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How Deep Does the Rabbit Hole of South Africa Corruption Go? | (Bloomberg) -- The name Gupta has become synonymous with state corruption in South Africa, as the family allegedly used its friendship with Jacob Zuma when he was president to win contracts and pick cabinet members. But recent evidence splashed across newspaper front-pages and televised hearings about bribes and sweetheart deals between businessmen and ruling African National Congress officials suggest the rot runs far deeper than most people thought. The scandals, which have embroiled international companies, threaten to deter investment in a country already battling perceptions of a skills shortage, comparatively high costs and violent crime. Its systemic in that entire systems have been subverted to promote corruption, said David Lewis, the executive director of South Africas Corruption Watch. Were down there right now with the worst. The nation has been transfixed by the televised testimony of the former chief operating officer of Bosasa, Angelo Agrizzi, at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture, a judicial panel investigating corruption. During nine days on the stand, he detailed how the services company bribed Zuma, members of parliament and other state officials. Heart Bleeds The commission last year heard the price of a bribe from the Guptas for a government official, in this case the finance minister, could be as high as 600 million rand ($160 million) -- this in a country where unemployment is near a record high of 28 percent. Sabelo Legwathi, a 47-year-old factory worker who lives in Kagiso, a township near Krugersdorp west of Johannesburg, said by the time he got home at 7 p.m., his family would give him a quick summary of the days proceedings: the entire ANC is going to prison. When I look at my 16-year-old son, I cannot vote for people I know have no interest in his future, he said. My heart bleeds for this generation. Cyril Ramaphosa, who replaced Zuma in February last year, insists the party is working to win back the voters confidence, and that holding the inquiry is helping to expose possible wrongdoing from the past. We are cleansing our country and our institutions, he said in a recent speech in India. Election Year But the revelations may undermine efforts by the ANC, the party Nelson Mandela led to power 25 years ago, to convince voters in elections likely in May that its not riven by graft. Evidence of wrongdoing keeps emerging. Another inquiry into Africas biggest fund manager showed that some of the $150 billion under its management went to help allies of the ruling party. A commission last year detailed how the tax agency was dismantled to help aid alleged graft, while companies such as McKinsey & Co., KPMG LLP, SAP SE and Bain & Co. have also been dragged into the scandals. McKinsey returned 1 billion rand to the state power utility after doing work with a Gupta-linked partner, KPMG has shed a 1,200 staff after clients dropped them because its auditors did improper work for the revenue agency and contributed to the collapse of a bank. Contracts that SAP and Bain won have also been questioned. Quite Horrifying We are still in the process of laying out the extent of the problem and its quite horrifying, said Piers Pigou, senior consultant for southern Africa at the International Crisis Group. Things are definitely, definitely very bad. While South Africa has struggled with graft before and after the apartheid era, Zuma has been blamed for hollowing out prosecuting agencies and allowing a culture of corruption to flourish during his nine-year presidency. The former leader, who says the Guptas were his friends, has been charged with corruption related to an arms deal in the 1990s. Zuma and the Guptas deny any wrongdoing. There are important instances of corruption pre-Zuma, but Zuma took it to new heights, Lewis said. There was nothing of this scale. South Africas saving grace may be the robustness of its media and judiciary, Pigou said. Theyve probably helped to keep Africas most-industrialized nation from slipping further down the ranks of graft and crime indexes. Transparency International ranked South Africa 73rd in its latest corruption ratings of 180 countries released on Tuesday. In the year that Zuma took over, 2009, South Africa was ranked 55th. Story continues | https://finance.yahoo.com/news/deep-does-rabbit-hole-south-073009421.html |
Could Unions Help Defeat ISIS? | To show a clear trend, Marcusa would ideally want to find towns to compare the Mtlaoui/Sidi Bouzid divergence to outside Tunisia. But thats difficult to do in other areas struggling with Jihadi-Salafism, as the labor movement has traditionally been repressed in those countries. Unlike Tunisia, where 670,000 workers went on strike just last week, other countries across the Middle East do not have the same unbroken history of labor activism. In oil-rich Iraq, the country that in 2017 suffered more terrorist attacks than any other nation, one would expect to find many Mtlaoui-type towns: Iraq has a long labor history, with union support instrumental to its independence in 1958. However, the labor movement there is only recently showing signs of strength and rebirth after a long period of suppression under Saddam Hussein, as well as the flood of corruption and mismanagement that followed the U.S. invasion in 2003. Iraqs sweeping changes to its labor laws in 2015, including the countrys first sexual harassment protections and reinstating the formerly banned right to strike, represent progress. But Saddams shadow remainsthe continued prohibition of unionizing among civil servants means its still not living up to the International Labor Organization standards of freedom of association it ratified in June 2018. Considering that Iraqs public sector employs over 40 percent of the countrys working age population, that represents a significant number of silenced voices. Labor unions effectiveness in Iraq can be illustrated by the enemies they have made. Soon after the invasion of Iraq, Hadi Saleh, the head of the newly-formed Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU)its largest union federationwas murdered by insurgents in his home. When ISIS invaded Mosul in 2014, they stormed IFTU offices. Years of U.S. State Department Human Rights reports show the labor movement sounding the alarm on the Iraqi states deep corruption. The same reports show multiple instances of the state interfering with union work and in many cases raiding union offices. [Iraqs unions] are used to shoutingnot in a bad way, but loudlyin order to inform the government: We are your friends. We are not your enemy. We want to work with you in order to build democracy, in order to have proper industries that work for everybody, said Abdullah Muhsin, an activist in Iraqs post-war labor movement who is now an international officer for the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) in the UK. To Muhsin, the nonsectarian nature of union organizing is a clear antidote to the divisions that have riven the country. The governments anti-union stance is, among other things, an obstacle in fighting extremism. If unions were allowed to do their job and be considered as a partner, Muhsin told me, we would not have seen these problems. Because unions are working from below, they are workers, they are in factories, in schools, in communities, they have eyes everywhere. Muhsin isnt alone in thinking strong civic organizations can make a difference fighting extremism. During the Obama Administration, a core pillar of Countering Violent Extremism or CVE, (the catch-all term for addressing terrorisms root causes) was the need to strengthen civil society, from womens groups to marginalized communities and organized labor. The term civil society has cropped up in every presidents national security strategy post 9/11. What the term lacks is specificitywhere exactly to focus in civil society. And thats the gap studies like Marcusas seek to fill. Heba El-Shazli, a professor at George Mason Universitys School of Policy, Government and International Affairs (SPGIA) said that the lack of attention to unions today differs from policy in previous decades, citing U.S. support for the Solidarity movement in Poland during the Cold War. A 28-year veteran of international labor issues, El-Shazli lamented unionisms relative absence from todays foreign policy debate, Its really outrageous that its just not on the radar. It really is. She wonders whether the overall decline of unions as a power in American society today means that policymakers no longer consider their strengths overseas. If so, however, thats short-sighted, she told me. Its too simplistic to say that more union activity will vanquish extremism in the Middle East, but theres ample evidence at this point that this and similar approaches might help. Inserting these findings into foreign policy is a matter of politics. Republican administrations have not traditionally been strong union supporters, but such recent research might interest the ascendant and vocal progressive wing of the Democratic party, who have previously been criticized for being insufficiently focused on international affairs. Encouraging countries explicitly to support their unions might seem to some like a pie in the sky idea. But after almost $6 trillion spent on an unwinnable war, and with ever-decreasing appetite in the United States for military solutions, surely its worth trying something new. | https://newrepublic.com/article/152942/unions-help-defeat-isis |
How will Michigan State basketball replace Joshua Langford? | CLOSE LSJ columnist Graham Couch shared his thoughts on ESPN GameDay coming to MSU during Wednesday's "Couch and The Rube" show Graham Couch, Lansing State Journal EAST LANSING Now that Joshua Langford officially has been ruled out for the rest of the season with a stress injury in his left foot, Michigan State basketball can begin to figure out how to cope without their co-captain. Luckily, they've had an eight-game head start on that, as the guard has been out since Dec. 29. That does not mean it will be an easy task for coach Tom Izzo and the Spartans to replace the production of Langford, a 15-point per game scorer and pesky perimeter defender. Josh is big, key player on our team, and that was a big loss, junior Nick Ward said after Sundays loss at Purdue. But were gonna keep fighting. It does make it a lot tougher. No. 6 MSU hosts Indiana on Saturday at Breslin Center (6 p.m., ESPN). Joshua Langford (foot) is out for the season. (Photo: Al Goldis | For the Lansing State Journal) I think the story should be what an unbelievable job these guys have done to weather that storm without a player of that caliber, Izzo said Tuesday, a day before revealing the final diagnosis. Windsor: Michigan State still capable of deep NCAA run without Joshua Langford More: Michigan State toughened as controversy swirled. Here's how Langfords injury, however, has had a rippling effect across the lineup for the Spartans (18-3, 9-1 Big Ten), who are tied for first in the Big Ten with Michigan. Shooting guard Matt McQuaid has assumed the role of defending the opposing teams top player, which he and his fellow co-captain Langford previously shared. And with Langford out and Kyle Ahrens dealing with a back injury, McQuaid who was supposed to be MSUs backup point guard has strictly played the wing. That has meant Cassius Winstons minutes per game have increased, with freshman Foster Loyer still working to gain trust enough to run the offense for longer than a few minutes before or after media timeouts. Winston, a Big Ten player of the year candidate, has averaged 34.7 minutes and 20.1 points in the eight games since Langford left the lineup, guiding MSU to a 7-1 record. Ahrens has missed three of the past five games. Aaron Henry has assumed the starting job on the wing, and Izzo has played fellow freshman Gabe Brown more out of necessity. Against Purdue, Izzo moved senior forward Kenny Goins out to the wing and plugged Xavier Tillman in beside Ward on the block. That can work for short stretches but also could be problematic should one of them run in to foul trouble, which happened with Ward in a scoreless 14 minutes against Maryland. Michigan State forwards Nick Ward (44) and Kenny Goins. (Photo: Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press) ESPN: MSU's Cassius Winston, U-M's Zavier Simpson among best in country Langford, a 6-foot-6 Alabama native who did not miss a game in his first 2 seasons at MSU prior to the injury, averaged 15 points, 3.6 rebounds and 2.3 assists while shooting 43.3 percent overall. The former McDonalds All-American averaged 28.4 minutes in his 13 games before leaving the Northern Illinois game on Dec. 29. You gotta understand when you take a couple cogs out the wheel you know, if you remove five spokes from a bike, the wheel doesn't work as well , Izzo said. We have to devise a couple new ways to do some things and get some of those freshmen to be better shooters. Joshua Langford supports his team against Northwestern, Jan. 2. (Photo: Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press) The dropoff from Langford to Henry and Brown on the wing in transition also is significant. Langford learned how hard and wide he needed to run to make the MSU fast-break lethal, as Izzo called it. The youngsters remain works in progress in that area. Where Brown has no hesitation to shoot a jumper coming off the bench, making 4 of 18 shots the past eight games, Henry understands that is something he needs to do more of since taking over the starting job. I gotta find confidence in myself to shoot the 3, said Henry, who is averaging 6.4 points with two made 3-pointers in Langfords absence. Ive worked on that every day, and it goes in more times than not. I just gotta find confidence in myself to shoot that. I gotta shoot the ball more. Langfords injury also has changed what the Spartans opponents can do defensively against them. Instead of worrying about the swingmans threat of a 3-point shot or midrange jumper, which he can create for himself off the dribble, defenders have been able to sag off Henry more of a slasher who is developing offensively. The inconsistent shooting from the freshmen on the wing without Langfords presence has meant more double-teams to Ward, when he catches the ball on the block, and increasingly more work for Winstonas he tries to set up the half-court offense. Some of the things that happen with these guys are because other people are out, Izzo said. Quarterbacks arent as good if they dont have the best receivers or the line blocking for them, as we learned last year. We dont want to deal with it, we dont want to talk about it, we dont want to make excuses for it it is a reality. The reality is people can do more to Nick when we dont have those two shooters. Kyle Ahrens shoots against Iowa in the second half in Iowa City, Iowa on Jan. 24. (Photo: Jeffrey Becker, USA TODAY Sports) The health of Ahrens, who averages 5.8 points and 2.7 rebounds in 18.8 minutes, becomes more critical minus Langford. He understands the defensive demands of the wing position, and provides tenacity at both ends and outside shooting on offense that can help offset the loss of Langfords 2.2 3-pointers per game and 40.3 percent shooting from deep. Ahrens missed Sundays 73-63 loss at Purdue, as well as MSU road wins at Nebraska and Penn State. Izzo and Ahrens both said they expect the back to be an ongoing issue and concern. Im just kind of healing up now, Ahrens said after going through Tuesdays practice. Taking it day by day. The progress weve made so far to here from Iowa is tremendous. Im feeling a lot better. With the progress I made today, Im a competitor, so I want to (play vs. Indiana) so bad. But its up to coach and what he wants and what he thinks is right. I hope to go. In the three games without both Ahrens and Langford, MSU averaged 68 points and went 2-1. In the five games with Ahrens playing and Langford out, the Spartans are averaging 79 points and won all of them. Defensively, they have allowed 63.3 points without just Langford and 64.3 points with both players out. MSU is averaging 82.8 points scored and 66.4 points allowed for the season. Thomas Kithier rebounds against Maryland's Ricky Lindo Jr. on Jan. 21. (Photo: Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press) Izzo said he might look at playing freshmen forwards Thomas Kithier and Marcus Bingham Jr. a little more to help alleviate the strain on the other big men. Kithier has provided some energy off the bench the past three games, while Bingham has remained on the bench until outcomes have been determined. The 6-11, 215-pound Bingham, whose physical strength remains a work in progress, could provide some of the outside shooting Izzo says the Spartans are lacking without Langford. That could require Goins to play more on the wing. Yet, MSU has continued to win as Langford has sat on the bench in his walking boot, turning himself into a pseudo-coach and cheerleader for his teammates. His leadership wont vanish while his playing time does. Contact Chris Solari: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari. Download our Spartans Xtra app for free on Apple and Android devices! | https://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/michigan-state/spartans/2019/02/01/michigan-state-basketball-joshua-langford-injury/2736661002/ |
Did someone kill or poach a California wolf pack? | Nearly four years ago in the forests of Californias rugged northeast corner, two black and brown wolves had a litter of five pups in the shadow of Mount Shasta. They became known as the Shasta Pack the first known gray wolves to have offspring on California soil in nearly a century. The pups, shown frolicking in camera footage released by state wildlife officials, became a statewide sensation, even as local ranchers bristled at the new threat to their cattle. Three and a half years later, the Shasta Pack has vanished from Siskiyou County. All but one of the wolves disappeared within a few weeks of a standoff between ranchers and the pack and after the wolves were spotted feeding on a calf carcass. Just one pup is known to have survived; biologists say DNA tests show it left the state. State wildlife officials were never able to place a tracking collar on a member of the pack before they vanished. No corpses were found. Digital Access for only $0.99 For the most comprehensive local coverage, subscribe today. Thats left a trail of questions. And wolf advocates say they are especially troubled by one of those questions in light of recent wolf news. Last month, state wildlife officers quietly opened a wolf poaching investigation following the death of an animal in neighboring Modoc County. If confirmed, it would be the first time someone killed a wolf in California since they were eradicated early last century. All those are possibilities, said Capt. Patrick Foy of the Department of Fish and Wildlife. However, Carter Niemeyer, a biologist who spent a decade as a wolf management specialist for the federal government, is skeptical the wolves dispersed so suddenly without some form of trauma first occurring to the pack. He said its rare for an established family of wolves to vanish from their territory. When it does happen, its usually because one or both of the adults suddenly died. When a pack just totally vaporizes, I would be suspect, he said. Something happened. The ongoing poaching case in Modoc County raises the specter that that something could have been nefarious. Radio silence On Dec. 2, Oregon wildlife biologists notified California officials that a yearling male, labeled OR-59 and wearing a GPS collar, had traveled from a pack in northeast Oregon and crossed the state line into Modoc County. Three days later, the wolf was spotted by a rancher feeding on a calf carcass, which investigators later determined may have died from pneumonia. On Dec. 9, Oregon biologists got a mortality signal from its collar indicating the wolf had died, according to a report on the California wildlife agencys website. Investigators have revealed little about the case. They havent said where OR-59s body was found, how the wolf died or why they find its death suspicious. Local ranchers said theyre not hearing much on their end either. Its been absolutely radio silence on anything wolves since it was found in early December, said Ned Coe, a Modoc County supervisor and cattle rancher who works as a field representative for the state Farm Bureau. Coe and other ranchers in Californias sparsely populated northeast corner have been living an uneasy coexistence with wolves since the animals returned to the state in 2011. In December of that year, OR-7, a 2-year-old gray male, left Oregons Imnaha Pack and traveled hundreds of miles to Californias northern border. He spent months wandering the state before returning to Oregon, finding a mate and starting his own pack. OR-7s appearance prompted the California Fish and Game Commission to grant gray wolves endangered species protections. While cheered by environmentalists, the decision was opposed by ranchers and big-game hunters who fear wolves will attack livestock and deplete deer and elk herds. Earlier this week, environmental groups were victorious when a San Diego Superior Court judge tossed a case filed by California farming and ranching associations that challenged the commissions listing, which prohibits killing a wolf under any circumstance. A convicted wolf killer in California could face years in prison. Amaroq Weiss of the Center for Biological Diversity said keeping the endangered species protection intact is critical. When the government strips the protections, it gives a signal to the public that wolves are not valuable they dont need to be protected so you can start killing them, she said. In Oregon alone, wildlife officials say 15 wolves have been killed illegally in recent years; only two people have been prosecuted for the crimes. Weiss estimates around two dozen wolves have been illegally killed in Washington since 2008. | https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/environment/article225258150.html |
How much will it cost for California to expand Medi-Cal? | State lawmakers are expected to receive a first look Friday at the costs tied to an ambitious plan to provide health insurance for more California residents. The report represents Californias response to the Trump administrations retreat on the Affordable Care Act, analyzing how to provide more generous consumer subsidies to pay for costly health insurance, subsidies for insurance companies and a state penalty on residents who fail to maintain health coverage. The report, authored by a group of health policy experts including economists Wesley Yin and Nicholas Tilipman and staff from Covered California, the states health insurance marketplace is one of the more detailed looks at options to shore up the states insurance marketplace in the face of challenges from the federal government. Consumer advocates have warned for months that lawmakers need to act. Digital Access for only $0.99 For the most comprehensive local coverage, subscribe today. The federal governments repeal of the ACAs tax penalty has made it easier for more than 300,000 California consumers to flee the individual insurance market, including as many as 250,000 insured through Covered California, according to estimates by the California Association of Health Plans. As fewer people sign up, premium costs are expected to soar for those who remain in the market. Already, Covered California is reporting losses in its latest enrollment figures, which showed a 24 percent drop in the number of new enrollees compared with 2018. The report to the Legislature is an early roadmap that could guide policy decisions and efforts to ensure the insurance offered on the California exchange remains affordable. But it will likely come at a hefty price, which may figure prominently in the hearing lawmakers are expected to hold Feb. 12. Covered California officials declined to comment on a draft version of the document reviewed by the USC Center for Health Journalism Collaborative. At its heart, the report seeks to find a way to help people like Celia Green stay insured through Covered California. A 56-year-old executive assistant living in Sacramento, Green first signed up for a policy with Kaiser Permanente in late 2016 for about $650 a month, she said. She saw the price rise the next year as her husbands pay increased even though she worked a part-time job. As her familys income went up, the value of her subsidy declined. When the monthly premium jumped yet again last December to around $1,240 a month just for her, Green decided to leave the exchange and joined her husband on his employer-based coverage, she said. Now it was to the point where my monthly premium was more expensive than just getting it through my husbands employer, Green said, even though my husbands employer didnt pay any portion. Among those the subsidies could help are older adults living in high-cost parts of the state who can pay more than 30 percent of their income just for premiums for the most common plans, the report states. Laurel Lucia, a health care expert at the UC Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education, said the state is poised to make broad-scale changes that could lower costs for California families. In his first budget proposal, Gov. Gavin Newsom recommended expanding Medi-Cal eligibility for undocumented young adults ages 19 to 25 at a cost of $260 million. Two bills introduced the first day of the legislative session, meanwhile, propose to expand Medi-Cal to all otherwise eligible undocumented adults, regardless of age, with an estimated $3 billion price tag. The new report provides a detailed look at different paths forward, said Lucia. These numbers are especially important at this point in time, because of the great interest among legislators and the governor in getting to universal coverage, she said. But also, because the loss of the federal individual mandate penalty makes it more urgent that we look at ways to counteract that. Two schools of thought The draft report breaks potential solutions into two schools of thought. One approach strives to make health coverage more affordable for as many consumers as possible and the other takes a more piecemeal approach, assuming budget constraints and targeting specific populations. The price tags mirror the ambitions of each plan. The report estimates the most expansive and generous plan will cost the state an additional $4.2 billion annually and cover as many as 764,000 more people. A portion of that sum would be defrayed by $1.1 billion in federal funding to help insurance companies contend with costly high-risk patients. The least expensive of all the options would cost $215 million annually and insure an additional 27,000 people. Several policy options emerged from the report. The options mix and match the amount of money dedicated to reducing premiums for consumers and for cost-sharing subsidies to shield insurance companies facing hefty bills from high-risk patients. The plan also weighs whether dollars collected from a potential new state tax penalty for those who fail to buy insurance could be used to defray the cost of more generous subsidies. One provision projected to cover an additional 478,000 people would expand financial support to households with an income of up to 600 percent of the federal poverty limit. That could mean a family of four with an income of as much as $150,000 could be eligible for a subsidy. The current subsidy cutoff for the same family is just above $100,000. In some parts of the state, like Los Angeles and the Bay Area, incomes can quickly be gobbled up by rising housing costs, making it all the more difficult to pay high health care premiums. The subsidies under the Affordable Care Act arent adjusted for cost of living, and in a lot of parts of the state theres not a lot of money left over for people in their household budgets to pay for health care, Lucia said. Californias slow march toward universal coverage is not without skeptics. The state already oversees the largest exchange in the country and has expanded Medi-Cal eligibility for undocumented children. As a result, since 2013, California has seen the biggest decline in its uninsured rate of any state. Still, none of the policies outlined in the Covered California draft report would target the 1 to 1.5 million noncitizen adults estimated to be among the states uninsured. While anyone can buy health insurance, undocumented adults in California currently receive no subsidies or access to low-income programs. Some health policy experts, like Lanhee Chen, a fellow at the Hoover Institution and professor at Stanford University, wonder if more subsidies will ever be enough. Chen said government subsidies have their limits and the real issue is the lack of transparency around the rising cost of health services. Obviously, the affordability issue is front and center for many Californians, and the notion of trying to subsidize or assist with the cost of health premiums is laudable in spirit, Chen said. But the idea of simply subsidizing people or creating more prescriptive government policies really ignores the fundamental factors that are driving up health costs in California and around the country. A number of state hospital, insurance and consumer advocacy groups embraced the reports findings, but each constituency has its own priorities. This is not just a multiple choice choose one. You can also have combinations. This is more like a buffet, said Anthony Wright, executive director of the consumer advocacy group Health Access California. We support (many) of these options. The question is, what can we get done this year? This story was produced in partnership with Uncovered California, a partnership with other news outlets across the state of California organized by the USC Center for Health Journalism News Collaborative. | https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/health-and-medicine/article225380830.html |
Whats on TV immediately after the Super Bowl? | CLEVELAND, Ohio -- James Cordens new CBS talent search series The Worlds Best gets the coveted time slot after Super Bowl LIII on Sunday. In previous years, networks have used the showcase to give an existing show a boost (i.e. This Is Us in 2018) or to launch a brand new series they think will be big hit. Sometimes it works (The Wonder Years in 1988). Sometimes it doesnt ("Grand Slam in 1990). With The Worlds Best, created by reality show king Mark Burnett, CBS not only hopes to make a big splash on a big stage, but also attempt to dethrone NBCs ratings juggernaut Americas Got Talent. As its title suggest, the series features contestants from all over the world. The acts will be judged by a celebrity panel of Drew Barrymore, RuPaul and Faith Hill. What sets the show apart is the ominous Wall of the World, a jury made up of 50 experts from every field of the entertainment industry from across the globe that will decide contestants' fates. At the end of the 10-episode run, a winner will be crowned and go home with a grand prize of $1 million. Look for the post-Super Bowl episode sometime after 10 p.m. After that, The Worlds Best settles into its regular night and time on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. (Feb. 6 and 13) before moving to 9 p.m. starting Feb. 20. The show airs locally on WOIO Channel 19. | https://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/2019/02/whats-on-tv-after-the-super-bowl.html |
Who is Cory Booker? | New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker became the latest senator to throw his hat into the 2020 ring Friday morning, when he announced his presidential campaign with a video posted to Twitter. Booker attained national fame as the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, for seven years. As a senator, he has been a vocal member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Biography Booker, who was raised in the affluent suburbs of northern New Jersey, has often cited his parents, Cary and Carolyn, as his inspiration. They were among the first black executives at IBM and desegregated their mostly white neighborhood. Booker received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Stanford University, where he also played as a tight end for the football team. After graduation, he was awarded the prestigious Rhodes scholarship to study at the University of Oxford, before returning to the U.S. to get his law degree at Yale Law School. After working as a public-interest attorney and housing advocate in Newark, Booker decided to run for the city's municipal council in 1998. He managed to topple a long-time incumbent and, at age 29, become the youngest-ever member of the council, where he gained notoriety for fasting outside a housing project to denounce the intensifying crime and drug use in some of Newark's neighborhoods. After launching an unsuccessful bid in 2002 against incumbent mayor Sharpe James, Booker ran again in 2006 and defeated deputy mayor Ronald Rice. During his tenure as mayor, Booker was praised for attracting large companies to Newark and revamping the city's downtown. However, he was also criticized by local residents and officials for appearing out-of-touch and focusing on his national image. After longtime New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg died in the summer 2013, Booker ran to fill his seat and defeated a little-known Republican mayor in a special election. In 2014, he won reelection to serve a full term in the Senate. Booker is notably the only vegan in the Senate. Key Issues and views Booker has made criminal justice reform and the decriminalization of marijuana integral issues of his agenda in the Senate. Pointing to the disproportionate incarceration of minorities for marijuana-related offenses, he crafted the Marijuana Justice Act in the summer of 2017. Booker is one of the chief architects of the First Step Act, a landmark bill that President Trump signed into law in December after rare overwhelming bipartisan support in Congress. The legislation increases investment in programs to curb recidivism among federal prisoners and modifies several sentencing laws, including mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenders. Although he hopes to tout it as a signature achievement of his career in Congress, Booker acknowledged that the bill is just one stepping stone to overhaul the criminal justice system. Controversy Although he has a liberal voting record in the Senate and has been a staunch critic of the Trump administration, Booker has faced criticism by some progressives for receiving large donations from pharmaceutical corporations and banks. His 2020 campaign will not accept donations from corporate PACs or lobbyists. In what he touted as his "Spartacus" moment, Booker claimed to have released confidential committee documents during the contentious confirmation process for Justice Brett Kavanaugh. His Republican colleagues accused him of grandstanding and said the documents had already been cleared. Criticism from Trump In a November interview with the New York Post, the president said Booker "ran Newark into the ground" and falsely accused him of not living in the city when he was mayor. During the 2016 campaign, Mr. Trump claimed to know more about Booker than the New Jersey senator knew about himself. "If Cory Booker is the future of the Democratic Party, they have no future! I know more about Cory than he knows about himself," Mr. Trump tweeted in July of that year. Grace Segers contributed to this report | https://www.cbsnews.com/news/who-is-cory-booker-2020-candidate-for-president-democratic-party-views-stance-issues-biography/ |
Which of these 5 Flyers could be dealt before the NHL trade deadline? | originally appeared on nbcsportsphiladelphia.com The trade dominoes are starting to topple around the NHL and the Flyers are expected to be in on the action as well. "I could see us buying and selling, I guess to use those terms," Chuck Fletcher said. "But the bigger focus is, we'd like to get some pieces in here that will be a part of this for a few years." Scroll to continue with content Ad Here are the five likely candidates Fletcher could move in order to get that accomplished. Simmonds is arguably one of the most highly-coveted players on the trade market. Cup contending teams would love to add a 25-goal scorer who works the trenches while providing a net-front presence on the power play. Fletcher mentioned that Simmonds isn't the only priority moving forward with several key RFAs that all need new contracts. "We have lots of holes and a certain amount of money in which to do it with the salary cap," Fletcher said Monday. "We're just trying to balance everything and make the right decision, but certainly in a few weeks I think it will be resolved one way or the other." He'll be signed to an extension. However, I just don't see a scenario where Simmonds is unsigned or not dealt prior to the deadline, and I fully expect the latter to happen. His value will never be higher than what it is between now and Feb. 25. Story continues Weise reported to the Phantoms this week, where he will be buried until further notice. It's an unfortunate situation for both sides, but a mistake that was made the moment the ink was dried on a four-year contract. Weise never brought that energy and physicality the Flyers were hoping for. "Dale's not going to be a part of this going forward, so we'll try to find him another team to go to," Fletcher said. "He's obviously hungry to get playing, and to find a situation that's better for himself." He'll be leveraged as part of an offseason trade. If that doesn't pan out, then Fletcher will buy out the remaining year on his contract with a reasonable cap hit spread out over two years ($1.18 million in 2019-2020 and just $583,000 in 2020-21). Raffl's in the final year of his contract that pays him $2.35 million. Now relegated to the fourth line, he has become expendable. Trading Raffl would also open up a roster spot for someone like Nicolas Aube-Kubel, who was called up in November. If Fletcher was able to squeeze a sixth-round pick from Arizona for Jordan Weal, then certainly Raffl can command a mid-round pick. Possible Teams: San Jose, Vegas, Colorado The Sharks have an extra fifth-rounder in 2020 and Vegas has three fifth-round picks in 2019 at its disposal. To get out of the Western Conference can be punishing and Raffl's size and strength may be an asset worth taking a chance on. He'll simply become a free agent on July 1. The Flyers are staring at a logjam on the blue line next season with Sam Morin and Phil Myers also NHL ready. I believe the organization values Gudas and the toughness he brings having tailored his game to the style of play we see now in the league. His contract is manageable at $3.35 million through next season. I expect Fletcher to hold onto Gudas as the Flyers make a push into February. If they can't close the gap, then Gudas could be on the move. "We'll have to see what our health is," Fletcher said. "I don't anticipate moving players out just to play young players." Possible Teams: Montreal, Minnesota The Canadiens and Wild are two teams that could benefit from Gudas' rugged style of play and could use one more right-handed shot on their respective blue lines. Could still be packaged in a deal over the summer or sticks around for one more season. However, Fletcher is also looking to add a top-four defenseman over the summer and Gudas doesn't seem to fit that mold. Personally, I don't see Ghost going anywhere before Feb. 25, but there have been quite a few rumblings in regards to the Flyers' 25-year-old defenseman. Hockey analyst Bob McKenzie mentioned Gostisbehere on TSN radio in Montreal: "Gostisbehere is a name that's been out there, but I don't know that it's at the top of the list of things that Chuck Fletcher wants to move out of town. That's not to say that he wouldn't for the right price." Possible Teams: Anaheim, Vancouver The Ducks and Canucks are two teams that could use Ghost's big shot on a sluggish power play. Anaheim would love to add a veteran defenseman as they recently acquired Michael Del Zotto through a trade with the Canucks for Luke Schenn. If he's not a part of the Flyers' top power-play unit moving forward, it will be interesting to see how and where Gostisbehere fits into Fletcher's plans after this season. Click here to download the MyTeams App by NBC Sports! Receive comprehensive coverage of your teams and stream the Flyers, Sixers and Phillies games easily on your device. More on the Flyers | https://sports.yahoo.com/5-flyers-could-dealt-nhl-193536004.html?src=rss |
Should The Kristaps Porzingis Trade Worry The Golden State Warriors? | The NBA was rocked yesterday by the New York Knicks trading Kristaps Porzingis to the Dallas Mavericks for a package including Dennis Smith Jr, two first round picks, and the expiring contracts of Wes Matthews and DeAndre Jordan. The Knicks have essentially traded away the best young talent theyve had since Patrick Ewing to open up as much as $76m of salary cap space this summer. Its a huge gamble, but the buzz around the league is that theyll target the Golden State Warriors Kevin Durant and the Boston Celtics Kyrie Irving. Warriors fans may well be nervous. Previously the Knicks had only enough cap space for one free agent, and beyond Porzingis didnt have much to excite potential additions. The opportunity to sell Durant on the Big Apple along with Irving is undoubtedly a better pitch than a roster that currently sits dead last in the NBA with just 10 wins all season. For once the Knicks do have their own draft pick and will be praying that the ping pong balls fall the right way and theyre able to draft Dukes Zion Williamson. But that last placed record no longer guarantees the best chance to pick first, after changes to the lottery odds which are coming in for the first time this year. Ironically it may be the one year the Knicks finally tank right, and then dont receive the traditional prize. History as a judge But one cursive glance at the Knicks free agency history suggests a different outcome. The Knicks have long attempted to fast-track the rebuilding process, repeatedly trading young talent and picks to open up cap space to chase the best players in the league. And the Knicks have always, without fail, struck out. Its the precise opposite of how the Warriors built their dynasty. In 2010, having carved out enough space to sign two of the monster free agency class headlined by Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh, the Knicks ended up with Amare Stoudemire and Raymond Felton. Stoudemire was a legitimate star, but his knees gave out quickly and his contract became an albatross. Meanwhile the rest of the teams young assets and picks were sacrificed on the altar of Carmelo Anthony. They never recovered and were capped out without draft picks and young talent for years. The next time the Knicks had significant cap space was 2015. Again they struck out and ended up with Robin Lopez as their big addition. Lopez is a solid big man, but hardly the savior Knicks fans wanted. Then in 2016 came arguably one of the most disastrous summers since 2005, where their infamous former General Manager Isiah Thomas blew the entire taxpayer mid-level exception on middling big man Jerome James, and then turned around and traded two unprotected first round picks for center Eddy Curry just a few months later. Together the James and Curry contracts (remember thats not Lebron and Steph) hamstrung the Knicks for years, and the two picks became LaMarcus Aldridge and Joakim Noah. The very same Joakim Noah for four years, $72m. But Noah was a shell of the brilliant player he had become in the intervening years. He played just 46 games for the Knicks in the 2016/17 season, and only seven more the following year before the Knicks had to buy him out and stretch the remainder of his contract, which is still clogging up their cap. Most recently, in 2017, the Knicks used their cap space to reacquire Tim Hardaway Jr on a $71m, four-year contract, just two years after theyd dumped him on Atlanta. Yes, thats the same Tim Hardaway Jr contract that in order to get off the Knicks just had to attach their prime asset Kristaps Porzingis to. Lets face it, the Knicks record with their cap space is horrendous. Its a whos who of bloated contracts for second-tier players, or stars with a concerning injury history that then pan out exactly as everyone expected. Thats why so many Knicks fans were excited to building around a young talent in Porzingis, and potentially a high draft pick this year, coupled with maybe a long shot at Durant or another top tier free agent. Giving all that up is a very high risk, unlikely reward strategy that is all too familiar to those who know the Knicks all too well. Theres still the risk for the Warriors that the Knicks buck the trend and do manage to tempt Durant to New York. But for now, theres another, more immediate impact for Golden State. Both Matthews and Jordan may well become prime targets on the buyout market. Yep, the Golden State Warriors. Matthews, a career 38% shooter from beyond the arc, would provide some defense and shooting on the wing, filling potentially their biggest need. If they go big, Jordan could back up Cousins nicely as long as the Collective Bargaining Agreement doesnt specify a maximum total of Olympians on team rosters. Then theres the long run impact of Porzingis future. Hes a restricted free agent this summer and reportedly was considering signing his one-year qualifying offer to become an unrestricted free agent in 2020. If Porzingis did become a free agent in 2020, and Durant had bolted to the Knicks, the Warriors could be sitting there armed with enough cap space to make a compelling offer to the young big man. Its extremely unlikely though that a player of Porzingis talent coming off an ACL injury would actually follow through with such a threat. Whats more, the Mavericks will be able to sell him on a future with rookie sensation Luka Doncic in a much more stable environment than Porzingis has experienced in his NBA career to date. Let's not forget that Dirk Nowitzki, the greatest European NBA player ever, is there to mentor them both and smooth their path to NBA stardom. In fact, the biggest threat to the Warriors may well be if Porzingis gets healthy and recovers his former strength. A tandem with Luka Doncic quite simply threatens to be the greatest European duo to ever grace the NBA. What's more, the Mavericks could carve out plenty of cap space themselves in either the summer of 2020 or 2021 to surround these two young stars with right at the moment that age would start catching up with the Warriors if they are able to keep their core together. All this drama came amid the biggest story of the approaching trade deadline, Anthony Davis' desire to leave New Orleans. The Knicks were among the teams rumored, but without Porzingis it's hard to see what their package is, even if they do win the draft lottery. What's more the Pelicans have every incentive to wait it out until the summer and trade Davis to Boston for their package of picks and young talent, meaning that Irving would almost certainly remain with the Celtics. If the Pelicans bite instead on the Lakers package of young players before the deadline, there's a considerable chance Irving could sign with Los Angeles to team up with Lebron James and Davis in a trio that definitely would threaten the Warriors. In the end, this move probably does slightly raise the chances of Durant moving to New York, given the bucketload of cap space the Knicks are now sitting on. But if the Knicks don't win the draft lottery, something completely out of their control, the remaining roster doesn't make for a very attractive pitch, even in the unlikely event Irving was to consider leaving Boston. In truth the old rules still apply. If anyone should be scared by the New York Knicks having cap space, its probably Knicks fans rather than the Warriors. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickmurray/2019/02/01/should-the-kristaps-porzingis-trade-worry-the-golden-state-warriors/ |
What If Venezuela's Leader Nicolas Maduro Does Not Step Down? | The call is getting louder -- from Washington to Brussels -- for Venezuela's president Nicolas Maduro to step down. They want him and the ruling Socialists United (PSUV) to abdicate power and make way for Juan Guaido, a man most democratic countries now refer to as el Presidente. Guaido is the president of Venezuela's National Assembly, the equivalent of the U.S. House of Representatives. He's like their Nancy Pelosi, the third in command after Maduro and his VEEP Delcy Rodriguez. Maduro stripped the National Assembly of its legislative powers in 2017, creating a Constituent Assembly of PSUV party yesmen and yeswomen instead. By the standards of the Western world, Venezuela is a dictatorship now. Last week, President Trump followed super hawk vice president Mike Pence to denounce Maduro. To both, Guaido is president and they want the government of Venezuela to restore democracy. Which, to them, means getting rid of PSUV. Gaming this out, there are roughly three options. See: Market Ponders The End Of Venezuela's PSUV -- Forbes In Venezuela, Maduro Lives His Simon Bolivar Moment -- Forbes The Battle For Venezuela's Future -- The Economist The first option absolves Washington from the coup narrative: the military convinces Maduro to step down, they appoint Delcy or some high ranking general as interim president and re-establish the National Assembly as the dual power governing Venezuela. The two sides begin working on a timeline for new elections, of which PSUV would clearly lose. That makes this scenario a bit of a fantasy, but who knows. It's still plausible. It's the version that has Venezuela's government collapsing on itself, with no outside forces manufacturing its downfall. PSUV, once founded by the late president Hugo Chavez, would no likely no longer exist as a political party. It would splinter off into smaller factions. The second option is Washington sanctions crude oil exports, really starving the Venezuelan economy of its primary source of cash flow. Protests get more out of hand, and we have some sort of Manuel Noriega of Panama moment. This may involve Senators like Marco Rubio reaching across the aisle to convince the liberal interventionists in the Democratic Party that some sort of military support is needed to get rid of Maduro and save Venezuela from a worsening human rights crisis. This scenario may be applauded by the majority of Venezuelans, but the fanfare would be short-lived as any U.S. military involvement in regime change there would play into the hands of future revolutionary movements to rise up once again. This would be their "told you so" newsreel of an American coup to show the poor and the intellectual left in the country repeatedly. It would not be a hard sell and would foment animosity in a country whose recent history has been one rife with Chavez-inspired Yankee Go Home rhetoric. The third option is the worst option for Venezuela, but the best for PSUV: Maduro and PSUV dig in their heels and maintain their grip on power. Washington does not intervene out of concern that it would be a bad look for them and the opposition in Venezuela. The economy remains sanctioned and deteriorates further. Venezuela becomes a more closed system, waiting for the day when PdVSA oil money runs out. For days, PSUV supporters have been taking to the op-ed pages in Venezuela (where the press is no longer free) and here in the States to express their thoughts on how the removal of Maduro makes Venezuela worse. Yes, the fall of a president is always messy. The end of Kirchnerism is Argentina made Argentina worse. The end of the Workers' Party rule in Brazil made Brazil worse. But these situations were caused by the parties in power. Venezeuala is not getting better under Maduro, not unless oil goes to $100 a barrel again. And then for sure Washington would ban imports of Venezuelan crude. Both Chevron and Valero are big importers of Venezuelan oil. They'd have to find it elsewhere. Sanctions are not the reason for the economic depression in Venezuela. Last year, Venezuela's GDP contracted by around 5%, according to the IMF. The year before, it was around 10%. PSUV has mismanaged the economy and is considered, by most people on the ground, as a corrupt political apparatus. The only thing socialist about them is their rhetoric and the fact that they subsidize things they cannot afford. All of this will be taken away by a new government. The country is broke. It has defaulted on all sovereign and quasi-sovereign bonds. Only the PdVSA 2020 is not in default. Barring self-implosion or overt military intervention, there is no plan B for Venezuela. There is no plan B if Maduro stays in power. And the only plan B, if he and PSUV go, is for the IMF to take over. Washington can call Guaido president all day long, but the real president of real life in Venezuela is Nicolas Maduro. The National Assembly does not exist, as far as PSUV is concerned. The constitutional crisis is still fluid, but the Maduro regime does look to be on its last legs. New sanctions were imposed this week on senior-level executives at PdVSA. There is some skepticism about regime change although this is much different than the forced regime change in the middle east. PSUV has been left to run Venezuela into the ground for years. There is overwhelming public support for their ouster. Economic sanctions will only destroy the already fragile cash flow situation in Venezuela and this is seen undermining domestic military support among mid-ranked officers. "You cut off the money, you cut off the militarys loyalty," says Siobhan Morden, head of Latin America fixed income for Nomura Securities and a long-time Venezuela watcher. The uncertainty is whether the Venezuela military finally caves to the cashflow stress, leading to option 1. A U.S.-led military intervention -- option 2 -- looks to be on the table. Recall National Security Advisor John Bolton's note about "5,000 troops to Colombia" in a notebook snapped in a photograph during a recent press conference with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. Any comparisons between PSUV and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia should be seen as a signal for military intervention to take out a Party believed to be financed, in part, by narcotrafficking. PSUV as FARC swings the door wide open to option 2. See: The U.S. Declares Economic War On Venezuela -- Forbes Option 3 is still playing itself out. President Maduro seems unwilling to resign at the moment. His latest offer for talks is a non-starter if the agenda doesnt focus on returning legislative power to the opposition-controlled Assembly. Worth noting, Maduro has been promising talks for at least two years. He's even made that promise to the Pope and Vatican officials. Venezuelan Catholic bishops were the first to say Maduro is not the legitimate president of the country following his inauguration on Jan. 10. "We assume that the Maduro administration has already lost support from mid-tier and junior officers and rank and file soldiers that equally suffer from the economic crisis," says Morden from Nomura. There have been no high profile defections from PSUV within Venezuela. The higher ranking military commanders have all circled the wagons around Maduro. It's now a game of Survivor to see if the Maduro regime can outwit, outlast and outplay the opposition, and the intensity of the economic shocks yet to come. The WSJ reported this week that PdVSA has only 10 days left of gasoline supply remaining. Venezuela's crisis isn't stagnating or improving. It's about to get worse. On Wall Street, bond markets have already priced in a high probability of PSUV's demise. Venezuelan bonds are outperforming their peers in emerging markets this month. The recovery value in Venezuela and PdVSA debt is near impossible to assess due to the political crisis, the worsening inflation outlook, and the collapse in domestic production capacity. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2019/02/01/what-if-venezuelas-leader-nicolas-maduro-does-not-step-down/ |
