimately be born by the consumer, a fact that the article avoids by stating that the polluter will pay. As just about everything we consume is produced subject to some degree of carbon use, the article is misleading as to whom bears the real costs. The environmentalist/statist agenda is very weak on economic effects, especially those that will cause simultaneous inflation and unemployment.
On a further note, Project Syndicate should not use its space to further the political agenda of a specific government. Moreover, it should not be used to raise the political profile of a currently serving Cabinet Minister. | {
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There are clear signs that major NATO member states – the US and Germany – are planning to divide Eastern Europe into "zones of influence"; while the Baltic states will hardly object to Berlin's taking them under its wing, Poland won't hail ceding part of its sovereignty to Washington, Russian political analyst Stanislav Stremidlovsky notes.
While NATO is beefing up its military presence in Eastern Europe, most notably in the Baltic region and in Poland, the question arises whether the major NATO players are seeking to divide the region into "zones of influence."
Washington's European ballistic missile defense (BMD) system project kicked off by NATO back in 2011, is one of the Alliance's most ambitious programs that allows it to cement its military presence in Eastern Europe; and there is hardly any other goal the Alliance is pursuing by implementing the European BMD program.
George Friedman, founder of Strategic Forecasting Inc. (Stratfor), also known as a "shadow CIA," says that it is not clear whom the BMD is expected to protect Europe from.
"Missile defense in Europe has become as much a political symbol as a weapon. I would argue that if political symbols matter, then it has served a purpose, because it is hard to envision the military purpose of the system," Friedman wrote in his article for Geopolitical Futures.
He called attention to the fact that the system would be ineffective against Russia, "should it wish to launch a nuclear strike against Europe." At the same time the BMD would be effective if some other nuclear power with a few missiles to launch attacked the EU. But there's the rub: the question arises why Russia or any other nuclear power would decide to launch a nuclear strike at all, and "totally unclear why their target would be Europe."
According to Friedman, the possibility of a nuclear strike is extremely low: "You would have to be crazy to use it [nuclear weapons]."
However, Warsaw and Washington are planning to build the anti-missile base — part of the complex European BMD system — in the Polish town of Redzikowo by 2018. A similar base became operational on May 5 in Romania.
Nearly simultaneously, NATO announced its plan to deploy about 4,000 troops (four battalions) in the Baltic states and Poland as part of the Alliance's strategy which aims to "deter" Russia.
The German Defense Ministry signaled its readiness to station a rotating military contingent of between 150 and 250 soldiers to Lithuania, Deutsche Welle reported late April, citing the German Press Agency. The announcement followed the visit of Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite to Berlin on April 20.
According to Russian political analyst Stanislav Stremidlovsky, by implementing the elements of the US missile defense system and deploying its troops in Eastern Europe Washington and Berlin are pursuing their own geopolitical goals.
The EU member states do not regard Russia as an imminent threat to Europe.
Furthermore, although Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski last month went even so far as to claim that Russia, not Daesh, poses the main security challenge to the EU, Poland is much more concerned about the ongoing refugee crisis engulfing Europe, Stremidlovsky points out in his analysis for Regnum.
He cites Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the leader of the Polish ruling right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party, who has repeatedly stated that the party is against bringing asylum seekers to Poland since there is no guarantee that the gesture of good will would not lead to the Paris-style terror attacks in the country.
Interestingly enough, experts admit that the victory of Poland's right-wing Euroskeptic party was obviously linked to its tough stance toward the EU refugee policy.
Stremidlovsky emphasizes that Polish policymakers and thought leaders are aware that NATO is incapable of protecting the country from the growing terror threat and is unable to contain the increasing flow of refugees.
Alas, NATO's military installations in Poland by no means meet today's needs of Warsaw: instead they are aimed at accomplishing Washington's geostrategic tasks in the region, he stresses.
According to the analyst, there are clear signals that NATO member states, the US and Germany, are using the current uncertain geopolitical situation in Eastern Europe to their own advantage, de facto dividing the region into "zones of influence."
However, while Lithuania and the other Baltic states are likely to welcome Germany taking them under Berlin's wing, Poland has its own geopolitical aspirations in the region.
Warsaw won't agree to cede part of its sovereignty neither to the EU nor to Washington, Stremidlovsky notes referring to the fact that Poland has increasingly been adopting a more independent, more sovereign and more nationalist policy. And it means Warsaw and Washington will soon face trouble in paradise, the analyst suggests. | {
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Temps in Marion and Alachua counties expected near record levels. Combined with little rain, officials raise concerns about wildfires.
Extreme heat is expected to increase all week, with the Sunday afternoon high temperature expected to reach nearly 100 degrees in Marion and Alachua counties.
The heat wave is due to a rain-blocking high pressure system that is positioned over the Southeastern United States.
Though residents of both counties will experience above-normal high temperatures, the daily highs will fall short of all-time records, according to more than a century of weather records maintained by the National Weather Service in Jacksonville.
On Sunday, predicted to be the hottest day, the expected high in Gainesville is 98 degrees, just shy of the 100-degree record for May 26, which was set in 1953.
On Sunday, the expected high in Ocala is predicted to be 97 degrees, five degrees shy of the 102-degree record for May 26, which was set in 1962.
Though the temperatures will not hit record highs each day, it will be much hotter than normal throughout the week.
From Tuesday through Sunday, the average daily high temperature in Gainesville is expected to be 94.7 degrees, 6.4 degrees higher than the 88.3-degree historic average for the same date range.
The average afternoon high temperature in Ocala is expected to be 94.2 degrees during that same span, 2.9 degrees higher than the 91.3-degree historic average.
With the expected extreme heat and little rain, the National Weather Service in Jacksonville issued a statement about increased concern for wildfires this week.
“There remains elevated wildfire potential through the Memorial Day weekend due to hot temps, low humidity and sparse rainfall,” said Angie Enyedi, a senior meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Jacksonville.
Enyedi issued graphics that show there is low ground moisture, especially along the Interstate 10 corridor northward. The big concern is that any spark could trigger a wildfire, especially during Memorial Day weekend. Officials said fireworks, campfires, grills and cigarettes could ignite a fire if residents are not careful.
The National Weather Service also noted that National Safe Boating Week runs from May 18-24. The service has partnered with the National Safe Boating Council, a NOAA Weather-Ready Nation Ambassador, to help promote safe boating practices. The council's website — www.safeboatingcouncil.org — offers free resources such as infographics, videos, audio clips, fact sheets and more.
Joe Callahan can be reached at 867-4113 or at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JoeOcalaNews. | {
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Big-budget, blockbuster games had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day on Tuesday. Was it an unfortunate fluke? Or the beginning of the end?
Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed Unity shipped Tuesday, and it wasn't long before players started finding all kinds of bugs and glitches—so many that Ubisoft created a "live updates" blog specifically to keep players abreast of fixes to game-breaking issues.
And then there was Halo: The Master Chief Collection on Xbox One. It won early praise for its single-player collection of four Halo titles, but the ambitious multiplayer mode—more than 100 maps, spanning the entire series—shipped out totally busted. "I was unable to access a single match of any kind, encountering various error messages or endless queues, and even one full game crash to the Xbox One dashboard," Arthur Gies wrote at Polygon, downgrading his review from a 9.5 to an 8.0.
But wait. There's more. Sega's Sonic Boom, the latest in its long-running Sonic the Hedgehog series, shipped with bugs that dwarfed Creed and Halo in terms of impact on the game. One huge gaffe in particular: You can jump infinitely into the air by pausing and unpausing the game. Sonic speedrunners discovered this almost immediately and used it to complete the game in under an hour.
There was also this touching scene, which makes one think that Sonic Boom may simply be a misunderstood work of postmodern genius:
In an age of cloud servers, mandatory online multiplayer and the ability to patch flaws with updates, big games shipping busted is nothing new. Three of them hitting on the same day, though, makes one think things are getting worse for some reason. As if there was something intrinsic to the triple-A, blockbuster gaming business that was starting to bust apart at the seams.
I wasn't alone in thinking this. "Issues in major AAA games shipping lately [equal] leaks in the bubble that is traditional AAA development," former Gears of War design director Cliff Bleszinski tweeted Friday. I pinged Bleszinski, now CEO of independent developer Boss Key, with an email to follow up.
"Making a videogame is really, really hard," he said. "The fact that games even ship could be deemed an outright miracle … even in the last generation of Xbox 360 it was impossible to ship the mythical 'bug free' game."
Gamers' expectations for what they get for their $60, Bleszinski said, have only grown since the Xbox 360 gave way to Xbox One.
"In 2015 and beyond, the expectations for a traditional AAA game’s feature set in an established franchise are so immensely high that when you couple that with the added graphical fidelity you’re looking at an increased budget, increased risk, and the potential for more bugs and problems," he said. "You can put 10,000 of the best [quality assurance] folks on your game for years before the game ships and I can guarantee they’re not going to find every problem or issue; you’re going to ship with some. The key is to get rid of the major game breakers, but even now, we’re seeing some of those problems on ship."
Bleszinski noted that perhaps the "early access" model being explored by many indie developers (and an official feature of Valve's Steam distribution service) could be a solution: "Put a version out there and see what sticks. Worried about bugs? Let your community report them. Worried a weapon or ability is overpowered? Look at the data that’s currently in the wild, and pivot."
But in the blockbuster biz, when games are developed in secret and unleashed with a major marketing blitz on a carefully chosen launch day, this may never catch on.
Even if Assassin's Creed Unity had shipped bug-free, players would still have been in for an unsettling surprise, since the game ships with microtransactions that let you speed ahead in the game without having to grind. (Come to think of it, the developer of Sonic Boom might have missed an opportunity by not selling that infinite-jump glitch for $5.)
In an age of "free" games that hit you up for money at every turn (as skewered by South Park last week), one of the arguments for the traditional game model is that, yes, you have to pay your $60 up front, but you get a whole game for it that you can enjoy at your leisure. Real cash creeping into these games' virtual economies is a growing trend, and who knows what that will do to the games' designs if it continues to tendril in?
Halo: The Master Chief Collection. Microsoft
Then again, perhaps it's not inevitable: Microsoft tried microtransactions with Ryse: Son of Rome, an Xbox One launch title, but removed all the cash-for-gold elements when it released the game on PC.
"What we’re looking at is a very precarious situation right now in the traditional space when you add in the mix of hype, game budgets, marketing budgets, and scope," Bleszinski said. "You start to see, yes, in-game purchases in the midst of a $60 brand-new game. Massive DLC campaigns. Things like a season pass. All the bullshit that no one really likes … is put into the games in order to try to keep the studios afloat with these massive game and marketing budgets. It just doesn’t add up."
There's simply a tremendous amount of pressure on any given triple-A game these days, much more so than in the past. By and large, publishers have spent the last few years aggressively narrowing their game lineups. They're releasing fewer games, and pinning more hopes on each. Sega has one foot out of the console game business, releasing just a few titles a year and putting most of its efforts into PC and mobile gaming. I would not be shocked if by the end of this console generation the Sonic franchise shifted entirely to mobile.
Assassin's Creed is an annualized franchise, it could not be delayed. Based on what now appear to be credible leaks on the NeoGAF message board in January about Microsoft's 2014 plans, Tuesday's release date for Halo: Master Chief Collection was locked down before Microsoft had even decided what games would be included.
There are no fallback plans anymore. No B-games to hold the lineup or get promoted to A-game status if a big game slips. The show must go on, the game must ship. Too much is riding on it. It's not a game with a marketing strategy, it's a marketing strategy with a game. If that means it ships busted, well, chain the social media team to its desks and order pizzas while they weather the storm. (Pizza optional.)
How many more days like Tuesday can the industry endure? | {
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Michael Collins is animated recapping Tiger Woods' second round and start of the third round at the Genesis Open. (0:59)
LOS ANGELES -- It took him until late Saturday afternoon, but Tiger Woods finally got hot at chilly Riviera, starting the third round of the Genesis Open with five consecutive 3s, including an eagle and three birdies.
The run vaulted him from just inside the cut line to inside the top 15 as play was halted due to darkness.
"I hit a few good shots, but I made some putts," Woods said. "I didn't have four three-putts out there (as he did in the first round). That was positive, and I got off to a nice little roll. Conditions were a little bit tough in the beginning, which was good for me because the guys weren't really doing much around the golf course, so that was positive.''
Justin Thomas leads the tournament at 13-under par, but played just two holes of his third round. Adam Scott is a shot back playing in the final group with Thomas and J.B. Holmes. Woods got to 6 under par through seven holes, but he will need to get up and down for a par from 30 feet at the par-5 17th.
Woods and the rest of the field will resume the third round of the weather-plagued tournament at 6:45 a.m. PT Sunday and will continue into the fourth round with hopes of completing the tournament before darkness.
"It's going to be a long one," Woods said. "Up early and start working on it and staying loose and staying ready. It's just going to be a lot of walking. And the last couple days, it's definitely testing the body.''
The tournament host who never has won the Genesis Open in 12 previous starts, Woods, 43, seemed on the verge of missing the cut early Saturday morning when he had six holes to complete from his second round. He immediately dropped a shot at the fourth hole, his first of the day, then made a couple of shaking pars before managing to knock in a 24-foot birdie putt at the ninth.
That gave him a score of 71 and a 36-hole total of 1-under 141, which seemed in danger of possibly missing the cut. But he ended up making it by 1 shot, as the cut came at 142, even par, with 76 players advancing.
When the round ended, Woods was 10 strokes behind leaders Thomas and Scott and in a tie for 52nd. Having difficulty with his putting and having hit just eight of 18 greens -- and with a long day looming on Sunday -- Woods was asked if he preferred two more rounds of competition over missing the cut.
"You saw what I did last year, I missed the cut here and I had to add an event,'' he said. "So I'm playing the weekend and I get two more rounds to kind of get after it.''
Getting a chance to play more golf appeared to be a good thing. His struggles on the greens had continued from his first tournament of the year at the Farmers Insurance Open. At both tournaments he has played this year, the 80-time PGA Tour winner has lamented his poor putting, although for different reasons.
At Torrey Pines three weeks ago, where a final-round 67 helped him finish in a tie for 20th, Woods said he wasn't reading putts well.
"It's different,'' Woods said. "I am not seeing the line, I'm not feeling comfortable because I'm not seeing the line. Consequently, I'm having a hard time starting my ball on line because I have a hard time seeing it. Hopefully I can find it in here in the last couple rounds.
"Can't get any worse than it was the first day; four three-putts is as bad as a human being can putt.''
Woods clearly found something Saturday afternoon. He made a 5-footer for birdie at the short par-4 10th, stuffed a 5-wood from 250 yards to 10 feet at the 11th and made the putt, then rolled in a 20-footer at the 12th and a 10-footer at the 13th. He was 5 under par through four holes.
The streak ended at the par-3 14th, where Woods made a par to at least continue his streak of five consecutive 3s before he made two more pars at the 15th and 16th.
Woods, who serves as tournament host with his TGR Foundation running the event, has had an odd history at Riviera, the course closest to his boyhood Southern California home.
In 11 previous appearances here, two as an amateur, he has no victories, three missed cuts and four top-10s. Along with one year when the tournament went to Valencia Country Club, Woods has played this event the most of any in his career without a victory. | {
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Ét af formålene med Elderlearn er, at det skal være med til at skabe ekstra indhold i de ældres hverdag. Men for Ruth handler det om, at hun gerne vil hjælpe. - Jeg har masser af venner, så jeg gør ikke det her, fordi jeg keder mig, siger Ruth. - Men du får altid noget ud af at mødes med andre mennesker, også fra andre kulturer, og af i det hele taget at være menneskelig. - Jeg er rigtig glad for Ruth, og det er spændende at lære hendes kultur og historie at kende. Jeg er meget glad for at have mødt hende, siger Mahmoud. | {
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The White House official who exchanged confidential taxpayer information with the IRS is a longtime Obama advisor and progressive activist who is currently the most powerful official on Obamacare implementation within the White House.
Jeanne Lambrew, deputy assistant to the president for health policy, entered Obama-world in 2008 as a health-policy adviser to then-Senator Obama’s presidential campaign. She was subsequently named deputy director and then director of the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) now-defunct Office of Health Reform, where she reported directly to Kathleen Sebelius.
Lambrew’s current “deputy assistant to the president” position, while modest-sounding, gives her extensive and centralized power over the White House’s efforts to implement Obamacare.
“[Lambrew] is also unabashedly liberal – often serving as the architect of her party’s most progressive ideas on healthcare reform,” wrote American Enterprise Institute resident fellow Scott Gottlieb in a March op-ed.
“The few remaining centrists thinkers inside the White House, mostly scattered across the National Economic Council and Treasury, are gone – or largely marginalized when it comes to issues around implementation. The people drafting and reviewing the regulations are mostly centered in the White House and its Domestic Policy Council — and they mostly work for Jeanne Lambrew,” Gottlieb wrote.
“Normally, the Office of Management and Budget and the National Economic Council would be heavily engaged on the issuance of regulations tied to a major law like Obamacare. Not the Obama White House. The economists still play on the fiscal issues related to Medicare and Medicaid. But when it comes to Obamacare implementation, they are not calling the shots. The power is centered on Lambrew,” Gottlieb wrote.
Lambrew exchanged confidential taxpayer information on organizations with IRS official Sarah Hall Ingram and White House health policy advisor Ellen Montz, according to 2012 emails obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and provided to The Daily Caller last week. Ingram attempted to counsel Lambrew and the White House on a lawsuit from religious organizations opposing Obamacare’s contraception mandate.
Lambrew also hosted 155 of Ingram’s 165 White House visits, according to White House visitor logs that were recently taken offline during the government shutdown. The IRS improperly targeted conservative groups for harassment of their tax-exempt applications and abusive audits between 2010 and 2012.
Lambrew previously served as a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a left-wing Washington think tank headed by former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta.
Podesta credited Lambrew with helping to shape the “foundation” of the progressive health care reform push beginning in 2005, which was eventually realized under Obama despite attempts to “demagogue” the issue by conservatives who believe that “health is a privilege, not a right,” according to Podesta.
Lambrew moderated a June 2008 Center for American Progress panel criticizing Obama opponent John McCain’s health policy.
Among numerous other positions in government and academia, Lambrew worked on health care reform at the Department of Health and Human Services between 1993-94, as First Lady Hillary Clinton led the administration’s disastrous health care reform initiative.
Lambrew has contributed money to the presidential campaigns of John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and Obama, and to the now defunct George Soros-funded PAC America Coming Together.
“Providing and improving health care for every American may be the current test of our country’s strength of conviction, as was enacting civil rights for all in the 1960s and the creation of the New Deal in the 1930s,” wrote Lambrew, Podesta, and Teresa L. Shaw in 2005.
The White House did not return a request for comment.
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BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi officials have imposed a curfew on Basra starting at 4pm local time (1300 GMT) on Saturday, a military statement said.
Iraq’s second biggest city has been rocked by five days of deadly demonstrations, in which government buildings have been ransacked and set alight by protesters angry over perceived political corruption. | {
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Horia Georgescu trebuia sa ajute guvernul bulgar in lupta anti-coruptie
Horia Georgescu si Meglena Kuneva. Foto: HotNews/ Facebook
Reporterul Petar Nanev si cameramanul Dobromir Ivanov, de la televiziunea bulgareasca BTV, au batut 358 de kilometri, de la Sofia la Bucuresti, pentru a filma un documentar despre lupta anticoruptie din Romania.Presa si opinia publica din Bulgaria se uita, cu uimire, peste Dunare cum ministri, parlamentari, magnati, primari si magistrati "mioritici" fac coada la usa Directiei Nationale Anticoruptie. "Facem un documentar despre progresele Romaniei in lupta anticoruptie. Aici justitia avanseaza, iar in Bulgaria ramane pe loc", explica reporterul Nanev.El si cameramanul sau au poposit, luni, in redactia HotNews, pentru a discuta mai intai cu colegii lui romani despre miscarile trupelor de mascati de la Bucuresti.---Nanev si Ivanov aveau o lista lunga cu oficiali si jurnalisti romani pe care sefii din redactia de la Sofia le-o dadusera pentru documentarul despre lupta anticoruptie din Romania. In capul listei bulgarilor - procurorul-sef al Directiei Nationale Anticoruptie, Laura Kovesi, urmata de presedintele Agentiei Nationale de Integritate, Horia Georgescu.An de an, ANI si DNA sunt " rasfatatele " rapoartelor Comisiei Europene asupra justitiei romanesti, care le lauda constant pentru lupta anticoruptie din Romania, in contrast, de exemplu, cu Parlamentul de la Bucuresti, criticat in permanenta pentru refuzul de a ridica imunitatea unor parlamentari si ministri-parlamentari vizati de anchete.De altfel, seful ANI era "motivul" principal al deplasarii jurnalistilor bulgari in Romania - Horia Georgescu avea programata o vizita la Sofia, unde urma sa se intalneasca, pe 23 martie, cu vicepremierul bulgar Meglena Kuneva, fost comisar european.", a explicat jurnalistul care era miza materialului pe care il filma la Bucuresti.Asa se face ca miercurea aceasta, la ora 11.00, in Bucuresti, reporterul bulgar, avea stabilit un interviu cu insusi Horia Georgescu, presedintele ANI. Seful ANI le si confirmase bulgarilor interviul, dupa cum a povestit Petar Nanev.E adevarat ca retinerea era pentru 24 de ore, insa jurnalistii bulgari si-au luat deja gandul de la interviul cu Georgescu.Potrivit DNA, Horia Georgescu este suspectat ca, in perioada 2008-2009, in timp ce facea parte din Comisia Centrala pentru Stabilirea Despagubirilor din cadrul Autoritatii Nationale pentru Restituirea Proprietatilor, a participat la emiterea unor titluri de despagubire supraevaluate cu 75 de milioane de euro in favoarea unor petenti care revendicau proprietati nationalizate de comunisti.Revenind la bulgari, ei il vedeau pe Geogescu ca pe unul dintre eroii luptei anti-coruptie din Romania.Vizita la Sofia, programata pentru 23 martie, urma sa vina dupa ce vicepremierul bulgar Meglena Kuneva fusese la Bucuresti, in 16 ianuarie, unde s-a intalnit cu premierul Ponta, cu ministrul de externe Bogdan Aurescu, precum si cu seful ANI, Horia Georgescu."Presedintele Agentiei Nationale de Integritate, Horia Georgescu, a primit astazi vizita Viceprim-ministrului Bulgariei, Meglena Kuneva, responsabila pentru coordonarea Politicilor Europene si Problemele Institutionale, fost Comisar European pentru Protectia Consumatorilor in perioada 2007 - 2010", anunta atunci ANI, intr-un comnicat de presa.Atunci, Georgescu se oferise sa-i ajute pe bulgari cu experienta lui in lupta anticoruptie."Pe parcusul intalnirii, au fost abordate teme generale precum prevenirea si combaterea coruptiei sau sistemul declaratiilor de avere si de interese, dar si aspecte particulare, cum ar fi modalitatea de functionare a Agentiei, rezultatele obtinute in activitatea de evaluare a incompatibilitatilor, conflictelor de interese sau a averilor nejustificate si, nu in ultimul rand, eforturile depuse de Agentie in indeplinirea obiectivelor stabilite pentru Romania prin Mecanismul de Cooperare si Verificare - Conditionalitatea 2".", se mai arata in comunicatul ANI din 16 ianuarie 2015. | {
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The US bill introducing new sanctions against Russia aims to sabotage the Arctic LNG 2 project, according to Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov. But Moscow will launch the project even if it has to do it on its own, he added.
Earlier this week, US senators introduced a bill suggesting a wide range of sanctions against Moscow, targeting its foreign debt, banking sphere and energy sector, including liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects abroad.
The sanctions may target the massive Arctic LNG 2 project developed by Russia’s biggest privately owned natural gas producer Novatek. France’s Total has recently joined the project, while Chinese investors also show strong interest in it.
Also on rt.com Russia’s largest LNG project kicks into high gear
If the US proceeds with the punitive measures, it is unclear how foreign partners may react, Siluanov said. While Russia hopes that “business interests will prevail,” the country can turn the project into reality on its own, the minister stressed.
“In any case we will implement this Arctic LNG project because we have the resources,” Siluanov told Russian outlet Business FM. He added that the country may consider using public funds due to the growing capacity of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, which is to surpass 7 percent of GDP this year.
The minister added that Novatek’s Yamal LNG plant in the Arctic, which recently reached full capacity, has already proven its high profit margins for investors.
Also on rt.com Dangerous liaisons? Italians want to build LNG plant in Russian Arctic despite US sanctions threat
Novatek’s second plant for liquefying gas in the region, Arctic LNG 2 on the Gydan Peninsula in Northern Siberia, is expected to start operations in 2022-2023. It will produce 19.8 million tons of LNG per year when at full capacity.
The project is estimated to cost up to $35 billion. Various foreign firms, such as Siemens, Italian companies Nuovo Pignone and Saipem, and Turkey’s Renaissance services have signed supply and construction contracts for the new facility.
The sanctions bill targeting Russia was earlier slammed by top Russian officials. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it was “bordering racketeering” and has nothing to do with international trading rules. Meanwhile, the Russian government warned that it is weighing up a proper response if the bill becomes law.
For more stories on economy & finance visit RT's business section | {
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Incredible footage has emerged online showing a snake eating another snake whole.
The video, filmed in the Sichuan Province of China earlier this week, depicts a gruesome fight to the death between the two reptiles.
According to local media outlets, the victor - a patterned snake- was actually smaller than the black snake on which it chowed down.
A local resident captured the epic battle close up on camera as neither of the breeds are venemous.
According to experts, it is not unusual for snakes to hunt and eat other snakes.
The carnivorous reptiles can also eat prey much larger than themselves with relative ease due to their ability to dislocate their jaws and stretch their stomachs.
Bon appétit. | {
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Brazile triggered this bunch by writing in her memoirs that she came close to replacing Clinton as the Democratic nominee for president after Clinton collapsed on the campaign trail at a 9/11 commemoration in New York.
Democrats in the tank for Hillary Clinton are calling former acting Democratic National Committee chairwoman Donna Brazile a Putin stooge for the great crime of...observing the obvious about Hillary Clinton's health.
Now this:
Hillary Clinton's campaign is now calling Donna Brazile a Putin stooge. This is actually happening. https://t.co/rz5Pgigkws pic.twitter.com/YrPprKz5IK — David Sirota (@davidsirota) November 5, 2017
The tweet cites a recent statement from Hillary's campaign supporters, in "An Open Letter from HILLARY FOR AMERICA 2016 team," that debunked Brazile's new book about all the disorder in the failed Hillary campaign:
It is particularly troubling and puzzling that she would seemingly buy into false Russian-fueled propaganda, spread by both the Russians and our opponent, about our candidate's health.
Like much that comes from Team Hillary, it pretty well asks us to stretch our imaginations, believing the absurd as the truth.
Who could forget Hillary's famous collapse at the 9/11 memorial, when she got thrown like a sack of potatoes into her Secret Service van and lost her shoe? Who could forget the odd bathroom breaks that made her, like Tonya Harding with her unlaced boot, late for her televised debate with Bernie Sanders? Who could forget the repeated cough attacks? Who could forget the strange moments of drug-like mania at press conferences?
Or that Hillary still has yet to release her medical records? Or that Hillary left her job as secretary of state after a "fall" that put her in the hospital and that her husband, Bill Clinton, said needed a long recovery?
To question these things, in the minds of the Hillaryites, is to embrace Putinism, to believe Russian propaganda rather than believe one's own eyes.
