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Levels of contaminants higher than in some of the world’s most polluted cities have been found downwind of Canada’s largest oil, gas and tar sands processing zone, in a rural area where men suffer elevated rates of cancers linked to such chemicals.
Irvine, Calif., Oct. 22, 2013 – Levels of contaminants higher than in some of the world’s most polluted cities have been found downwind of Canada’s largest oil, gas and tar sands processing zone, in a rural area where men suffer elevated rates of cancers linked to such chemicals.
The findings by UC Irvine and University of Michigan scientists, published online this week, reveal high levels of the carcinogens 1,3-butadiene and benzene and other airborne pollutants. The researchers also obtained health records spanning more than a decade that showed the number of men with leukemia and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma was greater in communities closest to the pollution plumes than in neighboring counties. The work is a dramatic illustration of a new World Health Organization report that outdoor air pollution is a leading cause of cancer.
While the scientists stopped short of saying that the pollutants they documented were definitely causing the male cancers, they strongly recommended that the industrial emissions be decreased to protect both workers and nearby residents.
“Our study was designed to test what kinds of concentrations could be encountered on the ground during a random visit downwind of various facilities. We’re seeing elevated levels of carcinogens and other gases in the same area where we’re seeing excess cancers known to be caused by these chemicals,” said UC Irvine chemist Isobel Simpson, lead author of the paper in Atmospheric Environment. “Our main point is that it would be good to proactively lower these emissions of known carcinogens. You can study it and study it, but at some point you just have to say, ‘Let’s reduce it.’ ”
Co-author Stuart Batterman, a University of Michigan professor of environmental health sciences, agreed: “These levels, found over a broad area, are clearly associated with industrial emissions. They also are evidence of major regulatory gaps in monitoring and controlling such emissions and in public health surveillance.”
The researchers captured emissions in the rural Fort Saskatchewan area downwind of major refineries, chemical manufacturers and tar sands processors owned by BP, Dow, Shell and other companies in the so-called “Industrial Heartland” of Alberta. They took one-minute samples at random times in 2008, 2010 and 2012. All showed similar results. Amounts of some dangerous volatile organic compounds were 6,000 times higher than normal.
The team compared the Alberta plumes to heavily polluted megacities. To their surprise, the scientists saw that levels of some chemicals were higher than in Mexico City during the 1990s or in the still polluted Houston-Galveston area.
Simpson is part of UC Irvine’s Blake-Rowland Group, which has measured air pollution around the world for decades. She and Batterman said the findings were important for other residential areas downwind of refineries and chemical manufacturers, including parts of Los Angeles.
“For any community downwind of heavy industrial activity, I would say it’s certainly prudent to conduct surveys of both air quality – especially carcinogens – and human health,” Simpson said.
“For decades, we’ve known that exposure to outdoor air pollutants can cause respiratory and cardiovascular disease,” Batterman said. “The World Health Organization has now also formally recognized that outdoor air pollution is a leading environmental cause of cancer deaths.”
Longtime residents near industrial Alberta have struggled to bring attention to bad odors, health threats and related concerns. The peer-reviewed study is one of few in the region and more investigation of the large and complex facilities is needed.
For example, Simpson said, it appeared in some cases that the companies were not reporting all of the tons of chemicals they release. She and her colleagues documented high levels of 1,3-butadiene that could only have come from one facility, but she said the company had not reported any such emissions.
Other authors are Josette Marrero, Simone Meinardi, Barbara Barletta and Donald Blake, all of UC Irvine.
About the University of California, Irvine: Located in coastal Orange County, near a thriving high-tech hub in one of the nation’s safest cities, UC Irvine was founded in 1965. One of only 62 members of the Association of American Universities, it’s ranked first among U.S. universities under 50 years old by the London-based Times Higher Education. The campus has produced three Nobel laureates and is known for its academic achievement, premier research, innovation and anteater mascot. Led by Chancellor Michael Drake since 2005, UC Irvine has more than 28,000 students and offers 192 degree programs. It’s Orange County’s second-largest employer, contributing $4.3 billion annually to the local economy.
Media access: UC Irvine maintains an online directory of faculty available as experts to the media at http://communications.uci.edu/for-journalists/experts/. Radio programs/stations may, for a fee, use an on-campus ISDN line to interview UC Irvine faculty and experts, subject to availability and university approval. For more UC Irvine news, visit news.uci.edu. Additional resources for journalists may be found at communications.uci.edu/for-journalists. | {
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Eat like a hunter-gatherer and you’ll be healthier—so goes the thinking behind so-called paleo diets. But a new study suggests that humans who live in industrialized societies don’t have the guts to stomach a real hunter-gatherer diet. Compared with hunter-gatherers, industrialized peoples’ intestines have fewer kinds of microbes—and are missing at least one major group of ancient bacteria. Yet even with all of these extra microbes, hunter-gatherers have fewer gut ailments, such as Crohn’s disease, colitis, and colon cancer.
Our bodies are home to trillions of bacteria—collectively known as the microbiome—but it’s unclear how our diet impacts the composition of these tiny organisms. Some studies have detected differences in the types of gut bacteria in obese and thin people, for example, while others have shown that hunter-gatherers harbor more diverse gut bacteria than do people in the industrialized world—a difference that may protect preagricultural communities from Crohn’s disease and colon cancer.
In a new study published online today in Nature Communications, an international team of researchers offers the first comprehensive look at the full-scale diversity of gut microbes in one group of hunter-gatherers and how the bacteria unique to them might function in their guts and affect their health. Anthropologist Cecil Lewis of the University of Oklahoma in Norman and his colleagues set out to detect differences in the core gut bacteria in hunter-gatherers and farmers in Peru, and compared them with residents of Norman. The researchers traveled by canoe upriver into the Amazon to study the diet and health of the Matses community, who are among the last hunter-gatherers in the world; they still hunt monkey, sloth, alligator, and other game, as well as gather wild tubers in the forest and fish in the rivers.
Getting “informed consent” from the Matses to gather their fecal samples, which are the best source of bacteria from the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, was a challenge, Lewis says, so the anthropologists gave the Matses a crash course in bacterial biology by showing them gut microbes under microscope. Once they explained that the gut bacteria lived inside them and could affect their health, one Matses man asked if the gut bacteria were the reason he couldn’t drink milk anymore, even though he could as a child. (The answer is yes, in part, because gut bacteria influence how much gas is produced by people who are lactose intolerant.) The researcher collected samples from 25 Matses and also from 31 Tunapuco, a traditional community of potato farmers from the Andean highlands who also eat guinea pig, pork, lamb, and some cheese from cows. They also collected feces from 23 people living in Norman, mostly academics who eat processed foods, including canned fruits and vegetables and prepackaged meals, as well as meat and dairy products such as milk and cheese.
Back in the lab in Norman, Lewis and his colleagues used state-of-the-art gene sequencing methods that allowed them to get long segments of the gene that is used as the standard for classification and identification of microbes, because it differs in various bacteria. They found that the hunter-gatherers’ and farmers’ gut bacteria were far more diverse than those in the people from Norman. The traditional groups have the most diversity in their microbiomes, including new types of bacteria that have yet to be named and several different strains of Treponema, spirochete bacteria that are usually absent in Western industrialized populations. There are strains of Treponema that cause disease, such as syphilis, but the strains found in the traditional people are more closely related to nonpathogenic strains in other mammals, such as pigs.
The detection of several strains of Treponema in the Matses suggests this type of bacteria has been present in human guts for a long time, because it was also found in the GI tracts of the Hadza hunter-gatherers in Tanzania and in nonhuman primates. “Suddenly a picture is emerging that Treponema was part of core ancestral biome,” says co-author Christina Warinner, an anthropologist at the University of Oklahoma. “What’s really striking is it is absolutely absent, not detectable in industrialized human populations.”
The team’s study also analyzed the function of the gut bacteria and found that the Treponema species in the Matses are most like those in the guts of pigs. There, the microbes play a role in digesting carbohydrates, or sugars. This suggests that the existence of Treponema “is likely a good indicator of a general high level of microbial diversity in the human gut,” says evolutionary anthropologist Stephanie Schnorr of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. “Now it seems clear that their function is related to helping metabolize carbohydrates, and this can have a number of benefits and implications for host health.”
The key question now is does the absence of Treponema leave industrialized humans without a valuable player in the metabolism of their food—and the prevention of autoimmune disorders, such as Crohn’s and colitis, for example? “What’s starting to come into focus is that having a diverse gut microbiome is critical to maintaining versatility and resiliency in the gut,” Warinner says. “Once you start to lose the diversity, it may be a risk factor of inflammation and other problems.” And trying to eat like our ancestors may not be enough to get the benefits of a true paleo diet and lifestyle. “So even if you could mimic a true paleo diet, you are still missing ancestral gut bacteria that were involved in food digestion in the paleo gut,” Lewis says. | {
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5 When she politely declined to sit on the famous Iron Throne
In June 2014, the Queen paid a visit to the set of Game of Thrones in Belfast. While the monarch got within inches of the show's famous Iron Throne, she didn't appear to be impressed by the chair, which is made of thousands of swords and definitely doesn't look comfortable. So, much to the disappointment of the show's producers, she turned down the chance to actually sit on it. “Apparently the Queen of England is not allowed to sit on a foreign throne,” executive producer David Benioff explained during an interview with Late Night host Seth Meyers a year later. “This is an esoteric rule we didn’t know about until that moment.” Still, we're sure she appreciated the model version she was presented with at the end of her visit. | {
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United States financial research company FactSet has filed a lawsuit against a company affiliated with professional trading service Blockchain Terminal (BCT), according to documents published by the Supreme Court for the State of New York County, Jan. 3.
As stated in the lawsuit, in January, 2018, FactSet and the defendant — CG Blockchain — entered into an agreement to develop an interfacing application between the two firms' products. FactSet also granted a license to CG to use its products.
According to the documents, CG had agreed to pay a minimum licensing fee of about $3.8 million, payable in three increments.
However, FactSet claims that the amount was not payed, and insists the contract between the two companies has thus been breached. Moreover, the plaintiff states that CG retained the benefit of using the licenses provided, also filing a second part of the complaint covering CG’s “unjust enrichment.”
FactSet insists that CG owes the company $2.8 million in damages, plus interest and attorney's fees.
According to crypto news outlet The Block — which recently published an investigation into Blockchain Terminal — this is not the first lawsuit filed against CG. As per the documents filed in the same court, New York staffing company Clarity LLC sued CG and, in particular, its managing director Edith Pardo, for about $150,000 in October, 2018. The plaintiff claims CG failed to pay for recruiting services.
In December, The Block published its investigation claiming that the person behind BCT, allegedly named Shaun MacDonald, was reportedly a convicted fraudster, whose real name is Boaz Manor.
According to Toronto news outlet The Star, Manor received a four-year prison sentence in Canada in 2012 for misappropriating $106 million from the Toronto-based hedge fund he co-founded. In April, The Globe and Mail reported that Manor agreed to repay nearly $8.8 million as compensation and agreed to a lifetime ban from the securities industry.
Later in December, the official BCT twitter account posted an interview with MacDonald, in which he admitted his real name is Boaz Manor.
BCT is alleged to have raised most of its funds via a $31 million ICO for its native BCT token in September 2017, The Block wrote in December. | {
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While the truck is undoubtedly in pristine condition—it was titled for the first time in June 2019—everything else about it is, for the most part, pretty typical. It's fitted with the 5.9-liter V8 which can be found in essentially every half-ton Dodge pickup of the era and, conveniently, it's a four-wheel-drive model. That last bit doesn't really matter, though, as no one will be driving this museum-grade piece through mud or snow anytime soon.
Other options include a bench-style front seat with room in the back for a few (admittedly small) passengers thanks to its extended-cab configuration. A period-correct bed topper stands as the only add-on, and it's been painted to match the truck's factory Solar Yellow hue. Lastly, the Ram 1500's Sport package brings with it a slew of nice amenities like power windows, locks, and mirrors.
Again, the likelihood of any of these features ever being used is non-existent, but at least the Ram will be immortalized in what's close to the model's top-spec. | {
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We can now confirm the rumours that Intel has given up on Nvidia because it has written a cheque to license AMD's graphics.
It looks like veteran GPU editor Kyle Bennet was right when he first reported the rumor, however wild it sounded. We didn't contemplate it but wrote about it several times. Intel needs a GPU licence and the Nvidia – Intel licensing agreement ended on March 17 2017, so Intel doesn’t have a licensc. It is more likely that Intel has a licencee from AMD but neither company has officially announced it.
Apple is licensing GPU tech from Imagination Technologies at least for the next eighteen to twenty four months until it gets its own. Samsung, MediaTek use ARM or Imagination Graphics IP but even without these two have good desktop / notebook graphics. Qualcomm acquired a huge set of IP from ATI when it was known as Imagion, and was the foundation for the Adreno today.
Nvidia Intel's shotgun wedding ends in divorce
If you are in Intel’s shoes,there are two options, Nvidia or AMD. We know that Nvidia sued Intel and forced it into a settlement and now that the shotgun wedding is over, Intel wants out. Nvidia and Intel had many disagreements over the Nforce chipset and the licensing, that resulted with $1.5 Billion settlement that Intel agreed to pay for five years. It does tend to sour a marriage somewhat if you go to court BEFORE the honeymoon, or indeed the marriage. Or the copulation - oh sorry we didn't mean to menion sex.
AMD needs money and licensing is a healthy revenue stream that will keep it going for numerous quarters. The licensing money usually positively affects gross margins, again something that AMD desperately needs to improve.
AMD loves Intel
Raja Koduri, Senior Vice President and Chief Architect, Radeon Technologies Group worked at Apple and worked closely with Intel too. He probably played an important role in these negotiations.
It remains to be seen when it will be formally announced and when it will start affecting AMD’s bottom line. The cooperation and agreement will allow Intel to access AMD’s graphics Intellectual Properties and most things Radeonish.
AMD will weaken its position to fight Intel on in the integrated solutions, but licensing money should help overcome that issue. Despite that fact that these companies compete, they are close when it comes to graphics.
Of course, when we came to know the existence of the deal, we will dig much harder to get the many more details about potential new products and if the Radeon will get inside of the future Intel CPUs. Intel takes a lot of time to implement a new architecture. | {
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A team of scientists led by the heliophysics group at Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has used observations of Comet Encke’s tail using NASA’s Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), and revealed that the solar wind flows through the vacuum of interplanetary space much as the wind blows on Earth: not smoothly, but with gusting turbulence and swirling vortices.
That turbulence can help explain two of the wind’s most curious features: its variable nature and unexpectedly high temperatures.
Scientists know a lot about the properties and behavior of the solar wind but don’t agree about how it is accelerated, especially at its fastest speeds. Moreover, the solar wind can be highly variable, so that measurements just short times or distances apart can yield quite different results. It is also very, very hot – hotter than it should be at such great distances from the Sun’s corona.
“The solar wind at Earth is about 70 times hotter than one might expect from the temperature of the solar corona and from how much it expands as it crosses the void,” said Dr. Craig DeForest, a solar physicist at SwRI, and lead author of the study published in The Astrophysical Journal on October 13, 2015. “The source of this extra heat has been a mystery of solar wind physics for several decades.”
Video courtesy of SciNews
The SwRI-led team took advantage of some of Comet Encke’s more unusual characteristics to study the solar wind. Unlike most comets, Comet Encke has what is called a compact tail. Rather than feathering out loosely, creating a wide spray of ions, Comet Encke’s ion tail streams out in a tight, bright ribbon of glowing gas with compact features.
Using the Heliospheric imager onboard STEREO, scientists studied the movements of hundreds of dense “clumps” of glowing, ionized gas within the ribbon of Comet Encke’s tail, which passed by STEREO in 2007. Fluctuations in the solar wind are mirrored in changes in the tail. By tracking these clumps, scientists were able to reconstruct the motion of the solar wind, catching an unprecedented look at its turbulence.
Turbulence in the solar wind could provide one of the answers to the mystery of the solar wind heating. Based on analysis of the comet tail motions, the researchers calculated that large-scale turbulence provides sufficient kinetic energy to drive the high-temperatures observed in the solar wind.
Turbulence may also explain solar wind variability. “Turbulent motion mixes up the solar wind, leading to the rapid variation that we see at Earth,” said DeForest.
Individual clumps of tail material bob and twist in the turbulent solar wind, in this highly processed image of Comet Encke from the HI-1 instrument on board NASA’s STEREO-A spacecraft. The circular dots mark individual clumps that were tracked by the SwRI/University of Delaware team to measure the flow of the solar wind. Image credit NASA//SwRI.
“In situ measurements are limited because they cannot follow the turbulence along its path," said William Matthaeus, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Delaware and co-author on the study. “Now, for the first time, we observed the turbulent motions along their complex paths and quantified the mixing. We actually see the turbulence.”
These observations provide a preview of what NASA plans to observe more directly with the Solar Probe Plus mission, which will travel within 10 solar radii of the Sun. However, because comets go closer to the Sun than any spacecraft can, they provide unique information about the solar wind and interplanetary space.
Source: SwRI
Reference:
"Turbulence in the Solar Wind Measured with Comet Tail Test Particles" - C. E. DeForest and W. H. Matthaeus and T. A. Howard and D. R. Rice - The Astrophysical Journal - October 13, 2015 - DOI:10.1088/0004-637X/812/2/108
Featured image credit: NASA/SwRI | {
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Silvies Valley Ranch
The Retreat, Links & Spa at Silvies Valley Ranch prides itself on being an eco ranch, and as well as being a wonderful place to ride and enjoy nature, it's also a golfer's paradise! | {
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The discussions were more detailed than those the company has had regarding other locations in Northern Virginia and some other cities nationally, adding to speculation that the site in Arlington County is a front-runner to land the online retail giant’s second North American headquarters and its 50,000 jobs.
The company is so close to making its choice that Crystal City’s top real estate developer, JBG Smith, has pulled some of its buildings off the leasing market and officials in the area have discussed how to make an announcement to the public this month, following the midterm elections, according to public and private-sector officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because Amazon has asked that the selection process remain confidential. The company may be having similar discussions with other finalists.
Two people close to the process said that if Crystal City was selected, Amazon was likely to move an initial group of several hundred employees into 1851 S. Bell St. or 1770 Crystal Dr., two dated office buildings that have been targeted for redevelopment but could be readied for occupancy by their owner, JBG Smith, in nine months or less. The bid also includes sites in Potomac Yard, in Alexandria.
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“There’s a lot of activity,” one individual close to the process said. The person added that people “seem really positive, and they seem pretty confident. . . . What we don’t know, maybe there are two or three other sites, and they’re doing the same thing. That’s what’s scary to people around here.”
At a conference in New York on Thursday, Amazon founder and chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos told the crowd: “Ultimately the decision will be made with intuition after gathering and studying a lot of data — for a decision like that, as far as I know, the best way to make it is you collect as much data as you can, you immerse yourself in that data but then you make the decision with your heart.” (Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
Spokesmen for Amazon and JBG Smith declined to comment, as did Arlington County Board Chair Katie Cristol (D).
Alexandria Mayor Allison Silberberg (D) declined to discuss whether advanced talks were taking place, but she said, “We think we’ve put forward a very competitive option, and we’re certainly honored to be considered.”
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D), asked on WTOP Radio on Wednesday about speculation that Crystal City was the front-runner said: “A lot of us are anxiously awaiting a decision, an announcement from Amazon. . . . A lot of [Virginia government] resources are being expended right now, and I think for good reason.”
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A spokesman for Northam declined to comment further on Friday.
But after publication of this story, Mike Grella, director of economic development for Amazon, posted on Twitter: “Memo to the genius leaking info about Crystal City, VA as #HQ2 selection. You’re not doing Crystal City, VA any favors. And stop treating the NDA you signed like a used napkin,” he said in reference to the nondisclosure agreements that Amazon required finalists to sign.
Excitement and anxiety
After launching a reality-show-like sweepstakes for a second home in late 2017, Amazon has effectively shut down disclosures about the search in the past nine months. Twenty finalist cities — many of which have spent considerable time and money pursuing the company — have little information about where they stand, according to officials in four other finalist jurisdictions.
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But stock market investors, online betting sites and corporate relocation experts have all declared Northern Virginia the favorite to land the HQ2.
Washington-area leaders believe the project is theirs to lose, and that Virginia, Maryland and the District would all benefit economically. Crystal City, with easy transit access, proximity to Reagan National Airport, and ready-to-occupy office buildings, has long been considered a strong contender. The District and Montgomery County also are among the 20 finalists.
Betting sites give Northern Virginia the most likely odds of landing the project, and stock analysts have sweetened their view of JBG Smith — owner of most of Crystal City — as Amazon’s announcement has approached. Analysts at Stifel Nicolaus recently upgraded the company from “Sell” to “Hold” and say just the possibility that Amazon chooses Crystal City has added four or five dollars to the company’s stock price.
In the Washington area, the anticipation is growing as hints filter out that Amazon is in the final stages of making a decision. The company tentatively considered making an announcement by the end of October, but has now put it off until November, according to individuals close to the process.
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“They have said publicly they want HQ2 operating in 2019,” one person said. “Starting to work on that level of detail with the finalists is something they absolutely are doing. . . . I think it’s a very small number of finalists. . . . [The announcement] requires some level of coordination and advance notice.”
Sharon Bulova (D), chair of the board of supervisors in Fairfax County, Va., where one of the sites is located, has felt the vibe.
“What I pick up from residents is enthusiasm,” she said. “They’re excited about the jobs that Amazon would bring.”
It’s also anxiety. Months of waiting have not quelled concerns about the potential pressure Amazon could place on the region’s already steep housing prices, congested roads and yawning divide between its wealthy and low-income residents.
When Bezos spoke at an Economic Club of Washington event in September, more than a dozen protesters occupied the sidewalk outside and civic groups — sometimes joined by union activists — have raised concerns about what the addition of such a fast-growing company would mean for the region’s schools, roads and housing prices.
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Even without Amazon, the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments has estimated that the region needs to add 235,000 housing units by 2025 to keep pace with expected job growth.
Amazon’s arrival could push the goal to around 267,000 by 2026, according to a recent analysis by the Urban Institute. Right now the region is on pace to add only about 170,000 new units by then, and the shortage threatens to exacerbate inequality.
“Whether Amazon comes or not, we have a challenge there,” said Peter Tatian, of the Urban Institute. “The economic growth that has been going on has been benefiting some people and causing problems for others.”
Amazon says it plans to make $5 billion in capital investments alone in the city it chooses and that its headquarters injected an additional $38 billion into the local economy in Seattle, generating an additional $1.40 for every dollar the company spent. But its growth has led to fissures between the company and Seattle.
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Homelessness in the city has escalated, and Amazon vowed to cancel some of its expansion plans if the city passed a new tax on big businesses to raise money to address the problem.
Little transparency from jurisdictions
Bezos and the company have made several recent announcements that could soften Amazon’s public image as it moves to open HQ2.
Now the world’s wealthiest person, Bezos announced in September that he would donate $2 billion of his own money to support groups battling homelessness in the United States and create a network of preschools in underserved communities.
“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that one of those issues was homelessness,” said Joe Parilla, a Brookings Institution fellow. “I think you can draw a pretty clear link between the debate that is unfolding in a lot of these tech hubs and how this gives a little bit of cover to Amazon as it is investing in these hot markets.”
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In October — after bearing months of criticism from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) over its treatment of workers — Amazon announced it would raise its minimum wage for all employees to $15 per hour.
But the company’s request for secrecy has kept a potentially thorny discussion, about how much states and cities should be willing to offer the company for its jobs, in the background.
Few of the public subsidies being offered to Amazon from states, cities and counties for the project have been made public, which some analysts say could result in blowback from taxpayers if they are announced as fait accompli. Maryland has offered an incentive package worth an estimated $8.5 billion, while the Newark subsidies are estimated at $7 billion. On Wednesday, a judge in Allegheny County, Pa., ordered the release of Pittsburgh’s proposal after a legal fight with a local television station. The decision is expected to be appealed.
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“I would question why cities weren’t more forthcoming [with their proposals], and I suspect it’s because there would have been some pushback to what the cities were offering,” said Heidi Learner, chief economist for the advisory firm Savills Studley. “From the public’s perspective the question is what is the city hiding or why shouldn’t they share how [those proposals] would actually lead to more tax revenue down the line?”
After Amazon initially pressed for more information, some leaders were expecting to hear the list of finalists narrowed down publicly, to give economic development teams from the eliminated cities a chance to move on.
“I think the process got away from them a little bit. They probably were planning for some kind of down-selection and changed their position on that,” said Jason Miller, chief executive of the Greater Washington Partnership, a business group.
In addition to tax breaks, some cities have offered to build or expand roads, transit, data networks or airports if Amazon arrives. Parilla, of Brookings, said it’s preferable to “maximize the broader benefit of these investments as much as possible.”
He also doesn’t think it makes sense for Amazon, an $816 billion company, to press a city or state for an enormous subsidy package that could cut into money for other services.
“My sense is that Amazon doesn’t want to repeat some of the antagonism in Seattle,” Parilla said. “It’s not great for the brand to be viewed as oblivious to the existing economic and racial inequities in the city where it’s going to invest.”
The ultimate decision is likely to rest with Bezos. He has a history of showing independence in such matters, such as when he needed a new headquarters for The Washington Post shortly after he purchased it.
The preferred choice among Post executives and consultants was a planned office building near Union Station, which they touted to Bezos during a tour of potential locations.
That site was the favorite — until Bezos weighed in, and chose a downtown building. | {
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Now that filming has wrapped on Aquaman, star Jason Momoa is taking a moment to look back and appreciate the memories.
Momoa shared a batch of photos from his phone that show events from the past several months of his life. These photos include shots from behind-the-scenes of Aquaman and possibly Justice League.
Take a look below.
“SO many beautiful MEMORIES it's been awesome going through my phone,” Momoa wrote on Instagram. “I wish I could show more Mahalo to my team you know who u are I will take you with me in my heart always. Mahalo to Australia for being so amazing to me and for respecting my OHANA I am going to miss so many. It's been a wild ride this last 7 months All my aloha j. JUSTICE LEAGUE TOUR. Here we go. Can't wait for the world to see it. Mahalo zack for picking me. Love u
The final photo in the gallery shows Momoa with a young actor. The actor is holding Aquaman’s trident, together with Momoa, and has tattoos similar to Aquaman’s tattoos, suggesting that this actor may be playing young Arthur Curry. Momoa confirmed that the Aquaman movie will be an origin story that goes all the way to the beginning of Arthur Curry’s life.
“It’s the whole origin story, for sure,” Momoa said. “You’ll see young Arthur and everything. It goes from before he was born...it’s the whole mythology of it.”
Aquaman currently has a 3.88 out of ComicBook.com User Anticipation Rating, making it the eighth most anticipated upcoming comic book movie among ComicBook.com users. Let us know how excited you are about Aquaman by giving the upcoming DC Extended Universe film your own personal ComicBook.com User Anticipation Rating below.
Aquaman opens on December 21, 2018,
Other upcoming DC Extended Universe films include Justice League on November 17, 2017, Wonder Woman 2 on December 13, 2019, Shazam in 2019, Cyborg in 2020, and Green Lantern Corps in 2020. | {
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Bolek and his wife, Zosia Brodecki, seen at their home in Rockville, Maryland, are both Holocaust survivors and met in a refugee came for displaced persons in Landsberg, Germany, after World War II.
The Brodeckis recently downsized their home.
The contents of their sprawling four-bedroom, American Dream dwelling in Richmond, Virginia, are now crammed into a one-bedroom apartment at the Hebrew Home of Greater Washington in suburban Maryland.
Photos in mismatched frames cover every inch of the walls and shelves in jagged rows.
GILLES KAAN, SUPPLIED COURTESY OF THE FAMILY Zosia Brodecki, whose maiden name is Piekarska, survived five German concentration camps during World War II. This photo of her was taken by a Dutch labourer who worked at a labour camp next to a camp she was in.
There are the relics from lost childhoods in Poland, of a teenage Zosia behind barbed wire in a Nazi concentration camp, of friends who perished in the Holocaust, of the young couple in the displacement camp in Germany where Zosia and Bolek met soon after the war ended.
Then there are the images of the life that came after, the multi-generational story that almost never was: the expensive professional head shot of Bolek, 94, that he commissioned when he became an actor after retiring as a small-business owner, the prized photo of Zosia meeting President Obama, the portraits of the couple's four children, the granddaughters, the great-grandchild.
Zosia, 88, uses a cane to lift herself out of her leather recliner, then points to a frame on the wall.
SUPPLIED COURTESY OF THE FAMILY Zosia and Bolek Brodeck, seen holding their son Joseph.
"Let me introduce you to my parents," she says.
They stare out from the photograph, frozen at age 30, her younger brother, Lolek, just a boy.
The last time Zosia saw them she was 12, before being forced into a cattle car with other Jewish Polish children.
"My mother told me, 'You are going to live, and you are going to tell the story,' " she says.
More then 70 years later, the Brodeckis are still doing that.
Stories like theirs, of horrors witnessed and atrocities endured, are increasingly important as the number of US survivors dwindles, from 127,300 in 2010 to a projected 67,100 in 2020, according to the Claims Conference, an organisation that seeks justice for Holocaust survivors.
On Thursday, Holocaust Remembrance Day, the survivors' memories are showcased to ensure that future generations will not forget the genocide and allow history to repeat.
Zosia closes her eyes, hands to her face, struggling as she recalls witnessing the dismembering of bodies. "But the children, what they did to the children," she says.
"I saw so much, I still don't even know how to express myself."
Zosia, whose maiden name is Piekarska, survived five German concentration camps during the war.
She worked at an ammunition factory at the last one, meticulously weighing gunpowder until her skin turned red.
At one point, boils covered much of her emaciated body, and she grew sick.
The others in the concentration camp drained her boils with razor blades so she would appear healthy and the Nazis wouldn't kill her.
A young Dutch labourer snuck her extra food, which she attributes to her survival.
"Can you forget something like that?" she asks.
This is a refrain Zosia repeats often when she describes what she calls the "kindness of others," which perhaps stands out all the more given her experience of human cruelty.
She says it after describing the people who gave her extra bread crumbs in the concentration camp, and the neighbours years later in America who offered to babysit her children in exchange for a piece of candy so she and her husband could enjoy a night out.
After the war, Zosia returned to Poland, where she learned that her father's candy factory was destroyed and that her family was gone, with the exception of a few cousins and family friends.
There was nothing there for her, so she moved to Germany to a large refugee camp.
It was there she met Bolek, a Polish Holocaust survivor and police officer at the refugee camp six years her senior.
A suitor had followed Zosia back from a dance one night, put a knife on her table, and demanded she marry him.
She called the police, and Bolek arrived. Except he wouldn't leave, and asked if they could become friends.
She had no family, knew no one else, and saw no reason to refuse the offer.
Three months later, they were married. Zosia was still underage when they wed, so she found a family to adopt her, who then signed her away to marry Bolek.
Bolek's eyebrows still raise, boasting of his seduction, when his wife recounts their meeting story 70 years later.
At first, the young couple only spoke together only of their lives before the war, trading memories of their brief childhoods, not the Holocaust.
They knew what the other went through, so there was no need to make each other relive it.
The numbers - 98539 - tattooed on Bolek's left forearm told Zosia that he survived Auschwitz, one of the deadliest Nazi extermination camps.
His tattoo did not reveal that he survived eight concentration camps and a death march transporting captives between concentration camps intended to kill as many people as possible along the way.
Four hundred people began the march, he said, but only 100 survived to the end. When he became weak, his friends dragged him, so the Nazis wouldn't kill or leave him for dead.
The tattoo on his arm that transformed him into a mere number in the eyes of his captors doesn't say that he got typhus during the war, then tied a belt around his neck and attempted suicide.
He was lying on the floor when he regained consciousness.
"I don't know. It's just in you," Bolek says, trying to explain why he survived the Holocaust. "It's the nature of a person."
Back then, they didn't talk about these nightmares, which they still have trouble believing actually happened.
But together at the refugee camp, Bolek and Zosia dreamed about America.
She loved Hollywood and wanted to meet Fred Astaire, Mickey Rooney and Shirley Temple.
In 1949, they emigrated to the United States, settling in Richmond, where they took up ballroom dancing and he later hit the disco clubs. Bolek's head still moves flirtatiously in rhythm from side to side as he talks about his disco days.
"I loved everything about America," Zosia says. "I live in the best country. My dreams came true."
Their eldest child, Joseph, was born in the refugee camp. Joseph Brodecki, now 69, led the international fundraising efforts to build the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and was a presidential appointee to the museum's council.
Their second child, Maria, was "made in Germany and born in the United States," Bolek says.
He worked in electronics and in 1962 opened a successful television and electronics store.
She doled out business cards throughout the city to jump-start sales. Their family expanded with two more children, Roma and Deborah.
"We met the nicest people," Zosia says, her pink-painted lips amplifying her youthful excitement.
The Brodeckis are mostly confined to recliners in their living room these days, but the couple hasn't stopped cracking pithy jokes. Especially Bolek - ask him about the Holocaust, and he'll pull out one in his arsenal of hundreds.
"Why you got to start with the jokes," Zosia says in her slight Polish accent. "We are talking about more important stuff."
"If I'm not going to laugh, I'm going to cry," he says.
Bolek's favourite jokes these days is telling about the time he met the actor James Woods while an extra on the set of a movie.
In the late 1970s, Woods starred in a NBC miniseries called Holocaust.
"I was in Holocaust, too," Bolek told the actor when they met.
Woods looked at him incredulously.
"Yeah, I was in the original cast," retorted Bolek.
The couple met Jack Lemmon once, and a picture of the actor adorns their wall.
They have a 14-year-old rescue Poodle-mix named Ginger Rogers who still scampers around their one-bedroom apartment.
"Jack Lemmon, he is a great man. But he has a mouth, ay-yay-yay, like he's in the Navy," says Zosia. "I fall in love with all men."
They talk about the Holocaust to preserve the memory, but are more likely to point to a photo on their wall and tell the story behind it.
There's the portrait of Zosia's father - a "wonderful man" - that she snuck inside her shoe before entering a concentration camp.
And 70 years later, in the spring of 2009, came the snapshot from a Holocaust event at the Capitol Building in Washington DC, where she met President Obama, whom she says she "loves."
Instead of a sterile handshake, she hugged him.
"You know, I never met a person I didn't like," she says. "There's kindness everywhere."
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British police now have greater powers to curtail the civil rights and freedoms of an insidious class of peasant: People who have committed no crime.
All a person has to do to be subject to this is to be “suspect” of “potentially” being a sex offender. The police will be able to apply this “sexual harm prevention order” in an arbitrary and capricious matter on “any person they judge to be a risk.”
The “prevention order” will last for a minimum of five years and may be extended without limit into the future.
If this new power is miss-used, as it will be, the press may not even be able to get away with revealing police abuse of this power.
Tweet | {
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Representative Peter DeFazio on Wednesday unveiled legislation to tax financial trades that will likely wither in Congress but could stoke partisan fires in the presidential election.
U.S. Representative Peter DeFazio (D-OR) throws up his hands as he talks to reporters after a Democratic caucus meeting at the U.S. Capitol in Washington in this August 1, 2011 file photo. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
The Oregon Democrat’s bill would levy a 0.03 percent tax on most financial trades, and is intended to discourage “risky trading behaviors.” DeFazio expects that will collect more than $417 billion in revenue in the next decade, which he said could be used to fund free higher education or infrastructure repairs.
When the Democratic Party gathers in Philadelphia for its national convention at the end of the month, it will adopt a platform that calls for taxing trades. Many liberals in the party embrace the proposal as a way to curb speculative trading, which they say led to both the 2007-09 financial crisis and the 2010 stock market “flash crash.”
The party’s left wing, led by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, who ran against Hillary Clinton for the presidential nomination, meanwhile, has pushed for free university education.
“Thanks to the reckless greed of Wall Street over the past few decades, the American economy is a grossly unbalanced playing field,” said DeFazio.
“The only way we can level it is if we rein in reckless speculative financial trading and curb near-instantaneous high-volume trades that create instability in the stock market and our national economy.”
The legislation is supported by Democratic Party stalwarts, including the AFL-CIO labor union federation, the Americans for Financial Reform coalition, the Communications Workers of America union, and advocacy group Public Citizen. The Center for Economic and Policy Research said it also backs the bill.
It will likely not get far. Republicans control both chambers of Congress, and most say that Wall Street regulation passed in the aftermath of the financial crisis has been overly restrictive. In addition, the Republican Party generally favors having fewer taxes.
“I am opposed to any taxes that would raise the cost of financial transactions,” said Randy Neugebauer, the Republican chairman of a House subcommittee on financial institutions, noting that the bill would tax stock, bond and derivatives trades.
Currently, the top U.S. securities regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission, charges a tax on security futures of less than half of a penny to recover the costs of regulating markets and financial professionals.
The idea for the tax can be traced back to economist John Maynard Keynes, who wrote in 1935 after another devastating financial crisis - the Great Depression - that a transfer tax on all transactions might mitigate speculation.
(This version of the story corrects reference to Center for Economic and Policy Research in 7th paragraph, which had been incorrectly described as a Democratic stalwart) | {
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Saving Labor with Disposables By Art Carden
by Art Carden
“I wonder if they make disposable towels.”
A few flicks of the thumb later, I had discovered that yes, in fact, they do make disposable towels and secured a box of 300 of them to be delivered to my house. My relief is tangible: I joined a gym about a year ago, and one of the inconveniences of my gym membership is that I regularly have to shower and change at the gym. Some gyms provide you with towels. My gym–Planet Fitness–doesn’t.
This means I spend a lot of time carrying around soggy towels and wet washcloths. Keeping them separate from my dry clothes is a minor annoyance, but having them stink up the car if I happen to forget they’re in there and wondering whether I have a clean towel or not is just another distraction in an already-crowded morning.
Hence, disposable towels or a fantastic addition to my quality of life. This is true of all sorts of disposables: disposable cups, disposable plates, disposable silverware, and when my kids were younger, disposable diapers. Disposables are a great source of convenience and better sanitation.
They also free up my time and energy for other things, like writing. The world is better off, presumably, to the tune of the additional articles I am able to write and lectures I’m able to prepare because I’m not spending as much time fussing with towels and dishes. Markets direct resources for their highest valued uses, and for skilled workers in places like the United States, their highest value activities are not washing dishes and doing laundry. Sure, we do some of this because it can be costly to outsource–you can eat at restaurants often, but it’s not that easy to find someone at 7 PM who is willing to do your dishes for a few dollars–but the less of it we can do, the better.