What Exactly Is The Employee Experience? | It's starting to happen. I hear it. I see it. Finally. It's not perfect, but we're making progress, and progress is better than nothing. The employee experience. It's finally getting the airtime it deserves. Yes, some of that airtime is in the form of more consultants talking and writing about it, but when they're doing that, they're spreading the word and pointing companies in the right direction. I've been talking about the employee experience for what seems like forever. For 25 years, I've been telling clients they need to listen to employees, understand the experience and do something about it. In the early years, they'd say, "We'll focus on the employees later." But in the last year or two, it feels like there's a greater understanding of the implications of waiting until later. (It's not perfect, though. I still hear clients say: "Oh, I never thought about that. You're right. It makes sense that the employee experience drives the customer experience.") It's not just about the impact on the customer experience; it's also about the impact on employees themselves. It's about treating them like humans, not like cogs in the wheels of corporate success. It's ultimately about caring about people like people do. It's the sum of all interactions that an employee has with her employer during the duration of her employment relationship. It includes any way the employee "touches" or interacts with the company and vice versa in the course of doing her job. And, importantly, it includes her feelings, emotions and perceptions of those interactions. In Jeffrey Pfeffer's book, Dying for a Paycheck, he cites the following: "In one survey, 61 percent of employees said that workplace stress had made them sick and 7 percent said they had actually been hospitalized. Job stress costs U.S. employers more than $300 billion annually and may cause 120,000 excess deaths each year. In China, 1 million people a year may be dying from overwork. People are literally dying for a paycheck. And it needs to stop." The employee experience needs to be at the top of the priority list. It's not at all about benefits and perks. A lot of companies mistakenly think that because they offer free massages and beer on Fridays that they've checked off the employee experience box. And it's not about culture either, although culture certainly plays into or affects the employee experience. Culture is the result of values plus behavior. It's what employees do when no one is looking. It's like the energy or the vibe of the place. Great cultures make for a great experience, while toxic cultures drain and demoralize. The following are some factors that, when a part of an employee's daily interactions with their employer, contribute to a great experience. Growth and development: Work together on setting career goals, developing a career plan and working toward it. Feedback and coaching: Provide constructive feedback about performance and help them maintain or improve their performance. Recognition and appreciation: Take time to recognize employees for the work they do, share their contributions and impact with the rest of the organization, and say "thank you" or show gratitude on a regular basis. Leadership: A lot of things fall under this one, but I'm talking about servant leadership (serving your employees and putting their needs before your own) and truly human leadership (providing a caring environment where everybody matters). Communication: It must be open, honest, candid, transparent and ongoing. This includes sharing information about the company (e.g., sales, revenue, personnel, challenges, etc.) Camaraderie and collaboration: Work together, play together; take real and sincere interest in your staff or your co-workers. Contributions: Let employees know the impact they are making on their customers and on the business. Ensure they understand the company's "why" and how they contribute. Trust and respect: Create an environment where employees are both trusted and respected. Empowerment: Give employees the freedom to do their jobs, enable them to take the right actions, and give them the authority to make decisions in their day-to-day roles that simplify their work and make things more efficient for themselves and their customers. Success: Help employees be successful by first defining what that means for each individual, then working together to ensure that happens. These are all essential factors in the employee experience. And yet, the employee experience isn't just about these things. Yes, employees want to be wrapped up in one nice big care package of employer love. But they have jobs to do. On top of being cared for, they need to be able to do great work. In a nutshell, the rest is about tools, processes and resources. Tools: This seems like a no-brainer, but employees need a desk, a computer, a workspace, tools, software, etc. Keep in mind, however, not every employee needs the same tools or the same types of tools. Processes: When there are no processes in place, employees make up things as they go. When there are broken processes, steps get missed, and things are done incorrectly. When there are old and inefficient processes, it's a waste of time. Resources: Ensure that employees have the training, education, books, documentation, etc. that they need to do their jobs well. At the onset of a client engagement, I interview executives, employees and customers to get an assessment of the current situation. When I talk to my clients' employees, yes, I hear about all of the "care package" items. But some of the biggest pain points of their experiences are typically about their inability to do a good job. At the heart of it all, employees want to do their job and do it well. Unfortunately, they can't if they aren't provided with the tools, processes and resources needed to do that. If you're not yet focusing on employees and their experience, it's time. Employees must come first. Don't delay! | https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2019/02/01/what-exactly-is-the-employee-experience/ |
Where's The Progress On Trump's China Trade Talks? | Multinationals in China are starting to see some signs of progress. Though it's not much to write home about. A promised meeting between Presidents Trump and Xi Jinping will be key for forecasting the outcome of a three month trade truce, now coming into the home stretch. Less that 48 hours after Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was asked to be extradited to the United States on breaking sanctions laws, China and the U.S. failed to make any noticeable changes on trade policy. This marks the second meeting since the 90-day ceasefire agreement was reached in November at the G20 Summit in Buenos Aires. "There are some points we don't agree to, but we will agree," president Trump told reporters yesterday. "I think when Xi and I meet, every point will be agreed to," he said, marking the second time that he has hinted to a pending deal being made once the two leaders have another face-to-face. The Executive Branch had no details on when the two would meet. Trump is supposedly going to Asia in late February to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. China could be a stop. See: Trump Gives Upbeat Assessment Of China Trade Talks -- WSJ The China "Hard Landing" Is Back On The Table -- Forbes China Is Losing The Trade War In Nearly Every Way -- Forbes Chinese Premier Liu He left Washington on Thursday, seemingly agreeing that whatever they do agree to will be fully enforceable. That means for issues related to intellectual property, U.S. companies can take legal issue with Chinese partners and rivals if they believe their trade secrets and/or technology was stolen. The long-standing concerns that foreign companies have about protection of intellectual property rights, technology transfer, and market access in China are the main issues U.S. multinationals want resolved. For U.S., American firms have put up with watching their Chinese partners take their products, copy them, and create a rival firm. They looked the other way because they felt that was the price to pay for being in a booming market like China. But now that China's tech prowess has grown exponentially over the last 10 years, companies are now starting to be more aggressive in calling on support of Washington to pressure Beijing to change. As we have stated repeatedly, a viable outcome must include a regularized, results-oriented government-to-government dialogue that produces measurable, commercially meaningful outcomes addressing the concerns of American companies," says Craig Allen, president of the U.S. China Business Council, a lobby firm representing American multinational companies in China. Over the last few months since Trump took office, Beijing has sped up plans to allow for U.S. automakers greater access to the market without a local partner. And has allowed for American banks to operate in China without a partner. Goldman Sachs has offices in Shenzhen, Shanghai and Beijing. JP Morgan is opening a China securities business in the mainland this year with a partner. It will have a 51% stake. It is also looking to increase its ownership position in China International Fund Management, a wealth management firm. Market access to financial service firms like Visa and Mastercard would also be a major win for the Trump Administration. As it is, Chinese UnionPay has a near total monopoly on credit card payment services in China. "It's clear that changes to the bilateral commercial relationship are underway and overdue," says Allen. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, one of Trump's diehard China hawks, hinted that trade talks were going okay, but would take hard work and much longer than 90 days to resolve. China's economy is slowing, but that does not seem to have given Beijing any sense of urgency. The sub-50 reading of the official manufacturing PMI points to weak sequential momentum. The official manufacturing PMI, which reflects sequential growth momentum, ticked up to a higher-than-expected 49.5 in January from 49.4 in December 2018. Despite the uptick, it remained below the expansion contraction threshold of 50 and was much weaker than the January 2018 print of 51.3. Chinas year-on-year growth has been slowing in a consistent pattern for about a decade. Several policy changes should lead to stronger activity and market sentiment in the second half of 2019. This is especially true if progress in trade talks shows to be more than the hallow words of politicians. Andy Rothman, a strategist for Matthews Asia, thinks both sides want to resolve the trade dispute sooner rather than later. "Trump seems to believe that resolving this problem and lifting his tariffs on Chinese imports is important to his re-election prospects, and he has adopted a more realistic negotiating strategy, dropping his irrational focus on the bilateral trade deficit as well as demands for Xi to make deep structural changes, such as eliminating his industrial policies and support for state companies," he says. "I think Xi recognizes that Trump's remaining demands, including better market access for American firms and stronger protection for intellectual property rights, will contribute to China's economic progress," says Rothman, who thinks Xi too wants to avoid a conflict that could escalate into a tech war. As it is, Meng's arrest is a potential disaster for Huawei in the U.S. A tech war is a huge barrier to China, jeopardizing their access to U.S. semiconductors. China is not yet up to snuff on homemade microchip manufacturing and processing speeds. A TrumpXi deal -- if it comes as Trump promised -- will not resolve the longer-term challenges, but it will lift short-term fears of an escalating trade war. To many in the market, that's a sign of progress. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2019/02/01/trump-touts-progress-on-china-trade-but-where-is-it-really/ |
Will The Majors Beat The Market In 2019? | The Majors will take on board the success most had in 2018 when the peer group outperformed an oil and gas sector beset by collapsing oil prices late in the year. First, higher distributions to shareholders. The Majors spent the downturn shoring up finances, reducing investment, cutting costs and selling non-core assets to raise funds. At the start of 2018, most were set to cope at U.S.$50/barrel. When oil prices rose well beyond that in the early months of the year, there was cash to spare. Shell, Total and Chevron all began substantial buy-back programs during the year. This was the first important signal to investors: returning cash to shareholders ranked higher than growth expenditure. Bolstering defensive credentials seems an important step towards regaining investor confidence. Second, companies showed a measured approach to new investment in 2018. As cash flow has recovered, most have resisted the urge to re-invest. Capital expenditure is starting to pick up, which is no surprise after the steep cuts of the last few years and the lows of 2017. So far, most Majors have held any increase to single digits. ExxonMobil has been the very visible exception. We estimate it beefed up annual investment by 33%, or U.S.$5 billion, in 2018, embarking on a new investment cycle focused on its world-class growth plays in Guyana, Brazil, Papua New Guinea, Mozambique and U.S. tight oil. ExxonMobils share price was the poorest performer among the peer group, seemingly underlining investors preference for the defensive. We expect the other Majors to proceed gingerly on spend again in 2019. Yet the number of final investment decisions is on the rise, suggesting the early stages of a broader new investment cycle. Its certainly going to happen in LNG. Shells go-ahead for LNG Canada and BPs for the Tortue FLNG project in Mauritania at the end of 2018 kicked off a new wave of big new projects in which ExxonMobil, Total and Eni will also be involved. Third, companies continue in their efforts to bolster portfolio resilience. The Majors have used M&A adroitly through the downturn to strengthen advantaged positions BPs acquisition of BHPs U.S. L48 assets is the stand-out example of 2018. Accessing low-cost oil was also a feature last year, with almost 4 billion barrels of oil equivalent of resource secured in UAE (Total/Eni), Oman (Shell/Total), Algeria (Total) and Azerbaijan (Equinor). These contracts may be low margin, but a key attraction is the ability to generate cash at low oil prices. Fourth, production grew despite reduced investment since the downturn. We estimate production rose by 4% on average in 2018; and the outlook in the medium-term is impressive. The combination of exploration, M&A, asset upgrades and access to discovered resource opportunities has boosted forecast production to 2025 by 10%, or 2.4 million barrels per day, compared with how we saw things in 2017. This is some feat after four years of lower capital spend. Its the second important signal to investors theres no pressing need to step up investment to sustain production volumes. The fifth theme jars with the defensive narrative, but its a good one, nonetheless exploration is making money again. The Majors, like the rest of the industry, slashed spend on exploration after 2014. A more focused approach to prospect evaluation, lower costs and faster project delivery has led to much-improved economic performance. 2018 was the best year in a decade, with full cycle industry returns averaging 13%. The Majors weighed in with 3.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent of reserves discovered, one-third of the industrys 2018 total. Eni and Totals Calypso gas discovery in Cyprus and ExxonMobils Guyana oil finds accounted for well over half the Majors total. If stock market out-performance is the metric of success, defensive is winning. Wed expect the Majors to keep the winning formula in 2019 and return surplus cash to shareholders. But its not a sustainable strategy for the long run and, in the not-too-distant future, the Majors will rely again on new growth opportunities from exploration to keep the business ticking over. Its reassuring to know theyve got their mojo back. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/woodmackenzie/2019/02/01/will-the-majors-beat-the-market-in-2019/ |
How Will The Bezos Divorce Impact Amazon? | Amazon founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos, is calling it quits after 25 years of marriage to his wife, MacKenzie Bezos. Jeff Bezos fortune is estimated at $139 billion, making him the richest man in modern history. Carving up property can be complicated in a divorce, but even more so if you are a billionaire with significant assets to be separated, such as houses, brokerage accounts, retirement plans, restricted stock, stock options and art. The Bezos empire includes many of these hard-to-divide assets as well as a 16.3% stake in one of the largest businesses in the world: Amazon. The vast majority of the Bezoses money is tied up in Amazon stock. Divorce lawyers and financial advisors are scratching their heads, trying to figure out how Jeff can buy out MacKenzies fair share of the 80 million Amazon shares they own. Buyout In many divorces, one spouse essentially buys the other spouses interest in the business. The CEO walks away with all the company shares, and the ex-spouse secures other marital assets such as brokerage and retirement accounts, real estate and collectibles. However, Jeff and MacKenzie do not have this option, because so much of their net worth is tied up in Amazon stock. Some couples structure the buyout over several years to ease the burden on the selling spouse and allowing them to come up with enough cash to compensate the ex-spouse. Co-Ownership Another option for the Bezoses is transferring the stock into MacKenzies name, while the voting rights of the shares remain with Jeff. The transfer would require some very creative lawyering but could offer a solution that would sit better with Bezos, as well as Amazon investors. Co-ownership is not a very popular way to distribute a business asset, because most couples are not able to remain business partners after a divorce. Often, a marriage ends due to some type of breach of trust or irreconcilable difference. A business partnership is also a marriage of sorts. If the couple could not make their marriage work in their personal life, they most likely cannot make a go of it in their business life either. Selling The Stock/Business The lack of liquidity means Bezos may have to sell stock, which could affect his ownership of Amazon and dilute his control of the company, putting his position as a controlling shareholder in jeopardy. This is any divorcing business owners worst nightmare. Imagine devoting your entire life to building a business and losing control of it while you are also suffering the loss of your marriage. Selling shares in a publicly traded stock is much easier than finding a buyer for a private company. It may take a significant amount of time to find the right purchase partner, and the couple might not realize the full value of the company if they are rushed to sell. Many business sales create a large tax burden on sellers, which they might neglect to consider in their haste. Actual Details Not Known The Bezos family has remained mum about the exact details of the financial split. We may have to wait until the next SEC filing submitted by Amazon to become privy to the stock ownership changes. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesfinancecouncil/2019/02/01/how-will-the-bezos-divorce-impact-amazon/ |
Can beer help a mom breastfeed? | In Maryland, beer enthusiasts love February. They've even renamed it "FeBREWary" to celebrate the joy of drinking craft beers all month long. Its not intended, of course, for pregnant or nursing mothers. But theres an old bit of folk wisdom that downing a beer, particularly a stout, can help increase milk production. Well, not exactly. In order for a food or drink to help lactation, it has to contain a galactagogue, a chemical that increases milk production. According to a 2017 study in the International Journal of Womens Health, 76 percent of breastfeeding mothers said they were not making enough milk for their children. This same study showed that while one quarter of infants are still breastfed when they turn 1 years old, nearly one-third of mothers stop breastfeeding before then because they believe they cant produce enough milk. Moms are as apt to listen to folk wisdom as anyone else. Kelly Ripa even broached the topic on her show "Live with Kelly and Ryan" on Jan. 28. "Thats the beer," she said. "Thats like a breast milk producer ... no its true! If, like, you have a hard time producing breast milk, the doctor will say drink a stout beer." STOCK PHOTO/Getty Images Unfortunately for FeBREWarians who might be thinking -- this is permission to drink up -- beer is not really a galactagogue. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) does not recommend drinking alcohol while breastfeeding and alcohol itself does not increase milk production or help moms breastfeed. There is some evidence, however, that the polysaccharide carbohydrates found in beer, such as barley and hops, do increase milk production, but these are also found in non-alcoholic beer. Other plant products like fenugreek, Coleus amboinicus Lour -- known also as Mexican mint -- or palm dates do, in fact, appear to increase milk production, according to one recent medical review. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends breastfeeding mothers avoid alcohol but notes that an occasional or celebratory standard size drink (12 oz. of 5 percent beer) wont be harmful to the baby. Because alcohol does enter breast milk within 30-60 minutes, the CDC recommends waiting a minimum of two hours after drinking before breastfeeding. Alcohol from three drinks will still be detected in breast milk six to eight hours later, and pumping and discarding the milk during that time window (known as pumping and dumping) wont change that. Of course, everyone should drink responsibly, not just breastfeeding moms. And drinking alcohol during pregnancy is something doctors still advise against. Breastfeeding moms may want to pack some healthy snacks to bring to any FeBREWary events to help avoid any temptation. Alexandra H. Antonioli, Ph.D., is completing a combined M.D./Ph.D. training at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. She is currently working with the ABC News Medical Unit. | https://abcnews.go.com/Health/beer-mom-breastfeed/story?id=60733047 |
What's it like being a drag queen in Inverness? | Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Venus feels like the drag scene in Inverness has not quite caught up "Call me he, call me she - I am at times both" - a drag queen from the Highlands explains what it is like being a drag performer in the UK's most northerly city. Darryl, from Inverness has two jobs - he works as a hospitality supervisor and also as a drag queen, going by the name Venus Guy-Trap. His first time in drag was 10 years ago when he went out to a bar in Edinburgh with a group of friends. Although he was nervous at first, Darryl says this soon changed once he realised how accepting of drag people were - compared with his own experience in Inverness. Absolutely not, I cannot envision any circumstance 10 years ago under which I would leave my house in drag," he says. "There is definitely progression. There's definitely been a change in the air here. Absolutely." Image caption Darryl describes his drag as 'fishy' - a term commonly used when a drag queen looks more feminine Darryl chose to move back to Inverness mainly because he always knew he would come back home, saying that he misses home anytime he is away. "I think moving back was a risk, taking Venus into consideration - based on the fact that there isn't quite as much demand up north for drag or any form of entertainment like it," he adds. "In places like Edinburgh and Glasgow there is a big demand for things like that - and with greater demand there comes greater presence of people willing to cater to that demand. Image caption Darryl was 18 when he first got into drag, the name Venus Guy-Trap came years later "The world is a little less scary for drag queens these days." When it comes to "he" and "she", although pronoun preference differs for each drag queen, the rule of thumb is to refer to the individual as he when out of drag and she when in drag. "I understand why people are becoming a bit more wary of how they use pronouns in this day and age," Darryl says. "But for me it doesn't hold any bearing on how I feel or how I respond to people." 'Definite progression' Darryl believes he is fortunate because he is one of the few entertainers in Inverness who perform in drag and that allows him to stand out with the limited number of bookings made available. "For people to come to my show, it is an experience for everyone, it's an experience for me being on stage in front of people from Inverness. It's an experience for them because it's not something they get to see every day." Image caption Getting into drag usually takes Darryl around 2 hours When performing, Venus sings live, dances, DJs and sometimes lip syncs to songs - offering a variety of choice. Last October thousands of people took part in the biggest LGBT+ event to be held in Inverness in 16 years - Proud Ness. Darryl was able to take part in the event as Venus and hopes to see similar progressive events in the future. 'More opportunities' He thinks venue owners and managers of bars and clubs in the city should offer more bookings for drag queens, and his advice for anyone in the Highlands who might be considering doing drag for the first time, is to just go for it. "Wear your armour, because you will at some stage come across someone who doesn't like what they see, or doesn't like what they hear - but that doesn't mean you have to feel bad about it." Image copyright Darryl Geegan Image caption Darryl's drag name is inspired by the carnivorous plant Venus flytrap Venus used to have a regular slot in Hootananny on Church Street, where her old spot has been taken over by a different drag queen. Venus mostly takes bookings outside of Inverness, because she feels the city does not offer enough venues for drag queens to perform in, something she hopes changes with time. "I would like performing to become a full time career, but that can only happen if Inverness chooses to move the way that Edinburgh, London, Newcastle all moved," she says. "There hasn't been much provision of drag entertainment in Inverness. "There are a lot of people who want to see stuff like that and I think all it really comes down to now is venue owners and managers just being a little more open-minded and thinking, 'could we make this work in our venue?' and if the answer is anything other than no, do it." | https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-47076923 |
Why are young people pretending to love work? | Welcome to hustle culture. It is obsessed with striving, relentlessly positive, devoid of humor and, once you notice it, impossible to escape. Never once at the start of my workweek not in my morning coffee shop line, not in my crowded subway commute, not as I begin my bottomless inbox slog have I paused, looked to the heavens and whispered: #ThankGodItsMonday. Apparently, that makes me a traitor to my generation. I learned this during a series of recent visits to WeWork locations in New York, where the throw pillows implore busy tenants to Do what you love. Neon signs demand they Hustle harder, and murals spread the gospel of TGIM. Even the cucumbers in WeWorks water coolers have an agenda. Dont stop when youre tired, someone recently carved into the floating vegetables flesh. Stop when you are done. Kool-Aid drinking metaphors are rarely this literal. Welcome to hustle culture. It is obsessed with striving, relentlessly positive, devoid of humor and, once you notice it, impossible to escape. Rise and Grind is both the theme of a Nike ad campaign and the title of a book by a Shark Tank shark. New media upstarts like the Hustle, which produces a popular business newsletter and conference series, and One37pm, a content company created by the patron saint of hustling, Gary Vaynerchuk, glorify ambition not as a means to an end but as a lifestyle. The current state of entrepreneurship is bigger than career, the One37pm About Us page states. Its ambition, grit and hustle. Its a live performance that lights up your creativity a sweat session that sends your endorphins coursing a visionary who expands your way of thinking. From this point of view, not only does one never stop hustling one never exits a kind of work rapture, in which the chief purpose of exercising or attending a concert is to get inspiration that leads back to the desk. Ryan Harwood, the chief executive of One37pms parent company, told me that the sites content is aimed at a younger generation of people who are seeking permission to follow their dreams. They want to know how to own their moment, at any given moment, he said. Owning ones moment is a clever way to rebrand surviving the rat race. In the new work culture, enduring or even merely liking ones job is not enough. Workers should love what they do and then promote that love on social media, thus fusing their identities to that of their employers. This is toil glamour, and it is going mainstream. Most visibly, WeWork, which investors recently valued at $47 billion, is on its way to becoming the Starbucks of office culture. It has exported its brand of performative workaholism to 27 countries, with 400,000 tenants, including workers from 30 percent of the Global Fortune 500. In January, WeWorks founder, Adam Neumann, announced that his startup was rebranding itself as The We Co., to reflect an expansion into residential real estate and education. Describing the shift, Fast Company wrote, Rather than just renting desks, the company aims to encompass all aspects of peoples lives, in both physical and digital worlds. The ideal client, one imagines, is someone so enamored of the WeWork office aesthetic whip-cracking cucumbers and all that she sleeps in a WeLive apartment, works out at a Rise by We gym and sends her children to a WeGrow school. From this vantage, Office Space, the Gen-X slacker paean that came out 20 years ago next month, feels like science fiction from a distant realm. Its almost impossible to imagine a startup worker bee of today confessing, as protagonist Peter Gibbons does: Its not that Im lazy. Its that I just dont care. Workplace indifference just doesnt have a socially acceptable hashtag. Its grim and exploitative Its not difficult to view hustle culture as a swindle. After all, persuading a generation of workers to beaver away is convenient for those at the top. The vast majority of people beating the drums of hustle-mania are not the people doing the actual work, said David Heinemeier Hansson, the co-founder of Basecamp, a software company. Theyre the managers, financiers and owners. We spoke in October, as he was promoting his new book, It Doesnt Have to Be Crazy at Work, about creating healthy company cultures. Heinemeier Hansson said that despite data showing long hours improve neither productivity nor creativity, myths about overwork persist because they justify the extreme wealth created for a small group of elite techies. Its grim and exploitative, he said. Elon Musk, who stands to reap stock compensation upward of $50 billion if his company, Tesla, meets certain performance levels, is a prime example of extolling work by the many that will primarily benefit him. He tweeted in November that there are easier places to work than Tesla, but nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week. The correct number of hours varies per person, he continued, but is about 80 sustained, peaking about 100 at times. Pain level increases exponentially above 80. Musk, who has more than 24 million Twitter followers, further noted that if you love what you do, it (mostly) doesnt feel like work. Even he had to soften the lie of TGIM with a parenthetical. Arguably, the technology industry started this culture of work zeal sometime around the turn of the millennium, when the likes of Google started to feed, massage and even play doctor to its employees. The perks were meant to help companies attract the best talent and keep employees at their desks longer. But today, as tech culture infiltrates every corner of the business world, its hymns to the virtues of relentless work remind me of nothing so much as Soviet-era propaganda, which promoted impossible-seeming feats of worker productivity to motivate the labor force. One obvious difference is that those Stakhanovite posters had an anti-capitalist bent, criticizing the fat cats profiting from free enterprise. Todays messages glorify personal profit, even if bosses and investors not workers are the ones capturing most of the gains. Wage growth has been essentially stagnant for years. Perhaps weve all gotten a little hungry for meaning. Participation in organized religion is falling, especially among U.S. millennials. In San Francisco, where I live, Ive noticed that the concept of productivity has taken on an almost spiritual dimension. Techies here have internalized the idea rooted in the Protestant work ethic that work is not something you do to get what you want; the work itself is all. Therefore any life hack or company perk that optimizes their day, allowing them to fit in even more work, is not just desirable but inherently good. Aidan Harper, who created a European workweek-shrinkage campaign called 4 Day Week, argues that this is dehumanizing and toxic. It creates the assumption that the only value we have as human beings is our productivity capability our ability to work, rather than our humanity, he told me. Its cultist, Harper added, to persuade workers to buy into their own exploitation with a change-the-world message. Its creating the idea that Elon Musk is your high priest, he said. Youre going into your church every day and worshipping at the altar of work. For congregants of the Cathedral of Perpetual Hustle, spending time on anything thats nonwork related has become a reason to feel guilty. Jonathan Crawford, a San Francisco-based entrepreneur, told me that he sacrificed his relationships and gained more than 40 pounds while working on Storenvy, his e-commerce startup. If he socialized, it was at a networking event. If he read, it was a business book. He rarely did anything that didnt have a direct ROI, or return on investment, for his company. Crawford changed his lifestyle after he realized it made him miserable. Now, as an entrepreneur-in-residence at 500 Startups, an investment firm, he tells fellow founders to seek out nonwork-related activities like reading fiction, watching movies or playing games. Somehow this comes off as radical advice. Its oddly eye-opening to them because they didnt realize they saw themselves as a resource to be expended, Crawford said. Its easy to become addicted to the pace and stress of work in 2019. Bernie Klinder, a consultant for a large tech company, said he tried to limit himself to five 11-hour days per week, which adds up to an extra day of productivity. If your peers are competitive, working a normal workweek will make you look like a slacker, he wrote in an email. Still, hes realistic about his place in the rat race. I try to keep in mind that if I dropped dead tomorrow, all of my acrylic workplace awards would be in the trash the next day, he wrote, and my job would be posted in the paper before my obituary. Lusty for Monday mornings The logical endpoint of excessively avid work is burnout. That is the subject of a recent viral essay by BuzzFeed cultural critic Anne Helen Petersen that thoughtfully addresses one of the incongruities of hustle-mania in the young. Millennials, Petersen argues, are just desperately striving to meet their own high expectations. An entire generation of students was raised to expect that good grades and extracurricular overachievement would reward them with fulfilling jobs that feed their passions. Instead, they wound up with precarious, meaningless work and a mountain of student loan debt. And so posing as a rise-and-grinder, lusty for Monday mornings, starts to make sense as a defense mechanism. Most jobs, even most good jobs, are full of pointless drudgery. Most corporations let us down in some way. And yet years after the HBO satire Silicon Valley made the vacuous mission statement making the world a better place a recurring punch line, many companies still cheerlead the virtues of work with high-minded messaging. For example, Spotify, a company that lets you listen to music, says that its mission is to unlock the potential of human creativity. Dropbox, which lets you upload files and stuff, says its purpose is to unleash the worlds creative energy by designing a more enlightened way of working. David Spencer, a professor of economics at Leeds University Business School, says that such posturing by companies, economists and politicians dates at least to the rise of mercantilism in 16th-century Europe. There has been an ongoing struggle by employers to venerate work in ways that distract from its unappealing features, he said. But such propaganda can backfire. In 17th-century England, work was lauded as a cure for vice, Spencer said, but the unrewarding truth just drove workers to drink more. Internet companies may have miscalculated in encouraging employees to equate their work with their intrinsic value as human beings. After a long era of basking in positive esteem, the tech industry is experiencing a backlash both broad and fierce, on subjects from monopolistic behavior to spreading disinformation and inciting racial violence. And workers are discovering how much power they wield. In November, some 20,000 Googlers participated in a walkout protesting the companys handling of sexual abusers. Other company employees shut down an artificial intelligence contract with the Pentagon that could have helped military drones become more lethal. Heinemeier Hansson cited the employee protests as evidence that millennial workers would eventually revolt against the culture of overwork. People arent going to stand for this, he said, using an expletive, or buy the propaganda that eternal bliss lies at monitoring your own bathroom breaks. He was referring to an interview that Marissa Mayer, the former chief executive of Yahoo, gave in 2016, in which she said that working 130 hours a week was possible if youre strategic about when you sleep, when you shower and how often you go to the bathroom. Ultimately, workers must decide if they admire or reject this level of devotion. Mayers comments were widely panned on social media when the interview ran, but since then, Quora users have eagerly shared their own strategies for mimicking her schedule. Likewise, Musks pain level tweets drew plenty of critical takes, but they also garnered just as many accolades and requests for jobs. The grim reality of 2019 is that begging a billionaire for employment via Twitter is not considered embarrassing but a perfectly plausible way to get ahead. On some level, you have to respect the hustlers who see a dismal system and understand that success in it requires total, shameless buy-in. If were doomed to toil away until we die, we may as well pretend to like it. Even on Mondays. | https://www.seattletimes.com/explore/careers/why-are-young-people-pretending-to-love-work/?utm_source=RSS&utm_medium=Referral&utm_campaign=RSS_all |
Is the White House Trying to Keep a Congressman Quiet on the Health Care Bill and Taxpayer-Funded Abortion? | This is a rush transcript from "On the Record," December 23, 2009. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated. Well, our next guest is a congressman and he says the answer is yes. But he's telling the White House to take a hike because he's talking to you right here, right now. Congressman Bart Stupak got the pro-life Stupak amendment into the House health care bill, and that amendment would ban taxpayer money from funding any health insurance plan that covers abortion. The Senate came up with an abortion compromise, but many in the pro-life movement says it does not go far enough. Congressman Stupak says the White House gave him a not so subtle message. Congressman Stupak joins us by phone. Good evening, sir. REP. BART STUPAK, D - MICH. (Via telephone): Well, they asked me not to say anything until they had a chance to walk me through the amendment and wanted -- apparently, they had just reached an agreement. They wanted the vote to go through the other day, so they said, Be just quiet and don't say anything until we get done with this vote and walking you through the amendment. And I gave them a few hours, and I just said, I don't need you to walk me through the amendment. I can read, and this amendment is unacceptable. VAN SUSTEREN: All right. And you're talking about the Senator Ben Nelson Senate amendment that is... STUPAK: Correct. It's not -- doesn't go as far as the Stupak amendment does in the House. STUPAK: No, no. The bill's amendment, besides firewall, does a number of things that's a dramatic break from current policy. The Stupak amendment keeps current policy, which says no federal funding for abortion and no federal funding for insurance policies that have abortion as a benefit. What the Nelson language does, besides the firewall, it, number one, recognize abortion as a benefit in the federal -- as a benefit underneath the federal plan. Number two, it says that at least one plan -- could be nine out of ten plans, but at least one plan must have abortion coverage. Number three, ever enrollee in the exchange (INAUDIBLE) OPM, the Office of Personnel Management, they call it -- would have to pay $1 per month for reproductive rights, which would include abortion coverage. So the Nelson amendment deviates many ways from current law and from the Stupak amendment. VAN SUSTEREN: All right. Now, when the two bills come together in conference, because I assume that the bill's going to be -- is passed tomorrow in the United States Senate so that it will go to the -- be reconciled with the House bill -- there seem to be three options. Either the bill that comes out of the reconciliation will be with the Stupak amendment or with the Senator Ben Nelson compromise or some sort of compromise between the two. STUPAK: Sure. I've repeatedly mentioned to the White House and leadership and Senate leadership that twice we have voted on language close to Stupak but not quite Stupak in the children's health initiative program this year, in April of this year, when we voted to expand it to 10 million children under the S-CHIP program. The president signed that into law. That had restrictive language on abortion. And then recently, even after the Stupak amendment, we voted on the labor/HHS appropriations bill, which basically has the Stupak language in it, and again, recently signed by the president. So what I've done in my amendment is (INAUDIBLE) in those two pieces of legislation that all these people who can't vote for the Stupak amendment have voted for and the president has even signed it into law. So there is precedent here. There is legislation we can look at that's already been signed into law. We all voted for it. Let's use that as our reference point and put that in the health care bill. Then we can move off the abortion issue and get the health care issue. VAN SUSTEREN: Why do you think that Senator Ben Nelson, who has been pro-life, didn't want -- I mean, I know that he tried to -- he tried to introduce the -- or tried to get the language of the Stupak amendment initially into the Senate bill. But then he agreed... STUPAK: Correct (INAUDIBLE) VAN SUSTEREN: ... to this. STUPAK: Right. I think he felt that he was actually making the language that was in the bill, that was originally in the Reid bill -- he thinks, and in a way, he has, because if a state opts out, then they won't have to have this abortion coverage -- in a way, he made the language better. It's better than what was introduced in the Senate. But it's not as good as the Stupak amendment and it's not reflective of current law. All Stupak amendment (INAUDIBLE) all we're saying is keep the current law. As your last guest, Senator Graham, said, you're expanding the federal role in the health care. He claims 60 percent of them are in a government-sponsored program. He says they'll go to 80. Well, if you're expanding from 60 to 80, why not just keep the current prohibitions in place that have been in place for 33 years, no public funding for abortion, and then let's really argue about health care and have health care pass for the American people. STUPAK: Oh, I think we got a long ways to go. Members I've talked to in the last 48, 72 hours are really concerned about some of the provisions in the Senate bill, especially those (INAUDIBLE) you know, some states got special deals and we feel it's unfair. We're here trying to provide a policy which is a health care policy, not a legislation that who gets the best for their state or who gets the best deal for this insurance company in their state. That's not what health care should be all about. (INAUDIBLE) talking about national health care, we should have all Americans covered and we're all in this together and it should be equitable and fair, no matter where you live. The quality of your health care or how much you pay should not depend on where you live. VAN SUSTEREN: Congressman, thank you, sir. STUPAK: Thank you. Content and Programming Copyright 2009 FOX News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Transcription Copyright 2009 CQ Transcriptions, LLC, which takes sole responsibility for the accuracy of the transcription. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No license is granted to the user of this material except for the user's personal or internal use and, in such case, only one copy may be printed, nor shall user use any material for commercial purposes or in any fashion that may infringe upon FOX News Network, LLC'S and CQ Transcriptions, LLC's copyrights or other proprietary rights or interests in the material. This is not a legal transcript for purposes of litigation. | https://www.foxnews.com/story/is-the-white-house-trying-to-keep-a-congressman-quiet-on-the-health-care-bill-and-taxpayer-funded-abortion |
When is a child too old for 'baby talk'? | Q: A relative keeps talking baby talk to my toddler. I want her to stop. A: Research has shown that baby talk the singsong, often simplified speech that adults use to talk to infants is helpful for youngsters early language development. However, its believed to lose its usefulness as children get older. Your relative could be using this type of speech because she underestimates your childs language abilities or thinks of your child as younger than he or she is. Young children can be shy around distant relatives and might not be very talkative, which can lead to this misconception. Start by giving your relative the benefit of the doubt that she doesnt know that shes doing anything wrong. Acknowledge that using baby talk was necessary when your child was younger, but now that your child is at a different stage of language development, its helpful for your child to hear adultlike speech and to encounter new words. Perhaps the relative has no idea what the proper language is. You can provide some guidance by having her read an age-appropriate book to the child. Lauren Emberson, co-director at Princeton Baby Lab A: Telling others how you wish for them to talk to your child can seem like being a helicopter parent, but explaining your rationale in a polite manner will make your goal clear. Model how you want your child talked to. Some people comment that I talk to my toddler like an adult, which is true. I intentionally talk to her in complete sentences and dont dumb down the conversation. Most adults will see this conversational tone and understand how your child communicates. Some may even feel silly when the child responds in a big kid voice. If the relative does not get the hint, address the matter directly. Say, We are working on her language development and find her catching on pretty well when we speak to her in our regular voice. Saying this casually will allow the relative to receive your explanation. Akilah Easter, etiquette expert | http://www.startribune.com/should-you-use-baby-talk-with-a-toddler/505157782/ |
Is there a Democrat who can go insult-to-insult with Donald Trump in 2020? | CLOSE According to a new poll, President Donald Trump has some challenges to overcome among the voters in 2020, while the race in the Democratic Party appears to be wide open. Veuer's Justin Kircher has the breakdown. Buzz60 Opinion: The president is unlikely to get many GOP challengers, but already the Democratic field is full. Let's run through the list and its prospects. Its official: Sen. Elizabeth Warren is running for the White House. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand announced her candidacy as well. And, most recently, Sen. Kamala Harris jumped in the race. It might be easier to list those who arent running. Basically, everyone youve ever heard of (and many you havent) think they have a shot in the next presidential election. Theyve assessed our current POTUS and smell blood in the Potomac. Looking at presidential history, Trump should be in a good position to get another four years. The incumbent always has an advantage, especially with a strong economy and troops returning home. But if we learned anything from 2016, the usual is in short supply. Anything can happen and likely will. Few say they'd vote for Trump in 2020 A Washington PostABC News poll recently showed that 56 percent of respondents would "definitely not vote for" Trump, while only 28 percent said they "definitely" would. The majority of Democrats dont have any particular candidate in mind to replace him, rendering their primary wide open. Thats why you see an endless roll call of Democrats flirting with a run. Candidates with high name recognition are septuagenarians Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders. Younger prospects with a national following include Beto ORourke, Cory Booker and Tulsi Gabbard. CLOSE Former vice president Joe Biden is expected to soon announce whether he will join the field of Democrats vying to challenge President Donald Trump in 2020. Daniel Sato, The News Journal Thats eight candidates so far, but were just getting started. Obama-era U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and HUD Secretary Julin Castro are making moves for 2020. From the Senate, theres Michael Bennet, Sherrod Brown, Amy Klobuchar and Jeff Merkley. And we have governors! Steve Bullock (Mont. ), John Hickenlooper (Colo.), Jay Inslee (Wash.), and Terry McAuliffe (Va.) might take their executive success to the Beltway. There's no shortage of challengers There are mayors (Pete Buttigieg, Bill DeBlasio, Eric Garcetti) and congressmembers (John Delaney, Joe Kennedy III, Eric Swalwell) and business tycoons (Mike Bloomberg, Andrew Yang). Each of these names has been floated for the highest office with several more behind them. The way the race is shaping up, the Democratic primary debates will need to drop the lecterns and install bleachers instead. Most Republicans arent worried about a President Pete Buttigieg (hes the mayor of South Bend, Ind., by the way), but Donald Trump broke the primary mold. The day he descended the golden escalator to announce his candidacy, no Democrats were worrying about him either. CLOSE Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz spoke with ASU President Michael Crow at a town hall and answered questions about a potential run for president. Thomas Hawthorne, The Republic | azcentral.com As the frontrunners attack each other through the primaries, a seeming also-ran could be the only candidate left standing. Once we get to the general election, we could have two major party candidates that voters arent especially fond of. Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz is betting on that as he considers launching an independent bid. Democrats are terrified that a centrist Schultz could pull votes away from their nominee. Republicans should worry too, especially as they watch females and suburbanites flee from the president in droves. Even GOP candidates are considering a primary challenge. Former Sen. Jeff Flake has demurred, but Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan and Ohios John Kasich see an opening. The Washington PostABC News poll showed that a third of Republicans want a different nominee. Predictions are deadly this far out, but no Republican will best Trump outside of a disastrous Mueller outcome or similar scandal. Any House move to impeach him will likely rally his party to his side. As for the Democrats, most voters just want a candidate any candidate who can stand toe-to-toe with Trump on the debate stage. And match him insult-to-insult. Jon Gabriel, a Mesa resident, is editor-in-chief of Ricochet.com and a contributor to The Republic and azcentral.com. Follow him on Twitter at @exjon. Click here to subscribe to azcentral.com. Read or Share this story: https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/2019/02/01/2020-democratic-presidential-candidates-match-trump/2733829002/ | https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/2019/02/01/2020-democratic-presidential-candidates-match-trump/2733829002/ |
Can something be trendsetting today if it was created centuries ago? | Open this photo in gallery FooTToo When Gucci teased a few images last month announcing its new luxury collection of floral waters and perfumes, The Alchemists Garden, the Instagram account Este Laundry took notice. Run by a group of self-described anonymous beauty insiders, and much like fashion watchdog @DietPrada, the accounts scathingly honest commentary calls out cosmetics players for such things as sexist ads, improbable treatment claims, cultural appropriation and copycatting. We dont think these are copies per se, Este Laundry wrote, but does #Guccis new fragrance line feel like a bougie, gaudy version of fellow Italian heritage brand #SantaMariaNovella1612? The contention prompted Rafael Bastos, the London-based business manager for Gucci Beauty, to respond to the comments in protest. In one of his several replies, Bastos scoffed: Inspired in Renaissance. I can assure you we didnt copy those clunky and odd looking things. As other observers, dubbed #Laundrites, swiftly pointed out, Guccis elegant throwback is less Santa Maria Novellas understated apothecary flasks and more LOfficine Universelle Buly 1803, the historic French brand recently recreated by Victoire de Taillac and Ramdane Touhami. They were inspired after reading an 1837 Honor de Balzac novel about a riches-to-rags, celebrity Parisian apothecary and perfumer, and revived the brand of the novels real-life inspiration, Jean-Vincent Bully. Story continues below advertisement In keeping with Gucci creative director Alessandro Micheles flair for giving a modern, madcap twist to diverse elements of history, from Ancient Rome to Regency England, The Alchemists Garden is inspired by the traditional look of herbalists and apothecaries. In the distant past, chemists, or pharmacists, mixed herbal remedies on demand and relied on Greek and Arabic texts for recipes of tinctures and potions that would ward off the pox, disinfect during the plague, fragrantly mask malodorous hygiene, and address other ailments like a broken heart with dubious curative powers. After the Renaissance, perfume houses established themselves as separate entities and the distinction between genuine medical treatments and ineffective elixirs that smelled nice was blurred. Early 20th-century perfumer Franois Coty, for example, learned how to compose fragrances while working in a pharmacy making lotions. The new Gucci perfume oils lavender, cypress, oud and rose are housed in squat jade-green and lapis-blue bottles with flat stoppers and pipette-style glass applicators that recall vintage opaline glass, and are adorned with floral coronets and stylized slithering snakes. Similar ceramic apothecary containers that traditionally stored crude drugs, liquids and ointments basically the medieval version of Costco bulk have for centuries featured baroque and rococo motifs such as shields, birds, festoons, ribbons and crowns. As with all luxury packaging, the perfume bottles are designed to romance the customer and begin the experience before smelling the first drop. Its a long-established tradition, but the one thing Este Laundrys commenters got right is that you can thank Santa Maria Novella for popularizing it. The venerable Florentine apothecary brand marks an important anniversary this year. The pharmacy may have been founded by monks in 1612, but its turning point came in 1989, when engineer Eugenio Alphandery, now co-owner, bought a stake from the family of the companys last monastic director. He streamlined the still largely handmade processes and scaled up operations and output while retaining the packagings old-fashioned heraldic shields, curlicues and armorial lettering. The careful and nearly invisible modernization put the brand on the luxury map for tourists and perfume aficionados alike. Part of a complex founded by Dominican friars in the 13th century, Santa Maria Novellas Florence flagship, on a now-grubby side street near the citys central train station, remains a tourist highlight. Its something of a pilgrimage, and in spite of all the publicity, the shop still feels like a whispered discovery. The grand main room has a vaulted ceiling and is surrounded by smaller chambers, including a tea room, a sacristy and, yes, even a traditional herbalist. Stepping off the street into the marble corridor, one is welcomed by centuries of accumulated scent. The antique ceramics that line the heavy walnut display cases are in a common style that dates back to the Renaissance. There are similar majolica artifacts in the Metropolitan Museum of Arts renowned collection, tin-glazed earthenware adorned with illustrations of snakes, sunbursts or scenes from mythology, such as a dragon-headed creature known as a biscione, gobbling up a child. Story continues below advertisement Story continues below advertisement The Alchemists Garden may be the most glamorous version to date, but Michele and the Gucci team didnt invent them nor did Monsieur Bully, or SMN. The same throwback design vocabulary, which already appears on everything from craft liquor-bottle labels to Rifle Paper Co.s limited edition Valentines Day packaging for LOccitane hand cream, suggests a medicinal undercurrent. But its not nostalgia that sells it. Through packaging, these products speak to the present moment by suggesting some similar measure of psychological comfort. Apothecary products were originally created to cure both physical diseases and emotional griefes and that overlaps nicely with whats now a US$4.2-trillion global wellness economy. The apothecary aesthetic appeals to the current obsession with wellness because it oh-so-subtly signals healthy living. Even in luxury livery, the pseudo-pharmaceutical packaging is a visual cue that the tonics and perfumes they contain are preparations necessary for physical, mental and spiritual well-being, rather than merely products. Visit tgam.ca/newsletters to sign up for the weekly Style newsletter, your guide to fashion, design, entertaining, shopping and living well. And follow us on Instagram @globestyle. | https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/style/article-can-something-be-trendsetting-today-if-it-was-created-centuries-ago/ |