It says a lot about why Hillary Clinton lost the election. She was never straight with people. And the number-one reason she failed to win over voters in places she refused to campaign in, perhaps for health reasons there, too, is that they couldn't see her as trustworthy.
Now anyone who thinks that, friend or foe, Republican or Democrat, is a Putin Stooge. Any questions as to why Hillary Clinton lost? | {
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Within three years cars sold in Europe will have automatic emergency braking and technology that spots when drivers are drowsy
All new cars will be fitted with devices that make sure they automatically keep to the speed limit in a move billed as the biggest overhaul of road safety in more than 50 years.
Within the next three years, models sold in Europe are expected to use technology that detects limits and slows down vehicles travelling too fast.
It will be one of 15 new safety features fitted as standard to cars, HGVs or buses. Other measures include technology that detects when drivers are losing concentration or falling asleep, a system that keeps cars in the centre of lanes and accident black boxes that record vehicle movements.
All cars will also be fitted with automatic emergency braking, which brings vehicles to a stop when pedestrians | {
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Verwarm de oven voor op 200 °C. Haal de bladeren van de bloemkool en snijd de stronk eraf. Leg de bloemkool in de ovenschaal en besprenkel met de olie. Rooster de bloemkool 45 min. in het midden van de oven.
Neem de bloemkool uit de oven en laat minimaal 10 min. afkoelen. Bestrijk de hele bloemkool rondom met de tomatentapenade. Pak de bloemkool in met het bladerdeeg en leg terug in de ovenschaal. Bak nog 40 min. in het midden van de oven. | {
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A year ago, President Obama gestured toward the first lady’s box at the State of the Union address at Eric Schneiderman, the attorney general of New York. Schneiderman had just agreed to co-chair the Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities working group, an initiative between state and federal law enforcement officials and bank regulators, designed to investigate and prosecute fraudulent Wall Street activity that led to both the creation of the housing bubble and its collapse. In exchange, Schneiderman dropped his objections to a settlement over some of the banks’ fraudulent post-crash activity, particularly around fraud in foreclosure processing.
Recent profiles of this event have called last night’s State of the Union the “anniversary” of the formation of the working group. But you can’t really have an anniversary of something that never existed in the first place. There never was a Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities working group, never a so-called task force dedicated to ferreting out Wall Street fraud -- the deceptive origination of mortgage loans, sale of worthless mortgage-backed securities for huge sums, and subsequent unloading of toxic debt to unsuspecting buyers. The working group fails to exist as a tangible entity to this day. What does exist is the same years-old Financial Fraud Enforcement Group that serves as a conduit for press releases about investigative actions already in progress.
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Schneiderman’s “task force” (a generous appellation) was merely a politically motivated shell organization grafted onto that public relations strategy. This was evident almost from the moment of the announcement, but the coalition of self-proclaimed bank accountability advocates, who had backed the administration into a corner over the lack of prosecutions, decided to align with Schneiderman and his kabuki task force, losing whatever leverage they may have had. If those same groups who feel “betrayed” and “lied to” had stayed on the outside and shamed those in power into action, we would probably have more accountability today.
Within a few months of the State of the Union announcement, a hearing in the House Financial Services Committee confirmed the essentially invisible nature of the task force. Maxine Waters, then a senior member of the committee and now the Democratic ranking member, asked Robert Khuzami, then the head of enforcement for the Securities and Exchange Commission, whether the entity had sufficient resources to investigate. Khuzami replied that the agencies involved – the SEC, the New York AG’s office and the Department of Justice – were supplying the resources. No new dollars were dedicated to the effort. When Waters asked when the task force would hire an executive director, Khuzami said they hired a “coordinator” to facilitate inter-agency activity. Specifically, he uttered this incriminating evidence: “We hired a coordinator, but most of the investigative work being done here is not really being done by a staff that belongs to the task force, it’s being done by the individual investigative groups that make up the task force.”
This is the key point. There are no offices, no phones and no staff dedicated to the non-task force. Two of the five co-chairs have left government. What “investigators” there are from the task force are nothing more than liaisons to the independent agencies doing their own independent investigations. In the rare event that these agencies file an actual lawsuit or enforcement action, the un-task force merely puts out a statement taking credit for it. Take a look at this in action at the website for the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, the federal umbrella group “investigating” financial fraud. It’s little more than a press release factory, and no indictment, conviction or settlement is too small. The site takes credit for cracking down on Ponzi schemes, insider trading, tax evasion, racketeering, violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act (!) and a host of other crimes that have precisely nothing to do with the financial crisis. To call this a publicity stunt is an insult to publicity stunts.
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Consider the first of the few major cases to specifically come out under the aegis of the RMBS working group. New York A.G. Schneiderman brought a suit against JPMorgan Chase over Bear Stearns’ fraudulent misrepresentations of mortgage-backed securities to investors. The case, filed nine months from the start of the non-task force (but, strategically, one month before the presidential election), borrowed liberally from private litigation brought against Bear Stearns two years ago by the mortgage bond insurer Ambac. The lawyer who authored that case, Karla Sanchez, left Ambac’s law firm, Patterson Bellknap Webb and Tyler, and went to work as an executive deputy attorney general for one Eric Schneiderman. In other words, the big case from the vaunted “task force” was basically written two years earlier, by a lawyer working in Schneiderman’s office, with virtually no new information added to the claims. Schneiderman could have filed this case any day over the last two years, without a scintilla of outside participation. Subsequent cases also appear cribbed from either private litigation or existing investigations, and include little that’s new or noteworthy.
This P.R. effort served the interests of everyone involved except the interests of justice. The Obama administration desperately wanted to complete the settlement with the biggest banks over the ongoing activity of foreclosure fraud, and wanted to get a growing outcry for holding bank fraud accountable under control before the election. Schneiderman wanted the president’s seal of approval, and to project a positive image among progressives for “going after” the banks. The banks wanted to settle as much of their liability as possible, protecting their profits and keeping executives out of jail. They all got what they wanted.
The progressive groups who paid lip service to seeking bank accountability didn’t get what they claimed to want. But they should have thought of that before jumping in with Schneiderman and offering unreserved praise for the un-task force before it even began to reveal itself as a fake. The day of the announcement, the Campaign for America’s Future, MoveOn.org, the New Bottom Line, the AFL-CIO, the Campaign for a Fair Settlement and more all sent out glowing press releases touting the president’s leadership and the tremendous opportunity presented by the task force. MoveOn called it “the biggest victory yet for the 99%.” This was farcical. The announcement collapsed the unified front against the foreclosure fraud settlement, which has delivered little meaningful relief to families and no accountability to Wall Street. The task force never even got started. These groups are now justifying their misjudgment by claiming Schneiderman “got played.” Schneiderman doesn’t see it that way; he said definitively that he would leave the task force if he found it unworkable, and yet he’s not only sticking around but approvingly speaking of its efforts. Someone got played, but it wasn’t Eric Schneiderman.
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Maybe these groups who claim to be interested in accountability should have recognized the value of what pressured the White House to set up the diversionary tactic of a task force in the first place: public shaming. Last month’s Frontline documentary "The Untouchables" has had arguably more of an impact on reviving moribund financial fraud cases than anything else. Within a couple of weeks of its premiere, the head of the criminal enforcement division, Lanny Breuer, announced he would step down. Then, DoJ suddenly decided to sue credit rating agency Standard and Poor’s over its conflict of interest in rating clearly fraudulent securities as safe assets, a case it had been investigating for two years. You can view this as an accident of timing; it seems more like a direct response. Shaming has done far more than a pretend task force, though that’s admittedly a low bar. You would think outside pressure groups would have recognized the virtue of outside pressure instead of trying to play an inside game.
President Obama didn’t mention the task force in this year’s State of the Union, though he did say that homeowners now “enjoy stronger protections than ever before.” He also made reference to a Burmese man, who, in reference to a presidential visit to Rangoon, reportedly said, “There is justice and law in the United States. I want our country to be like that.” Hopefully they don’t get news about the “task force” in Rangoon; I wouldn’t want to burst the man’s dreams. | {
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Gastkommentar Wider den Cyber-Analphabetismus Das Internet ist kein auf Dauer angelegter Wissensspeicher. Zu behaupten, es ersetze vollständig die Bibliotheken, ist Schildbürgerei.
Das Internet ist weder eine Bibliothek noch ein Speicher und erst recht keine Datenbank. (Bild: Imago)
Vor etwa dreihundert Jahren prophezeite der geniale Mathematiker, Philosoph und Bibliothekar Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, dass in tausend Jahren unsere Bibliotheken so gross sein würden wie ganze Staaten. Damals wurden auf dem Gebiete Deutschlands jährlich vielleicht 1500 neue Bücher gedruckt, aber diese Zunahme beunruhigte bereits Gelehrte und Bibliothekare. | {
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Construction workers tear down a wall of the former Red Lion Hotel Vancouver at the Quay. The Port of Vancouver is planning to replace it with a new hotel and possibly a public market as they work with the city to redevelop the waterfront. Molly Solomon / OPB
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Just under the Interstate 5 bridge on the Washington side of the Columbia river, clouds of dust from debris rise above the former Red Lion Hotel Vancouver at the Quay. Two giant excavators are hard at work tearing down what remains of the local landmark.
The hotel itself has only been here since the 1970’s, but almost everybody in town has a memory of it, including Abbi Russell, communications manager for the Port of Vancouver.
“I have a family member that has a business that used to have Christmas parties here. My husband and I looked at it when we were planning our wedding. My best friend waited tables here in high school,” said Russell as she snapped photos on the hotel’s demolition day. “We all have some kind of connection.”
The former Red Lion Hotel Vancouver at the Quay was located just west of the Interstate 5 bridge. The hotel was torn down in March 2017 to make way for new development on the city's waterfront. Molly Solomon / OPB
The city's waterfront is just a couple minutes from Esther Short Park and the heart of downtown Vancouver. But the two areas could not be more different. Large swaths of land along the water are still largely industrial or completely vacant. New plans to transform the space could fulfill a long-delayed dream to revitalize the waterfront. The city is hoping the new development will draw tourists and new residents to the growing southwest Washington region.
“It’s going to be a destination both for tourists and businesses alike, as well as residents of the community,” said John McDonagh, the president and CEO of the Greater Vancouver Chamber of Commerce. “They’re going to have access to the riverfront along there in a way that they haven’t had in decades.”
The land slated for development is an area called Terminal 1, a piece of property that the Port has owned since 1926. The building was originally a warehouse that moved goods made in the Pacific Northwest. Everything from lumber and wood products to grains and prunes were exported from the docks and shipped across the country.
“What we had essentially as the front door to the state of Washington, to Clark County, and the city of Vancouver, was an industrial face,” said McDonagh.
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McDonagh believes the waterfront makeover represents a shift toward a younger and cooler Vancouver. Just as Portland revitalized formerly industrial neighborhoods, like the South Waterfront and the Pearl District, Vancouver is hoping to capitalize on its prime real estate on the Columbia River.
Big changes are on the horizon for the Vancouver waterfront. Plans by Gramor Development include new restaurants and bars, a waterfront pier, and more than 3,000 new residential units. Courtesy of Gramor Development
Plans for the Port property call for a new hotel, and possibly a public market space. Down the road, the city of Vancouver has already broken ground on 32 acres of waterfront land. They’re working with Gramor Development on the $1.5 billion project. New restaurants and bars, a waterfront pier, and more than 3,000 new residential units are in the works. McDonagh says all of this, combined with the recent renaissance downtown, is changing Vancouver’s sense of place.
“Place gets defined by those restaurants with a cool vibe, or taprooms, or brewpubs. And I think Vancouver is aware of that,” he said. “And with the influx of young millennials looking for that place, I think the marketplace is responding.”
No Longer 'Little Old Vancouver':
For decades, Vancouver lived in the shadow of its neighbor across the river, Portland.
A view of the Port of Vancouver from the I-5 bridge in 1968. The area along the waterfront was largely industrial but is now gearing up for commercial development along the river. Courtesy fo the Port of Vancouver
“Vancouver as a community had an inferiority complex – 'Oh well, we’re just little old Vancouver,'” said downtown resident Pat Jollata. “That’s changing now.”
Jollata, a former Vancouver city councilwoman for two decades, says the city has grown a lot since she and her husband moved here in 1982. The downtown renaissance has brought hip restaurants and bars to her neighborhood. She thinks the new waterfront will only improve the city’s identity and help attract people to the Washington side of the river.
“It’s a great transition and people are really drawn to the water,” Jollata said. “And the younger people want to live in a downtown. There is a feeling of being where everything is going on.”
But she says, as a historian, it can sometimes be difficult to see familiar places like the Red Lion come down.
“You always hate to see things go away,” she said. “But I know that what’s going to come will be better than what was there.” | {
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By Brian “Pac” Sostak
We here at Chris Peteresen’s Film Blog try to cover as much movie news and as many film genres as we can while providing our unique and sometimes humorous perspective to what we see in the news and on the screen. However, since our inception there has been one genre that we have vastly overlooked and have sometimes been criticized for neglecting; the romantic comedy. Well I am here today to put an end to the negativity directed toward our site. “How are you going to accomplish this?” you might ask; simple, by redirecting it toward the genre itself.
I was asked recently why I disliked romantic comedies and as a serious film enthusiast I wanted to provide an educated and well thought answer; so here it is. The romantic comedy is completely shallow, unrealistic, and is doing everything in its power to ruin the real life relationships of its viewers. While that answer may not sound very educated or well thought, I do have some concepts to support that argument, five of them in fact.
5. Extravagance is Expensive
Ladies, have you ever watched a romantic comedy and sat in awe as the leading man performs some giant romantic gesture to win the leading lady’s heart and thought, “I wish someone would do that for me.” Men, have you ever sat through the scene of the same film and thought to yourself…
Simply put ladies, extravagance is expensive. The men on the movie screens can afford to put together these expensive and/or elaborate gestures to win the hearts of their women (and the women watching) because Hollywood is funding their cause. Us normal men, who may love our women just as equally, can’t afford to pull out all the stops to rent out Tiffany’s for a night; and if we could, the conclusion of our date would probably have to go a little something like this…
Take The Notebook for example, Ryan Gosling’s character (Noah) bought Allie’s (Rachel McAdams) dream home using his GI bill from WWII and an approved government loan. In 1947 the GI bill guaranteed approval for a home loan and provided $20/week of unemployment to ex military. The average salary in 1947 was $3,500 annually and the average price of a home in 1947 was around $13,000, meaning that this romantic gesture cost Noah at least 4 years of his annual salary.
Greatest Offender:
Then there is Love Actually, possibly the worst at depicting the grand gesture and you may not even realize it. There’s the writer, Jamie (Colin Firth) who retires to his French cottage and hires a Portuguese housekeeper, Aurelia (Lúcia Moniz). When he realizes he is in love with Aurelia, he learns Portuguese and travels to Portugal to propose to her, also stating that he is willing to relocate to be with her – a costly gesture.
And how about Sam (Thomas Brodie-Sangster), with encouragement from his stepfather Daniel (Liam Neeson) he breaks countless federal laws in an airport to profess his love to Joanna. Federal court, lawyers, fines, they can all add up to a lot of money to make a romantic gesture; not mention Sam was around 10 years old!
Hell he already purchased and learned how to play drums for this girl, now he’s committing federal crimes in an airport 2 years after 9/11 (release date: 11/14/2003). All for a girl in his class, do you remember the girl (or boy) you had a mad crush on in elementary school? Me neither.
4. Life is not Scripted
Now the ladies reading this might be thinking to themselves, “It’s not the dollar amount that makes the gesture worthwhile, it’s the amount of effort and thought that lets us know you care.”
So what about the gestures that don’t cost much, but took time to plan; or the sweet and romantic things the leading man says to his love during the third act? Why doesn’t your man do that for you? Simple, because he doesn’t have a team full of screenwriters and Hollywood magic to help him come up with these brilliant plans. Romantic Comedies, like any other fantasy film, relies on a tool so integral to movie magic that most films wouldn’t exist without it, the suspension of disbelief. Basically, the chances of things working out the way they do on-screen to favor the movement of the plot (and often the survival of a character) are astronomical and the filmmakers are asking the audience to just go with it.
This works great for an action movie because no one in the audience really expects that stuff to happen in real life. Who among you reading this really believes that Jason Statham can survive falling out of a plane with no parachute? If it weren’t for suspension of disbelief Crank: High Voltage wouldn’t exist.
The problem with suspension of disbelief in romantic comedies is that the plot doesn’t involve falling out of airplanes with no parachutes or surviving exploding vehicles, it involves love notes and elaborate plans, something completely plausible (but still unrealistic in real life).
Greatest Offender:
No other RomCom suspends disbelief greater than P.S I Love You. Even if you can get over the fact that Hilary Swank is capable of marrying a ripped Irishman, is able to take months off of work to fulfill the plot (after complaining about money early in the film), and that Gerard Butler would be totally cool with his wife sleeping with his best “chum”, there is still so much more unbelievable plot devices that drive this movie.
P.S. I Love You is about a widow (Hilary Swank) who receives various notes from her recently deceased husband that are encouraging her to move on with her life and pursue happiness. That’s right, her dead husband. Now these letters aren’t coming to Holly (Hilary Swank) in some supernatural way, that’d be too believable. Gerry (Gerard Butler) orchestrated the delivery of all of these letters to come at the perfect time before he died, though he did convince his mother in-law (who disliked him) to assist in the delivery.
So what this film is assuming is that Gerry, while suffering from a brain tumor, was able to orchestrate the timing and delivery of various letters to his wife from around the world and assume that she’d fulfill each of his wishes at the exact time he planned? Just in case this still seems believable, here are some of the symptoms of a brain tumor:
Severe Headaches
Seizures
Mental and/or Personality Changes
Mass Effect
Ringing/Buzzing and Hearing Loss
Decreased Muscle Control
Lack of Coordination
Weakness or Paralysis
Difficulty Walking, speaking, balancing, and seeing clearly
Still, this guy had the time and energy to visit his local travel agent and plan a trip to Ireland for his wife and her two friends?
3. Love at First Sight is NOT real
No other topic on this list irritates me as much as this one when it comes to Romantic Comedies, and one that is most often used. Girl meets Boy, Girl overcomes personal obstacle to be with Boy, Boy screws up, but their love overcomes and they end up together – in the span of a week.
Sure this happens more often in teen RomComs, and to be honest every high school romance feels like it’s life or death, but this concept isn’t exclusive to 17 year olds. Pretty Woman, What Women Want, Love Actually, and Hitch are 4 of the top 16 grossing romantic comedies (I’ve only seen 10 of 16, wow that’s too many) and they all follow this very premise: Love at First Sight. These films perpetuate the concept that once you meet the man (or woman) of your dreams you will instantly know and your love will overcome all odds.
It is almost comedic to me to watch on-screen as the two main characters (who’ve been together 2 weeks) embrace in a moment where everything else seemingly disappears and then one of them utters: “I love you”. This never happens in real life, there are only two instances when one person tells the other that they love them after two weeks:
A man tells a woman he loves her after two weeks because despite all of his previous efforts he has been unable to go “all the way”.
A woman tells a man that she loves him after two weeks because she is crazy, obsessive, possessive, and/or depressed.
You want a more realistic scenario of what would happen if a man told a woman that he loved her after such a short period of time, watch this:
Greatest Offender:
Leap Year is on my short list of the worst films of 2010 and for good reason; it is the poster child for Love at First Sight. In Leap Year, after Anna Brady (Amy Adams) is not proposed to by her boyfriend Jeremy (Adam Scott), her father tells her about this old Irish tradition where a woman can propose to a man in Ireland on February 29th. By great coincidence, God happened to add an extra day, February 29th, to the 2010 calendar (the next leap year isn’t until 2012) and Jeremy will just happen to be in Ireland on business. So Anna, with the help of her drunk father, gets the bright idea to travel to Ireland, find her husband and propose to him.
Now here’s where it really gets ridiculous. When her plane is forced to land in Wales, Anna employs the services of Declan (Matthew Goode) to escort her to Dublin so she can propose. Of course Declan says yes because he is a deadbeat bar owner with no money and is in debt up to his ears. Apparently none of that matters because he is Irish and when Amy Adams finally gets to her boyfriend Jeremy, she realizes she’s in love with Declan. (SPOILER ALERT) Anna decides to leave her boyfriend and travel to Ireland where Declan promptly proposes to her. If you want to watch a film where the good guy gets completely screwed and the villain walks away with the girl, then Leap Year is for you. This dude Jeremy waits just a few days too long to propose and his girl is stolen by some Irish bum with a ton of debt. This is the moral of Leap Year, propose to your girl ASAP.
2. Lust at First Sight IS real
It is easy to assume that the filmmakers just interpret the feeling of lust and associate with the feeling of love. If it were that easily explained then I wouldn’t be writing this column, but they seem to have love and lust completely backwards. Hollywood spits out films like Leap Year, where a girl goes to Ireland and falls more in love with a complete stranger than her own long time boyfriend in 5 days, but they also spit out films where “Plain Jane” pines over the stud for years and years finally to win over his heart. This is completely ass-backwards and it all plays into the fantasy that a woman will find the man of his dreams. Ladies, here is how you will end up with the man of your dreams:
You meet a tall, dark, and handsome man who is sweet enough to love but rugged enough to drive you crazy, and you love it. You will both know instantly that you’re in love but aren’t willing to admit it until some obstacle forces you to come to terms with your love. And he has an accent. You will meet the most popular, best looking, ripped, and richest man in the city and all the women want him, including his incredibly gorgeous girlfriend who he’s been with for years. However, after years of pining after him and acting like an idiot every time he’s around, he’ll realize that his perfect life and perfect woman isn’t perfect after all and he’ll leave all that behind to be with you. He may also have an accent.
Sounds great doesn’t it, too bad it’s all B.S. In reality (as any woman’s magazine will tell you), a woman will know within 5 seconds of sizing up a man whether or not she would sleep with him; for men it takes about 4.9 seconds less. That means that if you are waiting around for the guy of your dreams to notice your wit and charm, you’re probably missing out on a bunch of other, more compatible men for someone that will never be interested.
If you really want to get the attention of the one you’ve been lusting for all these years, the one you’d live happily ever after with if they’d just notice you, here’s a real life way to do it:
Women: consult a plastic surgeon
Men: get a better job
or get famous (applies to both)
Lust and sexual attraction is a shallow emotion, and if the movies aren’t willing to admit that fact I’ll be more than happy to do so. You can even call me a jerk if you want; the movies say that makes me more desirable.
Greatest Offender:
For a Romantic Comedy that was supposed to set the record straight on the real-life scenarios of love, He’s Just Not That Into You really dropped the ball on this one. Let me preface this by saying that I actually enjoyed this movie, and the characters I’m discussing for this topic are among my favorite in the film, but Gigi (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Alex (Justin Long) embody everything that is wrong with Lust at First Sight in the movies. Gigi meets Alex at the bar he manages while essentially stalking Alex’s friend Conor (Kevin Connolly). Gigi turns to Alex for advice on how to handle men and he provides her with advice such as “if a guy is treating you like he doesn’t give a sh**, he genuinely doesn’t give a sh**” and “you’re not the exception to the rule, you are the rule”. But after her pining over his best friend, then her pining over him he finally decides to go to her and say “You’re my exception”.
Instantly, the film just turned its back on everything it had been preaching for the past ninety minutes. It masqueraded as the truth and revealed itself to be just another run of the mill chick flick where against all odds boy falls for girl. I enjoy this film, but I want to hate it so bad because it is corrupting the minds of impressionable women everywhere. Just when they are on the verge of being convinced that life is not a fairy tale and as the title goes, He’s Just Not That Into You… Sike, he’s totally into you! You’re obsessive and stalkerish and often have emotional breakdowns, but there’s something he sees in you that he didn’t before and it is the one thing that was keeping him from loving you before.
Give me a break. I couldn’t even think of any images to accentuate the ridiculousness of this concept, it stands well enough on its own. And finally, the one thing that most all RomComs get wrong…
1. Happily Ever After DOES NOT Exist
Not in the manner it’s portrayed in these films anyway. Look, I’m not a cynic, I’m a realist; don’t peg me as being the a single and lonely man who is bitter about his love life, that’s not me. I’m even willing to admit to the 500 people who read this column (If I’m lucky) that I am in love with an incredible and beautiful woman (if it weren’t for these movies that gesture would seem romantic). But like I said, I’m a realist and love is hard, and life is even harder; it is filled with arguments, and compromise, and budgets, and accidents, and 9-5 jobs, and illness, and a whole lot more. Romantic Comedies don’t want to show you the tough side of happily ever after because it is not glamorous and it isn’t part of the fantasy that drew you to the theater in the first place.
You want so badly to believe that if you have love that nothing else matters and everything else will just fall into place. Unfortunately, that is not how it works and if Romantic Comedies evolved past “the honeymoon phase” of relationships we’d see that, if we actually went to see that movie.
Greatest Offender
This is the second time referencing this film, but I haven’t seen too many Romantic Comedies, they’re not my taste if you haven’t noticed. However, my greatest offender of the “happily ever after” complex is Sweet Home Alabama. Once again we have a girl, Melanie (Reese Witherspoon), who leaves her fiancé (Patrick Dempsey) to be with her husband (Josh Lucas) whom she already left once for being a loser. However, this time around Josh has made something of himself by taking glass he finds and selling it at an incredible mark-up. Not to mention, Andrew (Dempsey) is totally cool with her following her heart and living happily ever after with some other guy.
I’d like to pause from my current argument and point out something that most of the ladies who have seen this movie willfully overlook, Melanie is a gold digging slut. She got knocked up by her popular football playing boyfriend in high school and left him because he didn’t make anything of himself. She then went to NY to get famous and get engaged to a wealthy politician (who knows what/who she did in the meantime). Finally, she returned to Alabama to discover that the original guy, who she liked more but was a loser, has his own business, so she leaves the politician for the entrepreneur.
Most romantic comedies, including Sweet Home Alabama conclude with the two lovers getting together and supposedly living happily ever after, they fail to even montage what the rest of their relationship is like, leaving naïve viewers to believe that love is like that all the time, it’s not. Let me show you the synopsis of the proposed (by me) sequel to Sweet Home Alabama, it’s called Sweet Home Alabama: Double Wide.
After being left at the alter, Andrew Hennings (Patrick Dempsey) redirects his focus to politics. After becoming president and marrying Ms. America, he deems the beaches in Alabama a national park, forbidding Melanie’s husband Jake (Josh Lucas) from creating lightning glass, according to federal law. Because he’s a redneck, Jake ignores the law and continues to make glass until he’s struck by lightning and killed. Jake’s insurance didn’t cover his death because he was breaking federal law so Melanie (Witherspoon) and her two kids are forced to move back in with her parents; but it’s ok, they have a double-wide (chuckle b/c it’s in the title). Strapped for cash, Melanie is forced to go back to work as a fashion designer and re-realizes her dream as she designs a line exclusively for K-Mart, Sears, and Bass ProShops.
Perhaps Jake sends Melanie a case of beer from the afterlife, how romantic.
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Article content continued
The company didn’t elaborate then on what exactly it considers a prosumer to be but during a recent demo of its new Z30 smartphone, which was released in Canada this week, two spokesmen defined the customer type and why they might choose a BlackBerry.
“Their sole purpose is that this is primarily a communications device and a productivity machine,” said Michael Clewley, director of handheld software product management, while holding up his BlackBerry.