There is an important lesson here in wise stewardship. If you’re reading this, your time, energy, and focus are your most valuable assets. On net, you’re probably not doing the good you could do if you concentrated your time and attention on the tasks for which you have a lower opportunity cost. You create income for others by focusing on the tasks for which you have a comparative advantage and outsourcing to them the tasks for which you don’t. If you’re an engineer, then unless you really enjoy it, you probably shouldn’t mow your lawn. A better contribution to the world would be to do more engineering and pay someone else to mow your grass. On net, you and your trading partners end up with more engineering and better-kept grass. Disposables save you time and energy you would otherwise spend doing dishes and laundry, and on net the world is better off because of the additional engineering you’re able to do.
If you’ve gotten this far, you might be wondering about the environmental costs. Surely, it’s extremely wasteful to dispose of cups and towels after a single use. Perhaps, but if this is the case, it might be because the prices are wrong. Garbage service might be too cheap. Landfill space might be too cheap. Lots of products emerge out of a dizzying array of subsidies, taxes, restrictions, inducements, and other rules that distort the price. In a competitive market with well specified property rights, all of the relevant information is reflected in the price. Finally, one can think of a landfill as an “inventory” of sorts in the same way we might think of mines as inventories. Most of what’s in there isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, and who knows? Maybe the engineers who are able to do more work because they can hire lawn services will come up with cheap and effective ways to recycle all this stuff.
This means that our best estimations of the downstream environmental costs will be reflected in the prices of disposable towels and disposable cups. To the extent that there is an environmental problem with disposables, it’s because we’re not letting the price mechanism do its job, which is to ensure that people enjoy the benefits and bear the costs of their actions without imposing them on others.
Exchange and labor-saving convenience innovations like disposables free up time and energy we would otherwise spend on relatively low-value activities and enable us to direct this time and energy toward high-value activities. Don’t feel bad about making the most of them. After all, they enable you to make an even bigger contribution to the wealth and well-being of others.
Art Carden is Associate Professor of Economics at Samford University’s Brock School of Business, and he is by his own admission as Koched up as they come: he has an award named for Charles G. Koch in his office, he does a lot of work for and is affiliated with an array of Koch-related organizations, and he has applied for and received money from the Charles Koch Foundation to host on-campus events. | {
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Friends, I’m off on a pilgrimage to Sri Lanka and will be away from the internet for 2.5 weeks. I’ve scheduled an inspiring and thought-provoking story, in two parts, to be posted while I’m away. It is taken verbatim from Ajahn Amaro’s book “I’m Right, You’re Wrong”, and for me it contains the most memorable lesson in the book. I hope you find it useful, too.
Meanwhile, here is a question and answer from the same book, on a different subject:
Question: How does an activist who wants justice and wants to fight for justice step back from the reptile brain reactions into the ‘response’ place? Answer: Mindfully. It’s recognizing the feeling: ‘We need justice here. Now, where am I coming from in that attitude?’ Then we turn that reflective quality inwards and say: ‘Okay, this seems unfair and not right. Now, how am I holding that? Where is it in my heart? Where is that feeling coming from? Is it coming from a sense of wanting to benefit the “other” as well as myself? Is there an urge to punish? What’s there? What’s here?’ We try to be as clear and honest as we can. …
The work is both internal and external. We want to make the world a more fair and just place, and at the same time, we don’t want to magnify our own defilements, even though there is an enjoyable aspect to righteous anger. We can avoid being seduced by it!
We need wisdom to find the most effective path to facilitate change in a given situation. We may feel like fighting, we may feel ready to go to war, but if we approach both the internal and external aspects as work instead of a battle, it will likely produce a more beneficial effect.
As with most mindfulness exercises, we first turn inward and try to understand and acknowledge “what is here?”, what is the dominant feeling motivating us right now?
In some places, 2017 was a year of protests, heartfelt and necessary. We can look to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela as exemplars of brave, effective, and mindful resistance. Both of these leaders live on in the hearts of many and are still exerting a positive influence on our societies. We would do well to remember them.
The guideline remains in force, regardless of how frustrated we become, regardless of how fed up we are with cruel, negative behavior by others.
Hatred is never conquered by hatred.
Only by love is it conquered.
This is a law
ancient and inexhaustible.
— Dhammapada 5, translated by Ajahn Amaro
If we need help to defuse our righteous anger and find ways to redirect our energy towards positive change, help is available. We can talk openly and honestly with trustworthy friends, exploring options for action that express our wholesome desire for justice and kindness in the world. We can seek out organizations and individuals who are leading with positive intent; we can borrow the wisdom of others.
Fury is not a sustainable emotion; it’s draining and unhelpful. Determination and generosity can be both constructive and sustainable. Let us proceed mindfully and with mettā. | {
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Giotto Cennino Cennini, a Quattrocento painter trained by students of(the artist heralded as the father of the Renaissance) is the earliest-known publisher of an egg tempera formula in his craftsman’s manual, Il Libro dell’Arte o Trattato della Pittura (The Book of the Art of Cennino Cennini). “You must temper your colors always with yolk of egg,” Cennini instructed, “[and] always as much yolk as of the colors which you temper with it.”
Hundreds of years later, yolks were discarded in favor of egg whites, which were frothed with salt and used to coat paper for mid-19th-century albumen photographic prints. “At that time, everything [in photography] relied on kitchen chemistry,” says Art Kaplan, a photography conservation scientist at the Getty Conservation Institute. “It was people at home, working and trying out different things.”
Gustave Le Gray Roger Fenton Félix Nadar After the albumen process was publicized by French photographer Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard in 1850, albumen prints became one of the most prevalent photographic processes of the 19th century and were used to print images by photographers fromtoand
Both media have produced works with a canonical and physical longevity that laughably contradicts the normally short shelf life of their base ingredient. But making art with eggs is not without its conservation risks. In many ways, it has proven to be a recipe for fragility.
Egg tempera paintings, for example, are much more vulnerable to the elements than their oil-painted counterparts, because their thin layers create a minimal protective film. “Embedded dirt, grime, and soot that’s generated by the atmosphere tends to bond to the surface because the paint film doesn’t have as much integrity [as oil paint],” explains Modestini. “In oil paint, the pigment particles kind of settle to the bottom and it forms an enamel on the surface which, as the linseed oil dries, becomes a much tougher film. In egg tempera, it doesn’t have this protective enamel of the medium, and the pigments are more exposed.” | {
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Sen. Bernie Sanders' ambitious plan to overhaul the nation's healthcare system would grant coverage to those residing in the country illegally.
The Vermont lawmaker's new bill, which was introduced Wednesday, states that "every individual who is a resident of the United States is entitled to benefits for health care services." The Secretary of Health and Human Services would "promulgate a rule that provides criteria for determining residency for eligibility purposes under this Act."
Even if an individual is not covered under a broad definition of "residency" by the secretary of HHS, the federal government can take steps "to ensure that every person in the United States has access to health care."
But the bill states that the federal government would create a rule barring foreigners from coming to the United States for the sole purpose of receiving free healthcare.
Sanders' new Medicare for All proposal was co-sponsored by fellow 2020 Democratic presidential hopefuls Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirstin Gillibrand of New York, and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
Such a program would transfer all private insurance plans to a government-run single-payer plan over four years. Things such as premiums, co-pays, and deductibles would be completely eliminated.
Sanders' bill closely mirrors the measure he proposed during his previous run for president in 2016. His new bill features even more generous benefits, including funding for long-term healthcare for the elderly and terminally ill. Estimates put the total cost of around $32 trillion.
Following a Democratic primary debate in 2016, Warren Gunnels, an aide to Sanders, confirmed that millions of illegal immigrants would be covered under the senator's plan.
"It would cover everyone, including aspiring Americans," said Gunnels at the time.
In March, Gillibrand said she supported expanding Social Security benefits to illegal immigrants.
"If you are in this country now you must have the right to pay into Social Security, to pay your taxes, to pay into the local school system and to have a pathway to citizenship. That must happen," she said in Davenport, Iowa. | {
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Steven Musil/CNET
After a dustup over pornography showing up on Vine, the Twitter-owned video-sharing app has added an age rating for possible adult content.
The app for iPhone and iPod Touch, which lets anyone create and share six-second clips, quickly became a popular venue for pornography after its release last month. Twitter responded by trying to make it harder for users to find the adult videos, blocking a number of porn-related search terms such as "#porn."
The microblogging site initially added a warning still to the beginning of videos in question that users would have to bypass to see the clip. As first noted by The Verge, Twitter released a new version today that requires users to confirm that they are at least 17 years of age; the previous version described itself as suitable for users 12 and older.
The app captured the controversy spotlight when a pornographic video briefly made Vine's "Editor Pick" list, further raising the question of whether the video-clip-sharing app has a porn problem.
However, the pop-up confirmation screen on version 1.0.5 appears to do little more to prevent access to questionable content than previous moves; children under the age of 17 lacking direct adult supervision can easily subvert this new obstacle to install the app.
CNET has contacted Twitter for comment on the new move and will update this report when we learn more.
The update follows similar moves by Tumblr and 500px, the latter of which was briefly removed from the Apple App Store presumably because of its photo-sharing capabilities, which might allow users to search for and find naked bodies. | {
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“The tragedy we are experiencing summons us to take seriously the things that are serious, and not to be caught up in those that matter less, to rediscover that life is of no use if not used to serve others," the pontiff said in his homily. | {
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Insects: The Next Thing in Cooking
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I’d understand if you’re blinking your eyes as you read this article. After all, two of the most unconnected words have just been put together. It makes sense, yes, but it also at the same time doesn’t. Why not? We’re talking about eating insects here. It may evoke indescribable images from the squeamish, but if look at this at another angle, then you might have to agree that whoever said this has a point.
Let’s face it. The world is not exactly that young, and food supply is getting short. After years of excessive eating, we’ve come to the point that we ourselves are losing our environment for the sake of feeding our stomachs. It’s a natural human instinct of ours, to survive, but this is better done without taxing our resources. We should start looking for other food sources. It should be nutritious, filling, and at the same time, requires the least amount of raw materials in order to produce them. We do have a candidate right now, but I’m certain that a lot would be frowning on this. But please, before you dismiss all this outright, let’s hear it first. After that, you’re free to make your own opinion on the matter.
The topic? It’s about insects being used as human food.
Believe it or not, but there are many inspect species that are considered edible and fit for human consumption. In fact, there are some countries that consider them as delicacies. There are also many ways to prepare them. They can be cooked as it is, mixed with other condiments, fried, boiled, dried and many more.
Below are a list of insects that are commonly eaten in many parts of the world:
Atta laevigata (South American leafcutter ants) – considered as aphrodisiacs, the large queen ants of this species are harvested by peasants during the rainy season. After which the legs and wings are removed, immersed in salty water and then roasted on ceramic pans. Research has shown that these species are high in protein, has very low levels of saturated fat, and an overall high nutritional value.
– considered as aphrodisiacs, the large queen ants of this species are harvested by peasants during the rainy season. After which the legs and wings are removed, immersed in salty water and then roasted on ceramic pans. Research has shown that these species are high in protein, has very low levels of saturated fat, and an overall high nutritional value. Gonimbrasia belina (South African mopane worm) – these worms are harvested as a source of food for many Africans. The contents of the innards expelled, these are then dried or smoked to be preserved. They can also be canned in brine, tomato sauce or chili sauce to enhance their flavor. Usually, the dried worms are eaten as a crunchy snack, although there are those who rehydrate it in water first, then fry it with garlic and other spices.
– these worms are harvested as a source of food for many Africans. The contents of the innards expelled, these are then dried or smoked to be preserved. They can also be canned in brine, tomato sauce or chili sauce to enhance their flavor. Usually, the dried worms are eaten as a crunchy snack, although there are those who rehydrate it in water first, then fry it with garlic and other spices. Endoxyla leucomochla (Witchetty grub) – these babies are super high in protein and are harvested by Indigenous Australians. They can be eaten raw, which is said to taste like almonds and nuts or they can be lightly cooked in hot asheswhich then make the skin crispy like that of a roasted chicken and the insides yellow similar to fried eggs. Sounds pretty tasty, no? I’m thinking these would make a great snack for Superbowl Sunday 2011.
– these babies are super high in protein and are harvested by Indigenous Australians. They can be eaten raw, which is said to taste like almonds and nuts or they can be lightly cooked in hot asheswhich then make the skin crispy like that of a roasted chicken and the insides yellow similar to fried eggs. Sounds pretty tasty, no? I’m thinking these would make a great snack for Superbowl Sunday 2011. Rhynchophorus ferrugineus (Sago Worm) – these can be roasted on a spit or fried in oil, whose taste is similar to that of bacon or meat. This could be good for this little bugger since bacon has been topping the food trend charts for the past few years. It is considered as a high nutrition food among the Sarawaks of Borneo, a delicacy in Thailand, and food for special occasions in Papua New Guinea. Chocolate covered sage worm anyone? SWLT? I’d try it.
– these can be roasted on a spit or fried in oil, whose taste is similar to that of bacon or meat. This could be good for this little bugger since bacon has been topping the food trend charts for the past few years. It is considered as a high nutrition food among the Sarawaks of Borneo, a delicacy in Thailand, and food for special occasions in Papua New Guinea. Chocolate covered sage worm anyone? SWLT? I’d try it. Grasshoppers of the genus Sphenarium (Chapulines ) – these bouncy little guys are commonly eaten in some parts of Mexico and Central America. “Chapulines” are cleaned and toasted with garlic, lime juice and salt containing the extract of agave worms. This gives them its distinctive sour-spicy-salty flavor. Too bad for Mexico’s favorite comedic superhero “El Chapulin Colorado”.
) – these bouncy little guys are commonly eaten in some parts of Mexico and Central America. “Chapulines” are cleaned and toasted with garlic, lime juice and salt containing the extract of agave worms. This gives them its distinctive sour-spicy-salty flavor. Too bad for Mexico’s favorite comedic superhero “El Chapulin Colorado”. Bombyx Mori (Domesticated Silk moth silkworm) – in Korea, silkworm pupae are commonly boiled and seasoned, turning them into a snack called beondegi. You can find these on the streets (maybe Korilla can get into this in the future) and make for a great beer pairing. They can also be found in Chinese streets as a roasted snack. Forget pretzels, chex mix and beer. I want some Bombix….This could be a hit.
– in Korea, silkworm pupae are commonly boiled and seasoned, turning them into a snack called beondegi. You can find these on the streets (maybe Korilla can get into this in the future) and make for a great beer pairing. They can also be found in Chinese streets as a roasted snack. Forget pretzels, chex mix and beer. I want some Bombix….This could be a hit. Larvae of ants of the genus Liometopum (Escamol ) – these are considered a delicacy in Mexican cuisine, which earned it the title of “insect caviar.” They have a consistency similar to cottage cheese, yet taste like butter, with a nutty flavor. These will have some competition coming in from the Colombian Hormiga Culona (Atta laevigata) or as we’d call them in Engligh “The Big Butt Ant”. In Colombia when not roasted, people just pick these up off the streets and eat them.
) – these are considered a delicacy in Mexican cuisine, which earned it the title of “insect caviar.” They have a consistency similar to cottage cheese, yet taste like butter, with a nutty flavor. These will have some competition coming in from the Colombian Hormiga Culona (Atta laevigata) or as we’d call them in Engligh “The Big Butt Ant”. In Colombia when not roasted, people just pick these up off the streets and eat them. Imbrasia ertli (black caterpillars of Congo) – usually collected in whole colonies, these caterpillars are then boiled or roasted before eating, but it’s also common for these to be dried under the sun for preservation. There are talks of making these more popular in the area as they would provide for a greener more environmentally friendly alternative to the decimation of vegetative resources in the Republic of Congo. Maybe this is something we should consider in the US?
– usually collected in whole colonies, these caterpillars are then boiled or roasted before eating, but it’s also common for these to be dried under the sun for preservation. There are talks of making these more popular in the area as they would provide for a greener more environmentally friendly alternative to the decimation of vegetative resources in the Republic of Congo. Maybe this is something we should consider in the US? Lethocerus indicus (Thai Giant Water Bug ) – these insects are steamed before eating, or they can also be ground with chili into a paste and served with sticky rice. Unlike most bugs, these are not just fried. In the males, they remove the pheromones and use these in sauces. Could this be a new aphrodisiac? Smells like a mix of stinky cheese and nail polish remover…think I’ll stay away from that one.
) – these insects are steamed before eating, or they can also be ground with chili into a paste and served with sticky rice. Unlike most bugs, these are not just fried. In the males, they remove the pheromones and use these in sauces. Could this be a new aphrodisiac? Smells like a mix of stinky cheese and nail polish remover…think I’ll stay away from that one. Arachnida scorpiones (Scorpions) – these are commonly eaten in Southern China, Latin America and in neighboring countries. They are usually reared in large numbers at home and then cooked in various ways, for example, prepared as scorpion soup. These have a woody taste, and people usually eat it whole, except for the tail end.
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To supporters or protesters waiting outside the court, the sign of the sprinting intern elicits joy and cheers, and signals that a long-awaited decision has been passed down. | {
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It is profoundly isolating to have a child as severely disabled as Sammy. It’s hard even for well-meaning friends to understand the immense strain of his all-consuming needs. Patty and Rick — who tried for 8 years to get pregnant before Ben and Sam were born — grieve for one son’s lost potential every day, even as they struggle to give the other as normal a life as possible.
“Just to see this outpouring of people,’’ Rick Parker began, his eyes welling at the memory. “To see that these people were willing to put their hands and feet to what they believed. . .’’
When Paquette brought the boys to meet the family for the first time, the Parkers cried.
The nurse had barely begun telling Rudy about the Parkers before he said he’d help. Another boy would fill in for Rudy on game nights. And a third boy was on standby in case neither of the others could make it.
Rudy Favard was the first kid Paquette came across after that call. At Malden Catholic on a partial scholarship from the Catholic Schools Foundation, this son of Haitian immigrants was one of Paquette’s treasures. The linebacker, cocaptain of the football team and honor roll student was always willing to lend a hand.
Patty couldn’t carry him, either. Desperate, she called her pediatrician, who put her in touch with Elizabeth Paquette, the nurse at Malden Catholic High School. Paquette said she’d take care of it. The boys at Malden Catholic are taught to embrace service: She’d find plenty of students to help.
“We thought Rick was going to die, and we were terrified,’’ Patty recalled. “We knew right away he had to stop carrying Sam.’’
Until recently, Rick carried Sammy up those 14 stairs to his bedroom each night. But a few months ago, Rick had major surgery for a life-threatening heart condition, and now he can’t lift much at all, let alone a 75-pound child.
Which is where 17-year-old Rudy’s simple, life-changing act of kindness comes in.
A few feet away was the narrow, winding stairway that is the family’s biggest burden lately.
Ben’s twin brother, Sammy, lay on a cot in the narrow hallway just outside the kitchen. Unable to see or speak or control his limbs, he coughed or let out a little moan every now and then. Rick and Patty took turns feeding Sammy, who has cerebral palsy, through a stomach tube. He cooed when they kissed his face or stroked his cheek, and when they cooed back, he opened his mouth into a wide, joyful O.
On Tuesday night, Patty and Rick Parker were in their cramped kitchen with their 8-year-old son Ben. Dinner was over. Bedtime was near.
“You plan for your child’s future, but it’s hard to do that for Sam,’’ Rick said. “You have this pathway he should have taken, and the pathway he did take, and you don’t want to look at either one.’’
And over it all hangs the certainty that Sammy’s condition will never improve — even as he gets bigger and heavier.
Into this world of love and hurt comes Rudy. Four nights a week, he leaves his homework and makes the 10-minute drive to the Parker house. Around 8 p.m., he carries Sammy upstairs, chats a bit, hugs everybody, and heads home to finish his work. After considerable effort, the Parkers convinced Rudy to take enough money to cover gas, with a little left over.
In the few months the Parkers have known him, Rudy has become not just a help with Sammy, but a salve for their pain. He and Rick talk about football. Patty quizzes him on girls. Ben usually parks himself as close to Rudy as possible, looking up at him adoringly. And most nights, Sam will tremble with excitement as Rudy picks him up.
“It’s like family,’’ said the shy senior. It goes both ways: The Parkers were on the field with Rudy’s mother the night Malden Catholic honored its senior football players.
And so Rudy had barely knocked on the door Tuesday night before Ben was at it, jumping up and down, yelling, “Rudy is here! Rudy is here!’’
He greeted the Parkers, and went over to Sammy, gently lifting the boy’s left arm and sliding his hands under his back, the way Rudy’s father, a professional caregiver, had shown him. He lifted Sammy and held him close to his chest, and as the boy made his joyful O, Rudy carefully maneuvered him around the corners on the narrow stairway.
You couldn’t help but be struck by the painful contrast between the two boys: The robust athlete cradling the pale, helpless child; the young man preparing to go out into the world carrying someone who never will.
It’s a comparison lost on nobody, least of all Rudy himself.
“Can I ask you something?’’ he said, sitting in the Parkers’ living room after Sammy was asleep. “Is it OK if this article is more about Sam than me?’’
Why?
“He’s done more for me than I’ve done for him,’’ Rudy said. “There are times when I don’t want to go to practice, and then I look at Sam. By God’s grace, I can do what I’m doing, so I should keep it up. I’ve never been one to complain a lot, but just seeing Sam reaffirms everything, you know?’’
The Parkers won’t have Rudy for long. He’s already been accepted at four colleges, and others are courting him. Where he goes depends on financial aid and football.
The Parkers hope to be out of this cramped house and into a bigger one — with no stairs — before Rudy leaves town in search of his degree.
Until then, Rudy will bound up to the modest, pale green house on Fairmount Street. He’ll carry Sammy up to his cozy room. Then, for a little while, he’ll carry the Parkers somewhere better, too.
Yvonne Abraham is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at [email protected]
© Copyright 2011 Globe Newspaper Company. | {
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GEMA will Geld für Creative-Commons-Stück Peter Mühlbauer
Weil ihr dieser Wunsch nicht erfüllt wurde, klagt die Verwertungsgesellschaft vor dem Amtsgericht Frankfurt gegen den Verein Musikpiraten
Das Bild der Musikverwertungsgesellschaft GEMA in der Öffentlichkeit wird trotz der teuren Werbekampagne "Musik ist uns was Wert" immer schlechter: Kaum jemand zeigt Verständnis für die extremen Preiserhöhungen bei Speichermedien und Gaststätten, für die Hausdurchsuchungen bei Online-Demonstranten und dafür, dass nur fünf Prozent der dort gemeldeten Musiker die Regeln bestimmen dürfen. Diese Regeln sehen dann erwartungsgemäß so aus, dass diese fünf Prozent (oder 3.400 Personen) der Berliner Zeitung zufolge mit durchschnittlich 140.000 Euro im Jahr 65 Prozent der Einnahmen zugeschustert bekommen, während ein Großteil der Musiker ohne Stimmrecht darben muss.
Angesichts dieses PR-Desasters könnte man auf die Idee kommen, dass sich die GEMA kompromissbereit zeigt, um ihrer Auflösung vorzubeugen, die immer öfter gefordert wird. Doch das Gegenteil ist der Fall: Nun verklagt die Verwertungsgesellschaft den im Umfeld der Piratenpartei entstandenen gemeinnützigen Verein Musikpiraten vor dem Amtsgericht Frankfurt. Anlass dafür ist, dass der jedes Jahr einem Free! Music! Contest veranstaltet, dessen Siegerstücke auf einer CD unter Creative-Commons-Lizenz veröffentlicht werden. Zu den Gewinnern zählte im letzten Jahr auch das Projekt Texas Radio, das sich aus den Musikern Electronico und ElRon XChile zusammensetzt. Beide wollen ihre Musik unter Pseudonym und nicht unter ihren bürgerlichen Namen veröffentlichen.
Deshalb will die GEMA Geld für die Produktion der CD. Dabei bestreitet die Verwertungsgesellschaft gar nicht, dass weder das Stück noch die Pseudonyme bei ihr gemeldet sind. Ihren Anspruch begründet sie alleine damit, dass es ja sein könnte, dass einer der beiden Musiker, die anonym bleiben wollen, mit bürgerlichen Namen bei ihr Mitglied ist. Dann spielt es ihren Reglen nach nämlich gar keine Rolle, ob er das Stück bei der Verwertungsgesellschaft gemeldet hat. Denn hat er einmal den Vertrag unterzeichnet, dann will die GEMA alle Rechte an seinen Stücken wahrnehmen – egal, ober ein Musiker das will oder nicht. Aus diesen Gründen droht das Verfahren für die Verwertungsgesellschaft gerade dann zu einer Niederlage zu werden, wenn sie es gewinnt. Denn je mehr Menschen von einer Beweislastumkehr wie der "GEMA-Vermutung" Kenntnis erlangen, desto lauter dürfte der Ruf nach einer Änderung dieser Rechtslage werden. | {
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Because of its extreme isolation from any other major landmass, New Zealand's unique native ecosystem is literally for the birds. And these rather elegant-looking penguins briefly dominated this bird paradise, back when New Zealand was mostly underwater.
This artist's conception depicts the Kairuku penguin, a Maori term that loosely means "diver who returns with food." The bones of this particular penguin species were first discovered way back in 1977, but it's only now that North Carolina State researcher Dr. Dan Ksepka and his colleague Dr. Paul Brinkman from the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences have been able to reconstruct what the penguin would have looked like.
Before the Maori arrived on New Zealand about 800 years ago, there were only three mammal species on all of New Zealand, all bats. In the absence of the dominant class of animal life, birds evolved to fill all the available ecological niches, creating gigantic, ostrich-like grazing birds like the moa and enormous birds of prey like Haast's eagle. And while these species dominated New Zealand at the time of the arrival of the Maori, the country wasn't always so favorable to terrestrial birds. As Dr. Ksepka explains, the New Zealand of 25 million years ago was perfect for oceangoing birds like Kairuku:
"The location was great for penguins in terms of both food and safety. Most of New Zealand was underwater at that time, leaving isolated, rocky land masses that kept the penguins safe from potential predators and provided them with a plentiful food supply."
This species was the largest of the five penguin species that lived on New Zealand at the time. At about four feet two inches tall, it would have been a couple inches taller than the Emperor Penguin, the biggest living penguin. We're not yet completely sure what was the largest penguin ever, although the current estimate seems to be at about six feet tall. In fact, if Kaikuru was built somewhat differently, it might actually have tied that record, as Dr. Ksepka observes:
"Kairuku was an elegant bird by penguin standards, with a slender body and long flippers, but short, thick legs and feet. If we had done a reconstruction by extrapolating from the length of its flippers, it would have stood over 6 feet tall. In reality, Kairuku was around 4-feet-2 inches tall or so."
The paleontologists say that they reconstructed Kaikuru from two different fossil specimens, using the living King Penguins species as a guide. For more, including the abstract of the original paper, check out the North Carolina State website.
Artwork by Chris Gaskin, owner and copyright owner: Geology Museum, University of Otago. Used with permission. | {
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Welcome the Presentation Pigs!
These vibrant and fresh pigs are wholly illustrated in Adobe Illustrator, using vectors with CMYK colors.
Print Items
Unique Backgrounds
Awesome Illustrations
Use these pigs in your designs for restaurants, farms, organics and other food-related things. They are sure to spice things up! | {
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THAILAND seized four tons of ivory hidden in bean sacks tracked from Congo in what authorities said was the biggest bust in the country’s history, customs officials said on Monday.
The 739 elephant tusks, bound for Laos, were seized upon arrival at a port in Bangkok on Saturday after the authorities received a tip-off and had tracked the containers from Congo, the Customs Department’s director-general Somchai Sujjapongse told reporters.
He said that the shipment, labelled as beans, was shipped out of Congo in February and went through Malaysia before reaching the Bangkok port.
“We have been following the (shipment) for two months.
Intelligence reports said ivory from Africa might be smuggled with other products to go through the Laotian border,” Somchai said.
Thailand is one of the top destinations for African ivory smuggling in Asia and could face international sanctions soon if it doesn’t show progress in combating the problem.
Somchai said authorities believe that had the ivory worth $US6 million ($7.8 million) had reached Laos, it would then have been distributed to buyers in China, Vietnam and Thailand.
Poachers have killed tens of thousands of African elephants for their tusks in recent years to meet demand for ivory in Asia. China has imposed a one-year ban on ivory imports amid criticism that its citizens’ huge appetite for ivory threatens the existence of Africa’s elephants. | {
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Today is Sunday September 15 2019 – four days into the 2019 federal election and Justin Trudeau’s trained, clapping seals have all been trotted out, dutifully performing for their master, going after Andrew Scheer and the Conservatives with some of the most embarrassingly desperate attempts at smears, using the same old tired Liberal tactics in order to bob, weave, dodge and deflect from their abysmal time in office.
Factor in the bought and paid for Liberal media’s breathless reporting of these stories and the airwaves are flush with, well, what they are flushed with should be flushed, period.
Let’s turn the tables on the Liberals and see some of the skeletons in their closets.
Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan
Here we have Minister of Defence, Harjit Sajjan, who lied to Canadians when he bragged about being the “Architect of Operation Medusa”, in the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, which earned him the disgust of veterans and active service members across our country. To this day, he still wears the #StolenValour.
Twenty four hours ago, Sajan posted this tweet, which implies that Andrew Scheer is ‘friends’ with Faith Goldy. He and other Liberals came up with this line of attack, because years ago, before he was named leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, Faith Goldy interviewed Andrew Scheer.
Here is our not so ‘honourable’ Minister of Defence, posing with a convicted murderer and suspected terrorist, Jaspal Atwal.
Minister of International Development and Gender Equality Maryam Monsef
Not to miss out on the fun, former Minister of Democratic Reforms – Liberal MP Maryam Monsef, – who was roundly dispatched from that portfolio when she couldn’t deliver the goods on electoral reform – had to get in her two cents worth in with the Conservative bashing.
Don’t forget that Monsef lied on her Canadian immigration documents, by claiming she was born in Afghanistan when she was actually born in Iran. She has also claimed to be ‘fascinated with Sharia Law.
Instead of back benching Monsef, or kicking her out of caucus, Justin Trudeau made sure that Immigration Canada re-issued her a new passport and Canadian Citizenship documents with the correct place of her birth. In Canada, we have laws that state: anyone caught lying on official Canadian documents for citizenship, are grounds for deportation.
Yet here she is, spreading false information. Faith Goldy and Andrew Scheer attended the same rally earlier this year. They were not there together, nor is it known that they ever crossed paths.
Heritage Minister Melanie Joly
Not to be outdone, Liberal MP Melanie Joly goes after a Conservative candidate, Justina McCaffrey, for comments she made years ago about Justin Trudeau’s preoccupation with Quebec. It’s a question Canadians from coast to coast ask themselves, especially when it comes to Quebec receiving 11 billion dollars out of the 19 billion in equalization payments. A new question has recently popped up in regards to Trudeau’s silence on Quebec’s religious symbols ban, and how it is discriminatory to people of faith.
Since the Liberals are so preoccupied with dredging up history and judging Conservatives on the ‘company they keep’, here’s a few pictures of Justin Trudeau and the ‘company he keeps.’
Benjamin Levin: Architect of the Kathleen Wynne sex ed curriculum, convicted of child pornography and recently paroled.
Jian Ghomeshi: Former CBC radio host who was charged with multiple accounts of sexual assault and misconduct.
Peter Daglish: Canadian humanitarian worker who was recently convicted of child molestation.
Jaspal Atwal: Convicted murderer and suspected terrorist who made an appearance at a state dinner in India during Trudeau’s infamous and disastrous trip to India in 2018.
Joshua Boyle: Charged with child and spousal abuse and rape and currently on trial for these charges. Boyle was photographed With Justin Trudeau in December 2018 after he and his family were released from captivity.
Omar Khadr: Convicted Al Qaeda terrorist and recipient of 10 million dollars from Canadian taxpayers.
Justin Trudeau pledged to run a ‘clean campaign’. Either his minions didn’t get that memo, or they’ve been ordered by his office to dig up ancient history on Conservative candidates to deflect from their own dismal, past four years of government.
A message to the 2015 Liberals; People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
(credit to S Gwynne for this post)
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The monsters in Soul Sacrifice were once humans, but desire corrupted their souls and turned them into horrendous creatures. Soul Sacrifice Delta incorporates characters from Grimm’s fairy tales and Snow White is in the game.
Avalon, Sanctuary, and Grimm have new sorcerers that give players quests. Galahad has the nickname the sorcerer closest to a monster. Said to have sacrificed over a thousand beings, Galahad has a grotesque appearance.
Lyonesse is Bohman’s younger sister. Despite her gentle voice, Lyonesse lips purposely deceive. She is consumed by greed like her older brother and completely loyal to him. Modred is a sorcerer from Avalon who had to hunt down other wizards that broke the law. Those that see Modred’s face prepare to die and he was a legend. What happened to Modred and why does he look like he is a member of Sanctuary, a group that forbids sacrifices?
Players can make their own character in Soul Sacrifice Delta and outfit their wizard with over 100 different accessories.
On top of adding new spells, Soul Sacrifice Delta tweaked the combo system and now allows players to pull off counter attacks during boss battles.
Soul Sacrifice Delta is slated for release in March 2014 for PlayStation Vita. | {
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When the New York Giants agreed to trade wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. on Tuesday night, many wondered what it meant for the future of quarterback Eli Manning.
Related 5 wide receivers Giants could target to replace Odell Beckham
By trading Beckham away, it appears the Giants are committing to a full rebuild. And if that is the case, it makes little sense to cling to an aging Manning, who is entering the final year of his contract and will account for $23.2 million against the cap in 2019.
But very little about the Giants’ and general manager Dave Gettleman’s approach has made sense in recent weeks, so it should come as little surprise that the team remains fully committed to Manning despite trading away his No. 1 target and one of the team’s premiere play-makers, reports Ralph Vacchiano of SNY.
The stunning trade of Odell Beckham Jr. to the Browns on Tuesday did not alter any of those plans, multiple sources have told SNY. Manning is still expected to be the Giants’ starting quarterback at the start of training camp, at the very least. And there is no indication at all that they’ll attempt to cut his pay.
As Vacchiano alludes, this stance is subject to change, but by all accounts, it’s not going to.
Whether or not Manning returns in 2020 is the real question, but at least for now — for reasons that are not abundantly clear — he’ll remain under center in 2019 and try to push the organization forward in what is otherwise a very dark time. | {
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Ответы на ваши вопросы о расширении.
C какими браузерами работает это расширение?
Вообще это расширение должно работать на любом браузере, который работает на движке Chrome и поддерживает установку расширений. На данный момент расширение протестировано в браузере Chrome, начиная с версии 50, в браузере Opera, начиная с версии 36, Яндекс.Браузере, начиная с версии 15, мобильной версии Яндекс.браузера (его альфа версия позволяет устанавливать расширения, PhotoTracker Lite с ней тоже работает) и в браузере Vivaldi, начиная с версии 1.2. Наличествует полная поддержка режима инкогнито, счётчик не ведётся в этом режиме. Также в планах портировать расширение под Firefox.
Ну и зачем оно мне?
Я нашёл интересующий товар, но его нет в магазине или он кажется мне дорогим. Открываю поиск по картинке и возможно, нахожу другие магазины с этим же товаром.
Я выкладываю много фотографий в интернет на страницы моего блога и хочу знать вдруг где-то ещё используются мои фотографии. Открываю блог и ищу в пакетном режиме - при помощи быстрого поиска достаточно одного клика на иконке и результаты откроются в фоновых вкладках.
Так получилось что я - личность известная в интернете и не только, и мне хотелось бы знать — вдруг кто-то использует мои фотографии из социальных сетей в качестве своих. Я захожу на страницу своего профиля и быстро проверяю фотографии в Google.Image, Yandex.Картинках, Bing и TinEye. Удобно.
Я — контент-менеджер и мне надо проверять насколько широко используется в интернетах картинка, которую мне прислал копирайтер. Ищу, нахожу, возможно прошу прислать другую. Или нет. Так бывает что поисковики и не в курсе этой картинки.
Я — копирайтер и мне надо знать насколько заюзаную картинку я нашел. Или найти похожие если вдруг надо. Открываю поиск по картинке, смотрю сколько в выдаче резальтатов и блок похожие, если вдруг надо.
Я нарисовал красивые картинки. В смысле я иллюстратор и обычно их рисую и выкладываю в стоки. C PhotoTracker Lite удобно проверять - захожу в свою коллекцию на стоке и вперёд, кликать и смотреть, кликать и смотреть. Обычно раз в месяц проверять достаточно...
Я тут по блогам лазил и увидел кадр из фильма. Хочу узнать его название. Нажимаю, ищу и с достаточно большой долей вероятности нахожу. Потом смотрю - смотреть или не смотреть кино.
Я увидел фото картины и хочу узнать автора, а возможно и где и в живую посмотреть можно. Ну вы поняли, один клик, результаты, поход в музей.
Я тут вдруг очень популярен стал в Инстаграме и мне кажется что мои фотографии не только у меня лайкают. Открываем Instagram.com и дальше по проверенной схеме, клик, найти, клик, найти.
Мне очень понравился памятник на фотографии, но я не знаю кому он и где. Ну или храм. Или церковь. Или здание. Или водопад. Или остров. Или придумайте сами какой-нить большой объект который часто попадает в объективы камер, так как достопримечательность. Тоже можно узнать быстро и удобно что это и где при помощи PhotoTracker Lite.
Я увидел фото актрисы, но что-то забыл как её зовут. А на странице нигде не написано. PhotoTracker Lite помог быстро вспомнить открыв быстро Google.
Мы в отпуск собираемся, выбираем сейчас экскурсии. На одном сайте такие красивые фотографии! Но почему-то гугл показывает что они сделаны совсем в другом месте. Даже не знаем кому и верить. И это лишь часть вариантов использования которая пришла мне в голову пока я писал этот раздел. Знаете ещё варианты использвания? Пришлите сообщение, вот форма слева! Это расширение нужно чтобы вам пришлось делать меньше действий когда надо найти в интернете картинку по картинке. Ну, например, давайте представим:И это лишь часть вариантов использования которая пришла мне в голову пока я писал этот раздел.
И как им пользоваться?