Will The Illinois Supreme Court Free Chicago's Food Trucks? | Last week, Laura Pekarik, owner of the food truck Courageous Cupcakes, watched as her more than six-year legal challenge to Chicagos protectionist mobile vending rules reached the Illinois Supreme Court. Her son, who is younger than the lawsuit, sat next to her quietly listening to the attorneys and justices discuss whether his mothers food truck and others will have a future in the Windy City. Right now, the rules are stacked against Pekarik and other Chicago area food trucks. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in a recent analysis of food truck rules in Americas largest cities, concluded that, The experience of operating a food truck in Chicago is perhaps one of the most difficult in the country. The Chicago Tribune reports that only about 65 trucks operate in the city. That is just over half the number that operated in 2012. What makes this especially striking is that most major cities have seen a boom in the number of food trucks on their streets. Portland, Oregon, for example, is one quarter the size of Chicago but has more food trucks. This case presents two major issues to the Illinois Supreme Court: whether the city government may hobble mobile vendors in order to financially benefit brick-and-mortar restaurants and whether it may force food trucks to submit to GPS tracking. Chicago bans food trucks, whether operating on public or private property, from operating within 200 feet of any establishment that serves food. This includes everything from white table cloth restaurants to convenience stores. The map below from an Institute for Justice report shows how Chicagos 200-foot rule makes the city center almost completely inaccessible to trucks. The citys attorney, citing years-old testimony, claimed that Pekarik admitted her truck had no trouble operating in Chicagos Loop. If you watch closely, at the moment this claim is made, Lauras eyes widen. Thats because the reality is that it has been years since she regularly sent her food truck into the city because her operators simply couldnt find legal spaces. The city claims that the proximity ban is an attempt to control sidewalk congestion, yet it could not cite a single study that supports its claims that food truck lines are a threat to public safety. In fact, the citys attorney was reduced to misconstruing an Institute for Justice on sidewalk congestion to try, unsuccessfully, to make her point. This study, in fact, showed that the presence of a food truck had little to no effect on the time it took for a pedestrian to walk a block. Several of the justices showed skepticism about the citys congestion claims. Chief Justice Lloyd Karmeier pointed out that there would perhaps be more congestion in front of a crosswalk or theater rather than a restaurant. Justice Anne Burke followed up saying that there are no rules for other businesses that could cause lines, including theaters and retail outlets. Of course, Chicagos 200-foot rule has nothing to do with congestion. City lawmakers made that much clear when they repeatedly stated its purpose is to protect restaurants from competition. Mayor Rahm Emanuels own press release stated that the 2012 ordinance protects traditional restaurants. Illinoiss high court and a number of other state supreme courts have long recognized that such explicitly anti-competitive laws are unconstitutional. On top of the unconstitutional rationale at the heart of the law, Chicago requires food truck owners to submit to an unconstitutional search as a condition of operating. Every truck must have a GPS tracking device installed at the cost of the truck owner. The location data is stored by a private third-party company and both a trucks current location, as well as everywhere its been for at least the past six months, is available to the public upon request. The city knows its on shaky ground with this requirement, especially the public accessibility requirement. Just three weeks before the Supreme Court argument, the city created new regulations stating that the GPS coordinates are not available to the public. They didnt, however, change the law, which still says the exact opposite. The private company that Pekarik contracts with for GPS services indicated that it would abide by the law and provide private individuals with access to Lauras data if requested. In fact, the company indicated that it had already complied with at least one request for GPS data. But that request didnt come from city officials. Even though the city requires GPS tracking to enforce its 200-foot rule, it claimed its food inspectors would also need this data in order to conduct field inspections. But in more than six years, the city has never requested the location of any food truck. Food truck owners then are being forced to submit to an unconstitutional search that is completely unnecessary for any legitimate end. The justices had a number of questions for the city attorney about the GPS requirement, including whether caterers in the city are subject to a similar rule that they keep the city informed about where they operate. Justice Burke also asked the citys attorney to confirm that the food truck owners have to pay for their own monitoring. Whether food trucks will have much of a future in Chicago is now in the hands of the justices. But a ruling for food trucks wouldnt be a ruling against restaurants; if anything, the presence of food trucks has been shown to increase the foot traffic into nearby restaurants. IJ Senior Attorney Robert Frommer noted that Chicago lawmakers claims about the need to protect restaurants is contradicted by the real-world evidence of New York City, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C., all of which have both vibrant restaurant and vending industries without any kind of anti-competitive rules like the 200-foot rule. The only thing Chicago is doing for its citizens with its protectionism is limiting their food options and knocking out the first rung of the ladder in the food services industry. If the justices rule for Pekarik and the food trucks, mobile and brick-and-mortar food providers will flourish side-by-side, and Chicagoans will discover new cuisine that could one day become as iconic as the Chicago hot dog or deep dish pizza. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/instituteforjustice/2019/02/01/will-the-illinois-supreme-court-free-chicagos-food-trucks/ |
Can A New Service-Based Blockchain Business Model Deliver For Online Gaming? | Doubtlessly, ever since the dawn of the blockchain technology in 2008, industries have been revolutionized by the uncontested decentralization, security and transparency it delivers to traditional systems. The online gaming industry has experienced exponential growth in the past few years. In a span of 9 years from 2009 to 2018, the industry has grown from $20.51 billion to $51.96 billion, stapling it as one of the most lucrative and rapidly-growing industries to date. Studies show that 11% of all internet traffic is from online casino players. In the UK, the industry has increased by 300% since the new legislation in 2014. This spiked the industrys value in the UK to 6.7 billion, and by 2024, global online gambling is expected to rise up to $94.4 billion with a compound annual rate (CAGR) of around 10.9%. The blockchain protocol, alongside its irrefutable cryptographic techniques, has provided solutions to the then-unsolvable problems of centralized systems, specifically with regards to trust and privacy. This is the very reason why the blockchain itself has found its way from the most basic industries such as cryptocurrency, money transfer, and data networks, up to the most complex such as DNA databanks, and AI consciousness clouds. Together with versatility, imagination is the limit of this nascent tech. Blockchain-based technology users know that for every action, theres an equal and opposite transaction. However, they also know that fees are Blockchains Achilles heel, since miners and verifiers require to be rewarded in exchange for their service in keeping the blockchain ledger going. Each block being added to the chain requires a fee. This also applies to usage of other features of the whole ecosystem as well as other factors such as transaction sizes (measured in KB), network congestion and liquidity providers. As a matter of fact, there is a fee for every action on the chain. For the frequent loyal users of blockchain, this means fees on top of extra fees. Albeit lower than those of traditional counterparts, these fees are still an aspect of the blockchain technology that needs improvement. A new blockchain company named Faireum can be seen as The new kid on the block as it presents a new solution to protect users from incurring high extra fees with a service-based business model for the online gambling industry. With the innovations brought by its independent blockchain technology, Faireum aims to revolutionize the way users experience online gambling. Due to online gamings enormous size and overwhelming growth, as well as the common problems it faces, this will serve as a good ground to prove Faireums blockchain-as-a-service business model as the solution also to the pressing problem of high extra fees. As Faireum has its own token, called FAIRC, users are able to convert fiat money and other crypto, and use them for placing stakes on Faireums official gambling platform as well as availing themselves of its blockchain services. With this tokenization, Faireum claims that it will lessen transaction costs and eliminate delayed payouts by abolishing intermediaries by a completely automated and trust-free system. Faireum sees a sustainable business model service in their blockchain and its underlying technology as, instead of charging fee after fee for every transaction, The company will be using a subscription model for their services. This is their solution to maximize each players odds and minimize entry fees while at the same time ensuring a sustainable business for providers. Faireum also intervenes for customers because as customer loyalty and rewards are often overlooked in the existing blockchain business model, users feel unincentivized and unappreciated for their loyalty towards using the technology. With the traditional on-line casinos, players do not receive rewards for their loyalty. In the event that they lose, they do not get any form of compensation. Because of this, many online companies have lost customers. With the adoption of Faireum, online gambling steps are offering returns to players depending on the losses theyve incurred. Some online platforms even propose special bonuses for their players. For instance, some platforms return to customers 10% of all the money theyve lost in a month. These returns are made possible by reduced transaction costs courtesy of blockchain technology. Increased trust and transparency are also of utmost importance. In the past, there have been claims that online casinos are using scams and underhand methods to rob their clients, hence the phrase, the house always wins. Some proven cases of fraud on these online platforms cause many people to stay away from these sites. When a player realizes that the odds are stacked against him because of a lack of transparency, hell inevitably avoid the platform altogether to save himself the loss. Eventually, the casino ends up losing money and not making any at all. The new blockchain technology will help in boosting trust among online casinos and players building confidence in the industry. With smart contracts being used to verify records, data cannot be manipulated, hence an increase in transparency which will make the industry thrive. As the development of their ecosystem continues, Faireum plans to release software development kits (SDKs) for online casino proprietors to be able to adopt Faireums own official blockchain-based games as well as create their own games built on top of Faireums very own independent blockchain, opening to everyone the opportunity of having trustworthy tech and businesses that are sustainable even outside crypto. Introducing Faireums new service-based blockchain business model and its underlying technologies opens more options for users and proprietors alike to choose from, as it takes into consideration the most pressing concerns about their needs and offers appropriate solutions tailored specifically to target them. With these constant developments, the possibilities are endless for the technology and its industry. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/geraldfenech/2019/02/01/can-a-new-service-based-blockchain-business-model-deliver-for-online-gaming/ |
What Are 5 Proven Ways To Get More College Financial Aid? | I've always loved the idea of doing a ton of homework to reap a healthy college financial aid package. Since I hate the idea of loans, getting grants, scholarships and tuition discounts is the way to go. Few know more about this subject than Mark Kantrowitz, author of How to Appeal for More College Financial Aid. Mark has been on the front lines of this little-known battlefront for years. I'll be honest with you. You will have to plan ahead to get the best package. It's not a matter of calling up a college's financial aid office and berating them into a better deal. The numbers have to make sense to them and you have to document your reasons. Here's what Kantrowitz recommends: -- Get grants, not loans. "If the student has good grades and test scores, look for colleges that offer merit aid. These might not be top-tier institutions, but it is better to graduate with little or no debt than to borrow more than you can afford to repay." -- Note any changes in your family's income. "If your family's ability to pay is affected by special circumstances, such as changes in income in the last two years or something that differentiates you from the typical family, ask the college financial aid administrator for a professional judgment review. Financial aid administrators are more likely to make an adjustment for one-time events that are not reflective of ability to pay during the academic year, as opposed to a regular recurring event. And they are more likely to make an adjustment when the special circumstances are due to factors beyond the family's control, as opposed to lifestyle choices." -- Be careful with your investment decisions. "Reduce income during the base year by avoiding capital gains (or offsetting capital gains with losses), avoiding retirement plan distributions, and shifting bonuses from one year to the next. And don't forget to reduce reportable assets by paying down consumer debt." -- Don't put investments or savings into the student's accounts. "Shift assets from the student's name to the parent's name, such as by moving custodial bank and brokerage accounts into custodial 529 plan accounts." -- Divorces change aid consideration. If the parents are divorced, choose the parent with the lower income (including stepparent income if this parent has remarried) as the `custodial ' parent." -- If you appeal, document your reasons. "The appeals process is driven by independent, third-party documentation of the special circumstances and the financial impact on the family. Do not lie or misrepresent the family's financial circumstances. Financial aid administrators will reject an appeal if they feel the family is trying to game the system. Appeal for more financial aid as soon as you learn about the special circumstances, even if it occurs in the middle of the academic year." | https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnwasik/2019/02/01/what-are-5-proven-ways-to-get-more-college-financial-aid/ |
How Long Can the Super Bowl Be the Super Bowl? | The Super Bowl has thrived for half a century in the fertile fields of traditional television, which are quickly becoming a disaster zone. Americans under 35 watch at least 40 percent less traditional TV (that is, on the cable bundle) than they did in 2010. Ratings are drowning for everything on television, from broadcast to cable and from news to scripted programming. Although the big game might be dog-paddling to stay above water, it is still vulnerable: The Nielsen rating for the Super Bowl has declined every year since 2015. Even as footballs viewership base erodes, political and social forces might complicate the very identity of the Super Bowl. Traditionally, everything about the big game was designed to offer respite from controversy or partisan rancor. The pregame ceremony featured enough flags to furnish several presidential inaugurations. A noncontroversial artist belted out the national anthem before a patriotic burst of fireworks. An unobjectionable pop star (especially in the post-Nipplegate era) played PG hits during the halftime show. In the commercial breaks, Pixar-ish animals told Jay Lenoesque jokes to sell cars and soda. But big companies, including those paying for prominent ad placement during the Super Bowl, are learning that controversy can be good for business. For example, Nike partnered with the quarterback Colin Kaepernick to support his calls for criminal-justice reform, and Gillette took on toxic masculinity. Read: Millennials stare into the void, and Gillette stares back Youre seeing corporations embrace social-justice messaging because their consumers want it, their employees want it, and their potential employees want it, said Nneka Logan, an assistant professor of communication at Virginia Tech. The historical disjuncture between corporations and activists is breaking down. In an otherwise crowded and fragmented media environment, controversies can earn attention on television news. What corporations want to do when they veer left is be noticed, incite conversations, and feature on TV news as editorial, said Tom Goodwin, the executive vice president and head of innovation at Zenith Media. Thats an advertisement for Nike. An ad for Gillette. Free marketing for Starbucks. Even the backlash can draw positive attention to the brand, Logan said, as long as it focuses peoples attention on something the company sincerely wants to talk about. One has every reason to expect this political tone to take over the Super Bowl just as its taken over the rest of the public sphere. In fact, in a recent Super Bowl, Budweiser went so far as to project the somehow controversial message that immigrants are actually good. | https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/super-bowl-might-not-remain-apolitical/581743/?utm_source=feed |
Why Did Sprint Swing To A Net Loss In Q3? | Sprint published its fiscal Q3 (fiscal year ends March 31) results on Thursday, reporting a slightly wider than expected net loss, as it continued to shed postpaid phone subscribers. Below, we provide some of the key takeaways from the companys earnings and take a look at why it swung to a net loss during the quarter. We have created an interactive dashboard that outlines our expectations for Sprint over the year. You can modify the key drivers to arrive at your own revenue and EPS estimates for Sprint. Sprint lost a net of 26k postpaid phone subscribers over the quarter. While this was down from a loss of 34k subscribers in Q2, it compares to a gain of 184k subscribers in the year-ago period. The lackluster performance on the postpaid front is attributable to the companys focus on pulling back on costly promotions to stabilize the business and also due to more intense competition. For instance, rivals Verizon and T-Mobile respectively added 650k and 1 million postpaid phone customers over the holiday quarter. Sprints postpaid phone churn levels have also trended higher to levels of about 1.71% from 1.60% in the year-ago period, driven by this mounting competition. In mid-2018, the company tweaked its unlimited plans to offer more services, albeit at higher prices, to bolster its ARPU. However, this doesnt appear to be having an impact on the companys metrics yet, as postpaid phone ARPU declined to $50 from $51.25 a year ago, although this was partly due to a new revenue reporting standard. Overall, Sprint swung to a net loss on a GAAP basis, after reporting a profit over the previous quarter, as its Services revenues trended lower, while SG&A and interest expenses trended higher. The table below breaks down some of the factors that were responsible for the companys loss over Q3. Explore example interactive dashboards and create your own. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/02/01/why-did-sprint-swing-to-a-net-loss-in-q3/ |
What does the U.S.-China trade war mean for the oil and gas industry? | It goes without saying that the American Petroleum Institute (API), the D.C.-based trade association that aims to "influence a strong, viable U.S. oil and gas industry," would weigh in against steel tariffs. U.S. drillers spend over $8 billion a year on hundreds of tons of steel pipes (though only a tiny proportion of steel used by the American oil patch comes from China). What might be more surprising is that the API recently tweeted its opinion that uncertainty whether the trade war will get resolved "is nearly as damaging to trade and the overall economy as the actual tariffs." In fact, the oil industry needs to worry about a deterioration of U.S.-Chinese relations. While tariffs might come and go, there are a larger set of problems for the oil industry, as the U.S. considers its posture towards what prominent conservatives Derek Scissors and Daniel Blumenthal termed an increasingly "dangerous rival." Scissors and Blumenthal, among others, are suggesting the U.S. needs to untie its economy from China's. Their commentary, while considered controversial, resonates with some louder voices inside the Trump administration who argue that the U.S. should shrink dependence on China for U.S. and global supply chains. China is actively expanding its global presence across ports and other kinds of transportation networks. Almost 70 percent of global container traffic flows through Chinese-owned or Chinese-invested ports, according to a survey by the Financial Times, and China's investment in logistics businesses also covers energy infrastructure and pipelines, trucking, railways, airports and shipbuilding. The U.S. has already responded with an infrastructure fund of its own, despite President Trump's previous distaste for foreign aid programs. Reliable international supply chains are important for the U.S. economy, jobs and competitiveness for U.S. companies this became apparent for businesses that relied on components produced in Fukushima, Japan, when the city was hit by a tsunami in 2011. But the U.S. response to the challenges posed by intertwined supply chains needs to be managed carefully. The idea that China is a force needing to be reckoned with is gaining momentum across the political spectrum in Washington. Bruce Jones of Brookings argued in a recent paper that U.S.-China relations have reached the "closing of an era of expanding cooperation." President Xi Jinping's more assertive global strategies, combined with his authoritarian crackdown on domestic dissent and internment of Xiajiang Muslims, is prompting a reevaluation of China, not only by the Trump administration but by a larger cross section of American political leaders, academia and business leaders. The Trump administration has already taken some direct actions to address U.S. national security concerns related to Beijing's willingness to gain sensitive U.S. advanced telecommunications and information technology by a variety of means, including outright intellectual property theft. Last year, the Trump administration blocked Broadcom, the Singapore-based chipmaker, from taking over American firm Qualcomm, citing Broadcom's relationship with foreign entities such as Huawei, China's largest telecommunications equipment manufacturer, whose chief financial officer was recently arrested in Canada at the request of the U.S. due to a U.S. investigation for alleged violations of American trade control laws. If the U.S. moves to untether distinct linkages to Chinese supply chains, it is safe to assume that Chinese strategists will want to do the same. That is not just bad news for American technology firms with plants and businesses in China. It could be a problem for U.S. oil and gas firms that were counting on China as a steady customer for rising exports. A temporary hiatus in the trade war might allow for a few U.S. spot sales of oil and gas cargoes in China, but in the context of the wider strategic U.S.-China tensions, lengthier contractual commitments are now going to be a tougher sell. American oil and gas may have to shift to other markets. Already, U.S.-China trade issues are making it harder for American LNG export promoters to push forward credible deals to beat out Qatari and Russian gas sales ahead of looming multiyear contract renewals. China's national oil company CNPC's internal think tank is already suggesting so in its annual report, which concluded that ongoing trade disputes could force China to move away from U.S. LNG to other sources. All China-bound imports of U.S. oil and gas by Chinese entities have been on hold since September 2018. That is a big change from the heady days when U.S. and Canadian energy was viewed by Chinese firms to be as among the most secure and desirable in the world. As the API alluded to, a loss of access to the Chinese market is not the only potentially bad news for U.S. oil and gas. A deepening rift between the U.S. and China could spell difficulty ahead for the global economy. Chinese oil demand, which represents over 12 percent of total world demand, is a linchpin to global oil prices. With these larger geopolitical issues looming, it is unclear whether signs that China's economy will remain resilient. Any faltering in Chinese economic growth will spill over to the rest of Asia and potentially undermine demand for oil more generally. And that would be even worse news for the U.S. oil and gas industry, which has already seen oil prices slip dramatically on the back of a meltdown in Asian financial markets twice in the last two decades. Amy Myers Jaffe (@amyjaffeenergy) is the David M. Rubenstein Senior Fellow for Energy and the Environment and director of the program on energy security and climate change at the Council on Foreign Relations. Email Allyn West. Get the Gray Matters newsletter. It's among the most secure and desirable in the world. | https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/gray-matters/article/us-china-trade-war-impact-oil-and-gas-industry-13580334.php |
Is the NFL's Rooney Rule useless? | The Rooney Rule has been under fire lately for the lack of diversity it has generated, despite being designed specifically for that reason. Even with the Rooney Rule in place, there are only three head coaches and one general manager of color in the league. The rule isn't helping the league diversify at all. However, the rule has put many people of color in a position to get jobs, and anything is better than nothing. PERSPECTIVES The Rooney Rule was supposed to result in more people of color in the NFL. All it's done is give lip service to the league's "commitment" to diversity and nothing else. All teams have to do is interview diverse candidates before making an official hire. Giving a deserving candidate a job is not covered at all. So instead of hiring accomplished coaches or coordinators, teams are giving mediocre coaches like Adam Gase and college coaches with a reputation like Kliff Kingsbury head coaching positions. There is definitely a bias there. Throw in the fact that there's only one general manager who is a person of color and you have a rule that has no teeth. The Rooney Rule is terrible and ineffective. This will eventually become a topic, and I know some don't want to talk about it: If Zac Taylor accepts the #Bengals job, that guarantees 7 out of the 8 openings did not go to a minority candidate. Five minority coaches were fired. A big slap in the face to the Rooney Rule. -- NFL Update (@MySportsUpdate) January 11, 2019 There are problems with the Rooney Rule, but to say it doesn't work is going too far. There were no protections in place for people of color to get a legitimate shot at a high-level football job before the Rooney Rule, which resulted in successful coaches like Dennis Green and Tony Dungy getting fired despite a legacy of success. The Rooney Rules needs to improve, but it has been helpful in at least forcing teams to give people of color an opportunity to get jobs they were overlooked for before. It has flaws, but the Rooney Rule is still helpful. That's the main misconception people don't get with Rooney Rule. Literal opportunitues didn't exist before, which helps build opportuities. Many coaching personnel are son/brother/cousin of, which makes sense, you hire who you know and they grow up in the coaching life. -- THE Monday Morning QuarterBLACK (@TheMMQBL) January 11, 2019 The Tylt is focused on debates and conversations around news, current events and pop culture. We provide our community with the opportunity to share their opinions and vote on topics that matter most to them. We actively engage the community and present meaningful data on the debates and conversations as they progress. The Tylt is a place where your opinion counts, literally. The Tylt is an Advance Local Media, LLC property. Join us on Twitter @TheTylt, on Instagram @TheTylt or on Facebook, we'd love to hear what you have to say. | https://www.nola.com/interact/2019/02/is_the_nfls_rooney_rule_useles.html |
Did Bill Nye just suggest the U.S. will have to annex Canada to grow crops? | Earlier this week, the famed TV scientist Bill Nye went on an MSNBC talk show to discuss the economic cost of climate change and the consequences it could levy on rural America. Nyes chat with Hardball host Chris Matthews took a surprising turn when the Science Guy started advocating for a U.S. incursion, of sorts, into Canada. As global temperatures rise, Nye said, the growing (of crops) in North America is going to have to move north into what would nominally be Canada. We dont have the infrastructure, we dont have the railroads and roads to get food from that area to where we need it around the world. Of course it can be built, Nye added, but the longer we mess around and (dont) address this problem, the more difficult its going to be. It wasnt entirely clear if Nye meant to imply that Canada does not, in fact, have roads to transport crops, or if by using the word nominally he was envisioning an apocalyptic future in which the U.S. flexes its military might and annexes us out of self-interest. (If so, its worth noting that Gwynne Dwyer, a Canadian journalist and historian, warned of a wealth of similar outcomes that could unfold around the world in his 2008 book Climate Wars: The Fight for Survival as the World Overheats.) At the least, the MSNBC clip marks the latest chapter in Nyes colourful history of musing about Canada. Last March, the Science Guy appeared on stage with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a science and innovation panel held at the University of Ottawa, an event at which he said Canada wouldnt need to keep emitting fossil fuels if it were to embrace the use of renewable energy sources. Nye pressed Trudeau during the panel discussion to justify his governments decision to approve the expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline. He initially accepted Trudeaus answer that it will take time for Canadas energy sector to stop relying on oil. Its your country, Canadas going to do what its going to do, he said. But Nye later told reporters off-stage that he still believed pipelines are bad long-term solutions. In that same conversation with the press, Nye said he prefers to refer to the Alberta oilsands as tar, disparaging those bitumen deposits as an inefficient energy source. In October 2015, fewer than two weeks before the federal election in which Trudeaus Liberal Party won a majority mandate, Nye reflected on a recent trip he had taken to the oilsands by describing them as kind of the worst thing that any humans could be doing at this time in human history. It struck me, as a guy from the U.S., whos visited Canada many times. Ive skied in Canada, Ive hiked in Canada, Ive canoed in Canada, Nye said in an interview with On The Coast, a B.C.-based CBC Radio show. When you go to the tar sands, it does not look like Canada. Back in 2001, Nye struck a lighter tone in an interview with the National Post, assuring the correspondent that he loves Canada. I go skiing at Whistler. If you want to take fun to a whole other level, go to Toronto. Vancouver is a vision its wonderful, Nye said at the time. I buy Shreddies when Im in Canada. You cant get them in the U.S. Even the 2018 panel discussion with Trudeau wasnt all doom and gloom. At one point, Nye opened his wallet to prove to the crowd that he always carries a Canadian five-dollar bill, praising the banknotes depiction of astronaut Chris Hadfield and its celebration of space exploration more generally. I cant accept that, Trudeau joked when Nye revealed the bill. We have an ethics commissioner. Its not available, Nye replied. | https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/did-bill-nye-just-suggest-the-u-s-will-have-to-annex-canada-to-grow-crops |
Why Are These People So Proud to Be Dumb on Television? | From Esquire We live in the dumbest time in history. Certainly, there were times when human beings had less knowledge. But now we have more information at our fingertips than our ancestors could possibly have imagined, and we have chosen instead to promote stupidity in general, and our society's biggest dipshits specifically. Ignorance is a virtue, expertise is elitism, and the president's favorite teevee show features professional morons tasked with making sure the elderly caucasians tuning in each morning are all jumped up on resentful liberal-bashing so they'll stay tuned in for more resentment programing throughout the day. Anything is fair game if it Owns The Libs. Friday's addition to the oeuvre was a real doozy. Fox's Ed Henry: "We know it's cold outside. Now the left is actually using new terms for global warming, like 'extreme weather.' Are they just pushing the same old agenda with new words?" pic.twitter.com/hRL1M5Oooo - Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) February 1, 2019 Weather is not the same thing as climate. Weather is not the same thing as climate. Weather is not the same thing as climate. Here, the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration can explain: Whereas weather refers to short-term changes in the atmosphere, climate describes what the weather is like over a long period of time in a specific area. Different regions can have different climates. To describe the climate of a place, we might say what the temperatures are like during different seasons, how windy it usually is, or how much rain or snow typically falls. When scientists talk about climate, they're often looking at averages of precipitation, temperature, humidity, sunshine, wind, and other measures of weather that occur over a long period in a particular place. In some instances, they might look at these averages over 30 years. Imagine going on television to discuss something having proudly refused to learn a single goddamn thing about it. Most people would be embarrassed. These people just have that smirk etched across their faces, knowing this will get the viewers juiced up. You may have noticed that conservative "comedy"-what makes these folks laugh, or at least prompts that leering smile-mostly consists of needling other people with bad-faith talking points or outright cruelty. Meanwhile, that liberals get "owned" or "triggered" every time you make an ass of yourself disputing the scientific consensus that this is happening does not, in fact, mean the world will be spared what awaits us if we do not act on climate change. This is pure reactionary stupidity. You may also have noticed that this stuff is making a lot of people a lot dumber-including Ed Henry, who used to be a respected White House reporter but now fills in for Brian Kilmeade on the dumbest show on television. The subsequent segment was just as dumb as you'd expect: Because the left is losing the argument, radio host Mike Slater says its now extreme weather instead of climate change (weather and climate are not the same fucking thing), just like how they now say dreamers instead of undocumented immigrants (also not the same thing) pic.twitter.com/ZdPdt4ngFY - Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) February 1, 2019 You might have noticed that this genius-a talk-radio host with, presumably, zero scientific training, much less a degree in any field related to climate science-also suggested DREAMers are the same thing as undocumented immigrants. Actually, DREAMers are a specific group of people who were brought here as children by undocumented parents who, in many cases, don't know any other country. They are American in every way except on paper, which is why President Obama sought to protect them from deportation using an executive order. This guy would know that if he knew shit about shit. He does not. But funny enough, that first graphic in the segment was almost useful. The arrows there aren't far off: warming global temperatures have led to changes to the climate-just ask NASA-which in turn leads to more extreme weather. Previously, we focused on the increased ferocity of hurricanes and wildfires and drought, but there's growing evidence that the increasing frequency of the polar vortex-the arctic winds that have swirled south to plunge the American midwest to incredibly low temperatures-could also be linked to climate change. The Guardian explains: | https://news.yahoo.com/why-people-proud-dumb-television-153400935.html |
How Much Are Babysitters Making Around the Country? | Babysitting the kid down the street pays a lot better than working at Walmart or McDonalds. A new study from UrbanSitter finds the national average for an hour of babysitting now stands at $16.75 per hour for one child and $19.26 per hour for two children. To put that in perspective, thats more than twice the Federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour. Its also above the $9 per hour average at the retail giant and $8 per hour average for crew members at the fast food leader. (Of course, youll get more hours at either of those jobs.) The study, which gathered data from 28,000 families around the country, found that in San Francisco, with its high cost of living, sitters made the most, averaging $18.75 per hour for one child and $21.30 per hour for two kids. Las Vegas had the least expensive average, $11.63 per hour for one child and $14.71 per hour for two kids. Rates in other cities run a wide gamut: Los Angeles $16.06 (1 child); $18.01 (2 children) New York $17.30 (1 child); $20.85 (2 children) Boston $16.90 (1 child); $18.84 (2 children) Atlanta $13.17 (1 child); $15.75 (2 children) Miami $12.67 (1 child); $16.38 (2 children) Minneapolis $13.94 (1 child); $14.68 (2 children) Babysitting is a growth field, it would seem. While some cities have seen price reductions in the past year, Urbansitter notes that average rates have increased 2% in the past year (last years average was $16.43) and 18% in the last five years. And 18% of parents hire a sitter at least once a month. | http://fortune.com/2019/02/01/babysitter-average-regional-salary-rates/ |
Are social media companies doing enough to protect children? | Getty Images Social media companies should have a legal duty to protect children, that's according to a group of British politicians. They say social media has helped promote bullying and other issues online. The report by the UK Parliament's Science and Technology Committee calls for a new organisation to be created to watch over social media companies and take action if they break the law. Facebook's new vice-president Sir Nick Clegg has already promised to do "whatever it takes" to make the company's platforms - Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp - safer for young people. You need to be 13 to sign up to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat - although Snapchat has launched a version for under 13-year-olds. YouTube guidelines say you should also be 13 to have an account, though grown-ups can set up YouTube Kids accounts for younger children to use. To use WhatsApp you must be 16, after a change was made in 2018. The previous age limit had been 13. To enjoy the CBBC Newsround website at its best you will need to have JavaScript turned on. (Sep 2017) The committee - made up of a group of MPs from various political parties - has been looking at the effect of social media and screen time on the health of children. It surveyed more than 3,000 young people during its research. It said social media had positive qualities, but also led to body image issues, online bullying and damaged sleep patterns. It said these risks had existed before social media, but the popularity of apps had helped spread the problem. To enjoy the CBBC Newsround website at its best you will need to have JavaScript turned on. (Feb 2016) The report said social media companies should have a formal, legal "duty of care" over their users. That means they should have rules in place to protect users' safety and well-being. Office of the Children's Commissioner Anne Longfield has called for social media companies to be more responsible On Wednesday, England's Children's Commissioner, Anne Longfield, published her own open letter calling on social media firms to take more responsibility for protecting children from disturbing content. It was addressed to YouTube, Pinterest and Facebook, who also own WhatsApp and Instagram, and Snapchat. She called for an independent group, called a 'digital ombudsman', who would deal with complaints between young people and the tech giants. To enjoy the CBBC Newsround website at its best you will need to have JavaScript turned on. WATCH: Vlogger and Junior Bake Off winner Nikki's internet safety tips To enjoy the CBBC Newsround website at its best you will need to have JavaScript turned on. WATCH: Prince William wants tech companies to tackle cyberbullying (Nov 2018) It's something the Duke of Cambridge has also spoken out about. In November 2018, he accused social media companies of not being good enough when dealing with issues such as cyber-bullying. The prince praised the way they had helped bring people together, but said they also had a great deal to learn about being responsible. A spokesman for Instagram and Facebook agreed that the company had a "huge responsibility" to make sure young people were safe. "We are undertaking a full review of our policies, enforcement and technologies and are consulting further with mental health experts to understand what more we can do.". YouTube says its policies ban videos that include disturbing images, and any that do will be removed from the site. A spokeswoman for Snapchat said: "We work hard to keep Snapchat a safe and supportive place for everyone.". SOPA Images / Getty A spokeswoman for Pinterest said : "We don't want people to ever see disturbing content on our platform, and it is deeply upsetting to us if they do. "We have assembled a special team that is urgently working to strengthen our technology that helps keep unwanted content off Pinterest. "In addition, we are working with more outside groups with expertise in these issues to review our policy and enforcement guidelines and ensure we get this right. ". | https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/47072623 |
Could Bill Belichicks future include a job as a TV analyst? | ATLANTA On Wednesday, Bill Belichick fielded yet another question about his future once he decides to retire as the head coach of the New England Patriots. He usually, as respectfully as Belichick can, declines to answer and says hes focused on the immediate future, which in this case happens to be the big game on Sunday against the Rams. This time the question was about whether hed write a book once he retires. I dont know. Right now Im just trying to get ready for the Rams, Belichic said. Thats a full-time job. Well worry about that other stuff some other time. He paused, with just the right amount of comedic timing that fits his dry sense of humor. Would you buy one? he asked. A book written by Belichick to memorialize his coaching career would be so highly anticipated that it would secure an advance into the seven figures. This book will be demanded by the football gods whether he wants to write it or not, providing insights into his coaching philosophies, his take on Spygate and Deflategate, his reasoning behind trading away Jimmy Garoppolo and more. Thered be golf in Jupiter, Fla. Hed get on his boat in Nantucket and spend plenty of quality time with his grandkids. Its unclear whether Belichick would ever have any interest in this career path, but people I spoke with all seemed to believe he would be great as a talking headafter they stifled their laughter, of course. I have no idea. He would really have to want to do it. And if he put as much effort into a broadcasting career as he did his coaching career, I think he could offer some remarkable insights, Sean McManus, the president of CBS Sports, says. Ive spent time with him away from the cameras and hes a very engaging, articulate and can be an enthusiastic person to talk to about football. I think everyone looks at press conferences and says theres no way that guy can be on television. But if youve spent time with him in a one-on-one, hes an engaging guy. And if he wanted to do it, I think hed be good at it. McManus struck gold when he brought Tony Romo to CBS, and Romo may be the second-biggest storyline this week behind officiating. Ian OConnor, who last year authored a Belichick biography, told me Belichick would be Romo times five. FELDMAN: Inside the Private Meeting That Ultimately Landed Tony Romo a Top Analyst Job at CBS Combine Belichicks extensive knowledge of all three phases of football with his ability to process and analyze information in real-time, and it would seem that his best fit could be as a color analyst like Romo. There are friends and associates that I talked to who are frustrated by the fact that he doesnt show his humanity in the public arena, OConnor says. And I think if he stopped coaching and he went into the booth, he would open up that window to his soul and show a little more humanity than he does now. I think concerns fans around the country, particularly outside of New England, would have about his personality, they would see hes a complete human being and that would come out and make him even better. After spending nine years as the Ravens coach and winning Super Bowl XXXV, Brian Billick has been with FOX, ABC and NFL Network in various roles since 2008, and he does not foresee Belichick going to the booth. He cant imagine Belichick having a millennial producer in his ear telling him to talk more about a screen pass, and he remembers the toll it took on Bill Walsh when he left the 49ers in 1989 and joined NBCs top crew for three years before returning to coaching. It wore Bill Walsh out, and I worked with Bill [Walsh] on a number of different levels, Billick says. And Bill was a natural for it. He was intelligent and articulate. But he said, Brian I cant do it anymore. The lack of football Billick says hes been cautioned before about talking too much football in the booth, that getting too technical will go over peoples heads. But I quickly reminded him that people are loving it with Romo on CBS. Yeah, even though hes right about a third of the time, Billick says. Romo reminds me that middle linebacker who comes up to the line of scrimmage who says, Watch out for the screen! Watch out for the draw! And watch out for the deep pass! Ooook. And Im going to be right about one of them. I love it and its great energy and great fun. If Bill [Belichick] does that, God bless him. ROSENBERG: Ndamukong Suh Remains One of a Kind on the Biggest Stage of His Career Whats far more likely for Belichick post-coaching is an analyst gig that gets the Patriots coach in and out quickly, says Scott Zolak, who has been co-hosting Belichick Breakdowns on Patriots All-Access with The Hoodie for the past seven years. Zolak sees Belichick in a role similar to Tony Dungys film breakdowns with Rodney Harrison on NBCs Football Night in America. You put him in a five-minute segment, I think youre getting everything you can out of him, Zolak says. Its like cooking a steak. You put the butter and onions in and you get your wine reduction. You let that thing reduce down. You want to concentrate it. If you get Belichick concentrated for a three-to-five minute segment, thats money. At 66 years old, theres no telling how much longer Belichick will keep coaching, but sticking with Brady through his age-45 season would put Belichick at 70 years old. And when he finally does hang up the headset, he should have plenty of interested parties on the network side. If he wanted to do TV, I think every single network would be foolish not to audition him and see what it sounds like, CBS play-by-play announcer Jim Nantz says. Email us at [email protected]. | https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/02/01/bill-belichick-patriots-post-coaching-career-tv-analyst |
Can the Raptors Sell Kawhi Leonard On A Future In Toronto? | Backed by the superstar talents of Kawhi Leonard, the Toronto Raptors have elevated themselves into the elite of the NBA. With Leonard and a good surrounding cast, the Raptors are built to go for it all this year, and there is excitement in this city that is reminiscent of the Vince Carter days almost 20 years ago, even if they don't swing a deal at the trade deadline on Feb. 7. But amid all the hype is the fear that Leonard will opt out of his contract in the summer to become a free agent and possibly play for the Los Angles Lakers or Clippers. Everyone is ready the tea leaves. And speculation took off in late January when it was revealed that Leonard slammed down $13.3 million to buy a mansion in southern California. Of course, this could be just his off-season palace. But this home in Rancho Santa Fe is a homecoming of sorts because Leonard played two seasons of college basketball at San Diego State University before entering the 2011 NBA draft. This news overshadowed the fact that, according to previous reports, Leonard had previously purchased a home in Toronto. The California purchase, of course, added to fears that Leonard will pack up and go once he becomes a free agent at the end of this season. So far, Leonard has been having an outstanding season as one of the league's highest average point producers, even if he is taking a lot of games off. Leonard is currently earning around $23 million on the one-year deal he signed with Toronto, but as a free agent, he could easily earn more, and he could enhance his value by taking Toronto on a deep playoff run. It's believed Toronto could offer Leonard a five-year extension worth as much as $190 million on July 1. Leonard's health issues (he missed all but nine games last season with a quadriceps injury) have been managed smartly by the Raptors, who rest Leonard in the second half of back-to-back games, and sometimes more. The city of Toronto can be a hard sell for basketball players because it's a cold-weather climate and there is no legacy of winning here. But Toronto has significant upside. It is the NBA's fourth largest media market, it has a rabid basketball following across the country, and the city boasts some of the best restaurants and entertainment in the world. What might sell Leonard on staying is that the media-shy Leonard isn't the only show in town. Kyle Lowry, Serge Ibaka and Pascal Siakam are coming up big in big moments and taking the media pressure off Leonard, who rarely gives extensive interviews. Raptors general manager Masai Ujiri has made it clear that he is prepared to do whatever it takes to make Toronto a winner. He fired Dwane Casey, who weeks later was named NBA coach of the year after a 59-win season, and then traded the popular DeMar DeRozan for Leonard and Danny Green. To his credit, the Raptors have been consistent winners since Ujiri took over as head of basketball operations in 2013. Raptors coach Nick Nurse has also been building trust with Leonard. They have a professional relationship. In the end, all the Raptors can do is keep showing that they are committed to winning and putting Leonard in the best position to succeed. It's reasonable to suggest that Lowry, the heart and soul of the team, should be in Leonard's ear and trying to talk him into staying. But if Lowry is still upset at Raptors management for dealing his friend DeRozan, perhaps it's unrealistic for Lowry to recruit Leonard. Meanwhile, when Leonard missed four straight Raptors games in late January, more questions swirled about his "load management," which is the Raptors explanation for allowing him to rest. Yes, it makes sense to have Leonard ready for a long playoff run. But his absence has led to jokes in Toronto that perhaps Leonard should be encased in bubble wrap. If Leonard decides to take his services elsewhere, few in Toronto would be surprised. The Raptors have seen superstar players like Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady and Chris Bosh take their talents elsewhere. For the time being, Toronto is just enjoying the moment. The city is warmly embracing this team. At some point, we will know how much the Raptors desire Leonard for the long term. But in this era of free agency, fans realize that good times don't last forever. Change is inevitable. Ujiri has shown a willingness to take huge risks. Going into the trade deadline and down the stretch, it won't be Leonard you want to watch the most. It will be Ujiri. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/curtisrush/2019/02/01/can-the-raptors-sell-kawhi-leonard-on-a-future-in-toronto/ |