“While applications are good to have in some respects they’re not primary or sometimes even secondary for that type of user. And if they do use applications they’re using very targeted specific applications, they’re not spending a lot of time in the storefront browsing for the latest or greatest or trying to find out what’s hot and stuff like that. They’re going to look for apps that help get the job done for them.”
Todd Wood, senior vice president of design, said some think the “pro” in prosumer stands for professional, but it can also be short for producer.
“They create more content than they consume, in most cases, and arguably that was the original definition of prosumer,” said Wood.
“There’s a set of BlackBerry users that really think of themselves as enterprises in and of themselves so they want to choose a more professional or semi-professional device.”
Clewley did emphasize that the company hasn’t given up on trying to land some of the biggest apps, including Netflix and Instagram. He said the new build of BlackBerry’s operating system, 10.2, incorporates the latest version of Google’s Android platform, which should lead to more Android apps getting repurposed for BlackBerry users.
“What we find is developers who bring their apps to BlackBerry 10 actually see a good uptake of those applications but you’ve got to sort of win them over,” Clewley said.
“So I think we’re doing things to help users get the more fun applications or the media-type applications and we’re continuing to drive and go after important productivity focused applications.” | {
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Republicans have only five weeks to reach a spending deal with Democrats, but an aggressive focus on tax reform during that period is putting the effort in doubt.
Congressional Republicans want to pass a tax bill by Thanksgiving, and President Trump wants to sign it by Christmas. Right in the middle of that stretch lies the Dec. 8 deadline to pass legislation funding the government.
If Republicans and Democrats can't agree to a new spending plan, or at least a stopgap measure that Democrats say they don't want, the government will shut down.
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“I want to get this all wrapped up by Christmas. It wouldn’t surprise me if we’re not done with everything on the 9th,” said Rep. Tom Cole Thomas (Tom) Jeffrey ColeBottom line House approves .3 trillion spending package for 2021 Multiple lawmakers self-quarantine after exposure to Gohmert MORE (R-Okla.), a key member of the House Appropriations Committee.
Complicating things further, even a short-term deal to push back the Dec. 8 deadline wouldn’t buy lawmakers much time.
In mid-January, budgetary caps will kick in and cause across-the-board cuts to government spending. The Treasury Department estimated there would also be a January deadline for raising the debt ceiling.
But the push for tax reform is expected to be all-consuming, pushing the funding issues aside.
House Republicans delayed the release of the bill by one day this week as they worked out internal differences. They hope to start marking up the bill in committee next week and pass it the following week on the House floor, despite internal opposition to provisions dealing with state and local taxes.
The Senate is planning to release its own tax bill, which is expected to have significant differences from the House’s version. They aim to pass that bill before Thanksgiving as well.
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Both chambers take a recess the week of Thanksgiving, further squeezing the legislative timeline.
When lawmakers return, they will have just two weeks until the Dec. 8 deadline, which has sparked some talk of passing a continuing resolution (CR), a stopgap measure that keeps government funding unchanged. Republican leadership is even considering pushing the whole debate into February, a last resort that Democrats oppose.
“I have heard rumors that we would set aside negotiating an omnibus and do a CR instead because Republicans are so hellbent on passing tax cuts for the wealthiest and corporations that they simply don’t have time to walk and chew gum at the same time,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) a member of the House Appropriations Committee.
A central obstacle is that work on spending bills cannot proceed until Democratic and Republican leaders agree on a top-line spending number, and it’s unclear where the starting point for negotiations is.
“The quicker they can get us a set of numbers, the quicker we can resolve through and start checking things off, and then we’re just down to a few big items,” Cole said.
Republicans have put out three separate top-line proposals in the past six months: President Trump’s proposal that would increase defense spending and cut non-defense discretionary spending by $54 billion each; a House budget that would slash non-defense spending by $5 billion dollars while raising defense a whopping $72 billion; and the final budget, which originated in the Senate, keeping spending levels steady.
Republicans such as Sen. John McCain John Sidney McCainMcSally says current Senate should vote on Trump nominee Say what you will about the presidential candidates, as long as it isn't 'They're too old' The electoral reality that the media ignores MORE (R-Ariz.) are itching to get higher defense spending, arguing that current spending levels were to blame for recent non-combat troop deaths.
"We are killing more of our people in training than our enemies are in combat," McCain recently said on the Senate floor.
But Democrats are vying for equal increases to non-defense spending.
“Our red line is that we’re going to insist if you increase spending for defense, that you also increase spending for non-defense,” said Rep. John Yarmuth John Allen YarmuthGOP, White House struggle to unite behind COVID-19 relief House seeks ways to honor John Lewis Karen Bass's star rises after leading police reform push MORE (D-Ky.), ranking member of the House Budget Committee.
Democrats are also trying to use the must-pass omnibus to address issues such as DACA, the cancelled program that protects immigrants brought illegally to the U.S. as children, as well as several other priorities.
“We also have to make sure we pass DACA and raise the debt ceiling, all of those things have to happen. And doing those in a CR environment are more challenging,” said Wasserman Schultz.
But some Republicans remain bullish on the chances of getting a spending deal in time, despite the obstacles.
“We feel like we do have ample time even though the window is closing to get this across the finish line,” said Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.), the head of the influential Republican Study Committee.
“When there’s a sense of urgency, things have a way of expediting,” he added. | {
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Build 2016 is finished and as always it was great to see Microsoft bringing new opportunities to businesses and developers. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to attend, but luckily, the live stream of all the important sessions, especially for the keynotes, made up for that. These are the announcements that excited me the most.
Microsoft Bot Framework
Completely unexpected but a very cool way of building new applications and solutions. The idea behind the bot framework is to use conversations as an application framework. The big challenge for developers is to make the interaction with bots as natural as possible. To that end, Microsoft is offering a framework plus a set of intelligence services such as speech and text recognition and a wide variety of other cognitive services. This should enable developers to build clever bots that can automate the things we do on websites at the moment. I’m not sure it will replace websites anytime soon as Microsoft claims, but it definitely has some benefits over traditional applications. User interface design becomes kind of obsolete, and if you think about it, we have been using language to communicate our intentions forever, so if we can properly crack the key to that, we could see very interesting applications.
Obviously Microsoft wouldn’t be Microsoft if they didn’t connect their existing services to this new framework. Skype and Cortana will be tied in and soon you’ll see new integrations pop up in these tools.
Bash on Windows
A few years ago, the good old April’s fool day joke would be Microsoft releasing a Linux distro or working together with Linux and open source in general. The news is the same, only this time it’s for real. Through an integration with native Ubuntu binaries, windows developers can now use long known bash tools such as grep, awk, sed, … This definitely opens up a lot of possibilities, not in the least for making it easier to follow online tutorials.
HoloLens
Already announced earlier this year, but now it’s for real: the HoloLens dev-kit is now going out to developers. We’ve seen some impressive demos from Microsoft so far, but now it will be interesting to see what the rest of the world can do with it. This is the first real test for HoloLens. If it really is that impressive as the demos we saw from Microsoft, we’re up for some mind blowing applications in the next couple of months. Furthermore, because of a few design changes on the actual headset, users who tried it out reported a better field of view, which was one of the points of critique up until now.
Azure is getting bigger
Azure already consists of a huge set of services that make the life of developers easier. At Build 2016, Microsoft added a bunch of new services to grow Azure even more. These were all announced:
Azure IoT Starter Kits are now available for purchase from partners
Azure IoT Hub device management and Gateway SDK will be available later in Q2
A new service, Azure Functions is now in preview
DocumentDb supports a MongoDb protocol now
Azure Developer Tools
Microsoft Cognitive Services is in preview
Xamarin
Probably the most awaited announcement. As everyone was hoping, Xamarin will now come bundled with Visual Studio. That’s great news for developers that were using the paid version before as it was quite expensive. Not only does it come with paid versions of Visual Studio but also with the free community edition. To top it off, they also announced open sourcing the Xamarin core SDK. These announcements were certainly above expectations. While everyone was hoping for the Visual Studio bundling, no one dared to hope for inclusion in the free product and even less on having it available as open source.
Desktop App Converter
While one of the big disappointments of the last months was the discontinuation of the Android porting project, project Astoria, Microsoft now did release another porting tool, this time to convert Win32 application to UWP. Any app based on Win32 and .NET can be converted to the AppX format. Furthermore, work is still continuing on project Islandwood, the porting tool for iOS apps. Let’s hope these converters can make a dent in the app gap.
What are you planning to do with these new services? | {
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HeyyLovense:Interactive Toy that vibrates with your Tips #lovense #anal #squirt #latina #deepthroat #feet #OhMiBod | {
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Naravno da ću na koncertu pjevati Čavoglave. To je pjesma koja je i iz Domovinskog rata, pjesma o mojim prijateljima, suborcima, i ona ni o čemu nije sporna. Ona je svjedok vremena, svjedok kad se stvarala hrvatska država. I svi oni koji su tada pratili Čavoglave i druge naše pjesme iz Domovinskog rata su svjedoci istine.
Dakle, pjesma Čavoglave dan danas budi sjećanja na Domovinski trat, dane kada smo stvarali hrvatsku državu - kazao je Marko Perković Thompson na konferenciji za novinare održanoj u prostorijama Udruge četvrte gardijske brigade i Udruge specijalne jedinice iz Domovinskog rata BATT – Split, na kojoj je govorio u samostalnom koncertu kojeg će održati na splitskoj Rivi u nedjelju, navaečerr, 4. kolovoza, večer uoči Dana pobjede, Dana domovinske zahvalnosti i Dana Hravtskih branitelja
Thompson je zahvalio Koordinaciji braniteljskih udruga, Gradu Splitu i Županiji splitsko-dalmatinskoj što su ga pozvali i sudjelovali u organizaciji koncerta.
Koncert će početi u 21 i 30 sati. Nakon njegovog završetka bit će organiziran veličanstveni vatromet.
Upitan sudeluje li u predsjedničkoj kampanji Kolinde Grabar – Kitarović, Marko Perković je to zanijekao:
– Ne sudjelujem niti u jednoj kampanji, niti je to od mene tko tražio, pa tako ni u kampanji Kolinde Grabar – Kitarović. A na vaše pitanje, hoće li ona doći u nedjelju na koncert, to ne znam, nemam informaciju hoće li doći.
Upitan kako komentira predjedničku kampanju svoga kuma Miroslava Škore, Marko Perković je to odbio.
– Da bilo što kažem, svatko bi to protumačio na svoj način, pa bolje da to preskočimo - kazao je Marko Perković.
Kazao je da ne podržava niti jednog kandidata u kampanji, da nije član niti jedne stranke i da se ne osjeća ikonom desnice te da je manipulacija dovođenje u kontekst s početkom kampanje predsjednice Kolinde Grabar Kitarović.
– Što se tiče Čavoglava, našu priču oko proslave Dana pojede, Dana domovinske zahvalnosti i Dana hrvatskih branitelja ćemo opet vratit u Čavoglave, iduće, 2020. godine, jer su me to dosta tražili mnogi prijatelji, koji godinama tvrde da nastup u Čavoglava ima poseban ambijent. I to sam prihvatio – istaknuo je Marko Perković.
Odbio je odgovarati na pojedine novinarske upite oko cijene koncerta u na splitskoj Rivi. Na to je odgovorio njegov menadžer Denis Pletikosa.
– Sve je u okviru troškova Grada predviđenih za proslavu, koji su 400 tisuća kuna plus PDV – kazao je Pletikosa.
Inače, voditelj osiguranja cijelog događaja bit će Mladan Šiško, predsjednik Hvidre Split.
- Kad je Oluja u pitanju, mi Hrvati smo jedinstveni. Što se tiče samog sigurnosnog apekta, mogu kazati da je angažiran dovoljan broj redara i zaštitara, jer se očekuje dolazak velikog broja posjetitelja, budući da će Markov koncert koji se održava u slopu proslave Oluje biti festival domoljublja, ljubavi i zajedništva. Ljudi koji će biti osiguranju nisu nikakav represivni aparat, nego ljudi koji će biti na usluzi svima koji budu na splitskoj Rivi – kazao je Šiško. | {
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MADISON (WKOW) – While it’s up to the plows to clean off roads, it’s your responsibility to take care of your sidewalks.
“If your sidewalk is ice-covered and slippery, and people are going to fall and get hurt on it, that’s a very serious issue,” said George Hank, who oversees Madison’s department that handles dangerous sidewalk complaints.
He says his department has received more than 350 complaints this year of dangerous sidewalks, most from the last two storms.
The city ordinance says snow must be removed from sidewalks by noon the day after it stops snowing. With the most recent Madison storm, that deadline was noon Thursday.
“If they don’t want to shovel the sidewalk going up to their front door, that’s not part of the ordinance,” Hank said. “It’s just the public sidewalks that they are responsible for maintaining.”
The ordinance states that sidewalks must be completely clear edge to edge, Hank said. If they’re not, you will be fined.
“The city does not issue warnings for sidewalks,” Hank said. “It’s actually stated in the ordinance that … enforcement begins with citation.”
The first offense will cost you $124, according to Hank. When you’re ticketed, the city will leave a card on your door notifying you. If you still don’t clear your sidewalk after 24 hours, the city will send out a cleaning crew of their own – and send you the bill.
“It’s typically about $86,” Hank said. “I think half the ones we’ve left door cards on, we… end up clearing the sidewalk.”
It’s especially important to keep your sidewalks clear for those who can’t walk as easily.
“People with mobility issues – walkers, somebody who’s in a wheelchair, someone of that nature struggle trying to get through snow,” Hank said. “That’s another reason why this enforcement action is taken.”
If you see a dangerous sidewalk and would like to report it to the City of Madison, you can do so at www.cityofmadison.com/rap or call (608) 266-4551.
If you are physically unable to clear the sidewalk in front of your house or business, you can call the City of Madison at (608) 266-4551 and they will connect you with someone who can help you for the remainder of the season. | {
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We already know that 90 Day Fiance is a franchise meant to portray stories of lovers living in different parts of the world. The condition is that one of them must be a US citizen. It airs on TLC, a major TV network. The franchise’s unique concept has gained millions of viewers from all over the world in a very short time. The popularity grew so much that the viewers just couldn’t get enough of 90 DF.
College Edition; Franchise Featuring Young Adults
College time is the age when love is in the air. It seems like the 90 Day Fiance has realized this and has decided to feature young adults on a brand new show. They are casting students in a relationship with a foreign partner. Both the partners have to be students, one US citizen, and another international student. Ideally, the production is on the lookout for students who will be graduating at the end of this year.
The partner can also be a graduated international student whose OPT is about to expire. If they are married, one spouse has to be a US citizen. Even if the spouse is a former international student, such couples can apply. They have to be aged between 18 to 32 years. All ethnicities are acceptable. It seems like an interesting concept which is likely to have more audiences than ever. The regular watchers of 90 DF are most likely to stay tuned. Besides, the viewership of college students is likely to rise drastically.
Click Here For Rules and Application
90 Day Fiance: Other Successful Shows From The Franchise
The massive success of 90 Day Fiance drove the franchise to expand to some other ideas based on the same concept, yet unique. For instance, 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way has gained more popularity than expected. In fact, the filming for season 2 has also begun. It follows the lives of couples in which the US citizen is ready to leave their life behind in the States and move to another country for love.
Watching Americans adjust to a new lifestyle in another country is super interesting to watch. Moreover, cultural barriers and language issues make things even more intense. Another successful show includes 90 Day Fiance: Happily Ever After. It follows the life of 90 Day Fiance couples that fans already know. The show portrays the fate of their relationship. 90 DF: Before The 90 Days shows the lives of couples where the American visits the foreigner or vice versa for 90 Days.
Do you think 90 Day Fiance College Edition will match up to the success of other shows of the franchise? Let us know in the comments below. | {
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Article Overview
About Cyberknife Surgery
What makes CyberKnife so unique?
How does CyberKnife help?
How CyberKnife Surgery is done?
What are the benefits of CyberKnife Surgery?
What are the risks associated with CyberKnife Surgery are? Medical Tourism in India
How to get Medical visa to India
Which is the best hospital for CyberKnife Surgery in India?
What is the cost of CyberKnife Surgery in India?
Cost comparison of CyberKnife Surgery in India to other country?
Cyberknife Surgery in India
The CyberKnife System is a non-invasive option to surgery for the treatment of both cancerous and non-cancerous tumors anywhere in the body including the Prostate, Lung, Brain, Spine, Liver, Pancreas and Kidney. This treatment delivers beams of high-dose radiation to tumors with extreme accuracy offers new hope to patients worldwide.
Though its name may show images of scalpels and surgery, the CyberKnife VSI treatment involves no cutting. In fact, the CyberKnife VSI System is the world's first and only Robotic Radio Surgery system designed to treat tumors throughout the body non-invasively. CyberKnife gives a pain-free, non-surgical option for patients who have inoperable or surgically complex tumors or who may be looking for an alternative to surgery.
What makes CyberKnife so unique?
Unrivalled accuracy: The CyberKnife system other radio surgery systems
Unlimited flexibility and freedom: The CyberKnife system's robotic maneuverability tumor with a high dose of radiation
Real-time image guidance: The CyberKnife uses a very sophisticated 6D image guidance system to track and continually adjust treatment for any movement of the patient or tumor.
Convenient: Depending on the type of tumor , patients need only one to five CyberKnife treatments, typically lasting less than an hour each, while other radiation systems require dozens of treatments spread over several weeks.
, patients need only one to five CyberKnife treatments, typically lasting less than an hour each, while other radiation systems require dozens of treatments spread over several weeks. Patient safety: Unlike other linear accelerators, the CyberKnife operates on a fully integrated closed loop system.
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How does CyberKnife help?
The invention of CyberKnife is a great help to all the patients who are dealing with the deadly tumors.
CyberKnife is used to treat
Non Cancerous Tumors
Like Gamma Knife, CyberKnife works on a delivery of very high ablative dosages in a single or small number of sessions with precisions equal to or even more than conventional Gamma Knife procedure. CyberKnife has benefits of being non-invasive and does not need anesthesia or blood loss. Apart from being used as an alternative to surgery, CyberKnife is also indicated for post-op residual or recurrent cases. Also, CyberKnife can be used as a boost to Conventional Radiation.
Brain cancer
CyberKnife is used as a boost, for post-op residual or recurrent cases in malignant gliomas/glioblastomas. Brain tumors that may form good indications for CyberKnife radio surgery include neuromas arising from other nerves, pituitary adenomas, hemangioblastomas and meningiomas, hemangiopericytomas.
Prostate cancer
The difficulty in treating prostate tumors with radiation is that the prostate moves unpredictably as air passes through the rectum and as the bladder empties and fills. The CyberKnife Robotic Radio surgery System is able to overcome this challenge by continuously identifying the specific location of the prostate during the treatment and making active corrections for any movement of the prostate throughout the passage of the radiation delivery.
During treatment, a patient lays still and breathes normally while the CyberKnife zeroes in on a moving target, the prostate, and irradiates it without harming the surrounding areas. As a result, CyberKnife is more suitable for patients, radiation is delivered more accurately and treatments can be completed in three to five sittings.
Currently, the CyberKnife Radio surgery System is most frequently used as a single modality for early organ confined prostate cancers or in combination with external beam radio therapy as a boost, in cases of advanced or intermediate stages of prostate cancer. Depending on the stage of the patient's prostate cancer, doctors will recommend a treatment plan that best fits the patient's case.
Liver cancer
Treating liver cancer with radiation therapy is a challenge because liver tumors move with respiration. In addition, the tissue surrounding the liver tumors is very sensitive and can be damaged easily. The CyberKnife Radio surgery System is able to deliver very high doses of radiation to both primary (before or after a liver transplant or in conjunction with chemotherapy or other treatments) and metastatic liver tumors with extreme accuracy. Working side by side with the CyberKnife System is the Synchrony Respiratory Tracking System, which enables the radiation beam to track tumor movement in real time and allows patients to breathe normally during their treatment sessions.
Cancerous tumors in spine
CyberKnife is a good option sparing normal spinal cord with more precision than most of the other radiation delivery techniques. For local diagnosis in spinal tumors, CyberKnife can deliver highly specific radiation-sparing the surrounding normal tissues to a much greater extent.
Lung cancer
CyberKnife is useful in treatment of Lung Cancers when it is limited to a small area and can be used as an alternative to Radical Surgery. CyberKnife is very useful in cases of Lung Metastasis or post primary diagnosis limited residual or recurrent disease, when it can be targeted by the CyberKnife machine. The advantage of CyberKnife lies in delivery of radical ablative dose that can control the disease in a totally non-invasive mode. CyberKnife has specific capabilities of catching the tumor while respiration and thus can treat with minimal extra margins and thus decreasing the side effects very efficiently.
CyberKnife can be used as boost to small critical area close to the eyes or other vital areas to decrease the dose going to the vital areas and subsequent side effects. CyberKnife is also indicated for post-primary diagnosis residual and recurrent disease or Neck node residual or recurrent disease.
Sometimes in very early stage Breast Cancers, CyberKnife can be used as a very short course Radiotherapy that can just target the post operative surgical site. It is although possible only in selected cases and only treating oncologist can take this decision based on all available records and stage of the patient. CyberKnife can also be used in metastatic cases where disease has spread from the Breast to other organs like Lung, Brain, Bone or Liver and is still limited that is lesser in number (< 6) or small size (< 6 cm). CyberKnife cannot be used if there is gross widespread disease.
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How CyberKnife Surgery is done?
Preparing for CyberKnife Surgery
During the procedure of CyberKnife
The patient is positioned on the table ensuring his/her comfort. The robot moves around carefully to deliver radiation to the selected part.
At the same time, the VSI system X-ray
The patient undergoes 1 to 5 sessions, depending upon the severity and location of the tumor. Each session may last approximately for 1 hour.
After the treatment
Most of the patients undergoing CyberKnife VSI do not require any kind of observation. It is highly probable that the patient will not experience any side-effects, (although there may be some which vary with the severity and location of the tumor).
Follow up will depend on the case, site, disease or history of previous treatments and also further treatments if required.
What are the benefits of CyberKnife Surgery?
Though the name may bring in the image of scissors and a scalpel, the technology is non-invasive and painless. Some of the benefits of CyberKnife are:
Improved patient outcomes through better and more accurate targeting of tumor lesions
A painless treatment procedure
The technology is non-invasive and involves no blood loss
Minimum exposure of healthy tissues to the harmful radiations
Does not require hospitalization patients can immediately return to daily activities
No or minimal complications for patients post procedure
What are the risks associated with CyberKnife Surgery are?
Some of the risks associated with CyberKnife Surgery are:
Short-term side effects
Nausea
Fatigue
Headache
The best Hospital available for CyberKnife Surgery in Delhi is BLK Super Specialty Hospital. It provides CyberKnife at very affordable price and cost. The estimated cost of CyberKnife Surgery in Delhi at BLK Hospital will be an approximate to Rs.3 to 5 Lakhs. The treatments provide here are very cost friendly and the hospital provides all the facilities at a cheaper price. BLK Super Specialty Hospital is a 650 bedded hospital with dedicated 125 critical care beds with over 150 specialists across various super specialties making it one of the renowned hospital for cyberknife surgery in India.
The best Hospital available for CyberKnife Surgery in Gurgaon (Haryana) is Medanta Hospital. It provides CyberKnife at very affordable price and cost. The estimated cost of CyberKnife Surgery in Gurgaon at Medanta Hospital will be an approximate to Rs. 3 to 5 Lakhs. The treatments provide here are very cost friendly and the hospital provides all the facilities at a cheaper price. Medanta Hospital which is located in Gurgaon is a 1000 bedded multi specialty hospital. It follows medical practices and procedures which are research oriented and benchmarked against the best in India.
The best Hospital available for CyberKnife Surgery in Mumbai (Maharashtra) is Global Hospital. It provides CyberKnife at very affordable price and cost. The estimated cost of CyberKnife Surgery in Mumbai (Maharashtra) at Global Hospital will be an approximate to Rs. 3 to 5 Lakhs. The treatments provide here are very cost friendly and the hospital provides all the facilities at a cheaper price. Global Hospital is a 2500 bedded multi specialty hospital and known for its comprehensive treatments for all major specialties.
The best Hospital available for CyberKnife Surgery in Chennai is Global Health City. It provides CyberKnife at very affordable price and cost. The estimated cost of CyberKnife Surgery in Chennai at Global Health City will be an approximate to Rs. 3 to 5 Lakhs. The treatments provide here are very cost friendly and the hospital provides all the facilities at a cheaper price. Global Health City is a multi specialty hospital and known for its comprehensive treatments for all major specialties.
The best Hospital available for CyberKnife Surgery in Bangalore is Columbia Asia Hospital. It provides CyberKnife at very affordable price and cost. The estimated cost of CyberKnife Surgery in Bangalore at Columbia Asia Hospital will be an approximate to Rs. 3 to 5 Lakhs. The treatments provide here are very cost friendly and the hospital provides all the facilities at a cheaper price. Columbia Asia Hospital is the first corporate hospital in Bangalore. The hospital has reasonable health-care facility and experts from many faculties.
Medical Tourism in India
Medical Tourism is a way of associating patients to get world class medical, neurological and cosmetic surgery facilities overseas. India is a growing destination for medical tourism, and people from all over the world are looking to visit India for medical needs and requirements.
Medical Tourism involves travelling abroad to take world class medical treatment at very economical rates, as compared to countries like US, UK and Australia. As a result of which, we can see a rise in Indian medical tourism with each of the passing day.
Imagine a typical surgery performed in a high class hospital by experienced doctors at very low price than it generally takes. That's India. From the high quality of treatment, huge range of procedures, infrastructure and experienced doctors to perform any medical procedure with no waiting time, the list of benefits of travelling for medical treatment in India are many.
Lazoi is an online healthcare portal where the patients can easily book their appointments with any of the doctors irrespective of their location. We are having best surgical oncologists in India who remains ready to work for the welfare of the patients.
Domestic patients can be looked and taken care across all over India they have the flexibility of choosing the location where they want to have their treatment done. International patients are provided with high class medical care in the metro cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and many more.
Quality of care provided to the patients is what basically attracts people to India. However, the quality services provided to the patients should not be excess than the patient's affordability. If quality comes at an economical cost, it's an unbeatable advantage. This combination of getting best quality treatment with low cost advantage makes India very unique.
We are having various JCI-accredited hospitals and medical centers that are known to offer the best and the efficient healthcare services. International patients can get the benefit of having affordable medical treatments in India along with the use of state of the art technology, treatment at trusted hospitals and special personalized care.
If you are an international patient and you had your medical treatment done in India, you will get the facility of having second opinion with the doctor in the mode as you like which will be provided by us. You can ask an online query, get tele-consultation with the doctor or you can have an online video consultation. This helps in saving the travel time of the international patients.
We act as a bridge and provide various facilities to the patients as well as the doctors. This is because patients do not have the access of doctors. Lazoi is a formal and a high reputed organization which is trusted by many. Beware of misguiding agents which further can harm you and may also take huge amount of money.
Which is the best hospital for CyberKnife Surgery in India?
BLK Super Speciality Hospital - Delhi is the best hospital for CyberKnife Surgery in India.
What is the cost of CyberKnife Surgery in India?
Cost of CyberKnife Surgery in India is very less as compared to the other countries. The cost of CyberKnife in India will be approx Rs. 3 to 5 Lakhs.
What is the cost comparison of CyberKnife Surgery in India to other country?
Cost of CyberKnife Surgery in USA will cost around Rs. 16 to 40 Lakhs ($25,000 - $65,000).
Cost of CyberKnife Surgery in UK will cost around Rs. 22 Lakhs.