Посмотрите скринкаст на главной странице, там всё понятно. Ну или вот текстом - выберите поисковые системы в меню расширения, в которых будет производиться поиск. Нажмите правой кнопкой на изображении и выберите пункт меню 'Искать это изображение'. Или нажмите на иконке 'быстрого поиска', которая должна появляться над каждым изображением в итнернете, если соответствующая настройка включена, но пока что делает это только над теми, которые вставлены на страницу при помощи тэга <img> и не имеет активных элементов поверх изображения. Нюансы однако. Или же вы можете нажать правой кнопкой на ссылке, которая ведёт на изображение (на данный момент только ссылки на файлы *.jpg, *.jpeg, *.png, *.gif по протоколам http:// и https://) и выбрать пункт 'Искать изображение по ссылке' что также откроет результаты поиска по картинке.
А если мне надо несколько картинок проверить?
Загляните в настройки расширения. Там есть возможность выбрать как открывать вкладки с результатами - активными, чтобы сразу перейти к результатам или фоновыми, чтобы иметь возможность открыть результаты поиска сразу для нескольких изображений с одной страницы, а потом уже их проверить.
Так что это самый быстрый способ искать по изображению?
Ну, в общем-то да. 4 самых популярных поисковика картинок, открываются по нажатию одной кнопки мыши (ну или двух, ладно). Даже не знаю как ещё быстрее можно. Есть предложения? Готов выслушать, вот форма слева есть для этого. )
А зачем расширению такие разрешения?
В манифесте запрашиваются только эти разрешения — ['contextMenus', 'storage', 'notifications']
contextMenu - как очевидно из названия, нужно чтобы добавить пункт меню в контекстное меню
storage - для хранения ваших настроек и количества поисков. Очищается при удалении расширения.
notifications - требуется чтобы оповестить вас, если вы вдруг отключили все поисковики и что-то поискали. Окна не откроются и вы останетесь в недоумении почему. Теперь такого не произойдёт.
Никаких хитрых игр, я обещаю. Но про один нюанс упомянуть стоит. Расширение отправляет некоторую информацию об использовании чтобы мне было понятнее как используется расширение и чем его надо дополнить чтобы оно было ещё лучше. Никакой личной информации, позволяющей однозначно идентифицировать пользователя, не ведётся, хранится или используется ни в коем виде. Я не гугл, яндекс, бинг или тинай. ;)))
Воу воу воу, а что насчёт разрешения 'Просмотр и изменение всех ваших данных на посещаемых сайтах'?
Оно нужно для того чтобы вставлять небольшой java-script код, который выводит иконку быстрого поиска. Если вас это волнует, я могу выпустить версию без этого маленького помощничка и необходимости в этом разрешении. Напишите мне об этом через форму слева и если будет достаточно запросов - я выпущу версию без этого скрипта.
Могу ли я чем нибудь помочь?
Да, если владеете языками. Я был бы очень признателен если бы вы уделили немного времени и перевели дополнение на один из тех языков, которые ещё нуждаются в переводе. На данный момент расширение переведено на английский, польский, чешский и португальский бразильский. Я специальную страничку сделал, переводчик, грубо говоря. Если есть чем помочь - попробуйте, это просто. | {
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Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU), Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) and Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) were among the four recent picks of the Fast Money traders on CNBC.
According to Tim Seymour, Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU) is a company that’s trading at about 28 or 29 times earnings and to him, it’s going to 35 times. The company is making a lot of investments which make the company unattractive to some people, he said. However, what’s happening in the U.S. is also happening in China, the trader said, and the company is right to invest in areas it needs to invest in.
Seymour added that Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU)’s push in mobile and monetization of mobile is “very, very impressive”. Furthermore, the company is trading on liquidity, he said, and not on valuation.
Guy Adami, on the other hand, likes Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL). The company hit a “funk” in January, he said, but it appears that now they have their act together.
Furthermore, Adami said that the moves in Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) makes the stock interesting for investors looking for stocks to invest in.
Pete Najarian picks Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) as he says the stock has traded in a much higher area in the past. Now, the stock is trading on the low end of its volatility scale, he added.
Nonetheless, Najarian advises people who want to invest using Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) to use options because although the stock may have great moves to the upside, the stock can also have horrendous moves to the downside. Options protect investors in these cases, he said.
Stephen Mandel’s Lone Pine Capital owned about 7.03 million Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU) shares by the end of the December quarter. The stake in Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU) which made up 6.71% of Lone Pine’s whole portfolio decreased 15% quarter over quarter.
Donald Yacktman’s Yacktman Asset Management owned about 38.06 million Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) shares by the end of 2014. The Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) which was 7.09% of the fund’s whole portfolio at the end of the year decreased a substantial 39% quarter over quarter.
John Thaler’s JAT Capital Management LP owned 684,456 Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) shares by the end of the last quarter of 2014. The stake in Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) which made up 5.83% of JAT Capital’s whole portfolio decreased 28% quarter over quarter.
I Just Made 84% in 4 Days By Blindly Following This Hedge Fund
I just made 84% in 4 days by blindly imitating a hedge fund’s stock pick. I will tell you how I pulled such a huge return in such a short time but let me first explain in this FREE REPORT why following hedge funds’ stock picks is one of the smartest things you can do as an investor. We launched our quarterly newsletter 2.5 years ago and not one subscriber has, since, said ‘I lost money by EXACTLY following your stock picks’. The reason is simple. You can beat index funds by creating a DREAM TEAM of hedge fund managers and investing in only their best ideas. I just made 84% in 4 days by blindly imitating one of these best ideas. CLICK HERE NOW for all the details. | {
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Video
‘I was an idiot’ - road rage driver with children in back seat banned after ‘racing’ Audi
Mark Nally and Neil Kirk have been banned from driving for a year after an incident on the A10 last September. Picture: Norfolk Police Archant
Two men convicted of dangerous driving in a road rage incident - one who had four children in his car - have been banned from the roads for a year.
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Mark Nally and Neil Kirk have been banned from driving for a year after an incident on the A10 last September. Picture: Norfolk Police Mark Nally and Neil Kirk have been banned from driving for a year after an incident on the A10 last September. Picture: Norfolk Police
Norwich Crown Court heard how the drivers of an Audi and Dodge were engaged in a "urination contest" near the Hardwick Roundabout at King's Lynn on September 7 last year.
Mark Nally and Neil Kirk began "brake checking" and overtaking each other on the A10 after Nally, driving the Audi, cut Kirk off on the roundabout.
Kirk, 48, was convicted of dangerous driving on Thursday after a trial, while Nally, 28, pleaded guilty at magistrates court on May 13.
Kirk, a professional driver with more than 1.5m miles under his belt, had four of his six children in the car at the time.
The incident was captured on the dashcam of a driver following the pair, and passed to police.
Nally is seen "deliberately" cutting Kirk off as the lanes merge coming off the roundabout, before Kirk "slams on the brakes".
The pair then attempt to outmanoeuvre each other along the A10, driving into oncoming traffic.
Danielle O'Donovan, prosecuting Kirk at Norwich Crown Court, said the incident was "machismo".
"It is two men muscling each other out," she said. "The sad thing is these are middle-aged men, not 18-year-old boys, behaving like this on the roads."
She said Kirk admitted he had a moment of road rage.
"He does say I was an idiot, I was silly, I had road rage," she said. "He also says he was trying to protect his children. If that was really the driving factor he could have just pulled over.
"It is not driving to a safe standard or defensively. It is a urination contest."
Philip Farr, for Kirk, said he had been driving perfectly normally before the Audi "quite deliberately and aggressively cut him up".
"It is permissible in those circumstances to be angry," he said."The Audi drives right up his rear end. His kids are in the back and they think he has been clipped.
"Next the Audi decides to simply speed off around him into the oncoming traffic, then brake-checking him five times.
"What do you do in those circumstances? Probably the most sensible option is to drop back altogether. The other option is to overtake that car.
"That is what the defendant chose to do. He was not to know that the Audi was going to drive, frankly, like a lunatic.
"This wasn't perhaps his best bit of driving. He has his children in the back of the car and he is plainly guilty of a moment of hot-headedness."
Mr Farr added Kirk had been "living in the car which was the subject of these proceedings for the last eight months".
Judge Andrew Shaw told Kirk: "There is no doubt in my mind you momentarily reacted badly to the provocation of Mr Nally's aggressive driving."
He said he believed this was a "momentary lapse".
"You had your children in your car. They must have been frightened and intimidated."
Kirk, of Southend Road, Hunstanton, was given a conditional discharge and banned from driving for a year.
Nally, of Sluice Road, Wiggenhall St Mary, was given a 12 month community order, banned for a year and ordered to carry out 150 hours of unpaid work.
After sentencing, PC Ben Hawkins, based at Swaffham, thanked the member of the public who sent in the dashcam footage.
"We will use it and take action if deemed necessary," he said.
"This shows the importance of merge in turn lanes. All of this has happened, and people's lives put at risk, because of people not respecting the rules of the road and not allowing a merge in turn." | {
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U.S. employers hired more people in November than last year, but fewer than in October of this year, according to the LinkedIn Workforce Report.
Hiring across the U.S. was 26 percent higher last month than a year earlier, the data showed. The seasonally adjusted hiring figure was 2.2 percent lower than in October. Still, hiring has stayed consistently strong this year, LinkedIn says. Year to date, U.S. hiring has been 10.4 percent higher in 2017 than in 2016.
The sectors with the biggest year-over-year increases were oil and energy, up 30 percent, manufacturing and industrial, 15.7 percent higher, and aerospace, automotive and transportation, which is up 13.7 percent. The industries with the least growth in 2017 were media and communications, health care and pharmaceuticals and telecommunications.
LinkedIn's report is compiled from its 143 million user profiles in the U.S and 20,000 company profiles. LinkedIn has more than 11 million active job listings globally, and has more than 3 million new job listings added in the U.S. every month.
The Labor Department will release its closely watched monthly employment data on Friday. On Wednesday, ADP and Moody's Analytics said private payrolls increased by 190,000 in November, ahead of analyst expectations but less than the 235,000 in October. | {
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Article content continued
Jerrica Goodwin, press secretary to Finance Minister Travis Toews, said in an email that approximately $390,000 would be saved in 2020-21, compared to 2019-20, by finding redundancies in IT and administrative costs in the office of the election commissioner.
But those reductions had already been accounted for by Gibson when he proposed his budget for 2020-21, the documents indicate.
Opposition ethics critic Heather Sweet said the budget request is evidence that Bill 22 was never about cost savings.
“The UCP fired the election commissioner, purely on the basis of trying to cover up the corruption that they have in this government,” said Sweet. “This is a purely partisan attack on an individual that was investigating the leadership race, and it’s shameful and Albertans have a right to be extremely concerned.”
“There is no cost savings for Albertans.”
Resler, who has served as chief electoral officer since 2013, said investigations have not been disrupted and it is “business as usual” now that the two offices were combined on paper.
All of Gibson’s staff remain employed under Elections Alberta and no documents have been moved.
“Nothing has ceased and we’re ensuring that everything is progressing,” said Resler, noting he doesn’t expect the physical consolidation of the offices to begin for another few months.
Committee heard from a member of Resler’s team there are currently 76 complaints to the election commissioner awaiting assignment, some dating back to before the election. | {
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Elsa glowered at her phone. She didn't want to have to do this. It was stupid. She hadn't done anything wrong, so why the hell should she be the one apologizing? Because you need her help with something, not the other way around. She glared all the harder at the phone, but the task continued to not do itself.
She groaned and took a sip of her coffee. "Fine." As she pressed the call button, she leaned back in her chair, pushing off of her desk until she was at the window. Cars drove by thirty-some stories below her as the phone rang. She could afford throwing the phone out the window to avoid this conversation, and it was very tempting.
On the fifth ring, Anya finally answered. "Elsa?" she asked, her voice already showing irritation. I have the best friends.
"Hi." Just say 'I'm sorry.' You don't have to mean it.
"Was there something you wanted or are we just exchanging pleasantries?" The terse tone made the window option all the more tempting.
"I'm sorry," she grumbled.
A bemused chuckle sounded from the other end of the phone. "Well that is a surprise. Elsa Agnarrsen actually admitting her mistakes for once?"
She always was a sore winner. I still think it's a terrible idea for Belle to be working for her and I am genuinely terrified that it's going to hurt both of them, but fine, maybe I hadn't earned the right to criticize after how I'd been treating her. "I shouldn't have said anything. It was between the two of you, and I was wrong." Elsa was impressed with herself for how sincere she was managing to sound. She hadn't even written cue cards.
"All right. You're forgiven. I was probably overreacting a little too. Wanna grab lunch?"
Elsa glanced at the time. It was almost 10:30. "Yeah, I could eat."
"Oaken's?"
I'm trying to show that I've changed. I might as well add to it. "No, let's go someplace different. Want to get some bagels? Maybe a slice of pizza?" I can't even recall the last time I had a bagel. I am the worst New Yorker.
Anastasia took a moment to reply. "I'm sorry, did Elsa 'I eat Oaken's ever single day for brunch' Agnarrsen just say we should go someplace else?"
"I just call it lunch. The six am coffee is breakfast." And the eight o'clock one. Sometimes the 10 o'clock one if it isn't at Oaken's.
"Sure. There's a good bagel place by my office. I'll text you the address. Meet me there?"
Is it too late to change my answer? I'm not sure if I can go through my day without a chocolate croissant. She mused on that for a moment. That may be why Tiana thinks I need to watch my diet. "Yeah, sure, I'll see you there."
Fifteen minutes later, she arrived at Gothel's and miraculously found parking. Ignoring the construction crew outside, she made her way inside and found Anya waiting for her. "Morning, Elsa."
All right. I admit it. I have missed her. "Morning, Anya." They gave each other a quick hug before Elsa ordered a sesame bagel with some schmear and joined her friend at her table. "So, how is everything?"
"Oh, so Belle didn't tell you?" The corner of her mouth curled up in a slight smirk, emphasizing the dollop of cream cheese stuck there.
Elsa giggled and offered her a napkin. She may have felt a bit more called out if she could take Anastasia a tad more seriously with food on her face. "She did. I'd still like to hear it from you."
The smirk became a genuine smile. Anya loved talking about her work. It was a great way to get her defenses down, so that Elsa could extract the information she needed. Now I just need to figure out how to bring it up without her realizing that it's the only reason I apologized. Great. I'm gonna have to be vulnerable again, aren't I? "Business is really picking up. I won a few cases that earned me a bit of a reputation, and Dimitri had a pretty impressive case of his own." Anya's grin was infectious. It was hard not to be happy for her, she really was managing to make it work. "Did you hear about my recent suit where we actually managed to get the city of New York to pay for a wrongful death? Half a million. The other case was a good three hundred grand, and Dimitri's malpractice suit was a little higher. Before too long we might just join you in the big leagues."
Elsa managed to avoid laughing. "I thought you didn't want that. You wanted a nice peaceful private practice." Not that the two of you could compete with us.
She shrugged. "I suppose you're right. It would still be nice to see Gaston have to actually treat me as an equal for once."
He's not that bad. Oh God, what am I thinking? "Still, I'm happy for you. Hell, you're having better luck than I am. I actually lost a case recently. It," she paused, she really didn't want to talk about it again. "It was an old client of mine and things went really badly. I had no case, and yet I still managed to get an amazing plea deal, but he refused. Now that stupid fucking son of a bitch is gonna be in prison for the next twenty-five years. I didn't take it well." There, I'm vulnerable. Now tell me stuff.
"Oh." She swallowed, her eyes softening as she studied Elsa. "The case Belle mentioned?" Aww, was she checking up on me? "I'm sorry, Elsa. You never did handle losing all that well, and it sounded like this client actually meant a lot to you."
Elsa took a bite of her bagel. It was actually pretty good. Really good, even by New York standards. "You come here a lot? This bagel is fantastic."
"I do. I bring in buckets for the office. Now talk to me about the case."
Elsa shrugged and bit a large chunk out of her bagel. It practically melted in her mouth. "There's not much to say. I cared about the kid. He was an idiot, and I shouldn't have, I knew this was exactly what was going to happen to him, but he'd been my client since his first DUI back when he was sixteen. I'd gotten used to him, and now he's not around anymore." Elsa blinked away a stubborn tear. She didn't shed any more, but she hated how emotional she got about this fucker. "Forget about it, okay? It's over, I'm fine. I have a new case now. With Gaston." She added as much ire to her voice as she could manage, channeling her hate for actually being friends with him now that her hate for him as a person has largely vanished. I care about the worst people.
Anastasia laughed but it turned into a wolfish grin. She was enjoying Elsa's pain a little too much. "Wow. You have to try a case with that asshole?" Hey, that's my nickname for him, get your own. "I feel bad for you. He putting the training wheels back on, or just bored of being stuck up in his ivory tower?"
I can't believe I want to come to his defense. Oh well, let him rot. He's the one that told me to do this. "I think he's trying to make himself look good. A New York law firm can hardly have one of their name partners known as a bigoted asshole. He second chairs a case with an out lesbian, then he doesn't look so bad. It just means there's gonna be attention on us, and I need to make sure we look good. God knows he's not going to do anything himself."
"Of course not. Why do anything when he can have an associate – or a less senior partner do it for him. Christ, he really hasn't changed a bit, has he? We have to work ten times as hard for half the respect, and he barely even wants to give us that."
Elsa sighed. "Yeah. It's a damn boy's club, and they like to make sure we remember it. Unfortunately, it means with all the name partner's watching, I better kick some serious ass. Otherwise my name is never going to be up there."
"You sure you really want it next to his?"
"Of course." Elsa bared her teeth, matching her friend's fiendish expression. "Just think about how much it would piss him off."
Anya clapped her hands together and covered her mouth as she laughed, barely able to contain herself. "Okay, yeah, I'm in. You need to be name partner. What's the case? Anything fun?"
"Murder case. I can't say a lot right now, it's in the news and we just got the case." She paused as she studied Anya, appearing as if an idea was coming to her. "You know, you might actually be able to help. If you're willing."
She leaned in conspiratorially, tilting her head so her ear was closer to Elsa. "What do you need me to do?"
"You know the judge. Vlad?"
Her eyes widened as she leaned back in her seat. "You're trying a case with Vlad? Why? He doesn't even work in this district."
"Oh." She creased her brow, staring at Anya. Would this info even still be good? "He didn't tell you? This is the first case in his bracket since he's moved to Manhattan. Sorry."
She shrugged, trying not to sound hurt. "I hadn't talked to him in a couple weeks. He did say he'd put in again, I guess he got approved. I can't believe he didn't call me." She glanced at her phone.
"I'm sure he will. Anyway, Gaston wanted the case, since it had all that media attention, and who's going to turn down two of the best lawyers in New York? Well, one of the best and a big named showboat."
Anastasia managed to collect herself in time to retort "That's not fair to you, Elsa, you're hardly a showboat." She giggled playfully as Elsa rolled her eyes. "Oh, you meant Gaston. Yeah, he deserves that. So, Vlad, huh? He had seemed to actually be pretty glad that he wasn't in town anymore. He always wanted to want to move here, but it just meant he doesn't have to recuse himself anytime Dimitri or I'd have a case with him. No wonder he didn't tell me. He's probably worried I'm going to chew him out for it." Can't imagine what that'd be like. "Yeah, I think I can help you win."
Elsa placed her hands together and looked as desperate as she could. "Please. Anything you can think of that'll help. I'm not losing another case right now."
She nodded. "Of course, Elsa. Well for starters, don't be rude. Don't play your games, trying to irritate the opposing counsel, he doesn't tolerate any of that stuff. Who's the prosecution?"
"Facilier."
She took a sip of her coffee, but not before Elsa had seen the frightened look she'd given. "I've gone up against him before. The guy has a way with juries. With any luck, Vlad will reign him in some. Shit, Elsa, he is not someone I'd want to go up against if I'm less than 100%. Hell, even then I'd rather not. You're still pretty beat up about that case, are you sure you're ready for this?"
Elsa gave a derisive laugh. "It probably won't be for another month. I'll be more than ready. I'm gonna kick his ass."
Anya gave her a half-smile in encouragement. "Of course you will." The smile faltered and she bit her lip. "Just be careful. I'm amazed he hasn't been disbarred with some of the shit he pulls, let alone that he actually made DA. The only reason he quit his old firm is because they were about ready to fire him." She shook her head. "I don't know how to beat him. He won the only case I've ever had against him, and I'm better than you, so clearly you don't stand a chance."
"I beat you last time, remember?"
Rolling her eyes, Anya spat back "It was a fluke. Give me an actually even case against you, and I'll wipe the floor with you."
"The case was even, you're just not good enough. It's why I'm gonna be the one to beat Facilier."
"Care to put some money on that?"
I piss off Anya way too often to give her something she could disbar me over. "I'm good. So, what can I exploit with Vlad that'll help me here? I know you know more than you've said."
Taking her time, she finished off her bagel and took another sip of her coffee. "He tries to seem unbiased, even more than most judges, but he's a sentimental sap. When I was clerking for him, I saw him completely ignore a bunch of valid objections from a prosecutor just because he had been vilifying the defendant. It's literally his job, but Vlad didn't like the way he did it. If anyone can get someone to make an ass of themselves it's you, and if anyone can piss him off, it's Facilier, you may have lucked out. He's also generally pretty willing to overturn limits, and other rules that would restrain his authority as a judge. If it messes with his ability to run a trial, he'll ignore it, and that includes you. And Gaston. So don't talk over him, don't try to do anything without his say-so, treat him with absolute respect."
"I know how to handle a judge."
"Well he's the judgiest judge. He's got the ego, the pompous sense of nobility, and the desire to actually be a fair and impartial juror, giving every underdog their fair trial. He's gonna love the three of you."
"At least it's two big names against another one? I mean if I was crushing Pan in front of him that'd be a bit of an issue." Or him crushing me again.
"I suppose. Just be careful, Elsa. You're awfully good at pissing people off, and there's two people in there that you don't want to make an enemy of."
"I'll be fine. I just wanted to know what to expect." My last judge seemed to actively be favoring me and I still lost. How am I going to fair with one that won't let me run the courtroom? "I've got nothing to worry about."
With Gaston now up to date on their judge, the two of them walked into the Multnomah County Jail, ready to meet their client and begin preparing his defense. "You're gonna love him," Gaston explained. "He'll testify great. Real likable kid."
After an extensive check in, passing through security, a quick search, and Elsa being glad that she wore her hair down, the two of them were seated in plastic chairs at a scratched and mottled metal table across from their client. "Hi, Eric," Elsa began, her voice high and welcoming, trying to lull their client into a trusting passivity so he'd do whatever they said. She'd honed the tone over a lifetime in law, and it made people trust her as surely as if she was drugging them. Granted, they didn't have much choice by that point, they'd hired her. "My name's Ms. Agnarrsen, you've already met Mr. Gaston. I'd like you to tell me your story.
Eric Clements nervously ran a hand through his short black hair. He looked uncomfortable in the prison uniform he'd been given, more like it was too itchy for him than that he didn't belong. They'd taken his old clothes, the bloody Armani suit he'd been seen in on Television the previous Wednesday, to the lab for testing. Perhaps he just needed a higher quality uniform, maybe federal prison would suit him better. "Ms. Agnarrsen," he repeated, sounding distant. "I already told Mr. Gaston everything." He looked vague, confused, it added to his general out of place appearance. He shouldn't be here. Well, after today he won't be.
"I know, but I need to hear it in your own words. There can't be any surprises."
He nodded, clearing his throat. His eyes finally focused on her and he seemed slightly more there. He looked her up and down as if he was finally seeing her for the first time. "Well I lucked out for my lawyer." The one good thing I can say about Kuzco as a client is he never tried to make a move on me. "Well, I'm sure you already heard everything on the news. I went over to my ex-girlfriend's place, I was just checking up on her, she'd been messaging me some really scary things and I thought she was going to hurt herself. When I got there, I thought I was right. She was lying on the ground in a pool of her own blood. I tried to resuscitate her, they taught the swim team CPR back when I was in high school, I was really rusty at it, but I thought I could save her." A bitter laugh echoed from his throat, sounding entirely foreign in the claustrophobic chamber. "Of course if I'd actually remembered my training, I'd know that CPR is the last thing you should do for someone who's been stabbed, it just sends the blood out of them."
Gaston turned to her and withdrew a piece of paper from his manila folder. "The autopsy showed evidence of chest compressions that would support his story, even broke one of her ribs." Facilier would likely try to spin that to make him sound violent, she'd have to remember to tell the jury that that's how CPR is supposed to work, maybe even bring in an expert on it. Of course, it still wouldn't change that he did the wrong thing, but being in shock would certainly explain that, and it wouldn't make sense for the killer to have done it.
"And that's how you got so much blood on you?" The footage of him, covered in her blood, being paraded into the police car had been running on the news every hour for the last five days. I knew we should've requested a change of venue. Not that anyone anywhere in New York didn't see it. Spoiled rich boy murders pretty white girlfriend, it's the stuff reporters have wet dreams about. Anya actually said those exact words when she got a similar case when we were associates. Great, now I'm quoting her. Elsa was feeling more cynical than usual, which was saying something. Whether that was part of her general depression over her last case, or if it was from somewhere else wasn't clear to her.
He nodded. "It kind of sprayed on me when I did it. I hadn't even noticed the wound. I knew the blood had to have come from somewhere. I don't know how I didn't see it."
She looked back to Gaston. "Have they found the murder weapon?"
He shook his head. "Nope, nada. It's been almost a week, I'm really doubting it'll surface."
She wanted to ask if he'd disposed of it, but she was pretty sure he knew better. "Is there anything else we should know, Mr. Clements? Anything you don't tell us now will just mean that we won't be prepared for it in trial, and it could sink your case. We're your lawyers, it doesn't matter how bad it makes you sound, you need to tell us." I don't know why they always think it's a good idea to lie to their lawyer. Another thing Kuzco was weirdly good about, he was too dumb to lie. She stared into his eyes, the warmth that she had originally greeted him with vanished and her cold gaze bored into him. This case is too big for me to leave anything to chance.
Squinting at her, he tilted his head slightly. "What do you think I haven't said? We broke up, and it was a pretty bad break, I assume that's why the police immediately suspected me, but we'd been starting to be friends again. I was worried about her, so I checked up on her. Apparently I was right to worry. I don't know who would do that to Ariel, she wouldn't hurt a soul." He choked back a sob, tears beading in the corner of his eyes. "Who would do that to her? There was so much blood! It was horrible."
I wish he'd cried like that on the news. "All right, thank you."
"Are you gonna be able to get me out?" He sniffed, wiping at his eyes. "I can't stay in here. It's awful." He tugged at his uniform. It did look really itchy.
She felt a little guilty about her aquamarine silk dress. "I think so. You have strong roots in the community, no criminal record, you should be able to make bail."
He clasped her hand in his own. She recoiled slightly, you never want inmates touching you, for so very many reasons, not the least of which being how hard it is to fight back when they're already grabbing you. Dozens of horror stories she'd heard from other lawyers filled her mind. "Thank you, Elsa, thank you so much. I know you two will do right by me."
With a quick nod, she pulled her hand free and rung it gingerly with her other, making sure it was still whole. "Of course."
Gaston grinned. "See, what did I tell you, Elsie? This guy is a sure thing. We couldn't have found a better client if we set the case up ourselves."
She hoped Gaston would never stoop to that, even to cheer her up. "Well, as we didn't, we should probably still subpoena the DA's office for all of their files."
He shrugged. "I keep telling you, the jury doesn't care about facts." He pointed towards their client, who was still wiping a few stray tears from his face. "Just put this man up on the stand, and we'll be golden. Who'd convict this face?" He was very pretty, for a boy. Attractive rich straight white guys were by far the easiest clients, it's why they mostly represented them – and that they were the only people who could afford the services of Gaston, Philip, & de Ville.
"Did anything happen after you performed CPR? I'd certainly assume she didn't wake up and you then murdered her, but did you see anyone else? Any cars? Any masked figure running into the shadows?" Just need a complete picture, and anything I can nail the cops on for not pursuing.
Shaking his head, he replied "No. I just called the police and waited for them. I know you're not supposed to stop CPR until you're relieved, but she was kind of dead."
Elsa gave a polite chuckle. "Just don't phrase it like that in the courtroom. That's good though, the news neglected to mention that you were the one who called the police. Between the CPR and that, they'll have a tough time making it look like you're guilty."
He answered with a small smile.
"All right, Albert, let's get going. We should get back to the office and go over strategy before the arraignment."
"What strategy? It's an arraignment."
She rolled her eyes at him. "We'll see you in a couple hours, Eric." With that, she knocked on the door, and they were escorted out of the jail.
Back in her office, Elsa reclined in her over-sized leather office chair. You never notice how nice your office smells until you have to go to jail. That stench is overwhelming – metal, sweat, bodily fluids, and awful BO. It is, without a doubt, the worst part of this job.
Gaston threw open the door and plopped down into the less luxurious but still absurdly expensive chair across from her. "How'd you get here so quick? Traffic was a nightmare."
"That's why I always take the long way to the jail. It's quicker," she explained. We should've just carpooled. "You really trust this guy?" She didn't think he was a killer, but there was just something slimy about him that made her immediately dislike him and she worried the jury would do the same.
"Of course, what's not to trust?" Right. He's like Asshole.
Elsa sucked on her teeth. They should really have this conversation, she just really didn't want to. Fuck it. It was gonna happen sometime. "You know, there's a good reason I call you Asshole."
He blinked, blindsided by what to him seemed like a sudden change in topic. "Because I'm a dick and my name starts with 'A'?"
She actually hadn't thought about the fact that they'd both started with the same letter, Asshole just suited him. "Right, let's focus on the dick part." Wow, am I really the one lecturing someone on being a better person? Elsa Agnarrsen, what's happened to you?
"Please, you've never focused on a dick in your life."
"That. That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. The way I got Anya to forgive me and give me the info on Vlad earlier was by bonding with her over how awful you are. You alienate everyone, especially women, and gay people, and black people, and just people in general."
"Both everyone and people in general?" Doubt was clear on his face. He thinks I overstated, but no, it's completely true.
"Albert, I'm serious. I know that you're a decent guy under it all, but you can't keep making people feel this way. I get that it's a defense mechanism, that you don't want to give anyone the chance to reject you, so you push them away before they have the chance to get to know you, that you hate yourself at least as much as you love yourself, and that being nice is just too much fucking effort. Of course I get it, I am you.If you ever tell anyone that I said that, I will strangle you with your flamboyant satin tie."
"You think my tie is flamboyant?"
That was so very not the point. "It's a skinny tie and it's bright orange, yeah, it's a little flamboyant."
"Oh. I thought it was cute."
She shrugged. "I guess it's kinda cute."
He considered this for a moment, resting his chin in his hand. "Loud colors just suit me."
That earned him a chuckle. "You are very loud."
He met her eyes. "I guess that's why I always felt like we could be friends, not the loud thing, you're rather quiet and you keep to yourself to a point that I was a little worried you were in witness protection, but I always saw myself in you. You didn't deserve what I put you through. I'm sorry."
Here I was thinking that I couldn't manage to get through that thick skull of his. "I've already forgiven you, I'm not the one you should be apologizing to. As loathe as I am to admit it, you're my friend. You are, however, also a name partner in this law firm, and you have to stop treating your employees like this."
"I guess the sensitivity training never really clicked."
"Clearly."
With a heavy sigh sighed, he leaned back in the chair, resting his ankle on his knee. "How would I do it?"
She had not thought that far ahead. Him listening to her in the first place had seemed an already impossible feat. "Throw a pizza party and tell everyone that you're a massive asshole but that you'll try to be better?"
He waved his hand. "Pizza's too overdone. Think Tiana would cater it?"
"Probably. If I ask her to."
He nodded and turned his gaze to the window behind her, looking out on the mid-afternoon city. "I'll do it."
That was easy. "All right. Do I have to come?" I'm not big on parties on the best days, an 'I'm sorry I'm a bigoted asshole' party seems especially unpleasant.
Gaston blew out a slow breath. It was clearly not what he wanted to hear. "That's what they'll all say too, isn't it?"
She had to concede that. "They might."
"Then how can I make it up to them?" His blue eyes lock on hers. In all the time she'd known him, all his years making her life hell, she'd never seen him look like that – defenseless, scared, pitiful. The small part of her that still resented him relished in it, but the better part of her ached at his pain.
"Just stop treating them like that. Anyone you really pissed off, people like Anya or me, you can apologize to, but just stop being so bad. If you start behaving like a human being, then they'll see. They might not forgive you, and they don't have to, but they might at least work a bit harder. I mean, no one really puts much effort into the assignments you give, 'cause you're a dick."
"Wow." He sat up, his eyes still focused on her. "We hire really good lawyers if that's them barely trying."
She tried to resist. This was serious. It started with the corners of her mouth turning up, barely even enough to notice, but it kept coming, until finally she laughed so hard tears came out of her eyes. Trying to hold it back only made the laughter come out that much harder. She was doubled over, clutching her stomach when he finally joined in. They both had to wipe a tear away, though she suspected his wasn't from his joke. "Just start encouraging people instead of," she paused, where to even start? "Everything you do."
"Thanks, Elsa."
She nodded.
"I think I was hoping a little that you'd have this talk with me eventually. I needed that kick. I know how much I've hurt people."
Elsa shrugged. "Hurting people is what we do. Hell, it's why I had to go apologize to Anastasia."
"I thought you said you didn't do anything wrong."
"I didn't. Unfortunately, I haven't earned the benefit of the doubt. I've been a shit friend to her for so long, I'm surprised she put up with it for as long as she did. She doesn't just assume that I'm looking out for her and Belle when I'm worried about them working together, she assumes that I'm disrespecting her. Because I'm an asshole." Shit, I'm becoming self-aware. Go back. I liked it better when I was just a heartless bitch with no friends.
She wasn't sure when Gaston had stood up, but he rested his hand on her shoulder. "Well you've been a pretty great friend to me, when I sure as hell didn't deserve it."
She sneered. Being nice hurts. "I can say the same for you."
"Hug?"
"Don't push your luck."
He checked his Rolex. "Arraignment is in half an hour. We should get going."
"Carpool?"
"Sure, I can show you my new Mustang."
"I just need to get you a chauffeur's hat and it'll be perfect." She followed him out and they made good time on their way to the Manhattan County Courthouse.
"Okay, you're right, this way is quicker," he admitted, as they drove by a spot where they could see the throng of car stuck in traffic.
"Other than having to see a few drug deals on the way, it's by far the best route. Plus, you can give them your card, they're potential clients."
He chuckled and slammed on the brakes. That was the other downside of taking back roads. A truck was setting up for a delivery and they had to weave around it through the narrow passage. Fortunately Gaston managed without so much as a ding on the pristine vehicle.
They arrived with time to spare and soon found themselves in Courtroom 3A with Eric escorted out to them in a grey Brooks Brothers suit. He looked far more presentable than he had in the cell, and far less nervous now that he wasn't picking at his uniform. She wasn't sure that looking comfortable in the defendant's seat would help their case, but it would likely help his testimony.
Elsa rose before the judge had a chance to start. "Elsa Agnarrsen for the defense, your honor. We'll waive reading."
A skeletally thin man stood up at the prosecution's table. "Ardoin Facilier, for the city of New York. Now come on, Ms. Agnarrsen, you're taking all the fun out of this. I've never gotten to hear them read what I'm charging someone with before."
Is every other lawyer in this town French? "You'll just have to wait until your next case then, Mr. Facilier. I have no intention of making this fun for you."
His teeth showed in what must have been a smile. "Well I intend to make this as fun as possible. I mean all these cameras," he gestured toward the news crews in the audience, "I intend to provide them with all the drama they so seek. Hi, Mom." He waved, his grin growing even toothier as he stared right into the camera. "Let's make a show of this, Ms. Agnarrsen. Can you do that for me?"
The gavel banged. Everyone turned to Judge Vasilovich. "I will not have you make a mockery of my courtroom." The words were slow, deliberate, and commanding. "Mr. Facilier, your reputation proceeds you, and you exceed it. If you keep up the showboating, I will hold you in contempt."
"Your handcuffs or mine?" His lips curled, his eyes narrowing as he stared up at Vlad's imposing figure.
"One more word from you without my asking you first and you'll spend the night in a jail cell. Ms. Agnarrsen, I assume you wanted to ask for bail?"
Control was hers again. Facilier was going to be an interesting opponent, but he certainly didn't seem as imposing as both Anya and Albert had made him sound. This only made her more worried. "Yes, your honor. My client has strong ties to the community, he's in college in town, he has classes to go to, and he has no criminal record."
He turned to Facilier. "You can speak."
"I have no objections. You can even release him on his own recognizance if you'd like. See, Elsa? I can play nice."
"You will address me and you will keep your answers relevant, Mr. Facilier," the judge bellowed.
Facilier smiled and inclined his head.
"Bail is set for one hundred thousand. Trial is set for February twenty-fifth."
That's Olaf's birthday. Well, at least I'll remember the date. Eric's father would have no issue making bail, and they were all free to go. She had a month to find out exactly what made Facilier so formidable and figure out how to crush him. She wasn't going to lose again. | {
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Aristocat
wadsworth, i wish to go outside
and then back inside, and then out again | {
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Regular expressions you can read:
A new visual syntax (and UI)
Part 1
Lots has been written about the problems with regular expressions: learning them, debugging them, etc.
I propose a more visual syntax and a keyboard-usable UI for generating regular expressions.
The UI/syntax proposed here helps address issues related to readability, learnability, and memorability. Those who readily understand regex will find that this visual syntax does not slow them down. It makes existing regexes easier to read for both novices and true regex superheroes.
(If you just want to use it already, go here to enter your email and we’ll let you know.)
You write regexes just like you always have — with optional ctrl+space popup menu command completion or insertion. Also, part of the UI concept is to be able to import existing regex expressions for editing, then export them in your chosen dialect.
This dialect-agnostic visual syntax seeks a balance between two ends of a continuum:
Traditional regexes are so terse that it is hard to tell apart elements and their meanings. Literals, syntax, wildcards, variable placeholders, etc. are all mashed up together:
\b[A-Z0–9._%+-]+@[A-Z0–9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}\b
Literals, syntax, wildcards, variable placeholders, etc. are all mashed up together: \b[A-Z0–9._%+-]+@[A-Z0–9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}\b Some editors do already visualize regexes with charts. They are not directly editable, particularly not with a keyboard. These representations are typically very verbose and as such, are not particularly quick to scan through.
An example from regexper.com:
A regexper.com sample output for the above email example.
The real power of the visual syntax comes to life with the suggested UI. The UI will particularly help those who find the traditional syntax hard to remember.