Why Is Fuller House Ending? | A source close to the show said everyone is thrilled to come back for the fifth and final season, mainly because they were close to being canceled altogether. For Netflix and the pacing of the show, five seasons is a perfect run, the source said. Despite the start of fan campaigns, Netflix's Full House sequel series will wrap up in the fall of 2019 with its fifth and final season. The announcement was made via a compilation video featuring clips from the series and the cast promising they've saved the best for last. When Fuller House debuted, it was a hit right out the gate. Netflix doesn't release proper viewership numbers, but according to data from Symphony Advanced Media , Fuller House episodes averaged 14.4 million viewers in the 18-49 demographic in its first month or so on Netflix. Rumors about the fourth season being the last swirled ahead of its debut. Series star Cameron Bure was quick to shoot them down in an interview with E! News. She later expressed desire to continue doing the show for years to come. "Oh my goodness, I would play DJ Tanner for the rest of my life," Cameron Bure told us before the fifth and final season was announced . "If the audience wanted it and the networks wanted it, I would do it forever. I love her. I love our Fuller House family, and we really are family off screen. The more I get to be with them every day, whether it's working or just in everyday life friendship. It's just incredible, so keep watching! Give us a season five!" Netflix Fuller House End date: Fall 2019 Why: There were rumors about the fourth season being the last, but Netflix announced plans for a fifth season...and its last. Netflix didn't give an official reason, and it's clear it's not because of the cast wanting to move on. USA Suits End date: 2019-2020 season Why: No official reason was given, but the aging series has a spinoff in the wingsGina Torres will star in Pearson for the network. CBS Criminal Minds End date: 2019-2020 season Why: It was time. After 14 seasons the CBS series, which is produced by ABC Studios, has been on the cancellation bubble before (ratings decline and the complicated producing deals), but fans will get a proper end. "It's really bittersweet, but I'm so, so grateful to CBS for giving us this heads-up," Erica Messer, executive producer, told TVLine. But they respect this series and the cast and the crew and the fans enough to end this properly." Article continues below USA Mr. Robot End date: 2019 Why: Creator Sam Esmail was ready to end the acclaimed series that put Rami Malek on the map. "When I first created the world of Mr. Robot, I thought it would be a niche television series with a small, cult following. Over the past three years, it has become so much more, and I am continually humbled by the show's recognition and by the amazing cast and crew that work tirelessly to help bring my vision to life," Esmail said in a statement. "Since day one, I've been building toward one conclusion and in breaking the next season of Mr. Robot, I have decided that conclusion is finally here. Everyone on the creative team, including the amazing people at USA and UCP, didn't want to say goodbye, but we ultimately have too much respect for Elliot's journey to extend past its inevitable ending. Therefore, season four will serve as the final chapter of the Mr. Robot story. To fans of the show: thank you for the past three years, and I can't wait to share this exciting final season with you." Freeform Shadowhunters End date: 2019 Why: It all came down to money. "We are very proud of Shadowhunters, a series that broke new ground in the genre world and became a fan favorite," Freeform said in a statement. "However, along with our partners at Constantin, we reached the very difficult decision not to renew the show for a fourth season. But as big supporters and fans ourselves, Freeform insisted on and championed the filming of a special two-part finale that would give devoted fans a proper ending. The 12 episodes will air in spring 2019. We want to thank our talented creators, producers, cast and crew along with our colleagues at Constantin for their hard work and dedication and to Cassie Clare for her incredible book series. We look forward to the final chapter of this breakthrough drama." CBS Elementary End date: 2019 Why: It's just time for the Sherlock Holmes drama to end. The show, which stars Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu, was a big hit for CBS, especially internationally. "[Series creator Rob Doherty] set out to tell a story, and it feels like he has accomplished what he had set out to do. The actors, the crew and the staff feel that way, and we feel that. So are grateful and celebrating what we had and looking forward to the future," executive producer Carl Beverly said. Article continues below History Vikings End date: 2020 Why: No real reason was given, but the upcoming sixth season will be the show's last. However, the Vikings saga may not be over. History and series creator Michael Hirst are in talks for a follow-up series. Comedy Central Broad City End date: Final season begins January 24, 2019 Why: Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer were ready. The duo detailed their experience writing season four after the 2016 election and their need to grow with The New York Times. Showtime The Affair End date: 2019 Why: The relationship drama, originally starring Maura Tierney, Dominic West, Ruth Wilson and Joshua Jackson, dipped a bit in popularity in recent years, but according to Showtime it was always planned to be five seasons. Anna Paquin joins the cast for the final season that jumps around in time. "We love the intimacy, the nuance and the emotional honesty of The Affair's subjective examination of both infidelity and fidelity," Gary Levine, president of programming at Showtime, said in a statement. "Sarah Treem has always envisioned this as a five-season series, and we will be fascinated to see where she takes her talented cast and all of us next year in its climactic season." Article continues below Showtime Homeland End date: 2019 Why: Look, Claire Danes' Carrie Mathison has been through A LOT. Danes previously hinted that the eighth season would be the show's last and Showtime made it official at the 2018 Television Critics Association press tour. "Homeland has been the most joyful and rewarding experience of my career. Not many have been as lucky as me partnered with the miraculous Claire Danes, supported to the ends of the earth by Fox and Showtime, and working in the company of some of the most gifted writers, actors, and filmmakers in the business. I am sad to see the journey coming to an end, but it is time," executive producer Alex Gansa said in a statement. Why: After the dismissal of series star Jeffrey Tambor, the show's fate was up in the air. However, the show will go on...TBD when you'll see it. "Hopefully it sets the Pfeffermans up with some sort of beautiful reclaiming," series creator Jill Soloway said about the final season. "I think we're going to get there with some time." Fox Gotham End date: 2019 Why: Low ratings plagued the Batman prequel series, but thanks to fan support, the series got a final batch of episodes to say goodbyeand for young Bruce Wayne (David Mazouz) to transform into the caped crusader. Article continues below FXX You're the Worst End date: 2019 Why: According to FX, the decision to wrap up the series about Gretchen (Aya Cash), Jimmy (Chris Geere), Lindsay (Kether Donohue) and Edgar (Desmin Borges) was mutual. "Making You're The Worst has been an incredible experience and FX Networks have been dream partners," creator Stephen Falk said in a statement when the ending was announced. "I am thankful to have the opportunity to be thoroughly judged whether or not we stick the landing'which is a thing people say now that stupid Breaking Bad had to end so damn perfectly." HBO Game of Thrones End date: 2019 Why: Co-creators and executive producers D.B. Weiss and David Benioff said they always intended Game of Thrones to be a finite series. "We're trying to tell one cohesive story with a beginning, middle and end. As Dan said, we've known the end for quite some time and we're hurtling towards itThe thing that has excited us from the beginning, back to the way we pitched it to HBO is, it's not supposed to be an ongoing show, where every season it's trying to figure out new story lines. We wanted it to be one giant story, without padding it out to add an extra 10 hours, or because people are still watching it. We wanted to something where, if people watched it end to end, it would make sense as one continuous story. We're definitely heading into the end game now," Benioff told Deadline at the end of season six. HBO Veep End date: 2019 Why: Selina Meyer (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) hasn't been the vice president for some time, it seemed like the series had run its course. "It became clear that this season should be the last season," Louis-Dreyfus told THR about the decision to end with the upcoming seventh season. "We don't want to repeat ourselves or wear out our welcome. The story has a finality to it that feels end-of-series." "It was just a very natural thing," executive producer David Mandel said. "We don't want to repeat ourselves or be boring. It's bittersweet but it's right." Article continues below The CW iZombie End date: 2019 Why: The CW series has pretty much been a bubble show year after year, but a vocal fanbase and steady viewership kept it around for one last hurrah. "I have to admit, I have never been in this position before. It's kind of nice to know," series creator Rob Thomas told E! News about actually knowing a season of one of his shows would be the last. CW Crazy Ex-Girlfriend End date: 2019 Why: Series creators Rachel Bloom and Aline Brosh McKenna have maintained the show was always going to be four seasons, and they plotted out the arc that way when they began work on the show. "It's four at most. It's a series that lives in being finite," Bloom told E! News ahead of season two. "It's because Aline is a screenwriter. She was like, 'I just want to map out the whole series.' We spent months just marinating the characters and really mapping it out. Our ratings aren't amazing, so I don't think CW would be like, 'Please give us 10 seasons!' It works to our advantage in that sense." Jane the Virgin End date: 2019 Why: Executive producer Jennie Snyder Urman said she thought the Gina Rodriguez-fronted show had four seasons of story to tell, but that plan changed during season two. "I thought, We have enough to take us through five seasons.' We started to have those discussions in season three. The studio and the network were always really supportive. Mark Pedowitz told me early on, Tell me when it ends. Just give me enough notice.' I was really grateful to have that, because you don't often have that leeway and confidence, and the foresight to be able to plan your ending. Gina and I are creative partners, and we talk about everything, and we were on the same page," Snyder Urman told The New York Times. "It's the ending I pitched when I pitched the show. I couldn't have pitched them a million of the details that have happened along the way, and it doesn't have to do so much with the plot and with all the twists and turns. But the overall structure and what I wanted to say about certain things structurally, that's built into the ending." Article continues below Netflix Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt End date: January 25 Why: Netflix split the final fourth season into two, releasing six episodes first with the second half of season, seven episode, being the for Kimmy, Titus, Lillian and Jacquelineunless the rumored movie comes together for Netflix. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, co-creator Robert Carlock said the team originally envisioned a five-season run and saw the split season four as shortened fourth and fifth seasons. "We were never quite sure what the life of the show wanted to be," he said. "When we split up this fourth season into kind of a fourth and a fifth just in the boring, most practical way, you could think of them as two short seasons one wouldn't be coming out until 2019, so it just felt like the right time to pull up stakes since we were kind of pushing ourselves into next year." Netflix Orange Is the New Black End date: Summer 2019 Why: Netflix renewed Orange Is the New Black for seasons five, six and seven back in 2016. Many assumed the seventh season would be the last, but the streaming platform didn't confirm until October 2018. Series creator Jenji Kohan hasn't explicitly said why she wanted to end the show after seven seasons, the story does seem to be heading to a natural end. Piper (Taylor Schilling) was originally only sentenced to roughly a year in prison and season six ended with her finally getting released. "After seven seasons, it's time to be released from prison. I will miss all the badass ladies of Litchfield and the incredible crew we've worked with," Kohan said in a statement. "My heart is orange but fade to black." CBS boss Kelly Kahl said the network was in talks with producer Warner Bros. TV about Big Bang season 13, but that all changed. Series star Jim Parsons was ready to move on and the show wouldn't continue without him. "It's both as complex and as simple as just feeling innately that it was time. It speaks to a lot of things, none of them bad. There is no negative reason to stop doing Big Bang. It felt like we have been able to do this for so many years now, it doesn't feel like there is anything left on the table," Parsons told EW. "Not that we couldn't keep doing it, but it feels like we've chewed all the meat off this bone. I guess at a personal level, it feels like the right time in my life." However, Parsons is still an executive producer and narrator of Young Sheldon, so he's not going very far. | https://www.eonline.com/uk/news/1010784/why-is-fuller-house-ending?cmpid=rss-000000-rssfeed-365-topstories&utm_source=eonline&utm_medium=rssfeeds&utm_campaign=rss_topstories |
Can Pelicans survive in New Orleans without Anthony Davis? | This column first appeared in our NBA Click & Roll newsletter, which was delivered to inboxes on Wednesday. Then sign up for NBA Click & Roll, which also features the biggest moments, quotes and news you may have missed from throughout the Association. New Orleans is a fabulous city. Great food. Great music. Great arts and culture. Those kinds of questions always will surround teams in smaller NBA cities with smaller TV markets. And regarding New Orleans, its particularly timely because of Anthony Davis wish to be traded from the Pelicans. New Orleans Pelicans forward Anthony Davis. This isnt the first time relocation for New Orleans has been discussed. Back in 2010 when then-New Orleans owner George Shinn wanted to sell the team, there were suitors who had interest in buying and possibly relocating. The NBA ended up buying and taking control of the team for a short time. But the NBA views relocation as a last resort in most cases. (Yes, I understand where Seattle SuperSonics fans are coming from). And the NBA found a buyer for New Orleans in 2012 when Tom Benson, owner of the Saints, came to the rescue. But Benson died in March, and his wife, Gayle, is in control of the Saints and Pelicans. She could make a significant profit by selling. Benson paid about $340 million for the Pelicans, and in the latest "Forbes" team valuations, the Pelicans are worth about $1 billion, which ranks last among the 30 teams. New Orleans is a tough market for sure a small city (compared to other NBA cities), a small TV market (compared to other NBA cities) and a shortage of local corporate sponsors. Also remember: The Pelicans are on the receiving end of the leagues revenue-sharing program. A general view of the Smoothie King Center. (Photo: Chuck Cook, USA TODAY Sports) But two people familiar with the sale of NBA franchises told USA TODAY Sports they have a hard time seeing the Pelicans relocate for a few reasons beyond the leagues desire to keep the team where it is. The people requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the situation. The Pelicans arena lease doesnt run out until 2024, and yes, there are ways to get out of it, but it comes with financial penalties. And as of right now, with Davis, Pelicans attendance isnt horrible. The arena is filled to 91 percent capacity according to ESPN attendance figures. The latter three might not even be better NBA markets, according to one of the people with whom USA TODAY Sports spoke. Then, there is Seattle, always looming over the NBA as a potential expansion or relocation city. Rightfully so, too. There should be an NBA team in Seattle. A Seattle SuperSonics fan demonstrates before Game 4 of the NBA Finals. (Photo: Lynne Sladky, AP) But relocation fees are way less than expansion fees, both of which are shared among the rest of the teams in the league. When the Sacramento Kings were up for sale, one group planned to pay a $115 million relocation fee. Divided by 29 other teams, thats about a $4 million payout for each team. Hardly a game-changer. That could be close to $1.5 billion or higher, given the average value of a team is $1.65 billion, according to "Forbes". Divided by 30 teams, thats $50 million per team, the kind of money that interests other owners. So, while the topic of relocation often will surround a team such as the Pelicans, it will take something drastic for the franchise to move. For now, the Pelicans need to focus on their future, building without Davis on the roster and putting a product on the floor that is entertaining for fans and sponsors. Follow USA TODAY Sports' Jeff Zillgitt on Twitter. | https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nba/columnist/jeff-zillgitt/2019/02/01/anthony-davis-can-pelicans-survive-new-orleans-without-him/2727169002/ |
Can Elizabeth Warren and Adam Smith, Defying Trump, Persuade Americans to Get Serious About Nuclear-Arms Control? | It is the policy of the United States to not use nuclear weapons first. This is the elegantly simple declamation of a bill, introduced on Wednesday by Representative Adam Smith, Democrat of Washington, the new chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, and Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. The proposed legislation would reverse the longstanding American policy of being theoretically prepared to initiate a nuclear conflict without first being subject to a nuclear attack. Deterrence theory, which was adopted during the height of the Cold War, seemed to require that a country threaten its readiness to launch a premptive nuclear onslaught even before an enemy got to zero with its own countdown. Over the years, though, daylight fell between deterrence theory and strategic conduct. No first use became taken for granted as a matter of practice: the United States was not going to start a nuclear war. Barack Obama came close to turning that stance into policy late in his Presidency. Warned off by the national-security lite, including his own Secretaries of Defense, Energy, and State, who did not want to send softening signals to Russia and China, he declined to do so. But the Trump Administrations Nuclear Posture Review, issued a year ago this month, went fully the other way, openly declaring that the United States would launch nuclear strikes in response to non-nuclear strategic attacks, a vaguely characterized category that could be interpreted to include, say, cyber assaults on the American information infrastructure. Now, a readiness to use a nuclear weapon for the first time since the attack on Nagasaki is a central part of national-security doctrine, a perfect match to the Administrations across-the-board bluster. First use is a readymade organizing principle for Donald Trump. Smith and Warren are now openly defying that Trump doctrine. No first use can be understood as a kind of mantra, a symbol of a larger purposeto move away from the decades-old paralysis of nuclear mania. That it could inhibit even a nuclear abolitionist such as Obama shows how multifaceted the problem remains. Smith has introduced such a bill previously, but now he is joined by a colleague who stands at the pinnacle of the nations interest. Warren, who has all but announced a 2020 Presidential bid, embraced no first use in a major foreign-policy address at American University, in November, as one of what she called three core nuclear-security principles. The other two were no new nuclear weapons and more international arms control, not less both of which point away from the road that the Trump Administration has taken. In renouncing the first-use doctrine, Warren joined an eminently practical concernTo reduce the chances of a miscalculation or an accidentto an ethical one. To maintain our moral and diplomatic leadership in the world, we must be clear that deterrence is the sole purpose of our arsenal, she said. Introducing the No First Use Act marks a major move, for Warren, from the realm of rhetoric to actual lawmaking designed, at the very least, to prompt congressional consideration of a crucial national-security question. The Republican pushback came quickly. Senator Deb Fischer, of Nebraska, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committees subcommittee on strategic forces, said that the proposal betrays a nave and disturbed world view. Such dismissal will no doubt come from many quarters. How the initiative plays out in the push and pull of Presidential politics will say less, perhaps, about campaign competitions and media preoccupations than about the general attitude of the American electorate toward the subject. When it comes to the dangers posed by nuclear arsenals, complacency reigns, even as the Trump Administration goes steadily about the business of opening up a new nuclear age. When Trump launched his fire and fury like the world has never seen tirade against North Korea, in August of 2017, there was a short-lived rush of nuclear anguish, with many people of a certain age recalling incidents of Cold War Armageddon dread. But, with Trumps irrational about-face on North Korea, which seems based on what he has called the love between him and Kim Jong Un, and which his own intelligence chiefs discounted earlier this week, the broad fear of nuclear war resumed its place in the deep recesses of American denial. Warren is not taking her cues on this question from the polls. If she were, she would, like most other politicians, likely leave it alone. For two generations, Americans have not known how to think about the nations nuclear policy, or its arsenal, and so, for the most part, it seems, they havent. The twenty-first centurys stalling of arms reduction, and the withering of the U.S. commitment to the arms-reduction-treaty regime, have ranked low on the scale of the nations problems, as perceived from across the political spectrum. Obamas brief emergence as a globally celebrated nuclear eliminationist, and his inexorable fade from that stance when he was actually in power, says less about a leaders fecklessness than about the deadly lock that nuclear weapons have had on one Congress after another, on the ever-burgeoning defense industry, and on the American mind. There was an exception, which came during the fraught period of the first term of the Reagan Administration, when a burst of nuclear-war anxiety swept across much of the world. In Europe, the deployment of American cruise and Pershing II missiles ignited unprecedented grassroots protests. In this country, that anxiety inspired the Nuclear Freeze Movementwhich called for a freeze on the super-powers nuclear arsenals at their then current levels with municipalities, civic and professional groups, religious institutions, and cohorts of educators, physicians, and scientists all banding together against what felt like an imminent nuclear catastrophe. By March of 1982, the grassroots had sprouted a forest, and the nuclear-freeze resolution, A Call to Halt the Nuclear Arms Race, inspired a bill in Congress by sponsors that included two Massachusetts Democrats: Senator Ted Kennedy and Representative Ed Markey, who is now Warrens colleague in the Senate. (Markey, with Representative Ted Lieu, of California, reintroduced a similar bill of his own this week) Three months later, a million anti-nuke protesters gathered in New York City. A year after that, the nuclear-freeze resolution passed in the House. The idea of the freeze then opened into the larger idea of nuclear reduction, and, over time, to a wide embrace of the goal of nuclear abolition. Members of the Pentagons nuclear priesthood, including General Lee Butler and Admiral Eugene Carroll, Jr., and civilian architects of the nuclear-security state, such as Paul Nitze and William Perry, began to speak out against nukes. For a time, liberation from the grip of the absolute weapon seemed possible. Even Reagan had been preparing to move past the idea of freezing nuclear-arms levels to reducing them. Then, Mikhail Gorbachev became the leader of the Soviet Union, a historic shift occurred, and, against all predictions, the Cold War ended, not with conflagration but with negotiation. (On Friday, the Trump Administration suspended the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which came out of those negotiations, in 1987, following a long-running disagreement over Russia's compliance.) No first use is a simple idea, as the freeze was, and that is its strength. It is common-sensical, and harkens back to the informal moral consensus that America is not a nation to start a nuclear war. That consensus should be enshrined in law, but, even if all that comes of the Smith-Warren initiative is a renewed public debate, that will be more than salutary. Consideration of the No First Use Act not only in Congress but on the campaign trail can point forward to a new grappling with the unexamined set of nuclear questions, starting with Warrens other two core principles: of no to new weapons and yes to arms control. More than her proposals for the recovery from income inequality, her effort to unbolt the nuclear lock on the American economy and culture can be historic. | https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/can-elizabeth-warren-and-adam-smith-defying-trump-persuade-americans-to-get-serious-about-nuclear-arms-control |
Does Howard Schultz Have a Real Shot at Defeating Trump? | Robert Merry Politics, America American politics is a parade of surprises, including developments that seem inconceivable before they happen but afterward take on a coloration of being commonplace. Thought so. What this tells you is that American politics is a parade of surprises, including developments that seem inconceivable before they happen but afterward take on a coloration of being commonplace. The Trump election is a vivid example. Now we have hints from former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz that he may run for president next year as an independent candidatefunded in large part, presumably, by his own fortune born of his business brilliance. Howls went up immediately that he would be a spoiler in the race, split the anti-Trump vote, and almost single-handedly award Trump with a reelection victory. Besides, it was emphasized, he cant win. Probably he cant. But maybe he can. We just dont know, rather like we couldnt know four years ago that Trump actually could become president. As Schultz makes up his mind on whether to runand whether he can withstand the opprobrium of Democrats who are shrieking like teenagers at a horror movie, as the Wall Street Journal puts itsome observations may be in order. First, if ever there were a time in American politics when there could be a prospect for an independent victory, this may be it. The countrys political situation is intrinsically unstable. Trump has captured the reins of the Republican Party, but many Republicans recoil at the idea of having him as their partys leader. And Trumps public opinion approval numbers since his election, between around 39 percent. If Trump looks like a loser as the campaign year unfolds, then his base support could erode significantly. That could destabilize the countrys political situation further. Then there is the Democratic Party, lurching to the Left at the behest of such figures as senators Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris, not to mention the new crop of outspoken leftists and socialists who emerged in last years congressional elections. They have brought to the fore within the party such policy prescriptions as Medicare for All, a 70 percent top individual tax rate, and a truly confiscatory wealth tax on billionaires. Many Democrats will embrace these ideas, but others wont. And the emergence of a new party establishment of the Left, which seems to be in the works, will leave many Democrats uncomfortable, if not downright angry. That will destabilize the situation even further. Independent presidential candidates gain sway in turbulent campaign years, which 2020 figures to be. Thus, while theres no reason at this point to predict a consequential Schultz surge in the general election, it shouldnt be discounted, either. Voters are going to be angry, frustrated, fearful, and wracked with concerns about the state and direction of their country. Thats a recipe for voters casting a serious look at fresh electoral options. Second, lets explore the idea that Schultz would split the anti-Trump vote and hence deliver a reelection victory to the president. Its possible, but history suggests alternative candidates, if they reach a level of magnitude, often harm the incumbent more than the challenger. Thats because the incumbent (or incumbent party) generally gets the blame for what ails the polity, and alternative candidates serve to emphasize these ills to the electorate. Thus, Theodore Roosevelts 1912 independent bid destroyed the Taft incumbency; George Wallaces 1968 candidacy (which garnered nearly 14 percent of the popular vote) upended the Democrats hold on the White House; John Andersons 1980 insurgency (6.6 percent) helped defeat Jimmy Carter; and Ross Perots 1992 entry (19 percent) contributed to George H. W. Bushs downfall. Its rather pat to suggest definitively that a Schultz candidacy will give Donald Trump his only serious chance to get reelected, as William A. Galston put it in a Wall Street Journal open letter. The campaign year dynamics have yet to play out, and they could prove to be far different from what they appear to be today. | https://news.yahoo.com/does-howard-schultz-real-shot-133000942.html |
Should the Knicks Try to Trade for Kyrie Irving Now? | As the wave of earth-shaking NBA news rumbles on this weekheres something to chew on until the next bit of news breaks. With the Celtics, Knicks and Pelicans all approaching uncertain junctures and the trade deadline on the horizon, the domino effect of Anthony Daviss trade request on the entire league requires some additional thought. Here, then, is a scenario that could work to satisfy all three parties. First, a quick rundown of an increasingly league-wide epidemic of superstar unhappiness. The Knicks made a clear statement of intent by dealing Kristaps Porzingis on Thursday: New York is placing all their chips on bringing in superstar talent. Most signs point to the Knicks targeting Kevin Durant, who is expected to take meetings and look at his options this summer, and Kyrie Irving, who is expected to opt out of the final year of his deal in Boston. Irvings comments on Fridayintimating he would keep all of his options open in free agencycorroborate recent rumblings around the league that he is far from a lock to remain a member of the Celtics, despite more or less verbally committing to re-signing before the season. Meanwhile, the specter of a Davis tradeand his camps machinations to land him with the Lakerscontinues to hang over the entire league. The primary reason why the Pelicans can afford to wait to make a deal is because the Celtics can come to the table after the season with young talent and multiple first-round picks. The reason why Boston has to wait is because they cant simultaneously roster Davis and Kyrie Irving, because both are signed to designated rookie extensions, of which teams are only allowed to have one on payroll. The prospect of Bostons best offer gives New Orleans immediate leverage over Los Angeles and any other bidder going into Thursdays deadline, no matter how much Davis agent, Rich Paul, attempts to get the point across that they are not interested in signing with the Celtics long-term. There are a number of crucial contingencies with this scenariowhich make it speculative, to be fair, but think about it. Assume that Boston knows it might lose Irving. Assume that the Celtics knew they had enough to acquire Davis from the Pelicans before the deadline if they moved Irving first. We know for a fact the Knicks want star talent, and that the Knicks are now armed with forthcoming cap space and future first-rounders after dealing Kristaps Porzingis. New York could bid on multiple max free agents, but they are also in terrific position to trade for one. With Irvings situation now publicly in flux, the Knicks should at least be calling Boston. Of course, there is the possibility that Irving might sign in New York this summer anyway, which is fair, but there are a number of advantages the Knicks would gain by acquiring him immediately. The primary reason is the value of owning Irvings Bird Rights, which they can only acquire via trade. That would allow New York to go over the salary cap when re-signing him this summer, allows them to offer him the most long-term money, and most importantly, puts their first superstar in play before free agency even begins. There is a legitimate perception that the Knicks cant keep their best players happy; the Porzingis fallout and the history of ownership under James Dolan mostly affirms that. The optics of sitting down with, say, Kevin Durant and already having Irving committed are immensely valuable when it comes to making New York a destination. Going to get Irving demonstrates the Knicks are serious, and inarguably makes for a much more convincing pitch. And the best way to guarantee you have Irving in the fold and keep him off the market is, well, to go get him. As it stands, the Knicks can renounce the cap holds to all their free agents go into the off-season with about $24.4 million in salary on the books, with only Dennis Smith Jr., Frank Ntilikina, Lance Thomas, Kevin Knox, Mitchell Robinson and Damyean Dotson under guaranteed contract. The cap for 2019-20 is expected to be set at around $109 million, and Irvings cap hold would be approximately 150% of his previous salaryso roughly $30.1 millionleaving the Knicks with about $54.6 million in space. Thats enough to sign a max player, use the rest of the space to fill out the supporting cast, and re-sign Irving at the end of operations to go over the cap. If nothing else, its entirely preferable to a scenario where the Knicks enter July with no bird in hand, only the promise of cash and what the team might look like to a prospective signing. If youre New York and you think you can keep Irving, youre calling Boston. NADKARNI: The Porzingis Trade Is All About Kevin Durant for the Knicks The math in a hypothetical Knicks/Celtics deal works something like this: for Irving at his salary number, the Knicks can offer any of their own future first-rounders or the ones they just acquired from Dallas, packaged with one of their three expiring contracts. Scenario A: New York offers DeAndre Jordan or Wesley Matthews plus two future firsts. (Because they were just acquired, Jordan and Matthews cannot be combined with any other players). Scenario B: New York offers Kanter, Kevin Knox and a future first. If New York is serious, thinks they can legitimately land a second star, and wants to operate like a big-market team, they sacrifice the assets to do the deal. Knoxs development timeline doesnt align with the immediacy of a Durant-Irving pairing, the Knicks will still have their own first-rounders, and if the big guns fall into place, fans would get over it. Its scary to think about, but if the Knicks are really all-in on building a contender, they do the deal. And for what its worth, it would almost be foolhardy to think theyd to the Porzingis deal without knowing they had at least one big free agent on the way. Again, from Bostons perspective, you only do this deal operating with the knowledge that New Orleans will send you Davis. If the Celtics want to roll the dice on keeping the transcendent big man long-term, acquiring him nowwith the prospect of having Davis around for not one, but two playoff runsmaximizes Bostons window to sell him on staying. If the Celtics fear Irving will depart for nothing, then flipping whatever assets are necessary for Davis, a player who could flip the Eastern Conference for two years with his presence regardless of whether he wants to be a Laker, might be well worth it. The Celtics would also create some cap space with whichever contract they acquire from the Knicks. SHARP: The Porzingis Trade Was Smart. Everyone Calm Down If Boston can move Irving in the above scenario, then their offer to New Orleans for Davis could include Jaylen Brown (made easier by the hypothetical addition of Knox), Marcus Smart, Marcus Morris, and whatever number of first-rounders it would take to sway the Pelicans. It would more or less be an offer New Orleans couldnt afford to refuse. The Celtics could turn to the buyout market to fill out their playoff rotation, and figure it out going into next season with Davis, Gordon Hayward, Al Horford and Jayson Tatum as their principals, plus the possibility of re-signing Terry Rozier, and whatever Knox becomes. While having Irving in place would obviously help their chances of keeping Davis long-term, Boston has a creative, shrewd front office, would still have more draft picks to dangle to improve the team, and would maintain a legitimate pathway to winning the Eastjust maybe not this year. Still, you can argue that with Irvings situation unstable as it is, Hayward not fully back to being himself, and Bostons bouts of inconsistency, the likelihood of them making the Finals in 2019 remains slim. The long view here might even be more promising. This is all speculationthat probably needs to be spelled out againand its a complex scenario. But, its a hypothetical where all three teams win. The Knicks orient themselves to contend in the Eastern Conference next season and still have a full stash of their own draft picks; the Celtics avert the risk of Irvings departure, inherit the best opportunity to keep Davis around, still have draft assets and get to streamline their roster creatively; the Pelicans avoid handing Davis to Los Angeles and receive the best possible haul of picks to build for the future. Maybe. Maybe more than you think. | https://www.si.com/nba/2019/02/01/kyrie-irving-trade-rumors-knicks-celtics-2019-nba-free-agency |
Can Kyle Larson be the next NASCAR superstar? | Kyle Larson (Photo: Jared C. Tilton, Getty Images) Charlotte, N.C. NASCARs biggest stars have all moved on. Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. are television analysts while Tony Stewart is racing sprint cars again. Danica Patrick traded her firesuit for athleisure-wear while Carl Edwards just kind of disappeared. Americas top motorsports series is in need of a new face. The rapid wave of retirements brought in a crop of fresh-faced young drivers tasked with carrying NASCAR through a tough transition, but no clear superstar to fill empty seats and shape the next generation of racers. It might be a job best suited for Kyle Larson, considered by many the best hope to bridge the gap between grassroots racing and NASCAR and perhaps attract new fans to motor sports in a time of need. He is young at 26, and like childhood idol Gordon he hails from California and made his name racing sprint cars. Larson has the raw talent to take risks that other drivers avoid, and he has built a reputation as a clean racer who wont wreck a rival to win. His style has appealed to hardcore fans and his promise has piqued the interest of casual observers. He is half-Japanese, the most successful graduate of NASCARs diversity program, and the only Asian-American full-time driver in NASCAR. Larson has all the elements to be the next Gordon or Stewart. Fair or not, he knows there are expectations to bring attention and excitement to NASCAR. More: NASCAR Hall of Fame a great honor for Michigans Jack Roush I think if I just continue doing what I am doing it takes care of itself; I dont look at it like I have to work too hard to save motor sports, Larson said. I think if I just keep racing all the stuff that I do, its good for all of motor sports. The pressure was on Larson before he ever drove a stock car. Gordon, Stewart and Kasey Kahne anointed Larson the real deal after his sprint car career, which exploded one magical night in 2011 at Stewarts Eldora Speedway in Ohio. Larson that evening became only the second driver in history to win in all three kinds of USAC cars in a single night. Kyle Larson has won five NASCAR Cup races, including the August race at Michigan in 2016. (Photo: Sarah Crabill, Getty Images) Chip Ganassi hired him before the 2012 season and put him in a stock car for the first time, even though the young driver had been on a path toward IndyCar. Larson was 19 and on a fast track to a Cup ride just two years later. He has won five races in the five seasons since; his first Cup victory was at Michigan in 2016. But he has probably lost a dozen more because he is still learning to close out a victory. Ganassi has shown patience with Larson. Hes been at the front, he just has to close out some of these things, Ganassi said. I think he treats people with a lot more respect than they treat him with, and thats his attitude, and were OK with that. Hes approached NASCAR with his own pace. I dont want to say he has nothing to learn; we all have things to learn every single day. But Im perfectly happy with his angle of attack. Larsons most recent defeat, his last time behind the wheel, was one of the most difficult to swallow of his career. Christopher Bell, like Larson a budding star with a sprint car following, passed Larson on the final lap of the Chili Bowl last month to deny Larson the one victory he wants most. Bell won the $10,000 prize and the Golden Driller trophy for the third consecutive year, and Larson spent several sleepless nights replaying the final lap in his head. The break between the Chili Bowl and NASCARs opening of Speedweeks next weekend is the longest stretch of idle time Larson has had this offseason. He spent most of December racing in New Zealand and finds the routine of competing every night in sprint cars helpful in bouncing back after defeat. Im just ready for the next race, Larson said. It just makes it a lot easier to move on when you can go racing, get back in your car the next day or a couple of days later. It just is easier to forget about it when you can race again. Larson estimates he will race roughly 75 events this calendar year, only 38 of which are in NASCAR. The Indianapolis 500 remains on the horizon but not a priority. Still, he was intrigued when Fernando Alonso won the Rolex 24 at Daytona and said his next big project is unprecedented in motor sport. The former Formula One champion is likely going to try to race several disciplines in the biggest races in the world, and Larson wouldnt mind a similar plan. Larson was part of Ganassis 2015 Rolex victory. I feel like Im kind of in that same mold a little bit, Larson said. I obviously dont have the opportunity to run an F1 race, but I could do the Indy 500 and Ive won the Rolex and I race in NASCAR and Im still racing midgets and whatever. I feel like I do a little of everything already and probably even more so than he does. Hes so famous and hes probably one of the greatest race car drivers of all time, so it is cool to get a little bit of recognition as someone who can do what hes trying to plan. The NASCAR audience has an appetite for true racers and Larson has done well in earning new supporters. The married father of two is raising his kids at the race track, the way he and his wife grew up, and he is figuring out how far he can go in motor sports. Rival team owner Rick Hendrick sees Larson as todays Stewart, minus the notorious temper. Hes not quite as ornery as Tony and outspoken, but I think hes a great driver, Hendrick said. Thats what the fans like, somebody who just really can drive a car. Hes one of the most aggressive and has the least amount of baggage. He didnt wreck anybody and he runs everybody clean, he doesnt run over people. Hes fast and good, so I think we need him and I think we need him to win. | https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/motor/2019/02/01/nascars-biggest-stars-have-all-moved-on-jeff-gordon-and-dale-earnhardt-jr-television-analysts-while/2745714002/ |
What To Take From Harley-Davidson Full Year Results? | Harley-Davidson (NYSE: HOG) released its Q4 and full year results for the Fiscal Year 2019. The company reported $5.72 million in revenue, up by 1.2% year on year. The Net Income reported was $531.5 million, up by 1.9% YOY and EPS was $3.19, up by 5.6% YOY. The CEO during the investor call mentioned that the company has met or exceeded all planned milestones and the execution is on track and the company is energized with new and different people, riders and non-riders. We have a $46 price estimate for the company, which is above the current market price. View our interactive dashboard Our Outlook For Harley-Davidson in FY 2019 and modify the key assumptions to arrive at your own price estimate for the company. Key highlights of Fiscal Year 2018: The CEO during the call said that the company met or exceeded all stated planned milestones. In 2018, the full year e-commerce sales were up by 32%, they opened 23 apparel stores in Asia, 56 International dealers added, on track for 2-6 new models per year. In July, 2018 the company had announced the More Roads to Harley-Davidson plan, the acceleration of their strategy to build the next generation of Harley-Davidson riders, grow motorcycling, and return the business to growth through 2022. The company is on track to launch the new middleweight motorcycles in 2020. The Pan-America Adventure Touring and Streetfighter Motorcycle are being put through the paces on all kinds of terrain and are demonstrating power, strength, and competitiveness. During the year the company sold 228,051 motorcycles overall (down 6.1% YOY), with the US contributing 132,868 (down 10.2% YOY), and the international market contributing 95,183 motorcycles (up 0.4% YOY). Fiscal Year 2019 outlook: The company expects to make motorcycle shipments in the range of 217,000 to 222,000 and expects the gross margin to be down YOY, but with the operating margin expected to be flat. Restructuring expenses will be approximately $40-45 million and capital expenditures are expected to be in the range of $225-245 million. The company acknowledges the market challenges will persist and in the investor call the CEO said we know market challenges will persist and were meeting them head-on with drive, clarity of purpose, and a solid plan. Our More Roads plan leverages our many strengths and it is our call to action as industry leader. In the U.S., the company is expected to increase relevant motorcycling. They will also address the changing global and consumer preferences towards more accessible motorcycles and a growing interest in demand for the electric segment. The company further believes that And More Roads has tremendous international opportunities that can drive international sales to become at least 50% of the annual sales volume in the near term. Explore example interactive dashboards and create your own. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/02/01/what-to-take-from-harley-davidson-full-year-results/ |
What Do Cisco Systems And A Famous Church In Spain Have In Common? | I attended Cisco Live! Europe 2019 this week in the beautiful city of Barcelona, Spain. Famous for its amazing cuisine of tapas, paella, and ham, the city also features architectural wonders like the La Sagrada Familia, designed by the famous architect Antoni Gaudi. Construction started in 1882 and the story is that its been under perpetual construction ever since. I liken this to Cisco Systems approach to networking. Founded in 1984 by Stanford students Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner, the company has adapted and grown throughout the last three decadesboth organically and through strategic acquisitions such as Merakito gain massive market scale. Much the same could be said for the companys intent-based networking journey. When the strategy was announced by CEO Chuck Robbins in June of 2017, Cisco declared it was the companys future. I was initially critical, but over the past eighteen plus months, the company added significant capabilities from an analytics, security, and assurance perspective. This week, Cisco continued to build momentum behind its The Network, Intuitive with a new course in delivering a more robust Internet of Things solution set (IoT) and supporting a distributed data center model. I would like to share some of my insights and learnings after spending time with top Cisco leadership at the event. IT plus OT truly does equal IoT At this point, IoT is a white-washed term in the tech industry. From my perspective, its about widespread connectivitybe it smart home devices, IP cameras, or sensors on manufacturing equipment. All too often, product creators focus on the shiny object and speeds and feeds. This ignores the actual use cases that demonstrate the tangible value, transformation, and experience for the user. What I found compelling around the Cisco IoT announcement this week was a focus on use cases. I was amazed to learn that the company counts nearly 50,000 customers today that deploy a combination of IoT hardware and software-defined networking solutions (one example is the Port of Rotterdam, which manages the movement of thousands of shipping containers daily and wants to enable autonomous shipping by 2030). To accelerate its momentum in these areas, Cisco announced several initiatives, including an extension of its Catalyst product line in a ruggedized form factor, blueprint/engineering guides that guide partners and customers in deployment, a channel program that enables partner success, and DevNet resources that will help accelerate development and extend Ciscos reach. Ive written about DevNet in the pastif interested you can find that article here. The traditional Information Technology (IT) world reaped the benefits of software-defined networking, delivering better management, scalability, and security. However, in the Operations Technology (OT) space, often the non-carpeted functions of manufacturing and logistics are not connected or are under topologies that are proprietary, fraught with security risks, and complex, providing moderate to no insights. Cisco aims to change this, through a partner recruitment effort and by reaching into its own massive IT install base to uncover OT connectivity opportunities. Its also leveraging its IOS XE operating system and Kinetic software to link IT and OT together through a common framework, to provide visibility and insight to all devices. On the OT side, one of the most significant transformations will be predictive maintenance for manufacturing equipment, ensuring lower downtime and greater yields. Cisco cited its work with Zeiss Group, a 170-year-old German leader in optics and medical equipment, as another proof point. Zeiss Group utilizes Cisco technology to monitor and manage over 5,000 machines globally. A liberation of the data center The other significant announcement at the event this week were enhancements aimed at liberating the traditional siloed data center. This involves the expansion of Ciscos Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) into the cloud with Amazon Web Services and fast up-and-comer Microsoft Azure, an extension of Cisco HyperFlex hyper-converged infrastructure into branch and remote locations, improved lifecycle multi-cloud management within Cisco CloudCenter, and a simplified customer acquisition path for all of the companys data center solutions through a single enterprise agreement. I believe all of the aforementioned enhancements comprise a solid strategy on Ciscos partthe delivery of world-class networking infrastructure will not be a single, one-size-fits-all exercise. Data is being generated on an ever-increasing scale. As a result, connectivity has to be close to the creation source and needs to employ the right mix of on-premise, multi-cloud, and edge capabilities for each customers needs. I shared additional insights on this announcement in a taped segment on the show floor this week. If interested, you can find that video here. Wrapping up I attended the Cisco Live! North America event in Orlando last summer. Even though this event in Barcelona for the companys European, Middle Eastern, African, and Russian geography was smaller in scale and echoed some of the same messages, there was one notable difference. In every keynote, the common theme centered around use cases and customer experience. Thats a significant shift from the past for the networking giant and one that I believe will pay dividends for the company down the road. Cisco boasts that it has deployed 50 million networks over a twenty-year period. Suffice it to say, most in the industry know the companys reputation for delivering high-quality hardware. I believe leading with use cases and enabling channel partner success, not leaning into a single data center strategy, and continuing to invest in its DevNet developer programs will keep the company focused on its end-all goal of delivering intent-based networking to the masses. Disclosure: My firm, Moor Insights & Strategy, like all research and analyst firms, provides or has provided research, analysis, advising, and/or consulting to many high-tech companies in the industry including Amazon, Microsoft, and Cisco Systems, cited or related to this article. I do not hold any equity positions with any companies cited in this column. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/moorinsights/2019/02/01/what-do-cisco-systems-and-a-famous-church-in-spain-have-in-common/ |
Are the referenda on Suns arena renovation deal DOA? | CLOSE Sports Editor Mark Faller and columnist discuss the Suns arena deal and Devin Booker's recent antics. Oh, and A.J. Pollock's signing with the Dodgers. Diana Payan, The Republic | azcentral.com OPINION: There are certainly those who hope Common Sense Phoenix's referenda make it on the ballot. I'm not one of them. On Thursday, an attorney retained by Phoenix notified the group behind the referenda that the city clerks office will reject and otherwise not process the petitions when they are submitted. That is, even if the opposition turns in petitions with more than 13,700 valid voter signatures within the 30-day limit, the measure wont be put on the ballot. The council actions on the $230 million renovation deal do not constitute legislative acts subject to referendum, according to the attorney, Jean-Jacques Cabou of Perkins Coie. The view that the council actions were not legislative acts but rather administrative actions is not a given. For one thing, administrative actions are often those grounded in established statutes and standards; they are taken to carry out the legislative acts. Here, the city negotiated with the Suns for more than two years and city council members further negotiated terms with the team to their own political liking before they voted for the deal. A court should decide whether the city of Phoenixs argument holds water. The person, or persons, spearheading the referenda is cloaked in anonymity. About the only thing known about the Common Sense Phoenix committee is that its two listed members Natashia Hammer and Nick Vullo are affiliated with Petition Partners, the signature-gathering outfit hired to run the petitions, and that the campaign easily costs six figures. Drew Chavez, who operates Petition Partners, wont disclose who is writing the check. Nor has he responded to requests to comment on the citys letter, although he previously said attorneys that the group consulted conclude theres no way the council votes constitute administrative actions and thus, would be subject to referendum. Why I hope referenda don't make it to ballot There are undoubtedly those who hope Common Sense Phoenix calls the citys bluff and goes to court. Heres why I hope that it doesnt. The Talking Stick Resort Arena in which the Suns play belongs to the city. The team is but a tenant although its major one. If upgrades to the facility arent made to satisfy the obsolescence clause, the Suns were until this deal free to leave in 2022, leaving the city with an aging arena itd need to renovate regardless whether it's a concert and entertainment venue. The Suns drives not an insignificant amount of jobs and revenue you can argue the precision of estimates, sure and the presence of professional sports has an intrinsic and immeasurable value for downtown. The renovation deal assures the team stays an additional 15 years. But my biggest qualm has to do with the referenda themselves. They are meant as straight up-and-down votes on the deal the city council approved and predicated on the belief voters should reject the deal. A thoughtful, constructive approach would have been to run a companion initiative the costs would be about the same that outlines an alternative to keep the Suns downtown but with greater benefits and less investment by the city. Or, better yet, to have been part of the process when the matter was debated, and to make public the intent to take up the issue as a referendum before a council vote was taken. rather than offering a way forward. That it still lurks in the dark should reinforce public skepticism about the real motivations. Reach Kwok at [email protected]. Click here to subscribe to azcentral.com. Read or Share this story: https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/abekwok/2019/02/01/suns-arena-renovation-deal-referendum-public-vote-dead/2746183002/ | https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/abekwok/2019/02/01/suns-arena-renovation-deal-referendum-public-vote-dead/2746183002/ |