Cost of CyberKnife Surgery in India will cost around Rs. 2 Lakhs ($3,000).
Click on the "Button" below, If you have any Query/Question regarding "Cyberknife Surgery"
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Reining in previous EPA power plant rules and climate regulations has been only one part of the Trump administration’s environmental strategy. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images Trump issues rollback of Obama's biggest climate rule
The Trump administration rolled out its proposal for gutting former President Barack Obama’s most sweeping climate change regulation Tuesday — a move that could also block any future Democratic president from trying to put it back together.
The proposal from the EPA goes to the core of the criticisms that the coal industry and conservatives lodged against Obama's 2015 regulation, which used a novel reading of the Clean Air Act to require states to cut greenhouse gas pollution from the power sector. The replacement from President Donald Trump’s EPA would give states far more leeway to meet more modest climate goals — or even to opt of the program entirely.
But the new rule’s biggest impact could come from the inevitable lawsuits that environmental groups and Democratic-leaning states will file against Trump’s proposal. If they lose, the result could be a court decision enshrining the Trump administration’s hobbled approach to climate regulation as the only reasonable approach under the law — slamming the door shut on any later attempts to recreate Obama’s handiwork.
At the very least, experts say, the proposal from Trump’s regulators would mean years of delay in curbing one of the world’s most dire problems — the greenhouse gas pollution that causes climate change.
“They’re trying to put in place approaches that would undermine in the long term EPA’s ability to do what many of us think is its responsibility under environmental laws to protect the public health,” said Janet McCabe, the EPA air chief under Obama who oversaw the 2015 rule’s development.
EPA said the proposed rule would “more appropriately balance federal and state responsibilities” to regulate air pollution.
“Today’s proposal provides the states and regulated community the certainty they need to continue environmental progress while fulfilling President Trump’s goal of energy dominance,” said EPA acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler in a statement Tuesday.
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Climate advocates are already complaining that the Trump EPA plan won't put the country on a path toward seriously addressing greenhouse gas pollution. Under Obama, EPA pushed for a regulatory scheme that targeted the electricity sector as a whole with a goal of cutting carbon dioxide, pushing power companies to take steps such as helping their customers become more energy-efficient or replacing coal plants with wind or natural gas.
Instead, the Trump plan, which it is calling the Affordable Clean Energy rule, relies solely on making individual coal-fired power plants more efficient — a move that would achieve far shallower cuts in carbon dioxide pollution.
But agency officials also acknowledged the plan won’t reverse the larger economic trends that have led utilities to shut down coal-fired power plants in favor of cheaper sources like natural gas.
“We believe there’s going to be very little difference as to how CPP would play out versus how this proposed rule would play out,” Bill Wehrum, EPA’s air chief, told reporters on a conference call Tuesday, referring to the Obama-era Clean Power Plan. "The biggest reason is things have changed a lot since the CPP was put in place. The industry continues to transform in front of our eyes, there continue to be big shifts in the types of generating plants that power plant operators are building and operating."
EPA’s analysis of the proposed rule shows it would produce modest savings for power plants owners, while potentially adding billions of dollars in new health costs on the population at large to address problems such as heart and lung disease caused by an increase in pollution. Accounting for the “ancillary health co-benefits” that the Obama rule would have produced via concurrent reductions in soot and ozone pollution, the Trump proposal could impose between $12.8 billion and $72 billion in new costs by 2037, and could mean as many as 1,400 additional premature deaths per year. Another calculation that did not consider those ancillary issues found the Trump rule could cost as much as $5.4 billion more than Obama’s, or lead to benefits as high as $3 billion, by 2037.
The agency also predicted a “relatively small” effect on job creation, although it said employment may grow in the coal sector and fall in sectors such as natural gas or renewable energy.
Former Obama White House climate aide Jody Freeman expressed some concern that the court battle to follow could leave EPA with diminished authority to regulate greenhouse gases at all, unless Congress steps in with a new law.
“There’s certainly a legal pathway in which a court could lock in such a narrow reading that it would be very problematic for a future administration,” said Freeman, who is now director of Harvard Law School’s environment and energy program. “There’s also a pathway in which a court could uphold what one administration does and leave room for another to change its mind.”
The debate over EPA’s power to combat climate change has simmered for decades. The Obama EPA rule was crafted after the landmark 2007 Supreme Court decision that said EPA has authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases, though it stopped short of laying out just how far EPA could go toward curbing the pollution that scientists warn will need to drop to near zero within a few decades to stave off the worst effects of climate change.
The Obama rule advanced a risky legal argument that the electric sector’s unique characteristics meant the best way to reduce emissions was to consider fuel shifting, from carbon-heavy coal to natural gas or renewable power sources.
But opponents of that plan have blasted it as an egregious overreach of executive branch power, and the new Trump proposal hews more closely to traditional regulations that rely on the reductions possible at specific sources.
Many scientists warn that time is running short to avoid the worst effects of higher temperatures, rising sea levels and more powerful weather disasters that are caused by increased greenhouse gas concentrations in the planet's atmosphere. Conservatives and fossil fuel companies have argued that Congress never meant to empower EPA to enforce sweeping rules affecting such a major sector of the economy.
“I think that they are on a path that [former EPA chief Scott] Pruitt started, which was to say, ‘First walk, then run,’” said Tom Pyle, president of the energy industry-backed American Energy Alliance.
“The reductions in carbon emissions will be less, but it will be a legal rule, a lawful rule,” said David B. Rivkin Jr., a lawyer who represented Oklahoma and other states in litigation that froze the Obama rule in 2016.
Green groups fear the Trump plan and its modest goals could create a precedent that restricts what EPA can do and prevents future administrations from issuing stronger rules.
“As a policy matter, it locks in absolutely minimal changes,” said David Bookbinder, a former Sierra Club chief climate counsel who is now chief counsel for the libertarian Niskanen Center. The Trump administration’s opponents will argue in the upcoming legal challenges that EPA should not be allowed to establish a policy that guarantees those modest carbon reductions, he added.
If the Trump rule is eventually blocked by legal barriers, Pyle noted that at least it will put off stricter regulations for years to come.
“Even if a future administration comes in that’s more like Obama in terms of philosophy, it’ll still be years and years and years before they can actually clamp down and do a back-to-an-Obama-style rule,” he said.
One of the crucial legal disputes over EPA’s climate authority is determining what type of regulatory scheme represents the “best system” to reduce emissions. The phrase appears in the part of the Clean Air Act that both the Obama and Trump EPAs relied on to write their rules. Previous rules to curb less common types of pollution from other sources under that provision relied only on on-site emissions at generating stations rather than the sectorwide carbon rules the Obama EPA sought to impose.
Those "inside the fence line" actions form the basis for the Trump administration's rule, which would require power plants to increase their efficiency.
Obama's Clean Power Plan rule went well beyond the “fence line” to secure more reductions than efficiency, or heat-rate, improvements alone could ever achieve. It sought to justify its more aggressive approach by arguing the power sector needed to be addressed as a whole, and it said carbon dioxide was different from other pollutants because of its global effects.
“I do not think that inside-the-fence line is the appropriate legal interpretation of ‘best system’ of control for this industry, which is just not like other industries,” said McCabe. “It really isn’t a within-the-fence line sort of industry, it’s an integrated system.”
She added that several major utilities, including Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison, NextEra Energy and Houston-based Calpine Corp., helped defend Obama's Clean Power Plan by arguing that it echoed the real-world way utilities manage their electricity generating portfolios.
Reining in previous EPA power plant rules and climate regulations has been only one part of the Trump administration’s environmental strategy. EPA is also quietly seeking changes to several other policies that it says are needed to strengthen the rulemaking process, but which critics argue are an attempt to handcuff future administrations. Among those moves are a science “transparency” proposal and plans to reconsider how EPA calculates the costs and benefits of new rules.
“That, to me, is the answer, this two-part process,” Pyle said. “You’ve got to reform the regulations that are in your face, and then you’ve got to reform the institution so that these abuses are curtailed in the future.”
Some of those changes are included within the new climate proposal, including a measure that would allow coal plants to install upgraded equipment without having to go through an intensive air permitting process known as “New Source Review.”
Even before foes of the new relaxed power plant rule can actually challenge its legal basis, some experts are already questioning whether the Trump EPA will have it finalized in time to actually defend it in court.
EPA in July told a federal court that it hopes to finalize its carbon rule "by the first part of 2019."
But multiple observers said that’s an optimistic goal given EPA’s slow pace up to now and the agency’s need to craft rigorous policy and legal justifications in the face of what is likely to be an onslaught of challenges from environmental and public health groups and blue states. Adding time for that court process, which can often move at a snail’s pace, it is possible — but nowhere near certain — the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit won't be able to rule before the 2020 election.
If the White House switches hands, Democrats could have the opportunity to pull back the Trump rule and start over yet again — just like Trump did with Obama’s rule.
“If we’re dealing with a two-term president, we’ve got bigger problems,” Bookbinder said. | {
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A Long Island tourist arrested in Japan as he transported the severed head of a woman in his suitcase was a coddled “mama’s boy” who served briefly in the US Air Force, The Post has learned.
Yevgeniy Vasilievich Bayraktar, 26, was on vacation when authorities busted him leaving his Osaka rental with the grisly remains of a Japanese woman he had met on a dating site last month.
Little is known about Bayraktar, who lived in a modest bungalow in Mastic Beach with his mother and her third husband.
He was briefly stationed at the McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas before he was “separated” from the service in June 2012, serving only 11 months of a four-year stint as an airman first class, an Air Force spokesman told The Post.
He refused to say why Bayraktar was prematurely discharged.
Bayraktar was born in Odessa, Russia, and arrived in the US as a 9-year-old after his mother married a Texas engineer she met on a dating site.
“He and his mother were very close, but he and I were not,” said Benny Dacy, Bayraktar’s former stepfather, who now lives in Houston.
Dacy traveled to Odessa to meet his future bride, who was 12 years his junior and trained as an engineer. She lived with her only son in a cramped one-bedroom apartment, Dacy told The Post.
Dacy flew them to the US where he married Regina in a civil ceremony at the city hall in Abilene, Texas, where he then had a home.
Dacy said he tried to cultivate a relationship with the boy, but he kept to himself and was very close to his mother.
“He was a mama’s boy,” said Dacy. “If we were having dinner and he didn’t like the food, his mother would get up in the middle of the meal to cook him something special, and this was at a time when we didn’t have a lot of money.”
Dacy, 69, told The Post that Bayraktar, who was known as “Jake” when he lived in Texas, maintained contact with his biological father, a doctor who sometimes sent him money from Russia.
After Dacy financed Regina’s nursing-school studies in Texas, she and her son simply disappeared, he said.
“She called once to ask me for a divorce but I had no idea where they were until the news hit,” Dacy said. “It was the most traumatic time of my life when she just left me. She is a very selfish woman.”
Regina, who is married to another engineer, works as a registered nurse at a rehab facility in the Hamptons, according to a LinkedIn profile which was taken down last week.
Bayraktar was arrested Feb. 22 on suspicion of killing and dismembering Saki Kondo, 27, who was reported missing by her family on Feb. 16, a day after she went on a date with Bayraktar.
Police said that Bayraktar, who had been traveling in Japan since January, met the victim on an online dating site and took her to a vacation home he rented in Osaka, where he allegedly dismembered her between Feb. 16 and Feb. 18. He was on his way to another apartment he rented when police arrested him with Kondo’s severed head in his baggage, according to Japanese authorities.
Last week Bayraktar led police to the remaining body parts he allegedly buried in a forest on the outskirts of Osaka and Kyoto. | {
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Hundreds of students lined up Monday night for a peek at the city’s sex club scene, where some of their peers were munching on pizza and watching porn.
Related:University of Toronto student group hosts “epic sex club adventure
Inside the Oasis Aqua Lounge, a downtown club that bills itself as a water-themed adult playground, the atmosphere was close to a house party with little nudity, at least early in the evening. Students, some dressed casually in hoodies, ordered food, played Twister and watched adult flicks while lounging on couches and beds.
Spots at the event, which was organized by the University of Toronto Sexual Education Centre (SEC)Sexual Education Centre (SEC) to kick off its sexual awareness week, were coveted. By 7 p.m., the hour when nudity became allowed in most of the venue, the event was at capacity with 189 people inside, said Dylan Tower, the external education and outreach co-ordinator of the centre, which is an affiliated levy group of the U of T student union.
More than an hour later, at least 100 people lined up on Mutual St. trying to get in.
Owner Jana Matthews said Oasis has never had a comparable showing. Last year’s SEC event drew closer to 80 people, but even that turnout prompted Matthews to offer a weekly student night.
“I think it’s a statement the youth are making,” she said. “It’s OK to have sex . . . if people weren’t interested they wouldn’t be here.”
She also attributed the massive turnout to intense media attention, some of which was tied to a Reddit post calling the event an “orgy.” Even though event t-shirts had the same term on it, both Tower and Matthews said it was used in fun and wasn’t an accurate term for the event.
“It’s clear that it’s not an orgy. There’s very little, if any sex going on at the moment,” Tower said. “The best way I can put it, it’s a very sex-positive club night.”
Daniel, a 24-year-old student at U of T’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, was drawn to the event out of curiosity. He showed up at about 2:30 p.m.
Six hours later, he was still there with a group of peers from his program, ordering pizza and not sure how soon he’d leave to finish homework.
As a couples made out discreetly in one room, scattered baskets of condoms and lube were among the sightings setting the evening apart from most house parties. On the top floor, a private room was locked and some moaning could be heard throughout the evening.
Daniel, who asked to only use his first name, said he’d already texted his girlfriend about coming to the club with him on another night. “It kind of made it a really safe environment, almost with training wheels,” he said.
Another attendee, Cassandra, checked out the BDSM demonstration that included a naked man in the “dungeon,” where no drinking is allowed and rules including safety words are posted.
“I got a whole bunch of definitions, which was useful. I didn’t realize there were general safe words and more than one level for safe,” said Cassandra, a 23-year-old U of T student who also asked to only use her first name.
She said extra rules put in place for the event, which required student identification or being the plus-one of a student, made her feel more comfortable than she had expected.
As well as signing a waiver with a valid email address (consenting to the chance of seeing nudity and rules including “no means no”) there was an age limit of 35, no sex allowed downstairs and strict no phone use after 6 p.m.
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“People have really been looking forward to 7 o’clock when clothing is optional. I think it’s more of a novelty than anything else,” Cassandra said. “But I personally will be wearing clothing for the whole night.”
After 10 p.m. there was more nudity in the club, but there was little gawking. | {
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Neymar's father has accused Barcelona's board of engaging in "blackmail" over his €26million loyalty bonus and says their decision to contest the payment ended his support for the forward staying at the club.
Following the Brazil international's world-record €222m move to Paris Saint-Germain, Barca confirmed they will not pay the loyalty bonus to the player and his father after accusing the younger Neymar of breaching his contract with the club.
It was reported the 25-year-old's father and agent held up the deal in order to trigger a loyalty payment that would be owed after July 31, as part of the new contract the player signed with Barca last October.
However, Barca spokesperson Josep Vives claimed Neymar's talks with PSG prior to that date and the forward's failure to publicly express his commitment to the Catalans meant he was in breach of the terms of that agreement.
The moment Barca made it clear they would contest the payment was when Neymar Sr decided to end his support for a Camp Nou stay.
"If they weren't going to pay us, I couldn't do anything," he said to COPE.
"I could not submit to blackmail. At that moment, Barcelona lost my support.
"Until then, they had it. I was on the side of Barcelona trying to convince Neymar to stay. But with the attitude of the board I could not put myself on their side because the contract is very explicit and clear, and at no time was it proposed to honour that clause."
Neymar Sr added: "It is a contract signing bonus. The player's clause increased, so if Neymar had to leave, it would be a reason for the increase in the penalty clause, but that is a topic to discuss in the future, not for now.
"I know what we talked about and I can look you in the eyes and say what was said and what was not said - I know what we did. Now, if people do not respect what we say, I will not respect what they write." | {
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Kentucky Butter Cake
This old-fashioned Kentucky butter cake is super moist, ultra buttery, and infused with the best butter-sugar sauce. It creates a sugary, crunchy crust that you won’t be able to get enough of! Below are tons of tips for achieving the ultimate butter cake, as well as tricks for perfectly prepping Bundt pans, making a boozy bourbon version, freezing instructions, and more.
Are you a cake person? Or an “I eat the cake for the frosting” person?
I am unequivocally, unapologetically the latter.
But when I land on a cake that I actually crave that doesn’t have ANY frosting? You know it’s a certified winner.
Enter this butter cake. Simple ingredients, simple preparation, and a knock-your-socks-off glaze that takes it over the top. Enjoy it as-is (oh that sugary crust!) or with a dollop of whipped cream or vanilla ice cream. This is a cake that deserves a permanent home in your recipe box.
What is butter cake?
Butter cake is an absolutely quintessential cake in your dessert arsenal. It is loaded with butter and then rounded out with standard ingredients like granulated sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, and leaveners. It bakes up buttery, moist, and absolutely delicious.
Butter Cake vs Pound Cake
While butter and pound cake look similar on the surface, there is one key difference that separates them:
Pound cakes have historically contained one pound of each main ingredient (butter, sugar, and flour); while butter cakes have mostly the same ingredients, the ratios are slightly different.
Traditional butter cake is also sometimes referred to as 1-2-3-4 cake, which is an easy reminder of the ratios – 1 cup butter, 2 cups sugar, 3 cups flour, and 4 eggs. I love old-fashioned baking!
Kentucky Butter Cake
Kentucky butter cake takes it one step further by infusing the delicious, buttery cake with a butter-sugar sauce after it comes out of the oven. Left to cool and then flipped over, the glaze creates a buttery, sugary, crunchy exterior that is TO DIE FOR. Use the bourbon option (see below) for a phenomenal cake to enjoy while watching the Kentucky Derby.
Butter cake ingredients
The best part about butter cakes? There’s a 99% chance you already have everything you need right in your pantry and refrigerator.
Here’s the list:
Butter – Of course, it’s the star of the show! It’s a flavorful cake, so use your favorite butter (mine is Kerrygold).
– Of course, it’s the star of the show! It’s a flavorful cake, so use your favorite butter (mine is Kerrygold). Sugar – We’re making a wonderfully sweet cake, so we need sugar.
– We’re making a wonderfully sweet cake, so we need sugar. Eggs – To bring it all together and add extra richness.
– To bring it all together and add extra richness. Vanilla – Flavor, flavor, flavor!
– Flavor, flavor, flavor! Buttermilk – It makes the cake even more tender, but you can substitute regular whole or 2% milk if you’re in a pinch.
– It makes the cake even more tender, but you can substitute regular whole or 2% milk if you’re in a pinch. Flour – We’re using all-purpose flour, but you can use cake flour (sifted) for a lighter and more tender version of this cake.
– We’re using all-purpose flour, but you can use cake flour (sifted) for a lighter and more tender version of this cake. Baking powder + baking soda – Leaveners to get that cake to rise!
– Leaveners to get that cake to rise! Salt – For flavor, always.
Let’s make it from scratch!
This cake comes together incredibly easy using a traditional creaming method, here’s how we do it:
Grease and flour your pan – Literally THE most important step! You need to liberally grease every nook and cranny of your Bundt pan, and then dust it with flour, tapping out any excess. Since we glaze this upside-down IN the pan, it needs to be properly prepared to make sure it doesn’t stick when you turn it out of the pan. Whisk together dry ingredients – The flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt get a quick whisk in a medium bowl. Cream butter + sugar – It’ll take a few minutes to get it really light and fluffy. Add eggs + vanilla – Eggs two at a time and then the vanilla until everything is thoroughly combined. Alternate flour mixture and buttermilk – Mixing on low until just barely combined, then giving it a final mix with a rubber spatula. Don’t overmix! Bake – Spread the batter into the prepared pan and bake until a toothpick inserted halfway between the edge and center comes out clean, 45 to 55 minutes. Make the butter sauce – Heat the butter, sugar, and water in a saucepan over medium-low heat until the sugar is dissolved (don’t let it boil!), then remove from heat and stir in the vanilla. Glaze the cake! – Using a skewer, poke holes all over the surface of the cake while it is still in the pan. Then very, very slowly drizzle the glaze over the surface of the cake, allowing it to absorb the liquid before pouring more. Cool & turn out – Allow the cake to cool completely, then invert it onto a serving plate.
The bourbon option
If you want to add a kick to this cake, you can substitute bourbon for the water in the glaze.
You’ll get a punch of bourbon flavor throughout the cake and you don’t need to make any other adjustments to the cake.
Glaze options
If you’d prefer not to do a glaze and leave the cake as-is, it is certainly fabulous plain served with some whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.
If frosting is more your style, here are some options:
Troubleshooting Bundt cakes
Most people have issues with Bundt cakes when it comes to turning them out of the pan. To avoid broken cakes, it is super important that you prep the pan correctly. In my experience, you cannot simply spray a Bundt with non-stick cooking spray (like Pam) and expect it to do the trick.
Bundt pans need a bit more TLC. My standard formula is to grease with vegetable shortening (solid Crisco) and then flour liberally, tapping out the excess. You want to make sure every nook and cranny is covered in both grease and butter. Some folks swear by the baking sprays that have flour in them, but I’ve never been a fan. You can also find recipes online for “homemade cake pan release” which is a mixture of fat and flour that you can keep on hand. I have not used these, so can’t swear by them, but it’s an option!
Recommended Pans
I love, love, love Bundt pans! They are gorgeous and can create such unique, intricate designs. Below are some of my recommendations:
Make-ahead and freezing options
This is a perfect cake for making the day before serving; allowing the butter sauce to completely soak into the cake and getting that amazing crust on the outside is superb.
The cake also freezes extremely well. You can freeze the entire cake or individual slices; to freeze the entire cake, wrap tightly with plastic wrap, then a layer of aluminum foil and place in a zip-top freezer bag. For individual slices, wrap tightly in plastic wrap then place in a zip-top freezer bag. Both will keep well in the freezer for up to 3 months; thaw at room temperature.
More recipes for the Kentucky Derby:
If you make this butter cake recipe and love it, I would so appreciate it if you would take a moment to leave a rating below. Thank you so much! ❤️️
Print 4 from 70 votes Did you make this recipe? Kentucky Butter Cake Servings 12 servings Prep 30 minutes Cook 45 minutes Total 1 hour 15 minutes Course: Dessert Cuisine: American Author : Michelle This old-fashioned Kentucky butter cake is super moist, ultra buttery, and infused with the best butter-sugar sauce. It creates a sugary, crunchy crust that you won't be able to get enough of! Ingredients: For the Cake: 3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter (at room temperature)
2 cups granulated sugar
4 eggs (at room temperature)
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk (at room temperature) For the Butter Sauce: ½ cup unsalted butter (cubed)
1 cup granulated sugar
¼ cup water
2 teaspoons vanilla extract US Customary - Metric Directions: Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Liberally grease and flour a standard 10 to 12-cup Bundt pan. Make the Cake : In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter and sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, two at a time, until thoroughly combined. Add the vanilla extract and beat to combine. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the buttermilk in two parts, beginning and ending with the flour. After each addition, mix until just barely blended and stop and scrape the bowl. Stop the mixer before the last of the flour has been incorporated and complete the blending by hand with a rubber spatula. Scrape the batter into the prepared Bundt pan and bake until a toothpick inserted halfway between the edge and center comes out clean, 45 to 55 minutes. Make the Butter Sauce : When the cake comes out of the oven, begin making the butter sauce. Place the butter, sugar, and water in a saucepan and warm over medium-low heat until the butter is completely melted and the sugar is dissolved. Do not allow the mixture to boil. Remove from the heat and stir in the vanilla extract. Using a skewer, poke holes all over the top of the cake. Very slowly pour the glaze all over the cake, allowing time for it to soak in before pouring more. Allow the cake to cool completely in the pan, then invert onto a serving plate. Recipe Notes: Nutritional values are based on one serving Nutrition: Calories: 548kcal Fat: 25g Saturated fat: 15g Cholesterol: 118mg Sodium: 286mg Potassium: 119mg Carbohydrates: 75g Fiber: 1g Sugar: 51g Protein: 6g Vitamin A: 821% Calcium: 57% Iron: 2% Did you make this recipe? Leave a review below, then snap a picture and tag @thebrowneyedbaker on Instagram so I can see it!
A previous version of this cake was posted in April 2014. It has since been updated and the recipe improved upon based on reader feedback.
[Photography by Dee of One Sarcastic Baker] | {
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COVID-19 has brought wave after wave of awful news. Now for some people, the opportunity to continue working at home is a silver lining on this dark cloud. Others don’t view it the same way. The big question is, will companies want people to continue to work from home?
Unfortunately, businesses probably won’t consider employee preferences. Remote work is one of the most sought after benefits. But only 16% of companies in the U.S. exclusively hire remote workers. An additional 7% offer alternative work-from-home flexibility. In the coming months, this could change drastically.
Would You Rather Work Remotely?
Many people would prefer to work at home or think they would like to. The stay-at-home orders and work-from-home opportunities were a perfect match. It was a chance to test the waters for many people. You got to experience cutting out your commute, working in pajamas, and juggling parenting while being on-the-clock.
Remote work is rewarding. So it’s no surprise that most people are ready to set up a permanent home office.
86% of remote workers report less work-related stress. They also claim higher job satisfaction.
One Medium writer shared her highly structured daily routine. She wakes up, eats, works, and schedules her breaks. But that works for her. Various social media platforms are full of people snapping selfies in pajamas or working on the couch.
Bottom Line
Not every company will jump to let you continue working at home. Many will expect people to return to the office at least part of the time. Some managers aren’t comfortable with their team having autonomy. When that time comes, you might have to question if that’s the leadership you want to work under. Remote work became a reality, and then it vanished.
This surge in the possibilities for remote work also comes with many companies choosing to reverse their work-from-home policies. Top names on that list include Best Buy, Yahoo, and IBM.
If you want remote work, there are tons of opportunities available. COVID-19 brought on a lot of unexpected changes. You might need or want to plan a shift in your job or career. Many other people will also look for opportunities because of store closures and negative economic impact. When seeking remote opportunities, you must get creative. Rely on valuable resources and well-curated job boards for support in finding such opportunities.
Some People Want to Return to the Office
There are plenty of jokes going around about extroverts climbing the walls at home. And, there’s always a little truth in comedy. Many people miss the daily interaction and grabbing lunch with friends. The Monday donuts, Tuesday bagels, and birthday parties are an enormous part of many office cultures.
If you want to return to work, then you enjoy your team. That’s amazing because not everyone wants to go into the office and see their coworkers. But you might have some trouble after the stay-at-home order dissolves. Companies have many excellent reasons to let people work at home. Not to mention the impact of people staying at home rather than commuting is positive regarding the environment and road conditions.
A work-from-home employee reported how this paradigm causes nothing but procrastination, sloppiness, and loneliness. It’s unfortunate. When people get forced into remote work, they hate it. If you feel you’re getting stale, lonely, just unable to work, then maybe working from home isn’t right for you.
Bottom Line
Going back to work might not be an option. If your position becomes only work-from-home, that might not suit you. It isn’t for everyone.
One work-from-home veteran shared his experiences and why he hated it. The claim was that it killed communication because there was no non-verbal element. Then he argued that the significant cost savings of staying home are a choice. He’s right. People could bring a lunch, and they don’t need to go out. Also, people working from home use GrubHub and DoorDash.