You write a regex as you normally would. The UI will visualize the structure on the fly. When you find that you can’t remember a command, you can press ctrl+space to summon a search menu.
This menu contains all regex commands and descriptions: You can either search by command (to confirm if you remember the command’s meaning right) or by description (to recall what is the command for given task).
Supporting user memory
Regular expressions have a hard-to-memorize syntax. This is a particularly serious an issue considering that most of us do not write regexes for a living.
For many users, regex is a tool that gets summoned say, a couple of times a year. When we come back to them, previous learning has faded, and we might need hours just to get up to speed with the syntax.
To solve this, we will augment the above visual syntax with an UI that enables learning. This means three things:
As mentioned above, the new visual language is dialect-agnostic. Generate any dialect from your expression , the engine behind the syntax takes care of the actual generating.
, the engine behind the syntax takes care of the actual generating. Progressive disclosure for learning special element meanings. The general aim is to make elements self explanatory. To remain terse though, not all meanings are readily visible. If you forget the meaning of a symbol, you can just hover or click on elements to get explainers on what each element does.
The general aim is to make elements self explanatory. To remain terse though, not all meanings are readily visible. If you forget the meaning of a symbol, you can just hover or click on elements to get explainers on what each element does. In the visual syntax, a symbol means the same no matter where in the expression it is shown. The traditional regex language is context modal: Different characters mean different things in different situations, and have different escaping rules. This is particularly true inside and outside character classes [ ]. These inconsistencies are particularly difficult to remember between usages.
Implementation
This is a concept design. The idea is that the visual syntax will generate traditional regexes. You could see it as a visual DSL that generates (only barely human readable) traditional regular expressions. Ideally, IDEs would have support for this visual syntax such that you could switch between traditional syntax and this visual one.
See also Part 2: Regex You Can Read: How It Works for further details.
@TODO
Even this syntax can get unwieldy if the expression is complex enough.
Also, this does not solve all issues with regular expressions. Namely, it does not solve the core issue more intrinsically built into regexes: How do I make sure that my regex matches exactly those strings I want it to and none of the ones I don’t? There are debugging tools for regexes that allow you to find what you want by means of trial and error, but that’s a topic for another post.
To get early access to our crowdfunding campaign, and to know when you can try this in action, go here to enter your email.
Although Regex UCR will likely be open source, we will need your financial support to pay for coders doing the work. Hear things before others as they happen, and receive exclusive perks when our crowdfunding thing happens. (Added August 3, 2016)
Contact me to join our Slack channel if you want to work together on this and get write access to our github repository as well. We warmly welcome any help bridging the gap from design to code.
We’re still on the lookout for more people to join us. We would especially like more folks who
understand parsing regexes , or
, or have ideas on the implementation of the data structures needed or
on generating regexes from the syntax or
from the syntax or have any experience doing usability tests
are all around regex gurus and can help us gather data about different dialects and how different elements correspond
We already have a bunch of folks who have shown interest and plans are underway, but discussion is still just getting started. Open source and GPL. Now’s the time to step up!
BTW, thanks to Bret Viktor. His work has provided inspiration for much of this.
Go here to enter your email and we’ll let you know when we have something you can try.
See also Part 2: Regex You Can Read: How It Works with more samples of syntax.
(Image from part 2 featuring search menu added 2018–11–03) | {
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People inspect the damage after a car bomb exploded and targeted a religious center in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Numan town in Idlib province, Syria April 5, 2016. REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
ANKARA (Reuters) - U.S. officials are discussing with the Turkish military and government how the moderate Syrian opposition can push Islamic State farther east in Syria, Washington’s ambassador to Ankara said on Thursday.
“We have had some progress in recent weeks as these groups pushed further east along the border,” Ambassador John Bass told a group of diplomacy correspondents. “We will continue to focus on that area,” he said.
Syrian rebel forces seized numerous villages from Islamic State near the Turkish border earlier this week. The offensive includes factions fighting under the banner of the Free Syrian Army that have been supplied with weapons via Turkey.
A sustained rebel advance near the Turkish border would erode Islamic State’s last foothold in an area identified by the United States as a priority in the fight against Islamic State.
“There is conversation with the Turkish military and government to talk about opportunities to intensify support to those groups and to push Daesh east from the current line,” Bass said, using an acronym for Islamic State.
The United States is not providing the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, its close ally in the fight against Islamic State, with weapons or ammunition, Bass said. He said Washington is opposed to efforts by any Syrian group to change the demography of a region “under the guise” of fighting Islamic State.
Turkey has accused the YPG of “cleansing” towns of ethnic Arabs and Turkmen.
Bass repeated a call to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to lay down its weapons and cease attacks on Turkey. The PKK has waged a three-decade insurgency in Turkey and violence flared anew in July.
Ankara says the PKK, designated a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, is closely linked with the YPG. | {
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‘Several drunk troops behind bloodbath, laughed on shooting-spree, burned corpses’
Follow RT on
Gruesome new details are surfacing after 16 Afghan villagers including nine children were shot in their houses by at least one US serviceman. Witnesses to the atrocity now say that several drunken American soldiers were involved.
Neighbors at the village where the killings took place said they were awoken past midnight by crackling gunfire:"They were all drunk and shooting all over the place," Reuters cites Agha Lala, a villager in Kandahar's Panjwayi district.Lala's neighbor Haji Samad lost all of his 11 relatives in the rampage, including children and grandchildren. He claims Marines “poured chemicals over their dead bodies and burned them.”Twenty-year-old Jan Agha says the gunfire “shook him out of bed.” He was in the epicenter of the horrible shooting, witnessing his father shot as the latter peered out of a window to see what was going on. "The Americans stayed in our house for a while. I was very scared," the young man told reporters. Lying on a floor, Agha says, he pretended to be dead. He added that his brother was shot in his head and chest. His sister was killed as well. “My mother was shot in her eye and her face. She was unrecognizable,” he said.The Afghan parliament said the incident was barbaric and demanded justice. Both NATO and US officials condemned the violence, promising a swift investigation. US ‘fundamental strategy’ in Afghanistan won’t change – Pentagon The Pentagon’s chief spokesman, George Little, said on Monday that there was "every indication" that the perpetrator, whose name he refused to disclose, had not been accompanied by any other soldiers. He also said that the mass killing would not change the “basic war strategy” in Afghanistan. "Despite what some are saying, we’re not changing our fundamental strategy," Little said. Also on Monday NATO reacted to the massacre of Afghan villagers, with spokeswoman Oana Lungescu saying the shooting was an "isolated incident." She emphasized it would not affect the timeline of the previously discussed withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. Earlier a preliminary official report said the unnamed culprit, identified as a member of the US army staff, had acted alone and is now in custody after turning himself in at an American base.US troops in Afghanistan have been put on high alert as the Taliban has issued a threat vowing “to take revenge from the invaders and the savage murderers for every single martyr.”The statement published on the group’s website said that the US is “arming lunatics in Afghanistan who turn their weapons against the defenseless Afghans.”Afghan officials, fearing possible violent demonstrations, have deployed extra police and troops in and around Kandahar.The incident was one of the worst of its kind since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. It comes just weeks after copies of the Koran were burned at a US military base, provoking mass riots in Afghanistan. Slaying of 16 Afghan civilians 'absolutely tragic and heartbreaking' – Barack Obama US President Barack Obama has said during an interview with Denver TV Station KCNC that the killing of 16 Afghan civilians by a US soldier was “absolutely tragic and heartbreaking” but also noted that he was “proud generally” of what US troops had accomplished in Afghanistan while working under strenuous conditions. In another interview, this time with Orlando-based WFTV, the president reiterated his stance in favor of a pullout from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. He said the incident “does signal the importance of us transitioning in accordance with my plans that Afghans are taking more of the initiative in security.” Asked whether the incident could be compared to the infamous 1968 My Lai Massacre, in which US troops murdered up to 500 civilians in South Vietnam, Obama responded by saying it was not comparable. “It appeared you had a lone gunman who acted on his own,” he noted.US defense secretary Leon Panetta said that the death penalty was a possible punishment against the soldier who perpetrated the massacre. He noted that officials will use the military justice system to try the soldier and that the shootings must not derail the military mission in Afghanistan. In the meantime, Reuters quoted an anonymous US official who said that the accused soldier had been treated for traumatic brain injury after being in a vehicle that rolled over in Iraq in 2010. | {
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WINNING the world’s biggest sporting event should be a moment for unrestrained joy. And of course Germans danced in the streets last night, waving flags, honking horns, shooting off fireworks in the middle of busy intersections. To chants of “Super Mario! Super Deutschland”, Germany celebrated their 1-0 World Cup victory over Argentina courtesy of a late goal by Mario Götze. But Germans can’t be seen to do anything unrestrained, and so Germany’s remarkable championship run has been marked by team spirit and humility. More revealing than the night of the championship win was the aftermath of Germany’s shocking 7-1 dismantling of Brazil in the semifinal. That night Germans danced in the street too, but neither the fans nor the players could bear to dwell on the humiliation of the host country. Many Germans cheered Brazil’s meaningless 90th-minute goal.
Most Brazil fans went on to cheer for Germany in the final—and not only because Germany would face the hated Argentine rival. Football commentators and ordinary fans praised Germany’s skill on the pitch and their decency off of it, with German arms around slumped Brazilian shoulders in the moments after the semifinal, a touching thanks to the host on the team's official Facebook page, and tributes from Lukas Podolski, a German player, on Twitter, praising Brazil, "the country of football".
Germany has triumphed in sport just at a moment when it has been triumphing in other things. Its economy is creating jobs and wealth, its politics are stable to the point of dullness, and its position as Europe’s leader is unassailable. All of this has created resentment among those countries forced into austerity by the economic crisis, with pictures of Angela Merkel in a Nazi uniform shaming many a Greek street-protest. As in politics, so in sport: the word “Nazi” tended to spike on Twitter when Germany scored goals, and many a bad joke about “blitzkrieg” made the rounds during the trouncing of Brazil. But the team itself did nothing to earn that, playing with grace and harmony, giving itself so many chances to score that the result seemed inevitable.
Germany’s four World Cup wins have come at inflection points in the country’s history. In 1954, West Germany was just re-entering polite society. In 1974, Willy Brandt, the beloved chancellor who was opening his country up to the East, had just been forced from office by a spy scandal. In 1990, the two halves of divided Germany were in the midst of ticklish international negotiations about reunification. It was looking inevitable by then—the first all-German elections were being planned. But those players who had suited up for the East German squad were ineligible to play again for West Germany.
So this is the first-ever win for united Germany. It was a country united in more than one way: the last victorious team featured Jürgen Klinsmann, Lothar Matthäus and many similarly named. This year’s squad, alongside names like Müller and Schweinsteiger, featured others like Khedira, Özil, Boateng and Podolski. The German Football Association has dedicated itself to finding and developing all the country’s footballing talent. This inevitably meant that a multicoloured Germany featured a rainbow team including many from what Germans delicately call a “migration background”.
Der Spiegel, the country’s leading magazine, could not simply enjoy Germany’s historic run. Its Monday cover (which went to press before the final was played) featured various people (a footballer, the chancellor, a parent toting a baby, a burqa-clad woman) wrapped in the German flag, asking “Wir sind wieder…wer?”: “Who are we, again?” It was a play on “Wir sind wieder wer!” a slogan associated with the 1954 victory: “We are someone again!” That, in turn, was first said by Ludwig Erhard, the economy minister associated with Germany’s postwar economic revival, on Germany’s return to the family of nations.
Sixty years later, Germany is certainly someone: a world-beating economy again, and now world champion in football. In Brazil on Tuesday, protestors set fire to buses. Last night in Buenos Aires, riot police clashed with fans. In Berlin, nothing bigger than a beer bottle was broken. Let the restrained celebration begin. | {
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Post
Report Anonymous ID:B49XAdPz Thu 13 Jul 2017 15:17:50 No.133495663 Report
You just got knocked the fuck out
The punishment fits the crime
So keep your hand held high and you’ll find out why
That this raised fist ain’t afraid to fly
[Verse 1]
77 since the 88
Had to look at my phone 'cause I couldn’t believe the date
It's 2017 but in a 40’s trend
With a racist president that's “making everything great again”
But tell me when that this was fucking okay
All the streets and the screens popping triple K’s
You want the peace? uh-uh, nah that won’t fly here
'Cause if you blink they're pushing you back 300 years
Call it what you want but it's an eye for an eye
I’ll mark you with a down right down - right up right
They’re trying to censor that they’re the fucking oppressor
And all you say is that it's wrong when they’re swinging at Spencer?
Brand yourself like a bull when it sees red
“Make the lie big” that's what he said
Fuck him and fuck you too, and appreciate
That if you preach hate, then expect hate
[Chorus] x2
You just got knocked the fuck out
The punishment fits the crime
So keep your hand held high and you’ll find out why
That this raised fist ain’t afraid to fly
[Verse 2]
Lowest of the low, rats out of their holes
We never used to let these dickheads have any control
Speech is “free” but it comes with a price
And if you’re speaking out some bullshit I'll give you advice
Hit 'em with a left a left and a right
Got 'em dropping like flies with the stars in their eyes
So fuck them and fuck you too and appreciate that
If you preach hate, then expect hate
[Chorus] x2
You just got knocked the fuck out
The punishment fits the crime
So keep your hand held high and you’ll find out why
That this raised fist ain’t afraid to fly
[Verse 3]
What makes you think that this is okay?
What makes you think you’re the superior race?
What makes you think that this is alright?
Goodnight alt-right
If you preach hate, then expect hate
Nazi punks fuck off | {
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São Paulo
Os advogados do ex-ministro Antonio Palocci, preso em Curitiba por ordem do juiz Sergio Moro, estão tentando fechar um segundo acordo de delação premiada, dessa vez com a força-tarefa da Operação Lava Jato no Ministério Público Federal de São Paulo.
Os advogados Adriano Bretas e Tracy Reinaldet, do Paraná, viajaram para São Paulo em fevereiro e disseram aos investigadores que podem apresentar casos inéditos de corrupção vinculados à consultoria Projeto, empresa do ex-ministro da Fazenda.
Em 2011, a Folha revelou que Palocci havia montado a empresa de consultoria e ficado milionário ao mesmo tempo em que exercia o mandato de deputado federal e coordenava a campanha presidencial de Dilma Rousseff.
O ex-ministro Antonio Palocci ao ser preso na Operação Lava Jato - Rodolfo Buhrer/Reuters
Numa segunda visita à capital paulista, os advogados de Palocci mencionaram um cardápio de episódios envolvendo os clientes da consultoria e casos que implicam outras empresas e operadores do mercado financeiro.
A conversa com o Ministério Público Federal de São Paulo justifica-se porque os supostos crimes teriam acontecido no estado.
Bretas e Reinaldet se comprometeram a, em breve, retornar e entregar aos procuradores um documento formalizando uma proposta de delação. A Folha apurou que a peça será composta de cerca de dez anexos contendo denúncias de condutas criminosas.
Palocci já tem um acordo de colaboração premiada assinado com a Polícia Federal paranaense.
Antes de fechar acordo com os delegados, os advogados do ex-ministro haviam negociado com a força tarefa do Ministério Público Federal do Paraná, mas os procuradores não consideraram consistentes os casos levados pelo petista.
O trato feito com a PF aguarda a homologação pelo juiz João Pedro Gebran Neto, do Tribunal Regional Federal da 4ª Região (TRF4).
A Folha apurou que a tendência é de que a Procuradoria Regional da República do Paraná seja contrária ao fechamento do acordo de Palocci com a Polícia Federal, porém, os envolvidos no caso têm confiança de que mesmo assim Gebran vai homologar o acordo.
A descoberta da existência da Projeto fez Palocci pedir demissão do cargo de ministro da Casa Civil de Dilma seis meses após assumir a pasta.
A reportagem mostrou que Palocci adquiriu patrimônio milionário graças ao negócio, que tocou paralelamente à sua atividade parlamentar e partidária.
Ele comprou dois imóveis no prazo de um ano: um apartamento de luxo por R$ 6,6 milhões, em 2010, e um escritório por R$ 882 mil, no ano anterior.
Os dois negócios faziam o patrimônio do ex-ministro ficar 20 vezes maior do que o declarado nos tempos de Câmara dos Deputados.
A compra dos imóveis foi feita por meio da Projeto, que havia nascido com a razão social de uma consultoria, mas depois se transformou formalmente em uma administradora de bens imóveis.
Entre os clientes de Palocci na consultoria Projeto estavam Multiplan (gestora de shoppings), WTorre, Amil, Grupo Pão de Açúicar, Grande Moinho Cearense, JBS e os bancos Safra, Santander e Bradesco, entre outros. Não há indício de que essas empresas tenham participado de irregularidades, no entanto.
A Receita Federal apontou que a Projeto recebeu R$ 81 milhões de 47 clientes entre 2007 e 2015.
A Folha procurou a força tarefa da Operação Lava Jato paulista e os advogados do ex-ministro Antonio Palocci, mas ninguém quis comentar o assunto. | {
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Three NATO Protesters Charged With Terrorism; Protesters Say They Were Only Brewing Beer (UPDATED)
By Chuck Sudo in News on May 19, 2012 2:30PM
Brent Betterly, Brian Church and Jared Chase have been charged in an alleged NATO summit terror plot. CPD photos.
Chicago Police have charged three men with conspiracy to commit terrorism, providing material support for terrorism and possession of an explosive or incendiary device.
The three men, Brian Church, 20, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, NH; and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla.; were among eight arrested Wednesday in a raid of a Bridgeport apartment by police attorneys for the men alleged was illegal.
Police Department sources told the Chicago Sun-Times and ABC7 they seized "several Molotov cocktails" in the raid. Sarah Gelsomino of the National Lawyers Guild, which is representing the three men, disputed that and said what police actually confiscated was homebrewing equipment.
“Although some accusations of Molotov cocktails have been made by police, they have provided no evidence of criminal intent or wrongdoing on the part of the activists,” she said in the statement. “On Thursday, when asked about the raid at a press conference, Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy knew so little about the alleged terrorism investigation that he said he would have to gather further information before commenting.”
Gelsomino also said the charges against Betterly, Chase and Church is part of an ongoing pattern of harassment by police directed at the three.
Betterly, Chase and Church were also in a car that was stopped by Chicago police last week. Video of that incident alleges police tried to intimidate and harass the men.
UPDATE 2:45 P.M. — Prosecutors say the three men had planned attacks on the Obama campaign headquarters, Rahm's Ravenswood home and a police station. The three have been charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism and possessing an explosive device. They are being held on $1.5 million bond.
"My friends Zoe and Bill live in the apartment. They're home-brewing enthusiasts. They brew their own beer. You have materials like that," Occupy Chicago's Rachael Perotta told ABC7. | {
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Dr. Mayer Hillman, the influential social scientist known for producing research that has successfully led to policy changes to improve road safety, has declared humanity "doomed" due to its reliance on the burning of fossil fuels and the capitalist economic system that ensures that dependence will continue.
"We're doomed," Hillman told the Guardian in a recent interview. "The outcome is death, and it's the end of most life on the planet because we're so dependent on the burning of fossil fuels. There are no means of reversing the process which is melting the polar ice caps. And very few appear to be prepared to say so."
While green campaigners and some politicians call for a reduced dependence on fossil fuels and a shift to sustainable energy, like wind or solar power, Hillman warned that such contributions by individual governments are essentially "minute."
"So many aspects of life depend on fossil fuels, except for music and love and education and happiness. These things, which hardly use fossil fuels, are what we must focus on." —Dr. Mayer Hillman"Even if the government were to go to zero carbon it would make almost no difference," Hillman said.
According to the Guardian, the only solution is moving "to zero emissions across agriculture, air travel, shipping, heating homes—every aspect of our economy—and [reducing] our human population too."
But Hillman expressed grave doubts that this hope would be realized, as global leaders are unable or unwilling to lead a movement away from fossil fuels.
"I don't think they can because society isn't organized to enable them to do so," Hillman said. "Political parties' focus is on jobs and GDP, depending on the burning of fossil fuels."
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The warning of the senior fellow emeritus of the Policy Studies Institute comes as scientists raise alarm over the accelerated melting of the ice in Antarctica, driven by a "feedback loop" of warmer water melting glaciers, and as experts estimate that global warming has pushed one-third of the world's bird species closer to extinction.
"We've got to stop burning fossil fuels," he said. "So many aspects of life depend on fossil fuels, except for music and love and education and happiness. These things, which hardly use fossil fuels, are what we must focus on."
In his interview with the Guardian, Hillman indicated that he was giving his final word of warning to the world population, calling his statement his "last will and testament."
"I'm not going to write anymore because there's nothing more that can be said," he said.
For decades, Hillman's warnings to policy-makers have resulted in changes that many now take for granted. He urged British politicians to stop the spread of sprawling shopping centers outside city limits due to their environmental impact—eight years before planning rules were changed. He also pushed for energy-efficient ratings for buildings and homes—adopted in the U.K. in 2007—starting in 1984, and for 20 mile per hour speed limits in urban areas.
Now, Hillman is recommending world citizens think past 2100—the year when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns the Earth's temperature could rise up to 10.44 degrees Fahrenheit—when they think of the effects of the man-made climate crisis.
"Scientists warn that the temperature could rise to five degrees Celsius or eight degrees Celsius [nine degrees or 14.4 degrees Fahrenheit]. What, and stop there? What legacies are we leaving for future generations? In the early 21st century, we did as good as nothing in response to climate change. Our children and grandchildren are going to be extraordinarily critical," said Hillman. | {
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At anround-table, Nationalist Congress Party chiefsays BJP encourages Subramanian Swamy to get up and say something to derail the House. Excerpts:BJP is not serious. Informally, even they (BJP leaders) are saying there is nothing in it. The simple thing is, there was noise. Immediately, Manmohan Singh took the decision to cancel it (the deal for choppers). Whatever advance was given, that was also withdrawn. CBI inquiry was instituted. Three-four helicopters had reached India and that were not taken. If some monetary interest had been involved, how would they take all these actions? Who will pay money if the contract is cancelled? Those who are raising it are also fully aware of it. For instance, today (Thursday) in Parliament, they have not raised any noise. Just 5-10 minutes, and then smooth functioning started.I don’t understand what exactly they are thinking. The gentleman who is supposed to take responsibility to make Parliament function properly is the parliamentary affairs minister. We don’t see that. During UPA days, practically day and night, the parliamentary affairs minister’s approach was to keep opposition in good humour. To resolve issues and see Parliament function. But here, there is no dialogue, no discussion. In Lok Sabha , the opposition’s strength is very limited. In upper house, they (government) are in minority. In such a situation they prefer to create some obstruction practically every day. Since yesterday and day before yesterday, when Subramanian Swamy got up, the House just collapsed. And they (BJP) deliberately encourage him to get up and say something.To attack somebody. (Laughs)When the allegations surfaced, it was immediately decided in the cabinet meeting practically in 15 minutes, to cancel it, instruct the CBI to go in depth and take action against some Tyagi or whoever. Quick decision was taken. The credit for that goes to Manmohan Singh.The present government wants to destabilise the Congress. What Mr Modi has said about Congress-mukt India…whether that happens or not is one thing, but they are going in that direction. And wherever there is possibility to get some support within the Congress, they are jumping in. This happened in Arunachal and the same thing happened in Uttarakhand.I don’t see the Congress reacting effectively. That is why the other side is getting dividends.The No. 2 ( Rahul Gandhi )…if he is going to control the decision-making process… if that is correct, and this is what we hear from different quarters, indicates this kind of delayed reaction.Those in the Congress would be able to reply to this. Generally, in Parliament it doesn’t matter which side you are on; we know each other very well. But we don’t know him well at all. I have only met him twice in the last many years.I think he is the only leader in India who, out of seven days, five days he is travelling. I don’t know yet what the outcome of that would be. But who is travelling like him today? Anyone in BJP or Congress? At least he is going everywhere.His approach seems to be to visit maximum places in India.As of today, Congress party’s position is not very good. Tomorrow, when BJP is losing and people are fed up of BJP, what is the alternative? Congress is the alternative. Secondly, what I have seen over the last many years is that practically in every village there are some Congress people. It might be old Congress families or freedom fighters’ families but some symptoms of the Congress are everywhere. That is not the case with other parties. Which is why with a discredited BJP, people would prefer Congress.He is CM and has successfully managed the state. That has sent a signal that those who are unhappy with Congress and BJP want some consolidation. The signal is he is the person. Second, the general perception about him is that he is sincere, hard-working, pro-poor. That perception is going elsewhere from Bihar. I know him well for the last many years. He wants to concentrate authority with himself. The same was the case with Modi. Do you think Nitish will be able to make that transition from CM to PM? As of today, if the opposition has to come together and provide an alternative, he is the number one name.Not the Congress.Generally, our approach will be to associate with a non-BJP set-up.Because he is CM. He has the authority.Sonia enjoys more acceptability, including with other opposition parties. Some of us fought with her and we have seen the change in her. She is very accommodative.Ultimately, public at large (will decide). Suppose, in 2019, the BJP is on one side…and we have seen their performance in the last two years…definitely the voter at large would prefer some alternative. What is the alternative? As of today, the Bihar CM is a sort of cementing force for non-BJP forces.Without Congress, it’s (defeating BJP) not possible. Even with Deve Gowda, Congress supported him to become PM.This will depend on how Rahul performs over the next three years.I don’t see any impact on the field. People laugh when you bring this issue up. When Kanhaiya Kumar visited Bombay and Pune, there was tremendous interest among the youth. The attendance and response to his programmes were good. That indicates unhappiness about the government.Definitely. Otherwise, what was he? I could not understand why the government of India should take such interest in one institution. Do you know the name of the student leader in Bombay University?Immaturity. (laughs)Well, suppose they go against him, what political impact will it have? (Laughs)The Mumbai corporation elections will be the breaking point. Shiv Sena and BJP will dissociate and there will be a bitter fight. BJP’s efforts will be to control Mumbai city. Shiv Sena will never divest the control of Mumbai Mahanagar Palika to anyone else. Mayawati will form the government in Uttar Pradesh.I only know Kejriwal because of Anna Hazare. He was created by you people.Nobody knows Kejriwal.Sun rahe hain (I have also heard so). (Laughs). I feel, if the Akali government is discredited then Amarinder Singh will form the government.They told us yesterday that you have to shift your games elsewhere. We will shift them. Reason? Drought. In Maharashtra, the government has declared drought in certain districts. It’s not there in Mumbai or Pune. We are using recycled, drainage water to maintain the fields. Matches may have shifted but we still have to maintain the grounds. (Smiles).His father, Vithal, was a friend of mine. One day Vithal introduced me to his son and said he (Vijay) is very dynamic. But there is one problem with him. Suppose he knows he is getting Rs 1,000 at 12 o’ clock, by 10.30 he would spend (Rs) 1,200. (laughs).If I meet him I would definitely tell him.They should have taken initiative in this, which they have not done. | {
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If you expect every character you like to survive You're gonna have a bad time
125 shares | {
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So far, Silver Seven Sens has graded all of the players on the team as part of our end of season grades, but now it’s time to look at the off-ice staff.
It’s not always as easy to evaluate the job done by the management and coaching staff, but here we did our best. There definitely are certain things that we can point to and evaluate positively or negatively, and unsurprisingly, there was a lot of blame to go around between the management and the coaches.
Here are the overall grades from the staff and readers:
Management: C- (Readers: C-)
Not every move Pierre Dorion made since the summer has been horrible, but he certainly did not do a good job of adding to a roster that was on the cusp of being a solid team. Instead of wanting to improve after being oh so close to the Stanley Cup Finals, Dorion & Co. were content with essentially the same roster sans Clarke MacArthur and Marc Methot, and that was an enormous mistake.
By having newly acquired players such as Alex Burrows, Nate Thompson, and Gabriel Dumont in the bottom-six, it is clear to me that Dorion does not have a good eye for evaluating good depth forwards. Yes, I’m sure some of those acquisitions were made partly to satisfy Guy Boucher, but at some point you have to tell your coach that he needs to worry about coaching the players that he’s given.
Let’s take a look at Dorion’s moves since last summer:
As you can see, it was a mixed bag, and Dorion at least had a decent trade deadline with a couple big trades, plus not moving Erik Karlsson yet is a win (so far). Losing Methot instead of an inferior Cody Ceci wasn’t great, Thompson was a bad signing the second it was made, Dumont added nothing to the team, and I liked Shore as a 4th line centre who was actually good defensively, so seeing him go was a bit disappointing.
The Duchene trade still has lots of moving parts, because that first round pick next year could easily be in the top-5, especially if Karlsson is traded. But if Ottawa makes the playoffs, then it’s not as big of a deal and it might be a win for the Senators.
I didn’t list the re-signings that Dorion made, and that would definitely make things look worse. Re-signing Craig Anderson before he played a single game was a bad move in hindsight, Mike Condon has been a bad and expensive backup, and Ben Harpur has a one-way contract next season for some reason.
Despite all of that, my biggest issue with Dorion is that he failed to recognize some of the team’s weaknesses in the off-season, as he had a chance to bolster the lineup and make sure that 2016-17 wasn’t a fluke. Instead, he banked on his own players too much, and now they’re in an incredibly difficult position. If anything, my low grade for him is mainly due to his lack of adding to the roster, rather than his actual trades and signings.
And since this category is “management” and not just “Dorion,” we have to include Assistant GM and GM of the Belleville Senators, Randy Lee. This grade might be a tad higher if we were just including Dorion, but Lee has been an abysmal GM for the Senators farm team for years now.
In his four full seasons as GM of the Binghamton/Belleville Senators, the team has yet to make the playoffs, and they’ve failed to produce much young talent at all. Furthermore, the veteran signings that Lee makes hardly improve the team at all, as Jim O’Brien’s 29 points in 60 games can be considered a “success” compared to other veterans. It’s a sad state of affairs when the leading point getter on the team (Filip Chlapik) ends the year with 32 points.
The most baffling thing about this Belleville team though was how much they jerked around Marcus Hogberg. He played 18 games in Belleville and 16 in Brampton in the ECHL, despite being their best goalie prospect before Gustavsson was acquired. Instead, Danny Taylor, he of a phenomenal .900 SV%, got 32 starts and Andrew Hammond continued to play as well despite being part of the Avalanche organization.
Yes, Hammond was taking games away from Hogberg even though the B-Sens had no obligation to do so. The entire farm team has been a mess for a few years now, and perhaps that might partially be because their GM is a former strength and conditioning coach.
Overall, the management has not inspired much confidence, although Dorion has shown that he’s capable of making at least a few sensible moves like the Phaneuf and Brassard deals. Now we’ll see if he’ll be remembered as the GM who traded a two-time Norris winner though.
Coaching: D- (Readers: D+)
I’m semi-surprised that Boucher is still with the Senators organization. That may change in the near future, or some assistants may get fired, but as of now, Boucher probably has a short leash heading into next season.
It is becoming extremely apparent that Boucher is essentially a one-hit wonder wherever he goes. He’s followed an eerily similar run in Tampa Bay, Bern, and now Ottawa. In the first full season on each of these teams, they all went far in the playoffs. The Lightning and the Senators both went to game 7 of the Conference Finals and lost, whereas Bern actually won the championship. In each instance, there was strong optimism that he was the right coach.
But in the second season in Tampa, they had just 84 points in 82 games, and 32 games into the third season he was fired. Bern fired him even quicker, as in November of his second full season they let him go. Now the Senators could very well end up in a situation where they fire Boucher part-way through his third season in Ottawa, which would probably kill his chances of coming back to the NHL as a head coach.
I simply do not have enough faith in him being the long-term solution, and it appears neither do the staff or the readers.
Of course, we’re grading the entire coaching staff here, and all of the coaches should take blame for the horrendous special teams the Senators have had over the past two years. 2017-18 was especially bad, as they finished 27th on the powerplay and 26th on the penalty kill. The player personnel is part of the problem, but a good coaching staff should still be able to make a group consisting of Karlsson, Stone, Duchene, Hoffman, and Dzingel into a respectable offensive unit.
There’s also the issue of player usage, which is typically every Senators coach’s downfall. Boucher’s reluctance to use younger players early in the season was maddening, especially when the alternatives were his “guys” like Johnny Oduya, Alex Burrows, and Gabriel Dumont. He learned to give a bit more ice time to Thomas Chabot and even Christian Wolanin, but he still heavily relies on Cody Ceci in a shutdown role, which might just be the most miscast role for any player in the entire league.
I’m not going to pretend like I have an eye for noticing certain coaches “systems,” so I won’t touch on that in regards to how Boucher deployed it this season. I will say though that it was nowhere close to effective, as the Senators finished 30th in goal differential, adjusted corsi and expected goals for. Once again, part of that is because of a sub-par roster, but Boucher failed to get the most out of what he was given.
At the end of the day, it seems like most people are more willing to give Dorion another chance rather than Boucher & Co., and I tend to agree with that sentiment. I haven’t been happy with either of their performances over the past year, although at least Dorion has a chance to make up for it.
When evaluating why the Senators season went down the tubes so quickly, management and coaching are certainly two of the biggest reasons. | {
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De onde vêm os leites achocolatados? Se você respondeu “de vacas marrons” - mas não achamos que seja o caso -, você pensa como 7% dos norte-americanos adultos e sua resposta está errada. Diante do número impressionante, é bom deixar claro: o leite achocolatado é feito da mistura de leite de vaca (muitas delas marrons, é verdade), chocolate e açucar.
A alta taxa de pessoas que acreditam que o achocolatado sai pronto de uma vaca marrom foi identificada por uma pesquisa feita online pelo Centro de Pesquisa de Laticínios dos Estados Unidos (Innovation Center of U.S. Dairy), que ouviu mais de mil norte-americanos adultos. Isso significa que, só nos EUA, mais de 16 milhões de pessoas pensam assim, de acordo com a pesquisa.
Mas esse não é o único número de que surpreendeu diversos veículos de imprensa norte-americanos. Quase metade das pessoas ouvidas (48%) disseram que não tem certeza sobre de onde vem o achocolatado. Isso mesmo o leite sendo uma das bases da alimentação dos norte-americanos: só 5% deles não tomam a bebida.
O respeitado jornal Washington Post aproveitou para lembrar que o desconhecimento da população sobre a origem dos alimentos é chocante. No começo dos anos 1990, um em cada cinco norte-americanos não sabia que hambúrguer é feito de carne. Ou outra pesquisa, essa mais recente, com alunos de 10 a 12 anos de uma escola da Flórida, mostrou que 30% deles não sabia que queijo era feito de leite. | {
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1. How to hunt a Fox: The latest wrinkle in the race to acquire 21st Century Fox's entertainment assets involves Disney boss Bob Iger.
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that Iger is likely to extend his tenure as CEO beyond his 2019 retirement date if Disney (DIS) lands the Fox (FOX) assets.
Comcast is also said to be exploring a bid for the assets, which likely include Fox's movie studio, FX, National Geographic and Indian business Star.
Why does this matter?
Iger has repeatedly extended his tenure in recent years amid a troubled search for a successor.
The Financial Times reported earlier this week that James Murdoch, the current chief executive of Fox, could join Disney as part of the deal. The newspaper suggested he could even succeed Iger.
2. Bitcoin hits $15,000: Another day, another bitcoin (XBT) record.
The digital currency has shot above the $15,000 mark for the first time -- the fourth big barrier it's broken in less than two days.
It had already zipped past $12,000, $13,000 and $14,000 within 24 hours before hitting $15,000 on Thursday morning in New York.
Despite a flurry of warnings from top economists and business leaders, its upward trajectory has continued -- albeit with a few sharp dips along the way.
After breaking above $11,000 last week, it abruptly plunged by more than $2,000 before resuming its climb. Buyer beware!
3. Brexit bites: British Prime Minister Theresa May is trying again to make progress on the Irish border, one of three key issues that must be addressed before negotiators can discuss trade terms with the EU.
May is racing to get a deal before a key EU summit next week.
But she is being hobbled by divisions within her own party, which remains at loggerheads over its plans for Brexit.
Opposition lawmakers aren't happy either: They've been angered by news that the government department charged with negotiating Brexit hasn't examined its potential economic impact.
The pound, which has been under pressure all week, dropped 0.1%.
4. Media deal in court: AT&T (T) and the U.S. Department of Justice will be in court on Thursday.
The Justice Department filed a suit to block AT&T's bid to buy Time Warner (TWX), CNN's parent company, citing antitrust concerns. The first big question the judge needs to decide is when to schedule a trial. The two sides disagree when that should be.
The case could have implications for other big mergers, including CVS' (CVS) $69 billion acquisition of Aetna (AET).
5. Market overview: European markets were higher in early trade, but gains were limited to less than 1%. Asian markets were mixed, with Japan's Nikkei adding 1.5%.
U.S. stock futures were higher.
Wednesday was a mixed bag: The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 0.2%, while the S&P 500 was flat. The Nasdaq added 0.2% to snap a three-day losing streak.
Before the Bell newsletter: Key market news. In your inbox. Subscribe now!
6. Earnings and economics: Dollar General (DG) will release earnings before the open. Firearms manufacturer American Outdoor Brands (AOBC), formerly known as Smith & Wesson, will report after the close.
U.S. data on initial jobless claims will be published at 8:30 a.m. ET.
Download CNN MoneyStream for up-to-the-minute market data and news
7. Coming this week:
Thursday -- DOJ vs. AT&T in court
Friday -- U.S. Jobs report | {
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Deepening losses from train operations and engineering services drove net profit down at transport operator SMRT Corporation for the first quarter of financial year 2017.
DEEPENING losses from train operations and engineering services drove net profit down at transport operator SMRT Corporation for the first quarter of financial year 2017.
In its first quarterly results since the announcement of transitioning to the new rail financing framework and state investor Temasek Holdings' bid to take it private, SMRT reported on Monday after trading closed that net profit for the three months ended June 30 was at S$15.5 million. This is 22.9 per cent lower than that of a year ago.
Total revenue fell to S$313.9 million, a 2 per cent drop at S$320.3 million from a year ago.
Earnings per share thus dropped to 1.02 Singapore cents, from 1.32 cents in Q1 FY16.
Losses from train operations in particular weighed on SMRT's results.
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This segment saw its losses widen by 110.1 per cent to hit a loss of S$7.7 million. The loss was at S$3.7 million the same period a year ago.
Losses from LRT operations remained similar at about S$1.6 million.
These two segments account for rail operations. This section saw a total operating loss of S$9.4 million in Q1 FY17, some 76.8 per cent deeper from a year ago.