Will Sohu.com Bounce Back in 2019? | Sohu.com (NASDAQ: SOHU) is still struggling to fire on all cylinders, but investors nonetheless bid shares of the dot-com pioneer higher on Friday after it posted mixed fourth-quarter results. Revenue clocked in at $482.2 million for the final three months of 2018, a 5% decline from a year earlier, but a 5% sequential improvement. Just one segment of the Chinese online advertising, search, and gaming specialist mustered a year-over-year gain for both the quarter and all of 2018. But investors seem to prefer the sum-of-the-parts coverage that Sohu provides. Spun-off subsidiaries Sogou (NYSE: SOGO) and Changyou.com (NASDAQ: CYOU) -- representing Sohu's search and gaming operations, respectively -- were inching lower hours into Friday's trading day as Sohu shares were drifting higher. Sohu.com logo More Image source: Sohu.com. Searching for growth Sohu has now posted back-to-back quarters of declining revenue, but the report wasn't as bad as the 11% year-over-year slide it served up three months ago. Sohu actually landed on the higher end of the $465 million to $495 million revenue range that it was targeting in early November. After years of torrid top-line gains, the revenue trends have been choppy. Revenue declined for six straight quarters, then registered five periods of gains, before shifting into reverse during the second half of last year, according to data provided by S&P Global Market Intelligence. Sohu's Sogou-led search revenue rose 12% to $277 million for the quarter. Sogou's business now accounts for more than half of Sohu's revenue. The 12% increase isn't up to the headier growth spurts of the past, but it is ahead of the 5% to 11% uptick that Sohu was targeting for its search-related revenue. The flagship-brand advertising arm continues to sputter for Sohu, down 20% to $57 million but flat sequentially. Lastly, we have the Changyou-fueled online gaming segment clocking in with a 14% decline to hit $94 million. Slides aren't pretty, but investors were ready. Sohu's guidance last time out called for a 16% to 23% decline in its brand advertising revenue along with a 13% to 22% decrease for its online gaming business. The red ink continues at Sohu. Its adjusted deficit narrowed to $59 million, or $1.50 a share, a slightly larger loss than it was modeling three months ago. The guidance it initiated on Friday morning isn't impressive. It sees revenue clocking in between $390 million and $415 million for the current quarter. The big sequential hit isn't a surprise. There's seasonality here given the lunar new year, and you have to go all the way back to 2008 to find the last time that revenue moved higher between the fourth and first fiscal quarters. However, we're still looking at a 9% to 14% decline from the $455 million it sported in the first quarter of last year. Sohu also sees Sogou revenue declining 3% to 7%, brand advertising slipping 11% to 20%, and online gaming checking in with a 15% to 24% drop. This will be Sohu's third straight quarter of declining revenue, and naturally the bottom line isn't going to get out of the red anytime soon. Sohu is forecasting an adjusted loss per share between $1.30 and $1.55. The market's initial kind reaction to the choppy financials suggests that investors are bracing for the new normal. The stock is actually trading 37% higher than the 11-year lows it hit five months ago. If Wall Street is warming up to Sohu now, when it's not at its best, it could be a solid year for investors if it's able to start growing its revenue and keep narrowing its deficits in 2019. More From The Motley Fool Rick Munarriz owns shares of Sogou Inc. The Motley Fool recommends Sohu.com. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. | https://news.yahoo.com/sohu-com-bounce-back-2019-201500192.html |
Does Beto still have lightning in his bottle? | On Tuesday, President Donald Trump will deliver his State of the Union address, Gov. Greg Abbott will deliver his State of the State speech, and Beto ORourke will reveal his current state of mind to Oprah Winfrey in an interview in New Yorks Times Square. When it airs, in the weeks that follow on the Oprah Winfrey Network (Feb. 16, 8 p.m.) and in a podcast (Feb. 27) as one of "Oprah's Super Soulful Conversations," it will be the most public appearance of the former congressman from El Paso since he somehow barreled out of a losing campaign for the U.S. Senate last November into what post-election polls indicated was the top tier of Democratic presidential candidates for 2020 alongside old-shoe septuagenarians Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders. In the interim, ORourke has done some solo roaming in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico. He talked to folks at bars and cafes and museums and classrooms about their lives and the future of the country, obliquely looking for an answer about whether he should run for president, but without the self-defeating clamor and crush of media that would have inevitably ensued if he had done it in any more of a public way than he did. And then, as is his wont he does have a literature degree from Columbia University he wrote about the travels and posted it on social media, in this case Medium, to the mockery of some who considered his earnest quest an act of white privilege or emo self-indulgence or Kerouacian quackery. But he seemed to find what he was looking for, a reason to run for president if that's what he wanted. "Over the course of the trip Id gone from thinking about myself and how stuck I was, to being moved by the people Id met," he wrote in his last dispatch from Taos Pueblo. "Forgot myself in being with others." One could imagine him repeating those words to Oprah, or to the American people. Heading into the 2020 election cycle, Beto O'Rourke is at 46, in the description of Bethany Albertson, a political psychologist at the University of Texas, the "lurking front runner." It is not an outrageous claim. The New York Times has called him the "wild card" of the Democratic race. "Beto ORourke Weighs Presidential Campaign From an Unusual Position: Front-Runner," read the headline on Wednesday's Wall Street Journal story. The story included a telling detail: "New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, during her first swing through Iowa as a presidential candidate, told a private dinner of state lawmakers that Mr. ORourke was selfish for not sharing any of his 2018 fundraising haul with down-ballot Democrats, according to two people in attendance. An aide to Ms. Gillibrand disputed the characterization of the conversation." These last weeks have been treacherous ones for O'Rourke, accustomed to the adoration of Democrats everywhere during his sometimes ecstatic run against U.S. Sen. Ted. Cruz, R-Texas. As his political persona went from electric to acoustic on Nov. 6, a growing din could be heard from partisans of a gathering field of rival Democrats keen to remind party activists that before he was last year's sensation, O'Rourke was a relatively obscure middle-of-the-road congressman from El Paso, who, until Donald Trump reset the bar, had no claim to being ready to be president, a threshold no one thought he needed to meet when he was challenging Cruz. Then there was a much-cited mid-January interview with the Washington Post on his home turf, in which O'Rourke seemed to lack answers about the border the border he waxed so eloquently about during the campaign: "When it comes to many of the biggest policy issues facing the country today, ORourkes default stance is to call for a debate even on issues related to the border and immigration, which he has heavily emphasized in videos posted to Facebook and Instagram over the past month." A few days later, in a front-page story in The New York Times, some Texas Democrats expressed frustration with O'Rourke for not backing Gina Ortiz Jones in her razor-think loss in November, to U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, R-Helotes, out of his friendship for Hurd, whose cross-country March 2017 road trip with O'Rourke had really been the test run for the social media acumen and post-partisan elan that defined his Senate campaign. "Politics is about timing and showing up," said Texas political strategist Mark McKinnon, the co-creator, co-producer and one of the on-air ringmasters of "The Circus," Showtime's ongoing, real-time political documentary series. "The question for Beto is whether there is still lightning in his bottle." "The national media and Democrats' love affair with Beto is already starting to turn," McKinnon said. "Running for president is an acid bath that makes running for the Senate seem like a soothing sauna. Beto still has a lot of juice. And so hes got be thinking, `If I dont use it, do I lose it?'" In the "viciously quick" start of the 2020 nominating process, "it is stunning how quickly you can become yesterdays flavor," observed Daron Shaw, a government professor at the University of Texas. For O'Rourke, the newfound contention around him may be a measure of his perceived potential. "The criticism is emerging in part because he is this lurking front runner and hes lurking in a very on-brand way," said Albertson. "If anybody is surprised by the way O'Rourke is approaching his decision about whether to run for president, they shouldn't be. This is completely consistent with the way hes campaigned and the way hes entered the public dialogue." "On a more elemental level, the question he is going to have to face is not why didnt you give to down ballot candidates or why are you hanging around with Will Hurd," Albertson said. "The attack he is going to face is a thin legislative record." A light rsum Barack Obama was in the Senate less than O'Rourke's six years in the House, when he ran for president, but he had written a remarkable memoir, and he would make history as the first black president. Julin Castro, a former mayor of San Antonio and secretary of housing and urban development in the Obama administration, who announced his candidacy for president Jan. 12 in the neighborhood where he grew up in San Antonio, also has what would historically be considered a light rsum for a presidential candidate. But ORourkes with three terms on the El Paso city council and three terms in Congress is a lot lighter. "But Julin Castro isnt half, or a fourth or a tenth of the campaigner Beto is," Albertson said. I dont know?" Albertson said of O'Rourke. "I can see it working out just fine." "He is completely fine," agreed Jeff Roe, who ran Cruz's Senate campaign and his 2016 presidential campaign. "He doesnt need to move until the end of the first quarter," said Roe of O'Rourke. "Every day into April that he hasnt moved is bad. Oprah saves the first 60 days for him. Let the others punch out a bit and then assess." March will come in with a lion for O'Rourke with the premier at South by Southwest of Running with Beto, a full-length documentary by Austin filmmaker David Modigliani, whose crew was embedded with O'Rourke for the last year of the campaign a perfect segue to a sequel. "Because hes such a transcendent, once-in-a-generation candidate, he can come in late and be fine," said Nate Lerner, the Brooklyn political activist who, without ever having met or laid eyes on O'Rourke in person, launched Beto for President, one of two national draft efforts. "If anything it's an advantage because he's throwing everybody for a loop by not letting them in on what he's doing. I mean, nobody has any idea what Beto's going to do." A losing candidacy For a losing candidacy, O'Rourke's 2.6-point loss to Cruz was a stunning success. Eschewing PAC money, he raised more money than any U.S. Senate candidate in history. He built a national following. But there are Texas campaign professionals, both Democratic and Republican, who believe that O'Rourke missed a real opportunity to actually defeat Cruz. He was no match for Cruz in debates. He allowed the Cruz campaign to paint him as a far-left, open borders socialist, without real rebuttal. He resisted attacking Cruz and when he did it was halting and then amateurish. He could have had the finest ad talent in the nation and instead talked into his iPhone. Despite traveling to all 254 counties, the centerpiece of his campaign, he failed to significantly narrow the gap in rural Texas and he didn't run the table the way he might have with Hispanic voters on the border and elsewhere. Still, he ran on his gut and his gifts as a campaigner and he came very close. So far, he has made no apparent moves to staff up for a national campaign. "The honest answer is he hasnt made up his mind whether or not hes going to run and I dont think he would feel right asking people to put their lives on hold to sign up for a journey he hasn't committed to," said Bob Moore, the former editor of the El Paso Times, who has observed O'Rourke's political rise. If he runs, Moore said, one should expect a candidate and a campaign very much in the mold of his Senate run. "Ive come to figure that he was the first millennial. He was just way ahead of his time," Moore said. "Hes used to letting it all hang out there, warts and all. Thats just who he is. There was some of that criticism during the campaign that he was just too authentic and I wish hed quit being himself for a while. That was the secret of his success and to expect him to back off, I dont get where that criticism comes from. He is who he is. "People can project onto you what they want to project," Moore said. "That was really his whole campaign. He was deliberately vague at times, in part because he didnt have all the answers, but also because he wanted people to be free in part to sort of project their best hopes onto him, sort of what Obama did in 2007 and 2008." The similarities between O'Rourke and Obama in their political appeal and approach are obvious. But it is clear that @BetoORourke is taking the same unconventional-and intriguing-approach as he did in the Texas Senate race that made him a national figure." But for those on the left, particularly Sanders' supporters, who considered the Obama presidency a grave disappointment on policy, O'Rourke threatens to be the inheritor of Obama's political mantel. "They see someone who can make centrist bland Democratic policies cool," Elizabeth Bruenig, a Texan who is an opinion writer for the Washington Post, said on a December edition of the Brooklyn-based left-wing podcast Chapo Trap House. "I think it's important for the left to understand that this guy doesn't share your politics," Bruenig said. "Beto's interesting," Shaw said. "He's not quite Obama, but he's genuinely a little different and a little orthogonal, which is I think why he scares a lot of the more conventional candidates." Sideways to the customary order. "I think he's orthogonal to the usual left-right in the Democratic party," Shaw explained. That continuum is irrelevant to him." Instead of providing a checklist of policy prescription, Shaw said that what O'Rourke is offering is, "Here's an individual we like and we trust and he tells us what politics is about now." In manner and approach, Shaw said, O'Rourke is an especially good fit for the Iowa caucuses that begin the nominating process precisely a year from now. "Heck, how hard is a 99-county strategy once youve done a 254-country strategy," Shaw said. Bryce Smith, the 27-year-old Democratic Party chairman in Dallas County, Iowa, who watched O'Rourke's performance in the Texas Senate race and his ability to bring out new voters, agrees. "I would equate him to being a kind of new age campaign leader," said Smith, who owns a bowling alley in Adel, a booming Des Moines suburb. "The things he brought to his Senate campaign, I could see him bringing new twists and new ideas to a national campaign that would change the dynamics not just of the caucus or the primary but the race for president in general. "He has a good approach," he said. "I would call it that kind of Midwestern voice of reason that can connect to everyone regardless of race or income or gender and be able to talk to them in common terms but then relate it back to politics. He is willing to find common ground." Social media Shannon McGregor, a communication professor at the University of Utah, who studies the intersection of politics and social media, found that in the first year of the Trump presidency, 87 percent of Trump's tweets mostly those that attacked the news media and other perceived enemies generated news stories. By contrast, in the first year of his second term only 3 percent of Obama's tweets generated news stories, "even though we thought of him as the social media president." For O'Rourke the medium was Facebook Live, and virtually every event during the Senate campaign, from town halls to folding his laundry and getting his hair cut, was live streamed. For the length and breadth of his campaign, O'Rourke and those around him were a constant, natural, intimate presence for a vast audience of supporters. Even after the campaign ended, a few days after Thanksgiving, McGregor said, "it was something like a couple of hundred thousand people looked at a Facebook Live of him and his wife cooking a chicken dinner." "Our research in this area shows that if candidates share a personal story, or family stories, or what could be more intimate than watching your family cook dinner, that it develops this sense that you know who they are, and you have a relationship with them, even though you never come in physical contact with them, and this can increase the likelihood of voting for them. And because that is on these large platforms, that is certainly scalable to a national level if he decides to run for president." For all their obvious differences, what Trump and O'Rourke share is an ability to make a direct connection with voters with barely a skeletal staff and almost none of the traditional campaign infrastructure. All Trump needed was a plane, a place to hold a rally and a cable audience. For O'Rourke, it was an SUV, a room and an iPhone. Often, for O'Rourke during the campaign, it seemed more about the journey than the destination. "He loves hearing peoples stories. It gives him oxygen and energy. He just absorbs it and layers it all together into really great messages," said Cari Marshall, a communications consultant in Austin, who went to see O'Rourke at a small fundraiser at the Austin Motel the day after he announced for the Senate and ended up working as a full-time volunteer for the duration. I love that he is doing it his own way. I encourage him to take his time," she said of his decision on a presidential run. Whatever happens, she said, "Its been so nice to get back to the Medium posts and his lovely thought process." "I know we can do it," O'Rourke wrote from Taos Pueblo. "I cant prove it, but I feel it and hear it and see it in the people I meet and talk with. I saw it all over Texas these last two years, I see it every day in El Paso. Its in Kansas and Oklahoma. Colorado and New Mexico too. Its not going to be easy to take the decency and kindness we find in our lives and our communities and apply it to our politics, to all the very real challenges we face. ... But a big part of it has got to be just listening to one another, learning each others stories, thinking `whatever affects this person, affects me.' Were in this together, like it or not. The alternative is to be in this apart, and that would be hell." "I dont know if hell run or not. He probably doesnt know or not," said Tzatzil LeMair, who works at a cross-cultural advertising agency in Austin and, like Marshall, immersed herself in the Senate campaign as a volunteer and founder of Latinas for Beto. "Personally, I think it's a no-brainer," said LeMair, who is now part of the leadership team at Draft Beto. "It's not an easy decision, but he might not get another chance. I really hope he runs." | https://www.statesman.com/news/20190201/does-beto-still-have-lightning-in-his-bottle |
What if Election Day were a holiday? | Well, in 30 states, you are actually allowed to leave to go cast your vote.According to Business Insider, currently, there is no federal law that mandates employers provide their employees time off to vote.But, the majority of US states have time-off-to-vote laws, also referred to as voter leave laws. So, it really depends on where you work so you need to check before you cast that vote. Buzz60 House Democrats introduced their first piece of legislation in the new Congress this week, an anti-corruption bill that proposes making Election Day a federal holiday and encourages private employers to give their workers the day off, too. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell dismissed the legislation on the Senate floor, calling it a "power grab" by Democrats. He was subsequently dragged by progressive lawmakers on Twitter, including Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, who tweeted that "voting isnt a 'power grab.' Its democracy, and its literally the entire point of our representative government." But according to the Pew Research Center, Americans on both sides of the aisle support making Election Day a national holiday: 71% of Democrats and 59% of Republicans favor the idea. US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) holds a media availability on November 7,2018 on Capitol Hill in Washington,DC. (Photo: NICHOLAS KAMM, AFP/Getty Images) Civil rights and voting rights groups have been pushing for years to make Election Day a holiday, arguing it would allow working voters greater opportunity to cast their ballots. The measure has been included in several voting rights bills, including one in 2005 proposed by then New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, but they never passed. Numerous measures have been introduced by Republicans as well, including a 1998 bill that tried to make it a holiday called Freedom and Democracy Day. I'm sort of happy that McConnell fears making election day a federal holiday. It's such a frank acknowledgement that the GOP's ideas are not accepted by the majority of American voters. Any party that is scared of people exercising the right to vote, will eventually be doomed. https://t.co/Sle8vAhloq Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) January 31, 2019 Despite what history suggests are long odds, USA TODAY spoke to four experts about what it would be like if the United States did actually have Election Day as a holiday. It could improve voter turnout "Making election day a holiday would transform the culture around voting in our country and most inevitably improve turnout and participation rates across the board," said Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "Enduring long lines, obtaining access to child care, finding the money to take public transportation to the polls are all real barriers that make it harder for people to exercise their voice on Election Day. By clearing away some of those hurdles, we would inevitably make it easier for people to participate." According to a United States Census Bureau survey of about 19 million registered voters who did not vote in the 2016 general election, 14.3 percent said busy schedules was the main reason they didn't cast a ballot. A little more than 60% of U.S. citizens cast ballots in the 2016 presidential election, according to Pew, and whites made up 73.3% of them. Those who did not vote "were more likely to be younger, less educated, less affluent, and nonwhite. Clarke said it's difficult to speculate whether Democrats or Republicans would benefit more from an election holiday, but she would expect to see some specific groups with higher participation rates. "I think you would need real data over a few elections to make an assessment about partisan impact, if any," she said. "But what I can say is that more working mothers, more young people, more low-income workers with long hours, more of our emergency personnel are all constituencies who we would see participating in higher rates if Election Day were a holiday." In the 2016 presidential election, 53% of Americans making under 30,000 a year voted Democratic and 49% voted Republican. Among voters aged 18-29, 55% voted Democratic and 37% Republican. In the 2018 midterm elections, 67% of voters ages 18 to 29 favored the Democratic candidate. It would put us in line with other democracies Of the 36 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), 27 countries hold their national elections on a weekend. Israel and South Korea hold theirs on weekdays but they're national holidays. "We have among the lowest turnout rates of any modern democracy in the world today," Clarke said. In data analyzed by Pew, the U.S. ranks 26th in voter turnout. It could make a statement about civic participation Holly Jackson, an associate professor of English at the University of Massachusetts and the associate editor of The New England Quarterly, a peer-reviewed culture and history journal, says making Election Day a federal holiday would send a strong message about American values. While Election Day was never an official federal holiday, it was once observed as a holiday in communities across the country, the date having been chosen to accommodate agricultural work schedules, she said. Many businesses closed for the day and some states declared an official holiday. "The period of our history with the highest voter turnout rate was in the 19th century from the 1840s-1890s when election days were not only holidays in the sense that people got a day off work, but were truly celebrated with big public gatherings, food and drink," she said. "Even children too young to vote were involved in these festivities, which got them in the practice of civic participation and instilled a sense that it was important and fun." "Observing a holiday for Election Day is not only about allowing working people to access the polls although this is obviously an important consideration its a starting point for creating a culture in which the democratic process is honored and celebrated." Justin Levitt, a scholar of constitutional law and the law of democracy at Loyola University, agrees that an Election Day holiday would send a signal, but said it's not clear which party would benefit. "I think the main impact of an Election Day holiday is not the notion that individual federal workers dont have to go to work, but the broader social stamp of seriousness on Election Day participation," Levitt said. "The hope is that particularly in combination with the other opportunities to vote before Election Day, and to register on Election Day it would help to spur participation by those who vote less regularly at the moment. But especially in the Trump era, its not clear whether those voters would likely be Republicans or Democrats." It could nationalize what some states are already doing (but there's a catch) Laws governing whether people get time off to vote vary widely across the country. Election Day is a paid holiday for state workers in 13 states, according to Pew. Some states that allow time off to vote will penalize employers that keep workers from exercising that right. But in other states voters only get a limited amount of time to go to the polls, according to Workplace Fairness, and don't necessarily have to be paid if they do. In 20 states, you can be fired for taking time off to vote. Levitt, who served as deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice's civil rights division under President Barack Obama, says it's difficult to look at what states have done to increase voter turnout and make assumptions about how those changes would play out under a federal proposal. He said the impact of a state holiday on election day wont tell you much about the impact of a federal holiday, he said, in part because the "real impact of a holiday is the social message and a federal holiday is a much stronger message." In addition to making Election Day a federal holiday, the bill Democrats introduced would also promote automatic voter registration and early voting. These measures, which are getting less attention, are what create an "election period" rather than a single Election Day, and are the kinds of conveniences that may ultimately move the needle more than a holiday itself. Levitt said it's also difficult to gauge a law's impact until you've had a number of election cycles to observe changes in voter turnout. He uses the example of Georgia and Indiana, both of which passed strict voter ID laws between 2004 and 2008, which critics feared would deter minority voters. The opposite happened. "If you just look at turnout from 2004 to 2008, it skyrocketed, particularly among African Americans. But if you were to give an honest answer as to why, you would have to say, 'I have no idea,' because there are so many intervening factors," Levitt said, pointing to the fact that both were battleground states and that Obama was the first African-American major party candidate in 2008. There are some states where changes in election rules have led to increases in voter turnout, but it would be difficult to say how those changes would translate to the country unless the demographics of that state (or states) reflected the demographics of the nation as a whole. Oregon, for example, has been lauded for its voting-by mail reform, adopted in 1998 and which has seen several election cycles. A 2008 study in the Social Science Quarterly found Oregon's voter turnout increased by around 10 percentage points of registered voters in both presidential and mid-term elections due to the reform. In 2014, Oregon, alongside Colorado and Washington three "vote-at-home" states averaged a 65-percent turnout compared to 48 percent in other states. But Levitt said he isn't sure you'd see the same impacts in a place like Texas or Florida, which have a much different socioeconomic and demographic makeup. It could reduce confusion Paula Brantner, a senior advisor at Workplace Fairness, says state laws that govern voting rights vary so widely, most people don't even know what protections they have on Election Day. She said the Workplace Fairness website, which serves as a clearinghouse of information about workers' rights, gets between 2.5 to 4 million visitors a year, and the biggest spike in visitors is on Election Day. "People are scrambling to find out this information ... and unfortunately sometimes you have to notify your employer in advance, and you've lost your window of opportunity to do that," she said. In Tennessee for example, employees are given time off to vote unless their workday begins more than three hours after polls open or ends more than three hours before polls close. Even those three hours may not be enough," Brantner said. Or the polling place is in the opposite direction of where you have to go?" Brantner said laws like these are not "reflective of people's realities." Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/investigations/2019/02/01/election-day-federal-holiday-mcconnell-democracy-voter-turnout-democrats-republicans-voting-rights/2736634002/ | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/investigations/2019/02/01/election-day-federal-holiday-mcconnell-democracy-voter-turnout-democrats-republicans-voting-rights/2736634002/ |
Is It Safe to Get a Flu Shot While Pregnant? | When youre pregnant, its really a whole new world. Gone are the days where youre only thinking of yourself, because now youre constantly thinking of the tiny life growing inside of you, too and how nearly every little thing you do can or might affect it. Like common medications or vaccinations, for instance. Most pregnant women will do anything it takes to maintain a healthy pregnancy, including eating a well-rounded diet, following a pregnancy-safe exercise regimen, and resting as much as possible. When youre sick, its not as easy as it was before to recover, and youll have to carefully research any medications and treatments you might need, too. So suddenly, youre second guessing everything. And now that were in the throes of flu season, nearly everyone is encouraged to get a flu shot. The experts say yes, not only because it is safe for mother and babyits beneficial. Simply put, The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology recommends that all adults including women who are or will be pregnant during influenza (flu) season receive an annual influence vaccine, says Dr. Jennifer Aquino, obstetrician at NYU Langone Health in New York, NY. Dr. Aquino recommends that pregnant women, or women who are actively trying to become pregnant, should receive a flu vaccine as soon as it becomes available (which depends by region based on production and shipment, usually anywhere from August through November). To understand why the flu vaccine is highly recommended for pregnant mothers, we have to understand the difference between active and passive immunity. Active immunity is when a person becomes immune to a specific disease through either contracting the diseasethink measles or chickenpoxor through a vaccination. Either way, the person has directly come in contract with the disease, and their immune system has produced antibodies to fight off the disease and create immunity from it. Passive immunity is when a person is given someone elses antibodies and disease-fighting white blood cells. When a pregnant mother receives a vaccine and her body creates antibodies to fight the disease, those antibodies are passed down to the baby through the placenta, thus making the baby gain some immunity as well. Its also extra important for the mother to receive the vaccine because, as Dr. Aquino says, [pregnant women] are at risk for more severe complications from the flu than non-pregnant individuals. Thats because when a woman is pregnant, her body has a harder time fighting infections. Among those complications that can arise are severe breathing problems and respiratory distress. Its important to note, however, that if youre pregnant and you get the flu, there is no direct increased risk of miscarriage or birth defects. (MotherToBaby notes that a high fever has been associated with increased risks of miscarriage or birth defects, so they should be treated right away with acetaminophen). If a pregnant woman gets the flu, or is even exposed to someone with the flu, Dr. Aquino says they should be prescribed an antiviral medication, like Tamiflu. Medications should be taken as soon as possible as they stand a better chance of lessening the symptoms if taken early in the course of the illness, according to MotherToBaby. But the best way to treat the flu is to avoid getting it in the first place. Pregnant women should know that just because theyre carrying another life, the flu vaccine is totally safe, recommended, and is indeed beneficial to their little ones health. The real danger comes in not getting vaccinated. See more: How to Handle Wedding Stress When You're Pregnant While numbers for adults are not known, according to the Center for Disease Control, nearly 200 children died from the flu during the 2017-18 flu season, eclipsing the previous high for flu-related pediatric deaths which occurred in 2012-13. Of the fatalities, 80 percent did not receive the flu vaccine that season. As Dr. Aquino says, getting the flu vaccine isnt just a good individual decision for ourselves and our babies. Its a good societal decision, too. She says, We should all play our part and get vaccinated to protect each other from the influenza virus. | https://news.yahoo.com/safe-flu-shot-while-pregnant-210000566.html |
Is Arnold Schwarzenegger Too Socially Liberal for Conservatives to Support? | This is a partial transcript of The Big Story With John Gibson, August 28, 2003, that has been edited for clarity. JOHN GIBSON, HOST: Arnold Schwarzenegger (search) says he is in favor of legal medical marijuana (search), abortion rights and gun control, all traditionally liberal positions. State Senator Tom McClintock (search) says he's the guy for California conservatives. That's today's big question. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) CALIF. STATE SEN. TOM MCCLINTOCK (R), GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I think that's a decision that every voter is going to arrive at. My concern is that he's surrounded himself with the people who are responsible for the biggest tax increase in this state's history back in 1991. Warren Buffett (search), one of the most outspoken advocates for higher taxes in the country is his chief financial adviser, and he's pointedly refused to take a no-tax pledge. Those are my principle concerns. GIBSON: Right. But California seems to be not quite as conservative as you and your supporters. MCCLINTOCK: I beg to differ with you. I was the top Republican vote-getter in this state last year. I received more Democratic crossover votes, more total votes than any other Republican running on the ticket. The district that elected me to the state Senate by a double-digit landslide victory was also voting for Al Gore in the same election. So I'm quite confident that the reforms I have proposed over 20 years in the public arena to reign in our bureaucracies and to reduce our taxes and regulations, that is resonating with a very broad cross-section of California voters. GIBSON: Right. But if the election gets close and it looks to you like Gray Davis' mini-me Cruz Bustamante (search) could win, would you say to yourself, It's so important for somebody who at least calls himself a Republican to win, I will back out and throw my support to [Schwarzenegger]? MCCLINTOCK: This isn't about Republicans or Democrats. It is not even about Gray Davis (search), or Cruz Bustamante, or Arnold Schwarzenegger or Tom McClintock. This is about the future of California and the voters of California are more than capable of sorting out those questions and making their own decisions. GIBSON: You see the polls, though. I mean, you score well. But he's got a huge lead. MCCLINTOCK: Actually in the three major polls in this state, he has been stuck in the mid-to-low 20s ever since he entered the race. He is not showing any momentum. Meanwhile, I've gone from an asterisk to double-digits in the span of just three weeks. MCCLINTOCK: Yes, if the trend continues, that's exactly what I think. MCCLINTOCK: Well, 20 years of experience in the public arena, proposing exactly those reforms that everyone now agrees are absolutely essential if we're going to restore our state's finances, and our public works and our economy. MCCLINTOCK: Oh, absolutely. I know there's a tendency at the national level to focus on the glitz and glamour of the campaign. But what is going on here in California is a very serious discussion over the future of our state. The voters want to see a candidate's experience. They want to know exactly what direction a candidate would take this state. I've said from the outset, within moments of taking the oath of office, I'll rescind the governor's tripling of the car tax. I'll act to avoid the $42 billion of outrageously overpriced electricity contracts that Davis locked us into, and then I'll call a special session of the legislature to replace our worker's compensation law with Arizona's and bring our workers' compensation costs down by two-thirds. Those things can be done the first morning of the new administration. I've laid out all of those plans in very careful detail, and people are responding to that. GIBSON: Well, Senator McClintock, with all due respect, all great ideas and you're to be congratulated for being specific. But I don't think it's the national media that's driving the California polls. There seems to be a huge star power effect, which at this point, looks like it might be very difficult for someone like yourself to overcome. MCCLINTOCK: Well, John, again, despite unprecedented media coverage in the top three polls in this state, Arnold Schwarzenegger has shown absolutely no movement since he got into the race. He has been consistently in the low to mid-20s and stuck there. Meanwhile, I've shown significant momentum going, as I said, from an asterisk to double-digits. If you combine Bill Simons' voters with mine, if they will rally to my campaign, in the L.A. Times numbers, we approach a statistical dead heat. I thought I saw a poll just fresh out of California that put Arnold 15 points ahead of Bustamante and a considerable number ahead of you, who's behind Bustamante. MCCLINTOCK: And that's wildly out of sync with the three major polls in this state. It is a very, very small sample and, as I said, out of sync with every other poll that's been done. GIBSON: Senator McClintock, thanks for coming on and good luck. MCCLINTOCK: Thank you very much. (END VIDEOTAPE) Copy: Content and Programming Copyright 2003 Fox News Network, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Transcription Copyright 2003 eMediaMillWorks, Inc. (f/k/a Federal Document Clearing House, Inc.), which takes sole responsibility for the accuracy of the transcription. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No license is granted to the user of this material except for the user's personal or internal use and, in such case, only one copy may be printed, nor shall user use any material for commercial purposes or in any fashion that may infringe upon Fox News Network, Inc.'s and eMediaMillWorks, Inc.'s copyrights or other proprietary rights or interests in the material. This is not a legal transcript for purposes of litigation. | https://www.foxnews.com/story/is-arnold-schwarzenegger-too-socially-liberal-for-conservatives-to-support |
What Will it Take to Get Iraq Back on Track? | Attacks on American soldiers in Iraq continued through the weekend, claiming the lives of three troops in less than 24 hours, the U.S. military said Monday. Also, four U.S. soldiers were wounded late Sunday after attackers fired a rocket-propelled grenade at their convoy (search) in the town of Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, during a joint patrol of 3rd Amored Cav Regiment and the 1st of the 24th Infantry. One Iraqi suspect was killed and another wounded in the attack. The U.S. military also announced the end of a seven-day sweep dubbed Operation Sidewinder, in which 30 Iraqis were killed and 282 detained while 28 U.S. soldiers were wounded. The operation was aimed at rounding up Iraqi regime insurgents. The military said it confiscated ammunition stocks and hundreds of weapons. I have a son in Balad and I want to know why we are leaving our children over there unprotected. I see pictures on the news where one or two of them are just standing in the middle of these crowds like sitting ducks... Patti Hatch Las Vegas, NV All the news media makes sure we all know about the terrible killings in Iraq of our GI's..however, the news media is not reporting some of the good things that are going on,..that have been accomplished. I know for a fact that some very wonderful things are happening and tremendous progress has been made in just a few short weeks. The rebuilding of Germany took years..the rebuilding of Iraq is going at a much faster pace. Sue P. We are now seeing that the GWB plans for Iraq is to keep the Iraqi people under American control with the use of the Gun This will allow the major Oil Companies to have complete control of the Iraqi Oil. The main reason for the WAR. Den The first thing we should do is to get power back on for all of them. That would show them that we are there to help them. But most of all we (the US) needs to get Saddam. Then, and only then, will all the killing will hopefully stop. Greg IN - Send your comments to: [email protected] - Note: The views and opinions expressed on this page do not necessarily reflect those of FOX News or its subsidiaries | https://www.foxnews.com/story/what-will-it-take-to-get-iraq-back-on-track |
What exactly is Arsenals identity under Unai Emery? | Unai Emery has been studying. The primary aspiration this season was always writ large: get Arsenal back into the Champions League any which way. So to try to get the measure of where his team stand, what their chances are and also forage for clues to improvement, he has been busy examining Premier League trends to bring reassurance they are on the right track. I use a lot of information about the previous years in the Premier League of other teams and also our team, he says. I remember three years ago Liverpool were playing in the final of the Europa League, they were in the top four in the table in the Premier League. Their progress is very good progress. Maybe Manchester City is a different example, because they bought important players, paying a lot, and maybe we cant do that. But our way is we can do something similar to Liverpool, similar to Tottenham, doing more with young players, using players well who can improve with us. We are doing that. We need time, but also we need to be very demanding of ourselves. Denis Surez joins Arsenal on loan after extending Barcelona contract Read more Six months since Emerys first Premier League match, a free pass at home to Manchester City that ended more or less as expected with his experimental side dominated by the serene champions, Arsenal face City again. It seems like a useful time to try to assess the level of progress. We can calculate the tangibles: they are five points better off than this time last season and two positions higher in the table having snuck a little fortuitously back into fourth at Chelseas expense. They are not quite so far behind the league leaders (14 points compared with 23 last time). They were out of both domestic cups before the snow came, never mind melted. But it is the thing you cannot chronicle with statistics that matters even more for Arsenals longer term. Last weekend, as Arsenal were picked off by Manchester United, the question of team identity felt sharpened. United exhibited a style that seemed so familiar and Ole Gunnar Solskjr rubbed it in by explaining how he had shown his team videos of successful counterattacking goals targeting the very worst of Arsenal, with an overstretched defence more or less pointing neon signs behind the full-backs saying Space this way. Even if Solskjr has made it look easy by sorting out a clearly defined and inspirational method in a few weeks, it is not always that finger-clickingly simple. The challenge to create a team in his own image has been problematic for Emery because the tools he has to work with are not in many cases the ones he would have chosen, and half the time quite a few of those tools have needed fixing themselves. It is awful luck to lose some of the players who have shown the most improvement under Emery to long-term injury Hctor Bellern and Rob Holding particularly along with Danny Welbeck, whose work ethic would have appealed. The Mesut zil ( below) conundrum is a continuing complication. The fatigue suffered by Lucas Torreira after his initial tornado of form has not helped. Manchester City must improve or forget winning the title, says Pep Guardiola Read more Rewinding to the day Emery was announced as Arsenals chosen one to be the post-Wenger answer, he outlined his stylistic ideas. I like to win the ball back as quickly as possible. Its about two things: possession and pressing. We want to play looking forwards. His mission statement was to be among the best and beat the best. There have been flashes of high-intensity football from Arsenal the best example being a blistering second-half comeback in the league game against Tottenham but there have been plenty of games lacking that edge and energy. Only a few days ago against Cardiff they toiled, mostly pedestrian, not particularly cohesive, thankful for the individual attacking qualities of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Alexandre Lacazette. The worst games, the ones that seem to completely lack Emerys ideas of winning the ball back quickly, pressing and playing forwards, reared an ugly head in the humiliation at Anfield, for example. Overall it has been a mixed bag, with the manager tinkering repeatedly with players, formations and ideas, which is why it is so difficult to figure out exactly what Emery is trying to achieve this season with this group of players. Just over eight months after he was appointed, evidence of a stylistic shift away from the years of Wengerism remains cloudy. Now to the Etihad. Emery tries to stress that Arsenal need the points just as much as City for their own reasons. Usually we want to have the possession more than the opposition but against Manchester City, maybe I think it is not possible. Its a very big challenge for us to prepare for this match, he concedes. His admiration for Guardiola is unstinting, even if he has the luck to work with such refined squads. I have analysed a lot of teams and coaches and I think its difficult to find one coach who is better than Guardiola. He has had the possibility to take the best players at Barcelona, in Bayern and in City little by little. Every year he is improving with great players and also paying a lot for new players but he led them, at Barcelona, Bayern and City, one step more every place. This, for me, is the quality that makes me say he is the best. Without quite the same luxuries, Emery continues to plot his path towards the improvement he craves, the intensity he loves and the consistency of style he hopes will come. | https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/feb/01/arsenal-identity-under-unai-emery |
Will the January stock-market surge continue? | So the stock market changed its mind. Probably not. January was a giddy thrill ride for investors worldwide, as the market narrative jumped overnight from doom to boom. In Toronto, the S&P/TSX Composite Index ended an extended plummet the moment the Christmas turkey cooled, and bounced 8.4 per cent higher between New Years Day and month-end. In the United States, the S&P 500 enjoyed its best January since 1987, after enduring its worst December since 1931. Meanwhile, the MSCI World Index reversed course and soared 7.7 per cent as investors around the globe succumbed to sudden-onset bullishness. Its possible. But the next stage will be far more challenging. Among other things, it will hinge on whether a still strong U.S. labour market can continue churning out jobs despite a decelerating global economy. Add in the uncertainties around Brexit and around U.S.-China trade talks and the potential for another market reversal is high. One worrisome sign is that investors are rushing right back into some of the worlds riskier territories. Measured in Canadian-dollar terms, the strongest performers among national stock markets in January were Argentina, Brazil and Turkey not exactly a convention of economic whiz kids. Another reason for concern is the lack of any fundamental improvement to explain why stocks have suddenly recaptured their appeal. Sadly, it is not because of strong global growth. The run of the numbers outside the United States has been downbeat in recent weeks. One widely followed indicator, the J.P. Morgan purchasing managers index for global manufacturing, disappointed yet again on Friday and added to evidence that the world economy is in the midst of a considerable downturn, according to Franziska Palmas at Capital Economics, an economics forecaster in London. Neither are share prices jumping because of any unexpected spurt in corporate earnings. Results unveiled in recent days have been decent but uninspiring. The Citi Global Earnings Revision Index shows that industry analysts are continuing to mark down more profit forecasts than they are raising. The most compelling explanation that remains for the Great January Stock Surge rests on a combination of cheapness and interest rates. By mid-December of last year, share prices in many countries had reached multiyear lows in terms of how they stacked up against their expected earnings per share over the next 12 months. Barring a global recession, they looked like tempting buys. The catalyst to start buying these bargains was probably a rethink of the chances for future hikes in interest rates. Futures markets indicate that investors had a change of heart in mid-December, swinging around to the conviction that the U.S. Federal Reserve would stand pat on rates in 2019. Fed chairman Jay Powell was still talking in late 2018 of more rate increases to come, but the market didnt believe him. Story continues below advertisement Story continues below advertisement The prospect of supportive rates, combined with stocks cheapness, provided ample reason to load up on shares in January. The question now is how much more room the surge has left to run. The cheapness argument for buying stocks has eroded in line with the big gains during January. While many markets looked downright cheap in late December, they now appear only reasonably valued and that is if analysts dont further cut their forecasts for corporate earnings. Meanwhile, the low-rate rationale is looking messier. A red-hot jobs report on Friday added to the evidence that the U.S. economy is more robust than expected. If so, and the Fed believes inflationary pressures are mounting, it will be under pressure to return to hiking interest rates. To be sure, this would give investors a case of whiplash. Mr. Powell has already done one about-face. After indicating in December that future rate increases were likely, he surprised markets this week by sounding a far more accommodating tone and announcing that the case for raising rates and other tightening measures had weakened. Flipping back to his original position and reasserting the need for rate hikes might frustrate Fed watchers, but its hard to ignore the strength of the U.S. jobs market. Given the continued robust nature of hiring, maybe Fed Chair Powell should consider rethinking his rethinking of the economy and rate hikes, Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors said. In fact, if Mr. Powell doesnt change his tune yet again, it could be read as an indication the Fed sees dangers out there that arent being reflected in the jobs market. That would be truly scary. The sanest approach is to face up to the contradictory nature of the data. Both Mr. Powell and the stock market have changed their minds in recent weeks about what lies ahead. More changes are likely. If volatility is to be the theme of 2019, you should make sure your portfolio, and your peace of mind, can withstand the ups and downs. This is not a time to be scurrying for cover, but it is also not a time to be taking on more risk than you can afford. | https://www.theglobeandmail.com/investing/markets/inside-the-market/article-will-the-january-surge-continue/ |
When is the 2019 Puppy Bowl? | The 2019 Puppy Bowl will take place on on Super Bowl Sunday before kickoff of the big game. Tune in on Feb. 3 at 3 p.m. ET for the 15th annual showdown between Team Ruff and Team Fluff as Animal Planet's adoption extravaganza game once again brings in competitors from dog shelter's across the country for Puppy Bowl XV. You can find the starting lineup's here (and the just as adorable backups here) or just watch these adorable videos to meet the pups in play. Talk about Hard Barks! Come inside training camp with Team Fluff before #PuppyBowlXV. pic.twitter.com/tcH1FlnPSC Animal Planet (@AnimalPlanet) January 10, 2019 Every day of @Danschachner's life could feel like the Puppy Bowl, considering he is a proud foster. Hear how our #PuppyBowlXV ref has been inspired to work with animals. pic.twitter.com/GmaLLgMbKQ Animal Planet (@AnimalPlanet) January 15, 2019 The Puppy Bowl will be live on Animal Planet Sunday afternoon before the Super Bowl kicks off in Atlanta at 6:30 p.m. ET. | https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/02/01/animal-planet-puppy-bowl-2019-watch-date-time-tv-channel |