Leaving a position because it’s work-from-home, opens up that position for someone who wants this option. You can find something in a fun and engaging office environment. It could even be easier with many people expecting to work-from-home.
A Work-From-Home Position Could Be Beneficial. Can I Learn to Love It?
Learning the benefits that come with remote work can make it hard to go back, even if you hate working at home. Some people that are struggling with working from home might also need the financial break of paying for childcare. The benefits of of this can lead people who don’t want a remote work position to keep it.
So, can you learn to love it?
Maybe, some have. The people who have accepted that remote work is worth the struggle, acknowledge the need to face those challenges head on. If you’re missing the office mingling, then head to an industry event or get involved with an online community. Focus on making meaningful connections, not just office acquaintances.
If you’re struggling with keeping yourself motivated, then get an accountability buddy. Ask an old coworker, a sympathetic friend, or use an online platform to have someone to check-in with. Schedule a once or twice-a-week call to run through your tasks and your schedule, then let them do the same.
Learning to love remote work isn’t easy. But if your family needs the benefits, then consider making some changes. The overarching element of remote work is that it’s flexible. You can use various creative solutions to ease your struggles.
Will Businesses Find it Desirable to Keep Employees At Home?
As early as 2019, key governors were offering substantial tax breaks for allowing employees to work at home. Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker proposed providing $50 million in tax breaks to businesses that used remote workers.
Bills like this give employers tax benefits for reducing street congestion and carbon emissions. But there are other ways that employers benefit from using remote workers.
Employer benefits include:
Reduction in worker’s compensation insurance premiums
Lower need for office space and the ability to downsize
Cuts to utility bills, lease rentals, and other office-related expenses
Longer life from equipment
Access to a greater talent pool
Less absenteeism
Stanford found work-from-home employees improved performance by 13%. IBM saved over $100 million. Not to mention that remote staff has lower turnover rates as employees are happier and have a more satisfying work-life balance.
Unfortunately, when fear rules the executive offices, employers just won’t commit to remote work. Your company may be one of them. It’s not that they don’t want lower costs and better productivity; it’s the fear of losing control and the ability to micromanage their staff.
Should The Employee Get To Choose?
Most businesses and Human Resource professionals usually agree that there shouldn’t be an option to work-from-home. A company will usually have strict rules on whether employees can work at home, have structured flexibility, or in-office only.
Employees qualifying or not qualifying for remote work benefits can cause trouble. Say Mike can work at home, but James can’t, the situation can create a hostile environment. Companies often struggle to establish a fair structure that enables productive employees without alienating others. That is why many businesses feel they can’t give employees a choice. Instead, a position usually is or is not remote.
So it comes down to the individual. Will you leave your current position if they require you to return to the office? Or, will you stay and enjoy seeing your team members every day?
Putting a bet on the upcoming months, many companies will have their staff change to work-from-home positions. For the people who want to go back to the office, they’ll seek employment elsewhere. While people enjoying remote work who get told to return to the office will also start their job search. Many Americans will find alternative employment or even change careers to find a better fit for their lifestyle and maybe become more “essential.”
Although there’s a lot of talk about returning to “normal,” you’re in charge of your new normal. Working how you choose, in an office, or remotely is entirely up to you. However, it may mean a job search you didn’t expect for 2020. | {
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When you take a southbound train from New York’s Penn Station, a small miracle happens. After you emerge from the dark of the tunnel beneath the Hudson River into the daylight, you find yourself looking at a bucolic terrain of undulating grasses and meandering bodies of water intersected by monumental hunks of industrial engineering. The elevated portion of the New Jersey Turnpike bisects the landscape on epic concrete columns that look like something Romans would have built, and mysterious tanks and spindly steel towers pop up at regular intervals.
The slice of the New Jersey Meadowlands seen from the train window is an unmatched panorama of glorious incongruity. Robert Freudenberg, the vice president of energy and environmental programs for an urban research organization called the Regional Plan Association (RPA), used to commute from his home in New York City to a job in Trenton, New Jersey, where he worked for the Department of Environmental Protection. He’d take the train daily, and “there would always be this moment… I remember sitting on the train in those days, and every so often seeing an egret.”
I’m not surprised, therefore, that this common experience is part of what inspired a wonderfully contrarian proposal, one that would turn the Meadowlands, with its unexpected serenity and its surfeit of industrial detritus, into a national park.
The RPA, where Freudenberg works, is a relatively obscure organization founded in 1922 to try to shape the growth of the New York City metropolitan area, a wonky sidekick to the Port Authority that emerged around the same time to manage the transportation infrastructure shared by New York City and New Jersey. As its name suggests, the RPA issues plans for the future, ambitious compendia released at odd intervals that tend to say more about contemporary attitudes toward cities than they do about what the coming decades will hold, but that have also been quite influential. The first Regional Plan, released in 1929, pitched the rats’ nest of area highways that Robert Moses subsequently took it upon himself to build; the 1996 plan, the organization’s third, called for building a connection between the Long Island Railroad and Grand Central Terminal, a project now well underway.
The Fourth Regional Plan was released at the end of last year and strongly advocated repairing and expanding the subway system, building more affordable housing, and implementing a California-style system of charging fees to heavy emitters of greenhouse gases. Like all of the RPA’s plans, the most recent is progressive, clear-eyed, and just a little dull.
But within this very staid package is one jaw-dropping idea. The Fourth Regional Plan aims to cope with rising sea levels by fundamentally rethinking the New Jersey Meadowlands, with its 14 densely populated towns, its thousands of acres of warehouse and distribution facilities, its highways and rail lines, its stadiums and arenas. In a large section on climate change that mostly deals with ideas that are admirable but not very surprising—“modernize the electric grid” or “upgrade infrastructure to high standards of resilience”—there is a section entitled “Establish a national park in the Meadowlands.”
A national park in the Meadowlands? Crazy. But after reading the proposal, I paid a visit to the RPA’s Lower Manhattan offices and met with Freudenberg, a very nice, rational guy with a background in biology and public policy, who made the crazy sound sensible and maybe even inevitable.
“There’s been very little respect of the natural processes of the Meadowlands,” Freudenberg tells me. “One thing we’re trying to do with this is recognize that, on one hand, we’ve put a lot of important stuff in the Meadowlands. Nearly all of New Jersey transit lines run through the Meadowlands. Not to mention lots of contaminated sites from the industrial past. We’re in this situation where we put so many important things in the Meadowlands, and we’re going to have to figure out how we’re going to adapt a lot of it.
“At the same time, we’re going to have to make decisions about what we can adapt and where we’re going to have to let the water come in,” Freudenberg says.
Not only would it be a place where visitors could canoe or bird watch, but eventually, later in the century, they could also come to contemplate how rising sea levels have upended their reality: Goodbye Turnpike! Goodbye parking lot! Goodbye eternally unfinished shopping mall!
“We have a very serious task ahead of us,” says Adrian Benepe, the New York City Parks Commissioner under Mayor Bloomberg and now a senior vice president at the Trust for Public Land, a nonprofit that encourages and assists in park creation, “which is to try and insulate this giant population center from the impacts of climate change, and particularly the impact of storm surges and rising sea levels. Unless you look at it on a regional basis and have regional authorities with the power and the teeth and the abilities to make the big necessary changes, we’re all going to be underwater in just a few decades.”
The big picture problem, he says, requires a top-down solution. “You can’t have small towns making decisions for regional security. It doesn’t work.”
Benepe’s point should be obvious to most informed observers: Climate change requires us to think big—actually, to think huge—and come up with responses that, just like natural phenomena, ignore arbitrary jurisdictional boundaries. The hard question, then, is: How could this be done? How do you turn a complex, intensively developed, sometimes hideous region into a national treasure?
For starters, the 8,400 or so acres of Meadowlands that are currently natural preserves will get handed over to the National Park Service. Then, in coming decades, as sea levels rise, neighborhoods in low-lying towns like South Hackensack or Little Ferry, which can’t practically be protected from floodwaters, and low-lying industrial and commercial tracts, including Teterboro Airport, will be depopulated, shut down, and folded into the park.
Over time, the Meadowlands National Park would transform from a scattered cluster of green spaces to a large, contiguous landscape of wetlands, an expanse of marsh big enough to act as a sponge for the region, mitigating storm-driven floods. Not only would it be a place where visitors could canoe or bird watch, but eventually, later in the century, they could also come to contemplate how rising sea levels have upended their reality: Goodbye Turnpike! Goodbye parking lot! Goodbye eternally unfinished shopping mall! Unlike Yosemite or Yellowstone, this national park would pair natural beauty with a kind of Road Warrior chic.
As it turns out, the RPA has a long history of pushing unconventional approaches to parks. “We recommended the transfer of Governors Island to become a park,” Freudenberg tells me. “We recommended the Gateway Recreation area become a new model of urban national park back in the Second Regional plan in the ’60s. We recommended that the Palisades be protected in the First Regional plan.”
All of those successful proposals had an element of crazy in them. But 21st-century New Jersey is a more complicated place than it was during the Depression, when John D. Rockefeller Jr. stealthily bought up much of the land atop the Palisades and handed it over to the Palisades Interstate Parks Commission.
The Meadowlands area is managed by a state agency that was founded in 1969 as the Meadowlands Development Commission. It was supposed to find an economically beneficial use for what was then regarded as wasteland. The commission spent its early years clearing out the mountains of garbage that over a hundred New Jersey towns had routinely, heedlessly, dumped in the swamps.
“We’re in this situation where we put so many important things in the Meadowlands, and we’re going to have to figure out how we’re going to adapt a lot of it. At the same time, we’re going to have to make decisions about what we can adapt and where we’re going to have to let the water come in.”—Robert Freudenberg, Regional Plan Association
In 2001, the agency was renamed the Meadowlands Commission, which, according to environmental activist Bill Sheehan, founder of nonprofit the Hackensack Riverkeeper, “kind of took the word ‘development’ out of their vocabulary.” The official agency, over time, had evolved into a steward of the environmentally sensitive wetlands. Then, in 2015, under Gov. Chris Christie, it was folded into the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, the proprietor of all those stadiums and parking lots. (Many of the state’s environmental offices were shut down, defunded, or otherwise monkeyed with during Christie’s eight years.) In short, when you start talking with anyone on the west side of the Hudson about the concept of a Meadowlands National Park, you immediately find out more than you ever wanted to know about New Jersey’s byzantine political culture.
Sheehan, who has been a force for environmental protection and wetlands restoration since he founded his nonprofit over 20 years ago, and has fought tooth and nail to preserve every square inch of wetland, says this: “I’m interested in the idea. Don’t get me wrong, you know? I think it would be like, after a very, very long battle.”
RPA’s proposal isn’t the first to suggest this sort of restoration for the Meadowlands. A human encyclopedia of the ways things can go off the rails in New Jersey, Sheehan brings me up to date on the obvious precursor, the much-ballyhooed Rebuild By Design “New Meadowlands” project, a winner of the 2013 competition staged by the federal department of Housing and Urban Development in response to Hurricane Sandy.
The project, as it was originally imagined, was majestic. The design team, led by MIT’s Center for Advanced Urbanism and the Dutch firms ZUS and De Urbanisten, came up with a vision of impeccably restored wetlands (with swimmers in the Hackensack River) surrounding new neighborhoods built to urban densities and protectively ringed by berms. The renderings were mind-blowing because they showed that exact thing you see from the train window—natural splendor punctuated with industrial ruins—but better: the Hollywood version.
The project, much delayed, originally came with an $850 million price tag, obviously inadequate, and received only $150 million in funding. The competition design team was replaced by the engineering firm AECOM, which then worked closely with low-lying communities like Little Ferry and South Hackensack to translate the big picture into something… smaller. The end result was a kit of parts for water management: berms, storm drains, and bioswales. These are things every low-lying town should have, but the transformational vision was dead.
Or, as Sheehan put it, “They were supposed to be looking at resiliency, and all they could get out of their planning process was being able to clean the storm drains on a regular basis.”
The funny thing about those Rebuild by Design renderings, which have been revived as illustrations for the RPA’s Meadowlands proposal, is that they are much more grounded in reality than I’d assumed. There are vistas along the Hackensack that are every bit as lovely as the scenes in those drawings. One day I visited Laurel Hill Park, on the waterfront in Secaucus, where the Hackensack widens as it nears Newark Bay, and I recognized a railroad bridge that, in the Rebuild by Design vision, doubled as a seafood restaurant. Secaucus, as it happens, is also the place you see when you emerge from the train tunnel.
I emailed a copy of the RPA proposal to Michael Gonnelli, the mayor of Secaucus, a suburban town with about 20,000 residents. His first reaction: “It’s kind of farfetched.”
Climate change requires us to think big—actually, to think huge—and come up with responses that, just like natural phenomena, ignore arbitrary jurisdictional boundaries.
I mistakenly took that to mean that he thought the national park was a bad idea. We chatted for a while about how his town has been coping with climate change. Anyone who builds, he says, has to raise the site’s elevation. “We put up berms all around the river now. We’ve done nothing but flood control since Sandy hit here. That’s all we’ve done.” As the conversation progressed, it became clear that Mayor Gonnelli was intrigued by the national park concept. “I don’t think it’s impractical,” he says. “We’ve got quite a bit of wetlands that we’d be willing to donate for sure.” And he even began speaking in terms of how to move the idea along: “We have a mayors’ Meadowlands committee. It’s something I could certainly bring up out there.”
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I like the idea of Gonnelli rallying his fellow mayors, but it’s hard for me to imagine 14 New Jersey elected officials agreeing to a plan that, in some cases, will shrink or eliminate their towns. The key to the plan, the reason the proposal calls for a national park, is that only the federal government (under some future administration) would have the money and the chutzpah to cut through the inevitable infighting and red tape. In fact, that’s pretty much how it happened last time.
“There’s tremendous precedent for doing this going back about 40 years, which is the creation of Gateway National Recreation Area,” Benepe explains. The Gateway National Park, also proposed by an RPA plan, was established in the 1970s and includes bays and seashores in Queens, Staten Island, and New Jersey. So, like the proposed Meadowlands National Park, it preserves and maintains a scattered set of sites. “So, for those who say it can’t happen, it will never happen, there is completely ample precedent for this.”
Landscape architect Susannah Drake, principal of Brooklyn-based DLANDstudio, worked on a competition that fed ideas to the Regional Plan. She speculates that it might be possible to simply enlarge the Gateway National Park to encompass the Meadowlands.
“Really, all you’re doing is kind of expanding the boundaries of the national park to include what is a very ecologically kind of fragile area,” Drake reasons. “I think it also might make the area easier to manage, in a way, going forward, because when you have private landowners who are in a situation of constantly having losses and then, looking to the federal government to repay those losses through FEMA… it may actually be more economically viable to translate it into a national park.”
While adding pieces of the Meadowlands to an existing national park could be an effective shortcut, it lacks the pizzazz of a park that comprises the whole Meadowlands. Establishing a national park, however, is an extended process. Will Rogers, the president of the Trust for Public Land, an expert on transforming private land into public space, cautions, “There’s a high bar in terms of the resource value. It has to be extraordinary. If you look at our national parks, there has to be some compelling either resource or historical or other context that really makes that particular place stand out.
“What happens is first of all,” Rogers continues, “is a place is identified that seems appropriate, and then there needs to be an official study of some kind about whether the place is worthy of national park status.” The study, he says, is “often congressionally authorized, and it would be done in conjunction with the Interior Department.”
The upshot, then, is that strong backing from the state’s Congressional delegation is key. As it happens, Bill Pascrell, the congressman for the ninth district, which covers much of the Meadowlands, was instrumental in creating the Great Falls National Historical Park in Paterson, which is about as unorthodox and urban a park as you could imagine. The focal point of the park is the 77-foot-high waterfalls on the Passaic River, but the park also exists to commemorate Paterson’s role as the nation’s first planned industrial city, powered by water and founded by Alexander Hamilton in 1792. The old mill buildings and gritty surroundings are as much a part of the park experience as the natural splendor.
Surely it will take a while for officials at every level of government to wrap their heads around this concept. In a way, that’s the beauty of it. The real power of the RPA’s proposal for a Meadowlands National Park is that it’s big enough to be inspiring.
Congress has to appropriate money to pay for the National Park Service to do a study. “And if it passes muster,” Rogers says, “then you need an authorizing bill that would create the park that has to go through Congress.
“So, needless to say, under the best of circumstances it’s a lengthy process, and depending on the way the political pendulum is swinging vis-a-vis public lands, protections and what they’re used for, there are times when you would say, ‘Well, let’s wait for the pendulum to swing back the other way.’”
While we will have to wait for the national political pendulum to swing, New Jersey’s own pendulum already has. A new governor, Phil Murphy, a Democrat, took office on January 18. Murphy’s press office thought it was too early in his tenure for him to comment on the RPA proposal and suggested, instead, that I check out the environmental positions stated on his campaign website. In short: Whatever former Gov. Chris Christie did, Murphy will do the opposite. For instance, he will have the state rejoin the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a consortium of East Coast states that Christie snubbed. “As the most densely populated state in the nation, Phil understands that preserving our open space is essential,” the website reads. Murphy’s support for the park seems, at least, possible.
Of course, turning the big picture into reality is going to require lots of baby steps. Freudenberg is just at the beginning of the process: “We take this idea on the road,” he says. “We start talking to the people we need to talk to, people in the towns. Elected officials in the state. The new governor. The senators and representatives in Congress. We listen to what people say. We wind up on the other side of this with a vision that works, that we keep pushing. We want to keep pushing this along, but let everyone join in. And push this idea forward. Take it to the next step.”
And, as you might expect from someone who works for an organization that exists to blur boundaries, Freudenberg insists, “This is not just a New Jersey thing. This is a Northeast megaregion thing.”
Surely it will take a while for officials at every level of government to wrap their heads around this concept. In a way, that’s the beauty of it. The real power of the RPA’s proposal for a Meadowlands National Park is that it’s big enough to be inspiring. The same quality that makes it quixotic also makes it important. Right now, many of us are hunkered down trying to figure out how to hang on to basic things we’ve long taken for granted: clean water, clean air, public education, reproductive rights, freedom of the press, equal rights… Politics has become a mad scramble. Even existing national parks and national monuments, previously sacrosanct, are under siege. But maybe you don’t have to wait for the pendulum swing to set an agenda. Maybe it’s smarter not to wait. | {
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If we're going to have one of these unfortunate exercises in Second Amendment freedoms every couple of days, somebody should alert news editors and news directors so that they can be properly prepared. The cost of freedom is always high, you know. First, UNC-Charlotte, and now this one, on Tuesday, in Denver, which produced the saddest passage in the long history of The New York Times.
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"I heard a gunshot," said Makai Dixon, 8, a second grader who had been training for this moment, with active shooter drills and lockdowns, since he was in kindergarten. "I’d never heard it before."
Eight years old.
Second grade.
Trained properly in how to stay safe in school against someone opening up with military-grade weapons.
Trained since kindergarten.
To hell with any society that makes that sentence possible.
To hell with anyone who made that society possible.
Respond to this post on the Esquire Politics Facebook page here. | {
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It’s always a novel experience to wake up on Monday and remember that a news post is required.
A lot has happened! Holy shit. Uh… Let’s see. We announced our Magic: The Gathering show, The Magic Hour in the fleeting moments before last night’s Acquisitions Incorporated game. That felt novel, also. It’s gonna be a real weird show and I hope that’s alright. I’ll get the trailer up for you when it hits the channel; I think this one made it to the show on a jump drive.
If you’re looking to catch last night’s Acquisitions Incorporated, featuring our good friends Patrick Rothfuss and Holly Conrad, look no further: we’ve got you right here with the Twitch VOD. We cut them all out later, but you’ll find the AI game at or around the 7:23 mark; I think it might be prefaced by the Magic trailer in-line…? What happens in the theater for the video feed isn’t always one to one on Twitch. I can’t really check it because I am in a hotel chock full of nerds and a nerd is a creature who subsists largely on wireless fi. I would describe the current level of service as “porous” if not “wholly imaginary.” If you see this post at all, know that a miracle occurred this day.
If you were with us in person, or in spirit, you know that Gabe - which is to say, Jim - has been the recipient of a fairly substantial costume upgrade from Dani Hartell. Here’s our group shot after the game, taken by the inimitable Dabe Alan:
Love this photo! What an awesome night! pic.twitter.com/ewcIZQCjKK — Gabe (@cwgabriel) September 3, 2018
The strip we did for Saturday’s Make A Strip panel, also known as Today’s Strip, makes reference to the very real heat generated by the outfit and also includes an actual quote by Kara.
Just a couple more panels to go! Then I’m going to find meat and eat it until I pass out. And I’m not particular about the meat.
(CW)TB out. | {
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Russia's agriculture minister warned Wednesday that Moscow must spend billions of dollars in the coming years subsidizing farmers in order to avoid a shortage caused by its ban on most Western foods.
Agriculture Minister Nokolai Fyodorov's stark comments represented Moscow's first admission that its decision to strike back at U.S. and EU sanctions with sweeping food bans may have long-term costs for both its budget and consumers.
The trade war is part of a broader crisis in East-West relations sparked by Russia's perceived attempts to split strife-torn Ukraine in two after Kiev's decision to seek a closer political and economic alliance with Europe.
Russia relies heavily on foreign fruits and vegetables because its long winters and inhospitable climate keep farmers from growing produce desired by the country's booming middle class.
It also imports huge volumes of Australian and European meat along with U.S. poultry and Norwegian salmon, all banned under Russian President Vladimir Putin's orders earlier this month.
The agriculture minister told the Rossiya 24 news channel that "the volume of additional support needed to substitute for the embargoed items in full, if we are talking about short-term, through the end of the year, is tens of billions of rubles."
Ten billion rubles is now equal to $275 million (about 200 million euros).
"But there are also medium-term measures: next year and in the subsequent years, you could say that this sum will be measured in the hundreds of billions of rubles," Fyodorov said.
His estimates suggest that Russia may have to spend at least $10 billion on farm subsidies over the coming few years.
That level of support has not been provided for in the federal budget and may require other popular social programs to be cut.
Russia's economic slowdown has limited the government's tax revenues while jitters over Ukraine's future and possible additional Western sanctions have kept investors from filling the void left by cautious levels of state spending.
Natalia Shagaida of the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration said the government's current agricultural subsidies see just eight kopeks spent for every ruble of goods produced.
"In order to enjoy greater production, you need money spent on agricultural modernization, especially in the dairy farming industry," Shagaida said.
"You need cheep loans and enormous state support," the economist said.
"You may then see some results in vegetable farming, for example, as early as next year. Even with dairy, you might see progress within two years. But the rest will take at least five years," Shagaida said. | {
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De tweestrijd die zich al sinds het Paasweekend afspeelt in Forum voor Democratie, tussen partijleider Thierry Baudet en tweede man Henk Otten, is op donderdagavond uitgelopen in het vertrek van Otten uit het partijbestuur.
Otten voelde zich gedwongen tot die stap nadat NRC donderdagmiddag het nieuws naar buiten had gebracht dat hij uit de partijkas een betaling van ruim dertigduizend euro had gedaan aan zichzelf – en na de ontdekking daarvan had moeten stoppen als penningmeester.
De twee medebestuursleden, voorzitter Thierry Baudet en secretaris Rob Rooken, probeerden Otten al weken uit het bestuur te zetten. Op donderdagavond meldde hij in een tweet dat hij het bestuur verlaat „in het partijbelang”. Hij noemt het „onthutsend” hoe Baudet en Rooken „karaktermoord” op hem plegen. En dat de ruzie hiermee nog niet voorbij is, blijkt uit de laatste zin in zijn tweet: „Ik zal op het juiste moment uitgebreid ingaan op de gehele gang van zaken.”
Verschillende bronnen zeiden tegen NRC dat in de boekhouding van de partij is ontdekt dat Otten eerder dit jaar geld overmaakte aan zijn eigen adviesbedrijf, zonder overleg met andere bestuursleden. Nadat dit aan hem was voorgehouden heeft hij het bedrag teruggestort in de partijkas.
Otten bevestigt de betaling – exclusief btw komt het neer op 25.000 euro – en zegt dat het „een vergoeding was voor bovenmatige uren” die hij heeft verricht voor onder meer de fondsenwerving voor FVD (dat zou gaan om tonnen) en voor ledenwerving en planning van de campagnes. Otten noemt de betaling nu zelf „een slordige omgang met de interne governance”. Hij betaalde het meteen terug omdat hij er „geen discussie” over wilde, maar vindt nog steeds dat hij er recht op heeft. Hij wil dat het bestuur de betaling alsnog zal goedkeuren.
Otten zegt ook dat hij de kwestie heeft „aangekaart” bij de kascommissie van de partij. Die vond volgens Otten dat „de zaak naar tevredenheid is afgehandeld”. Thierry Baudet weerspreekt dit.
Otten wilde bestuurslid blijven
Henk Otten, aankomend Eerste Kamerlid van FVD, zegt dat hij het eens was met het besluit om te stoppen als penningmeester. „Het was te veel werk om in je eentje te doen.” Maar eerder wilde hij niet terugtreden als bestuurslid. „Ik denk dat het essentieel is voor de partij dat ik in het bestuur blijf”, zei Otten in een eerdere reactie.
Lees ook het NRC-interview met Henk Otten: ‘Baudet trekt de partij te veel naar rechts’
Otten is medeoprichter van Forum voor Democratie en al jaren achter de schermen de drijvende kracht achter campagnes, de selectie van kandidaten en de partijorganisatie.
De statuten van de vereniging Forum voor Democratie, in 2016 door Otten zelf opgesteld, bepalen dat alleen de algemene ledenvergadering een bestuurslid kan schorsen of ontslaan. Daarvoor is een tweederde meerderheid nodig bij een vergadering waar eveneens tweederde van de leden aanwezig is. De partij heeft nu naar eigen zeggen meer dan 36.000 leden. Als dat aantal klopt zouden er 16.000 stemmen nodig zijn om een bestuurslid weg te sturen.
Sinds afgelopen zaterdag is er een stevig conflict gaande in de top van Forum voor Democratie, die bij de Provinciale Statenverkiezingen van 20 maart de grootste partij is geworden. Henk Otten kwam in een interview in NRC met harde kritiek op partijleider Baudet. Hij zei moeite te hebben met de stijl van Baudet, die zou radicaal rechtse kiezers aantrekken, en ook met inhoudelijke punten, zoals het onlangs gelanceerde meldpunt tegen ‘linkse indoctrinatie’ in het onderwijs.
In hetzelfde interview pleitte Otten voor meer interne controle op het partijbestuur. Hij zei: „We zullen nu toch iets van checks and balances moeten inbouwen.” Hij vindt dat de statuten „aan modernisering toe zijn” en is voor uitbreiding van het partijbestuur.
De jaarrekening van de partij over 2017 is door een externe accountant en de interne kascommissie goedgekeurd.
Machtiging
Volgens verschillende bronnen rond de top van de partij stoorde het Baudet in toenemende mate dat Otten als enige beschikte over een machtiging om betalingen te verrichten. Vorige week maakte de partij al bekend dat er drie adviseurs aan het bestuur zijn toegevoegd, van wie twee zich zullen bezighouden met de financiën.
Dinsdag verklaarde FVD dat Otten de functie van penningmeester al heeft neergelegd. Hijzelf zei toen dat dit besluit niet door anderen is afgedwongen, maar te maken heeft met zijn toekomstige rol als fractievoorzitter in de Eerste Kamer. Hij was lijsttrekker op de kandidatenlijst voor de senaat. De Eerste Kamerleden worden eind mei door de Provinciale Staten verkozen. Op woensdag schreef Baudet op Twitter dat Otten ook zijn functie als medewerker van de Tweede Kamerfractie zal neerleggen.