Engineering services incurred losses more than four times than that seen a year ago. It lost S$2.7 million, or 439.8 per cent deeper than Q1 FY16.
Buses chalked up a thinner operating profit of S$0.2 million. This is 86.3 per cent lower than the same period a year ago.
Taxis, despite performing "better than industry average" according to chief executive officer Desmond Kuek, saw operating profits of S$4.5 million, a 17.9 per cent drop from Q1 FY16.
Rental and advertising recorded an operating profit of S$20.6 million and S$4.9 million respectively in Q1 FY17, a decrease of 2.4 per cent and an increase of 0.3 per cent respectively compared to Q1 FY2016.
Other services increased 164.2 per cent to S$1.4 million, mainly due to higher contribution from charter services and external fleet maintenance.
SMRT shares closed flat on Monday at S$1.63 apiece. | {
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Superstar IU graced fans with her much-awaited comeback music video for ‘Blueming’. In the new release, IU rocks her newly minted blue hair and wore equally colorful outfits to match!
Let’s have a look!
IU’s ‘Blueming’ MV Fashion
Look #1
IU danced in her bedroom decked in a comfy Polo Ralph Lauren jersey graphic tee paired with yellow Gucci socks worn with the leopard-printed Fluff Yeah slides from Ugg.
Jersey Graphic Tee $69.99 Buy from here Fluff Yeah Leopard-print Slides $102 Buy from here Socks with Gucci and flower $155 Buy from here Pins Jersey Graphic Tee Fluff Yeah Leopard-print Slides Socks with Gucci and flower
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Look #2
Her next look is an explosion of color thanks to her silk nature-inspired motif shirt from Gucci color-blocked with a pink jacket and numerous pins!
Silk Nature-inspired Motifs Shirt $2,200 Buy from here Pins Silk Nature-inspired Motifs Shirt
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Look #3
In another scene, the singer rocks a velvet Dolls Kill LBD with butterfly embroidery where she scored styled points by styling it with net stockings, denim jacket, and a cool beret.
Black Velvet Embroidery Dress $72 Buy from here Classic Beret Check White $77 Buy from here Pins Black Velvet Embroidery Dress Classic Beret Check White
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Look #4
She stands in front of a wall covered in blue flowers and matches the scene with her Cecilie Bahnsen sheer midi wrap dress with a yellow print all over.
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Buddhism, and especially Indian Buddhism, famously takes the position that there is no self. What this is usually taken to mean is that there is no core in a person (or anything else) that remains unchanged while other features change. Critics of Buddhism have usually raised the objection that if there is no core that remains unchanged in a person—if there is no self—then it is difficult to make sense of the Buddhist teaching in rebirth. Moreover, if there is no self, then there is no one to undergo awakening or enlightenment. Both of these issues will be discussed in the module, which will be followed, as in previous modules, with questions for discussion.
How can there be personal continuity through one or more lifetimes?
What makes awakening possible? | {
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The Islamist terrorist group ISIS is instructing Muslim sympathizers in Europe (and presumably the United States) to seek out leftist activists to form an “armed combat” alliance.
The armed alliance against European governments will further ISIS’s goal to conquer Rome by 2020.
The call to recruit leftists is in an eBook entitled Black Flags from Rome. The eBook is the subject of a two part report by Bridget Johnson at PJ Media. (Excellent reporting in both part one and part two.)
While Western leftist groups like Obama funder group Code Pink , ANSWER , and ISM have given political support and humanitarian aid to Islamist terrorists, there have been no readily apparent instances of Western leftists joining Islamist terrorist groups in committing terrorist acts in recent years.
Leftist terrorism in the West of late has been largely about the environment and animal rights. There were some attacks planned by leftists allied with the Occupy movement that were mostly ineffective or were disrupted by law enforcement. The anarchist Black Bloc groups have mainly attacked property and mostly used non-lethal weapons in protests.
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In the 1970s and 80s, leftist groups including the Weathermen, Symbionese Liberation Army, the Red Brigades and the Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinfoff) waged a terror war in the United States and Europe.
Johnson says the ISIS eBook references the IRA and and a French Islamist group as examples of how to wage war and aid jihad in Europe.
“It offers the Irish Republican Army attacks of the ’80 and ’90s as an example of a “ruthless” guerrilla campaign in Europe, and the GIA (Group Islamique Army) in France as emblematic of the 1990s “Islamic jihad revival in Europe.” The GIA, notes the text, also trailblazed in Europe with its magazine propaganda and solicitation of donations to smuggle weapons to jihadists in Algeria.”
ISIS writes that a good place to recruit leftists is at anti-Israel protests.
ISIS is counting on frustration among some leftists at their inability to change the system combined with admiration for the strength of Islamists “to fight against the injustices of the world” to prove fertile in recruiting them to form a terror alliance against the West.
Excerpts from the ISIS eBook as reported by Bridget Johnson:
“It states that European Muslims can ally with “a growing population of left-winged activists (people who are against; human/animal abuses, Zionism, and Austerity measures etc)” who “look up to the Muslims as a force who are strong enough to fight against the injustices of the world” in countering a growing divide between Muslims and “right-wing neo-Nazis.” It specifically cites people who are “sometimes” allied with Anonymous or anarchy groups — even though, angered by the assault on Charlie Hebdo, Anonymous is currently carrying out a hacking operation to take down ISIS accounts. ““If you have ever been at a pro-Palestine / anti-Israel protest, you will see many activists who are not even Muslims who are supportive of what Muslims are calling for (the fall of Zionism). It is most likely here that connections between Muslims and Left-wing activists will be made, and a portion from them will realise that protests are not effective, and that armed combat is the alternative,” the book states. “So they will start to work together in small cells of groups to fight and sabotage against the ‘financial elite’.” “The book predicts such “recruits” sympathetic to their cause “will give intelligence, share weapons and do undercover work for the Muslims to pave the way for the conquest of Rome.””
David Horowitz’s 2006 book Unholy Alliance explored the decades-long relationship between the Left and radical Islamists. ISIS is apparently ready to write a deadly new chapter. | {
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Vejur is married to Leah , has a 579 day old daughter named Sarah and a 491 day old son named Dane , and has a pet cat named Spirit.
Farm horse: Sanique 2 Sheeps: Rep , Grilley 1 White Cow: Minnie 4 White Chickens: Jerkbird , Prusello , Zetch , Welli 2 Brown Chickens: Bord , Jumby 6 Pigs: Zetsurt , Noze , Chupino , Shasha , Bromo , Polla 1 Brown Cow: Brallers 6 Dinosaurs: Pru , Temu , Pretsley , Grosicka , Nackito , Fat Bird 6 Rabbits: Winono , Nash , Fickello , Wu , Laso , Groko 6 Ducks: Memu , Snona , So , Murtini , Chu , Trocko 2 Goats: Tritchie , Frona | {
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Gallente Federation
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Justified Chaos
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War and Order
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Gallente Federation
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Justified Chaos
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Gallente Federation
X Gallentius (Osprey)
Justified Chaos
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Gallente Federation
RonPaul Rox (Osprey)
Justified Chaos
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Justified Chaos
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Torvin Yulus Corporation
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Did he say Jump
LENCA5 (Ishtar)
Death By Design
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Spiritus Draconis
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
SmokinJs Arthie (Vexor Navy Issue)
Justified Chaos
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
Aster Vinland (Vexor Navy Issue)
Noob Mercs
Gallente Federation
Ist blood (Orthrus)
Justified Chaos
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
PeleKea (Thrasher)
Death By Design
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pyronatic (Thrasher)
Mecha Enterprises Fleet
Gallente Federation
Carlos Bandolier (Catalyst)
Aardvaarks Super Mega Exchange
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Brutor Tribe
Gamma Serpentiz (Catalyst)
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Ammji (Purifier)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Itachi Uchonela (Hound)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Aster Vinland (Nemesis)
Noob Mercs
Gallente Federation
Naysayer Cruwler (Nemesis)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
kera ventalte (Svipul)
Death By Design
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Roy Henry (Jaguar)
Black Fox Marauders
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
kera ventalte (Kitsune)
Death By Design
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Nook Alms (Hyena)
Moira.
Villore Accords
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Gallente Federation
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Gallente Federation
Kane Nova (Crow)
IronClad Victory
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Madhouse Mafia
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Gallente Federation
Bobman Smith (Griffin)
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Black Fox Marauders
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Davir Sometaww (Raptor)
Snuff Box
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Chancey Jankins (Atron)
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Laurra Dakan (Stiletto)
Justified Chaos
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
Zorn Orlenard (Imicus)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Sheogorath Madlord (Federation Navy Comet)
Madhouse Mafia
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Zorn Orlenard (Federation Navy Comet)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Ion Bydo (Ares)
Genstar Inc
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Ammji (Capsule)
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Tandros Kreel (Capsule)
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
PeleKea (Capsule)
Death By Design
Did he say Jump
(Caldari Sentry Gun II)
Wiyrkomi Peace Corps
Roy Henry
Black Fox Marauders
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
Zorn Orlenard
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Wohenmang
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
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Tandros Kreel
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Sam Chadelanne
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
ZerostarJJ
Mostly Sober
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
Laurra Dakan
Justified Chaos
Spaceship Bebop
Gallente Federation
Predator Elite
Death By Design
Did he say Jump
Crimson Draufgange
Extreme Overkill Inc.
The Bastard Cartel
Gallente Federation
I SeeU
Aideron Robotics
Gallente Federation
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A town in the Australian state of Victoria has been inundated by tumbleweed.
Gardens, homes and garages in Wangaratta have been smothered by the plant, with some homes blocked in by piles two metres high.
The fast-growing Panicum Effusum weed, more commonly known as "hairy panic", has been drifting into the town for days.
One resident claimed she spent eight hours clearing up the tumbleweed on one day, only to have it return the next.
Hairy panic is native to inland Australia. It is not uncommon in Wangaratta but this year the dry conditions have produced a bumper crop.
Residents suspect that the tumbleweed is coming from a nearby unmaintained field, but the local council has refused to help homeowners to clean it up. Despite its dry, flammable nature, the council does not consider the plant a fire risk.
This is not the first time that a town has been inundated by tumbleweed.
In January 2014, tumbleweed in a town in the US state of New Mexico covered homes and blocked streets and, just two months later, towns around Colorado Springs were also swamped. Strong winds brought excessive amounts of the plant debris, causing piles of tumbleweed more than two metres high.
In this region of the US, tumbleweed comes from the Russian thistle plant. This is a prickly plant which makes the tumbleweed more dangerous and can even scratch your car as they drift past. | {
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This is an archived article and the information in the article may be outdated. Please look at the time stamp on the story to see when it was last updated.
LEQUIRE, Okla. — A 72-year-old Oklahoma woman took matters into her own hands when she killed 11 venomous copperhead snakes living beneath her home.
Susan Thompson was visiting her neighbor, Mrs. Newby, last week when she discovered the elderly woman had killed 11 copperhead snakes, WTVD reports. Newby used a shovel and shotgun — which family members say are her “weapons of choice.”
Thompson posted a picture of the woman on Facebook Thursday afternoon with the caption, “Mrs Newby killed 11 copperheads last night at her house! She’s a snake killer if you need help call her! She is 72 years old!”
As if she needs to be any more impressive, Newby killed a 5-foot diamondback snake last month, according to KOTV.
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El Grupo de Lima pidió este lunes la suspensión de las elecciones en Venezuela y afirmó que sus miembros seguirán tomando medidas para apoyar a los ciudadanos venezolanos.
“Unas elecciones que no sean transparentes, justas, libres, sin la participación de los partidos de oposición y con presos políticos, no son elecciones”, dijo Néstor Popolizio, ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Perú.
Jorge Faurie, ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Argentina, explicó que el grupo está comprometido con un cambio de gobierno en Venezuela.
“Estamos acá porque queremos ayudar a los venezolanos, con una crisis que se ha desbordado por la región. Tenemos todos los latinoamericanos un voto con la democracia. Esperemos que Venezuela recupere su democracia”, explicó Faurie.
Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Perú “Unas elecciones que no sean transparentes, justas, libres, sin la participación de los partidos de oposición y con presos políticos, no son elecciones” #GrupoDeLima — Examen ONU Venezuela (@VE_ONU) 14 de mayo de 2018
Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Argentina “Estamos acá porque queremos ayudar a los venezolanos, con una crisis que se ha desbordado por la región. Tenemos todos los latinoamericanos un voto con la democracia. Esperemos que Venezuela recupere su democracia” #GrupoDeLima — Examen ONU Venezuela (@VE_ONU) 14 de mayo de 2018
Comunicado oficial del Grupo de Lima. Reiteramos el llamado de suspensión a las elecciones de este 20 de mayo en Venezuela. pic.twitter.com/B77F6iZtBc — Grupo de Lima (@thelimagroup) 14 de mayo de 2018 | {
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Zdaniem Witolda Waszczykowskiego osoby LGBT chcą rozchwiać polskie społeczeństwo m.in. przez wpuszczenie do Polski tysięcy imigrantów z „obcych kultur”, którzy zamiast pracować, będą pobierać „socjal”. To wielopiętrowa bzdura. Cudzoziemcy w Polsce rzadko pobierają świadczenia, pochodzą głównie z sąsiednich krajów i nie głosują, bo nie mogą
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Witold Waszczykowski 8 lipca 2019 osiągnął mistrzostwo w tworzeniu piramidalnych konstrukcji z elementów, które do siebie nie pasują. W rozmowie o społecznościach LGBT i ich „ideologicznej ofensywie” w Polskim Radiu 24 były minister spraw zagranicznych, a od niedawna europoseł PiS powiedział:
„Taka [tradycyjna – przyp. OKO] rodzina oznacza stabilność społeczeństwa, należy to rozbić, jeśli jeszcze okazuje się, że stoi za tym Kościół, który spaja to społeczeństwo. Te środowiska [LGBT – przyp. OKO] uważają, że trzeba to rozchwiać. Do tego wpuścić tysiące imigrantów z obcej kultury, którzy staną się z czasem wyborcami, ponieważ będą zależni od programów socjalnych, bo przecież przez lata nie wejdą na rynek pracy, bo nie znają języków, czasem nie mają zawodu”.
Innymi słowy: Witold Waszczykowski oskarża przedstawicieli społeczności LGBT o chęć zniszczenia polskiego społeczeństwa. Jednym ze środków ma być wpuszczenie do Polski imigrantów.
Ta opowieść już na pierwszy rzut oka jest nonsensowna, uznaliśmy jednak, że warto prześledzić ją dokładniej. Europosłowi Waszczykowskiemu udała się bowiem rzadka sztuka: stworzył retoryczną konstrukcję, w której fałszywy jest absolutnie każdy element.
Straszenie imigrantem
Przedstawiciele PiS od początku swoich rządów demonizowali imigrantów, szczególnie osoby z krajów muzułmańskich. Utożsamiano je z terroryzmem, używając strachu przed utratą bezpieczeństwa jako argumentu w kolejnych kampaniach wyborczych. Jednocześnie rząd chwalił się przyjęciem „miliona uchodźców” z Ukrainy, aby uzasadnić to, że nie może przyjąć uchodźców, którzy do Europy przybywali przez Morze Śródziemne. W rzeczywistości szczątkowa liczba Ukraińców w Polsce wnosiła o azyl. W OKO.press pisaliśmy o tym kłamstwie kilkukrotnie.
Rząd PiS regularnie używa w swojej narracji migrantów i uchodźców do bieżącej walki politycznej – czy chodzi o spór z Brukselą, czy polską kampanię wyborczą.
Nic dziwnego, że w czasie, gdy jednym z najważniejszych wrogów PiS są osoby LGBT i ich walka o równe prawa, Waszczykowski dla wzmocnienia efektu sięgnął w swojej wypowiedzi po innego znanego wroga – imigrantów.
Jego wypowiedź o migrantach składa się z czterech elementów:
Migranci, którzy chcą przyjechać do Polski, pochodzą z „obcej kultury”;
Migranci staną się w Polsce wyborcami;
Będą zależni od programów socjalnych;
Przez lata nie wejdą na rynek pracy, bo nie znają języków i nie mają zawodu.
Przyjrzyjmy się tym twierdzeniom.
Obca kultura zza miedzy
Migranci, którzy przyjeżdżają do Polski, to przede wszystkim mieszkańcy biedniejszych krajów naszego regionu, a w zdecydowanej większości – Ukrainy.
Według najnowszych danych rządowego Urzędu do Spraw Cudzoziemców za rok 2019, w Polsce przebywa 401 184 migrantów. Dane obejmują różne rodzaje pobytu, trzy zdecydowanie najliczniejsze grupy to 225 tys. osób na pobyt czasowy, 74 tys. osób na pobyt stały i 73 tys. zarejestrowanych obywateli Unii Europejskiej.
Wśród 400 tys. migrantów prawie 50 proc. to Ukraińcy. Kolejne najliczniejsze grupy narodowościowe to Białorusini (5,8 proc.), Niemcy (5,3 proc.) i Rosjanie (3 proc.). O żadnej z tych grup nie można powiedzieć, że są odległe kulturowo od Polski.
Te dane nie opisują całego ruchu migracyjnego w Polsce. Według danych NBP w 2018 roku liczba Ukraińców na polskim rynku pracy wyniosła ok. 800 tys. osób. Większość z nich pracuje w Polsce nie na podstawie zezwolenia na pracę tylko oświadczenia pracodawcy.
Z kolei dane uzyskane na podstawie aktywności w telefonach komórkowych mówią, że w Polsce przebywa 1,27 miliona Ukraińców.
Można z pewnością stwierdzić, że większość migrantów w Polsce to osoby z krajów bliskich nam kulturowo. Wśród (nielicznych) osób, które otrzymują polskie obywatelstwo, wygląda to podobnie. Jak pisze Biuletyn Migracyjny:
„Największą liczbę polskich paszportów w 2014 roku w ramach dostępnych procedur naturalizacji otrzymali obywatele czterech państw położonych na wschód od Polski (69 proc. wszystkich), tj. Ukrainy – 1 909, Białorusi – 739, Rosji – 367 i Armenii – 367”.
Dlaczego więc Waszczykowski mówi o obcości kulturowej, skoro najwyraźniej Polska przyciąga głównie sąsiadów? To echo prawicowych opowieści o Europie Zachodniej, która ma być rzekomo zdominowana przez muzułmańskich imigrantów tworzących „strefy szariatu” i żyjących z socjalu i przestępczości. Opowieści te są z reguły po prostu zmyślone, ale prawica – nie tylko polska – regularnie wykorzystuje ksenofobiczne mity do tworzenia atmosfery strachu i budowania poparcia.
Od migranta do wyborcy długa droga
Argument, że do Polski zostaną masowo sprowadzeni imigranci, którzy będą głosować w polskich wyborach, jest wyjątkowo nietrafiony. Żeby zostać wyborcą w Polsce, migrant musi najpierw otrzymać polskie obywatelstwo.
Jakie są warunki uzyskania obywatelstwa przez cudzoziemca? Jak pisze RPO:
„W sposób uproszczony obywatelstwo polskie nabyć mogą cudzoziemcy, którzy jednocześnie:
posiadają prawo stałego pobytu lub przebywający w Polsce na podstawie zezwolenia na osiedlenie się bądź zezwolenia na pobyt rezydenta długoterminowego Wspólnot Europejskich;
pozostają co najmniej 3 lata w związku małżeńskim z osobą posiadającą obywatelstwo polskie.”
Odkąd w 2012 roku Polska zliberalizowała prawo, które reguluje przyznawanie polskiego obywatelstwa, średnio rocznie otrzymuje je między 4 a 5 tys. osób.
W kwestii przyznawania obywatelstwa jesteśmy w Unii Europejskiej na szarym końcu, razem ze Słowacją. Kraje Unii średnio przyznawały obywatelstwo 1,6 osoby na 1000 mieszkańców. Rekordzistami są Luksemburg (8,4), Szwecja (6,9) i Cypr (6,4). W Polsce i na Słowacji – 0,1.
Trudno więc się spodziewać, że te osoby będą miały kluczowe znaczenie w wyborach. 5 tys. głosów w ostatnich wyborach do Parlamentu Europejskiego dałoby wynik lepszy o 0,04 proc.
Tymczasem MSWiA opracowało projekt polityki migracyjnej, według którego planuje drastycznie zaostrzyć zasady przyznawania polskiego obywatelstwa. Decyzja w tej sprawie ma zależeć m.in. od „przyjęcia jako swoje własne wartości obowiązujących w Polsce, w tym światopoglądowych, religijnych, politycznych, kulturowych, obyczajowych”.
Migranci nie głosują na prawicę
Choć Waszczykowski nie powiedział tego wprost, jego obawy miałyby cień sensu tylko pod jednym względem: imigranci i mniejszości nie głosują na prawicę. Trudno się dziwić – agresywna antyimigrancka retoryka i nacjonalizm są dla nich odrzucające, a nierzadko są też bezpośrednim zagrożeniem.
W Stanach Zjednoczonych mniejszości zdecydowanie popierają Demokratów. 88 proc. czarnoskórych i 65 proc. Latynosów głosowało w amerykańskich wyborach prezydenckich w 2016 roku głosowało na Hillary Clinton.
W Polsce trochę podobnie działa to z mniejszościami narodowymi, oczywiście nieporównanie mniejszymi niż np. w Stanach. Wybierają one obecną opozycję nawet tam, gdzie PiS wygrywa zdecydowanie.
Przykładowo – w wyborach do Parlamentu Europejskiego okręg, który obejmował województwa podlaskie i warmińsko-mazurskie zagłosował Na PiS w stosunku 47,3 proc. do 37 proc. dla Koalicji Europejskiej. W powiecie hajnowskim, w którym mniejszość białoruska jest w Polsce procentowo najliczniejsza, wygrała KE z 48,1 proc. głosów wobec 32,6 proc. PiS. W sąsiednich powiatach PiS wygrało miażdżącą przewagą – w siemiatyckim 59,4 proc., w bielskim 57,9 proc., w bielskim – 55,2 proc.
Imigranci nie żyją z socjalu
Waszczykowski twierdzi również, że imigranci w Polsce nie będą pracować, za to będą pobierać świadczenia socjalne. Nic na to nie wskazuje.
Obywatele Ukrainy przebywający legalnie w Polsce mają prawo do korzystania z programu 500 plus. W 2018 roku 500 złotych z tego programu było pobierane na 4562 dzieci.
Z 500 plus mogą korzystać cudzoziemcy, obywatele UE oraz 8 innych krajów, z którymi Polska podpisała umowy o zabezpieczeniu społecznym. To Czarnogóra, Serbia, Bośnia i Hercegowina, Macedonia, USA, Kanada, Korea Południowa, Australia, Ukraina, Mołdawia i Mongolia.
W październiku 2017 roku dopłaty do minimalnej emerytury lub renty z ZUS pobierały 263 osoby z Ukrainy. Według danych Ministerstwa Rodziny, Pracy i Polityki Społecznej za 2018 rok, w Polsce było zarejestrowanych zaledwie 5227 bezrobotnych cudzoziemców. To spadek o 5,2 proc. w stosunku do 2017 roku.
Wszystkie te liczby wskazują na to, że cudzoziemcy są bardzo umiarkowanie zainteresowani pobieraniem świadczeń socjalnych, nawet gdy mają do nich prawo. Dużo bardziej interesuje ich praca.
OKO pisze o polskiej gospodarce.
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Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The employee offered to pay back part of the sum with his retirement bonus
A Japanese man gave away tickets worth more than 25 million yen ($222,000; £174,000) to a Tokyo tourist attraction after developing a fear of foreigners.
The ticket seller, now in his 70s, said he was too scared to speak to overseas tourists after one yelled at him years ago, local media reported.
So he let some 160,000 tourists enter Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden for free between 2014 and 2016.
And now an audit has revealed the cost of that fear ran into the millions.
The issue first came to light in December 2016, after a colleague noticed his "strange ways" and alerted the management, who quizzed the man - who has not been named.
It was then he admitted he had not been charging foreigners for tickets, which cost 200 yen ($1.80) for adults and 50 yen for children, because he was uncomfortable asking for money.
"I don't speak any other language and I got scared when a foreigner began yelling at me a long time ago," the man said by way of explanation, according to SoraNews24.
An investigation was launched by the Ministry of Environment and, following a scan of his computer records, it was discovered he was issuing tickets then cancelling them to even the database between 2014 and 2016.
He asked another employee who handled the data, to undo the sales, SoraNews24 said.
An audit has now revealed the loss to be at least 25 million yen. As a result, the man was given a 10% reduction of his month's salary, other Japanese media reports say.
But the man has since resigned, and offered to pay half of his retirement bonus in an attempt to reimburse the garden. | {
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Jim Cramer was a self-professed skeptic of driverless cars. That opinion changed when he got into the passenger seat of one at Alphabet's headquarters this week.
"I thought they were a pipedream, something that wouldn't be viable until the distant future. Turns out I was wrong, and the future is now," the "Mad Money" host said.
After a short ride in a Waymo with someone chaperoning in the driver seat, Cramer's entire opinion about driverless cars changed. He realized he trusted the technology more than he trusted a driver to not drink, text or fall asleep at the wheel. | {
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You are here: Home > Andrew Johnson ANDREW JOHNSON
THE SEVENTEENTH PRESIDENT.
THE TAILOR WHO BECAME PRESIDENT. There are many things which have had to do with making men Presidents of the United States, but it was not until April, 1865, that murder was one of those things. In that fair month, just after the Civil War came to its end, and peace and happiness seemed ready again to settle clown upon the land, the foul hand of an assassin took from us one of the best Presidents we had ever known, the revered Abraham Lincoln. Then according to law, Andrew Johnson, the Vice-President, became President. He and Abraham Lincoln, who were elected together to these two great offices, both began life as very poor boys. Johnson began, in one way, lower than Lincoln, for he did not even know how to read and write until after he was sixteen years old, and by that age Lincoln had read many books and was getting to be what the people called learned. Andrew Johnson was born in the city of Raleigh, North Carolina, on the 29th of September, 18o8. Like Lincoln, he was born in a small log-cabin. His parents belonged to that class known as "poor white trash," whom even the slaves of the South looked down on and despised. But his father must have been a good and brave man, for he was drowned in trying to save a friend who had fallen overboard.
Little Andrew was then only four years old. His mother had to work hard to keep both of them alive, and he had to help all he could, so he had no chance to go to school. He was only ten years old when he was made a tailor's apprentice, and he worked hard for five years before he ever heard a man read. In those days there was not much education for the poor, and hardly any at all in the South. When the ignorant prentice boy heard a man read to the tailors he thought it was wonderful. It seemed to him almost like magic. A strong wish came to him to do this wonderful thing himself, and he got some of the men in the shop to teach him his letters. He was quick to learn them, for he had a very good mind. But Andrew Johnson did not get what we may call an education until he was eighteen years old, and then he owed it to a good woman whom he made his wife. His mother and he had moved to Greenville, a small town in the mountain part of Tennessee, and here he did the best thing in his life, for he met and married a bright young girl who was well educated and bad read a great many books.
The young couple were poor enough, but they both wanted to get on in life, and the young wife, who was a very attractive and ambitious girl, set herself to teaching her husband. She read to him while he worked at his trade, and in the evenings she became an earnest teacher and he became an eager pupil. In that way he soon got something of an education. He had a very good memory and held on to all that was read to him or that he read himself, and few boys ever got along more rapidly than the poor young tailor under the careful teaching of his wife. Young Johnson soon began to take part in affairs in his town. From the first he was on the side of the poor. He was one of them, and knew all they had to bear. And he soon showed that he was a born orator. He could speak in a sharp and fiery manner that took with all who heard it, and the people who lived near gathered in numbers to hear him. When he was only twenty they elected him for one of their aldermen, and when he was twenty-two he was made Mayor of Greenville. That was getting along very fast for the boy who had first begun to read six years before. And now we come to the story of the rapid way the tailor's apprentice climbed upward. When he was twenty-seven his friends, the common people, sent him to the Tennessee Legislature, first to the House and afterward to the Senate. That was not honor enough for their favorite, and he was sent to Congress in 1843 and kept there for ten years. In 1853 came another great lift, for he was elected Governor of Tennessee. When his term was up he was elected again. The tailor of Greenville was getting along famously, was he not? In fact, there was then no more popular man in the State of Tennessee than Andrew Johnson. He kept doing things that amazed and interested the people. He was not ashamed of his early business, and here is one of the odd things he did when he was Governor of Tennessee. He made with his own hands a very handsome suit of clothes and sent it as a present to the Governor of Kentucky, one of his old friends. But the Kentucky Governor had been a blacksmith in his young days, and was not ashamed of it either, so he forged on the anvil a shovel and tongs and sent them to Governor Johnson, saying that he "hoped they would keep alive the flame of their old friendship," When Johnson's second term as Governor had ended he was as great a favorite as ever, and was elected to a still higher office, that of Senator of the United States. This was in 1857, when politics in Congress were red-hot. He was a Democrat and a Southerner and might be expected to be a strong advocate for the cause of the slave-holders, but he was not. While the other States of the South were leaving the Union, he worked with all his strength to save Tennessee. President Lincoln made Andrew Johnson Military Governor of Tennessee. He went South determined to hold, by the hand of authority, what had been gained by the hand of war. He did not mince words with his enemies, but threatened to send them to prison or to hang them. When the Mayor and Council of Nashville refused to take the oath of allegiance he locked them up in the city jail. Some time after that the Confederate armies marched back into the State. Their coming filled many people with alarm, but it did not frighten the bold Governor This is what he said: "I am no military man, but any one who talks of surrendering I will shoot." You may be sure that all this made Governor Johnson very popular in the North, and that, in 1864, it brought him the nomination for the Vice-Presidency. The greatest day and most famous speech of Andrew Johnson came in October, 1864. Then, in the streets of Nashville, a great assembly of colored men gathered to hear him speak. Never did he show more fire and spirit. The vast audience went wild with enthusiasm. When he reached the climax of his speech, and said that he would be the Moses to lead them from bondage into liberty and peace, his hearers broke into sobs of feeling and shouts of joy. That speech went like wildfire through the North. It won him a host of votes. In a week or two after he was elected Vice-President of the United States. Inauguration day came on the 4th of March, 1865, and six weeks later the murder of Abraham Lincoln lifted Andrew Johnson to the highest place in his country, that of President of the United States. Never had the country known anything like the progress of these two men—that of Lincoln from the lowly position of woodchopper, that of Johnson from the bench of the tailor's apprentice, to preside over one of the greatest nations of the earth and make the White House at Washington their palatial home.
The war was at an end. The South, which had fought with all its strength, lay conquered and prostrate before the Government at Washington. To the astonishment of everybody the new President did not treat the South with severity. Instead of seeking to punish the rebels severely, he wished to let them off without any punishment at all. He did not wait for Congress to act, but at once invited them back into the Union, without asking of them any security against future troubles. The whole country stood amazed. The members of Congress were incensed by his hasty and unwise action. When they came together in December they hastened to undo all that the President had done, and made it plain that the South would not be brought back into the Union until the powers of secession were tied hand and feet.
Then there came a war of a different kind from that in the field. It was between the President and Congress. He went so far at length that they declared he had broken, the Constitution and must be impeached---that is, he was put on trial for what were called " high crimes and misdemeanors." Never had such a charge been brought against a President of the United States. It is to be hoped it never will be again. The Senate of the United States was formed into a great court, before which the President was tried as a breaker of the law and a traitor to his oath. He was not convicted; it took a two-thirds vote to do that; but he escaped by only a single vote. Soon after that his term of office came to an end and he was succeeded by a very different man, Ulysses S. Grant, the great war general. But President Johnson had many friends in the South, for his course as President had pleased the Southern people highly, and six years after his term as President had ended he was sent back to the Senate by Tennessee. But his term was very short, for in July, 1875, soon after he had returned to Tennessee from his first session in Congress, he suddenly died. No other President ever had so stormy a career as Andrew Johnson. Yet he was a man of kindly nature and had qualities which endeared him to his friends. He always had women of fine character about him. His wife, who had done so much to start him in his career, was too feeble in health to take on herself the duties of mistress of the White House, but her daughter, Mrs. Martha Patterson, took her place, and performed the social duties of the position with suitable grace and dignity. He was surrounded to the last by those who loved and believed in him, and died in the full assurance that he had done his best for the country's welfare, and had been very badly treated by Congress. Source: "The Lives of the Presidents and How They Reached the White House" by Charles Morris, LL.D., 1903. Related Links: The White House
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●The Italian government said it has 152 confirmed cases, up from three in a matter of days. Three people have died. Authorities have locked down about a dozen small towns and canceled events across the north, including Venice’s Carnival.
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● South Korea raised its national threat level to “red alert,” the first time the country has used the highest setting since the H1N1 swine flu outbreak in 2009. The total number of confirmed cases in the country reached 763.
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● Iran has confirmed eight deaths related to the coronavirus, the most outside of China, media reported Sunday. South Korea confirmed its seventh death.
●The Chinese government reported 409 new cases across the country on Monday and 150 deaths, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the country to 77,150, with 2,592 deaths.
●Three cruise ships have docked in Wuhan, Hubei’s capital, to house medical workers to help the city’s overburdened health-care system. On Sunday, Wuhan’s Union Jiangbei Hospital announced that a 29-year-old doctor had died of coronavirus, the second death of a young doctor in Hubei in recent days.
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HONG KONG — Coronavirus outbreaks in South Korea and Italy continued to expand rapidly on Sunday as both countries reported a slew of new cases and Italian authorities raced to seal off hot spot towns.
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Although the latest Chinese figures showed new cases largely concentrated in Hubei province, concern was growing about the virus in other parts of the world, including in Europe, which had yet to experience a large-scale outbreak until now, and where containment efforts could test the continent's open-border ideals.
South Korea reported a significant rise in cases on Monday, with 161 new cases, bringing the total to 763, and one more death, for a total of seven. Italy said the number of confirmed cases had reached 152, up from three in a matter of days.
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The sudden outbreak in Italy caught authorities there off guard, while causing severe interruptions of the sort that have upended life in China. Universities across northern Italy, where the outbreak is concentrated, are shuttered; major soccer matches have been canceled. Venice's famed Carnival, which can draw more than 100,000 people daily, was suspended two days before its scheduled end.
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In the mostly smaller towns where the virus has been detected, checkpoints have been set up designed to prevent most people from entering or leaving. Video from the closed-off hot spot towns showed abandoned piazzas, boarded-up mini-markets and closure signs even on churches. Residents who went outside were largely wearing masks, and in one of the few supermarkets in the area that remained open, the line stretched out the door.
"Since we're dealing with the risk of an epidemic, we cannot say we're certain that we can contain it," Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said in an interview with Sky TG24, an Italian news channel. "But these are absolutely measures we deem effective — very rigorous — to contain the spread of the coronavirus, to limit the risk of contagion."
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But authorities acknowledged that they were seeing cases, including two in Venice, that had no apparent connection to Chinese travelers or the closed-off Italian hot spots, which are mostly concentrated toward the south of Milan.
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A broader outbreak would be particularly complicated in Europe, where countries maintain open borders. Conte said changing that policy would be "draconian" and could be devastating for the Italian economy, which is among the weakest on the continent.
The Chinese government on Monday announced 409 more confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus, bringing the total in mainland China to 77,150, with 150 more deaths from the outbreak bringing the total up to 2,592 across the nation.
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Within China, the outbreak remains worst in Hubei and its capital, Wuhan, where the outbreak first emerged in December. The updated official figures showed that the vast majority of new cases confirmed across China — 398 — were in the province, as were all but one of the new deaths.
Hubei has been under lockdown since Jan. 23, an unprecedented organizational response to a health crisis. As of Sunday, three cruise ships had arrived in Wuhan to house medical workers for the city’s stretched health-care system, drawing mixed reactions from Chinese Internet users.
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Japan’s NHK reported the same day that cases had risen to 135 — not including the cases linked to the Diamond Princess, where at least 650 people who traveled aboard the ship are now confirmed cases and three passengers have died.
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The Diamond Princess outbreak alone has had a global impact. At least 18 Americans, seven Australians, four Britons and two Israeli nationals have tested positive for the virus after returning to their home countries. Medical authorities in the United States and Australia say they expect to find more cases as more tests are done.
Twelve Indian crew members have been confirmed as cases aboard the ship, India’s NDTV reported on Sunday.
With some new indications that the coronavirus may have an incubation period longer than 14 days and a variety of cases with no clear link to Hubei, as well as lingering worries about China’s counting methods, health officials remain concerned about the risk of a global pandemic.
In China, Hubei remains center of most cases
Wuhan’s Union Jiangbei Hospital on Sunday announced that Xia Sisi, 29, a front-line doctor from the department of gastroenterology, had died of coronavirus on Sunday morning. Xia had been hospitalized since Jan. 19, the hospital said.
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The toll on health workers in Hubei has been heavy. China Daily reports that Peng Yinhua, another 29-year-old doctor in Wuhan, died Thursday after postponing his wedding to help treat the outbreak.
China is bringing in seven cruise ships to help house medical workers for the coronavirus response, with the first, named Blue Whale, arriving on Friday evening followed by Changjiang Fu Tai and Changjiang Fu Tai No. 2 on Saturday.
In total, the ships will provide 1,267 beds for health workers, according to local media reports, and China has taken extensive efforts to provide a safe environment, including having a dedicated ship to dispose of waste. But on Chinese social media, opinions were split about the idea, with some comparing it to the situation aboard the Diamond Princess.
Alarm rises in Italy
Just days ago, Italy had only three cases, including two Chinese tourists. But its experience shows the difficulty that countries might face in containing the virus, which can be carried by people who don’t immediately show symptoms.
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At the beginning of the weekend, Italy had cases in two of its largest northern provinces, Lombardy and Veneto, mostly spread around smaller towns. But authorities said Sunday that there were also cases in Piemonte and Emilia-Romagna, also in the north.
Neighboring countries expressed concern about their proximity to a high volume of infected patients. Austria on Sunday halted its train traffic to and from Italy for several hours, while a member of France’s parliament asked for reinforced border control during this time of year, when thousands of Italians typically flock to French festivals.
South Korea raises national alert level to highest possible
South Korea’s case total has risen more than twentyfold in a week, from 30 last Monday to 763.
The country’s military has reported 11 cases as of Monday. Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo instructed soldiers not to leave the barracks other than for exceptional situations, placing the military under a near-lockdown.
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South Korean President Moon Jae-in told an emergency meeting that the country was now at a “crucial moment” that called for all-out efforts from the government and public alike in the face of the virus. Moon raised the national alert level to red, the highest, a first for South Korea since the 2009 epidemic of H1N1 swine flu.