Should the Portland Trail Blazers bring back Wesley Matthews? | In a shocking Thursday afternoon trade, the Dallas Mavericks acquired New York Knicks star forward Kristaps Porzingis in exchange for for a slew of assets, point guard Dennis Smith Jr. and two players on expiring deals in DeAndre Jordan and Wesley Matthews. Now, with the NBA season past the midway point and just days away from the February trade deadline, there are rumblings that both Jordan and Matthews may be buyout candidates if the Knicks can reach a deal with the players before March 1. That would mean both Jordan and Matthews could be available to join another team for the remainder of the regular season and the playoffs. The Philadelphia 76ers, Houston Rockets and Golden State Warriors would all reportedly be interested if a buyout happens. After a successful stint with the Trail Blazers in which Matthews became a fan favorite as a stalwart defender and deft three-point shooter, he wasnt even given a qualifying offer by Blazers President of Basketball Operations Neil Olshey and joined the Mavericks on a sizable four-year deal. Now, with the Trail Blazers sitting at No. Matthews has been solid this season in Dallas, where he has averaged 13.1 points, 2.3 rebounds and 2.3 assists while shooting 38 percent from three-point range in 44 games. He would fill two major holes the Trail Blazers must address before the playoffs: three-point shooting and defense on the perimeter. Knowing he is already familiar with the team and their style of play, one would think Matthews would be a great option for the Blazers so long as he has a clear role and Portland can pick him up at a decent rate on the buyout market. You tell us: | https://www.oregonlive.com/blazers/2019/02/should-the-portland-trail-blazers-bring-back-wesley-matthews.html |
Should Every Election Day Be A Federal Holiday? | Move past the theatrics of the government shutdown, impeachment and the threat of investigations ad infinitum and theres the question of Democrat squad goals in a Pelosi-run House of Representatives. One way to judge that: prioritized legislation. HR 1, also known as the For The People Act. The measure contains an election-reform bushelful of liberal chestnuts same-day voter registration, provisional ballots, poll worker recruitment and training. And these two nuggets, stashed inside Section 1903. Election Day Holiday. For purposes of any law relating to Federal employment, the Tuesday next after the first Monday in November in 2020 and each even-numbered year thereafter shall be treated in the same manner as a legal public holiday described in section 6103 of title 5, United States Code. And . . . Roughly the same odds as Mitch McConnell doing hot yoga with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Heres what the Senate Majority Leader had to say about the notion earlier this week: Just what America needs, another paid holiday and a bunch of government workers being paid to go out and work for I assume . . . our colleagues on the other side, on their campaigns. Lets assume there wont be an election holiday anytime soon not until Democrats control both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. At the heart of the debate is voter turnout give more people the day off, more people will go out of their way to head to the polls. As shown in this Fair Vote chart, turnout ebbs and flows in presidential cycles elections a big falloff from 1992 to 1996 (58.1% vs. 51.7%), then a steady rise through 2008 (61.6%) followed by another drop in 2012 (58.2%) and then a return to 60.1% in 2016. As the chart shows, presidential turnout corresponds with midterm turnout and in 2018, turnout skyrocketed from 36.7% four years previously to 49.6%. The three presidential elections held in the 1960s ranged from a high of 63.8% (JFK) to a low of 62.5% (Nixon). The second Trump vote could reach those levels. If that level of participation gnaws at you, then consider: turnout for UKs Brexit vote was a shade over 77%; while 67.9% of the French electorate turned out for 2017s presidential election. But only 35% bothered to cast un bulletin de vote in the second round of Frances parliamentary election (its what comes from loading the ticket with the likes of retired matadors and mathematical savants). You might be surprised. According to the U.S. Census Bureaus data on nonvoters, registered voters from households making more than $150,000 are most likely to say they dont have time to turn out on Election Day. Try lower-wage earners at restaurants and stores enterprises that would look to cash in if the working class got an extra day off. There is one other option: move elections to Saturdays. But thats not guarantor of a higher turnout. Poland, for example, holds elections on weekends. In its last two presidential elections (2015 and 2010) turnout was 55% 5% less than the 2016 vote in the U.S. Switzerland also votes on weekends. That nations turnout in 2017s national election was only 46% (you want to get the Swiss fired up, put a contentious idea in front of them a vote vote to join the EEA in 1992 brought out 79%; the 2016 vote to deport foreign criminals, 63%). Dont give the nation a day off, but do a better job of giving voters options for getting involved. In California, for example, theres now permanent voting by mail (voters can also go on line, after theyve submitted their ballot, to see if theyve been processed). In the Golden State, a majority of voters make their choices by mail rather than going to polling places on Election Day. This comes with complications that non-blue states might not like like allowing provisional ballots to be counted, a vote-counting that can be painfully slow (it takes California over a month to certify statewide election results). However, it gives voters the choice of not having to detour from their routines on Election Day. And even if elections arent routine in the age of Donald Trump, its a nice option to have. I invite you to follow me on Twitter: @hooverwhalen | https://www.forbes.com/sites/billwhalen/2019/02/01/should-every-election-day-be-a-holiday/ |
Should lululemon athletica Worry About Nike's New Yoga Collection? | On the heels of a solid fiscal second-quarter earnings report, Nike (NYSE: NKE) announced it was launching a new yoga collection for men for the first time. This is while the company also sees a big opportunity to expand its apparel category overall. However, Nike's core business is still selling sneakers. That's not going to change, and that's also why lululemon athletica (NASDAQ: LULU) should continue to do fine. Just as Nike has been successful turning a basketball shoe into a fashion statement, Lululemon has accomplished the same in athletic apparel. Both companies are really good at what they do best, and that will protect Lululemon's competitive position from larger rivals. A woman practicing yoga. More IMAGE SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES. Why Nike wants to enter Lululemon's turf Most of Nike's business is dependent on sales of footwear, which makes up about two-thirds of annual revenue. Nike has been doubling down on its innovation in running and basketball shoes to solidify its lead against a strong push from Adidas. Last quarter, Nike grew total revenue by 14% year over year on a currency-neutral basis. The top line was driven by 15% growth in the footwear category. However, during last quarter's conference call, CEO Mark Parker called apparel "one of Nike's greatest growth opportunities." Nike has experienced double-digit growth in apparel, and so have other retailers. Lululemon is currently ahead of schedule in its plans to reach $1 billion in annual revenue in its men's category. Other retailers, particularly Gap's Athleta brand, have ramped up efforts to target men, as well. The move into men's yoga clothing by the swoosh brand is not so much an attempt to go after Lululemon as it is an opportunity to diversify its revenue more, especially into the broader apparel market that has been growing faster than Nike's core sneaker business. Lululemon looks unstoppable While Nike is gradually investing more in apparel, Lululemon recently raised its outlook for the current quarter (which ends in January) for revenue and earnings based on strong sales through the holiday season. Lululemon now anticipates revenue to be in the range of $1.14 billion to $1.15 billion, an increase from the previous expected range of $1.115 billion to $1.125 billion. These are fantastic results for a brand that is on the high-end range of the price spectrum in the industry. The items in Nike's yoga collection are priced around $50 to $75 for tops and bottoms. This is significantly cheaper than Lululemon, where a T-shirt can cost as much as $88 and a pair of pants can cost as much as $178. Despite the price discrepancy, Lululemon continues to charge forward. Lululemon and Nike have distinct brands Over the last few years, Lululemon made a lot of improvements to the business operationally to drive accelerated growth in revenue through 2018. Ultimately, however, Lululemon's robust 21% growth in revenue in the fiscal third quarter is a result of making products customers want to buy. That might be stating the obvious, but it's important to remember that Lululemon's strong revenue growth over the last year is driven by customers paying premium prices for what they perceive as clothing far superior to your average workout clothing. | https://news.yahoo.com/lululemon-athletica-worry-nike-apos-230000318.html |
How could Arizona pass the drought contingency plan and still fail? | CLOSE Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey signs the Drought Contingency Plan in a ceremony at the Arizona state Capitol on Jan. 31, 2019. Thomas Hawthorne, The Republic | azcentral.com Opinion: We knew there would be details to finalize after Jan. 31. But it's not fair to lump Arizona in the same boat with California. Weve known for quite some time that not every I would be dotted and T would be crossed by the feds Jan. 31 deadline to join the Drought Contingency Plan, which aims to keep Lake Mead from tanking to critical levels. The gamble was that if we passed the plan legislatively by then, the federal Bureau of Reclamation would recognize what a monumental action that was and give us a pass. Yet media reports suggest that Reclamation is lumping Arizona with California, which clearly did not meet the deadline, in its reasoning for taking an action that we had all hoped to avoid. Its easy to feel betrayed by that, to conclude that Arizona was asked to move mountains and then when we did, we were told it still wasnt good enough. Particularly given how cagey Reclamation has been in explaining what it meant by done. Officials have been loath to offer specifics since the deadline was set. Commissioner Brenda Burman told reporters in a conference call Friday that "neither California nor Arizona have completed all of the necessary work," and that "close isn't done." Yet Reclamation praised Arizona for meeting the Jan. 31 deadline in a tweet, noting that "with this huge step forward, we are more optimistic than ever that all seven Basin states will put a plan in place to protect the Basin this year." We applaud the action of #Arizona to pass legislation by the January 31st deadline authorizing completion of the #DCP. With this huge step forward, we are more optimistic than ever that all seven Basin states will put a plan in place to protect the Basin this year. pic.twitter.com/ivjmgySTcH Reclamation (@usbr) February 1, 2019 It remains unclear if the agency is happy with us for getting legislative approval, if its holding our feet to the fire for not having buttoned up an agreement with the other states to let us store more water in Lake Mead, or if it thinks were not done because there are still a slew of agreements to complete the implementation plan which doesnt preclude our joining the three-state deal but rather affects how we dole out its cuts within Arizona. Thats unfortunate. Arizona should be spending this day celebrating one of the most important votes lawmakers have made in years. Instead, were left scratching our heads over what more if anything Reclamation wants from us. The agency issued a notice in the federal register Feb. 1 saying it intends to solicit comments from the seven Colorado River basin states on what kind of actions it should take a nuclear option that no one wants to see. Such comments would likely tear apart working relationships among states, because things would be said that cant be unsaid about who deserves water and who doesnt. Arizona stands to lose the most in that process, partly because it has junior water rights and partly because the perception persists (incorrect as it is) that Arizona remains a holdout on this deal. At least this bought us time The good news is Reclamation isnt planning to collect comments until March 4, and it has said it will cancel things entirely if states button up all the details before then. Id still like to see Reclamation clarify that the pressures largely on California now, considering that several signatories havent given the final authorization our Legislature just did. That doesnt mean Arizona is off the hook to finish the agreements that will make our implementation plan tick. But its not fair that we are once again doing damage control, reminding our basin brethren about just how much work Arizona has done. No other state has agreed to take the level of cuts we have. No other state was required to get legislative approval to join the deal. No other state has done the level of planning we have to implement its cuts. And despite all that, we still weren't the last to sign. Because perception often clouds reality, and it's so hard to kill the idea that Arizona just doesn't want to play ball, I suspect we'll be repeating those words a lot over the next few weeks. Reach Allhands at [email protected]. MORE FROM ALLHANDS: Read or Share this story: https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/joannaallhands/2019/02/01/drought-contingency-plan-isnt-done-arizona-can-we-define-done/2745877002/ | https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/joannaallhands/2019/02/01/drought-contingency-plan-isnt-done-arizona-can-we-define-done/2745877002/ |
Why has the West pressed the mute button on Africa? | Recent crackdowns in several African countries have been met with a muted response from the international community. Image copyright AFP Image caption Congolese protesters talked about the death of democracy after the election result For even the most mildly superstitious souls it was an unsettling moment: the newly sworn-in president of the Democratic Republic of Congo was delivering his maiden speech when he was unable to go on. "I am not OK," Felix Tshisekedi declared. Aides moved in to help and he was eventually able to resume. An adviser later reported that the new president's flak-jacket was too tight and he had felt faint. President Tshisekedi was standing near his predecessor, Joseph Kabila, whom many fear will continue to exert a powerful control over the government - a suffocating influence some have suggested after allegations, which have been denied, of a secret deal between the two. The world looked at DR Congo, suspected a big electoral fix but decided to look the other way. There was no appetite for confrontation on the part of the African Union (AU), the Southern African Development Community (Sadc), the European Union or the United States. Image copyright AFP Image caption President Tshisekedi (R) has been accused of doing a deal with his predecessor Joseph Kabila (L) The AU hastily convened and just as hastily abandoned a mission to DR Congo's capital, Kinshasa, that had been intended to promote a negotiated solution to the row over electoral fraud. The requests to delay the announcement of official results were ignored. US contradiction The AU was left with nothing to negotiate. For a regional body that promotes "African solutions to African problems" it was a humiliation. The US ambassador to Kinshasa, Mike Hammer, hailed a "first-ever peaceful, democratic transfer of power", in the process managing to look past the State Department's own publicly expressed concerns over the electoral process. There was no easy answer to the dilemma presented by the vote. From early on it was clear that there were not going to be large demonstrations against the government, no great manifestation of public fury to pressure the international community into action. This in part was to do with the fractured nature of the political opposition, fear of the security forces and the decision by the Catholic Church and civil society to refrain for now from large-scale mobilisation. Image copyright AFP Image caption Western powers have opted for promoting stability in the DR Congo Looking at all of this, the regional and international actors opted for what diplomats call "stability". In DR Congo this means a continuation of the existing muddle while hoping that it does not all collapse into disaster. For the millions of Congolese - displaced from their homes by conflict, living with dire poverty and the threat of disease, denied a share in the immense mineral wealth of their nation, bullied and preyed upon by armed groups - do not expect an amelioration of their plight any time soon. In all of this it is also worth considering what I would call the politics of preoccupation. It is not just in relation to DR Congo but also to Zimbabwe with its crackdown on dissent and Sudan in the throes of a popular uprising against the regime of President Omar al-Bashir. The last few weeks have seen deepening repression. Soldiers in Zimbabwe terrorise their fellow citizens and their counterparts in Sudan fire live ammunition into crowds. Yet the international response has been muted, to put it mildly. Image copyright AFP Image caption Young people have been at the forefront of protests in Sudan British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt called on Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa not to "turn the clock back". This statement was based on the assumption that the clock had moved forward in Zimbabwe since the ousting of Robert Mugabe at the end of 2017, a doubtful proposition just now. Rather than condemn the brutality in Zimbabwe, the most powerful country in the region, South Africa, called for the lifting of economic sanctions. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has his own preoccupations. There is the fight against corruption and for his political base within the governing African National Congress (ANC) where allies of his predecessor, Jacob Zuma, still lurk. Winning a handsome majority in the coming elections will strengthen Mr Ramaphosa's hand. Do not expect any emphatic foreign policy departures until he feels more secure. You may be interested in: The other major continental power, Nigeria, is facing elections in a fortnight in which President Muhammadu Buhari is running for a second term. Mr Buhari has just caused uproar by firing his chief justice, who could have played a crucial role in a disputed election result. The US, EU and the UK all sounded their displeasure. 'Ethical intervention' In Britain foreign policy is consumed by the Brexit debate. Across the rest of the EU Brexit and a host of domestic crises have led to a turning inwards. African political problems are not a priority. How distant now the days of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair's "ethical foreign policy" and the sight of British troops patrolling Sierra Leone. The disastrous aftermath of the Iraq war ended that brief period of ambitious interventionism. The French still maintain strong military and economic links in several African countries. But their limited, and purely rhetorical, response to the DR Congo election outcome indicates the priority of domestic issues like the ongoing "gilets jaunes" protests. In America, the White House and the legislators are kept busy with the Mueller investigation, the continuing border wall saga and the 2020 elections. A month ago US Secretary of State John Bolton outlined an Africa policy aimed at challenging the expansion of Chinese, and to a lesser extent Russian influence. But with the cutbacks at the State Department under the Trump administration it is difficult to see how a more vigorous Africa policy - whatever its ideological or political focus - can be implemented. With Sudan, the Americans have other reasons to go easy on the criticism: the Bashir regime has been helpful in the fight against violent Islamist extremism. The Western powers have expressed "deep concern" while the AU reminded "Sudanese political leaders of their collective responsibility to pursue constructive, peaceful avenues for addressing the country's pressing challenges". The words have been lost in the cries and bullets on the streets. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Victims tell of being beaten and shot by Zimbabwe's security forces But constantly looking to what the rest of the continent or international community does or does not do fails to reflect the deeper dynamics of change on the continent. It cannot be said often enough: Africa is not a single social, political, economic or cultural entity. As the popular phrase goes, Africa is not a country. DR Congo, Sudan and Zimbabwe are each shaped by different histories, albeit with a common legacy of colonial rule. But these days there is another crucial commonality. It is what you might see as the upside of the current period of turmoil. Arc of intolerance In each country a highly organised, youth-driven and tech-savvy civil society has learned that change need not always be sponsored by mainstream politicians or foreign governments. History has taught them that politicians can promise change and deliver only more of the same or worse. The young activists of Bulawayo, Goma and Omdurman do not depend on outsiders. Image copyright AFP Image caption Young activists in Uganda have been instrumental in the rise of musician-turned-MP Bobi Wine The post-colonial era saw too many foreign interventions that were cynical and selfish, or inadequate, fleeting or poorly thought out. Recognition of this has helped create a vigorous spirit of self-determination among today's protesters. These are the people who patiently record the terror inflicted by the Zimbabwean security forces, who are circulating flyers across Khartoum to organise demonstrations, and whose activism forced then-President Kabila to hold an election, however flawed. Nothing has been more important in African politics over the last two decades than the rise of this activist generation. That is why the counsel of despair should be avoided when contemplating the crises that have been playing out in recent weeks. A swathe of the continent is suffering from either regressive authoritarianism, flawed elections, entrenched corruption, or combinations of each. One might call it an arc of intolerance. In Cameroon, the leader of the opposition has been arrested in the wake of a highly compromised election. The authorities in Uganda are accused of persecuting charismatic politician Bobi Wine, while in Tanzania, President John Magufuli is steadily squeezing the life out of democratic opposition. East v West These are just a few examples that have produced a muted response from most of the international community. I say most because the Chinese and the Russians have always stood apart from the language of condemnation. Image copyright AFP Image caption It was all smiles from African leaders at last year's Forum on China-Africa Cooperation summit It is common currency these days to argue that where the West steps back because of its own preoccupations China and Russia will rush in. Both Beijing and Moscow have their own agendas to pursue without even lip service to ideals of human rights and accountable government. The Gulf powers are also jostling for influence. But it risks being patronising to assume that people across the continent cannot recognise, and mobilise to counter, a new kind of exploitation when it appears. The ruling party in Zimbabwe especially needs international economic assistance to counter the catastrophe created by its own incompetence and brutal tactics. That help will not be forthcoming as long as a climate of fear continues. Nor do the Chinese or the Russians have endlessly deep pockets, or the inclination, to bankroll an inherently unstable system. But I am focusing here on a more powerful long-term agent of change. I stress long term. None that I met - from Goma in the east all the way to Kinshasa in the west - believe they will be rescued by foreigners. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The Congolese protester who gave his life for the cause Likewise in Sudan and Zimbabwe there are vibrant debates taking place around the economy, education and women's rights. The activist movements are crucibles of thought as well as street protest. The activism we see is not driven by ideological or sectarian fanaticism. It is characterised above all by reason. That is no small thing in a world where ideologues have wreaked so much misery in recent decades. Yet activism alone cannot solve the legacy of decades of misrule and corruption. But what it has created is a growing sense of democracy as something more expansive and inclusive than a ballot box that can be stuffed with fake votes or stolen by a power elite. DR Congo's pro-democracy activist group, Lucha, which was a target of Mr Kabila's violent crackdown, recently expressed the tireless hope of its activism in a tweet. "In this tumultuous period, our people must redouble their efforts and vigilance. We must be even more demanding to make the policies accountable to us. Regardless of our political affiliation or our ethnic identity, we must put the nation above all." | https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-47060799 |
Will Expenses Kill Skechers Stock in 2019? | From one standpoint, eclectic shoe designer Skechers USA (NYSE: SKX) had a great 2018. Through the first three quarters of the year, sales rose by double digits, led by expansion overseas and strong U.S. consumer spending. At the same time, the company's bottom line has gone stale, eaten up by rising costs. Expenses could remain elevated in 2019. However, investors shouldn't lose sight of the fact that higher expenses are the name of the game when a company is growing. 2018 (so far) in review During the third quarter, Skechers reported that international wholesale sales increased 11.8% compared with the prior-year period, while global retail (stores in the U.S. and abroad that the company owns and operates itself) grew 10.8%. International wholesale and retail combined made up 55.5% of the company's total revenue. That continued the positive trend the shoe brand enjoyed all year. However, investors were more concerned with the bottom line, which barely increased in the first nine months of 2018. Skechers stock has fallen more than 30% over the last 12 months. Metric Nine Months Ended Sept. 30, 2018 Nine Months Ended Sept. 30, 2017 YOY Increase Revenue $3.56 billion $3.19 billion 12% Gross profit margin 48% 46.5% 1.5 p.p. General and administrative expenses $1.08 billion $905 million 19% Selling expenses $289 million $263 million 10% Earnings per share $1.62 $1.57 3.2% Data source: Skechers. Chart by author. YOY = year over year; p.p. = percentage point. In spite of the big top-line increase and stronger gross margin, a big increase in general and administrative expense severely limited Skechers' profit growth. Skechers has been ramping up spending on advertising and infrastructure in international markets -- particularly China -- including a new distribution center to handle increased demand there related to the country's November 11 Singles' Day shopping holiday (akin to Black Friday here). The interior of a Skechers retail store. More Image source: Skechers. Fortunately, spending in China is reaching an inflection point and could start to ease up, according to management -- although Skechers may make additional investments there depending on need. The company continues to grow its number of retail stores, too. On the third quarter conference call, Skechers CFO John Vandemore stated: "For the [fourth quarter] of 2018, we expect our ongoing capital expenditures to be approximately $20 million to $25 million, which includes an additional 10 to 15 company-owned retail store openings, 10 to 15 store remodels, expansions, or relocation, as well as office renovation. This estimate excludes capital expenditures related to our distribution centers worldwide, including China, as well as office expansion at our corporate headquarters." In short, investors should expect Skechers to continue making substantial investments to support its growth. Specific to the home office expansion, the company broke ground in January 2019 on a multiyear project that will more than double its office space and include a new showroom and design center. Skechers hasn't disclosed the total cost of this project yet, but it's something to keep an eye on in the quarters ahead. However, if Skechers can continue its strong sales growth, investors shouldn't fear an increase in expenses in 2019. The stock's plunge over the past year reduces the pressure on the company to post strong earnings growth this year. Yet profit growth will inevitably come sooner or later once management is content with its ambitions overseas. Thus, expense growth should be a secondary consideration at Skechers -- as long as costs don't get too out of hand -- with sales growth once again taking center stage. More From The Motley Fool Nicholas Rossolillo and his clients owns shares of Skechers. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Skechers. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. | https://news.yahoo.com/expenses-kill-skechers-stock-2019-005100796.html |
Are LeBron James and James Harden playing by another set of rules? | Yes, James Harden and LeBron James seem to know they have an edge. (Getty) A weekly dive into the NBAs hottest topics. Take One: Collusion and collisions Scroll to continue with content Ad Some people just get to break the rules. Thats what it seems like, at least, with LeBron James saying it would be amazing to play alongside Anthony Davis barely skirting tampering rules while agent Rich Paul, one of LeBrons closest friends and business partners, was preparing to request a trade from the Pelicans on behalf of his client. James Harden, in the meantime, has scored 28.4 percent of his January 43.6-points-per-game average from the free-throw line, elbowing, cajoling, flopping and crashing his way to MVP candidacy. Consider what got less notice: After a game at the Fiserv Forum, Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo shook Daviss hand and told him, Come to the Bucks, man. Three days ago, Patrick Beverley received a flopping warning for a Matrix-recalling backward dive. The truth is, some rules were made to be broken. And everybody breaks them. Only the very bad and the very effective draw notice, their advantage drawing the ire of their opponents. (Yahoo illustration/Amber Matsumoto) Story continues Thats certainly the case with Harden. He leads the league in drives, at 19.7 per game, but he only gets 3.5 of his 13.5 driving points from the free-throw line. The rest are because of his uncanny strength and finishing ability, a feathers touch and, recently, an ability to scare his defenders into submission with the threat of the whistle. (Remember when the Lakers defended him with their arms behind their backs?) He also leads the league in points from pull-up jumpers, one of the toughest shots in the game. The Ringers Zach Kram put it best: Eliminate free throws, and Harden would still lead the NBA in scoring. Hardens ability to get to the line doesnt make his game gimmicky. He utilizes the games most effective gimmick better than anyone else because he can still beat you every other way. It may well be the case with the Lakers, too, the gravitational pull of LeBron James and Showtime combining and naturally drawing in the NBAs most promising trade target. [Ditch the pen and paper on footballs biggest day. Go digital with Squares Pickem!] Everybody flops. Everybody talks. James Harden will keep lighting defenses on fire, and the Lakers will keep drawing the eye of the leagues best players, less because of foul play, and more because that is simply what they do. Take Two: Anthony Davis is already on LeBrons level Davis camp has made it clear what he wants: to no longer be a Pelican, to play for the Lakers alongside LeBron James, and to do it sooner rather than later. Thats illuminating, because up until this season, we havent learned a great deal about Davis since he and his unibrow showed up in Lexington, Kentucky, and blocked nearly every shot at Rupp Arena eight years ago. Hes mostly been a quiet guy playing in a quiet market. It came as a slight surprise, then, that he would be the one to want to play with LeBron James a prospect other stars reportedly shudder at on basketballs biggest stage. Then again, maybe its because Davis possesses the talent necessary to walk onto a court with LeBron and not feel immediately like a second wheel. He has been a superstar for years a megastar-in-waiting and theres no reason to believe that as Davis inches toward his peak and LeBron descends, their abilities wont meet. In fact, they might already have. Davis is the leagues second-leading scorer at 29.3 points per game, and pulls down 13.3 rebounds and dishes a healthy four assists per game. Hes a defensive monster who hits his free throws, hardly ever fouls, and leads the league in player-efficiency rating. All hes missing is a team that can turn his impact into a shot at a championship. Take Three: Luka Doncics fearless creativity Doncic invites trouble. He likes to do the hard thing, like split pick-and-roll traps, zip passes to open shooters crosscourt and throw Hail Mary passes across the court. With 30-foot range that gives him a shooters touch when hes driving, generational vision and deceptive ball-handling skills, Doncic is a perpetual threat. His every move provokes a reaction. He knows this. He uses it like few before him. Hell fake a pocket pass to get off a clean floater. Hell look off opponents at the top of his jump, turning a mid-range shot into a corner triple assist. And then theres my personal favorite, the first in what I hope is a career full of intrepid reactions to difficult defenses: the falling, impossible floater turned into an alley-oop. (Hes done it a few times now, so you know its not a fluke.) Doncic should be at the end of his rope. Hes falling away on the baseline, trying to nail the hardest shot in basketball with defenders lunging at him. But thats the beauty of Luka: He has more court awareness falling sideways than most players do standing upright. Take Four: Shooting like Steph Just less than two years ago, Kings owner Vivek Ranadive shipped DeMarcus Cousins to the Pelicans in a deal that included Buddy Hield and a first-round pick because he felt Hield had Steph Curry potential. It was a lot to put on a second-year player with a single-digit average, prompting a series of Kangz-related schadenfreude. We might have been better off tapping the brakes. Hield certainly isnt Curry, but hes turned himself into a 20-point-per-game scorer and hes scoring 7.7 of them third-best in the league from catch-and-shoot jumpers, which hes sinking at a scorching 49.1 percent. The Splash Brothers. On Dec. 12, the Kawhi Leonard-less Raptors narrowly inched by the Warriors and discovered the tiniest of weapons. With Steph Curry consistently switching onto Danny Green and busting the Raptors offense, head coach Nick Nurse opted to do something Green only did twice in his final year as a Spur: put him in the post. With a three-inch, 30-pound advantage, Green took Curry to task and discovered a new facet to his game. Hes posted up 20 times this year twice more than he did in his last five seasons as a Spur. Its still not a big part of Greens game, but its the kind of wrinkle that can keep a 10-year vet engaged and could potentially pay dividends in key postseason moments. More from Yahoo Sports: NFL cancels Maroon 5s Super Bowl news conference Pats Brady labeled known cheater on broadcast Ex-NFL star says he drank Hennessy before NFL games Martin: Rams RB never strayed far from West Coast roots | https://sports.yahoo.com/lebron-james-james-harden-playing-another-set-rules-151509461.html?src=rss |
Does Facebook really know how many fake accounts it has? | 1 / 3 Back to Gallery Facebook sells advertisers on its access to real people 2.27 billion of them, a network that exceeds the populations of North America, South America and Africa combined. The answer lies partly in how many of the accounts are fake. The Menlo Park company defines fake accounts as profiles that are either designed to break its rules, for example by spammers or scammers impersonating others, or that are misclassified, such as someone setting up a Facebook profile instead of a Facebook page for a business. Yet the number of Facebook accounts that fit those descriptions is less clear. While the company discloses its estimates of fake accounts, its figures have fluctuated and are confusing. Even Facebook admits its understanding of the numbers is tenuous. Duplicate and false accounts are very difficult to measure at our scale, it said in a securities filing in October, and the actual numbers may vary significantly from our estimates. With Facebook reporting a jump in the number of fake accounts on its site Wednesday, lets dig into what figures it has given before and why they dont necessarily add up. That has implications for the manipulation and abuse of the platform, as well as the companys business. First, Facebooks estimates for fake accounts, made in securities filings, have oscillated in recent years. Facebook cut its estimate of fake accounts significantly in 2016. A year later, it more than quadrupled the estimate. And Wednesday, in small print at the bottom of a slide about earnings, Facebook increased the estimate by 36 percent, to 116 million. Facebook arrives at its estimates by analyzing a sample of accounts, looking for names that appear to be fake or other behavior that appears inauthentic, the company said in securities filings. We apply significant judgment in making this determination. Alex Schultz, Facebooks vice president of analytics, said in an interview that its fake account estimates fluctuated in part because periodic attacks can cause spikes in the figures. He added that Facebook had grown in some emerging markets where fake accounts are more prevalent. For years, investors, analysts and journalists had only Facebooks estimates to judge fake accounts. Last year, Facebook introduced a transparency page, which discloses how many fake accounts it has taken down each quarter. Those figures revealed that the scope was far larger than the estimates in securities filings had suggested. Lets run through the math on this in more detail. Facebooks new numbers added up to more than 2.8 billion fake accounts taken down in the 12 months that ended Sept. 30, or about 7.7 million a day. Facebook had previously reported that about 3 percent to 4 percent of its active users were fake. According to the new figures, the accounts taken down each quarter were equivalent to 25 to 35 percent of its active users (though those accounts were not counted in Facebooks active-user tallies because they had been removed). More curious was how Facebooks estimate of active fake accounts barely budged even as the number of accounts it took down each quarter fluctuated widely. For instance, Facebook said it had caught 583 million fake accounts in the first quarter of 2018 and 800 million the next quarter. Yet between those two quarters, it told investors that its active fake accounts had increased by roughly 1 million. Those numbers suggest either that Facebook happens to be eliminating exactly enough accounts each quarter to keep its active fake-account estimate flat or that its estimate is more like a guess. You can use your judgment, said Brian Wieser, an analyst at Pivotal Research who discovered last year that Facebook was claiming it could reach more people in the United States than the Census Bureau said lived in the country. I think there are reasons to be skeptical of the numbers they put forward. Facebooks figures also imply that over the past year, it has caught and taken down roughly 90 percent of fake accounts that are created on its site most, it said, within minutes of registration. Facebook said it also stopped millions of fake accounts from registering each day. Schultz said such a success rate was possible because the vast majority of accounts we take down are from extremely naive adversaries, who typically create automated accounts that are easy to spot. The smaller number of fake accounts that elude detection are generally manually created accounts. Schultz added that Facebook was cautious in removing manually created accounts because it didnt want to erase authentic profiles. We dont want to over-enforce, he said. So what we actually focus on is the harmful behavior. Yet obvious fake accounts that are engaging in harmful behavior slip through. Last year, I found dozens of fake accounts masquerading as the companys founder, Mark Zuckerberg, to scam Facebook users out of cash. Some had been up for years. Facebook also said the vast majority of fake accounts it removed were ones that it had spotted, rather than ones that users had reported. Of the 2.8 billion fake accounts it took down in the year that ended Sept. 30, Facebook said, it found 99.3 percent on its own. Those numbers also contradict my experience. Last year, I easily created 11 Facebook accounts that used the same name, occupation and profile photo as my verified account. They remained live for five days, until I reported them to Facebook. Instagram, which Facebook owns, also left up 10 impostor accounts I had created until I reported them; it took down only five, until I alerted a Facebook spokesman. If an account appears to be impersonating another user but isnt engaged in harmful behavior, Facebook often leaves it up, Schultz said. He said such duplicate accounts could be from people who had lost their password or were confused. Duplicate accounts are banned under Facebooks rules. But they persist anyway, in even greater numbers than fake accounts, according to the companys estimates, compounding its problem of inauthentic activity. Facebooks estimates of duplicates have also seesawed, including nearly doubling in 2017. On Wednesday, Facebook increased its count by 20 percent, to 255 million. Aaron Greenspan, Zuckerbergs Harvard University classmate who now tracks Facebook, issued a report last week questioning how many authentic users Facebook has. Greenspan, who started a site called the Face Book while at Harvard and settled a trademark dispute with Facebook in 2009, said he believed the social network had far more fake accounts than it had disclosed, posing a grave risk to its business. The fact there are so many unexplained differences and so many gaps, it paints a picture that, when you combine all these factors together, it would indicate theres something going on here that theyre trying to hide, he said. Schultz said Facebook was doing its best to police inauthentic accounts and be as transparent as possible about how many it believed were still on its site. We disclose it very publicly, in my opinion, he said. When I asked him how advertisers felt about paying to show ads to fake accounts, Schultz said, What advertisers need to feel comfortable about are the actual results generated by our ad campaigns. Jack Nicas is a New York Times writer. | https://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Does-Facebook-really-know-how-many-fake-accounts-13582378.php |
Who is Ralph Northam, the Virginia governor who faces resignation calls after racist yearbook photo? | Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam speaks during a news conference in the Crystal City neighborhood in Arlington, Va., Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2018. Amazon, which has grown too big for its Seattle hometown, said it will split its much-anticipated second headquarters between New York and northern Virginia. WASHINGTON The backlash was nearly instant. Within hours of a photo surfacing on Friday that showed Virginia's Democratic governor in a photo showing two people dressed in blackface in Ku Klux Klan robes, a chorus calling for Ralph Northam to resign grew and spread across social media. The photo was part of Northam's 1984 yearbook during his last year at Eastern Virginia Medical School. A half-page with four photos of Northam included one of two people, one in a blackface costume and the other wearing a KKK robe. Northam admitted he was in the photo and apologized, but did not detail which of the pictured individuals he was dressed up as. Here's what you should know: Soft-spoken and moderate Northam is widely viewed as a moderate within his party, someone who says he voted twice for former Republican President George W. Bush. He has described himself as a fiscal conservative but socially liberal, as Northam has advocated for tighter gun laws and loosening abortion restrictions. Republicans in the state at one point tried to recruit Northam to switch parties, according to the New York Times, something Northam rejected. My fellow Virginians, earlier today I released a statement apologizing for behavior in my past that falls far short of the standard you set for me when you elected me to be your governor. I believe you deserve to hear directly from me. pic.twitter.com/1rSw1oxfrX Ralph Northam (@GovernorVA) February 2, 2019 A former doctor, Northam is soft-spoken and was relatively unknown outside of Virginia when he took up a bid for governor. Northam entered politics in 2007 when he ran and won a bid to become a state senator. In 2013, he took up a bid for lieutenant governor, winning the post to become second in command for then-Gov. Terry McAuliffe. His military, medical history Before his political career, Northam served as a doctor in the U.S. Army and treated soldiers overseas during the Gulf War. He served eight years in the military and traveled to Germany where he tended to soldiers during Operation Desert Storm. He attended both Virginia Military Institute and Eastern Virginia Medical School and, after completing his residency, started treating children as a pediatric neurologist. He continued that work while serving as lieutenant governor, spending his days both at the state capitol and treating children suffering from illnesses. Response to Charlottesville The deadly Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville stunned the nation and thrust the small, southern city into the epicenter of a radical discussion about race and anti-Semitism. After the 2017 rally, which left one woman dead and several injured after a neo-Nazi rammed his car into a group of counterprotesters, politics became even divisive. President Donald Trump cast blame on "both sides" and said "you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides," causing an uproar that took over the news cycle for days. Northam, after the rally, denounced the "ugly" event and praised the city and its residents for promoting a place that values "openness, diversity and inclusion," according to the Washington Post. "White supremacists have descended upon Charlottesville again to evoke a reaction as ugly and violent as their beliefs just as they did before, I am urging Virginians to deny them the satisfaction," Northam said in a statement. More: 'I am deeply sorry': Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam apologizes for yearbook photo with blackface, KKK costumes More: Calls for Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam to resign flood in after blackface, KKK photo surfaces An effort to remove a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee led to the rally and violence. Northam, at first, supported the removal of all Confederate statues in the aftermath of the event. He later changed his mind, saying it should be left up to local officials. Racially charged governor's race Northam ran for governor in 2017 in the aftermath of the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, an event that shifted politics in the state. The rally drew neo-Nazis and members of the alt-right, many of whom carried Confederate flags or wore clothing with Nazi or KKK insignias. | https://news.yahoo.com/ralph-northam-virginia-governor-faces-030818061.html |
Would An Increased Salary Cap In Australia's Slumping Big Bash League Lure International Stars? | Everyone in Australia is trying to be a problem solver. The lucrative Big Bash League (BBL), Cricket Australias (CA) goldmine, has had a gradual decline in popularity in the past couple of seasons sparking fears that the Twenty20 competition is in a terminal slump. The current season has been marred by low crowds, poor matches on slow pitches and a downturn in television ratings. Undoubtedly, the overstretched and watered down BBL is now on the nose. After being in damage control with concerned broadcasters, CA is plotting changes to next season. This is a big deal for all involved with much at stake. This season has stretched out to 59 matches, an increase of 16 matches as part of CA's (USD) $800 million television deal with cable channel Fox Sports and free-to-air Channel 7. The eight teams now play 14 games in a proper home-and-away format, which makes a great deal of sense, except is has blown out the season to two months and well past the school holidays period. It is longer than the Indian Premier League (IPL), the most popular and successful Twenty20 competition in the world. The BBL has been invaluable in luring a new wave of fans to the sport, especially kids and families, but they dont particularly want the tournament to go well into February when school returns. With so much money committed, the current home and away season is locked in for the six-year duration of the broadcasting agreement. With reducing the season off the table it means other aspects of the league are being evaluated. There has been much criticism over the declining standard of the BBL, particularly the lack of headliners compared to previous seasons. International stars such as AB de Villiers and Andre Russell have chosen the lucrative and shortened Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) ahead of the BBL, which has also always suffered from the absence of its best Australian players due to schedule clashes. The IPL, in a notable contrast, has a fixed window in April-May where the India national team does not play. CA chief executive Kevin Roberts has indicated the BBLs (USD) modest $1.2 million salary cap will be reviewed in a desperate bid to lure marquee players. Potentially increasing the BBL salary cap is tricky and would require consultation from the Australian Cricketers Association due to concerns about domestic cricketers losing out financially and on playing opportunities. "We need to be competitive in terms of player payments and make sure we really cement the position of the BBL in the top two domestic T20 leagues in the world, he said. "But it's a delicate thing to work through." The situation has created uncertainty and a lack of continuity throughout the BBL, notably reinforced when Melbourne Stars lost Nepalese spinning sensation Sandeep Lamichhane to the BPL midway through the tournament. "I think the Pakistan Super League, the Emirates league, could start to take our overseas players and the Bangladesh Premier League's obviously got Sandeep throughout the middle of our tournament, Glenn Maxwell, the Stars marquee player, told SEN Radio. "I think when you're expanding the competition and making it 14 games (each), you've probably got to be expanding the salary cap a little bit more just to make sure you can get those signings in otherwise we are going to be competing. According to ESPNcricinfo, BBL chiefs want overseas players to be paid outside of the salary cap and an idea has been mooted that to ensure players are distributed equitably there would be an implementation of drafts for overseas, domestic and rookie players. Picks would be distributed based on the previous season's standings. "I think going forward there may be a way for us to have a separate salary cap for the overseas players for each team to make sure we are getting the big draw cards, the (Dwayne) Bravos of the world, and potentially AB de Villiers down the road," Maxwell said. The BBL is only in its eighth season and its swift emergence into a money spinner has been monumental but there needs to be much deliberation and inventiveness to ensure it isnt merely a fad. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/tristanlavalette/2019/02/01/would-an-increased-salary-cap-in-australias-slumping-big-bash-league-lure-international-stars/ |