Henk Otten noemt het uitlekken van de betaling „uiteraard niet toevallig”. „Het leidt de aandacht af van de broodnodige discussie over de volwassenwording van onze partij en organisatie.” Hij zegt dat hij die discussie als lid van het partijbestuur „binnenskamers onverminderd” zal voortzetten.
De overige twee bestuursleden van FVD, Thierry Baudet en Rob Rooken, deden een oproep aan Otten vrijwillig het bestuur te verlaten. Na het uitlekken van „het nieuws omtrent de greep in de kas” is Ottens positie onhoudbaar geworden, aldus de bestuurders. In een verklaring op de site van de partij schrijven ze: „Totdat dit publiek werd, poogden we de affaire intern op te lossen en hem de eer aan zichzelf te laten houden - maar nu is dat helaas niet langer mogelijk.”
Laatste update (21.39 uur): Dit bericht is geactualiseerd toen bekend werd dat Otten uit het bestuur van FVD stapt.
Baudet staat er eventjes alleen voor
NRC De Haagse Stemming Het belangrijkste nieuws van het Binnenhof en een inkijkje in de politieke dag die komen gaat Inschrijven
Een versie van dit artikel verscheen ook in NRC Handelsblad van 26 april 2019 | {
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Can you remember the last customer service experience that left you fuming? Not too hard, right? We all want to be treated with a level of respect, and with so many people veering on the edge of a boiling rage these days sometimes all it takes is one nasty exchange with a company's representative to send you teetering over the edge.
It happened to me recently when I made a call about an item I'd returned to a company for an exchange that had seemed to vanish. The agent on the phone interrupted me repeatedly and was actively unhelpful. Even though I knew better than to let it get to me, it did and I simmered all day — until I fired off an email to the company's founder. He actually replied, and the next day someone called to apologize, make things right and even tell me how they'd be coaching the employee to improve her customer service. I ended up being a bigger fan of the company than ever.
We have this perception, especially in U.S., that the customer is always right, and that by giving them your business they have this responsibility to you.
But it doesn't always end so well. I'm now embroiled in a months-long situation with the manufacturer of a big-ticket home item that I just can't seem to get resolved and it's ruining my day far too often. Friends and family echo these sentiments with their own customer service gone wrong stories and their anger is palpable as they recount their experiences.
Why We Can't Shake a Bad Experience
The last thing any of us needs is a reason to tilt into a vortex of fury. But what do we do to stop it?
Well, it helps to understand why we feel that way. I talked with Uma Karmarkar, an assistant professor at UC San Diego who holds doctorates in both consumer behavior and neuroscience.
It only makes sense, she tells NBC News BETTER. In particular if “you've already engaged with that firm, we have this perception, especially in U.S., that the customer is always right, and that by giving them your business they have this responsibility to you.” Assuming you're talking with someone from that company because something has gone wrong, “to be insulted on top of that by not being listened to … is going to create this frustrated response, but also loss of agency,” she says. And that's what really critical.
In these instances, say when you get into an endless loop with a service rep clearly just reading from a script and not offering any real help as you rehash the problem, “you don't have a path forward, you don't have any way to respond or fix the problem,” she says. “[And] we don't like cliffhangers … there's a reason we move to edge of our chairs when music reaches a crescendo.”
While this can be seen even in a much more entertaining situation — Karmarkar cites a scene in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” where it's impossible to resist ending the “shave and a haircut ...” jingle — it's infuriating when we're left hanging with no power to change things.
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Bad Customer Service Can Feel Like an Unresolved Loop
The nasty encounters generate all these negative emotions, Karmarkar says, and emotions have a duration. “If you can't handle them, process them or switch them,” of course they're going to hang on. Since we can't just set them aside, “I would imagine that is what can poison the rest of the day.”
Any justification that allows us to close that narrative leads to [fewer] rage-inducing interactions.
Things can take an even more drastic turn when we move through the various channels of communication. Interacting with a real live person — face to face — is much easier to navigate, Karmarkar says, thanks to nonverbal cues like facial expression and body language. Much is lost on the phone, not to mention in online chat support — where now we have to wonder if we're even talking to a human or a robot.
The awful feeling that we're not being acknowledged is so bad, in fact, that even a negative resolution may be better than feeling you were cut off, she says. We can even make do with some kind of justification. “People feel better with a concrete reason,” she says. “Any justification that allows us to close that narrative leads to [fewer] rage-inducing interactions. For example in the airline industry, providing some information about a delay is better than giving none.”
Reach for Resolution, Even if the Problem Remains
But where does that leave us if the company truly just doesn't seem to care? Unfortunately there's no easy answer. Look, it's just hard. We're no longer talking just about 'can you fix my product?' "It's shifted into a personal relationship now,” says Karmarkar.
Ask yourself: Do you want restitution or do you want to punish them?
But “there are certainly ways of trying to retain your agency,” Karmarkar says. You can “look for other ways to communicate your frustration and take actions you feel bring you closer to restitution” — otherwise known as the 'ask for the manager' approach. There's an interesting balance happening here though, she notes. “Do you want restitution or do you want to punish them”? (Can't it be both? I sometimes wonder!)
That's also hard to recommend, she says, because “what if they don't respond? You're stuck and now you have two points of frustration.”
Then a “lovely suggestion but a difficult one,” she says is to “humanize the interaction from the other person's point of view … create reasons for why they're treating you this way. Maybe they're having a bad day, maybe they have a bad boss.” But is that likely for most of us? “It requires a lot a lot of empathy and compassion after you've been harmed,” Karmarkar acknowledges. “It's so hard because you've placed your trust in them [and then you were] punished.”
Twitter can be a great place to vent your frustration if you aren't being heard, but know your goal before you post. mrdoomits / Getty Images/iStockphoto
Find Another Outlet for Your Frustration
Because a key factor here is the feeling of being wronged, another way of finding your way out of the rabbit hole is to seek validation elsewhere, according to Karmarkar. Enter Twitter. But tread carefully, she cautions. While this can serve two purposes — trying to get a response from the company, and getting validation from others that you were treated poorly — and may provide relief, “the ugly shadow to that is holding that resentment over time — a grudge,” she says. “Where every time I think of it I'm angry again.”
It's worth finding a way past the seething stage, because it's not just about you, Karmarkar reminds us. Say “you had a bad day at work so you're rude to someone online … you get these spreading ripples because people are trying to find outlets to express that frustration.
It's not just hurtful to you ... it may spill over.” And before you know it we're all being horrible to everybody.
The “ultimate goal,” Karmarkar says, “is finding a way to have the harm done to you be validated.” While many of us rush to vent to anyone who will listen — for as long as they'll listen — that's “not the same as finding someone whose opinion is meaningful to you who can agree that there was harm done to you and make you feel as if your voice was heard.”
So if you've got a trusty friend who will hear you out that may just be the best solace.
Beyond that, Karmarkar says, “I suspect it's not qualitatively different from how to handle frustrating interactions in interpersonal relationships” — a topic where advice abounds. When all else fails, there's a reason advice like take a timeout, do something active or just find something to laugh at has such staying power. It actually helps.
So the next time I go round and round with the current villain company in my life maybe I'll try the best of both worlds — a walk with my dog, and a friend who can listen.
NEXT: What happens to your brain when you binge watch Netflix
Want more tips like these? NBC News BETTER is obsessed with finding easier, healthier and smarter ways to live. Sign up for our newsletter and follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. | {
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No couple agrees on everything, but Bill Clinton may have gone off-script when he insulted Obamacare after Hillary spent much of her campaign praising it. Bill criticized the spike in premium prices and decrease of coverage, calling it a “crazy system.”
Speaking in Michigan on Monday, Bill Clinton went on a brief rant and ripped into the Affordable Care Act. The faults he found with it were remarkably similar to many points Republicans have made, such as the detrimental effects Obamacare has on small businesses.
“The people that are getting killed in this deal are small business people and individuals who make just a little too much to get any of these subsidies,” Clinton said.
Naturally, this was an interesting choice of words for a Hillary Clinton rally where the people in attendance were more likely to be in favor of the Affordable Care Act than say at a Trump rally
While Hillary has said she plans to build on the successes of Obamacare and acknowledged various flaws within it, even her harshest remarks were a far cry from Bill who said, “You’ve got this crazy system where all of a sudden 25 million more people have health care and then the people are out there busting it… wind up with their premiums doubled and their coverage cut in half.”
“It’s the craziest thing in the world,” he added.
This is not the first time Bill Clinton has stolen the spotlight with controversial statements on the campaign trail. Just last month, he told CBS News that Hillary Clinton fainted, “frequently,” and then had the audio scrubbed from broadcast.
Bill Clinton's ‘frequently’ comment on Hillary’s past faintings edited out of CBS transcript https://t.co/Kk5AI2IpL9pic.twitter.com/ELATn4pWCd — RT America (@RT_America) September 13, 2016
If nothing else, Bill and Hillary may be in for a lengthy chat. | {
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Book snobs who insist that reading literature is superior to listening to an audiobook may want to look away now.
Neuroscientists have discovered that the same cognitive and emotional parts of the brain are stimulated whether a person hears words, or reads them on a page.
A YouGov study carried out in 2016 found that just 10 per cent of Britons believed that listening to an audiobook was the same as having read the physical version, with the majority believing it was a lesser form of culture.
But experts at the University of California, Berkeley, disagree.
Lead author Dr Fatma Deniz, a researcher in neuroscience said: “At a time when more people are absorbing information via audiobooks, podcasts and even audio texts, our study shows that, whether they're listening to or reading the same materials, they are processing semantic information similarly.
“We knew that a few brain regions were activated similarly when you hear a word and read the same word, but I was not expecting such strong similarities in the meaning representation across a large network of brain regions in both these sensory modalities.” | {
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Where have I been?
Good question eh? Once again, I’ve fallen off the radar a bit, running around trying to stay ahead of the game. I always seem to be so far behind…However, today, I am ahead. I was able to run pain free for a whopping 8 miles. After completing the Moab 55k a few weeks back, I had a hard time recovering from a lingering minor calf strain. It is no longer lingering and I am finally back at it. I’ve been travelling alot in support of the Wings for Life World Run, a global event for spinal cord injury research. This “charity run” will happen in 3 locations in the US, and 34 other locations on 5 other continents. Hit that link and check it out. I’ll be running in Denver if you’d like to come join me for a great cause.
I’ve been golfing to stay sane, with all the busy-ness I’ve encountered this past winter. I played Doral in Florida, and a bunch of courses in Salt Lake, due to our warm spring temps. Speedgolf is on the radar this year, so I’m practicing more at my “efficient technique”. Best round so far. 77 in 58 minutes, with lots of lollygagging. Bernard Lagat, you better watch out for the Speedgoat in October!
In other big news. I am now making a formal mention that I’ll be headed back to Mt. Kathadin in Maine for another run at the AT record. I”m sure I’ll get some negative response, but keep in mind…this is all about being on that amazing trail, moving quickly and efficiently, and giving it all the respect I can possibly give it. If I fail, or fall behind a potential record, I am jumping in our vehicle and coming home. I won’t complete it this time if the record can’t go down. There will be no blog, no circus, and no listening to people tell me that hikers are faster than runners. Or visa versa….there is no difference, one person just moves a bit quicker and takes more risks. So there you have it. Oh yah, I”m gonna run Western States before the AT too. Because 100 miles is not that far.
The Speedgoat 50k now has very close to 500 runners on the list, it’s gonna be a barn burner, and if there are any coorporate sponsors out there interested in getting involved with the most badass 50k in the US, go hit my coaching page and grab my email, and send me a note. This year’s field is thicker than the blue bells in Mineral Basin. Lots of dough on the line, and I’m not talking pizza.
This coming Sunday, I’ll be hanging at the “Roost” in Denver. Yup, the Runners Roost. Show up around 4pm and we’ll go for a run and shoot the shit. Hit the link here for more details. We will also be demo-ing the new Hoka One One’s. Come take em’ for a ride.
Now go run, cuz’ it’s a nice day! | {
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Everything we know about the formation of solar systems might be wrong, says University of Florida astronomy professor Jian Ge and his postdoc, Bo Ma. They've discovered the first "binary-binary" -- two massive companions around one star in a close binary system, one so-called giant planet and one brown dwarf, or "failed star" The first, called MARVELS-7a, is 12 times the mass of Jupiter, while the second, MARVELS-7b, has 57 times the mass of Jupiter.
Astronomers believe that planets in our solar system formed from a collapsed disk-like gaseous cloud, with our largest planet, Jupiter, buffered from smaller planets by the asteroid belt. In the new binary system, HD 87646, the two giant companions are close to the minimum mass for burning deuterium and hydrogen, meaning that they have accumulated far more dust and gas than what a typical collapsed disk-like gaseous cloud can provide. They were likely formed through another mechanism. The stability of the system despite such massive bodies in close proximity raises new questions about how protoplanetary disks form. The findings, which are now online, will be published in the November issue of the Astronomical Journal.
HD 87646's primary star is 12 percent more massive than our sun, yet is only 22 astronomical units away from its secondary, a star about 10 percent less massive than our sun, roughly the distance between the sun and Uranus in our solar system. An astronomical unit is the mean distance between the center of the Earth and our sun, but in cosmic terms, is a relatively short distance. Within such a short distance, two giant companions are orbiting the primary star at about 0.1 and 1.5 astronomical units away. For such large companion objects to be stable so close together defies our current popular theories on how solar systems form.
The planet-hunting Doppler instrument W.M. Keck Exoplanet Tracker, or KeckET, developed by a team led by Ge at the Sloan Digital Sky Survey telescope at Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico, is unusual in that it can simultaneously observe dozens of celestial bodies. Ge says this discovery would not have been possible without a multiple-object Doppler measurement capability such as KeckET to search for a large number of stars to discover a very rare system like this one. The survey of HD 87646 occurred in 2006 during the pilot survey of the Multi-object APO Radial Velocity Exoplanet Large-area Survey (MARVELS) of the SDSS-III program, and Ge led the MARVELS survey from 2008 to 2012. It has taken eight years of follow-up data collection through collaboration with over 30 astronomers at seven other telescopes around the world and careful data analysis, much of which was done by Bo Ma, to confirm what Ge calls a "very bizarre" finding.
The team will continue to analyze data from the MARVELS survey.
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A group of World War II veterans in an Honor Flight group Tuesday knocked over barriers imposed during the government shutdown at the WWII Memorial in Washington, D.C., to get inside.
As part of the federal government shutdown, national parks are closed. But the group of veterans continued to the monument Tuesday, as reported by Stars and Stripes reporter Leo Shane:
Honor flight vets just knocked over the barriers at the WWII memorial to get inside, #shutdown or no. pic.twitter.com/T4bx8kvFYj — Leo Shane III (@LeoShane) October 1, 2013
No sign of folks leaving. The vets have control of the memorial. #shutdown pic.twitter.com/eGj4kmFEiP — Leo Shane III (@LeoShane) October 1, 2013
Update: WFB staff writer Lachlan Markay arrived at the WWII Memorial, where a second group of Iowa vets (in yellow shirts) have also arrived at the memorial. Park police are letting all vets through, according to Shane.
"We're looking about how to deal with this in the future," Park Police spokeswoman Carol Johnson said Tuesday. | {
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FloSports is doubling down on its foray into Major League Soccer. The Austin-based over-the-top sports media company announced Monday that it has reached a deal with FC Cincinnati to become the team’s exclusive regional streaming broadcast partner.
The two-year agreement, which runs through the 2020 season, is the second MLS local rights package that FloSports has bought since launching soccer vertical FloFC.com earlier this year. FloSports is the exclusive local broadcast partner of D.C. United.
FC Cincinnati just began its first MLS season after a three-year run in the United Soccer League.
“What we were looking for was trying to get the most exclusive rights that we could get our hands on,” FloSports vice president for global rights acquisition Mike Levy told the American-Statesman. “And then we really appreciated the passion that fanbase has showcased as a USL team. They’ve had tremendous ticket sales early on and we’re bullish that they’re gonna have success.”
The partnership with FC Cincinnati is not entirely exclusive, as local Sinclair TV station WSTR Star 64 will broadcast games in the market. Regionally, fans in areas such as Louisville and Lexington, Ky., and Dayton, Ohio, will only be able to access games via FloFC.com — unless the games are aired by one of MLS’s national broadcast partners.
This season, 27 of 34 FC Cincinnati matches will appear on local broadcasts. Outside team regions, all MLS matches are available on the ESPN+ subscription service.
“We’ve been talking to Flo for a long time about how we can do something together,” MLS senior vice president of media Seth Bacon said. “When we continued to talk we realized one of their strengths is distributing live content. For us, the most available, beneficial and valuable opportunities that exist are our local media rights.”
Terms of the agreement weren’t disclosed, but Levy said FloSports paid a rights fee for both the D.C. United and FC Cincinnati packages, on top of committing resources to film and produce in-depth features and interviews.
A subscription to FloSports costs $150 per year, which pencils out to $12.49 per month. There’s also a $30 monthly payment option. Subscriptions provide access to all platforms within the FloSports network — a total of 25 verticals covering everything from track and field to wrestling, gymnastics and cheerleading.
D.C. United fans received an email for a discounted subscription. Levy said that won’t be the case for FC Cincinnati.
“At present we’re not looking at that,” he said. “There’s always flexibility and working with the club to make sure we’re driving the best engagement possible. There was a unique aspect to the D.C. United deal that enabled them to control pricing.”
FloSports co-founder Mark Floreani hinted at the second MLS rights deal during a South by Southwest panel Friday about the future of sports media rights. Bacon was also on that panel, and there were several members of the Austin FC front office in attendance.
“We should just bring them up and sign the contract now,” Floreani joked, before adding, “It’s our early days with MLS. The D.C. United deal is our first and we have another one coming up.”
D.C. United fans encountered issues Sunday during the first FloSports broadcast of the team's match against New York City FC. Some users were blocked from viewing the game in a region that shouldn't have been.
"D.C. United is deeply disappointed by the broadcast problems in its first match on FloSports today," D.C. United co-chairmen Steve Kaplan and Jason Levien said in a statement. "We are taking these issues very seriously and find the problems encountered unacceptable. We entered into this agreement with FloSports to offer in-depth year-round coverage and to ensure that our fans can watch our matches in high definition and on their mobile devices for the first time in our 24-year history.
"We contacted officials at FloSports during the broadcast as it became clear there were significant issues and these discussions continued late into the evening. In the coming days we will be working with FloSports to ensure this does not happen again."
MLS’s national TV deals were a topic of discussion on the SXSW panel Friday, as the league's current contracts with ESPN, Fox and Univision expire in 2022. Teams have been asked not to sign local deals beyond then so MLS can potentially offer a comprehensive package to bidders.
Meanwhile, FloSports is investing in soccer beyond just MLS. The company has rights to Coppa Italia and Supercoppa Italiana (available in Canada only), and has an agreement with CONCACAF for the new Nations League competition featuring national teams from North America, Central America and the Caribbean.
“We keep getting bigger and better rights, which only tells us that the marketplace is ready for it,” Levy said. “We’ve just got to go out and do what we do.” | {
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Everyone remembers the day they were diagnosed. When a new diagnosis occurs near a holiday, it can be difficult to cope with this news while trying to survive the most hectic time of the year. Read more below.
The day before Thanksgiving 2009, my husband Joe and I were in the Denver airport headed to Missouri to spend the holidays with family. When the call came from my doctor telling me my biopsy showed breast cancer, the hum and bustle of the Denver airport became suddenly quiet and time stood still. I had a few moments to collect myself before boarding the plane. Throughout that Thanksgiving weekend, I felt detached and raw with emotion. At some times the tears flowed, at others I felt frozen and robotic while going through the motions of the holiday.
As the holidays approach once again, I look back on those memories. I am hoping to give some encouraging words to fighters who face a diagnosis during the holidays. Here are my top strategies and pieces of advice for all of you out there:
1. There will be other holidays.
It is true that today is all that is promised. That goes for everyone though, not just you. It is easy to feel that since you have cancer this could be your last holiday. You don't know that, though. Thinking like this might put undue stress on you to make the holiday the best ever by spending lots of money, buying expensive gifts, etc. Some people find it best to celebrate for more than just one day so they have the energy to take a raincheck and celebrate another day. Perhaps you are so exhausted from the recent news that you can't stay up late on New Year's Eve, for example. Instead, you might decide to make up for it by having brunch and watching the parades the next day. Any day can be a holiday if you make it one!
2. You don't have to enjoy yourself.
Sometimes the pressure of being merry and keeping up appearances can be overwhelming. You are not under any obligation to put on a happy face. Take a moment for yourself, disappearing from the party for a half hour to center can be helpful. Even taking a minute in a room of the house where you can be alone can do wonders. If you are out in public, exiting to the restroom to breathe and distract yourself with your smartphone or anything that shifts focus away from the present situation. Don't be guilted into cheering up so others can feel more at ease. Feel and do what is best for you.
3. Be prepared for advice.
As your family or guests arrive they will likely find out your news. You know how word travels fast, right? Your loved ones will have the best intentions in the world, but that doesn't mean they will give great advice. "It will all work out for the best", "Just stay positive", "I'm sure you will be ok" or other such cliches are meant to help the advice giver feel better about a difficult topic. Don't expect their advice to make you feel better or make the situation more bearable.
4. Take care of your daily needs.
You are going through a trauma. Treat it as such by scaling your life back to the barest essentials even during the holidays, when you are expected to be superhuman. Eat if you can, get plenty of rest, hydration, get some moderate exercise-endorphins are your friends! While under the significant stress this diagnosis will cause it is easy to forget to eat, or have no appetite at all. You may have no desire to shower, wear clean clothes, or brush your teeth. Fight that urge as much as you can. If you stay up on self-care it may be easier to have moments of merriment this season.
Do you have any tips for those who are newly diagnosed during the holidays? Share yours in the comments below.
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Death is the ultimate punishment a state can impose. Because of the death penalty’s severity and finality, its implementation should never be rushed or done without full due process of the law.
Yet Missouri will do exactly that if it proceeds with the execution of Mark Christeson on January 31. Intervention from the U.S. Supreme Court is now needed to prevent a grave miscarriage of justice. The federal courts have truncated due process by ordering unreasonably expedited briefing and hearing schedules, solely for the purpose of maintaining an execution date that was set at the State’s request while appeals were already pending. No court has ever fully considered the merits of Mr. Christeson’s important underlying constitutional claims, and no court has ever provided him with counsel free of conflicts of interest to raise those claims.
Mr. Christeson was 18 years old at the time of the offense for which he was sentenced to death and has significant cognitive limitations, scoring only 74 on an IQ test. There are also other mitigating factors in his case that were not properly presented at trial, such as a tragic history of pervasive sexual violence in his family. Yet no court has fully considered the merits of these claims or analyzed whether he has an intellectual disability that makes his execution unconstitutional, because the first attorneys to raise these claims filed the petition 117 days late. Although it is the lawyers who made the error, the fatal consequences of their mistake fall squarely on Mr. Christeson, and courts have declared that all of his claims for relief are now waived and “procedurally barred” from review. For many years afterward, Mr. Christeson’s lawyers concealed their serious error from their client, preventing him from seeking new counsel who could argue that the procedural bars should be set aside on equitable grounds.
These issues led the United States Supreme Court to intervene in 2014, granting a stay only hours before his execution. The high Court sent the case back to the lower courts, directing them to appoint new, conflict-free counsel.
Without even holding a hearing, and based on the limited evidence that counsel could compile with minimal funding, the court concluded that Mr. Christeson was not entitled to relief.
Responding to this directive, the federal trial court appointed new attorneys to represent Mr. Christeson, but it approved only 6% of their requested budget, thereby creating a new conflict of interest for substitute counsel who lacked the funding or resources necessary to adequately investigate and assess his severe cognitive impairments. Without even holding a hearing, and based on the limited evidence that counsel could compile with minimal funding, the court concluded that Mr. Christeson was not entitled to relief.
Before the federal Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals had decided whether to consider Mr. Christeson’s appeal of this decision, the state of Missouri decided to go forward with their plans to execute Mr. Christeson, setting his execution for January 31. After taking several extensions for filing their own briefs, lawyers for the State asked the court to set short deadlines for Mr. Christeson’s counsel so that the execution could proceed on schedule. Mystifyingly to many, the Eighth Circuit agreed to hear the appeal but then granted the State’s request for an expedited schedule, leaving Mr. Christeson’s attorneys a mere five business days over the holidays to file his appeal brief.
The Eighth Circuit ordered the district court to hold another hearing to develop evidence about prior counsel’s abandonment of Mr. Christeson. The lower court responded by scheduling the hearing less than two days after receiving the order. This timeline was so short that Mr. Christeson’s counsel could not even arrange for witnesses to travel to Missouri in time for the hearing, let alone adequately prepare to present evidence and make complex legal arguments. After the hearing concluded, the court ruled immediately from the bench, rejecting all of Mr. Christeson’s claims and sending the case along its hurried path toward execution.
If the death penalty is to be used at all, it should be carried out fairly and only with full due process of law. Justice should never be sacrificed for the sake of expediency in any criminal proceeding, and in a capital case, a court’s failure to take the necessary time to hear all relevant evidence is simply unacceptable.
No court has ever fully considered the merits of Mr. Christeson’s claims, and if this execution proceeds on January 31st no court ever will. Now is the time to halt the frenzied rush toward his execution and ensure that he is provided with the means and opportunity to present his case, before the state makes an irreversible mistake.
Carol S. Steiker is a professor at Harvard Law School and co-author with Jordan M. Steiker of “Courting Death: The Supreme Court and Capital Punishment.” | {
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ALBANY, NY – The American Hockey League announced Thursday that Albany Devils right winger Mike Sislo has been named to the 2015-16 AHL All-Star Second Team, as voted by coaches, players and media in each of the league’s 30 member cities.
Sislo, who is currently playing for the New Jersey Devils, has a career-high 52 points despite only playing in 54 AHL games this season. His point total ranks tied for first on the team and tied for 15th in the league. Additionally, he has a career-high 27 goals and 25 assists. He is tied for third in the AHL in goals and leads the league with 14-power play tallies.
This year, Sislo represented the organization at the 2016 AHL All-Star Classic. Additionally, he garnered AHL Player of the Week accolades for the period ending Jan. 10. During that span, he notched three goals and three assists for six points in three AHL games during a busy week that saw him skate in five contests in two leagues over the seven-day span.
The 28-year-old was also named February’s AHL Player of the Month. He posted nine goals and seven assists for 16 points along with a +8 rating in 11 games for the Devils, helping them to a 9-1-1-0 record.
At the NHL level this season, the 28-year-old has played 17 games, producing three goals and an assist. He notched his first two career NHL goals on Mar. 17 against Minnesota.
For his career, Sislo has logged 301 career AHL games, producing 186 points with 92 goals and 94 assists. He is the franchise’s all-time leader for goals and power-play tallies (33). He also ranks second for points and assists. | {
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Fundamentals of Surveying (FS)
72-Hour Comprehensive Review Course with FS Exam Practice Sessions
About our FS Exam Prep Course
Do you want to become a licensed Surveyor Engineer? Taking the Fundamentals of Surveying (FS) exam is the first step, and we’re here to help you pass. Our FS exam prep course is designed specifically using NCEES’ exam specifications. When you sign up for our prep course, you will receive comprehensive course materials that are based off of the FS Surveyor Reference manual, fundamentals of surveying practice problem and solution sheets, instructor-led course lectures, and more!