The majority of South Korea’s coronavirus cases have been linked to two clusters at a church in the southern city of Daegu and a nearby hospital in Cheongdo County in North Gyeongsang province.
More than half of South Korea’s cases are traced to the Daegu church, which is a branch of Shincheonji Church of Jesus the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony. Shincheonji, a fringe religious sect, is often described as a cult by critics.
The South Korean government temporarily shut down Shincheonji’s 1,100 churches and annex buildings nationwide in an attempt to control the spread of the virus among members and their surrounding communities. President Moon Jae-in called the shutdown “a fair and inevitable step” to ensure community-wide safety and said there was “no intention to limit religious freedom.”
South Korea also confirmed its seventh coronavirus death: a 62-year-old man linked to a hospital in North Gyeongsang province, where four people have died from the virus. The confined environment of the hospital’s locked psychiatric ward possibly helped the virus spread there, according to the KCDC.
Growing fears in the Middle East as death toll in Iran rises
State officials in Afghanistan and Armenia have closed their borders to neighboring Iran as a preventive measure after Iran’s Health Ministry confirmed 43 cases and eight deaths in the country on state television Sunday.
Afghanistan reported its first suspected cases of the coronavirus in the western city of Herat on Sunday, according to the health chief of the province, also called Herat. Three people, all elderly men, had recently returned to the city from Iran, Abdul Hakim Tamana told The Washington Post by phone.
“We do not know at this stage whether they are suffering from cold, pneumonia or possibly coronavirus,” Tamana said.
Thousands of people travel back and forth every day between Afghanistan and Iran because of trade, employment and family ties. Afghan officials were testing all people crossing the border for coronavirus symptoms. But many who travel between the two countries also use informal routes, where screening doesn’t take place.
The outbreak has increased tension between Iran, already isolated by sanctions, and its neighbors. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Sunday that the threat of coronavirus had been exaggerated by the country’s enemies who hoped to cast doubt upon Friday’s parliamentary election.
On Saturday, however, Iran itself ordered the closure of schools and universities in a bid to prevent the outbreak from spreading further.
In Israel, reports that a group of South Koreans who tested positive for the infection had visited some of the country’s most popular religious and tourist spots prompted concern across the country.
Dozens of students who may have been in proximity to the South Korean tourists were directed to stay in home-based quarantine for two weeks, as were hotel housekeepers and employees of Masada, Tel Ber Sheeva and other national parks.
Non-Israeli travelers from South Korea and Japan have been barred from entering the country, according to local media reports, and Israelis arriving from multiple Asian countries face two weeks of mandatory quarantine. South Korean tourists began to return home on Sunday after initially being stranded in Israel because of the country’s ban on travel to South Korea, Reuters reported.
Japanese emperor voices fears about Olympics
More than 800 people in Japan have been diagnosed with the coronavirus, though the bulk of those cases come from the passengers and crew of the Diamond Princess cruise ship — which has reported an additional 57 cases, bringing the total up to 691. Most of the new Diamond Princess cases were among crew members still aboard the ship, officials said.
An additional 147 cases that are not connected to the ship also have been reported, the Japanese Health Ministry said.
The Health Ministry said Sunday that a third passenger had died after leaving the ship. The cause of death was pneumonia, Japan’s health minister said, but the ministry did not disclose whether the man, who was in his 80s, had coronavirus.
In light of the death, Health Minister Katsunobu Kato said officials will closely monitor the health of passengers who disembarked from the ship after the quarantine ended, including through daily phone calls.
The United States and other countries have imposed an additional 14-day quarantine on passengers returning from the ship, out of concern the virus was still spreading around the vessel during the initial period, but Japan has insisted its arrangements to isolate passengers and prevent the virus spreading were sound.
Japanese Emperor Naruhito, in his first news conference since ascending the throne, said on Sunday that he was looking forward to the Tokyo Olympics in the summer but that he was concerned about the spread of the new coronavirus, Reuters reported.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe ordered a government task force to prepare for a potential surge in the number of people infected with the new coronavirus, NHK reported.
Abe said the outbreak has entered a “crucial phase” with cases emerging around the country where the infection route or a link to China could not be traced. He said authorities need to prepare for a possible jump in patient numbers, by focusing efforts on preventing infected people from becoming seriously ill.
The State Department on Friday raised its travel advisory for Japan and South Korea to Level 2 on its four-level scale, urging older travelers and people with chronic medical conditions to consider delaying unnecessary travel. | {
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Kurt Warner suffers broken jaw after being elbowed in face
Kurt Warner has not appeared in an NFL game since 2009, but six years off from football didn’t stop him from breaking his jaw.
Warner revealed on Twitter Friday that he recently took an elbow to the face and suffered a broken jaw. He didn’t go into specifics about how the injury happened:
Just placed myself on IR – took an elbow 2 jaw & broke in a couple places!!! @WarnerBrenda wondering if this could finally stop me? #NevaEva — Kurt Warner (@kurt13warner) November 20, 2015
A few minutes later, Warner’s wife Brenda shared some nasty photos on Twitter that showed the damage. In addition to breaking his jaw in multiple places, Warner also had his teeth separated.
My hubs @kurt13warner just broke his jaw. The break separated his teeth! Now I get to take good care of him…still pic.twitter.com/epppYrnSe4 — Brenda Warner (@WarnerBrenda) November 20, 2015
I knew teeth could break, fall out or get holes in them, but how on earth can they separate?! I don’t even think I want to know.
This certainly isn’t the first broken jaw we have seen, and you can look at an X-ray of one of the nastier ones here. But an NFL analyst suffering a gnarly injury like that? I think that’s a first. | {
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Illustration by Jashar Awan
Iggy Pop said recently that he’d be “tending bar between sets” if he had to rely solely on record sales to survive. The proto-punk legend has alternate sources of revenue (a recent appearance in a car-insurance commercial, for instance), but less well-known musicians, such as the gifted composer and guitarist Stephen Ulrich, have to come up with more creative solutions.
A former architecture student, Ulrich supported his musical career for a time by building models for I. M. Pei (where he nearly severed an essential finger with a table saw) and by painting enormous advertisements along barren stretches of the South Bronx. In the past few years, he scored a six-part PBS series on comedy, two seasons of HBO’s “Bored to Death,” and “Art and Craft,” a documentary about the art forger Mark Landis. The film work came about in part because of the cinematic sound of Ulrich’s trio, Big Lazy, which for nearly two decades crafted dark, noir-tinged instrumentals. Dominated by Ulrich’s intricate, jazz-inflected guitar style, the sophisticated, gritty band endured—relying on the occasional licensing deal, performing in dives and at the odd wedding, and self-releasing albums—until 2008, when its bass player abruptly quit.
Two years ago, Ulrich decided to form a new version of Big Lazy, this time with the upright bassist Andrew Hall and the drummer Yuval Lion. “I missed the sweaty places,” he said. “I don’t know how many times I’ve heard people tell me in some bar, ‘You’re playing the soundtrack to my life.’ ”
At a recent appearance at Spectrum, a tiny living-room venue on the Lower East Side, Ulrich performed several Big Lazy songs, including “Black Eyed Susan,” an older, spacious ballad that features a haunting lap-steel solo drenched with reverb and tremolo. With echoes of Ennio Morricone and country-tinged Americana, the song conveys the feeling of distant vistas. “I always have a place in mind where each song takes place, a certain geography,” he said. Yet the beauty of Ulrich’s music is how it avoids specificity, leaving it to listeners to imagine where they want to be. On Nov. 13, Big Lazy will be at the Manderly Bar at the McKittrick Hotel, in Chelsea, to celebrate the release of a beguiling new album, “Don’t Cross Myrtle,” that alternates between the raucous and the lyrical. ♦ | {
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Proposition 209 – the California ballot initiative to prohibit discrimination and preferential treatment on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin – has been a source of controversy in California since its passage in 1996. The primary opponent of 209 is an aptly named organization – the Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN). Yes, that is the true name!
BAMN has protested, demonstrated and filed a seemingly endless series of lawsuits, all with the objective of overturning Proposition 209 or Proposal 2 in Michigan, the subject of the recent decision of the United States Supreme Court. This case, Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, involved the question of whether it is constitutional for a white majority electorate to approve a ballot initiative to prohibit race preferences. Schuette was decided 6-2 with one justice, Elena Kagan, not voting because of her association with the case in her prior position with the Obama administration.
The Schuette case represents, quite likely, the last legal challenge to be brought against Proposition 209, Proposal 2 or any of our other anti-preference initiatives. Given this likelihood, attention should now be focused by all parties on how to adapt to and implement the vision represented by 209.
California is a very diverse, pluralistic society. The people of this state comprise various ethnicities, religious convictions and, what some call, “races.” This reality was a motivating factor in the genesis of and campaign to enact 209. The central question was: what is the optimum public policy framework to guide the conduct of a diverse people to ensure fairness and equitable treatment for all.
It is clearly understood that history has not always been kind to all of the people of California. There is hardly a group that has not endured some degree of discrimination and oppression based solely on the identity – ethnic, racial, or some other characteristic – of those who comprise the group. The message of 209 to all was that “you are an equal.” When you apply to college, for employment, or bid on a public contract, none of your history will be held against you or credited to your record in determining your merit.
Unfortunately, once any group has been given special consideration, rarely do the members of that group ever happily relinquish their claim to such considerations. That is the painful reality that confronts America in its quest to wind down race based affirmative action. This is precisely why the Supreme Court must boldly accept its responsibility to interpret the Constitution, as it sees it. And, in this regard, constitutional scholars for decades have consistently opined that the Constitution is “colorblind.”
Yet, when it comes to race, the Court has chosen to be incremental in its efforts to deal with race. Instead of ruling once and for all that race preferences offend the principle of equal treatment and violate the simple command of equality proclaimed in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Court, every 25 years or so, reminds us that the Constitution “barely tolerates” race preferences, but it nonetheless allows such policies to continue.
In 2003, the Court savaged the fundamental principle of equal treatment for every person when it jumped on the “diversity” bandwagon. Certainly, the Court recognizes the inherent contradiction between the principle of equal treatment for every person and its decision to allow the use of race as a way to achieve diversity. Equal treatment carries with it the abiding belief that every individual is endowed with certain unalienable rights. Among those rights is the right to be treated as an individual in the public arena by one’s government. The pursuit of diversity harbors no respect for the individual. Rather, such a pursuit licenses the government to discriminate against some individuals to ensure that the ultimate mixture of students yields enough of some “races” to produce a critical mass of whatever is not produced through the normal process of competition. Thus, the pursuit of diversity produces an irreconcilable conflict with individual rights.
With the Supreme Court clearing the way for the people to achieve a society that exalts equal treatment, it is now incumbent upon the people to take the action that a majority of the Supreme Court justices refuse to take: end preferences and relegate race to the dustbin of history. | {
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Check out our new site Makeup Addiction
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Where's the Shredder? Right. here. | {
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After the owners of the U.S. conservative magazine, the Weekly Standard, announced last Friday it was shutting down and firing dozens of people during the holiday season, U.S. President Donald Trump quickly took to Twitter to celebrate.
Trump wrote, “The pathetic and dishonest Weekly Standard, run by failed prognosticator Bill Kristol (who, like many others, never had a clue), is flat broke and out of business. Too bad. May it rest in peace!”
For Trump, his obnoxious glee was clearly justified. The end of the Weekly Standard further shrinks the space on the right for anti-Trump conservatives, and is yet another sign of just how much Trump has remade the Republican Party in his own image - a fundamentally different set of values and policies to those once proudly espoused by U.S. conservatives.
Founded by Kristol and Fred Barnes in 1995, just after the GOP’s historic Congressional sweep and Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America, the Weekly Standard grew to become the focal point of intellectual conservatism in the U.S. - nicknamed the “in-flight magazine of Air Force One” during the George W Bush administration.
The magazine featured some of the right’s most respected voices from Charles Krauthammer to David Frum to Christopher Hitchens to David Brooks and was a major force in pushing for and selling both the war on terror and the war in Iraq.
However, it is likely to be best remembered for its last two years or so, in which it served as a platform for some of Trump’s most potent critics. The magazine’s writers, Kristol among them, serially called the president out for his “America First” agenda, his betrayal of conservative values, his mistruths, attacks on American institutions and traditions and lack of coherent policy. It appears that The Weekly Standard’s subscribers will be moved over to the relaunched Washington Examiner magazine, a publication far less committed to principled opposition to Trump.
Anti-Trump conservatives had become that rare voice in American media life: commentators, often with deep experience in government if not White House service under Republican presidents, offering fact and morality-based criticism of Trump, which could break though the partisan echo chambers and both left and right.
But the Weekly Standard’s demise is just one sign of how fragile and contested that ground is with many in the “Never Trump” movement becoming ever fiercer critics of the president as Trump loyalists close ranks behind him. Former top GOP strategists and policy makers who have consistently raised the alarm against Trump - such as Frum and Ana Navarro - are now considered irredeemably "fake news" by most Trump supporters, who also reject the calls to rethink and resurrect American conservatism from its deterioration and contamination by Trump.
Anti-Trump conservatives are now more likely to find a welcome and employment in mainstream centrist/center-left media such as the New York Times, the Atlantic and the Washington Post.
Indeed, the week preceding Friday’s announcement offered yet another example of the depths to which mainstream pro-Trump media has descended - on Fox, Trump’s in-house cable network.
On Wednesday, on Laura Ingraham’s high-ratings Fox News show, Ann Coulter claimed that the Democratic party was constituted by “Muslims and the Jews and the various exotic sexual groups and the black church ladies with the college queers” united only by their hatred of “white men.” Coulter was quickly called out from across the political spectrum as a racist.
Later that same day, Fox host Sean Hannity and ex-White House assistant and Fox News contributor Seb Gorka discussed the sentencing of disgraced former national security adviser Michael Flynn who plead guilty to lying to the FBI. Gorka and Hannity repeatedly attacked the integrity of the FBI, minimized Flynn’s actions and called the whole affair “entrapment.” Gorka’s spin went so far as to suggest Trump should pardon Flynn and make him his new chief of staff.
Then on Thursday to top it all off, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, whose popularity has surged since he took a sharp right-hand racist turn, declared immigrants make the United States “poorer and dirtier.” Ironically, Carlson was part of the Weekly Standard’s first staff and featured on the masthead of its first issue.
While the pro-Trump media is actively working to discredit Trump’s detractors and the legal challenges swirling around him, and attempting to make some of his more hardline policies - like his stance on immigration - seem more palatable and urgent, the Weekly Standard did none of that, its writers held fast to modern conservative principles: free trade, respect for rule of law and standing up to foreign despots.
The Weekly Standard also focused on enlarging the conservative movement to include women, minorities and younger voters. Ben Shapiro, in May this year, offered a prescription for how to win them back. He argues that young people should be attracted by the new GOP’s emphasis on fighting political correctness, “Freedom of speech is good because you have value as an individual human being with a unique point of view; you’re not reducible to your skin color, your ethnicity, or your income.”
The magazine became synonymous with neo-conservatism. While that term has become pejorative, its principles explain why many of the magazine’s writers never embraced Trump. Neoconservatives, many with Jewish roots, strove to ensure that the hard won victories of the twentieth century over fascism and communism, for human rights and against genocide, would be preserved, at all costs. Hitchens wrote in the Standard in September 2005, in defense of the war in Iraq, “Coexistence with aggressive regimes or expansionist, theocratic, and totalitarian ideologies is not in fact possible.”
Despite the obvious and tragic policy failures of neo-conservative policy not least in the Mideast, it still declared its fidelity to a moral backbone, the Constitution and what were once more universally accepted as conservative American values.
That was why the Weekly Standard had such a long-running feud with GOP Rep. Steve King, well-known as America’s white supremacist Congressman, who quickly jumped on the Trump bandwagon slamming the Weekly Standard after its demise. King tweeted, “.@RealDonaldTrump is right on The Weekly Standard’s deserved demise (“pathetic and dishonest”). If the articles targeting me were redacted until only truth remained, there would not be much left to read.”
The feud was particularly fierce regarding vile anti-immigrant remarks that the Standard reported King made. King later denied that the audio of his remarks existed and even taunted the magazine to release the tapes - which it eventually did.
Adam Rubenstein, the magazine’s former assistant opinion editor shot back at King on Twitter, “...We released the audio recording of what you said, after you dishonestly disputed my reporting. As Hayes [the magazine’s former editor-in-chief] put it, we "wouldn’t focus on your bigotry if you weren’t a bigot."
And the founding Weekly Standard deputy editor John Podhoretz had this to say about Steve King, once an unpleasant but gratifyingly outlier GOP congressman: “The problem with this tweet [dancing on the Standard’s grave] is that you are a foul, disgusting liar and a stain on American public life. The stench of your deceit and your views pollutes your district, your state, your party, and the United States.”
In a week when U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, who once passionately led the charge to impeach Bill Clinton in 1999, says of Trump today that he has “no problem” with the president “lying about sex.” And when the longest-serving GOP senator in history, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee, says he doesn’t care if the president commits a crime, there can be little doubt as to just how much conservative principles are quickly eroding.
While it’s a cheap win for the president to herald its collapse as a victory for Trumpism, it should also be noted that many of the Weekly Standard’s storied writers have gained vastly enlarged audiences for their anti-Trump columns and public events in the non-conservative media landscape - a far larger megaphone with which to righteously berate the president. | {
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Big Huge Games is a name that anyone familiar with the fall of 38 Studios knows well. But before building Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, Big Huge Games was known for strategy. Brian Reynolds and Tim Train, founders of both the new and old Big Huge Games developed Rise of Nations.
Reynolds tells us that it was luck and timing that allowed the team to recapture the Big Huge Games name. The trademark was up for auction in Rhode Island, who was selling off 38 Studios assets to recuperate money lost in the economic development deal. The old Big Huge Games was acquired by Epic Games and renamed Impossible Studios before being shuttered in February 2013.
Now, the studio (formerly called SecretNewCo) has a partnership with South Korean publisher Nexon, 26 employees, and is working toward the release of its first game: DomiNations. Reynolds, who also co-founded Firaxis, describes the game in terms that will seem familiar to fans of the Civilization series.
“[DomiNations] is a historical strategy game that covers the sweep of human history,” Reynolds says. “You move through the ages and build wonders of the world, make alliances, and rule your kingdom.”
As you watch the trailer above, you won’t be blamed if you get a distinct Clash of Clans vibe. Reynolds is open about DomiNations’ borrowing some of those elements, but points out some places where the two games diverge.
“They are similar in some of their execution,” Reynolds tells us. “There’s no question that Clash of Clans is the first huge smash hit of mobile strategy games. We think of it as this developing new genre, and we have certainly taken some inspiration, but we don’t think anyone has done a ‘sweep of human history’ game in that genre yet.”
You’ll choose one of a number of civilizations at the start of the game, each with different benefits. Unlike Firaxis’ series, you’re stuck with that choice for better or worse. Reynolds identifies this as a major differentiator between DomiNations and other titles like Supercell’s Clash of Clans.
You’ll make a number of irrevocable changes throughout the game like this, including which wonders to build. You’ll also have choices related to exploration, peeling back the fog of war and uncovering new terrain on which to build. DomiNations is a free-to-play title, and the monetization is similar to Clash of Clans, in that you can pay to speed up construction.
You’ll be able to play from the earliest days of humanity through the enlightenment era of the late 1800s. As time goes on, Big Huge Games will add more periods, extending the arc and pushing the end-game further out.
No specific release date is available yet. However, Big Huge Games expects to release the title on Apple and Android devices in 2015. | {
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Yesterday, I demonstrated that the report by Dr. James Tansey of UBC Sauder School of Business blaming red tape instead of foreign speculators has used a demonstrably false report as basis for estimating the impact of government regulations on housing prices.
Today we look at the second half of Dr. Tansey’s claim, i.e., that foreign buyers are having little impact on housing prices.
Here’s Dr. Tansey’s exact claim:
The CMHC study cited above, which is the most authoritative to date demonstrates that the effect of foreign investors is small compared to other factors.
The CMHC study Dr. Tansey is referring to is the report from earlier May 2018 titled *Examining Escalating House Prices in Large Canadian Metropolitan Centres* .
Here’s what the report actually says about foreign buyers (emphasis mine):
A persistent challenge in understanding demand for housing in Canada is the extent of foreign investment. We have supported Statistics Canada in their efforts to bring better data to bear on this question while filling short-term data gaps ourselves. Ontario and British Columbia have also started collecting data on the flow of foreign investment. It remains difficult to quantify the impact of foreign investment, however. The comprehensive data released by Statistics Canada in late 2017 suggest that non-residents account for 3.4 per cent of residential properties in Toronto, and 4.9 per cent in Vancouver. Non-resident owners, however, tend to own proportionately more condominium apartments than singledetached housing. As discussed below, however, prices of single-detached housing have increased proportionately more than those of condominium apartments. While official data on the stock and flow of foreign investment appear low, it is possible that upsurges of foreign investment at market peaks could alter expectations of domestic homebuyers on the price they should pay for housing, and encourage domestic speculators. Our new Homebuyers Motivation Survey shows that 52 per cent of the buyers who purchased a home recently in Toronto and Vancouver believed that foreign buyers were having an influence on home prices in those centres. Actions taken by the Provinces to curtail foreign investment could therefore have been timely to reduce excessive short-term spikes in house prices.
Dr. Tansey is being intellectually dishonest by claiming that the CMHC study ”demonstrates that the effect of foreign investors is small compared to other factors.” CMHC report admits that it’s difficult to gauge the impact, and suggests that even if the foreign buyer numbers are low, foreign buyers could be punching above their weight by altering the expectations of local buyers. CMHC even concludes that the BC’s and Ontario’s foreign buyer tax may have been a timely measure to cool down housing prices. | {
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In 1915 the National Biscuit Company (NBC) filed 13 copyright infringement suits against such firms as Ohio Baking Company, Dake Cracker Company, Hargrave Bisuit Co., and Pacific Coast Biscuit Co. to enjoin these businesses from either infringing upon NBC’s brand names (including their registered “InerSeal”) and/or violating the sanctity of their packaging motifs.
In a few cases, injunctions were asked to stop the unauthorized use of similar trade names, NBC’s Uneeda Biscuit vs. Iwanta Biscuit, whereby the defendants were ordered to restrain fraudulent competition “in imitating the complainant’s packages or cartons in size and color and general appearance.”
The list of offenses were often quite exact: “The defendants claim that they have the right to use the straight lines and cures in a trademark, that they have the right to use the word ‘seal,’ that they have the right to use white lines on a red background, and that they have the right to use cartons of a particular size and different colors which they have adopted for their packages, and that the complainant cannot appropriate any of these things so as to preclude others from their use.” (The outcome was in favor of NBC.)
One such case, found in National Biscuit Company’s annual book of Trade Mark Litigation: Opinions, Orders, Injunctions and Decrees Relating to Unfair Competition and Infringement of Trade Marks against the Pacific Coast Biscuit Company of New Jersey, were adjudged guilty of various violations of trade name and trade dress and ordered to retrain from using the “Swastika” or red end seal or trademark, “calculated to mislead or deceive. . . ”
It’s not at all clear what is more shocking, the exactitude of some of the mimicked package designs or the widespread application of the swastika logo, which is nonetheless so ubiquitous that registering it as a trademark is impossible. The courts were very strict about how close a competitor could edge up to the line of deception regarding trade name and package design.
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#copyright #DailyHeller #packagingdesign #trademark #StevenHeller #NationalBiscuitCompany #Plaigarism | {
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The Black Forest stretches from Karlsruhe as far as the Upper Danube and from Pforzheim to Lörrach with its pine forests, pastures and mountain lakes. There are monasteries, castles and ruins – much of it relatively untouched by the modern world.
When strolling through these ancient woodlands, some things for the witch to watch out for are the Lumbricus Badensis (giant earthworm), red-capped fly agaric toadstools and the mischievous Wolpertinger, a reclusive hybrid animal of the region.
A close relative of the Wolpertinger was described by Pliny The Elder in his Natural History as a creature with the body of a bird and a rabbit’s head, said to inhabit the Alps.
They are part of a larger family of horned mammals that exist throughout the Germanic regions of Europe, such as the Austrian raurakl (identical to the wolpertinger), the Thuringian rasselbock (a cousin of the American jackolope) and the North Hessian dilldapp (more hamsterlope than jackolope) and the Swedish skvader (a fine example of which is on display at the Sundsvall Natural History Museum).
Images of creatures resembling the wolpertinger have been found in woodcuts and engravings dating back to the 17th century. It has been claimed that these are based on found skeletons of rabbits suffering from the Shope papillomavirus, which causes bony tumours to grown on the rabbits head and body, but that seems to me to be reaching a bit.
While the wolpertinger is rarely spotted in the wild (and according to legend, only at full moon), you can find man-made facsimiles occasionally, some of which are exceptionally amusing to look at.
“One way of coping with something unknown is to make an imaginary representation of it so that it may be identified and may through familiarity, become less frightening.”
Animal Fakes & Frauds – Peter Dance
Unlike the South African Tokoloshe or the Balinese Leyak, Wolpertingers and their kin are not necessarily maliceful or destructive, rather, they embody the spirit of the forest: playful, joyous, free and only slightly sinister.
To evoke the animal spirits within yourself and break free for a while from the anodyne and too-familiar modern world, I recommend this powerful mixture, combining the specialities of the area: Black Forest Gateaux and strong coffee.
Wolpertini
1 shot unsweetened strong espresso coffee
1 shot chocolate liqueur
½ shot black cherry syrup
Dash cherry liqueur or Kirschwasser
3 tablespoons lightly whipped double cream
Garnish: grated bitter chocolate & glace cherries
This can be mixed by hand, but it’s preferable to use a cocktail shaker.
It is entirely up to you whether you wish to make this a hot or a cold cocktail. Your choice may be influenced by which method you use to obtain your coffee shot. If you prepare it at home, it is simpler to make, mix and drink straight away, so a hot version may be preferred.
For myself, I never make coffee at home as I have 3 perfectly good coffee shops on the street directly opposite me and prefer to let their baristas do the work.
For this cocktail, therefore, I am using pre-prepared iced espresso shots from the supermarket and leaving them cold.
Add to your coffee shot a shot of chocolate liqueur. You can use any of the choco-options available. Classic Crème de Cacao is excellent and Godiva Chocolate Liqueur has been recommended by my fellow coven members.
I am using Mozart Black Chocolate liqueur as it is less sweet than most.
Add half a shot of cherry syrup, ideally black cherry or Morello cherry syrup. You can never go wrong with the Monin range.
Add a hard dash (approximately 1/3 of a shot) of cherry liqueur or Kirschwasser.
Have your cream prepared and ready before you shake the ingredients vigorously together, pour into the glass and add the cream as a floater.
Float the cream on top over the back of a spoon, letting the edge of the glass take the impact rather than pouring to the centre. A steady hand is needed for this, but you should end up with a perfect white snowcap.
This is the ideal method, but if you have no desire to be a hero, you can get a can of squirty cream and just squirt away.
Do not mix again, just sprinkle a pinch of bitter grated chocolate over the top and drink.
Pretzels on the side would be a good choice of snack.
Put on some suitable music during the entire process and turn it up when you imbibe. I will make some suggestions here, but anything which you find invigorating or exciting is fine and dandy.
Wolpertini Playlist
“Paddling Out” – Miike Snow
“I Fink U Freeky” – Die Antwoord
“Open Up” – Chic
“Paranoia”– Harvey Danger
“Peek-A-Boo” – Siouxsie & The Banshees
“Psycho Killer” – Talking Heads
“A Question of Time” – Depeche Mode
“Road Rage” – Catatonia
“The Savage” – The Shadows
“Scorpio Rising” – Death In Vegas
“Scratch Your Name” – The Noisettes
“Seremonia” – Apparat Organ Quartet
“Profondo Rosso Theme” – Goblin
“Spoonman” – Soundgarden
Remember that you are aiming for an elated, slightly unhinged state of mind, not violent insanity. If you start feeling too dangerous, try these as an alternative:
“The Magic Wood” – Joan Baez
“Teddy Bears Picnic” – Nina Steele
“Little Red Riding Hood” – Sam the Sham & The Pharaohs
“Love Potion No. 9” – The Clovers
“Corn Rigs” – Paul Giovanni
“Big Bad Wolf” – The Sham-ettes
“How Do” – The Sneaker Pimps
“Foul Owl On The Prowl” – Boomer & Travis
Let your spirits rise and your mood lighten as you get in touch with your inner forest spirit. And bear in mind that if you drink more than three of these late at night, the alcohol, sugar, fat and caffeine content combined with powerful music may cause you to believe three impossible things before breakfast the next day. | {
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Aaron Lennon's adroit winner and Gareth Bale's justified dismay at, once again, being branded a diver commanded more attention but Tottenham's two central midfielders were the key to the team's sixth win in eight Premier League games.
The strength and intelligence of Sandro, especially, and Mousa Dembélé ensured that Spurs were able to control the game for prolonged periods while leaving their wingers free to concentrate on attack.
Things worked so well that Sandro suggested André Villas-Boas's players could be champions come May. "Everybody talks about Manchester United and City and even Chelsea for the title but never Spurs," said the Brazilian. "Why not Spurs? We have a good coach, a good squad and everything is working well.
"This is a fast, dangerous team built to attack and we are not content to just be a top-four side. No one is talking about Spurs as champions but then, bang, we will win it and they will be talking about Tottenham then."
Sandro and Dembélé are so powerfully accomplished that, unlike many Premier League counterparts, they can thrive in a 4-4-2 formation against alternatively configured opponents fielding three central midfielders.
Sunderland's 4-4-1-1 system meant, in effect, they had two-and-a-half men staffing that department on Saturday, but Sandro ensured that Stéphane Sességnon flitted around to limited effect while Dembélé concentrated on involving Lennon and Bale at every opportunity.
Nearly a year since being dismissed by Chelsea, Villas-Boas's moulding of this Brazilian-Belgian axis has not only ensured Luka Modric's departure was not the disaster it might have been but quietly restored his boy wonder reputation.
Judging by the visiting manager's friendly words of touchline tactical advice for Jermain Defoe and the post final whistle hugs reserved for the substitute Scott Parker and his assistant Steffen Freund, the 35-year-old is also developing the sort of human, empathetic touch critics claimed he lacked at Stamford Bridge.
Tottenham's Gareth Bale, right, shows his displeasure at being booked against Sunderland. Photograph: Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto/Allstar
The narrative of Villa-Boas's perceived past coldness is widely accepted but maybe he has not changed quite so radically as imagined at Spurs. Perhaps the frostiness belonged largely to a cabal of senior Chelsea players? "I always believed in my managerial ability," he said. "But it's an unpredictable job."
Like his old mentor, Sir Bobby Robson, the Portuguese – displaying a sense of humour noticeably absent during his west London days – is able to entertain an opposing viewpoint, which explains the sympathy he extended to Martin Atkinson following Bale's harsh late booking for a perceived dive in the face of Craig Gardner's challenge.
"It was a big refereeing mistake but Gareth's pace makes things very difficult for referees to judge," said Villas-Boas, adopting the sort of conciliatory, measured, magnanimous tone Sir Alex Ferguson often avoids. "Speed is difficult to analyse and everyone makes mistakes."
A fifth booking of the season means Bale misses Tuesday's meeting with Reading and the winger dubbed the league's principal diver did not share his manager's capacity for forgiveness. "If there's contact, what do you want me to do, hit my head on the floor?" Bale said. "I have to put my hands down to protect myself."
Earlier he had flattered to deceive, exciting Spurs fans but frustrating them too as his final delivery repeatedly undid some thrilling approach work.
Lennon eventually blossomed but a surprisingly slow start against the Sunderland left-back Matt Kilgallon – deputising for the ineligible Tottenham loanee Danny Rose – allied to Emmanuel Adebayor shooting against the bar from two yards, offered Sunderland early hope.
Sebastian Larsson struggled in central midfield but few players take a meaner dead ball and his free-kick laden with curve, dip and vicious pace prefaced John O'Shea giving Martin O'Neill's side a 40th‑minute lead.
Its fragility was confirmed when Carlos Cuéllar headed a corner into his own net and Lennon manipulated the ball around O'Shea before beating the excellent Simon Mignolet with a fine right-footed finish.
Spurs deserved to win but Sunderland have improved significantly over the past month and, like Villas-Boas and Sandro, O'Neill can approach 2013 with optimism.
Man of the match Sandro (Tottenham Hotspur) | {
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AI Trends Shaping the Future of Retail
Artificial Intelligence is essentially intelligence demonstrated by machines, similar to the natural intelligence used by humans. Due to its constantly evolving nature and its ability to learn from experiences, AI is able to achieve things like independent decision making and problem-solving, and in some cases can even understand and respond to user-generated questions. Artificial Intelligence has improved tremendously over the last few years and its use in various sectors and industries is rapidly on the rise, but how exactly does it benefit the retail industry?
AI In Retail
In terms of AI Retail Services, Artificial Intelligence’s most prolific use in retail is in self-learning algorithms. These algorithms each serve their own specific purpose and continuously evolve to become more advanced as they process more data. As retailers show more interest in this revolutionary technology, a recent surge in AI retail developments has led to the emergence of two major AI trends: personalisation and prediction.
Personalisation
There’s no denying it – modern customers want, and even expect personalisation. For centuries, dedicated in-store sales associates have been the pinnacle of personalised shopping experiences, but the fact is that there are certain things that machines can do better and faster than their human counterparts. For example, while a sales associate might be able to recommend items based on customer information gathered there and then, there’s no way for them to take other factors like a customer’s past web or social media activity into consideration.
Advanced AI algorithms take into account information a retailer has gathered on potential customers and analyse their behaviours to determine the best course of action that will increase the likelihood of a shopper making a purchase – and it only takes them a fraction of a second to do so.
AI in retail isn’t just limited to sales, however. Popular UK-based online supermarket Ocado has been leveraging AI retail services to enhance their customers’ online shopping experience, and to categorise incoming messages from customers in order to reply to them faster and boost their overall customer experience.
Predictions
As we previously mentioned, data collected by retail AI algorithms can be used to accurately predict and recommend products a customer might be interested in. Predictions powered by AI can also be used by retailers on a wider scale to help predict and forecast demand, giving them a better idea of what’s more likely to sell, and enabling them to manage their inventory more efficiently. Retail giant Amazon has been using similar AI prediction technology for years now, and has even taken it a step further by developing an AI-based system that can actually predict new and upcoming fashion trends. This is achieved by analyzing shoppers’ social media posts and other web behaviors – allowing Amazon to prioritise new and upcoming fashion on their site, as well as giving them valuable data that can be used by their own fashion brands.
AI prediction in retail is a game changer, so much so that it’s already influencing UK retail design services. When designing retail spaces for their clients, UK retail design agencies like Untitled Project can incorporate AI into their designs to help manage inventory and give retailers more insight as to how to plan their next move.
The Future of AI Retail Technology
Even though relatively new to the retail industry, Artificial Intelligence is already viewed as a futuristic way to simultaneously improve customer experiences and increase revenue. AI-driven personalisation and prediction will undoubtedly have a major influence on the future of retail, both on and offline, and practically any brand or retailer can start benefiting from this incredible technology. As a premier UK Artificial Intelligence company, Untitled Project is at the forefront of AI retail technology. Get in touch with us today to find out how combining our expert in AI retail services with our top-notch retail design services can take your brand to the next level. | {
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With the relentless tide of human misery suffered by innocents in Syria, we have to welcome any deal that could end fighting in most areas of the country. The provisional ceasefire brokered between the United States and Russia, which is to take effect on Monday, seems to offer that prospect.
Nobody would call the agreement perfect – particularly the vagueness about the future of Syrian president Bashar Al Assad, whose clinging to power has visited so much destruction upon his country – but after 10 months of failed ceasefires and the continuing nightmare for millions of civilians, even an imperfect agreement is a cause for cautious optimism.
The Assad regime will stop targeting rebel forces in most areas of the country and there will be a joint US-Russian air campaign against ISIL and other extremist groups. There will also be new negotiations about the country’s political future.
Moderate opposition groups cautiously welcomed the deal, on the proviso that the Assad regime fulfil its obligations. Their condition is entirely understandable, based on the many times the regime has said one thing but then done another, regardless of the human misery such duplicity has had on ordinary people who find themselves standing in the way of Mr Al Assad’s survival and that of his regime.
Of concern will be that there is no clear path for Mr Al Assad to be eased from power, just vague references about discussions between Russia and the regime on that issue. For good reason, many groups in Syria believe that the president is part of the problem and cannot be part of the solution.
But in keeping with the aphorism that “perfect is the enemy of good”, an imperfect deal that ends the carnage in most parts of Syria but continues to sanction raids on radical groups such as ISIL and Al Qaeda is still worth pursuing.
While this might be yet another false dawn, we have to take seriously anything that offers the chance to improve the lot of a benighted generation of Syrians, nearly 500,000 of whom have been killed, with millions more forced from their homes.
As we know all too well, Syria’s problems do not stay neatly within that country’s borders and have already manifested themselves in the refugee crisis and by being a recruiting tool for terror groups world wide. | {
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The endangered North Atlantic right whale population took a big hit last year, with a record number killed by fishing gear entanglements and ship strikes. That’s giving new urgency to an ongoing debate over threats posed by Maine's lobster industry.
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist Mark Baumgartner says that to help the whales survive much longer, the rope Maine lobstermen use to tend their traps must be modified or even eliminated. And it's not just for the whales' sake.
"I feel the industry is in jeopardy,” Baumgartner says.
He was in Maine this month for the annual lobstermen's association meeting, to detail the whale's plight. If the lobster industry doesn't respond effectively, he says, the federal government will step in.
“As the population continues to decline and pressure is put on the government to do something about it, then they're going to turn to closures, because that's all they'll have," Baumgartner says.
There were about 450 North Atlantic right whales estimated to be alive in 2016. Only five calves were born last year, while there were 17 deaths caused by rope and gear entanglement or ship strikes.
Baumgartner says with no new births and another death already this year the trend-line is tipping toward the whale's effective extinction within 20 years.
The head of a North Atlantic right whale peers up from the water as another whale passes behind in Cape Cod Bay near Provincetown, Mass. in 2008. (Stephan Savoia/AP)
His warnings are getting a somewhat frosty reception from Maine lobstermen such as Bob Williams, who’s been hauling traps off Stonington for more than 60 years.