Why Are We For Globalization But Against The AI Revolution? | One of the great ironies of the debate about AIs disruptive impact on society is the way in which it offers an almost perfect mirror image of the debate around globalization. We speak of AIs potential to cause mass job displacement as an existential danger that must be addressed with Universal Basic Income or legal protections, while lauding the disruptive job loss of globalization as simply the natural and inevitable course of nature. In fact, many of the same policymakers and thought leaders that have long promoted globalization have been among the loudest voices warning we must protect society against similar disruption from AI. Once arcane subjects like Universal Basic Income (UBI) have become household names over the last few years as governments have struggled with how to address what many have projected to be the coming AI-fueled employment apocalypse. According to Google Trends, US-based web searches on UBI have surged since the start of 2016, coinciding with the identical rise in public searching about AI as a whole. In short, as AI has roared back into the public consciousness over the last two years it has brought with it a parallel surge in concerns about what this new AI renaissance will mean for peoples jobs. In many ways this reflects the extraordinary string of rapid advances over the last few years that have seen AI algorithms achieve unprecedented advances in everything from image categorization and speech recognition to gameplay and driverless cars. AI has finally reached a tipping point where the general public no longer regards it as merely a laboratory curiosity and the antagonist of Hollywood movies. Populations are recognizing that while current AI systems are still in their infancy, they are finally approaching accuracy levels and application domains where they could begin to have a measurable impact on employment in certain sectors. As ordinary citizens begin grappling with the idea that a soulless machine could take their job, politicians and pundits alike have begun warning that governments must take immediate measures to curb the spread of AI before it can begin to take peoples jobs or at least compensate those who lose their jobs to their silicon counterparts. In essence, the idea of AI algorithms taking our jobs is seen as something unnatural, an affront against how society is supposed to function. AIs impact on employment is something to be curbed, corralled and controlled. Partially this is a reaction to the idea that humans might make themselves obsolete. In the rush of formerly impossible AI achievements over the last several years such as driverless cars and algorithms that can master advanced strategy games and learn to play video games all by themselves, the public is increasingly seeing the classical science fiction trope of humanity creating AI that replaces humans as more and more plausible. Replacing human jobs is merely the first step in this progression. Seen in this light, the objection to AI displacing human jobs is a reaction not to job loss, but to the subordination of humans to their machine creations. That by ceding their employment to machines, we are one step closer to machines entirely replacing us. However, this simplistic description does not fully explain the outsized reaction and policy proscriptions that have arisen in the reaction to AIs rapid rise. If our fear was solely limited to AI run amok, our focus would be on designing failsafe mechanisms for ensuring positive control over AI creations in the event they deviate from their expected behaviors. We would be exploring approaches for understanding algorithmic abnormalities beyond simply trying to detect how they can fooled, such as examining how AI systems of the future could leverage those vulnerabilities to escape their failsafe programing. We would be seriously examining topics like Isaac Asimovs Three Laws of Robotics. Those are the kinds of responses that might emerge if the primary concern about AIs advances were with respect to its potential to eventually turn on humanity. Instead, nearly all of the conversation to date has been around the economic impact of AIs potential to replace an ever-growing number of jobs. Ideas like Universal Basic Income narrowly focus on the employment impact of AI as a traditional technological disrupter like the Industrial Revolution. This is a critical distinction because it reinforces that our fears over AI are rooted not in future hyperbolic concerns of terminator robots someday launching nuclear war on society, but rather on the very real employment impact that AI may bring in the coming years. Seen through this lens, there are remarkable parallels between the fears of future AI-fueled job loss and the steady march of historical job loss that has occurred due to globalization. AI replaces human workers with cheaper silicon versions. Globalization replaces a local worker with the cheapest available human option, potentially on the other side of the world. In both cases a local job is lost and a job somewhere else is created. The difference is that globalization has impacted largely working-class jobs, while the middle and upper classes have been not only insulated from its effects, but actually benefited from reduced costs for goods and services. In contrast, the AI revolution stands poised to bring these same disruptive impacts to the middle class, wreaking the same havoc to their economic standing as globalization has done to the working class. AI has taken on the role of public embodiment of this new form of job displacement, as evidenced by the lockstep increases in public interest in both AI and UBI. Putting this all together, it is no small irony that the same forces that have relentlessly promoted globalization in spite of its economic impacts to the working class are now treating AIs potential for a similar disruption to the middle class as a public emergency that requires radical intervention to protect against. While AI may still be very much in its infancy, its impact is already being felt in forcing us as a society to confront the impact of how our ever-changing digital world affects us all. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2019/02/01/why-are-we-for-globalization-but-against-the-ai-revolution/ |
What to do when its 30 below and the dogs gotta go? | Let's say the cold wind feels like a hot iron, boiling water instantly turns to snow, a giant lake is so frigid it is emitting "sea smoke," and officials are exhorting all humans to stay inside. But you've got a dog, and the dog has some urgent needs to take care of. "Honestly, it's a d--- nightmare," said Chicago resident Bridget Devine, who described a routine that will sound familiar to all parents of small children about to go sledding. "In order for them to be safe, I have to put these little boots and jackets on them for every single trip outside," she said. "These boots are basically deflated balloons that I have to force on their feet, and because I have two dogs, this process alone takes like 10 minutes." That's if the dog will wear bootees, which many won't. Or if the dog will even consent to going outside, which some won't. Across the deeply frozen Midwest this week, owners of dogs, big and small, were confronted a few times a day with the unavoidable prospect of taking their pets out for bathroom breaks - an activity that could be painful for both human and pooch. Some described standing in their warmish doorways while holding onto an extra long leash attached to a dog doing its business outside. Others told of dogs that chose to urinate on the porch rather than venture beyond, or that resorted to indoor "pee pads" for a few days. One Midwesterner, who did not want to be named, said the family dog stuck its nose out the dog door Thursday morning, backed away and "took a pee on the table leg while looking at me." Chicago resident Joseph Berger's dog, a shepherd-Chow mix named Summer, usually takes three to four walks that last 30 minutes to an hour. This week, they lasted 10 minutes max, or "about nine minutes too long by my count," said Berger, who works in magazine marketing. Putting on her bootees is "a traumatic experience for both of us," Berger said Thursday. But particularly excruciating was collecting what she had produced (a substance that, several Midwest dog owners attested, froze like a rock within seconds). "Cleaning up after her was really terrible because I have to remove one glove layer to be able to manage the poop bag," Berger said, adding that Summer is accustomed to getting a biscuit as a reward when she does something good, such as not barking at other dogs. "Glove off, toss her a biscuit, glove back on. Yesterday and today, that was torture," he said. Not all dogs are alike, of course, and some did not mind the subzero outdoors. Lucy, a thick-coated border collie mix in Madison, Wisconsin, even frolicked with delight in the deep snow. "I think I require more preparation than the dog does," said her owner, illustrator Michael Hirshon, 31, who donned long underwear and multiple layers of shirts, sweaters and jackets for a fleeting excursion Thursday morning in minus-30 temperatures. "It took about five minutes, because I knew she had to poop, and she likes to dawdle. So it required a lot of her jumping around. She usually walks around to find the perfect spot." The polar vortex-friendly dogs did not include Luna, a thin-coated lab-cattledog-pitbull mix who lives near Minneapolis. After refusing to wear protective socks, she consented to wearing a small hooded sweatshirt belonging to her owner, dental student Andrea Smith. But she only barely agreed to go outside. "She was just hunched over, like, 'Nope, forget it,' " said Smith, 26. "She will keep minimal amounts of paws on the ground, and she runs inside." Darren Szrom's Lab-retriever mix, 13-year-old Diamond, is used to hunting with him in zero-degree weather. But it was "just way too cold for literally man or beast," Szrom said of the past few days in Chicago, and even Diamond wasn't having it. Within seconds of being let out into the yard, Diamond "was on the deck, laying down on top of his paws to keep them warm like a wild animal would," Szrom said. "Apparently, a minute was too long." But it was long enough for Szrom to be able to answer a burning question for some of us in balmier parts of the United States: No, he said, dog pee does not freeze midair. "It definitely hit the ground as a liquid," Szrom said of Diamond's No. 1. "I don't know how long it was liquid." -- The Washington Post | https://www.oregonlive.com/weather/2019/02/what-to-do-when-its-30-below-and-the-dogs-gotta-go.html |
Are we finally seeing end of Super Bowl road for Brady, Pats? | American-Statesman columnists Kirk Bohls and Cedric Golden weigh in on various topics concerning Sunday's Super Bowl between the New England Patriots and Los Angeles Rams: 1. Bohls: I just cant see it. The Patriots have beaten much better teams than the Rams and are hitting their stride with one of their best running games behind an offensive line that has not yet given up a postseason sack. Do not bet against Bill Belichick. Call it New England, 38-27. Golden: Any team with Drew Brees at quarterback has a chance to oh, shoot, I forgot; the Saints got robbed. The Rams arent as dynamic, but if Todd Gurley returns to his regular-season form, theres a shot. I dont. New England wins 33-23. Bohls: Ill go out on the limb and give the award to Patriots rookie running back Sony Michel, who will top 100 yards and score two touchdowns. Tom Bradys trophy case is already full. Golden: In New Englands five Super Bowl titles, Brady has been named the MVP in four of them. He gets one for the thumb. 3. Bohls: I think he should, and I bet Giselle and Toms kids and Tom Brady Sr. want him to, but thats a totally personal decision. Given the emphasis on protecting quarterbacks, I think he just might play until hes 45 as per his wishes. No fun in that. He'll choose to dress in an NFL locker room for three more seasons. Bohls: I've got to go with one of the most unlikely MVPs ever in the Cowboys Larry Brown, a last-round draft choice whose two picks off Neil ODonnell secured Dallas' win in Super Bowl XXX and made him the first cornerback to win MVP in a Super Bowl. For this year's possible one-hit wonder, Ill pick Pats receiver Chris Hogan, who had a very quiet year but might emerge in a big way if Aqib Talib focuses on taking away Julian Edelman or if the Rams stay in their preferred zone defense. Golden: Giants wideout David Tyree became an overnight sensation with his helmet catch against the Patriots in Super Bowl XLII. Ill take Patriots running back Rex Burkhead for Sunday. I expect him to catch four passes for 60 yards and a touchdown. 5. Pick a prop bet that you like. Bohls: Out of the 1,000 prop bets I saw, Im taking Maines basketball team minus 6 (against New Hampshire) over the combined point total by the Patriots and Rams. But I also was intrigued by the over-under prop bet on the height of the player who scores the winning touchdown. Golden: The over-under on how many plays CBS color commentator Tony Romo will correctly predict was at 7.5 for most of the week. I would take the under. 6. Bohls: Its close. Im taking the Larry Bird-Michael Jordan game of H-O-R-S-E McDonalds commercial barely over the ribbiting Budweiser frogs. Golden: Its hard to top the Budweiser Clydesdales playing football with the cowboys iconic line after a successful field goal hoof boot. They usually go for two, he said. 7. Bohls: Dallas first has to sign Demarcus Lawrence but should pounce on Jadaveon Clowney (although the Texans might franchise him) before drafting tight end Irv Smith or Noah Fant. Houston has to keep Clowney and go hard after Carolinas Daryl Williams, one of the best tackles in the game, as well as Rams guard Roger Saffold. Golden: The Seahawks arent going to extend safety Earl Thomas after he broke his leg. He wants to play for Dallas. Easy call. Houston should throw a truckload of cash at running back LeVeon Bell. Imagine that offense with Bell, Deshaun Watson and Deandre Hopkins. 8. Bohls: Yes, though he could get an extra ring for his efforts. But he could have had the Colts' job and a rejuvenated Andrew Luck with a great offensive line and an emerging defense. Golden: I dont think so. I have believed for some time that Belichick is ready to end his wildly successful partnership with Brady and owner Robert Kraft. McDaniels is the next coach. Thats why he stuck around. 9. If Brady's the G.O.A.T., who's No. Bohls: As much as I love John Elway, my favorite quarterback, Id go with four-time Super Bowl winner and third-round draft pick Joe Montana, whose first wife at Notre Dame once showed me around the South Bend campus. Golden: Joe Montana is the G.O.A.T. with Brady second. Joe Cool was more money than Chase Bank with four Super Bowl titles in four appearances. He holds the record for most career Super Bowl passes without an interception (122) and is the highest-rated Super Bowl passer ever (127.8). Bohls: Give me the resurgent Colts against the equally resurgent Bears. Golden: Off the top of the dome, Ill go with the Kansas City Chiefs and the Los Angeles Rams. | https://www.statesman.com/sports/20190201/are-we-finally-seeing-end-of-super-bowl-road-for-brady-pats |
Will groundhog give good news for winter sufferers? | PUNXSUTAWNEY, Pa. As the Midwest and East Coast try to recover from this weeks dangerous Arctic blast, Pennsylvanias most famous groundhog is gearing up to reveal whether an early spring is on the way or if winter will stick around. Members of Punxsutawney (puhnk-suh-TAW-nee) Phils top hat-wearing inner circle plan to reveal their forecast at sunrise on Saturday. The festivities have their origin in a German legend that says if a furry rodent casts a shadow on Feb. 2, winter continues. If not, spring comes early. In reality, Phils prediction is decided ahead of time by the group on Gobblers Knob, a tiny hill just outside Punxsutawney. Thats about 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. | https://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/will-groundhog-give-good-news-for-winter-sufferers |
Why are we so coy about sex education for gay teens? | For novelist Lev Rosen, school sex ed involved putting condoms on fruit. We need to be much more creative and fun, he argues When I was 13 years old, when I knew I was queer but wouldnt be saying so for a year, I remember some boys at school during lunch talking about gay sex. They called it gross, they laughed about it. Thats what I heard from my peers about the topic. I heard nothing from my teachers; I wasnt about to ask my parents; and the gay people on TV never did more than peck each other on the lips. Sex education for teens is one of those topics we tend to dance around. No one wants to talk to them about sex. It sounds pervy to tell kids how to have sex as if youre ruining their innocence or, worse, grooming them. I dont know what your sex education was like, but I remember mine: it was putting condoms on bananas. Fun fact about bananas: theyre all genetically identical. Every banana youve eaten is the same as every other banana youve eaten. And many of the sex-education classes taught today are exactly the same as the one I attended more than a decade ago. Condoms on bananas, STDs, reproduction no talk of pleasure or consent, much less gay sex. The message is clear across all media: gays have to be kept sexless because theyre already too much about sex So, I wrote a novel for teens that features guides to oral sex, anal sex, and basic BDSM. I didnt do this just so people had someone new to send hate mail to; I did it because teens have heard all this already from TV, playground talk, and online porn. Even sheltered teens already have some idea about how sex works; pretending they dont isnt going to help anyone. And while not all of them want to try these things, those who do, need to know how to do it safely, and with consent. Instead, they learn all of that from the media. In most media aimed at teens, queer men tend to be sweet and sexless. Youve seen or read the gay best friend character who talks about how hot guys are but never touches one. Or youve experienced mainstream gay romance with gentle kissing, hand-holding, maybe a hug (fully clothed). Even when they get to say what they want, these boys on TV or in film rarely long for more than a kiss and a cuddle. We never see the mimed, under-the-covers sexy-and-shirtless making-out that our straight peers are treated to. Straight teens get to have sex on TV. Gay ones, not so much. Theres this thing I call the glass closet: the idea that liberal-minded, well-meaning folks who genuinely dont think they have a problem with queer people tend to confine them to a rigid definition of good queerness. For women, this means not going too butch, usually. For men, it means not going too femme, and also, not being too slutty. Thats way too gay. Society likes to keep gay teens sexless. It likes to maintain that gay content (even something non-sexual, like the representation of gay parents) is inappropriate for childrens TV or books. Those who complain say its too adult implying that queerness, essentially, is all about sex, while straightness is just what a normal relationship looks like. Its a weird dichotomy: straight people holding hands are non-sexual, while queer people holding hands is somehow the same as broadcasting pornography. The message is clear across all media: gays have to be kept sexless because theyre already too much about sex. And so, if all the gay teenagers on our screens are portrayed as good gays, kept safely in the confines of the glass closet, and sex-ed doesnt discuss more than bananas and STDs, then real queer teens turn to the one place they can see their desires: porn. If you havent seen any gay (male) porn, let me describe most of it: everything is clean and polished (yes, even most of the dirty stuff). Everyone has lots of vocal fun. No one ever flags until they finish. Of course, porn is fantasy, and the men in these videos do massive prep for these scenes. It looks much easier than it is thats half the fantasy. And as fantasy, its fine. But as a primary source of education, gay porn leaves young queer men with an idealised, routine set of acts that suggest a (wrongly) regimented set of requirements for real queer sex. Standardised sexual imagery, it turns out, is just bananas with abs. The lesbian sex in mainstream porn is designed for male visual pleasure. So queer women have to navigate male sexuality Ive also spoken to queer women about their sexual education. They didnt always go to porn for their sex-ed, but they didnt find it at school or home either. Those who did look for it in porn had the additional problem that the fantasy being presented wasnt even being presented for them. Many young women will encounter lesbian sex through mainstream porn, says Allison Moon, sex educator and author of Girl Sex 101. This means everyone, not only girls, can get some very wrong ideas about lesbian sex, because the lesbian sex in mainstream porn is designed for male visual pleasure. So queer women have to navigate male sexuality whether or not it interests them. And that leaves queer teens in sex-education classes in an awkward place. Straight teens can ask about things theyve seen on TV, they can apply condoms-on-bananas to what they learn from the media, and come away with a basic framework of sex. Queer teens can only turn to porn. The good news is that, in some places, things are changing. When I contacted my old high school to find out how the condom bananas were going, I spoke to the director of health and wellness about how the sex-education curriculum has changed, and how its about to change even further. We can do better, and were on the cusp, she told me, before going into future plans: a curriculum that covers the usual safe-sex issues, but also talks about consent, healthy relationships, porn literacy and queer sex. I was thrilled to hear it. I may have even become a little teary, thinking about a class of young queer people who get a real sexual education that applies to them. But not every school does this. And they need to, because queer people are everywhere. Weve made strides in acceptance, but today I still see gay men in their 20s and 30s online saying they dont know how things work. I get emails from men saying my book taught them things they wish they had learned as a teen. Teens today tell me that its so nice to hear someone talk about gay teens having sex, about how they feel, as though, even if theyre out, theyre still not allowed to act on their desires or are unsure how. Right now, teenagers choices for learning are two extremes (the good gay or the bad gay) neither of which is helpful. Either way, these teens end up feeling as if theyve done something wrong. And we can fix that so easily. Just start talking about it, teaching it. We do it with straight sex. We can fix this the way we can fix most things in life: just gay it up. What gay teens should watch and read Another Gay Movie (2006) A raunchy teen sex comedy about four gay guys trying to lose their virginity before graduating. There are gross sex gags, some nudity, and the pressure to lose ones virginity is problematic, but if you wanted a queer male version of the American Pie movies (or the more recent Blockers), this is it. I Killed My Mother (2009) A French-Canadian film that features young gay men having fun, sexy sex without being porn like many of the straight teens you see on TV today. Release, by Patrick Ness There are plenty of graphic, but beautifully wrought sex scenes in this book about a queer teen trying to find some freedom for himself in a small American town and with his deeply religious family. Under The Lights, by Dahlia Adler This fun romp on the set of a Hollywood television show has explicit lesbian sex behind the scenes, as the character deals with who shes playing on TV, and who she is when shes with her publicists daughter. Princess Cyd (2017) In this quiet and beautiful film about a teen girl (Cyd) spending the summer with her aunt, theres one great scene between Cyd and Katie, who is a little bit boy (and played by a non-binary actor). Its exactly the sort of sex we should be seeing everywhere. Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts) by LC Rosen is published in paperback by Penguin on 7 February at 7.99. To order a copy for 6.99, go to guardianbookshop.com. | https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/feb/02/why-are-we-so-coy-about-sex-education-for-gay-teens |
Is deep freeze the latest sign climate change is accelerating? | Hundreds of thousands of fish have choked during Australias hottest month since records began, swathes of the United States is colder than the north pole, new ruptures have been found in one of the Antarctics biggest glaciers and there are growing signs the Arctic is warming so fast that it could soon be just another stretch of the Atlantic. And so the new year is carrying on where the old one left off, with growing signs climate disruption is accelerating at a more destructive rate than many scientists predicted. The US deep freeze, which has plunged temperatures in Minnesotato -50C (-58F), may appear to have little in common with the searing heatwave that cooked Marble Bar, Australia, in 49.1C. But the extremes are consistent with theories about how increasing human emissions change major weather systems. Polar vortex: cold that has killed at least 21 to give way to 'spring-like' weather Read more As carbon builds in the atmosphere, the planet warms and the ice caps melt, so the temperature gradient between the equator and the poles flattens out. Although the science is not yet conclusive, many scientists believe this is weakening the jet streams, which are important drivers of weather systems. During the summer, this means high-pressure fronts linger for longer causing heatwaves such as those in parts of the northern hemisphere last May, June and July, and in the southern hemisphere over the past two months. During the northern winter, it loosens the polar vortex, which lets the warmer southern air in, causing the freakishly high Arctic temperatures recorded last winter, and allows the frozen air out, which is being seen in the US. This also manifested itself last year in Europe as the Beast from the East. Despite seasonal ups and downs, the overwhelming global trend is towards higher temperatures. Last month, the Copernicus Climate Change Service, the European institute that gathers satellite data, was the latest institution to confirm the past four years have been the warmest recorded. Dramatic climatic events like the warm and dry summer in large parts of Europe or the increasing temperature around the Arctic regions are alarming signs to all of us, said Jean-Nol Thpaut, the head of Copernicus Climate Change Service. Only by combining our efforts, can we make a difference and preserve our planet for future generations. In October, the United Nations top climate science body the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that North America and Australia were among the areas likely to feel the impact of significant rises in extreme heat. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A fire raging in the Bunyip state park near Labertouche in Australia. Photograph: William West/AFP/Getty Images Bob Ward of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, said: It is very important to note that, despite the cold weather, there is a very clear trend in the United States and Canada of winters becoming warmer, as they are around the world. It is a reminder that part of the challenge of climate change is that many of the impacts may be unexpected and unprecedented. Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are now higher than they have been on Earth for millions of years. Modern humans have only been around for about 200,000 years, so we have no historical or even evolutionary experience of the climate that we are creating. That is why nobody can claim with confidence that we will be able to cope with all the impacts that everyone can see are developing around the world, including more extreme droughts, heavy rainfall, and heatwaves, disappearing glaciers and ice caps, rising sea levels and acidifying oceans. | https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/02/deep-freeze-latest-sign-climate-change-is-accelerating |
Why are we sending foreign aid to Mexico? | U.S. Border Patrol agents stand in front of a secondary fence in San Diego. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell) I strongly object to the $10.6 billion foreign aid package slated for Mexico, a country that does little to stem the flood of illegals through their country and to our southern border. Lets use part of this $10.6 billion to build the wall and the rest to hire more Border Patrol officers. Ask the experts what they need to assist in controlling the number of illegals coming across our borders. They will tell you what they told the president: They need the wall. We are now in the 21st century. It is time to shut down our 18th-century laws, specifically as they apply to anchor babies. | https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/letters/why-are-we-sending-foreign-aid-to-mexico-1588060/ |
Where is our humanity at the southern border? | Our status on the worldwide stage is being judged every day that we treat humans as animals when all they are seeking is asylum and an opportunity for a better life. REUTERS/Ross D. Franklin/Pool/File Photo It is past time to stop incarcerating immigrants in these prison-like facilities. This reflects poorly on us as a nation, and we should be ashamed for allowing it to happen and to continue. Children should not be separated from their families, and facilities should be livable, not abominable. It has already been reported that thousands more migrant children have been separated from their families than previously known, and the mental anguish and torment may never be forgotten by these innocents. Our status on the worldwide stage is being judged every day that we treat humans as animals when all they are seeking is asylum and an opportunity for a better life. The time is upon us to correct the errors of this administration and to stand proud as Americans and stop what is being done to benefit the wealthy and frighten the poor. | https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/letters/where-is-our-humanity-at-the-southern-border-1588064/ |
Are gas stoves as good as woodburners? | Woodburning stoves are seen as bad for the environment, so were looking at coal- or log-effect ones Every week a Guardian Money reader submits a question, and its up to you to help him or her out a selection of the best answers will appear in next Saturdays paper. Now that woodburning stoves are seen as the devil, weve been looking at realistic coal- or log-effect gas stoves but prices vary hugely and then theres the installation cost. Email your suggestions to [email protected] or write to us at Money, the Guardian, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU | https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/feb/02/gas-stoves-woodburning-stoves-environment |
Is the Favourite historically accurate? | As Oscar season hots up, the frontrunner in several categories is The Favourite, Yorgos Lanthimoss marvellously mad film about jostling for power in Queen Annes court. The films success represents Olivia Colmans elevation to the highest echelons of the movie hierarchy, but if it wins big on 24 February it will also mean a return to favour for a genre largely ignored by the Academy in recent years: the period drama. Back in the olden days say, the mid-1990s period dramas were the perfect career move for actors who feared a fluffy romcom might be too risque. Many actors established their Oscar calibre with an Austen adaptation (Gwyneth Paltrow, Keira Knightley, Kate Winslet), a Merchant Ivory production (Helena Bonham Carter, Hugh Grant, Daniel Day-Lewis) or royal biopic (Cate Blanchett). Meanwhile, at the box office, these films have been the meat and potatoes of British film reliable, traditional, unexciting for about as long as the industry has existed. Then, about 10 years ago, period dramas started getting weird very weird. Screaming the F-word at a string quartet from a palace window weird, or holding a catered birthday party for your 17 bunny-babies weird. While Lanthimos is about to get the glory, this tone-change was pioneered mostly by a handful of female directors. Period drama had always been unusually interested in womens inner lives, but films such as Sofia Coppolas post-punk Marie Antoinette (2006), Jane Campions dreamy Keats biopic Bright Star (2009) and Andrea Arnolds influential Wuthering Heights (2011) took that further. They eschewed the conventions that had long defined the genre in pursuit of a more direct expression of characters thoughts and feelings. Often this involved a rejection of the traditional trappings of romantic drama, as in the 2014 Austrian film Amour Fou, which recounts the real-life story of the suicide pact (or murder-suicide) of 19th-century German poet Heinrich von Kleist and his lover Henriette Vogel. In writer-director Jessica Hausners deadpan telling, theres no mistaking the vanity that motivates Heinrichs supposedly grand, romantic gesture. Lady Macbeth review brilliantly chilling subversion of a classic | Peter Bradshaw's film of the week Read more And if you were shocked by The Favourites fruity language, then you must have missed 2016s Lady Macbeth, a pared-back adaptation of Nikolai Leskovs 1865 novella, relocated to 19th-century Northumberland, in which a stifled young bride (played by Florence Pugh) rails against her oppression with murderous consequences. In it, director William Oldroyd replaced the usual chaperoned tea parties, averted gazes and stuttering proposals with a different kind of courtship ritual. That is, if you can call the rutting that unites Florence Pughs character and a local farmhand courtship. It annoys historians, but laypeople do continue to derive their impressions about the past largely from film and television drama. This can mean that when we watch a historical film were not seeing an accurate depiction of times gone by, nor even a film-makers take on times gone by; were watching a film-makers take on films gone by. The period dramas that attempt to disrupt that misinformation cycle do so partly by depicting the grubby texture of everyday life before the advent of antibiotics and washing detergent. So, when the words This Mud Stinks appear on screen in The Favourite, its as much a mission statement as it is a chapter heading: period dramas are to be defined by frilliness and formality no longer. Accuracy per se isnt the goal; as co-screenwriter Tony McNamara told the LA Times: No one knows how anyone spoke back then. That was the thing about the dialogue I dont know how they spoke, so it doesnt matter to me how they spoke. I wasnt trying to mimic something. Its how I imagined they would speak. And most of all, we wanted it to be funny. That said, the effect of this explicitness isnt merely to make the films more relevant for contemporary audiences. In the case of The Favourites lesbian love triangle, at least, there is also some factual basis. What I can tell you is that people at the time thought that Queen Anne and the Duchess of Marlborough were [lovers] and this was a line of attack that was used by their political enemies, so thats one thing, says historian Lucy Worsley, who is curating an exhibition of The Favourites Oscar-nominated costumes at Kensington Palace and Hampton Court Palace. Another thing is that people were very much sharing beds the whole time; that was a standard way of sleeping. Its all very difficult to define, isnt it? she says. I sound like a millennial! Millennial trendiness might also be detected in another characteristic aspect of the new period drama: their increasingly diverse casting. This challenge to Hollywoods long-entrenched habit of whitewashing history is, however, overdue. In his barnstorming speech on diversity at the 2016 London film festival, Selma star David Oyelowo described the difficulty he had getting a biopic of the black, 19th-century, bare-knuckle boxer Bill Richmond into production. One rejection letter summed up the limiting view of the time that British period drama should offer viewers a treat by depicting either a familiar title or a piece of history which is ripe for a revisit. Oyelowos project is yet to be greenlit, but in the meantime Mary Queen of Scots and Lady Macbeth feature roles for black British actors, and 2018s Victoria & Abdul joined Amma Asantes 2013 film Belle on the shortlist of British period dramas with non-white leads. This, too, can be justified by historical record (Onyekas book Blackamoores documents a significant presence of dark-skinned people in Tudor England, for example), but as Worsley points out, thats rather missing the point: Feature films are not accurate historical sources its a very common misconception but they are entertainment. They are not a guide to the past. Theyre a source of wisdom rather than knowledge, and theyre about emotion rather than fact. Perhaps its no coincidence, then, that the emergence of new period drama roughly coincides with an explosion of academic interest in the history of emotion, a research field that Worsley enthusiastically describes as what all the cool-kid historians are working on. The website for the 2008-founded Centre for the History of Emotions at the Max Planck Institute in Berlin describes their work as resting on the assumption that emotions feelings and their expressions are shaped by culture and learnt in social contexts [and are] thus historically variable and open to change. The answers are as varied as the films, but one thing is obvious: in all its sweary, smutty, oddball glory, period drama is now far from cinemas safe bet and all the better for it. | https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/feb/02/bed-hopping-and-bunnies-the-favourite-and-the-radical-remake-of-the-period-drama |
Will Trump's China Trade Deal Amount to More than a Hill of Beans? | In Data Sheet last month, I predicted Donald Trump and Xi Jinping would agree on a trade deal this yearand that it would do little to ease long-term tensions in the US-China relationship. In the wake of Trumps White House meeting Thursday with Chinese vice-premier Liu He, that seems like a pretty safe bet. In the brief encounter (the full transcript is here), Trump telegraphed so clearly his eagerness to get to yes that he all but offered Liu the Resolute desk. He touted the biggest deal ever made; suggested hes willing to waive his own March 1 deadline for getting a deal done; gushed repeatedly over the prospect of headline-grabbing Chinese purchases of US soybeans and other farm products to narrow the bilateral trade deficit (Thats a lot of soybeans. Thats really nice.); and said next-to-nothing about hard-to-enforce commitments to widen market access for or protect the intellectual property rights of American companies. Trump also hinted hes open to cutting a side deal involving Huawei Technology as part of a grand trade bargain. Earlier in the day, Trump tweeted that he wants to close the deal personally. The Wall Street Journal reports Trump responded enthusiastically to a Chinese proposal that he meet with Xi in the Chinese resort island of Hainan following his planned summit with North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, in late February. Its almost impossible to imagine Trump would travel all the way to Hainan without signing some kind of agreement. Former Reagan economic adviser Martin Feldstein, in a recent essay entitled There is no Sino-American Trade War, argues fixating on the trade balance only plays into Chinas hands, making it easier for Beijing to buy its way out of concessions on issues that really matter: US access to Chinas market and Chinese theft of American technology. The basic economic fact, Feldstein observes, is that the overall US global trade imbalance is the result of economic conditions in the US the excess of investment over savings. If the Chinese bought enough US goods to eliminate the bilateral imbalance, the US imbalance would merely shift to other countries, without reducing the overall imbalance. Later in the day, the White House released a statement listing seven negotiating points with China, including technology transfer, intellectual property, obstacles to American business in China, commercial cyber theft, subsidies for state-owned enterprises, obstacles for American trade to China and currency concerns. The statement stresses: The purchase of United States products by China from our farmers, ranchers, manufacturers, and businesses is a critical part of the negotiations. More China news below. | http://fortune.com/2019/02/02/will-trumps-china-trade-deal-amount-to-more-than-a-hill-of-beans/ |
Is Under Armour a Buy? | Under Armour (NYSE: UAA) (NYSE: UA) has taken investors on a volatile ride in recent years. Shares of the athletic apparel and footwear company have risen nearly 50% in the past 12 months but are still down more than 50% compared to three years ago. Let's find out. A massive market opportunity Despite years of rapid expansion, Under Armour has long runways for growth still ahead. Within the $280 billion athletic apparel and footwear market, the company is targeting what it refers to as "focused performers." These are consumers who care deeply about maximizing their athletic and fitness performance. Under Armour estimates this market to be as large as $92 billion worldwide. This represents a sizable long-term growth opportunity for a business that generated $5.2 billion in revenue over the past year. A very fit and muscular man jumping rope. More Under Armour is refocusing its brand to better serve athletes -- and those who aspire to become them. Image source: Getty Images. Refocusing on its core customer Under Armour believes that its brand resonates well with hardcore fitness enthusiasts. To strengthen this connection, it's repositioning itself as a "human performance company." After attempting to expand into the athleisure segment with only moderate success, Under Armour is reducing its product lineup and strengthening its focus on items that it believes give its customers a competitive edge. Adapting to shifting retail trends Additionally, Under Armour is reducing its reliance on wholesale distribution partners and expanding its direct-to-consumer sales channels, such as its e-commerce websites. This is partly out of necessity, as the recent bankruptcies of sports-apparel retailers such as Sports Authority have taken a toll on Under Armour's results. However, it also gives Under Armour a more direct connection with its customers, which can help it better control its brand image. It should also give the company more data that it can use to better target its promotions, thereby boosting the return on its advertising investments. Intriguing international expansion prospects Looking ahead, much of Under Armour's growth will likely come in international markets. The rapid growth of the middle class and a corresponding increase in purchasing power for consumers in massive emerging markets such as China are fueling demand for higher-quality apparel. In turn, Under Armour expects to grow its international revenue by as much as 19% annually over the next half-decade. Challenges remain Still, while its international expansion prospects look intriguing, Under Armour's growth remains sluggish in its core North American market. The company's traditional retail partners are struggling as sales migrate to online channels. Although this is benefiting Under Armour's e-commerce business, it's hurting its brick-and-mortar sales, which comprise a larger percentage of its business. In turn, Under Armour expects to deliver only low-single-digit sales growth in North America over the next five years. A less-than-ideal price Despite these challenges, Under Armour's shares trade at a premium price. The stock is currently changing hands at more than 60 times Wall Street's earnings estimates for 2019. That's a bit rich -- even for a company that's projected to grow its profits by 40% annually over the next five years -- particularly since Under Armour has a history of issuing overly optimistic financial targets. | https://news.yahoo.com/under-armour-buy-113000432.html |
Is Tesla a Buy? | Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) may be the most hotly debated stock on the market. And in early 2019, the debate has reached a fever pitch. The company ended 2018 with 90,700 deliveries in the fourth quarter, and it already plans a production expansion in the Chinese market. As good as growth is, Tesla has struggled to make as much money as it needs to in the long term, and hasn't come anywhere near making the $35,000 Model 3 that investors were promised. With billions in debt coming due in the next year, Tesla faces a future that is far from certain, and investors have a lot to think about before buying the stock. Tesla Model S driving on oceanside highway. More The Tesla Model S. Image source: Tesla. Tesla's growth machine is in full swing The ramp-up of Model S, Model X, and Model 3 production has driven a massive growth curve for Tesla, as you can see below. But revenue growth doesn't mean Tesla is making money. TSLA Revenue (TTM) Chart More TSLA Revenue (TTM) data by YCharts You can see that Tesla has burned through billions of dollars over the past five years, mainly to build the Gigafactory in Nevada and its Fremont, California, factory. If Tesla stopped investing in growth, it could eventually generate positive free cash flow, but here's where the company's fundamentals and continued investment complicate the investment thesis. Tesla isn't making as much money as it hoped When Tesla announced that it was laying off 7% of its workforce, it wasn't the layoffs that worried investors. It was Elon Musk's admission that Tesla is nowhere near making the Model 3 for a cost that would allow a $35,000 version and/or a 25% gross margin that Musk has long been projecting. You can see below that the ramp-up of the Model 3 has coincided with a drop in gross margins -- and that's despite Tesla selling only high-priced, high-margin Model 3s thus far. | https://news.yahoo.com/tesla-buy-120400150.html |
What if Apple ran social media would it pry? | The idea seemed simple enough. An app to learn more about mobile users habits, what websites they visit, what they shop for on Amazon and the like. Except that the way Facebook went about fishing for users data, which blew up this week when it was revealed the social network did an end run around Apple's policies, wasn't kosher. Apple kicked Facebook out. (It did the same thing with Google this week as well, but that's another story. More on both in a minute.) Apple and Facebook have a totally different way of looking at our information. Facebook appears to covet every morsel it can gather about us, as a way of selling targeted advertising. Apple says it doesn't want to know and makes a big deal of saying it doesn't monitor your keystrokes on the iPhone, Siri searches or mapping routes. "Every Apple product is designed from the ground up to protect that information," the company says. Apple warned investors that revenue would come in lower than expected for the quarter. (Photo: Apple) Facebook, of course, sucks up our data every time we like a photo, comment on a post, share a life event, buy an item through its Marketplace, reach out to friends far and wide on Messenger. We wondered: What would a Facebook look like if it adhered to the strict pro-privacy stance of Apple. Yes, but it would be different, argues Bennett Cyphers, a staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation advocacy group. It would be one that still hungers for your data, but asked permission first and was less greedy. "You could still build the features people love about Facebook without the things that make it so invasive" he says. "That means less targeted ads and more user choice about how we consume Facebook." Remember that Apple CEO Tim Cook has made a big deal about how Apple doesn't retain your personal information. "You are not our product, you are our customer," he has said. In a recent Op-Ed for the Wall Street Journal, Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg said users want relevant ads, and to make them so, "we need to understand their interests. So based on what pages people like, what they click on, and other signals, we create categories for example, people who like pages about gardening and live in Spain and then charge advertisers to show ads to that category." In the piece, he also said users have "control over what information we use to show you ads, and you can block any advertiser from reaching you." Well, yes and no. I've clicked every button on Facebook to stop advertisers from tracking me, which is good news/bad news. I killed the relevant ads, but I still have non-relevant advertisers like auto dealers from Wisconsin, Arkansas and Colorado targeting me (I live in Los Angeles), along with a chiropractor in Corona, about an hour from my home. But again, I clicked the buttons in the security settings to keep out the snoopers. Most people don't. And despite the headlines of the past year about hacks and other ills, Facebook has more users and made more money than a year ago, it revealed this week in its earnings report. Still, Cyphers insists that in a retooled, less data-thirsty Facebook, users could still go to their News Feed, see posts from friends, with ads based on their travels and interests. Facebook doesn't have to keep tracking you when you leave the social network, via the "Pixel," code that is on over 2 million websites. (That's how when you shop for something on Amazon without buying it, you see an ad for it within minutes on Facebook. Or stop by a local big box grocer, buy something and hand over your loyalty card, and get pinged with an ad from the grocer when you turn on Facebook again. "Even if you're not on Facebook, they know what you're doing," Cyphers says. So does Google. Every time you search for something, Google notes your interest, demographic and location. When you sign in to watch YouTube and it auto plays videos based on your viewing history, it only got that information because you gave it to Google. Ditto for using Google Maps, Trips and other Google apps that track you. For that matter, so does Apple. GPS on iPhones track our every move, even if Apple insists it doesn't hold onto the information. This week Apple had its own privacy flap when it was discovered that a bug in the FaceTime video calling system could listen in on the caller before the call was even accepted. Apple apologized, pulled down the feature and says it will return Monday, working like it's supposed to, via a software update. Later this week, Apple was in the news for banning Facebook and Google from banning their internal apps. This is how both firms did end runs around Apple by releasing data snoop apps to the public, outside of the iOS App Store, and showing that you don't want to mess with Apple. Apple's response to the breaches, saying it did so to "protect our users and their data," rang hollow to the Georgia Institute of Technology's Ivan Bogost. "Apple is not a company committed to data privacy. It is a company that adopts considerably better policies than its more data-hungry competitors, but that does little to curtail the general problem." Writing for the Atlantic, Bogost says that if Apple really wanted to, it could offer a much more serious substitute to snoopy data collecting apps like Facebook, "one that could bring about a whole different world of technological experience." Beyond its short-term bans on internal apps, it could certainly go further and ban data-collecting apps like Facebook, Instagram and Google off the iPhone altogether. It could dump Google as the built-in search engine for the Safari browser on the iPhone. Now that would make a statement. (Photo: Apple) In other tech news this week: DirecTV Now lost 267,000 subscribers in the holiday quarter. The AT&T-owned service was looking to streaming to stem the tide of people fleeing from cable. Some 500,000 had signed up on $10 monthly promotional pricing, and when AT&T jacked the rate to the normal $40 monthly, many cut this cord as well, AT&T said. Google said its little-used social network, Google+, will shut down on April 2nd. That would be the day after Google usually bombards us with April Fool's Day pranks. Uber adds public transit to app as it expands transportation beyond traditional rides. This week in Denver, the popular ride-sharing app through the updated app users will be able to see ETAs for their trips through traditional Uber Pools, UberX, Select etc. rides as well as through public transportation including trains, buses and subways. In the future, people will be able to buy tickets for the bus through the app. This week's Talking Tech podcasts Talking Tech has an Alexa skill now. Hear all about it. How Apple looks to replace lost iPhone income. Apple's iPhone sales fell 15%, while rest of company on a tear. Mo Rocca's Mobituaries brings obits to life 1-800-Dentist launches new mobile site to find dentists Follow me on Twitter, Instagram and YouTube, where I'm @jeffersongraham, listen to the daily Talking Tech podcast wherever you find great online audio and don't forget to subscribe to the Talking Tech newsletter, http://technewsletter.usatoday.com Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2019/02/02/what-if-facebook-and-google-acted-like-apple-didnt-want-your-data/2748757002/ | https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2019/02/02/what-if-facebook-and-google-acted-like-apple-didnt-want-your-data/2748757002/ |
What if the poor people of all races formed a political alliance? | When Hurricane Michael ripped the roof off a federal prison in the Florida Panhandle town of Marianna in October, the inmates there were transferred to Yazoo City, Miss. Thus, the prisons employees were required to make a seven-hour drive and work in two-week stints to keep their positions. In December, the federal government was partially shut down, which meant those federal employees were traveling back and forth to work in Mississippi without getting paid. I voted for him, and hes the one whos doing this, 38-year-old Crystal Minton, a secretary at the prison, said of President Donald Trump to The New York Times. I thought he was going to do good things. Hes not hurting the people he needs to be hurting. The Rev. William Barber spoke about more than a hundred million hurting Americans in an address at Tulane Universitys McAlister Auditorium Wednesday night (Jan. 30), without (to my recollection) specifically referring to the shutdown. But Barber made sure to make this point: Poor white people have repeatedly been harmed by politicians they believed would only hurt others. Barber pastors a church in North Carolina, where, according to a 2016 federal appeals court ruling, lawmakers passed voting restrictions designed to target African-Americans with almost surgical precision." Politicians who have been ushered into office thanks to voter-suppression efforts, Barber argued, have passed laws that have punished the poor. And most of Americas poor are white. Barber began his speech by thanking his hosts for not inviting him to a Martin Luther King celebration. You dont celebrate martyrs, he said. To honor them, he said, you go to the place they fell, reach down in the mud, pick up the baton and go the next mile. When King was assassinated in 1968, he was leading what he called a Poor Peoples Campaign. Fifty years later, Barber co-chairs the Poor Peoples Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. The first goal of this is to change the narrative, he said before Wednesdays speech. Referring to the federal definition of poverty, he said, All you have to do is be single and make $12,000, and they say youre not poor. We know thats not true. In this May 10, 1968 file photo, sign-carrying participants in the southern leg of the Poor People's Campaign march through Atlanta. (AP Photo, File) AP -WR About 40,600,000 people in the United States (12 percent of the population) meet the governments stingy definition of poverty. But according to the Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2017, published by the Federal Reserve, Four in 10 adults in 2017 would either borrow, sell something, or not be able to pay if faced with a $400 emergency expense One in five adults cannot cover their current months bills, and one in four skipped a medical treatment in the past year due to an inability to pay. In his speech, Barber said that about half of Louisianas 4.7 million residents are struggling financially, but, I bet you havent had a person run for office talk about the poor. Well, certainly not in a way that suggests that the poor are deserving of advocacy, respect and public officials who will work to make their lives less miserable. Of course, politicians arent going to champion the poor because they all live in a country where everybody is (at minimum) middle class. Of course, its mathematically impossible for everybody to be in the middle, but thats the lie that millions of impoverished Americans have told themselves: that theyre in the middle, too. Or that theyre in a temporary bad spot that could be cured with a little more hard work. When I asked Barber if a general reluctance to use the word poor helps explain resistance to a Poor Peoples Campaign, he said he and his co-chair, the Rev. Liz Theoharis, were encouraged to think about a word other than poor when resurrecting Kings campaign. People said we might not want to call it that, Barber said. Imagine that: trying to address a problem you wont even name. I dont know if Barber and Theoharis ever seriously considered calling their campaign something else, but Barber said that the people theyre fighting for made it plain the language they should use: We want folks to know were poor Im not gonna tell that lie anymore that Im middle class. Im one check away from poverty. And because 62 million Americans are working every day for less than a living wage, Barber said, theyre not even one check away from poverty. Segregation, King said in a 1965 speech, is what the poor white man in the South got instead of decent wages. And when his wrinkled stomach cried out for the food that his empty pockets could not provide, he ate Jim Crow, a psychological bird that told him that no matter how bad off he was, at least he was a white man, better than the black man. The prison employees quote that she elected Trump to hurt other folks but not her is symptomatic of the disease King diagnosed. Barber is trying to do what King was trying to do when he was murdered: Bring the poor of all races together to demand changes that help them all. The poor in the South hold the key, he said. These states are not red states. They are unorganized and undermobilized states. If you change the South, you change the country. Jarvis DeBerry is a columnist on the Latitude team at NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune. Latitude is a place to share opinions about the challenges facing Louisiana. Follow @LatitudeNOLA on Facebook and Twitter. Write Jarvis at [email protected] or @jarvisdeberry. | https://www.nola.com/opinions/2019/02/what-if-the-poor-people-of-all-races-formed-a-political-alliance.html |