Topics Covered in the Course
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Statistics and Adjustments
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Professional Communication
Business Concepts
Course Formats
To help you pass the FS exam, we offer two separate learning formats. Choose the one that fits your schedule and learning style!
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Choose the learning format that fits your preparation needs by checking out our Compare Plans table. We also offer bundling options.
About the FS Exam
The FS exam is generally the first step in becoming professionally licensed. The 6-hour exam consists of 110 exam questions. This exam is Computer-Based, meaning that participants can take the exam at an NCEES-approved Pearson VUE test center.
Exam applicants who take the FS exam are typically pursuing professional careers as licensed surveyors. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Surveyors make precise measurements to determine property boundaries. They provide data relevant to the shape and contour of the Earth’s surface for engineering, mapmaking, and construction projects.”
Interested in signing up for our FS exam prep course? We’ll help you pass! Sign up today; you won’t be disappointed! | {
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A modern and symbolic retelling of one of the most tragic Greek love stories, a man who comes face to face with his doppelganger and a thought-provoking retelling of Egyptian history are among the themes of this compilation of short stories and poems by author Marié Murray. Primarily dealing with the madness of Art, the intricacies of human emotion, and laced with gothic romance and elegant prose, this book’s haunting effects are sure to stay with the reader well after they have read the last page. | {
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Québec a choisi de prolonger la ligne bleue du métro de Montréal même si les études qu’il a commandées montraient qu’il aurait été plus avantageux de prolonger la ligne orange, a découvert notre Bureau d’enquête.
Ces études avaient été gardées secrètes. Elles ont servi de base au conseil des ministres pour aller de l’avant, en avril 2018, avec ce projet évalué à 3,9 milliards $.
Bien que l’Autorité régionale de transport métropolitain (ARTM) ait refusé de nous les fournir via une demande d’accès à l’information, nous avons pu les consulter au cours des dernières semaines.
Elles ont été réalisées entre 2011 et 2015 par la défunte Agence métropolitaine de transport (AMT), pour analyser divers prolongements des lignes bleue (vers l’est), orange (jusqu’à Laval) et jaune (à Longueuil).
Les experts concluent qu’un prolongement de 2,1 km de la ligne orange entre la station Côte-Vertu et la gare de train Bois-Franc aurait, au kilomètre, transporté plus d’usagers, fait abandonner la voiture par plus de gens et permis de meilleurs gains de temps qu’un prolongement de la ligne bleue.
Cette option aurait aussi été la seule à soulager le tronçon est de la ligne orange, contrairement au projet de ligne bleue qui risque de le surcharger davantage.
«Le petit bout entre Côte-Vertu et Bois-Franc c’est une connexion qui aurait dû être faite depuis bien longtemps. Si j’avais été à l’AMT, j’aurais mis ça comme priorité. En deuxième c’est le métro d’Anjou», estime la professeure associée au Département d’études urbaines de l’Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), Florence Junca-Adenot.
Selon elle, le prolongement du tronçon ouest de la ligne orange devient encore plus pertinent maintenant que le Réseau express métropolitain (REM) passera à Bois-Franc.
«Choix politiques»
L’experte rappelle qu’en matière de transports, il y a souvent des «choix politiques».
Depuis ces études, la planification des transports en commun dans la région de Montréal est passée dans les mains de l’ARTM. Son porte-parole Simon Charbonneau affirme que la priorisation de la ligne bleue a fait «l’objet d’un consensus des élus des municipalités et du gouvernement du Québec».
Les documents que nous avons consultés montrent que les futures stations du prolongement de la ligne bleue seraient peu utilisées par rapport à d’autres stations du réseau.
Métro inutile?
Selon le professeur en urbanisme à la Faculté de l’aménagement de l’Université de Montréal, Jean-Philippe Meloche, le prolongement de la ligne bleue n’est pas «dans la zone payante» pour utiliser un métro.
«Plus je m’approche des zones où le sol vaut cher et où la congestion est très importante, plus les bénéfices du tunnel deviennent importants. Plus je m’éloigne de ces zones, moins le bénéfice est important», indique-t-il.
Ainsi, il croit que la densité résidentielle de Saint-Léonard et l’espace de surface peu congestionné de la rue Jean-Talon Est ne justifient pas un métro. Il suggère qu’un train de surface, plus léger et moins cher, aurait pu être une meilleure option.
Les experts que nous avons consultés s’entendent toutefois pour dire que le nord-est de l’île est mal desservi et a besoin de transport en commun.
«Il y a une grosse quantité de gens qui se déplacent pour aller travailler vers l’est et pour aller travailler vers le centre», rappelle Mme Junca-Adenot.
TROP TARD POUR RECULER?
Puisque le plan d’affaires n’a pas encore été approuvé par Québec, le projet de la ligne bleue pourrait toujours être annulé. Toutefois, des contrats ont été octroyés pour l’architecture des stations dans les dernières semaines, et Ottawa a confirmé du financement pour ce projet.
La ligne orange sera encore plus surchargée
Le prolongement de la ligne bleue risque de surcharger davantage la ligne orange. Selon les études que nous avons obtenues, l’ajout de cinq stations sur la ligne bleue augmenterait de 6 % le nombre maximal de passagers à circuler en une heure (charge maximale) sur la ligne orange, en direction Côte-Vertu, en 2031. «On n’est pas capable de prendre ces passagers supplémentaires aujourd’hui et on ne sera pas plus capable en 2031», juge M. Meloche.
En 2031, l’AMT prévoit que la charge maximale du cœur de la ligne orange sera de 63 000 passagers le matin, dont 3500 venant du prolongement de la ligne bleue.
Les trains Azur pouvant accueillir environ 45 000 passagers par heure par direction, confie un expert à notre Bureau d’enquête. Pour prendre tous les passagers prévus en 2031, il faudrait donc de nouveaux trains ou augmenter la fréquence de passage.
Le SRB n’aidera pas
Selon la STM, le prolongement de la ligne bleue ne va « pas nécessairement » engorger la ligne orange.
«Les usagers sont un peu paresseux. Si tu peux rester dans ton mode, sans transférer, tu vas le faire. Le SRB Pie-IX, c’est à l’étude pour qu’il continue jusqu’au centre-ville», donne en exemple M. Chamberland.
Mais selon les simulations menées par l’AMT, le Service rapide par bus (SRB) entraînera plutôt «une hausse sur les points de charge maximale de la ligne orange en direction Côte-Vertu».
Et sa prolongation jusqu’au centre-ville aurait un «impact limité» sur l’achalandage de la ligne orange, peut-on lire.
Jean-Philippe Meloche estime que le REM, qui sera connecté à la ligne bleue, pourrait venir régler ce problème. «Les gens de Saint-Léonard vont pouvoir se rendre au centre-ville, en évitant la ligne orange. Le prolongement de la ligne bleue sans le REM, ça aurait été encore plus mauvais», soutient-il.
ACHALANDAGE PROJETÉ EN 2031
Prolongement de la ligne bleue (option retenue)
Pie-IX: 6900
Anjou: 5600
Lacordaire: 3000
Langelier: 2900
Viau: 1700
Prolongement de la ligne orange (option écartée)
Bois-Franc: 14 100
Poirier: 3300
Les stations avec le plus d’entrées en 2019
Longueuil: 14 500
Honoré-Beaugrand: 9700
Bonaventure: 8900
En nombre d’entrées en période de pointe du matin (PPAM)
4 AUTRES SCÉNARIOS ÉTUDIÉS
Une boucle avec la ligne verte
Ce scénario consistait à rattacher la ligne bleue à la ligne verte par la station Radisson. Ce projet, plus long et plus complexe, aurait amené beaucoup plus de gens aux nouvelles stations, surtout des usagers actuels du transport en commun.
Finir au nord de l’A40
Construire le terminus du métro le long de l’A25, entre Jarry et Bombardier aurait permis d’ajouter un large stationnement pour attirer davantage d’automobilistes sur la ligne bleue. L’achalandage aurait augmenté un peu, mais pas de manière significative.
Passer un peu plus au sud, sous la rue Bélanger
Cette option de même longueur n’amenait pratiquement aucun changement sur l’achalandage, mais était meilleure pour l’accès en transport actif.
Un prolongement moins long jusqu’à Lacordaire
Étonnamment, le tracé plus court scruté en 2013 allait jusqu’à Lacordaire et non jusqu’à Pie-IX comme le projet annoncé par le gouvernement péquiste dans les années 1990. Cette option aurait causé un problème de rabattement des autobus à cause du peu d’espace non bâti au coin des rues Lacordaire et Jean-Talon. | {
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Welcome to PA Food Safety Search for Inspection Results Kansas Department of Agriculture Establishment Match By Name/Location Establishment Name (Full or Partial Name):
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Following the Blockchain Conference and Expo held in the European Parliament, its Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) has voted against hasty regulatory steps regarding the blockchain technology.
The idea of avoiding pre-emptive regulation was part of the report on virtual currencies made by German MEP Jakob von Weizsäcker. Such measures may turn out to be harmful, claims the politician, because the blockchain technology is still at an early stage of development.
“One reason why regulating now in detail would be difficult is that we don't know yet what the most important use of blockchain might be,” von Weizsaecker told Reuters.
In the meantime, the MEP suggests monitoring “to avoid stifling innovation.” But in the future regulative steps, too, will be necessary. The document contains a recommendation to create a task force focused on the distributed ledger technology that in the future would offer legislative bodies expertise on technological and regulatory issues both on the European level and within member countries.
“IT innovations can spread very rapidly and become systemic. That's why we call on the Commission to establish a taskforce to actively monitor how the technology evolves and to make timely proposals for specific regulation if, and when, the need arises,” said the politician as quoted on the website of the European Digital Currency & Blockchain Technology Forum (EDCAB).
ECON voted to adopt the report by 54 votes to 1 (with 2 abstentions). The document will now be considered at the Parliament’s plenary meeting in May.
A conference and expo focused on virtual currencies and the blockchain technology took place in the European Parliament from 18 to 21 April. The event was organised by the Cobden Centre educational charity together with EDCAB. The conference was non-commercial and was held for an educational purpose, that is familiarising MEPs with the development of crypto-technologies. The event was hosted by Syed Kamall, who has the right to organise an exhibition within the Parliament as a chairman of one of the parliamentary fractions (namely, the European Conservatives and Reformists Group).
The conference is very timely, claims Steve Baker, UK Member of Parliament and founder of the Cobden Centre. It is now when the destructive outcomes of financial policy worldwide are becoming more and more evident, that the society needs a free market currency, he said. And such a currency is created by means of the crypto-technology.
The event was attended by blockchain industry leaders, as well as representatives of such organisations as the World Bank, IMF, Bank for International Settlements, OECD, European Securities and Markets Authority and Europol.
Roundtables were held during the conference, covering such important topics as trusting distributed ledgers or virtual currency regulation. Many MEPs actively participated in the conference and expressed their interest in the future development of crypto-technologies.
Generally, regulators and industry representatives that met at the conference share the opinion that Europe needs innovation and expressed an intention to work together, reads a recent EDCAB article. In particular, during the discussion of crypto-technology regulation, MEP Ashley Fox urged to be cautious in regards to blockchain.
“There is a consensus in the Parliament, that policymakers should be careful not to regulate the technology out of existence,” he said.
Andrew Levich | {
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In today’s fiercely competitive age, it is no secret that online presence is equivalent to brand awareness, high traffic rate, and better lead generation. This makes it really important to present your brand online in the 21st century with result-oriented strategic planning and boost its credibility in the targeted market. On this note, the skilled web promotion and web promotion solution strategists striving to implement numerous “White Label Web Promotion services” to make your brand highly recognizable, relatable, and authentic, thereby setting itself apart from the competition. | {
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Danmarks Tekniske Universitet, DTU, har for første gang oprettet et særligt center med det erklærede formål at forske i militært udstyr, som eksempelvis radarer, satellitter, droner og dele til kampfly og lette materialer til beskyttelse af soldater.
Centeret har allerede indgået samarbejdsaftaler med verdens største våbenfirma, Lockheed Martin, og med Danmarks største våbenfirma, Terma A/S.
Vi forsker ikke i krudt og kugler. Men når industrien beder om hjælp, vil vi selvfølgelig hjælpe dem.
Henning Heiselberg, DTU
– Der er brug for mere forskning og udvikling indenfor sikkerhedsteknologi. Der er alt for lidt årvågenhed på området, siger centerleder Henning Heiselberg til Arbejderen.
Han har en PhD i fysik og kommer fra en stilling hos Forsvarsministeriets Materiel- og Indkøbsstyrelse og Forsvarsministeriets kampfly-program.
Henning Heiselberg mener, at der er en løbende trussel mod Danmark.
– Hvis ikke vi hele tiden er oppe på dupperne, sakker vi bagud og bliver sårbare. Det kan godt være, at Danmark måske ikke er umiddelbart truet, og der ligger andre lande som Sverige og Baltikum mellem Danmark og et angreb. Men vi er medlem af NATO og skal yde vores indsats, siger Henning Heiselberg henviser til, at Danmark har gjort krav på et område på næsten én million kvadratkilometer i Arktis.
– Rusland gør krav på dele af Arktis, der overlapper Danmarks krav. Så Forsvaret har er en vigtig opgave i, at beskytte kongeriget Danmark mod indtrængere. Det er måske Forsvarets vigtigste opgave i den nærmste fremtid. Og her kan DTU hjælpe til med viden og forskning, der kan styrke den danske overvågning af Arktis med radarer og droner.
I øjeblikket er Henning Heiselberg og to studerende i gang med et projekt om satellitovervågning af Arktis. Og centeret er også i gang med at udvikle en drone, der kan bruges til overvågning af store områder i Arktis.
Samarbejde med våbenindustrien
I går besøgte det nye center, DTU Security, Folketingets forsvarsudvalg for at fortælle om planerne om mere militær forskning.
– Vi vil gøre udvalget opmærksom på, at DTU har en række kernekompetencer indenfor forsvar og sikkerhed, som kan være interessante, når politikerne skal forhandle et nyt forsvarsforlig.
– Danmark får inden længe leveret 27 Joint Strike Fighter kampfly. Det er oplagt, at DTU byder ind med viden fra vores højteknologiske vindmølleforskning om let, stærkt komposit-materiale, som kan bruges til eksempelvis kampflyets hale og vinger. Og kampflyene skal serviceres og opdateres. Her kan DTU også byde ind, fortæller Henning Heiselberg.
Ifølge DTU's hjemmeside er der tale om et "sikkerheds- og forsvarsteknologisk forskningscenter", som skal være "organisatorisk ramme og kontaktpunkt i forhold til DTU’s samarbejde med offentlige og private virksomheder inden for sikkerheds- og forsvarsområdet".
DTU samarbejder blandt andet med Terma A/S og Lockheed Martin om udviklingen af Joint Strike Fighter-kampflyet. Og universitetet har fem ingeniør-studerende udsendt til Lockheed Martins kampfly-hovedkvarter i USA.
>> LÆS OGSÅ: Danske studerende skal udvikle kampfly
DTU samarbejder også med NATO's forskningsenhed, NATO Science and Technology Organization, og har holdt flere møder med NATO-enheden. Ligeledes er der et samarbejde med Forsvarsministeriets Materiel- og Indkøbsstyrelse om beskyttelse af danske soldater.
Etiske overvejelser?
Henning Heiselberg kan ikke give et klart svar på, hvor centerets grænse går for, hvad man vil forske i.
– Vi forsker ikke i krudt og kugler. Men ellers ved jeg simpelthen ikke, hvad jeg skal svare på det spørgsmål. Når industrien beder om hjælp, vil vi selvfølgelig hjælpe dem. Det gælder også sikkerheds- og forsvarsindustrien. Men det er jo ikke os, der producerer tingene. Det er jo industrien. Vi laver kun forskning og udvikling og undervisning og rådgivning.
Han vil helst tale om de mere fredelige projekter i hans center – om eksempelvis droner, der kan finde søminer. Og når talen falder på forskning i kampfly, vil han helst se kampfly som et forsvar af Danmark. Men han indrømmer dog, at kampfly kan bruges offensivt.
– Ja, kampfly kan bruges offensivt. Og det bliver de også, når Danmark deltager i forskellige NATO-missioner, siger Henning Heiselberg, som ikke helt ved, hvordan han har det med at forske og udvikle i dele til kampfly, der bliver brugt til at bombe i andre lande.
>> LÆS OGSÅ: Satellit-producent vil ikke producere til krig
– Det er et etisk spørgsmål. Der er så mange ting, som man kan lave... Men når industrien spørger os, om vi vil være med til at forske i et projekt, så vil vi selvfølgelig hjælpe dem så vidt muligt.
Men hvordan har centerlederen det med, at forskere, som er specialiseret i højteknologisk vindenergi, måske fremover skal bruge deres tid og talent på at forske i kampfly?
– Der er et pres for at øge forsvarsbudgettet og styrke Forsvaret. Derfor er det en god ide at bruge nogle af de penge på forskning og udvikling i sikkerhedsteknologi til gavn for dansk industri. Det er jo ikke vindmølleindustrien, som politikerne ønsker at øge. Det er forsvarsbudgettet, lyder det fra Henning Heiselberg. | {
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This is the sixth installment in Carlos Acevedo’s Shoot The Moon series covering the career of Larry Holmes.
***
March 31, 1980
“Never being happy isn’t the same as being unhappy. Is it?”— Montgomery McNeil, Fame
In the weeks leading up to his title defense against Leroy Jones at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, Larry Holmes, already seething over assorted wrongdoings—real and imagined—found himself sharing the flickering spotlight with two heavyweights—one of them from the past (Muhammad Ali) and one of them purportedly representing the future (John Tate). By fight time, however, Holmes had been upstaged by Mike Weaver, a plodding journeyman he had stopped more than a year earlier. On the undercard of a prime-time, multi-site extravaganza aired on ABC, “Hercules” had scored a miracle KO of the illiterate Tennessee hillbilly Tate, leaving him facedown on the canvas like a whiskey priest run over by a covered wagon.
By coldcocking Tate in the fifteenth—and final—round, Weaver, trailing on all cards, threw an entire Craftsman wrench set into the Ali comeback. Even with a credible performance against Holmes in 1979 and now the stunning victory over Tate, Weaver could not qualify as a box-office magnet to draw Ali into the ring with him. The undefeated Tate had been the target for Ali all along.
When Don King announced that Jones would be next for Holmes—before Holmes had even defended against Lorenzo Zanon—the old bugaboo was back: “The Easton Assassin” was targeting tomato cans. This narrative was something Holmes bitterly assessed before the fight. “There’s so much conniving and scheming in boxing, there are days when I feel like I don’t want anything more to do with it,” Holmes fumed. “I win, but it’s never because of how good I am, always that my opponent is weak.”
Jones had emerged from boxing outposts such as Denver and Wichita (as well as the seedy Las Vegas club scene) to challenge for a distinction that still retained a mythic power over the sporting public—even if it was now a disputed crown thanks to the limitless imbecility of dueling sanctioning bodies. Although Holmes had been the beneficiary of WBC chicanery in 1978, when he won a paper title from Ken Norton via narrow decision, he was in no mood to acknowledge Tate or his renegade WBA crown. “I’m the only true champion, and the people know it,” said Holmes. “If television, AP or UPI wants to say there are two champions, I can’t tell them what to say. But I think I’ve proven myself and regardless of what goes on elsewhere.”
For Holmes, “elsewhere” meant more than Tate and his claim to heavyweight supremacy; it meant the Ali-verse, where the retired “Greatest” remained, in his own mind at least, axis mundi. Even after years of rehashed skits and diminishing performances in the ring, Ali retained a stranglehold on the collective imagination, especially that of the intellectual left, which never ceased believing that Ali was some sort of political revolutionary, far beyond the reaches of a grubby blood sport.
Holmes was far less impressed with the cultural cachet that Ali claimed and recognized his comeback as mere crass commercialization crossed with monstrous egocentricity. “Every time Ali goes to the bathroom, it makes news,” Holmes said. “It’s all wrong what he’s doing. He just doesn’t know when to quit. I think he needs the money, but any time someone makes $60 million and that doesn’t last, another $8 million won’t help. It was overspending on his part. I never needed a $250,000 bus . . . houses in Chicago, California, and Miami. There was never a need to prove anything. All I ever needed was to wear my jeans and have shoes to wear.”
Money, of course, was a motivating force, but for Ali, perhaps, not the prime mover in his comeback plans. While Ali still commanded the world stage to an extent, his public pursuits were now more serious, more somber, more sour. And real-world failures would accrue far more often than losses in the ring ever did. His limited ambassadorial roles, as in his recent mission as a celebrity diplomat for Jimmy Carter, could not compare with the adrenalin rush of victory before a feverish audience of millions. In a way, he was like the character of Clare Vawdrey in the Henry James story The Private Life: Ali simply could not exist without being in the limelight; he needed, as some sort of life essence, adulation on a grand scale. Without it, Muhammad Ali was void.
With Ali, as usual, monopolizing the national attention span—since the mid-1960s he had been as ubiquitous as the soup cans of Andy Warhol—Leroy Jones, undefeated and unknown, seemed like an afterthought.
Born in Meridian, Mississippi, Jones was twelve years old when his family moved to Brooklyn. He attended Boys High School in Bed-Stuy, where he played basketball and football—losing a scholarship to Grambling when he injured his knee—and eventually wound up in Denver grinding out a living as a heavyweight rounder under the management of Bobby Lewis. (In New York, where he won two Golden Gloves titles, Jones fought out of the Telstar Gym on 28th Street and immediately drew criticism for his flabbiness. At one point, Jones entered an amateur tournament weighing three hundred pounds, which brought unflattering comparisons to roly-poly Buster Mathis Sr.)
Out West, Jones joined the Denver Rocks amateur club and became a regular sparring partner for heavyweight demolition man Ron Lyle. To make a hard living even harder, Jones worked with George Foreman in the same brutal capacity. During The Great Inflation of the 1970s, economic hardship had become the new normal for millions of Americans, and Jones compounded the national trend by choosing a dangerous, dubious, and disreputable profession. After a successful pro debut, Jones deposited his $150 check into his bank account . . . and was still naive enough about boxing to find himself shocked when it bounced. Subsequent paydays suffered from less red tape, but, for years, they barely outstripped the amount. To support his family between fights and sparring sessions, Jones worked two jobs in Denver: he was a maintenance man at a hotel and a floor waxer in a hospital.
In 1977 Jones received some overdue exposure when he competed in the ill-fated U.S. Boxing Championships, outpointing brutish Dino Dennis before the tourney, a corrupt and crooked co-production cooked up by Don King and his underlings (including The Ring) went up in flames. Over the next few years, Jones remained undefeated with minimum activity and few noteworthy wins. “Yeah, sometimes I think there’s a lot of injustice in my life,” Jones said about his struggles. “But then I look at it again and say, ‘Hey, man, you just gotta pay a little more dues than the next man. When you finally make it, you’ll appreciate it more.’”
His 24-0-1 record did include a decision over Mike Weaver, however, in the days when Weaver thought roadwork meant trotting to the corner store for a six-pack of Eastside Old Tap. With his only real distinction being his lack of distinction, Jones personified the heavyweight desert of 1980. Now, at twenty-nine, he had finally stumbled into the opportunity of a lifetime, along with a purse—$150,000—that would surpass all of his previous paydays combined.
Throughout the buildup of the fight, Don King tried to hype the mismatch, repeating, ad nauseam, a banal slogan wherever he went: “Today nobody, tomorrow somebody.” Oddsmakers, at least, were not fooled by this pitch. Most books that bothered to set a line made Holmes anywhere from a 12-1 favorite to a 20-1 favorite.
When Holmes entered the ring, he had already spent weeks steaming at distractions and what he perceived as slights to his standing. There was Ali, of course, sucking the oxygen out of the sports world; there was Tate, with his brash claim of being heavyweight co-ruler. (In a strange incident, Holmes abandoned his training camp in Cleveland after being hoaxed; two men, dressed in severe suits, served Holmes with a bogus paternity suit. Holmes set up camp in Cleveland as a favor to his trainer, Richie Giachetti, who owned a gym there. “But it will be a cold day when I come back. I won’t be back to visit. This joke isn’t funny.”) Then came Weaver, whose KO of Tate in Knoxville an hour or so earlier became instant legend material.
Finally, Holmes was unhappy essentially fighting in a swing bout on the telecast. His starting time was, more or less, TBA, with a waiting period ranging from fifteen minutes to an hour and a half. This potential tedium did not sit well with the brooding champion, who found fault even in top billing. “Who wants to stand around with gloves on for two hours?” Holmes asked. “I thought I got away from this kind of thing when I left the amateurs.”
It must have been a relief for Holmes to hear the opening bell ring. After just a few rounds of milling, Jones, who weighed in at a flaccid 254.5 pounds, probably did not feel the same way. He was simply no match for Holmes. A lively crowd at the Sports Pavilion in Caesars Palace watched as Holmes began pummeling Jones in the third round.
Top-heavy, Jones fell off-balance repeatedly, and his attempts at combinations were graceless; at times, he looked like a man trying to swat flies with a soggy newspaper. This untidy (anti-) style made him a wide target for Holmes, who strafed his pudgy opponent with crosses, hooks, uppercuts, and body shots. Whatever blows Jones did manage to land, including the occasional counterpunch, were cuffing or slapping. Holmes barely acknowledged these shots, including a snappy right hand that landed in the third.
From time to time, Jones tried to crowd Holmes and score from short range. If Jones thought he could smother Holmes in the trenches, he was painfully mistaken. On the inside, Jones often wound up with his feet parallel and his hands out of position. Although in later years Holmes would be typecast as a jab-and-dance master—an imitation of Ali when Ali would glide around the ring on his toes—his performances were notable for their variety. Despite his reliance on one-twos, he exploited flaws and openings as they appeared. Against Jones, Holmes showed his versatility.
Holmes battered Jones until “Big Bad Leroy” sprouted an angry boil on his left eyelid and until Referee Richard Greene had finally reached his threshold for sadism. With Holmes bludgeoning Jones in a corner, Green stepped in to stop the butchery with a handful of seconds left in the eighth round.
Larry Holmes had made his sixth successful title defense. There remained only the question of Muhammad Ali and whether or not Holmes would fight the man who once shook up the world. “Of course I’d fight him,” Holmes said. “It’s not my fault if the sucker wants to come back to the ring—I’d fight my mother if she gets into the ring—but when I beat him up and hurt him, then everybody will be against me for that. All this business with the promoters fighting, the managers fighting—everybody but the fighters fighting—has made me tired. I’d like to bring the championship together, but if it’s not to be, it’s not to be. My main concern these days is to get paid, go home, and be with my family. When I do leave boxing, people may not remember me as a great heavyweight. The way things are going in the sport these days, I’ll be satisfied if they say that I was a good champion.”
Eventually, perhaps, the media would get around to that. But a week after Holmes had battered Jones, Sports Illustrated shined its considerable spotlight on the heavyweight division. On the cover? Flabby in training gear and now sporting a mustache, was none other than Muhammad Ali. | {
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On Tuesday, the Colorado Senate passed a Democratic-sponsored bill that would seek to award all of Colorado’s presidential electoral votes to the winner of the national presidential popular vote.
It goes next to the House which is also controlled by Democrats.
Colorado will join 12 states and the District of Columbia in the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. The idea was conceived by George Soros’ son Jonathan and three businessmen. The measure will replace — circumvent — the Electoral College without the need for a constitutional amendment when the states that have joined have a combined total of 270 electoral votes.