"There was a lot of deaths on the right whales this year, but none in the Gulf of Maine," Williams says, reflecting a complaint heard from many Maine lobstermen.
None of the dead whales were found near Maine's coast. But three were found off Cape Cod (which is part of the Gulf of Maine), where Baumgartner uses passive recording devices to help track their movements.
Massachusetts' already-diminished lobster fishery in recent years has been closed during the height of right whale migrations.
Williams says the industry in Maine has stepped up too, adopting expensive gear required by regulators. Now scientists are proposing new modifications, such as weaker ropes or even rope-less technology that relies on radio signals to locate traps. But Williams says those are likely unworkable off Maine.
"Because we have heavy tides and all that and the farther east you go down towards eastern Maine, the extreme tides down there," he says.
Many fingers in Maine are pointing the blame at Canada.
"Canada needs to step up," says Patrick Kelliher, the commissioner of Maine's Department of Marine Resources.
Kelliher says that while the Gulf of Maine is a known part of the whales' territory, their paths lie mostly far off Maine's coast. Meanwhile, he says, Canada's Gulf of St. Lawrence has suddenly become a killing ground.
"With what's going on in the Gulf of St. Lawrence right now with the Canadian crab fishery, that's where most of that gear is,” Kelliher says. “If you looked at the diameter of that rope, that's not Maine fishing gear; [it] could be offshore lobster gear but a lot of it is known to be Canadian."
In an unusual new circumstance, most of the whales found dead last year turned up in Canada's Gulf of St. Lawrence, rather then U.S. waters.
Scientist conjecture that the whales could be ranging more widely, following the ebb and flow of their traditional food sources, or looking for new ones. Their staple is a tiny crustacean called Calanus finmarchicus, whose abundance changes with the currents and the climate.
Scientist Mark Baumgartner and colleagues tagged 18 North Atlantic right whales and used satellite telemetry to chart their movements. What they found surprised them: The whales ranged far more widely around the Gulf of Maine than they had expected. (Courtesy Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
"The reason whales died last year is because they were utilizing relatively new habitats, where there's no protective legislation in place, " says Erin Meyer-Gutbrod, a marine scientist at the University of California Santa Barbara. "They're facing waters that aren't protected by vessel speed reductions, fishing gear regulations, seasonal fishery closures, they don't have any of those protections because we didn't realize they were going to be there."
Earlier this year the Canadian government did impose new requirements that would be familiar to U.S. lobstermen, like strictures on floating rope and mandatory reporting of lost gear. And late last month Canada Department of Fisheries and Oceans biologist Matthew Harding floated a new idea to skeptical fishermen in New Brunswick's growing snow crab industry.
He told a CBC reporter that the government could shut down a large swathe of the fishery when whales might be present, or it could take more dynamic action — smaller temporary closures that could be could be more mobile and more tailored and specific to certain areas.
Similar strategies are being explored in the U.S. But there may not be much time. Last month the New England-based Conservation Law Foundation filed a federal lawsuit against the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for violating the Endangered Species Act. CLF says the feds are failing to regulate Maine's lobster fishery in a way that protects the whale from extinction.
CLF lawyer Emily Green says it's a vital issue for the organization's members.
"The majesty of this incredible species that they've been able to experience. Those are moments the these people really treasure,” Green says. “They would experience it as a personal loss, if they knew that was something they could never experience again because in their lifetime their own government had failed to protect the preservation of the species."
Stakeholders in both countries are working to prop up the struggling species without sinking the lobster and crab industries.
But the question now is whether legal action could hasten new fishery closures, and whether that would do enough to save the whales.
This story comes via the New England News Collaborative and was first published by Maine Public. | {
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In January 1949, the Deens were disturbed by scratching sounds coming from their walls and ceiling in their home in a Maryland suburb of Washington DC.
They believed they had rodents and called in an exterminator who found no evidence of the critters. Although he tried to get rid of the animals, the noises only became louder. Then, there were noises like someone walking in the hall with squeaky shoes. At times, furniture and dishes moved for no apparent reason.
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Then, Douglas Deen was attacked. His bed shook and the bedclothes were pulled off. When he tried to hold onto them, he was pulled to the floor.
Finally, the Deens were convinced that they had an evil spirit and asked their Lutheran minister, Rev Luther Schultz for help, according to Guiley and most of the articles I have read. According to, solely to Wilson, the Lutheran minister’s name was M. Winston. I use the name that the majority of sources use.
Schultz tried to help. He said prayers for Douglass and asked the thing that possessed the boy to leave him alone in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
The terrifying events continued and the boy could not sleep. In February, the Rev. Schultz invited the boy to spend the night at his house.
Mrs. Schultz spent the night in the guest room and Douglass and Schultz were going to sleep in the twin beds in the master bedroom.
Schultz heard Douglass’ bed creating, then felt it. It was vibrating. The boy was awake, but lay very still.
Schultz suggested Douglass sleep in a heavy arm chair and kept watch. The chair moved backwards several inches. The minister told Douglass to put his legs on the chair, giving it his full weight. The chair continued to move until it ran into the wall.
The chair began to turn, in surreal slow motion until it dumped Douglass on the floor. He was not hurt. Schultz noticed that the boy appeared to be in a trance and had not tried to get out of the slow moving chair.
The next day, Schultz persuaded to have Douglass treated at a mental health clinic. The boy acted wildly and the words, “Go to St. Louis,” appeared on his chest. The color was red, like blood.
Douglass’ favorite aunt lived in that city, so he was sent to the St. Louis Hospital. The family thought it would be good for him. Then, he exhibited symptoms characteristic of possession. He drooled steadily and coughed up phlegm. Scratches appeared on his arms.
It was decided to exorcise the boy. For 35 days, three Jesuit priests and an Episcopal priest and a Lutheran minister performed at least twenty exorcisms.
Douglass’ body would jerk violently. He had supernatural strength and spat in the exorcists’ eyes. The attacks abated and, after he returned home, they disappeared.
Father Walter Halloran, a Jesuit Priest and the last living exorcist who performed the rite on Douglass, died on March 9th of this year. According to what he said during an interview, Father William S. Bowden asked him to help with the exorcism. It was performed at Alexian Brothers Hospital.
The boy would get violent and the elder priest needed someone strong to help him. One day, Douglass, in a violent fit, broker Father Halloran’s nose.
According to Wilson, the boy replied to the rite of exorcism in Latin. This could have happened. I have not read this in other accounts. It is Wilson’s reasoning as to why the boy could speak in Latin that I have a problem with.
According to this author, Douglass could have unconsciously picked up the language at “mass” at church. He wrote that the parents appealed to their Lutheran minister for help. Lutherans do not have mass and they do not and did not, in 1949, conduct services in Latin. According to all accounts I have read, the boy was Lutheran.
Schultz contacted J. B. Rhine was the director of the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University. Rhine and his wife, Louisa, also a parapsychologist drove to Washington to talk to Schultz about the case. By this time, the phenomena had ceased, so the Rhines could not make personal evaluations.
The Deens, the Rev. Schultz and the exorcists were convinced Douglass was possessed. Rhine differed. He believed that the boy was expressing his unconscious ability to affect matter, PK, psychokinesis, the ability of the mind to affect matter which is the phenomena that occurs in poltergeist cases.
It is possible that Douglass could have been a human agent poltergeist. The second and third stages of possession, infestation and obsession are poltergeist activity.
The trances, coughing up of phlegm and drooling are characteristic of possession. And, if Wilson is correct about the boy speaking in Latin, speaking in unknown languages is also characteristic of possession. | {
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There are a host of things that set Alexandria, a native Bronxite, apart from your run-of-the-mill House candidate. For starters, she's probably the only candidate in a House race who still gets carded at bars. And it's not hard to see why: with a vibrant smile and energetic, high-toned voice, her youthfulness is overwhelmingly obvious. But Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, though only 28 years old, isn't one to be underestimated. As a first-time candidate in the 2018 midterm elections, she's looking to unseat one the nation's most powerful Democratic incumbents.
UPDATE: Ocasio-Cortez won the Democratic primary to represent New York's 14th District in a landslide upset on June 26, beating long-term incumbent Rep. Joe Crowley by a margin of about 15 percent, per The New York Times. In a tweeted statement, Crowley congratulated Ocasio-Cortez on her win, saying that he looks forward to "supporting her and all Democrats this November." Ocasio-Cortez will face off against Republican Anthony Pappas in November.
EARLIER: A community organizer, Ocasio-Cortez's résumé includes working on economic policy, organizing for Bernie Sanders' campaign, and serving as an educational director for high school-age youth. She studied economics and international relations, and lists economic reforms, Medicare, health care, immigration rights, and climate change among her priorities should she get to office.
While other twenty-somethings might be out grabbing dinner with friends after work, Ocasio-Cortez would change into an extra set of clothes and set out canvassing. "I started my campaign out of a Trader Joe's bag with a bunch of printed palm cards and an idea," she tells me in an interview for Elite Daily. "I did that for five months."
Ocasio-Cortez had just turned eight when Democrat Joe Crowley was selected to represent New York's 7th district in 1998. At the time, the area encompassed parts of the Bronx and Queens, but thanks to a redistricting in 2012, the district is now New York's 14th. Now, 20 years later, she's threatening to unseat the man who's represented the district since she was a child.
She's got a steep uphill battle facing her June 26 primary. She'll face off against Crowley, who's exactly double her age and has more than 20 times the cash, before getting a shot at the November general election. According to the Federal Election Commission disclosures, her campaign had about $128,000 to Crowley's $2.78 million in funding. (She proudly touts that her campaign accepts no donations from corporate PACs.)
They're going to tell you as a young person, no matter what you've done, that you're not good enough.
If elected, Ocasio-Cortez could be the youngest woman ever elected to the House. According to the Congressional Research Service, the average age of a House member at the beginning of this session was 57.8 years, and 61.8 years for a senator. That's one of the highest averages in the legislature's history. Under the U.S. Constitution, House representatives must be at least 25 years old (and senators 30) when they take office. The youngest member of Congress currently is fellow New Yorker Elise Stefanik, who was 30 years old when she took office in 2015.
In fact, it's out of a sense of responsibility as a young person that Ocasio-Cortez is daring to take on a high-profile member of her own party. "Congress is too old, they don't have a stake in the game," she says. Issues like climate change and the rising costs of higher education and housing, she adds, aren't being addressed by the current representation.
Andy Hur
"They won't have to deal with 20 foot storm surges, but we will," she adds, referring to current officeholders. "It's going to be us and our kids that have to deal with this."
Voters across age brackets have embraced the idea of having a younger leader in office, Ocasio-Cortez tells me. And plenty of those potential voters are her own age. According to the Center for Information and Research on Civil Learning Engagements (CIRCLE) at Tufts University, 18- to 29-year-olds comprise 21 percent of the voting age population — more than the senior population. And Millennials will soon become the largest voting group in the country. They're not alone. There's also a surge of new voters — like the student activists behind the school gun violence protests this spring — who have made it clear they plan to exercise that power this November.
Ocasio-Cortez may be younger than most candidates, but she's had plenty of practice debating the issues. Growing up in a Puerto Rican family, "Politics were talked about at the table every single day," she explains. "It's the culture. In Puerto Rico, you talk about politics all the time, even when people disagree."
Ocasio-Cortez graduated from Boston University in 2011. I ask if she, like many Millennials, has any outstanding student loans — something Crowley, at 56, presumably doesn't have. "Oh heck yes," she says, laughing. "I'm definitely still paying these off."
In school, she got through financially on a combination of scholarships, work-study jobs and other odd jobs, and tutoring in economics. Upon graduation, she moved back to the Bronx and started working as an educator at the National Hispanic Institute. But after her father passed away at the height of the financial crisis in 2008, she had to take on additional jobs waitressing and bartending to help the family make ends meet.
Corey Torpie
Ocasio-Cortez still rents an apartment in the Bronx, but as a third-generation resident, she's now the only one of her immediate family who still lives there. "My mom had to move to Florida because she couldn't afford it" she tells me. "Our family is largely separated because of the cost of living in New York." Free tuition, affordable housing, and a $15 minimum wage are all issues on her priority list should she be elected.
And it's because Congress has so few representatives that are like her that Ocasio-Cortez believes more young people need to run for office. "We need an entire generation to start taking up these seats," she says.
"When you start, you're gonna be loaded with doubt," she says. "At a certain point, they're going to tell you as a young person, no matter what you've done, that you're not good enough. We just can't take that sitting down."
Her advice for young people like her is clear. "You just gotta own it, man. You just gotta own it," she says. "Don't ask permission, roll up your sleeves, and start knocking on people's doors."
Editor's note: This article has been updated to reflect that Ocasio-Cortez would be the youngest woman, not person, elected to the House. | {
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A prominent New Zealander facing sexual assault charges is on trial this week.
Photo: RNZ / Claire Eastham-Farrelly
The man, whose identity is currently supressed, is standing trial in the Auckland District Court after pleading not guilty to two charges each of of indecent assault and attempting to dissuade a witness.
He is on trial with two other men who face one and three charges of attempting to dissuade a witness respectively.
The high-profile New Zealander is accused of indecently assaulting two men in February 2008 and October 2016.
He is further charged with two charges of attempting to dissuade a witness from giving evidence in his trial in April and May of 2017.
All three defendants pleaded not guilty to each of the charges this morning.
The Crown - whose case will be led by Simon Foote and Henry Benson-Pope - is set to call 20 witnesses, including a number of detectives.
The trial before Judge Russell Collins and a jury of seven women and five men is set down for four weeks. | {
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Hugo Lloris insists Tottenham's philosophy cannot be compared to Liverpool's after losing to Jurgen Klopp's side in the Champions League final.
Having reached the showpiece event without signing a single player since January 2018, many believe Spurs are at a crossroads this summer.
Following defeat in the Champions League final to Real Madrid 12 months ago, Liverpool went out and spent big to come back strong this time around.
However, captain Lloris does not think it is realistic for Spurs to do the same.
0:37 Before the semi-final second leg, Lloris said he was aware of the importance of winning trophies
"It is difficult to compare both projects," Lloris said. "There is one club who sets out to win every competition in which they play, and that is not the case with Tottenham.
"We work and try to stick with the philosophy of the board, manager and the club.
"We look to improve every season and we have shown improvements year after year, so we now cannot throw everything in the bin after a Champions League final defeat.
"It's been a big step for the club and the only thing we can look to do is come back stronger next season."
If reading on skysports.com, comment below to get involved in the debate, but please adhere to our House Rules. If you wish to report any comment, simply click on the down arrow next to the offending comment and click 'Report'. | {
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Sedan i somras har striden om det så kallade copyrightdirektivet rasat.
Techjättar som Google har aktivt kraftsamlat för att stoppa det, då reformen kan tvinga dem att ta ansvar för att deras användare inte sprider upphovsrättskyddat material utan licens via deras plattformar.
Dessutom ger direktivet medier rätt till ersättning när nätplafformar använder deras material, även korta utdrag.
Efter att direktivet justerats i flera steg inom EU:s maskineri har två saker återstått. Dels ska ministerrådet rösta om saken, och dels ska EU-parlamentet göra detsamma.
Sveriges regering har tidigare varit kritisk. Men nu har regeringen svängt.
Det bekräftas i ett mejl som Breakits krönikör Emanuel Karlsten har fått från Patrik Sundberg, rättssakkunnig på Justitiedepartementet.
"I den nu aktuella omröstningen har medlemsstaterna haft att ta ställning till direktivet i sin helhet. Sverige har då gjort bedömningen att de positiva delarna av direktivet överväger de negativa och att det därför inte funnits skäl att rösta nej", skriver Patrik Sundberg i mejlet.
Ministerrådet har nu, med stor majoritet, godkänt copyrightdirektivet. Det uppger Financial Times.
Det sista steget innan direktivet blir lag i samtliga medlemsländer är nu en kommande omröstning i EU-parlamentet. Exakt när omröstningen sker är ännu inte bestämt, men den väntas ske i slutet av mars eller i början av april.
Flera svenska EU-parlamentariker är kritiska till copyrightdirektivet. Mest omstritt är artikel 11 och 13 – och om du vill veta mer om vad de innebär finns en matig genomgång här. | {
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D.C. United has never seemed right this year, even in pre-pandemic days, when it was slow to adapt to the departure of attacking stars Wayne Rooney and Luciano Acosta, as well as Paul Arriola’s long-term knee injury. | {
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Les élèves québécois et canadiens ont encore de quoi se réjouir dans les résultats du test PISA dévoilés mardi, à Paris. À nouveau, ils se classent parmi les plus forts en mathématiques, en lecture et en sciences. Tour d’horizon.
Marie-Eve Morasse
La Presse
Parmi les meilleurs lecteurs
En 2018, c’est la lecture qui a été au cœur de l’évaluation du Programme international pour le suivi des acquis des élèves (PISA) à laquelle se sont soumis les élèves.
Le Canada fait bonne figure et se classe sixième au monde, derrière la Chine*, Singapour, Macao, Hong Kong et l’Estonie. Les élèves canadiens ont, à 86 %, atteint un niveau où ils peuvent au minimum identifier l’idée principale d’un texte, trouver de l’information et avoir une réflexion sur l’objectif et la forme du texte.
Les Québécois arrivent troisièmes au pays, derrière l’Alberta et l’Ontario, mais ex æquo avec la Colombie-Britannique.
L’Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques (OCDE) note dans son rapport que les compétences en lecture ont été profondément transformées par les changements technologiques, notamment le téléphone intelligent. « La lecture n’est plus seulement l’extraction d’information ; il s’agit d’acquérir des connaissances, d’avoir une pensée critique et de faire des jugements basés sur des faits », écrit l’organisation.
Dans l’ensemble des pays de l’enquête, moins d’un élève sur dix a été capable de faire la différence entre un fait et une opinion. À ce titre, les Canadiens ont mieux que la grande majorité des pays évalués dans le cadre de ce test.
Encore une fois, les performances des élèves canadiens en mathématiques et en sciences sont au-dessus de la moyenne de l’OCDE. Dans l’ensemble du pays, ce sont les Québécois qui ont obtenu les meilleurs résultats en mathématiques.
L’organisation note toutefois que les performances canadiennes déclinent en mathématiques depuis 2003 et en sciences depuis 2006. En moyenne, les élèves de la Chine et de Singapour ont surpassé ceux de tous les autres pays tant en lecture qu’en mathématiques et en sciences.
* Quatre villes et provinces chinoises ont participé à l’étude, soit Pékin, Shanghai, Jiangsu et Zhejiang.
Intimidation et bonheur à l’école
Le Canada surpasse aussi la moyenne de l’OCDE dans des domaines moins enviables. Le quart des élèves canadiens ont dit être victimes d’intimidation à l’école, un pourcentage plus élevé que la moyenne observée par l’OCDE (23 %). Au Japon, par exemple, moins d’un élève sur dix a dit être victime d’intimidation.
Par ailleurs, 27 % des jeunes Canadiens ont rapporté que dans la plupart de leurs cours, sinon tous, l’enseignant doit attendre une longue période de temps avant que les élèves se taisent, comparativement à 26 % pour la moyenne de l’OCDE.
Par contre, la très forte majorité (93 %) des Canadiens disent se sentir « parfois » ou « toujours » heureux, et ils sont nombreux (87 %) à estimer qu’ils peuvent la plupart du temps trouver une solution à leurs problèmes.
« Dans la plupart des systèmes éducatifs, incluant le Canada, les filles ont exprimé une plus grande peur de l’échec que les garçons, et cette différence de genre est plus marquée chez les étudiants les plus performants », note l’OCDE dans son rapport.
Égalité
L’enquête PISA s’attarde aussi à l’égalité dans le monde de l’éducation. À titre d’exemple en lecture, 24 % des élèves canadiens venant d’un milieu socio-économique favorable ont été parmi les meilleurs aux tests, contre 7 % pour les élèves de milieux désavantagés.
« Au Canada, les étudiants les moins et les plus performants sont regroupés moins souvent dans les mêmes écoles que la moyenne des pays de l’OCDE », lit-on toutefois dans l’enquête.
Le rapport de l’organisation note aussi que 33 % des élèves canadiens inscrits dans une école en milieu désavantagé au niveau socio-économique fréquentent un milieu où la direction dit avoir de la difficulté à recruter des enseignants. Cette proportion chute à 18 % des élèves inscrits dans les écoles de milieux avantagés.
Qui passe ces tests ?
Les tests PISA évaluent les compétences des élèves de 15 ans, ce qui signifie pour plusieurs pays la fin du parcours scolaire obligatoire. En 2018, ce sont environ 600 000 élèves dans 79 pays qui y ont participé. Au Canada, cela représente 22 000 élèves répartis dans 800 écoles de 10 provinces. Le Yukon, les Territoires du Nord-Ouest et le Nunavut ne participent pas à cette étude, pas plus que les élèves autochtones des écoles de bande, précise le porte-parole du Conseil des ministres de l’Éducation du Canada.
Peut-on se fier aux tests PISA ?
« Sur le plan méthodologique, c’est pratiquement incontestable. Au fil des ans, on l’améliore continuellement et c’est public, si bien qu’on peut y faire des critiques », dit Jean Bernatchez, professeur en sciences de l’éducation à l’Université du Québec à Rimouski.
Encore faut-il être d’accord avec les « valeurs sous-jacentes », ajoute-t-il. « Ça met en évidence un certain nombre de valeurs, notamment la performance, qui se mesure par la compétence plutôt que par le savoir. » Les pays qui se retrouvent traditionnellement en tête du palmarès, par exemple le Japon, Hong Kong et Singapour, « privilégient le groupe au détriment de l’individu ».
En 2015, les données québécoises aux tests PISA avaient été jugées non représentatives par certains, en raison d’un boycott de cette enquête par la Fédération québécoise des directions d’établissement d’enseignement (FQDE). C’est chose du passé : les directions ont participé à l’enquête en 2018, dit Élodie Lacroix, porte-parole de la FQDE. | {
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Donald Trump sues Bill Maher for $5 million over orangutan bet The butt of jokes proves again why he's the butt of all jokes
The cheap joke that is Donald Trump has somehow become cheaper: The real estate mogul yesterday filed a $5 million lawsuit against Bill Maher, after the television host failed to fulfill his end of a deal asking Trump to prove he is not a "spawn of an orangutan."
Maher made the bet on Jay Leno's show, very obviously mocking Donald Trump's non-announcement announcement in October, in which the birther promised to donate $5 million to a charity of Obama’s choice upon the release of the president's college transcripts. Maher mocked Trump and "the syphilitic monkey that runs his Twitter account," saying, "We did a new rule one week, that suppose that Donald Trump had been the spawn of on orangutan having sex with his mother." He clarified to Leno, "I'm not saying it's true -- I hope it's not true. But unless he comes up with proof, I'm willing to offer $5 million to Donald Trump that he can donate to a charity of his choice."
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Everyone was in on the joke except for Trump, who amazingly became the joke of the joke (of the joke). He offered up his birth certificate to prove that he was not, in fact, the son of an orangutan: “Attached hereto is a copy of Mr. Trump’s birth certificate, demonstrating that he is the son of Fred Trump, not an orangutan."
And after Maher didn't pay up, Trump sued. "I don't think he was joking," Trump said regarding the bet on Fox News yesterday. "He said it with venom. That was venom. That wasn't a joke. In fact, he was nervous when he said it. It was a pathetic delivery."
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In a statement released to Politico, Trump added, “Bill Maher made an unconditional offer while on 'The Jay Leno Show' and I, without hesitation, accepted his offer and provided him with the appropriate documentation. Prior demands for payment went ignored by Mr. Maher despite the fact that the beneficiaries of this suit will ultimately be the charities […] who would share equally the $5 million — something I am certain they can desperately use.”
The best part? Trump tweeted that he "had an obligation to sue for charity." | {
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PHILIPPINE Airlines (PAL) confirmed a report saying it lost a record P10.6 billion in 2019, its biggest loss in its corporate history.
The flag carrier told the stock exchange on Monday, March 2, 2020, the loss “generally describes the current condition of the airline” and major shareholders were addressing the situation.
The coronavirus outbreak and Taal Volcano eruption in January have further put pressure on the company’s financial woes.
PAL, controlled by billionaire Lucio Tan, recorded its third straight year of losses since 2017. Shares of PAL Holdings fell 4.35 percent on Monday.
The company disclosed it laid off 300 employees after trading hours on Friday, Feb. 28.
“Apart from the retrenchment program announced last Friday, PAL also initiated a voluntary separation program for eligible long-serving employees as a first crucial step in a necessary restructuring effort to reduce overhead costs,” it said.
PAL attributed the loss to “unsustainable long-term debt and lease obligations.”
In a letter sent to the firm’s employees last week, PAL president Gilbert Santa Maria is quoted to have detailed the company’s financial challenges and said PAL is “working on turnaround initiatives to strengthen revenue generation and manage costs.” PAL reportedly has a total head count of around 6,000 employees compared to rival Cebu Pacific’s 4,000 workers.
In January 2019, ANA Holdings Inc., Japan’s biggest airline, invested US$95 million in PAL Holdings and acquired a 9.5 percent stake in the Filipino carrier.
ANA’s investment was seen to provide PAL with funds to expand in a market where a rash of low-cost carriers have encouraged more people to fly for business and leisure in the past decade.
PAL has a checkered history. It underwent ownership changes and privatization in the 1990s and in 2014 when Tan cut his two-year partnership with San Miguel in a bitter share buyback. San Miguel had taken a 49 percent stake in PAL in 2012, but disagreements over how the airline was managed forced Tan, who controlled the carrier, to buy back the diversified conglomerate’s holdings. (CSL) | {
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Datainspektionen har inlett en granskning mot en butik som planerar att använda teknik för ansiktsigenkänning, skriver myndigheten i ett pressmeddelande.
Enligt Di Digital är det Löwengrips bolag Nordic tech house som ska granskas för ett planerat verktyg som kan scanna av kunders ansikten.
– Vi vill i ett så tidigt skede som möjligt utreda hur den här tekniken fungerar och förhåller sig till dataskyddsförordningen för att skapa klarhet för alla aktörer, säger Nils Henckel, jurist på Datainspektionen i pressmeddelandet.
Om butiken kommer att använda ansiktsigenkänning för att identifiera enskilda personer kan det handla om känsliga personuppgifter. I så fall måste butiken uppfylla särskilda krav för att det ska vara tillåtet, skriver myndigheten. | {
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(RNS) Donald Trump's support has plummeted in the past week -- but white evangelicals are sticking with him.
"Among religious groups, white evangelical Protestants are the only ones who are standing firm right now," said Dan Cox, research director at the Public Religion Research Institute, which conducted the poll with The Atlantic Survey.
The poll, released Tuesday (Oct. 11) -- and taken during the days surrounding the release of a tape of Trump bragging about forcing himself on women -- shows his support has eroded among female voters and most religious groups during the past week.
But white evangelical Protestants show no statistically significant change in their willingness to vote for Trump, with 65 percent of them in his camp.
That contrasts with white Catholics Protestants, for example, who are defecting from the Republican presidential nominee. They went for Trump over Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, 56 percent to 31 percent, in a survey concluded on Oct. 2. In this latest survey, white Catholics reversed themselves, favoring Clinton over Trump, 46 percent to 42 percent.
"For Republican candidates, white Christian voters have been crucial, and this white Christian wall -- we're starting to see cracks in it," Cox said. "White Catholics and white mainline Protestants -- they have strongly supported Republicans. They're divided now (between Trump and Clinton). That's amazing."
And though there aren't numbers yet, he added, there is evidence that Trump is underperforming among Mormons, perhaps making Utah -- a historically red state -- competitive in the presidential election.
Overall the poll shows that Clinton holds an 11-point lead over Trump and that she has increased her lead over him for the second week in a row. Nearly half (49 percent) of the poll's 866 likely voters said they would cast a ballot for her, as opposed to 38 percent for Trump. These numbers mark a steep fall in support for Trump, and an edging upward for Clinton.
The poll -- which has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points -- went into the field from Oct. 5-9. The tape of Trump speaking lewdly about women and boasting that he could do "anything" with them given his star power was released on Oct. 7.
But Cox warned against overestimating the effect of the tape on voters. Trump was already losing ground with women before the tape's release. His remarks about Miss Universe's weight gain during and after the candidates' Sept. 26 debate helped cement his reputation as a man who degrades women.
The greatest shifts in the past week were among women. Trump’s support among female voters has dropped 5 points, to 28 percent, while his support among male voters fell 1 point, to 48 percent.
Though evangelicals are hardly budging in their willingness to vote for Trump, they have overall lent him significantly less support than they have Republican presidential nominees in the past. Traditionally, the GOP standard-bearer can expect the votes of about 80 percent of white evangelical Protestants. In this campaign, about 65 percent to 70 percent have expressed support for Trump.
But even these numbers baffle many evangelicals and nonevangelicals alike, who say his rhetoric and life story make voting for him impossible.
Trump has shown no sustained interest in his Presbyterianism, has twice divorced and has disparaged Latinos, Muslims and other groups, seeming to defy the biblical command to embrace "the stranger."
Christianity Today, a flagship publication of evangelical Protestantism, editorialized Tuesday against Trump in a piece that argued: "Evangelicals, of all people, should not be silent about Donald Trump's blatant immorality."
Some evangelicals support Trump perhaps not so much because they admire him, but as a foil to Hillary Clinton, who is the focal point of much of their disdain.
But even after the release of the salacious audio Friday, evangelicals could not be faulted for wondering whether Trump's behavior would ever tip their leaders against him -- some said they would take their vote elsewhere, but plenty affirmed their support for the Republican nominee. | {
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NFL combine: RBs Saquon Barkley, Derrius Guice impress on Friday
INDIANAPOLIS — Saquon Barkley might not care if he's the first, fifth or last pick of the NFL draft, but at the NFL combine on Friday the Penn State running back solidified his stock as one of the best players available at any position.
Barkley turned in an impressive workout on the first day of field drills, running a 4.4-second 40-yard dash that was second best among running backs and posting a 41-inch vertical jump.
"I’m competitive, but I don’t care if I’m drafted one, five or 72 or the last pick," Barkley said Thursday. "I’m going to come in with my head low ready to work. That’s not going to change me. No matter where I’m drafted or who I’m drafted by, they’re going to get the same person."
Barkley is widely projected as a top-five pick in a deep group of running backs, and he wasn't the only standout at his position in drills Friday.
Auburn running back Kerryon Johnson, a potential second-round choice, and Alabama's Bo Scarborough, both posted 40-inch verticals, tied for second behind Barkley — just four running backs have topped 40 inches in the past three years, including Ameer Abdullah and Zach Zenner.
More NFL combine:
Western Michigan OT Chukwuma Okorafor's amazing football journey
10 to watch at NFL combine: Arden Key, Nick Chubb, Lamar Jackson top list
And LSU's Derrius Guice (4.49 seconds), San Diego State's Rashaad Penny (4.46), Arizona State's Kalen Ballage (4.46) and North Carolina State's Nyheim Hines (4.38) all ran sub-4.5 40s.
More: Lions GM, coach should stop playing games and answer questions
Asked Thursday what message he was trying to convey to teams at the combine, Guice, a potential first-round pick and someone who could interest the Lions with the 20th pick of the first round, said, "If you don’t draft me I’m going to give your defense hell."
USC running back Ronald Jones, another potential Lions' target in Round 1, pulled up with a hamstring injury on his only 40-yard dash attempt.
Michigan's Mason Cole tied for 13th among offensive linemen with a 5.23-second 40.
Contact Dave Birkett: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett. Download our Lions Xtra app for free on Apple and Android! | {
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The quest for understanding the self and search for the meaning of life is as old as memory. No one can give us the correct answer because for each one of us, the path to the answer is different. But clues are all around in nature because understanding Self is linked to understanding life. In this post, we meditate on the trail of numbers in nature to see where they lead us.
Many people are afraid of Math because no one helped them make friends with numbers. Nobody introduced them to the wonder and wisdom that is hidden in the language of the Universe.
After all the positive feedback for our Healing forest learning program and requests for more nature games, meditations and mindfulness activities we have come up with this interesting walk format. We hope these mindfulness exercises help you create new learning and a new respect for yourself. Because nature and numbers are a part of you, just as you are a part of them.
NATURE MEDITATIONS & NUMBERS
Let us take a slow and gentle walk in nature. Our aim is to observe and reflect. Walk with a few like minded friends or go alone. Carry a pen and paper to note down your insights and experiences. And be open to try something new. (A free download of all meditations in this article is given at the end.)
Math is like love; a simple idea, but it can get complicated.
9 Numbers in Nature: We begin the walk with an exercise to start seeing numbers in nature. Participants have to find the numbers 1 to 9 in their surroundings. Everyone can quickly strike off 1 and 2 as we all have one nose and two ears. The other numbers have to be found outside of the human body. For example a flower with 5 petals, an ant with 6 legs. All participants are given a time limit of 10 minutes to find as many of the remaining numbers as possible. The exercise is to be done individually or in pairs. The group reassembles at the end of the time to work together as a team and find any missing number that no one could find.
8 Patterns in nature: Nature is full of patterns that have astounded mathematicians and poets alike for centuries. One such pattern is called the Fibonacci. The Fibonacci sequence starts like this: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55 and so on forever. Each number is the sum of the two numbers that come before it. It’s a simple pattern, but it appears to be a kind of built-in numbering system to the cosmos. The numbers in the pattern can be found in our own DNA as well the spirals of the Galaxy.
The numbers of the Fibonacci sequence are very commonly seen in petals of flowers . Examples include the lily, which has three petals, buttercups, which have five, the chicory’s 21, the daisy’s 34. These are all numbers from the Fibonacci sequence.
Nature Meditation: The aim of our exercise is to find interesting patterns in nature and take pictures. Try and see if you can collect a similar pattern in two different objects of nature.
7 Colours: Every Colour that you see is a number. Light travels as a wave and each colour in the spectrum has a specific wavelength and frequency. Our visual sense is not only able to gauge and see different colours but also associates certain emotions with them subconsciously.
Nature Meditation: The aim of our next exercise is to spot all the 7 rainbow colours during your nature walk. Each individual makes a list of at-least 7 different colours they can observe during the walk. The aim is also to spend a little time with each separate colour and become aware of how the colour makes us feel. At the end of the exercise people who are drawn to the same colour can group together to see whether they share other common personality traits.
6 Geometry: Have you ever marvelled at the beauty and shape of a spiral sea-shell? Geometry is all about shapes and their properties. Lines, curves and shapes that can be drawn on paper make up plane geometry, while 3 dimensional objects are part of solid geometry.
The spiral curve is one of the many examples in nature that give us a hint of the underlying simplicity which gives rise to the complexities in nature. The study of geometry allows us to become aware of the larger design of Nature. Here’s a short film on the curve called ‘life’.
Nature Meditation: Creating a spiral. This can be done individually or in a group. The intention is to create a beautiful spiral with objects found in nature. Make it as big as you can. Each person starts from the same center point and creates one arm of a spiral radiating outwards. After working on it for 10 minutes, the creator stands on the outer edge of their spiral arm and starts to walk back to the center slowly and mindfully following the path of their spiral. The last person to reach the center wins. (You cannot pause and have to continue walking inward as slow as you can).*Don’t forget to erase your spiral and disperse everything back in nature, before you leave.
Send us a picture of a nature spiral from your walk on our Facebook group: Art of Nature. Next month, we will create a short film with all the spirals collected from different corners of the world and leave a download link here.
5 Senses are our window to the world. Every person perceives the world differently based on how each of their different senses have developed. Staying in the city does take a toll on our overall sense perceptions where some senses can be overloaded like our sight and some underdeveloped like our smell. Being in nature allows us to relax our senses and sharpen them so that our experience of the world can become richer.
Nature Meditation: Walk or sit silently in the forest. Focus on any one sense at a time for a short period of 2-3 minutes. Make a note of all the unique things you can observe and sense. Repeat the exercise with another of your senses. Notice how each sense reveals something new about the nature around us. The aim of this exercise is to bring us into the present moment and stop our thoughts from leaping into the past or future.
4 Breath of 4: In this exercise we focus on our breath to bring our mind to the present moment and take the help of numbers to build mindfulness. We use counting to stay focused on the breath. Inhale. Exhale. After the out-breath you count one, then you breathe in and out and count two, and so on up to ten. This is a very good exercise for calming your mind.
Once you have brought your attention to the breath you can deepen your awareness to see the breath is made of 4 stages not 2. Inhale. Exhale. And 2 small gaps after each inhale and exhale. Inhale. Pause. Exhale. Pause. Sit in a quiet spot in nature and repeat the breath count to 10 being aware of the 4 stages of each breath.
This meditation makes us realise that numbers live with us as part of our lives and we can always turn to them for focus, attention and peace of mind.
π Circles: Take a circle. Any circle in the world. Measure it’s length, all the way around the circle. Then measure it across, from one edge to the other edge. Now divide the two lengths. You will always get the same number. 3.14…
This number is called Pi and is often written using the greek symbol π. What’s strange about Pi is that the division is never complete. You can go on dividing without reaching an end. Here’s an example 22 divided by 7. π has been calculated to over two quadrillion decimal places and still there is no pattern to the digits.
Nature Meditation: Spot the circles. Count the maximum number of circular objects one can notice in your surrounding nature within a time frame of 5 minutes. If you can, try and measure the circumference and diameter of any circle and divide them to find your own Pi.
Nature Meditation (Alt): The other interesting exercise with number 3 is to observe the 3 different stages of life. Birth. Maturity. Death. Find and take pictures of objects in different stages. Reflect on how everything is changing from one stage to another.
2 Opposites: Nature is made up of opposites. Day and night. Left and right. Sound and silence. Hot and cold. To observe the two opposing sides of nature is to understand our own true nature.
Nature Meditation: For this exercise participants divide into 2 equal groups ‘Positives’ and ’Negatives’. Members of the 2 groups walk in separate directions and each individual (depending on their group) makes a list of 5 positives or 5 negatives they observe in nature. The groups reassemble after 5 minutes and make pairs between the positives and negatives group. Each pair then tries to see how many matching opposites do they have between their 2 lists. For e.g.: If one person wrote ‘light’ and the other person wrote ‘shadow’ then it is considered a successful match.
With this exercise we observe that perception of life – positive or negative is based on our mind. And the mind can be trained to choose. *Some wise people in your group might raise a doubt and say that in nature there are no positives and negatives. Everything just is. They are right. Agree with them and tell them it’s just a game.
1 Oneness: Have you ever wondered why we only count in multiples of 10 ? A counting base of 10 is natural probably because we have 10 fingers. In ancient societies, a base 10 system wasn’t always used. The Sumerians used a base 60 system. This is why we count time in bases of 60 (60 minutes in an hour, 60 seconds in a minute). Machines are built using switches, so it is natural for them to count only off (0) and on (1).This system is called binary.
There can be many other number systems, but one thing connects them all. Numbers are concepts which only have meaning when they relate to each other. In a sense, it is this relationship that gives each number a specific meaning in the larger number system. For e.g 5 is related to 10,15,20,25 in a certain way. Here’s another chain of relationships: 1,2,6,24, 120….Can you figure out the next 2 numbers in this chain?
Nature Meditation: Participants take some time out to observe the many relationships that exist in nature. Each person comes up with a chain of nature relations. For e.g. Sun – Plant – Flower – Bee. The aim is to see who can come up with the longest chain of relationships… and perhaps to realize that we are all part of multiple chain of relationships, which give our life true meaning.
0The number Zero is widely seen as one of the greatest innovations in human history. Zero is both a number and a concept meaning the absence of any quantity. With the help of Zero we can do complicated equations and perform calculus. It is also at the heart of the language of computers which speak in 0’s and 1’s.
In philosophical terms it represents nothingness or emptiness out of which all existence arises. We end our nature walk by taking a few minutes to walk in silence and reflect on the concept of zero.
Meditating on zero is a meditation in humility. It is to become aware that in the vastness of the Universe – both in space and time, our small individuality amounts to nothingness. And yet, just like the importance of zero, one can realize how significant even the most insignificant thing in the world can be.
MEDITATIONS ON NATURE | FREE DOWNLOAD Download link of 2 posters for mindfulness meditations on nature with numbers. We would appreciate a link back to our site in case you re-post them.
Please share these 10 beautiful meditations on nature by numbers with friends who might find it interesting. If you enjoyed this post, check out our learning program for more nature based walks and activities.
You can subscribe to our monthly blog posts at this link. We are a small group of friends trying to find new ways to reconnect people with nature. Our aim is simple. Helping people heal. Helping forests heal. | {
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The American Journal of Potato Research (AJPR), the journal of the Potato Association of America (PAA), publishes reports of basic and applied research on the potato, Solanum spp. It presents authoritative coverage of new scientific developments in potato science, including biotechnology, breeding and genetics, crop management, disease and pest research, economics and marketing, nutrition, physiology, and post-harvest handling and quality. Recognized internationally by contributors and readership, it promotes the exchange of information on all aspects of this fast-evolving global industry.
There are three general categories of publication: (1) full-length articles describing original scientific research in the form of a regular publication; (2) short communications concisely describing poignant and timely research results in four or fewer journal pages; (3) review papers, book reviews and symposium proceedings.
Peer review is conducted using Editorial Manager®, supported by a database of international experts. This database is shared with the journals Euphytica and Potato Research. | {
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People around the world reacted with astonishment Saturday after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau waxed poetic about Cuba’s former leader Fidel Castro in a statement he released hours after news broke that Castro had passed away.
In his statement, Trudeau referred to the former guerrilla revolutionary as a “remarkable leader” and pointed to Castro’s friendship with Trudeau’s late father, Pierre Trudeau. Castro attended Trudeau’s Montreal funeral in 2000.
“It is with deep sorrow that I learned today of the death of Cuba’s longest serving President,” Trudeau wrote in the statement, which was circulated around 4 a.m. EST Saturday morning. “Fidel Castro was a larger than life leader who served his people for almost half a century. A legendary revolutionary and orator, Mr. Castro made significant improvements to the education and healthcare of his island nation.”
“While a controversial figure, both Mr. Castro’s supporters and detractors recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people who had a deep and lasting affection for ‘el Comandante.'”
Trudeau’s full statement can be found at the bottom of this article.
Here in Canada, many Conservative members of Parliament and Tory leadership candidates took to Twitter to condemn Trudeau’s tribute to the deeply divisive leader. Maxime Bernier published a series of tweets in both French and English, calling the prime minister’s praise of Castro “repugnant.”
Prime Minister Trudeau should apologize and retract his statement on the death of dictator Fidel Castro https://t.co/crAqmbry91 #cdnpoli — Lisa Raitt (@lraitt) November 26, 2016
Trudeau had a chance to stand for freedom and human dignity today and instead stood with a brutal dictator. https://t.co/TflJeaG3vp #castro — Kellie Leitch (@KellieLeitch) November 26, 2016
Castro, a socialist and Cuban nationalist, formed and led a rebel army in the 1950’s and overthrew Cuban president and dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959. Castro embraced Soviet-style communism; under his almost five-decade rule of the island nation, Cuba became a one-party socialist state and Castro imposed radical economic reforms throughout the country.
Relations between the United States and Cuba reached crisis levels under Castro’s administration, culminating in the severance of diplomatic ties in January 1961. The two countries only re-established their diplomatic relationship in 2015. Canada, however, has always maintained relations with Cuba, which were especially warm in the 1970s and 1980s when Pierre Trudeau was prime minister.
Castro was both loved and hated around the world. To some, he was a revolutionary hero; to others, he was a dictator who oversaw a number of human rights abuses during his regime.
U.S. Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio — both of whom ran for the Republican presidential nomination — attacked Trudeau over social media on Saturday. Rubio, who is the son of Cuban immigrants, called the statement “shameful.”
Is this a real statement or a parody? Because if this is a real statement from the PM of Canada it is shameful & embarrassing. https://t.co/lFXeqU7Ws0 — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) November 26, 2016
Disgraceful. Why do young socialists idolize totalitarian tyrants? Castro, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot — all evil, torturing murderers. #truth https://t.co/mYJonVK7JB — Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) November 26, 2016
Journalists in North America and the United Kingdom also expressed their surprise and disapproval of the Canadian prime minister’s tribute to Castro on Twitter.
For all of the British fans of Justin Trudeau, this from him on Castro is worse than Corbyn. O, Canada, oh dear https://t.co/8dnCeha3zQ — Tim Montgomerie ن (@montie) November 26, 2016
This is a sad statement for the leader of a democracy to make: https://t.co/NN959KsMcP — Jeffrey Goldberg (@JeffreyGoldberg) November 26, 2016
Kudos to Justin Trudeau for finding a way to gloss over the whole murderous, oppressive dictatorship thingy. Actually kind of impressive. pic.twitter.com/GppKwOJjCw — Robyn Urback (@RobynUrback) November 26, 2016
I suspect Canadian PM Trudeau hasn’t spent lots of time with Castro’s detractors, who rarely concede this point or use this terminology. pic.twitter.com/LMxd3zQ1Z5 — Roque Planas (@RoqPlanas) November 26, 2016
Trudeau’s statement spread far and wide and caught the attention of social media users in Israel, Spain, The Netherlands and Egypt.
Is this real? Trudeau is praising Castro? https://t.co/lTwYwIzMJs — Gilad (@gilad73) November 26, 2016
Escándalo en Canadá por el mensaje de Trudeau de obsequiosa y grotesca adulación al dictador. Aun peor que Obama. https://t.co/UA5Fav8xVG — Hermann Tertsch (@hermanntertsch) November 26, 2016
This only goes to show that Justin Trudeau has serious difficulties distinguishing good from bad, right from wrong. Unacceptable. https://t.co/m3cQ5KYrB5 — spiervanzwicht (@spiervanzwicht) November 26, 2016
Aha,nu komt de aap uit de mouw: Trudeau, de moderne cryptocommunist.
Voor wie is deze man ook al weer ‘n lichtend voorbeeld? ☘️#FidelCastro https://t.co/3KDjafRsQ6 — Toon Sesink (@Toon_Sesink) November 26, 2016
This guy is nuts Canadian PM Trudeau Praises Dictator Castro as ‘Remarkable… https://t.co/nRR49BK1TI by #singsandsews via @c0nvey
— moustafa sabry (@mossabry) November 26, 2016
The son of former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper also called Trudeau’s statement “an embarrassment for Canada.”
What an embarrassment for Canada.https://t.co/thKMpPnBRU — Ben Harper (@Ben_S_Harper) November 26, 2016
Saturday afternoon, Interim Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose issued her own statement on Fidel Castro’s passing, in which she focused more on Cuban citizens than on their former leader.
“With the passing of Fidel Castro, my thoughts and prayers are with the people of Cuba who continue to endure his long and oppressive regime, even after his death,” Ambrose wrote. “Under his rule, thousands were impoverished, thousands were imprisoned and executed, and free speech, thought and assembly were curtailed or banned, all to live up to his version of ‘socialism.’
“Canada and the Cuban people have had a long and warm friendship over many years. With today’s news, my hope is that a brighter day will be coming for the Cuban people, where they may live in freedom and where democracy, human rights, and the rule of law are enshrined.”
Statement by the Prime Minister of Canada on the death of former Cuban President Fidel Castro
November 26, 2016
The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement on the death of former Cuban President Fidel Castro:
“It is with deep sorrow that I learned today of the death of Cuba’s longest serving President.
“Fidel Castro was a larger than life leader who served his people for almost half a century. A legendary revolutionary and orator, Mr. Castro made significant improvements to the education and healthcare of his island nation.
“While a controversial figure, both Mr. Castro’s supporters and detractors recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people who had a deep and lasting affection for “el Comandante”.
“I know my father was very proud to call him a friend and I had the opportunity to meet Fidel when my father passed away. It was also a real honour to meet his three sons and his brother President Raúl Castro during my recent visit to Cuba.
“On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family, friends and many, many supporters of Mr. Castro. We join the people of Cuba today in mourning the loss of this remarkable leader.” | {
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DOLAR.jpg
Allí estimó que el dólar llegará, en promedio, a $17,92 en 2017, luego se irá a $21,21 en 2018 y costará $23,53 en 2019. Lo que supone una devaluación de casi el 50% en sólo tres años.
Este dato se desprende del informe en Diputados al que accedió El Destape, donde además se detalle que el objetivo del Gobierno con la inflación es: "alcanzar una tasa de crecimiento interanual del IPC INDEC en el rango de la meta 3.5%-6.5% para el año 2019".
EL BLOQUE JUSTICIALISTA ANALIZA EL PRESUPUESTO
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“Happy Father’s Day, Mom!” Angel Soft has made several enemies with those four simple, seemingly harmless words.
Why are the naysayers so upset about the ad? Because they feel like it devalues the role that fathers play in the development of their children.
And to an extent, you may be able to see their point.
While no one can deny that mothers are integral to the growth and development of a child and that many more men than women neglect their parental duties, the idea behind celebrating Father’s Day is to celebrate the men who do show up.
Whether it’s the biological dad or a caring stepfather, who steps into the role for a needy child, the day is supposed to be about those guys, not about the guys that can only make a baby while failing miserably at fatherhood.
By shifting the focus to single mothers, critics are accusing Angel Soft of denigrating the good guys on the day that is supposed to be “their day” with the “Happy Father’s Day, Mom” ad.
Before continuing, see the ad for yourself.
And now T.J. Sotomayor, who seems to be heading the outrage against the Angel Soft ad, responds.
If you’re not in a place where you can hear Sotomayor’s comments for yourself, here’s the gist of it. Angel Soft is basically “making a mockery of fatherhood and masculinity” by smearing fathers on a holiday devoted to them.
The video is not without its social media support either, and they’re not all male detractors. Take this comment from Lisa Troy.
“When are the men going to stand up to these 3rd wave feminists! This commercial is the most hurtful commercial to ALL fathers out there! The real bullies of America are the 3rd wave useless feminists pushing their liberal social engineering project to effeminate males.”
And this.
“I think this is a vicious attack on men, I just think its really… weird and misguided. Hearing them say ‘Happy Father’s Day, Mom’ gave me a weird feeling. Like the statement happy FATHERS day MOM is an oxymoron. It doesn’t work. And I don’t know why they felt like they had to do this. The stories of these people were very touching but… why didn’t they just do this on Mothers Day?”
Angel Soft has responded, and it’s pretty clear they didn’t expect the fallout. In comments to Advertising Age, they said the ad wasn’t mean to degrade fathers.
But what do you think, readers? Is the Angel Soft message, “Happy Father’s Day, Mom!” out of line? Sound off in the comments section.
[Image via YouTube screen grab, linked above] | {
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'Freddie Mercury felt like a god. Then he started behaving like one,' by the man who signed Queen
By NORMAN J SHEFFIELD, Founder of Trident Studios where Queen first recorded
NORMAN J SHEFFIELD on the amazing story of how one of Britain's best loved rock bands made it big
Freddie Mercury used to say there was no question in his mind that Queen would be a success
I was sitting in my office one day in 1971 when I got a call from my brother Barry down in the studio.
‘Norman, come down and have a listen to something,’ he said.
John Anthony, Trident’s A&R man, had discovered a band called Smile.
At the start, the lead guitarist was an astrophysics student from Imperial College called Brian May, the bassist and singer was an art student called Tim Staffell, and the drummer was a biology student called Roger Taylor.
It turned out that they’d now reshaped the band.
Staffell had been replaced by this little Indian-looking guy with a big, operatic voice and they had a new bass player.
John had asked for their demo. It was raw but there was definitely something there. I’d opened Trident Studios in 1968 in Soho.
Its cutting-edge facilities and happening vibe were attracting the greatest talents of the era, from The Beatles and Elton John to David Bowie and Marc Bolan.
The four guys who came into my office a couple of weeks later were an intriguing mix of characters.
Roger Taylor was a really good-looking kid, with long blond hair and charm. Brian May was tall with a mane of curls and a little introverted but clearly very intelligent. The bass player, John Deacon, was also quiet. I could tell right away that the fourth member was going to be high maintenance.
His real name was Farokh Bulsara. He was born in Zanzibar and educated in India. The family had immigrated to England when he was a teenager. He’d gone to Ealing Art College to study art and graphic design. He was also a gifted singer and pianist.
When he joined the band, he immediately gave himself a more rock ’n’ roll name: Freddie Mercury.
He was charming, acted a bit shy and reserved at times and spoke in quite a posh, mannered voice. When he relaxed he had a very sharp sense of humour and spoke at a hundred miles an hour.
Queen turned out to be every bit as good - and demanding - as we'd anticipated. Things had to be one hundred per cent right, otherwise they wouldn't be happy
They’d rightly decided to ditch Smile as their name. I nearly choked on my coffee when I heard their new one: Queen. The world wasn’t as enlightened then as it is today.
We were worried that it would be a real turn-off, especially given the band’s look. Freddie apparently had a girlfriend but we were pretty certain he was gay.
But the name wasn’t up for negotiation. I agreed to offer the Queenies, as we christened them, a loose kind of arrangement. There were times when the studio was ‘dark’, usually at 2am. So we said: ‘We’ll give you this downtime in the studio to see what you can do.’
They turned out to be every bit as good – and demanding – as we’d anticipated. Things had to be one hundred per cent right, otherwise they wouldn’t be happy. They’d spend days and nights working on the harmonies.
Arguments would start about the tiniest little detail. They’d start screaming, shouting and chucking things. Sometimes it would blow over in a few minutes, but at other times they would stew on it, not talking to each other for a day or two. They’d always sort it out, however. It wasn’t personal, it was about the work.
The more adulation Freddie received on stage, the harder he became to work with offstage
Freddie used to say there was no question in his mind that Queen would be a success.
‘There was never a doubt, darling, never,’ he’d say with an imperious wave of his hand.
The title of their first album was simply Queen.
Another suggestion had been Dearie Me, Freddie’s catchphrase, which was quite funny but the band were a hard enough sell as it was.
They spent ages arguing about the album sleeve. The front cover was a single image of Freddie on stage, with two spotlights in the background.
For the back cover the boys put together a collage of snaps of themselves.
Freddie had driven everyone to distraction fretting over whether he looked ‘gorgeous enough’ in them.
By the end of the year they were on the road with Mott the Hoople, but Queen were getting more encores and bigger cheers than the headliners.
They were due to go to Australia for a gig when Brian suddenly developed a really high fever. His arm had swollen up to the size of a football and doctors diagnosed gangrene.
At one point it was touch and go whether he would lose it. Luckily the crisis eased and he was allowed to fly.
However, the gig was a disaster. The local DJ introducing them had clearly taken against them because he introduced them as ‘stuck-up Pommies’. When they got on stage, the crowd turned against them, too.
The boys were mightily relieved when they got on a plane back to London. For some bizarre reason, the British press had been tipped off that Her Majesty the Queen was arriving at Heathrow. So when they saw four knackered musicians emerging through Customs, they weren’t too happy.
On their first tour of America, Brian’s health was deteriorating. Our worst fears were confirmed when doctors announced he had hepatitis.
The rest of the tour had to be cancelled. It was a disaster, professionally and personally. Then, when they came back to London in August, he had to have an emergency operation for an ulcer.
The opening track on A Night At The Opera attacked their management
But on October 11, 1974, EMI put out Killer Queen, from their third album, Sheer Heart Attack.
Within weeks it had given the boys the thing they’d most wanted – a No. 1 single.
As Queen hit the road again, this time as a headline act in their own right, it was clear they were on the verge of major success.
But the more adulation Freddie received on stage, the harder he became to work with offstage.
The tour came to an end at the famous Rainbow Theatre in London. The day before the gig, Freddie was being even more pedantic than usual.
‘Oh, stop being such a tart, Freddie,’ Brian said.
Freddie was outraged. He tossed back his head, waved his arms and stormed off in a strop.
When it was time for the soundcheck, Brian turned the mic on.
‘Freddiepoos, where are you?’ he shouted.
Freddie appeared immediately with a face like thunder. He flounced on stage, gave Brian a vicious look and then just got on with it. That’s what they always did.
In 1975 they went to Japan and found 3,000 fans waiting for them, all chanting the band’s name. It was like Beatlemania. Freddie had finally found the acclaim he’d craved all his life. He felt like a god. Unfortunately, he soon started behaving like one, too.
The more successful they became, the more agitated Queen had grown about money. One of the most heated rows came when John got married. In the run-up to the wedding he announced he wanted me to spring £10,000 (about £90,000 in 2013 values) for him to buy a house. I didn’t react too well.
Then Freddie demanded a grand piano. When I turned him down, he banged his fist on my desk. ‘I have to get a grand piano,’ he said.
Norman J Sheffield: By the time I realised things were badly wrong it was too late
I wasn’t being mean. We knew there was a huge amount of money due to come flooding our way from Queen’s success. I explained that some of it was already coming in but the vast majority of it hadn’t arrived yet.
‘But we’re stars. We’re selling millions of records,’ Freddie said.
‘And I’m still living in the same flat I’ve been in for the past three years.’
The amount of money we’d invested in the band was huge.
We’d advanced them equipment and salaries right at the beginning and had continued to pour money into them for four years.
The fact the band owed Trident close to £200,000 (£1.75 million today) didn’t seem to register with Freddie.
I can remember the conversation.
‘The money will come in December,’ I said. ‘So wait.’
Then came a phrase he would make famous around the world in years to come, although no one would have known where it was born.
Freddie stamped his feet and raised his voice: ‘No, I am not prepared to wait any longer. I want it all. I want it now.’
By late 1975 I was hearing that they were making all sorts of derogatory comments about Trident.
Then I heard a track from A Night At The Opera called Death On Two Legs. The opening two lines summed up what was to come.
‘You suck my blood like a leech/you break the law and you breach’, then, ‘Do you feel like suicide?’ it went on, ‘I think that you should’. It was some kind of nasty hate mail from Freddie to me.
Soon Bohemian Rhapsody roared to the top of the UK charts and stayed there for nine weeks. A bittersweet moment, it came as news was beginning to leak that we had split from Queen.
We should have talked more. And I should have been more attentive to their feelings. By the time I realised things were badly wrong, it was too late.
In March 1977 the company settled with the band for the sale of all of its future rights, the rights to the old albums and the settlement of the management debt.
Freddie’s dream finally came true and he became a very wealthy man. When he died, no one was sadder than me. He may have been a monster to deal with, but he was also a genius.
I did see him once, in the years following our fallout, in 1986, when I took the family to their Knebworth concert. He was friendly, as if the rows of the past were forgotten. It turned out to be their last live concert, which meant I was at their first and last.
Years later, after his death, I went to the Freddie Mercury Memorial Concert at Wembley, where I saw the three remaining members being photographed.
John Deacon pointed at me and said: ‘And if it hadn’t been for that man we wouldn’t be here.’
Brian and Roger looked at me and nodded. That gesture went a long way towards exorcising the ghosts of the past.
Extracted from ‘Life On Two Legs: Set The Record Straight’ by Norman J Sheffield, out now and online from Amazon and in bookshops priced £14.95 for paperback, £7.49 for Kindle. | {
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『マトリックス』20周年！4D上映が決定 2019年7月3日 13時00分
『マトリックス』を4Dで観るチャンス！ - (C)1999 Village Roadshow Films (BVI) Limited. C 1999 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved.
1999年に公開されたキアヌ・リーヴス主演の大ヒットSFアクション『マトリックス』が、製作20周年を記念して、9月6日から2週間限定で4D上映されることが明らかになった。
あれから20年『マトリックス』フォトギャラリー
『マトリックス』は、自分の生きる世界が機械の見せる仮想現実だと知った天才ハッカー、ネオ（キアヌ）が、人類の救世主として戦いに身を投じるSFアクション。日本のアニメやSF小説に影響を受けた哲学的な物語、東洋テイストを積極的に取り入れたカンフー＆ワイヤーアクション、バレットタイムなどのVFXが融合した映像表現が話題を呼び、熱狂的な支持を得た。
[PR]
現在もさまざまな作品に影響を与えている同作が、製作20周年を迎える節目の年に再び劇場上映。「映像革命」とうたわれた本作の迫力を、当時はなかった4D上映で体感できる、またとないチャンスとなる。
また日本公開からちょうど20年となる9月11日にはシリーズ3作品の 4K ULTRA HD （3枚組・価格：6,345円+税）が新規価格で発売される。（編集部・入倉功一） | {
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12.01am GMT
Good evening and welcome to our live blog coverage of the 2013 state of the union address, the all-you-can-eat buffet of presidential speeches.
This is no gauzy inaugural address, no giddy election-night victory speech, no somber statement on an unnatural disaster, no playful turn on a talk show or at a tuxedo dinner. This is a policy pig-out, a night for the president to gather all of Congress around and berate, badger and beg them to act on issues he asserts as vital to the national interest. The president picks the issues, he assigns them priority and nobody can interrupt except to clap or be a jackass.
There's an unusually tantalizing element to tonight's speech in that President Barack Obama may deliver a proper scolding to Republicans for what Democrats portray as obstructionist tactics in the face of the popular will. Obama has just become the first president since Eisenhower to win a majority of the popular vote twice, and the first Democrat to do so since FDR. Polls show a majority of the country is with him and against the GOP, which has now achieved 55% disapproval.
Obama all but ignored Republicans in his inaugural address. In tonight's speech, the president will “throw down the gauntlet" to Congress and demand they take "common sense" action, an anonymous White House official has told reporters. The president is apparently even cussing in meetings. Will this "new Obama" be on view tonight?
The White House has let relatively little drop in terms of what will be in the speech, but one major line has come out: the president will announce that he is bringing 34,000 US troops home from Afghanistan – about half the current force – within a year, on the way to a complete pullout by the end of 2014. It’s to be seen how Obama will argue that key regions have been secured, that the Taliban have been fatally crippled or that Afghan security forces are ready to take over. In any case the president has a remarkable breadth of foreign policy ground to cover, from North Korea's nuclear test, to Syria's war, to renewed violence in Iraq, to relations with China and Russia, to Iran's nuclear program, to Israel/Palestine, to Mali, to Somalia. If the president does not return to last year's attack in Benghazi, Libya, rest assured that Senator Marco Rubio will, in his rebuttal for the Republican side.
The White House has been eager to talk about the fact that Obama will talk about the economy. With the unemployment rate still above 8%, jobs and economic growth are still the issues people care about most. In a recent Quinnipiac poll, 35% of respondents rated the economy as the topic they would most like the president to address, followed by the budget deficit (20%), gun policy (15%) and health care (12%). In his discussion of the economy, the president will lay out four areas of focus, officials say: manufacturing, infrastructure, clean energy and education.
Immigration issues barely rated in the Quinnipiac poll (4%), but with bipartisan support building for a new immigration law, Obama is sure to expend considerable rhetorical effort on the topic. Gun control has arrived at a similar, sudden moment of possible legislative action after perennial debate. Tonight’s guest list includes a full complement of invitees to put a face on immigration and gun policy.
Republicans have telegraphed one line of attack on the president's speech, accusing him of emphasizing pet issues and losing focus on the economy. The White House was at pains Monday to rebut the assertion. "You've seen the president act aggressively on comprehensive immigration reform," White House press secretary Jay Carney said. "You've seen the president put forward a series of comprehensive proposals to reduce gun violence in this country in the recent weeks.
“These are important priorities of the president and of the nation. But what remains his number one priority is what it has been since he took office, which is to get this economy growing, get it creating jobs, strengthening the middle class and expanding the middle class — allowing those who seek and aspire to the middle class to get there, giving them the tools to do that." | {
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A rally to get out the vote had a 1920 theme as people celebrated the 100 anniversary of the of the 19th Amendment. | {
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After just an hour of what should have been a six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk, an astronaut's helmet leak forced NASA to cancel the mission on the International Space Station this morning.
NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and Luca Parmitano of the European Space Agency, both flight engineers, were scheduled to prepare the space Sstation for the addition of a Russian multipurpose laboratory module. They were planning to replace a video camera, move wireless television camera equipment and reconfigure thermal insulation over a failed electronics box.
U.S. astronaut Karen Nyberg assists Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano after water began building up inside his helmet during a spacewalk outside the International Space Station. (Photo: NASA via Reuters)
Most of the work had to be shelved for today and NASA said controllers will reschedule the work into future spacewalks.
The trouble began around 9 a.m. today when Parmitano reported that there was water floating behind his head inside his helmet, according to NASA. A leak in his helmet was causing the trouble.
While the leak didn't pose an immediate hazard to the astronaut, NASA's mission control scrubbed the spacewalk anyway.
The space agency also noted that today's abbreviated spacewalk was the second shortest in the history of the space station. This was the 171st spacewalk at the station, totaling 1,075 hours and 22 minutes of work outside the orbiting station.
Today's spacewalk was the third to prepare for the new Russian module.
On July 9, Cassidy and Parmitano completed a spacewalk that lasted a little more than six hours. On that walk, they replaced a space-to-ground transmitter that had failed in December and they began to route power cables for the addition of the Russian module. They also removed a failed camera assembly and installed power redundancy cables.
In June, two cosmonauts completed their own spacewalk to prepare for the coming Russian module. The addition is set to replace an older airlock with a combination research facility, airlock and docking port that will be brought to the space station on a Proton rocket later this year, according to NASA.
This article, Astronaut's leaking helmet forces NASA to scrub spacewalk, was originally published at Computerworld.com.
Sharon Gaudin covers the Internet and Web 2.0, emerging technologies, and desktop and laptop chips for Computerworld. Follow Sharon on Twitter at @sgaudin, on Google+ or subscribe to Sharon's RSS feed . Her email address is [email protected].
See more by Sharon Gaudin on Computerworld.com. | {
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Кража
В Нижегородской области 26-летний священник Николай Пчелин продал 48 икон XVII-XVIII веков из церкви Рождества Пресвятой Богородицы, а также несколько ценных предметов и книг, в частности, Евангелие в шестикилограммовом серебряном окладе. Проданные иконы в иконостасе подменяли дешевыми копиями. Приговор Пчелину был вынесен еще в 2004 году, он получил 2,5 года колонии. Десять лет спустя, в мае 2014 года, еще один экс-священнослужитель в Нижегородской области был осужден на пять лет лишения свободы условно за похищение из церкви трех икон — «Введение во храм Божьей Матери» стоимостью 460 тысяч рублей, «София премудрость Божия» стоимостью 470 тысяч рублей и третьей неназванной иконы, оцененной в 450 тысяч рублей.
Настоятель храма Пророка Илии в селе Уват Тюменской области Сергей Дмитришин, который одновременно занимал пост депутата думы Уватского сельского поселения, подал архиепископу Тобольско-Тюменской епархии прошение о выделении 500 тысяч рублей для приобретения служебного жилья. При этом в личной собственности у священника уже было два дома. Выделенные деньги настоятель присвоил. Ему предъявили обвинение в по части 3 статьи 160 УК («Присвоение или растрата»); в 2010 году уже бывшего священнослужетеля приговорили к четырем годам лишения свободы условно. Кроме того, сообщалось, что Дмитришин похитил 40 тысяч рублей у верующих поселка Першино.
Священник Александр Щинов в Кировской области присвоил деньги от продажи земли и дома, бывших в собственности Вятской епархии. «В ходе дальнейших разбирательств выяснилось, что в 2000 году отец Александр подделал подпись Владыки Хрисанфа на указе о передаче в собственность отца Александра дома на территории храма в поселке Кстинино. В тот период он как раз был настоятелем этого храма», — рассказывали юристы епархии.
Убийство
На хуторе Можаевка Ростовской области клирик храма Владимирской иконы Божьей Матери Евгений Демидов «избил свою супругу из-за того, что она не успокоила проснувшегося их малолетнего ребенка». От полученных травм женщина скончалась. Суд приговорил священнослужителя к девяти годам лишения свободы.
Священник Свято-Александрийского епархиального подворья в Ростове-на-Дону Владимир Рудинский из охотничьего ружья расстрелял свою жену и восьмилетнего сына, после чего застрелился сам. Друзья священнослужителя рассказывали, что в последнее время тот находился в депрессии, вызванной материальными сложностями. В Церкви отметили, что от большой нагрузки у Рудинского помутился рассудок; он был похоронен по православным канонам.
В деревне Каликово Канашского района Чувашии в 2006 году бывший священник Николай Андреев задушил свою 76-летнюю мать, подозревая, что она перешла в «сатанинскую веру» и тайком добавляет в его еду мышьяк. Тело матери он бросил в колодец, а за водой стал ходить на пруд, чем и навлек на себя подозрения бдительных соседей.
Экстремизм
Проповеди отца Василия из села Иваньково в Тульской области суд признал экстремистскими. Как отмечал прокурор региона Олег Черныш, речи священника были размещены на диске с названием «Православие или смерть». Кроме того, отец Василий был автором шести видеороликов, в частности, «Чипирование», «Американское шоу» и «Гробы для американцев». Все они также признаны экстремистскими материалами.
Священник Андрей Евстигнеев, служивший в кафедральном соборе Сошествия Святого Духа в Саратове, был временно запрещен в служении за грубость в отношении прихожан. Это произошло после того, как во время крещения девочки отец Андрей спросил у ее родственников: «Зачем вы выбираете жидовские имена?». Тетя девочки написала заявление в СК с требованием возбудить против священника уголовное дело по статье 282 УК, однако, насколько известно, следователи не нашли в этом высказывании иерея состава преступления.
Уголовное дело по 282-й статье было возбуждено в отношении архимандрита Вятской епархии отца Серафима, который, посещая исправительную колонию №7 в поселке Восход Нижегородской области, не только исповедовал осужденных, но и раздавал им видеокассеты и записки, повествовавшие о «врагах Православия — жидомассонах». Кроме того, он передал заключенным признанный экстремистским материалом фильм Константина Душенова «Россия с ножом в спине. Еврейский фашизм и геноцид русского народа».
Наркоторговля
В Калужской области за торговлю опиумом был осужден священник по фамилии Андрюшин и его подельник по фамилии Москаленко. «Священник изготавливал зелье кустарным способом, затем сбывал его своему подельнику. Последний, в свою очередь, ничего не подозревая, предложил наркотики сотруднику криминальной милиции, проводившему оперативно-розыскные мероприятия, то есть проверочную закупку», — рассказывали в областной прокуратуре. По версии ведомства, священник и его друг сами были наркопотребителями.
Изнасилование
Настоятеля храма Ильи Пророка села Юрское в Липецкой области Вячеслава Копытина суд заключил под стражу по обвинению в изнасиловании. Заявление на священника написала его любовница, которая пыталась порвать с Копытиным после того, как узнала, что священник женат и не собирается разводиться. «Вечером 4 мая он пришел домой к своей возлюбленной. … Уложив детей спать, священник остался ждать свою бывшую подругу. Поздним вечером, когда женщина вернулась домой, между ней и незваным гостем вспыхнул конфликт. Священник жестоко избил подругу, а затем ее изнасиловал», — писал местный портал Gorod48.ru, отмечая, что экспертиза подтвердила факт изнасилования и побои.
Во Владимирской области бывший священнослужитель Сергей Бельский был приговорен к 14 годам лишения свободы за изнасилование девочек 15 и 16 лет. Девочек он встретил в Ивановской области, когда те голосовали на дороге; Бельский отвез их в лесополосу и запер в автомобиле, где изнасиловал. «После этого старшей девушке Бельский дал 300 рублей, чтобы она добиралась обратно самостоятельно. Используя беспомощное состояние второй потерпевшей, Сергей Бельский, подвергая девушку сексуальному насилию, удерживал ее в автомобиле до утра», — сообщали в Следственном комитете. Ранее Бельский был осужден за изнасилование 21-летней девушки — впрочем, к тому времени его уже лишили сана «в связи с недостойным поведением и нарушением церковной дисциплины».
Нарушение авторских прав
В Кирове против настоятеля храма Веры, Надежды, Любови и матери их Софии отца Георгия возбудили уголовное дело о нарушении авторских прав. По версии следствия, священник руководил ООО «Вера, Надежда, Любовь и София», которое использовало нелицензионное программное обеспечение «1С предприятие» и Microsoft, из-за чего правообладателю был нанесен ущерб в размере 206 тысяч рублей.«Как рассказал отец Георгий, проблемы у него и его фирмы начались после смерти митрополита Вятского и Слободского Хрисанфа в 2011 году и прихода на его место из Хабаровской епархии владыки Марка. По словам отца Георгия, новый глава начал «зачистку» местного духовенства и назначил своих людей из Хабаровска и Комсомольска», — писал «Коммерсант». Уголовное дело закрыто за недостаточностью доказательств; клирик подал жалобу в ЕСПЧ.
ДТП
Иеромонах Илия на внедорожнике Mercedes Gelandewagen стал виновником ДТП на Кутузовском проспекте в Москве. Он не справился с управлением и врезался в следовавшее по соседней полосе такси Skoda Octavia. После этого Mercedes вылетел на участок дорожных работ и сбил стоявших там людей. От полученных травм инженер участка «Гормоста» Николай Сергеев и сотрудник проектной организации «Точка опоры» Павел Лейкин скончались на месте. Свидетели аварии утверждали, что иеромонах был пьян. Суд приговорил его к трем годам лишения свободы.
В городе Ачинск Красноярского края священник на автомобиле Toyota Corolla насмерть сбил женщину с полугодовалым ребенком на руках. Женщина погибла на месте, ребенок был госпитализирован. Представители ГИБДД отмечали, что водитель был трезв, а трагедия произошла на проселочной дороге, на перекрестке неравнозначных дорог, где нет освещения и пешеходного перехода.
Пьяный настоятель подмосковного храма Сергия Радонежского Владимир Гаврилов на внедорожнике Toyota Land Cruiser врезался в фуру в Нижегородской области. На опубликованном в сети видео инцидента священник ругается с сотрудниками ГИБДД, матерится и засыпает. В его машине обнаружили пустые бутылки из-под пива и водки и травматическое оружие. Позже Гаврилов заявил, что в ДТП якобы виновен его брат-близнец. Суд лишил священнослужителя прав на 1 год и 8 месяцев.
За рулем такого же автомобиля Toyota Land Cruiser передвигался и епископ Костомукшский и Кемский Игнатий, который стал виновником ДТП в Мордовии. После аварии у его пассажирки врачи диагностировали двойной перелом позвоночника: у женщины парализовало ноги.
Драки, стрельба, бытовые конфликты
В городе Елец Липецкой области священник Николай Клабухов из стартового револьвера, переделанного под стрельбу боевыми патронами, ранил двоих пьяных молодых людей, которые приставали к его несовершеннолетней дочери. За незаконное хранение оружия и превышение пределов необходимой самообороны суд приговорил его к штрафу в 50 тысяч рублей.
В Санкт-Петербурге протодьякон храма святых апостолов Петра и Павла Сергей Фрунза не поделил дорогу с двумя сестрами-пенсионерками, одна из которых сделала ему замечание за опасную манеру вождения. «В ответ на это Сергей Фрунза побил обеих пенсионерок, а сыновьям потерпевших заявил, что его не удастся привлечь к ответственности. Одной из пенсионерок Фрунза рассек губу ключами от своей машины, в больнице пострадавшей накладывали швы. Ее сестру святой отец ударил в переносицу. У обеих женщин было диагностировано сотрясение мозга», — сообщало издание 47news.ru.
Педофилия
В республике Коми к 20 годам лишения свободы в колонии строгого режима суд приговорил отца Деонисия (Дениса Вандышева), признав его виновным в совершении преступлений в отношении девочек в возрасте от семи до 12 лет, а также умственно отсталых женщин, признанных недееспособными. «С совершеннолетними мужчина вступал в половую связь, двенадцатилетних злоумышленник фотографировал в обнаженном виде в эротических позах, а к частям тела раздетых девочек помладше он прикасался», — писало местное ИА «БНК». По версии прокуратуры, большую часть преступлений священник совершил на территории летнего православного епархиального подворья в деревне Визябож, куда отец Деонисий был направлен «для духовного окормления воспитанников дома-интерната для умственно отсталых детей».
К 14 годам заключения приговорен в Краснодарском крае священник Ставропольской епархии Роман Погребняк, которого суд признал виновным в трех преступлениях сексуального характера в отношении малькиков от девяти до 12 лет.
В Ульяновской области пономарь прихода Спасо-Преображенского храма в Димитровграде Александр Берсенев получил 20 лет — суд признал его виновным в изнасиловании 19 мальчиков. Ранее Берсенев уже был судим за сексуальное насилие над подростками-хоккеистами, у которых он был тренером.
Кроме того, в Петербурге добиваются экстрадиции из Израиля духовника футбольного клуба «Зенит» Глеба Грозовского, которого обвиняют в изнасиловании несовершеннолетних, в Челябинской области священника задержали по подозрению в похищении троих детей, в Кабардино-Балкарии — за развратные действия в отношении десятилетней девочки, в Ставропольском крае — объявили в розыск по обвинению в растлении мальчиков и избиение домочадцев. | {
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