This law will forever change how we elect our president and vice president. It will forever ensure the presidency for Democrats because it gives the power of the vote to highly populated Democratic cities and states.
After enough states – the equivalent of 270 electoral votes – pass it, it might become the law of the land. They now have 172 electoral votes. Colorado would make it 181 electoral votes.
Republicans no longer win the popular vote and this will seal the deal for the far-left Democratic Party that wants a one-party electoral majority.
Venezuela here we come.
It is likely unconstitutional because the Electoral College should only be changed by a constitutional amendment, but by the time the Supreme Court hears the case, it will be too late.
Democrats hate the Electoral College and this compact will destroy it.
IT IS A TROJAN HORSE
It warps the electoral college into a system by which states who agree to form a compact share all their electoral votes within their group and are forced to give their votes to the candidate with the largest number of popular votes within the compact.
Check out the map for one very reasonable scenario. Imagine a compact with liberal states, one conservative and a couple of swing states. All the donors/ACORNers will descend on the populated areas who will win and drag the conservative and swing states with them. The eleven states in this scenario, pictured on the map, will carry the necessary electoral votes to win the election.
That is how an election can literally be won by 11 states, leaving the other states disenfranchised with no chance of having their votes counted – they are forced into giving their votes to the state/s that come out ahead. If the 11 states include liberal, one conservative, and some swing states as in this scenario, the swing states, and conservative states will be forced to hand over their electoral votes to the liberal winners simply because they had the largest voter count – but who was voting?
All the electioneering can be done in the handful of states and all the ACORN organizers can focus on the handful of states. The election will be decided by the liberal cities where the heaviest concentration of people resides.
THE FRAMERS TRIED TO PROTECT AMERICANS FROM THE TYRANNY OF THE MAJORITY
The Constitution’s Framers envisioned the Electoral College as one of their many structural securities against majoritarian tyranny — what James Madison described in The Federalist No. 10 as the problem of “faction”:
By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.
There are two methods of curing the mischiefs of faction: the one, by removing its causes; the other, by controlling its effects.
The Electoral College gives smaller, rural states a say in government. That isn’t what Democrats want. They want the elite coastal states to decide every election.
READ MORE AT THE DAILY WIRE AND HERE | {
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32 ratings Crazy Dave, but as a TF2 Soldier
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Yesterday, we gave you the chance to speak your mind on Apple’s choice to omit 4K video support from the latest Apple TV — did Apple blow it, or does 4K support not yet matter?
After over 6,500 votes, and more than 125 comments, we have a clear answer: roughly 2/3 of readers said Apple made the right call leaving 4K support out of the Apple TV, as they didn’t care (yet) about the feature. That’s a decisive majority. But a solid 35% of readers opined — often strongly — that neglecting 4K support had cost Apple their business, given that 4K Ultra HD TVs are becoming affordable and more popular.
I hoped we’d see some intelligent discussion, and was thrilled that so many comments actually delivered, including insights on why Apple’s approach was practical — for now. Here are some of the best comments readers posted on each side of the debate…
Representing the 65% of users who said “No, I don’t care about Apple TV 4K support (yet),” the most common thread was that 4K content currently isn’t compelling enough to be a necessity, particularly in a low-end Apple TV, and mightn’t be for 2 years.
4K is just not an issue right now. And I don’t see much need to future proof a $150 item. – Jon C The reality is that 4K is not “there” yet. [1080p] HD is where +95% of current content is filmed and distributed. Why would I stress future proofing a $150 device? By the time 4k is ubiquitous enough to make it a no brainer that generation of Apple TV will have enough features to make it worth upgrading. – Akil Ford
Some of the most interesting comments discussed a compromise — using (much-improved) 4K upscalers built into 4K Ultra HD TVs to make better use of higher-quality 1080p source files.
I had a perfectly fine 1080p Sony XBR television but recently upgraded to a Sony XBR 4K TV… And all content is upscaled to 4K and looks PHENOMENAL. So even without a lot of 4K content out there, you’re still reaping the major benefits of a razor sharp image 99% of the time for viewing. […] Since my TV upscales the content anyway, I’ll take the standard 1080p file that I know will load quickly and stream beautifully. – verizon2828
There were lots of comments regarding the current state of 4K streaming standards and broadband service.
Apple never uses half baked technologies, instead it implements those when everything is ready and polished…. HEVC (H.265) is not finished yet, it still doesn’t render videos with grain as good as H.264/AVC does. And videos with grain are almost 9/10 of all movies ever shot because it is the side effect of the film itself and only movies shot on digital cameras don’t have grain. So, it means that 4K videos is not yet ready for “everywhere use” at Apple. You can’t see these rendering problems on iPhone screen, but you will notice those in a second on TV. – Gagik Stepanyan
Netflix has a handful of shows and documentaries that support 4K. For me 4K streaming is a no go… because of 300 GB a month data cap on my 100mbs cable broadband. Just normal HD on Netflix eats quickly into my data caps. The infrastructure and way ISP’s are set up now does not make 4K streaming a good experince for most people… It needs time. – taoprophet420 The average US broadband speed is 12.6 Mbps per Akamai. High quality and reliable 4K streaming would require 20 Mbps or more with current compression technology. –
And some of the comments focused on the modest benefits 4K offers users of smaller TVs.
Yes, everyone wants 4K TVs, and if you have a 4K TV, you want devices that work with it. So Apple is behind in what people want. However, I don’t think it actually makes in difference in useable quality. Unless your TV is bigger than 65″, you’re not actually going to notice any difference when you’re sitting on the couch. You’ll only notice when you go up and get really close to the TV. – dwsolberg
Not everyone agreed with this, however. Representing the nearly 35% of users who said “yes, I’m skipping it because it can’t play 4K videos,” several readers noted that they own 4K TVs and appreciate the improved visual quality they’re already seeing in 4K streams.
“Daredevil” in 4K on my 55″ Samsung looked much better than in 1080p on my old 46″ set. – I purchased a 4k Samsung 40″ Smart TV this month…. I have to say, I can see the difference between 4k native and 1080p DVD or 4k upscaled [1080p] streamed content. Upscaling generally looks good but I can appreciate the difference with native content…. Aside from a noticeable general improvement in picture quality with 4k content, 4k resolution on my 40″ TV is particularly appreciated with video content that contains text…. I have to say, now that I’ve had time with the Samsung Smart TV environment, I don’t see any need to buy an AppleTV in the future. – sbandyk
For some people, the lack of 4K support is important for theoretical reasons.
I decided to skip this Apple TV because it doesn’t have 4K, even though I don’t have a 4K TV yet, and the only 4K content I currently have is from my iPhone. But I decided that anything I upgrade at this point should be 4K. Since Apple has already implemented 4K on the iPhone and iMacs I imagine a 4K Apple TV isn’t that far off. – davegolden
Mirroring comments we’ve seen on earlier Apple TV articles, quite a few readers expressed anger at what they felt was either planned obsolescence or development inconsistency by Apple.
Anyone who wants to think Apple didn’t include 4K because there isnt enough content yet or it hasn’t taken off yet has their heads in the sand…. The fact is 4K TVs are dirt cheap right now, 9to5Toys was offering one at 600 yesterday I believe. This is classic Apple, just like you stated, they pulled the same stunt with 1080p. And I for one will skip it this year so that I buy a future proofed device. Not to mention that A8 is going to be pretty choppy once Devs start coding their games for the next model released with enough power to push 4K. – chrisl84 A bigger concern for me is the lack of technology consistency in Apple’s lineup. You have phones that can now record 4K but a brand new Apple TV that cannot handle it. You have an iMac which is 5K and a high end Mac Pro which is stuck with an aging non-HD display…. And you have a company which is so secretive that you have no idea whether and when these inconsistencies are [ever] going to be addressed. – Warren Shaw
One thing that’s clear from both the comments and the poll, which again has over 6,500 votes counted, is that while there’s a strong majority that doesn’t care about 4K support yet, a 1/3 minority that cares a lot about 4K — enough to skip the new Apple TV over it — is not trivial, despite what some commenters might suggest.
0.0.0.0.0.0.1 of people care. You can talk about future proof, but the fact is, 4k is not standard on everything right now. – viciosodiego
That’s just plain wrong. Our poll’s very large sample size, combined with the science of statistics, provide us with numbers that are very broadly generalizable. Even if we only had 4,200 responses, we could say with 99% confidence that the roughly 65% “no” and roughly 35% “yes” split we saw would be accurate to +/- 2% for a much larger population of people. Even today, with 4K penetration at as low of a level as it will be for decades, around 1/3 of people think it’s a major omission in the Apple TV. Leaving it out this time was a reasonably safe bet for Apple, but since 4K Ultra HD TVs keep falling in price, it’s clearly going to be at the top of the next version’s list of features.
More From This Author
Check out more of my reviews, How-To guides and editorials for 9to5Mac here! I’ve published a lot of different topics of interest to Mac, iPad, iPhone, iPod, Apple TV, and Apple Watch users, as well as a personal gift guide for Apple fans, a great gift guide for iPhone users, a detailed gift guide for Mac users, and a separate gift guide for Apple photographers.
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Check out 9to5Mac on YouTube for more Apple news: | {
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BOSTON (AP) — Asian American leaders in Massachusetts on Thursday condemned what they say is continued racism, fear-mongering and misinformation aimed at Asian communities amid the coronavirus pandemic that originated in China.
State lawmakers, local officials and public health professionals speaking at the steps of the State House cited recent incidents in London and New York City in which Asians were targeted. They also called out news organizations that continue to link the virus with Asians.
Running stock images of Chinatowns and Asian people wearing face masks with coronavirus stories, as well as using the phrases “China virus” or “Wuhan virus,” aren’t reflective of the current pandemic, which has hit Italy particularly hard, said Elisa Choi, who heads the Massachusetts chapter of the American College of Physicians.
“This is not an Asian American virus, this is not a Chinese virus,” she said. “There is nothing inherent in us as Asian Americans that makes us carriers of this virus.”
Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins said her office wasn’t aware of any local incidents of discrimination against Asians that have risen to the level of a crime.
But she and others speaking Thursday noted that other big cities are already dealing with concerning incidents.
In New York last week, police say a man of Asian descent was sprayed with Febreze on a subway train in a coronavirus-related hate crime that was captured on video.
Police in London have charged two teens in a ” racially aggravated assault ” against a 23-year-old Singapore university student last month.
Meanwhile, gun stores in the Los Angeles-area are reporting brisk businesses from Asian American customers concerned about retaliatory attacks.
Much of the bigotry Asians are experiencing is on social media, rather than physical encounters on the street, said state Rep. Tackey Chan, a Democrat from Quincy, which has one of the state’s largest Chinese communities.
And “microaggressions” — mundane, almost imperceptible social slights — have become a part of daily life for many Asians since the virus emerged in December, said Sam Hyun, a member of the Massachusetts Asian American Commission, a state agency that advocates for Asian communities.
“It’s the whispers in the grocery, the side glances, the avoidance,” he said.
Low income Asian American workers are also struggling as customers continue to stay away from Boston’s Chinatown and other Asian neighborhoods, despite efforts by officials to support local Asian-owned businesses, said Karen Chen, of the Chinese Progressive Association, a Chinatown advocacy group.
For most people, the new coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death.
The vast majority of people recover from the new virus. According to the World Health Organization, people with mild illness recover in about two weeks, while those with more severe illness may take three to six weeks to recover.
The Associated Press receives support for health and science coverage from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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An analysis of Syrian immigrants in the United States published Dec. 13 offered a pretty compelling snapshot of what, indeed, is going on: A lot of hard work, integration and success.
The study, put out jointly by the Center for American Progress, a center-left think tank in Washington, and the Fiscal Policy Institute, examined 2014 census data to paint a picture of roughly 90,000 Syrian immigrants in the country. It found that, “when given a chance, Syrian immigrants are fitting into and excelling in the United States, both socially and economically, on a wide variety of metrics.”
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Here are some of the major findings, as detailed in a news release:
Syrian immigrants are a highly entrepreneurial group: Eleven percent of the Syrian immigrants are business owners in comparison [with] 4 percent of immigrants and 3 percent of U.S.-born people.
Syrian immigrant businesses are thriving: The median earnings of Syrian business owners are $72,000 a year . This means they are supporting and growing the local economy and providing employment.
They are well-educated: Syrian men, in particular, are more likely to have a college degree or an advanced degree such as a master’s, doctorate, or professional degree.
Syrian immigrants speak English at high levels compared to all immigrants.
The graphs below demonstrate the extent to which Syrian immigrants — many of whom are doctors, lawyers and others with post-bachelor degrees — earn higher wages and run thriving small businesses, compared with other immigrants as well as people born in the United States.
Cities such as Los Angeles and New York were home to close to a third of Syrian immigrants in the country, although communities exist all over the country. The populations examined in the study are not part of the influx of some 12,500 Syrian refugees resettled in the past year. But, as the authors of the report suggest, they can serve as useful intermediaries in aiding the settlement of new refugees.
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“The 90,000 Syrian immigrants who were in the United States before the recent arrival of refugees have been thriving and are therefore well-positioned to help their compatriots when they arrive,” the report says. “Policymakers should take into account the fact that the United States already has a robust Syrian community that is making contributions and may be well-placed to facilitate the integration of new Syrian refugees.”
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“The United States accepts refugees on humanitarian grounds, not to improve the American economy. But, the striking success of Syrian immigrants in this country should give us some confidence that Syrian refugees can become integrated and successful here,” David Dyssegaard Kallick, senior fellow at the Fiscal Policy Institute and a co-author of the report, said in an email to WorldViews.
He went on: “While refugees are not exactly the same as immigrants, and they are coming here under much more dire circumstances, the fact that other Syrians are thriving here bodes well for the new arrivals, and it’s also an indication that as refugees arrive in this country they may find at least some people who speak their language, know the culture they come from, and can help them find their way in this country.” | {
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New Delhi, India - At least three civilians and a police officer have been killed in violence in the Indian capital, New Delhi, on the day US President Donald Trump kicked off his two-day trip.
Nearly 50 people, including 37 police officials, have been injured after supporters and opponents of the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) clashed on Sunday and Monday in the northeastern part of Delhi after alleged provocation by a local leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Kapil Mishra, who led a rally in support of the new citizenship law.
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A tyre market was set on fire later on Monday, the Press Trust of India said. One video posted on social media showed crowds of men shouting "Jai Shree Ram" or "Hail Lord Ram", a revered Hindu deity, as they went on a rampage, according to the AFP.
Several vehicles and a fire truck were torched in Jaffrabad and Maujpur in the northeastern parts of the capital as police fired tear gas to disperse the protesters.
Breaking now: one civilian dead in Delhi group clashes, one policeman dead. Tragic. While Delhi police focusses on security cover for our VVIP guest, while our leaders invoke Mahatma legacy, maybe time to be more pro active in ensuring peace on the street? @IndiaToday tv — Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) February 24, 2020
In a video posted by Mishra on Twitter, he was heard issuing an ultimatum to police to remove anti-CAA sit-ins in the area where hundreds of protesters, mostly women, blocked a road and demanded the revocation of the law, which critics say goes against India's secular constitution.
In the video, Mishra said they would be quiet while the US president was in the country.
"Giving a three-day ultimatum to Delhi police to clear the roads in Jaffrabad and Chand Bagh of protesters. Don't try to reason with us after this," Mishra can be heard saying in Hindi in the video. He added that if the roads were not cleared, "we will be forced to hit the streets".
A ruling party leader flanked by a senior police official issues an open warning. No one has acted against him -neither the police or his party. 24 hours later, violence in east Delhi spirals, the police seem adrift. #chronology https://t.co/dEYS9zMSjf — Sreenivasan Jain (@SreenivasanJain) February 24, 2020
"Hundreds of women have been peacefully protesting against the CAA since Saturday night near the Jaffrabad Metro station. But on Sunday, after Mishra led the rally, his supporters pelted us with stones leading to clashes," Zohran, a Jaffrabad resident, told Al Jazeera.
He said his uncle was also beaten up by an angry mob as he was returning home from a religious gathering which had nothing to do with the protests.
"What we saw today is the result of Mishra's comments," Zohran added.
"The BJP leaders are trying to give the protests a Hindu-Muslim colour. They incite people in the name of religion which is very unfortunate."
Delhi police said some incidents of "violence and arson" were reported and they "appealed to the people of Delhi and particularly to the North East District to maintain peace and harmony".
India's Home Minister Amit Shah called an urgent meeting of top officials of Delhi over the violence in Jaffrabad.
People supporting the new citizenship law beat a #Muslim man during a clash with those opposing the law in New Delhi, India, February 24, 2020. The location is Chandbagh opposite Bhajanpura. @Reuters photo by @dansiddiqui . #DelhiBurning pic.twitter.com/SjBiesgQmd — Syed Hassan Kazim سید حسن کاظم (@kazimtweets) February 24, 2020
"Yesterday, BJP supporters came to Jaffrabad and incited people. Police officials were there but they did nothing," Nadeem Khan, a Delhi-based activist, told Al Jazeera from Jaffrabad.
"Members of various right-wing organisations, brought from various places, threw stones on houses and beat up the locals. It's clearly an organised, preplanned attack," he added.
Activist Harsh Mander said he was "very fearful that the state will now try to crush the dissent, the spontaneous non-violent uprising across the country, with extreme use of force".
"They make it into a Hindu-Muslim issue, spread lies and propaganda but that hasn't worked for them this time," Mander said before adding that "it's clear that they [BJP] will create hatred and incite violence in order to crush the anti-CAA movement".
Opposition Congress party spokesman Sanjay Jha termed the situation in the capital as "extremely distressing".
"It's disturbing that violence has escalated into a full-fledged riot with police forces unable to control mob fury. The death of a police constable manifests the gravity of the madness on the streets of Delhi. Provocative inflammatory speeches from leaders of the ruling dispensation are responsible for encouraging thugs, with police often a mere bystander," said Jha.
BJP spokesman Nalin Kohli said the violence in the capital city was "highly condemnable".
"The culprits must be identified, strictest action should be taken against them. There is after all the death of a police officer and 37 police officials have been injured.
"This is making a mockery of what is supposed to be peaceful protest." | {
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Denne uka foreslo statsminister Erna Solberg (H) at regjeringen skal kunne ta sosialstønad fra innvandrere – dersom de fortsatt ikke kan godt nok norsk til å få seg en jobb.
Utspillet kommer i forbindelse med at regjeringen vil sende forslaget ut på høring. De vil endre loven, slik at innvandrere med rett og plikt til introduksjonsprogrammet, må gå på norskkurs hvis de ikke mestrer språket.
Venstresiden sier at dersom du stiller krav til flyktninger og fratar dem rettigheter, vil du ikke bare drive folk til søppelkassene, men også inn i kriminaliteten.
Venstresidens hypoteser
Denne saken setter følelsene i kok på høyre- og venstresiden i norsk politikk.
Med norskkrav til sosialhjelp, har Høyre foreslått et reformprosjekt som tar sikte på å skape en ny og avgjørende mulighet for dem som ikke har klart å tilegne seg språket på normert tid. Slik kan de stå bedre rustet til å få seg en jobb. Det er i første omgang ment at dette skal gjelde personer under 30 år.
Prosjektet avvises av representanter fra venstresiden, uten at de legger frem alternative tiltak og løsninger.
I stedet driver venstresiden med en utstrakt bruk av hypoteser om at denne loven vil ramme de aller svakeste, de som har lese- og skrivevansker eller andre forhold som umuliggjør for dem å tilegne seg det norske språket.
Når forslaget tåkelegges i en sky av emosjonelle utspill, bidrar det ikke til å beskytte disse menneskene.
Spill på følelser
Selv er jeg en flyktning som kom fra Irak til Norge i 2015. For meg er dette forslaget om å kreve norskkunnskaper helt logisk.
Men når forslaget tåkelegges i en sky av emosjonelle utspill, som bare har til hensikt å spille på menneskers følelser eller brukes som et valgpolitisk virkemiddel, bidrar det ikke til å beskytte disse menneskene.
Statsministerens forslag viser en ansvarsfølelse overfor mennesker som er en del av samfunnet. En statsminister som tror på, og har tillit til, at disse menneskene kan forbedre sin livssituasjon.
For personene det gjelder, representerer dette en ny sjanse til å utvikle seg.
Man aksepterer å oppbevare folk i en sort boks. Uten språk, skole, jobb og kunnskap om hva som foregår i samfunnet rundt.
Mangler ideer
Venstresiden preges av mangel på ideer. Resultatet er i praksis at man aksepterer å oppbevare folk i en liten sort boks. Uten språk, uten skole, uten jobb og uten kunnskap om hva som foregår i samfunnet rundt.
I organisasjonen som jeg er styreleder i, Fakkeltog, tror vi at innvandrere innehar ressurser, erfaringer, ferdigheter og pågangsmot. Mangelen på språk legger en dempende effekt på utøvelsen av disse ressursene.
For å gjøre det mulig å bruke denne positive energien, er tilstrekkelig språkopplæring helt avgjørende.
Nedvurderer innvandrere
I organisasjonen vår er målet vårt å styrke tilliten i samfunnet, og språk er et viktig verktøy her.
Jeg hører venstresiden sier at dersom du stiller krav til flyktninger og fratar dem rettigheter, så vil du ikke bare drive folk til søppelkassene, du vil også drive dem inn i kriminaliteten. Det skremmer meg, og det er det styggeste jeg hører noen si om flyktninger som meg selv.
Innvandrere er mennesker med moral, kultur, menneskelighet, hjerte og sinn.
Vi aksepterer ikke kriminalitet i vårt eget land, som vi har flyktet fra, og vi aksepterer det ikke i vårt nye land.
Morgendagens problemforeldre skapes i dag.
Vet hvor skoen trykker
Det vil bli vanskelig å håndheve Solbergs norskkrav. Men reform og utvikling må komme fra alle deler av samfunnet.
Nav kan være mer løsningsorienterte og samarbeide med instanser som har den nødvendige kompetansen.
Vår organisasjon mener alvor når vi støtter opp om Solbergs norskkrav, nettopp fordi vi befinner oss nær virkeligheten:
Forestill deg at du er under 30 år og ikke snakker norsk. Du har ikke jobb, og du har ikke problemer med fysisk eller psykisk helse. Hva bruker du tiden din på?
Du lever i et mareritt, og noen må vekke deg fra det!
Vi er flyktninger som forstår og respekterer det Norge har gitt oss fra første minutt.
Morgendagens problemforeldre
Hvis ikke disse menneskene deltar i samfunnet, kan vi bare skru tiden frem 10 år.
Da vil de være foreldre som ikke snakker norsk, og som befinner seg langt fra det norske livet. De vil være ute av stand til å veilede sine barn, med de utfordringer det vil skape med barnevern, læringsutfordringer, tilpasningsproblemer og annen ungdomsproblematikk.
Morgendagens problemforeldre skapes i dag.
Jeg er ikke Ernas advokat. Vår organisasjon støtter ikke noe politisk parti, og vi fokuserer på tiltak og løsninger som vi tror fungerer.
Vi er flyktninger som forstår og respekterer det Norge har gitt oss fra første minutt i dette landet. Vi prøver å være dyktige i studier og arbeid, for å gi noe tilbake.
At myndighetene stiller krav til oss, er naturlig og respektfullt.
Når venstresiden benytter ord og vendinger som å «ta det lille de har» og «angripe de svakeste i samfunnet», gjør de folk små og verdiløse.
Oppnår motsatt effekt
Når venstresiden kommer med sin krasse kritikk mot norskkravet, benytter de ord og vendinger som «å ta det lille de har» og «å angripe de svakeste i samfunnet». Da gjør de folk små og verdiløse.
Jeg opplever det som diskriminerende. Sannsynligvis er den reaksjonen det motsatte av det de egentlig ønsker å oppnå.
I vår organisasjon har vi dialog med alle de politiske partiene, og arbeider i kontakt med flyktninger i byer og tettsteder rundt om i Norge. Vi ser at partiene i liten grad oppsøker arenaer der flyktninger er.
De færreste partiene har noen konkret strategi for å løfte innvandrere. Vi har derfor ikke sansen for at noen partier i valgkampens hete utgir seg for å være denne målgruppens høye beskytter.
Innvandrere er en gruppe med vidt forskjellige interesser og kulturer. Det er bare et spørsmål om tid før dette også reflekteres i lovgivende myndigheter. Først da kan vi kan vi gi et bilde av virkeligheten, ikke bare vrangforestillinger og fantasier.
Vi trenger flere innvandrere som folkevalgte. I dag har kun 3 prosent av de folkevalgte en annen kulturell bakgrunn. I Oslo er det bedre, med 1 av 6 folkevalgte, men det er langt igjen før det gjenspeiler virkeligheten. I Oslo har 33 prosent av befolkningen en annen kulturell bakgrunn.
Regjeringen bør tar ansvar for å implementere dette tiltaket på en mye bedre måte enn dagens introduksjonsprogram for flyktninger. | {
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My grandfather was recently diagnosed with cancer, and I can't wait for him to die because he is an asshole.
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Our Politics newsletter is now daily. Join thousands of others and get the latest Scottish politics news sent straight to your inbox. Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email
Scottish Labour activists admitted there is “no longer a core vote” as they brace for council election losses, according to a brutally honest report seen by the Record.
Minutes from a branch meeting in Labour-controlled Falkirk show members hope to avoid any reference to “national politics of the day”.
The leaked notes suggest Labour’s problems under Jeremy Corbyn are seriously denting chances of holding on at May’s crunch vote.
It comes just days after a poll showed the party’s support has halved since the last local authority election in 2012.
The minutes from the Braes branch stated: “Nationally the situation is difficult - polling and analysis shows there is no longer a core Labour vote/typical Labour voter.
“For the council elections the party aim is to campaign on local issues, focussing on the strengths and achievements of local candidates - not national politics of the day.”
But members present at the meeting on February 1 also admitted the local campaign isn’t even ready - and there isn’t a social media strategy. The manifesto won’t be written until next month.
And in a hint of wider canvassing problems for Labour, the minutes add: “The party doesn’t necessarily make it easy for folks to get involved.”
The minutes show they are still looking for a local message for non SNP voters who they hope to persuade to vote for Labour in their second vote on the multimember ballot.
Labour want to push the message that they have improved local housing, amenities and bus services while the SNP Scottish Government have forced cuts on councils.
One proposed local slogan, designed to campaign against predicted SNP outsourcing, was “keep it in the cooncil”.
(Image: Yuk Moi/PA Wire)
Labour returned 14 councillors in Falkirk in 2012, making them the largest group with one more than the SNP. They formed an administration with Tories and independents.
In 2013, Labour were rocked by vote-rigging allegations in Falkirk during the selection process to replace disgraced MP Eric Joyce.
The minutes suggest the branch fears Lower Braes councillor Alan Nimmo could lose to his rivals. Members suggested focussing efforts there.
In Upper Braes, they proposed to focus on re-electing John McLuckie, with no written record of the second member Rosie Murray, who wasn’t at the meeting.
Upper Braes members unanimously agreed they don’t want to split votes by having two candidates on the ballot.
SNP Falkirk Council group leader Cecil Meiklejohn said: “These revelations show just how far the Labour party has fallen in Scotland - and it is clear that they have given up on putting in any kind of effort to win a majority in May with this admission that they no longer have a core vote.
“Falkirk Labour have been engulfed by scandals over vote-rigging and corruption and were happy to join forces with the Tories.” | {
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