What's the Women Ice Angler Project? | Shelly Holland (left) lands a brown trout while Shantel Wittstruck celebrates the catch during a Janurary, 2019 ice fishing outing on Lake Superior as part of the Women Ice Angler Project. (Photo: Rikki Pardun) Barb Carey of Oxford founded the Women Ice Angler Project five years ago to help increase awareness of female participation in the sport and provide learning opportunities for new or novice hard-water anglers. The group held its most recent event Jan. 23 to 27 on Lake Superior near Bayfield. Attendees included Carey and pro-staff anglers Shelly Holland, Bonnie Timm, Shantel Wittstruck and Rikki Pardun, as well as outdoor media specialists K.J. Houtman, Hannah Stonehouse Hudson and Krissie Mason. Future Women Ice Angler Project outings in Wisconsin are planned Feb. 9 at the Milwaukee lakefront for trout, Feb. 16 on Big Green Lake and March 8 to 10 near Hayward. To become a member, attend an event or learn more about the group, contact Carey at [email protected] or visit wiwomenfish.com. | https://www.jsonline.com/story/sports/outdoors/2019/02/02/what-women-ice-angler-project/2745971002/ |
Can Disney Keep Its Momentum Going Into 2019? | Disney (NYSE: DIS) has a remarkably stable business thanks to its diverse entertainment empire. In fact, even as parts of the business, such as ESPN, have struggled at times, the media titan notched record sales and profit results in seven of the last eight years. Yet Disney is entering more volatile territory in 2019. The company faces a high bar to pass given last year's massive outperformance at the theaters, for example, while major strategic initiatives like the push into subscription streaming and the integration of its 21st Century Fox acquisition threaten to pinch short-term profits. A father and daughter eating popcorn at the movies More Image source: Getty Images. Investors will get more details about each of these challenges when the company kicks off its fiscal 2019 with earnings results set to publish on Feb. 5. Here's a look at what to expect from the media giant. The bad news Most investors who follow the stock are predicting modestly lower results on both the top and bottom lines. A big reason for that decline is the fact that Disney did so well in the box office in the year-ago period. Hit releases included Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Thor: Ragnarock, and Coco. This year's schedule was much lighter and led by Mary Poppins Returns and Ralph Breaks the Internet. CEO Bob Iger and his team said back in November that the relative weakness in the release calendar could mean far lower sales in the theatrical division and as much as $600 million less in profit. Comparisons should get a bit easier as Disney progresses through the year and releases more of its heavy-hitters from the Marvel, Disney Animation, and Pixar studios. It has a high bar to meet overall, though, after having dominated the global box office in each of the last two calendar years. The two smaller trends expected to pinch results this quarter are a spike in programing costs at ESPN, which is driven by the timing of content investments, and continued spending to support the ESPN Plus streaming app. The good news On the positive side of the ledger, look for Disney to show continued strength at the parks and resorts business, which has been flexing its pricing power muscles lately. That segment expanded revenue by double-digits last year with help from record attendance; the new Shanghai park; and rising prices, spending, and occupancy rates. All of these factors should contribute to another record year for Disney's in-person entertainment offerings. Meanwhile, investors have good reasons to be optimistic about the cable broadcasting segment, which has posted improving subscriber trends in each of the last five quarters. Sure, Disney is still watching its pool of pay TV fans shrink, but the pace of the decline fell to below 2% last quarter, from 5% a few quarters earlier. Another improvement, or even stable results, would confirm that there's plenty of life left in the company's cash-producing TV broadcasting business. Looking ahead The big wildcards for investors this year include the closing of the 21st Century Fox deal, which will be sure to trigger spiking short-term expenses. Greater challenges lie ahead in the integration of the business and any potentially large writedown charges that might occur once management has a better idea of how productive these assets actually are. | https://news.yahoo.com/disney-keep-momentum-going-2019-154700903.html |
Have Private Clouds Finally Found Their Place In The Enterprise? | In the early days of cloud computing, private clouds promised the scalability, elasticity, and manageability of public clouds combined with the security and control over on-premises data center environments. For many years, however, it seemed this promise was unjustified, as vendor cloudwashing obscured the sad fact that rather than being the best of both worlds, private clouds were actually the worst. Early private clouds, in fact, were neither private nor clouds. Many such clouds either ran in public cloud environments (thus undeserving of the appellation private) or suffered from a lack of any cloud benefits. Today, however, private clouds have taken a prime position in the pantheon of hybrid IT a mix of public and private clouds as well as on-premises virtualized and legacy environments. Early Private Clouds Fall Short The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an agency of the US Department of Commerce , formulated the core definitions of cloud computing back in 2011, including the definition of private cloud. Private cloud: the cloud infrastructure is provisioned for exclusive use by a single organization comprising multiple consumers (e.g., business units), according to The NIST Definition of Cloud Computing by Peter Mell, senior computer scientist and Timothy Grance, manager of systems and network security. It may be owned, managed, and operated by the organization, a third party, or some combination of them, and it may exist on or off premises. Private clouds, therefore, might be on or off-premises but in the early days, the goal was generally on-premises, in order to bring the benefits of public clouds to the corporate data center. Many vendors jumped into this market, putting together various cloud in a box offerings that purported to meet the requirements for private cloud, with limited success. Getting cloud right turned out to be harder than everyone thought, and such early private clouds didnt offer the scalability, elasticity, and resilience that were the most important characteristics of the cloud. Over time, however, such offerings matured. Private cloud leverages the benefits of public cloud, including rapid deployment, scalability, ease of use and elasticity, touts the recent IBM Cloud white paper How to get the benefits of cloud behind your firewall: IBM Cloud Private, but can also offer additional capabilities such as greater control, increased performance, predictable cost, tighter security and flexible management options. For the most part, however, while vendors fell short, the public cloud providers stepped into the private cloud game. An early offering: virtual private clouds (VPCs). Virtual private cloud is an on-demand configurable pool of shared computing resources allocated within a public cloud environment, explains the Global Virtual Private Cloud Market 2018 by Manufacturers, Countries, Type and Application, Forecast to 2023 by Market Research Vision (purchase required). It provides a certain level of isolation between different organizations using the resources. VPCs, therefore, offered the cloud characteristics that enterprises craved, but were only private in the sense that their network settings were logically behind the corporate firewall although physically, VPC resources shared data centers, racks, or possibly even servers with third-party cloud resources outside the private cloud. Reconsidering the Private Cloud In addition to the various cloud in a box vendor offerings, an open source effort also sought to fill the private cloud void: OpenStack. However, as I warned in an article back in 2015, OpenStack proved overly complex and poorly managed to address most enterprise private cloud use cases. Today, OpenStack is on the wane. Private cloud operating systems, such as OpenStack, are falling out of favor with enterprises, explains David Linthicum, chief cloud strategy officer at Deloitte Consulting, in his Remove Hybrid & Multi-Cloud Complexity and Take It to the Next Level: A GigaOm Market Landscape Report (purchase required). Hybrid clouds are moving away from paired public and private clouds, to paired public and legacy systems. Hybrid clouds which NIST originally defined as a mix of public and private clouds were now dropping the private cloud portion of this equation altogether. A Dell EMC executive in China concurs with Linthicums take. Enterprises are returning to adopt solutions provided by major software developer such as VMware or Microsoft , explains Felix Xu, director of Dell EMC Greater Chinas cloud business. Many of them originally hoped to avoid the control of these large solution providers by using open source software such as OpenStack, but it has turned out such open source platforms do not have resources necessary for further development of these platforms to meet their needs. The VMware and Microsoft solutions Xu is referring to, however, are unlikely to be private clouds or at least, not first-generation private clouds. VMware, for example, has been extending its virtualization environments to public clouds, while Microsoft is a public cloud provider that is offering an on-premises version of Azure. The Hybrid IT Future of Private Cloud Today, while private clouds still retain their identity as a separate offering, they are more likely to be one part of a broader hybrid IT strategy. From a customers perspective, theres a lot more options than theres ever been to break down the divide between on premises and the public cloud, explains Chadd Kenney, CTO and VP of product and solutions for Pure Storage. Pure Storage is only one of several vendors who is capitalizing on this trend. The private cloud vendors, including brands like Nutanix , Dell EMC, and Red Hat , continue to grow steadily and there are hardware-centric, software-oriented and hybrid offerings to meet every need, says David McCall, VP of Innovation for QTS Data Centers. One of the primary drivers of this hybrid IT strategy is the realization that public clouds dont meet every enterprise need and that a cloud first or cloud migration strategy need not be all about public cloud offerings. When you look at large enterprises, theres been almost zero movement to put their major systems of record into Amazon or Azure or any other public cloud, explains David Floyer, CTO and co-founder of Wikibon. Theres a realization that its much better to create the cloud near where the data is processed than move it. Furthermore, while OpenStack fell short, Kubernetes and the rise of containers generally is also having a significant impact on the role private clouds play within enterprise hybrid IT strategies (see my December 2018 article on the rise of Kubernetes). Were going to see private clouds and even multi-clouds start to increase support for Kubernetes, says Andy Walls, IBM fellow and CTO of IBM Flash Storage. Many private clouds are increasingly based on containers. Therefore, Kubernetes support is going to increase and expand, and along with that, if that becomes the de facto standard, you can more easily go from one cloud vendor to another. In the final analysis, then, the question about the role of private clouds becomes part of the hybrid IT discussion more an implementation option than a strategic decision in its own right. Its really more about the application and the outcome and transforming those things to take advantage of modern systems than a light-and-dark contest between public and private cloud, explains Carl Brooks, IT analyst at The 451 Group. Depending on the exact scenario, it could be cheaper to run [a workload] in private cloud versus public cloud [or vice versa], but it is very dependent on the workload and outcome. This workload centricity, in fact, is at the heart of hybrid IT, as workloads connect the infrastructure to the applications that IT puts in front of customers. Distinctions of public vs. private vs. hybrid eventually become implementation details that organizations can configure as a matter of policy, while supporting the changing needs of customers in the digital era. Intellyx publishes the Agile Digital Transformation Roadmap poster, advises companies on their digital transformation initiatives, and helps vendors communicate their agility stories. As of the time of writing, Pure Storage is a current Intellyx customer, and IBM, Microsoft, and VMware are former Intellyx customers. None of the other organizations mentioned in this article are Intellyx customers. Image credit: Seeweb, Karen Roe, and Jason Bloomberg. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonbloomberg/2019/02/02/have-private-clouds-finally-found-their-place-in-the-enterprise/ |
Is Lululemon Athletica a Buy for 2019? | Over the past 12 months, shares of lululemon athletica (NASDAQ: LULU) have risen 90%. The most recent surge came after an upgrade on 2018 holiday season guidance, helping the athletic-wear stock rebound from a slump brought on by a broad stock market sell-off at the end of the year. Lululemon has enjoyed several tailwinds. Athleisure (that is, activewear and sports-inspired clothing for all situations) has continued to grow in popularity, and consumers have been generously spending -- to the tune of 4.9% more on clothing alone in 2018, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. After a blockbuster run, though, Lululemon may have a difficult time repeating that same success in the new year. 2018 ends with a boom... and some stretchy pants It's easy to see why shares of the clothing company have come roaring back. During the all-important holiday shopping season, management updated revenue guidance to between $1.14 billion and $1.15 billion, up from previous guidance of $1.12 billion. Earnings per share also got an upgrade to a range of $1.72 to $1.74, up from a range of $1.64 to $1.67. Metric Nine Months Ended Oct. 28, 2018 YOY Increase 2018 Including Q4 Guidance YOY Increase Revenue $2.12 billion 23% $3.26 to $3.27 billion 23% Earnings per share $1.97 93% $3.69 to $3.71 94% to 95% Data source: lululemon athletica. YOY = year over year. The results are impressive, but Lululemon has been measured by how it approaches expansion. Through the third quarter of 2018, there were 426 physical stores, up a net 22 from the start of the year. Instead of growing primarily by new openings, the company has instead benefited from a surge in same-store sales at existing stores -- which increased 6% during the third quarter -- as well as directing traffic to the online store. Direct-to-consumer sales were 25.3% of revenue in the third quarter, compared with 21.2% in the same period in 2017. Lululemon isn't alone in the athleisure-wear category, though. Gap (NYSE: GPS) and its Old Navy and Athleta brands continue to grow their presence in sportswear, and the largest sports-only chain, Dick's Sporting Goods (NYSE: DKS), has also launched its own branded lines of clothing. Yet in spite of the competition, Lululemon has continued to resonate with new and existing buyers, both here in the states and abroad. The maker of stretchy pants and other sports-inspired clothing could nevertheless continue to run higher. After all, Lululemon has momentum on its side, both on the top and bottom lines. Even should sales growth take a breather, management has said it thinks gross profit margin on product sold could continue to expand, especially as a result of the emphasis on direct selling online and new higher-margin products such as coats and sweaters. Three young people running across a bridge wearing athletic apparel. More Image source: Getty Images. On the other hand, there is reason for investors to give pause before jumping on the bandwagon. Even after earnings nearly doubled in 2018, the stock still trades at a premium, largely because share performance matched that of earnings. The trailing-12-month price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio currently sits at 52.5, a metric that only slightly improves to 43.2 when using free cash flow -- a better measure of profitability, as it factors only for basic operating expenses and capital expenditures and excludes items such as depreciation and amortization. On a one-year forward basis, the P/E is currently at 40. Paying for decades' worth of profits that haven't yet been realized only makes sense if the bottom line continues to expand at breakneck speeds, and that's what is implied in the rich valuation. Thus, there's little room for error, and if there's any slowdown at Lululemon, the stock could suffer losses at current levels. Of course, for those looking to the long term, Lululemon looks like a solid bet on the apparel industry of the future. Nevertheless, after renewed investor optimism over new fourth-quarter guidance, the stock is too rich for my taste. More From The Motley Fool Nicholas Rossolillo and his clients own shares of Dick's Sporting Goods. The Motley Fool recommends lululemon athletica. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. | https://news.yahoo.com/lululemon-athletica-buy-2019-170300704.html |
Could Mastercard Be a Millionaire-Maker Stock? | While Mastercard (NYSE: MA) has corporate roots more than a half century old and has existed under the current name since the late 1970s, it only went public about 13 years ago. Yet in that baker's dozen years, it has delivered incredible returns. The stock price today is up more than 4,200%, and when adding in dividends paid, investors since the IPO have enjoyed an incredible 4,520% in returns. To put that in monetary terms, every $1,000 invested in Mastercard on its first day of trading would be worth more than $45,000 at this writing. There's no doubt that a few fortunate investors have been able to ride Mastercard's success to millionaire status. While it's probably wildly optimistic to expect 4,000%-plus returns over the next 13 years, the company remains one of the best growth stocks for the next decade and beyond. There are major global economic and demographic trends that bode well for the company's prospects. Man looks at light bulbs drawn on a chalkboard, one of which has a dollar sign inside it. More Image source: Getty Images. Mastercard may not be a millionaire-maker stock all on its own; frankly, counting on any one single stock to achieve that kind of wealth is dicey at best. But I have little doubt that Mastercard, as part of a strong portfolio, can help investors build great wealth over the long term. Two huge trends helping push Mastercard forward As much as Americans see debit and credit cards as nearly ubiquitous, the global truth is that cash is still king, making up the vast majority of worldwide transactions. Furthermore, even in developed economies, cash still makes up a substantial portion of payments between merchants and customers. But that's quickly changing as the global middle class becomes steadily bigger, and technology gives more people the power to use electronic means to conduct commerce. As several Foolish colleagues call it (with some tongue in cheek), there's a "war on cash" happening around the world. MA Chart More MA data by YCharts. The global middle class is set to add some 1 billion new members over the next decade, and the advent of mobile computing is proving to be a powerful confluence of events that's making electronic payments the first, most-convenient choice for many global consumers. These two trends are already driving growth for Mastercard. Gross dollar volume surged 10.2% in the U.S. and 16% in international markets last quarter, improving on already-strong 9.5% growth in the U.S. and 13% internationally in the prior quarter. Even as volume and revenue surged to record levels, management took steps to rein in expenses, helping grow adjusted net income an incredible 33%. | https://news.yahoo.com/could-mastercard-millionaire-maker-stock-170100182.html |
Will Anyone Save Black Colleges? | Black collegeswhich were founded, primarily after the Civil War, to educate black people who were shut out of most higher educationhave been underfunded for decades. That they are now overlooked for big donations in favor of wealthier schools seems like insult on top of injury. Of course, financial woes like those Bennett is dealing with arent limited to black colleges. Small liberal-arts institutions are struggling, tooand those troubles have led some schools to close or merge with other colleges in the past several years. According to Alvin Schexnider, a former chancellor of Winston-Salem State University who now operates a higher-education management-consulting firm, any institution that has a high tuition-discount rate, is located in a rural area, has fewer than 1,000 students, or has a small endowment will likely face existence-threatening struggles in the coming years. The risk is amplified at black colleges, where even less existence-threatening challenges such as taking on debt to pay for building improvements on campus are more expensive. The lack of transformational gifts means that they rely on smaller donations year after year. And when they are on the ropes, they often have to consider fundamentally restructuring their business model, whereas some other institutionsmost notably, Sweet Briar College, whose alumnae raised $21 million in three months to help keep the institution openare able to marshal resources in a serious pinch. Getting large donations is like getting a small-business loan, Schexnider told me. Are we going to be back here, being asked for money again, two, three, four years down the road? The goal, of course, is to build a consistent stream of private gifts, but donors would prefer not to provide bailout funds on an ongoing basis. Read: The limits of a billion-dollar donation to Johns Hopkins In 1986, Hugh Gloster, a former president of Morehouse College, offered a prescient assessment. History has shown that the private black college experiences a very slow death, he said. You will have an increasing number of weak private colleges lose accreditation, and they will lose enrollment, and then they will lose financial stability. He stopped short of saying that the institutions would die off, but he foreshadowed the fate of several HBCUs in the following three decades. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, or SACS, Bennetts accreditor, will review the schools appeal on February 18. Though the school may have been able to marshal the $5 million, it does not guarantee that its accreditation will be restored. The college will maintain its accreditation while the appeal process is ongoing. If its appeal is unsuccessful, administrators have said the college will sue SACS, and maintain its accreditation while the lawsuit works its way through court. Meanwhile, the school has applied to another accreditor, the Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools. Black colleges are historically important institutions that still produce more than 25 percent of black STEM-degree holders, and a quarter of black education-degree holders. But the private ones are dealing with the issues small liberal-arts colleges also facelow enrollments, smaller endowmentsand many of them are doing so without the safety net of wealthy donors who can bail them out in an emergency. We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected]. | https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/02/what-bennett-colleges-pledge-drive-foreshadows-for-black-colleges/581863/?utm_source=feed |
Is It Finally Safe to Buy Facebook Again? | Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) stock surged 11% on Jan. 31 after the social media giant's fourth quarter results crushed Wall Street's estimates. Revenue rose 30% year over year to $16.91 billion, beating expectations by more than $500 million. Net income increased 61% to $6.88 billion and EPS rose 65% to $2.38, beating the analyst consensus by $0.19. Facebook's monthly active users (MAUs) rose 9% to 2.32 billion, and its daily active users (DAUs) also climbed 9% to 1.52 billion. Its worldwide average revenue per user (ARPU) rose 19% to $7.37. Those robust growth rates allayed concerns that Facebook's privacy and security issues would impede its growth. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. More Image source: Facebook. For the first quarter, Facebook expects its revenue growth rate to decelerate sequentially by a mid-single-digit percentage on a constant-currency basis. It expects year-over-year revenue growth to continue to decelerate over the course of 2019. Analysts currently expect that Facebook's revenue will rise 24% in fiscal 2019 but its earnings will stay roughly flat. The bulls were clearly enthusiastic about Facebook's fourth quarter beat, but the stock remains more than 20% below its 52-week high. Let's take a closer look at Facebook's fourth quarter to see if the stock is worth buying again. The key numbers Facebook's 30% increase in revenue represents its slowest growth rate since its IPO, and that slowdown won't end anytime soon. The deceleration was mainly caused by the sluggish growth of its MAUs and DAUs in the U.S., Canada, and Europe. Region Q4 MAUs YOY change Q4 DAUs YOY change U.S. and Canada 242 million 1% 186 million 1% Europe 381 million 3% 282 million 2% Asia Pacific 947 million 14% 577 million 16% Rest of World 750 million 8% 478 million 8% Data source: Facebook Q4 earnings presentation. Chart by author. YOY = year over year. Facebook's users in the U.S., Canada, and Europe generate significantly more revenue than its users in Asia and the rest of the world. However, Facebook still grew its ARPU significantly across all four regions, indicating that advertisers weren't deterred by its headline-dominating privacy and security issues. In fact, Facebook added 1 million active advertisers over the past year to bring its total advertiser count to 7 million. Region Q4 ARPU Growth (YOY) U.S. and Canada $34.86 30% Europe $10.98 24% Asia Pacific $2.96 17% Rest of World $2.11 13% Data source: Facebook Q4 earnings presentation. Chart by author. YOY = year over year. Revenue from Instagram -- which wasn't disclosed separately -- also contributed to Facebook's growth, as Instagram Stories surpassed 500 million DAUs. Instagram's closest rival, Snap's Snapchat, had just 186 million DAUs in the third quarter. Furthermore, Facebook's DAU count rose sequentially in the U.S., Canada, and Europe during the fourth quarter, after declining in Europe and remaining steady in the U.S. and Canada during the third quarter. This indicates that the dip in the third quarter was likely a temporary news-driven event, and Facebook can gradually replace those lost users as long as it avoids more high-profile scandals. Rising ARPU should gradually offset slower user growth in the U.S. and Canada and stabilize its top-line growth over the long term. Stabilizing margins and inflated earnings Facebook's operating margin fell 11 percentage points year over year to 46% during the fourth quarter, due to higher infrastructure investments and a 42% increase in its headcount. However, that also represents a 4 percentage point improvement from the third quarter. | https://news.yahoo.com/finally-safe-buy-facebook-again-192100856.html |
Who's in, who's out among possible 2020 Democratic candidates? | Democratic governors, senators, U.S. House members, mayors and business titans are angling for the chance to take on President Donald Trump in the 2020 election. Hes running; he never disbanded his 2016 campaign. Democrats are courting donors, hiring staff, booking flights to Iowa and New Hampshire, writing books and vying for TV time to make their case. One year from today, on Feb. 3, 2020, the Iowa caucuses will kick off the presidential election process. Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas were the caucus winners in 2016. These men and women wont all decide to run, and the eventual nominee could be a surprise after another rollercoaster campaign. But heres a look at whos capturing the buzz right now. Yes, already. Joe Biden Former vice president Says hes most qualified to run for the office. Assets: High name ID, deep roots in party, linked to Barack Obama. Iowans like him best so far. Challenges: Hes 76 and has a long record, including some gaffes. Hes run twice (1988, 2008) and lost. Not exactly new blood. Michael Bloomberg Former NYC mayor Plans to decide this month. Assets: Billionaire businessman with progressive bona fides on gun regulations and climate change. Challenges: Used to be an independent and a Republican. Backed disputed stop-and-frisk approach to fighting crime. Cory Booker U.S. senator, New Jersey Announced that hes definitely in on Feb. 1. Assets: Has an aggressive presence on Capitol Hill and visibility on social media. He says hes fearlessly authentic. Challenges: Faces a name-recognition deficit in a crowded field; relied on big donors in campaigns. Sherrod Brown U.S. senator, Ohio Hes touring early-voting Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina. Assets: Won a third term last year in a state that no Republican has won the presidency without. Challenges: He a populist on economic issues, less so on trade. Steve Bullock Montana governor Hes been spending a lot of time in Iowa. Assets: Hired top Democratic strategists and favors an assault-weapons ban. Challenges: Hell need to boost his public profile. May not decide whether to run until the legislative session ends in April. Pete Buttigieg South Bend, Ind., mayor Announced an exploratory committee Jan. 23. Assets: Hes a gay Rhodes scholar and veteran of the war in Afghanistan, ran for DNC chairmanship. Challenges: No mayors made a direct leap to Oval Office, but Calvin Coolidge and Grover Cleveland once presided over city halls. Julian Castro Former HUD secretary Announced that hes definitely in on Jan. 12. Assets: Familys background gives him immigration/wall credibility. Challenges: He would be, at 45, the third-youngest person to become president. Fellow Texan Beto ORourke is the newest rising Democratic star. John Delaney Former U.S. rep., Maryland Hes been campaigning for the job since July 2017. Assets: Early start includes multiple visits to Iowa, New Hampshire. Promises to pursue bipartisan ideas. Tulsi Gabbard U.S. rep., Hawaii Said shes running, but hasnt made a formal announcement yet. Assets: She was the first Hindu and first American Samoan in Congress and served in combat in Iraq. Challenges: Her campaign manager quit last week, suggesting disarray, and shes under fire at home. Kirsten Gillibrand U.S. senator, New York She officially became a candidate on Jan. 15. Assets: Says its time for a woman and she votes against Trump policies. Challenges: Shes still blamed not just in Minnesota for shoving Sen. Al Franken out of office and once backed tougher deportation policies. Kamala Harris U.S. senator, California She said on Jan. 21 that shes going for it. Assets: Shes a liberal black woman with a tough-on-crime background. California has new clout after moving its primary to early March. Challenges: CSPAN fans know her, but polls show many voters dont yet. John Hickenlooper Ex-Colorado governor Hes hiring staff and odds favor a run, he says. Assets: Hell leverage the states track record on health care, environment and the economy. Challenges: Needs to raise cash to introduce himself to voters, but money doesnt readily flow to unknown candidates. Jay Inslee Washington state governor Hes not ruling out a run. Assets: Hes banking on the urgency of fighting climate change and creating clean-energy jobs. Some fellow Dem govs have criticized him. Amy Klobuchar U.S. senator, Minnesota Shes dropping hints that shes going to run. Assets: She won big in last years re-election bid and is seen in stark contrast to Trump as a calm, centrist pragmatist. Challenges: A Washington Post columnist noted her perceived lack of toughness. Mitch Landrieu Former New Orleans mayor Waiting and watching. You never say never. Assets: He has built a reputation for encouraging racial reconciliation and led a fight for removal of Confederate monuments. Terry McAuliffe Former Virginia governor Says hes obviously looking at a run. Assets: Calls himself compulsively optimistic. Backs a realistic Medicare-for-all plan. Challenges: Longtime links to Clintons might turn off some voters. Former party chairs support might overlap with Bidens. Beto ORourke Former U.S. rep., Texas Not ruling anything out. Assets: He became a star by almost beating GOP Sen. Ted Cruz and setting fundraising records. Challenges: Hes 46, which might make him a more plausible vice presidential candidate. National media focused recently on his go-it-alone streak. Bernie Sanders U.S. senator, Vermont Hes seriously considering running again. Assets: He could capitalize on support and buyers remorse from 2016. Challenges: Hes older than Biden, and some Democrats say his attacks doomed Clinton. Hes apologized for campaigns sexual harassment issues. Elizabeth Warren U.S. senator, Mass. Announced an exploratory committee Dec. 31. Assets: Her economic populism could give her a blue-collar advantage in crucial Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin. Challenges: The DNA test she took to prove American Indian heritage was widely viewed as clumsy. | http://www.startribune.com/the-possible-2020-democratic-presidential-field/505036972/ |
How have the Patriots fared against the spread in the Super Bowl? | The Patriots are 55 all-time in the Super Bowl and 53 since Tom Brady became New England's starter in 2001. The Patriots have struggled to cover the spread in the Super Bowl, sitting at 361 overall and 35 in the Brady-Bill Belichick era. New England has noticeably struggled as favorites. Brady and Co. are just 15 against the spread as favorites in the Super Bowl, with the lone cover coming in a 34-28 win in Super Bowl LI. The Patriots entered as three-point favorites against the Falcons. Check out the full list of Patriots' spreads in the Super Bowl below: Super Bowl LII: Entered -4.5, lost 41-33 to Philadelphia (no cover) Super Bowl LI: Entered -3, beat Atlanta 34-28 (covered) Super Bowl XLIX: Entered +1, beat Seattle 28-24 (covered) Super Bowl XLVI: Entered -2.5, lost to Giants 21-17 (no cover) Super Bowl XLII: Entered -12, lost to Giants 17-14 (no cover) Super Bowl XXIX: Entered -7, beat Philadelphia 24-21 (no cover) Super Bowl XXXVIII: Entered -7, beat Carolina 32-29 (no cover) Super Bowl XXXVI: Entered +14, beat St. Louis 20-17 (covered) Super Bowl XXXI: Entered +14, lost to Green Bay 35-21 (pushed) Super Bowl XX: Entered +10, lost to Chicago 45-10 (no cover) | https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/02/02/patriots-super-bowl-against-spread-brady-belichick-rams |
What Do the Patriots Eat Before the Super Bowl? | ATLANTA The conversation seemed innocuous enough, but there was a noticeable uncertainty phasing its way into Marcus Cannons expression. Oh yeah. I cant tell you. Since the Patriots dine frequently at the Super Bowl, the search for their pre-game menu seemed easy enough. Theyve been here five times since 2011 alone, which means four different planning sessions for a pre-game meal done by their current nutritionist, Ted Harper, who joined the team in 12 after time with the Armys special operations command. Stories of his custom meal plans have been reported, but the contents of those meals, save for pistachios, require a deeper dive (the Patriots declined a request to make their menu public). Like many aspects of the NFLs most successful franchise, their dining habits take on mysticism. SI EATS: How to Throw a Tom Brady-Approved Super Bowl Party The truth is, if youre looking to throw a Super Bowl party with food that truly represents the type of meal the players are eating before the game, it wouldnt take the artistic hands of Thomas Keller, or even the irreverent culinary mind of Guy Fieri. Before the biggest game of their lives, the biggest meal is usually something quite standard; something familiar. Heres what we uncovered from a few Patriots who talked about arguably the most important meal of the NFL season. The night before any game, I have some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and thats my night meal before going to bed, Deatrich Wise said. In the morning, Ill have some French toast, hash browns, a whole bunch of fruit and oatmeal. If its a 1 p.m. game thats it, if theres a later game, Ill have some pasta with margarita sauce, vegetables and sweet potatoes. Thats my meal. Wise said the foods he listed pretty much covered the breadth of a Patriot pre-game meal, though a hamburger or chicken wing might be thrown in from time to time. Nothing special, Stephon Gilmore said. We try and eat the same things. Gilmore is also a peanut-butter-and-jelly devotee and has been since college. Before a game, he might also throw in a banana. Another offensive linemen seconded the pasta option. I used to enjoy myself a lot, but now I eat healthy and my body changed, Gilmore said. You have to eat healthy as a professional, theres so many games. You have to take care of your body as much as you can. SI EATS: Sports Illustrated Ranks the Best Super Bowl Party Foods While all of the food options are surely calibrated to a players specific needs, and likely extends beyond the confines of their seemingly bland buffet, almost all the Patriots we spoke to for this story said that their time with the club has given them simple guidelines on how to handle their nutrition all the time, even when theyre not at a team-sponsored function. Gilmore said he ditched a long-time favorite, Wendyseven in the offseason. Other players said that the college dining hall and unlimited swiping meal card led to some misadventures in dieting and laugh at the way they used to be. However, as is usually the case with the Patriots, there are going to be some parts of the menu well never find out about. We have a pretty healthy team, Cannon said. You should ask Ted, he said. Email us at [email protected]. | https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/02/02/patriots-super-bowl-2019-pregame-menu-dining-habits |
Who's The Better Lakers Player At Age 34, LeBron James Or Kobe Bryant? | Maybe it's unfair to compare two Hall of Fame players. In any sport. But we do it anyway. In the case of two Lakers' greats, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, we're comparing guys who played different positions, with different teammates around them at different times in a somewhat different league. Clearly, with his five championships and all things considered Kobe is the better Los Angeles Laker. First things first. Bryant appeared in 78 games as a 34-year-old Laker in the 2012-2013 season. The best James can do at 34 this year is 65 games. He could very well finish with a 50-60 game season. Points per game couldn't be closer. Kobe finished in the spring of 2013 at 27.3. LBJ is at 27.2 as we speak. Minutes per game: Bryant 38.6, James 34.8. Field goal percentage: James .515, Bryant .463. Three point percentage: James .350, Bryant .324. Free throw percentage: Bryant .839, James .683. Rebounds per game: James 8.5, Bryant 5.6. Assists per game: James 7.2, Bryant 6.0. Steals per game: Bryant 1.4, James 1.3. Blocks per game: James 0.7, Bryant 0.3. Turnovers per game: James 3.4, Bryant 3.7. Forgive me for the pet peeve, but it's the free throw shooting that gets to me. As as fan I enjoy watching LeBron play for the Lakers; almost as much as I did watching Kobe. It's fun as hell. But I find it difficult to comprehend the missed free throws at key points during a game. And at non-key points. Kobe always made his free throws. He was simply automatic. Bryant famously made his final two shots of his 34-year-old season from the line after tearing his Achilles against Golden State on April 12, 2013, and did not appear in the postseason. James may make a playoff appearance for Los Angeles this spring and we can add those numbers to the mix. We'll update after the final game of the regular season on April 9, too. My purpose here is not so much to answer the question, but to ask it. Or to have you answer it. And to make sure that Kobe Bryant -- the 20-year Laker and five time NBA Finals champion -- is appreciated for what he did over a fifth a century in Los Angeles. James has played 35 games in purple and gold. Kobe, 1346. For perspective, I've added the 34-year-old numbers for some other Lakers Hall of Famers below. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1981-82): 35.2 MP, .579 FG%, .706 FT%, 8.7 TRB, 3.0 AST, 0.8 STL, 2.7 BLK, 3.0 TOV, 23.9 PTS. Elgin Baylor (1968-69): 40.3 MP, .447 FG%, .743 FT%, 10.6 TRB, 5.4 AST, 24.8 PTS. Wilt Chamberlain (1970-71): 44.3 MP, .545 FG%, .548 FT%, 18.2 TRB, 4.3 AST, 20.7 PTS. Jerry West (1972-73): 35.7 MP, .479 FG%, .805 FT%, 4.2 TRB, 8.8 AST, 22.8 PTS. And remember, glove conquers all. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/howardcole/2019/02/02/whos-the-better-lakers-player-at-age-34-lebron-james-or-kobe-bryant/ |
How will Pebble Beach greet Dustin Johnson after playing boycotted tourney? | In summer 1990, I phoned Arthur Ashe, a tennis player, to ask him about golf. There was a controversy raging about pro golf tournaments held at private clubs that had restricted memberships. I wanted to get the perspective of Ashe, who was a leader in the boycott by athletes and entertainers of then-apartheid South Africa. Most American athletes honored that boycott, including tennis great John McEnroe. But South Africa held a golf tourney with huge purses, and most pro golfers ignored the boycott every year to play Sun City. I asked Ashe, who was as quiet and intelligent a protester/poop-stirrer as you could ever hope to meet, if golf was the least-enlightened sport. If you dont count polo, Ashe said. He also said, By far, the most glaring exception to the (South Africa) boycott is golf. Saudi Arabia is hosting a big golf tourney that concludes Super Bowl Sunday. It is a showcase to promote Saudi business and tourism. Look at our wonderful country! Because the Saudi crown prince ordered the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in October (according to our CIA), and because of other serious Saudi human-rights violations, including abuse of womens rights, many top international golfers boycotted the tourney, much as Roger Federer boycotted a rich Saudi tennis tourney in December, saying, It was a very quick decision. Among the golfers saying NO to the Saudi golf tourney: Tiger Woods, spurning a $3 million appearance fee. At least three Americans did play, including Dustin Johnson. More Information Deep thoughts, cheap shots & bon mots ... Inspired by an email with a photo from Italy, heres an alternative to the sky-tram gondolas that Oakland and the As are proposing to transport folks to an As ballpark at Howard Terminal: Real gondolas, on the waterfront. Turn Broadway into a lovely canal, with singing gondoliers. It would be a bit slower than the sky gondolas, maybe, but a lot cheaper and more romantic. The Root website reported that when the Clemson national-championship football team visited the White House, 42 of the teams 57 black players did not attend. Of the black players who did go, most were younger players with no secure place on the team and no scholarship security. Either that or they didnt want to face a huge wall of junk food. Gotta love Patrick Mahomes. The K.C. QB went to bat for Kyler Murray after the As draft pick/Heisman Trophy winner was criticized for his TV appearance and awkward handling of the question about picking a sport to play. Get outta here, Mahomes! President Trump, talking about a border wall from sea to shiny (sic) sea, brought back fond memories of Tony Bennetts God Bless America at a Giants postseason game in 2014. ... to the oceans, bright with gold! If I were building an NBA super team, I would find some way to get the future rights to the sons of LeBron James and Dwyane Wade. Check out video of LeBron Jr., 14, and Zaire Wade, 16. They make their dads look like insurance salesmen in a YMCA pickup game. NBA Coach of the Week: Steve Kerr. No, for wearing a Jackie Robinson T-shirt to the game Thursday to celebrate J.R.s 100th birthday. One thing thats annoying at big events like the Super Bowl is the cute little kiddie reporters sent to ask questions, and everybody goes, Awww. What really annoyed me was when I realized those are just regular reporters. Knucklehead of the Week Draymond Green On Twitter, the Warriors forward mocked Utah center Rudy Gobert for crying when he talked about his moms reaction to Rudy being left off the All-Star team. (Andre Iguodala joined in the mockfest of Gobert.) Green got plenty of back-at-yous on Twitter, like, Remember when you cried to KD after you lost? and, All hail the All Star averaging triple singles. Green did some public whining Thursday night, which earned him a you-could-see-it-coming-a-mile-away technical foul with 4:33 left in the game against the 76ers, with the Warriors down by seven. Cost the Warriors a point. What Goberts tears cost his team: 0. Read More Johnson told the Associated Press, Im going over there to play a sport Im paid to play. Its my job to play golf. Unfortunately, its in a part of the world where most people dont agree with what happened, and I definitely dont support anything like that. Im going to play golf, not support them. Im not a politician. I play golf. Johnson will tee off next week in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. You can cheer for Johnson because hes a great golfer playing the sport he gets paid to play. Or you can not root for him. Your choice. Its a free country. Scott Ostler is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @scottostler | https://www.sfchronicle.com/sports/golf/article/How-will-Pebble-Beach-greet-Dustin-Johnson-after-13584079.php |
Could Toyota Motor Be a Millionaire-Maker Stock? | For the second year running, Toyota (NYSE: TM) has the most popular car in the U.S., its RAV4 crossover vehicle, which beat out the Nissan Rogue and Honda CRV for the top spot. In fact, Toyota has four of the top 10 best-selling cars, more than any other auto manufacturer. Yet despite being one of the biggest automakers in the world, Toyota's stock has lost more than 12% over the past year. A depressed stock doesn't mean the company is a bad investment, though. It could be a chance to buy a great business at a discount. So let's take a look at whether Toyota could turn investors into millionaires by buying shares today. People three people next to a river with two kayaks and two Toyota RAV4s More Image source: Toyota. Car sales taking a detour Out of the gate, Toyota is facing an uphill battle. The U.S. automotive market just managed to eke out a 0.6% gain in sales from last year to 17.33 million vehicles. Even worse, analysts are forecasting lower sales for the next two years at least. That's not just in the U.S., but globally as well. Aside from the U.S. market slowing, China is seen as the greatest risk to auto sales, and automaker profits are expected to diminish. Germany's Center of Automotive Management says, "[T]he "fat years" in the automotive industry are over for now. Rather, technological, economic and political changes are now announcing difficult times for the industry, which should significantly reduce profits and returns over the coming years." With more expensive technological innovations expected for the industry, such as more advanced electric cars and autonomous vehicles, along with an animus against gas-powered cars in numerous foreign markets, automakers are expected to face a difficult immediate future. The future, it's electric! Toyota has never been a high-growth company, and even though its four U.S. manufacturing plants insulate it from fallout from any escalating trade tensions, the auto market has fallen out of favor. Its Prius remains a leader in the hybrid vehicle market, but sales continue to fall (down 19.4% in the U.S. last year). Toyota has also failed to make it into the all-electric market. The closest it has come is the plug-in Prius Prime. It said last year it would introduce 10 electrified vehicles by the end of 2020, but those efforts are going to be aimed at the Chinese market because of the country's lucrative EV incentives. How it intends to market EVs to the rest of the world remains unknown, as is the meaning of "electrified." That can mean more than just a pure electric car. Buy a lottery ticket instead The foregoing doesn't mean Toyota is necessarily a bad investment, but it's not going to be a millionaire-maker for anyone anytime soon. Not that an investor should be trying to make a cool million on a single stock in a short amount of time, but even for those with more appropriate long-term investing horizons, it would be hard put to see Toyota stock turn into a million-dollar bet. The auto market is very cyclical and is just entering what is expected to be a multiyear downturn. Even though Toyota pays a healthy dividend of $3.93 per share that yields 2.8% currently, an investor is going to need to wait a very long time to see a million-dollar return on their investment. Over about the past 40 years, Toyota has returned around 950%, significantly worse than the S&P 500, which has gained over 2,400%. To turn a $10,000 investment into $1 million, an investor would need Toyota stock to grow nearly 10% each and every year for the next 50 years. So in the long run, it's not impossible for Toyota to be a millionaire-maker stock, just improbable. And as economist John Maynard Keynes noted, in the long run, we're all dead. Investors would likely be better served putting their money in other vehicles than into this carmaker. More From The Motley Fool Rich Duprey has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. | https://news.yahoo.com/could-toyota-motor-millionaire-maker-200500371.html |
What time does the Super Bowl start tomorrow? | The Patriots and Rams will face off in Super Bowl LIII on Feb. 3 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m. ET. New England defeated Kansas City in the AFC Championship. Los Angeles advanced with a win over New Orleans in the NFC Championship. Patriots quarterback Tom Brady will be looking for his sixth Super Bowl title in nine appearances. It's the Patriots ninth Super Bowl in 18 years. Maroon 5, Travis Scott and Big Boi will perform during the big game's halftime show. Motown legend Gladys Knight will perform the national anthem ahead of kickoff. The game will be televised by CBS and streamed online through the network's website. Broadcasters Jim Nantz and Tony Romo will call the game for CBS. | https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/02/02/super-bowl-start-time-tomorrow-patriots-rams-game |
What Does It Mean To "Consent" To The Use Of Our Data In The Facebook Era? | As Facebook has struggled to contain the fallout from its latest privacy fiasco this week, the company has repeatedly emphasized that participants consented and granted their permission for what amounted to spyware being installed on their phones to convert them into highly intimate surveillance systems. Indeed, the companys response to nearly every one of its privacy stories over the past year has been to argue that its users legally consented to its practices so they have nothing to complain about. Once upon a time, researchers wishing to collect intimate information from individuals were largely required to adhere to a standard known as informed consent. Informed consent refers to the idea that signing your name on the dotted line of a 50-page legal contract filled to the brim with arcane legal technicalities and unenforceable clauses may mean that the company has the legal right to do what they please to you, but that such practices are not ethical or moral because the individual likely didnt actually truly understand what would be happening to them. Instead, obtaining informed consent means carefully explaining to a research subject issues like the complete inventory of every piece of information that will be obtained from them, the reason for its collection, how it will be collected, how long it will be stored for, what it will be used for and who will have access to it. Most importantly, it entails explaining to the subject what the pros and cons of the research are, especially the unintended consequences and dangers they might face through their participation. Informed consent is about the idea that research subjects arent merely rows in a spreadsheet or records in a database. They are real live human beings whose lives may be irreversibly impacted by the research being conducted on them. For many decades this was the standard that prevailed in most human behavioral research. The rise of the digital era with its massive repositories of datasets free for the taking have upended all of the ethical practices that had developed over the previous half century. Once researchers themselves were no longer collecting data, but rather making use of data that someone else had collected for an entirely different purpose, perhaps without the knowledge of the subject or even against the explicit demands of the subject, those researchers argued they shouldnt be held responsible for ethical data use anymore, since they were merely using someone elses data. Even medical records and data stolen through computer breaches were suddenly fair game. In essence, researchers were able to launder issues of data ethics by using data that others had collected. It was the rise of commercial social media platforms that really accelerated this trend. As the companies began to publish in the literature using their exquisitely intimate and breathtakingly large datasets, the journals that in the past would have acted as ethical stewards and refused publication, suddenly could not resist the temptation to be the first to publish these large studies and so set aside their decades of ethical practices and welcomed these massive studies with open arms. Funders rushed to support this new wave of informed consent-free research and academics raced to get their hands on large social datasets through any means possible, terms of service be darned. As journals and funders normalized the idea that informed consent was no longer required and that mere legal consent per website click-through agreements was sufficient, informed consent has rapidly faded away from behavioral research. In todays world no academic can afford to work only with data that has been obtained through informed consent. That would place them at such a disadvantage that they would lose all possibility of obtaining tenure or promotions. Or at least that seems to be the unfortunate view that has become so prevalent in academia of late. In turn, the rise of the microtasking gig economy through services like Amazon Mechanical Turk brought this disdain for informed consent to academic data collection. An academic researcher who pays a group of community members to sit for a 15-minute interview in their university lab must go through extensive ethical review. Recruit those subjects on Amazon Mechanical Turk and most institutions require no ethical review at all in practice, considering it exempt since it is collected online. In essence, as our interactions with other humans are increasingly mediated through digital channels, we have dehumanized them from living breathing people to mere datapoints devoid of any rights, protections or considerations. Even children, once an extraordinarily tightly protected research class, can now be mass harvested and manipulated at will without so much as the most cursory ethical review, so long as they are accessed online, rather than in person. Academia has wholeheartedly embraced this retrenchment from the traditional norms of data ethics, which in turn has produced a steady stream of researchers headed for the big technology companies that arrive viewing ethics as an outdated quaint relic of history. In turn, as these researchers push ethical boundaries ever further and publish those studies in the literature, academia rushes to match this newly lowered ethical bar, producing a new cohort of researchers that head to the companies to push the bar even further lower in an endless downward cycle. The journals that once firmly condemned or refused to publish even the most minimally ethically questionable research now warmly welcome studies that lack informed consent or the right of subjects to opt out. Ironically, even the new data ethics initiatives refuse to actually talk about data ethics. Legal standards continue to be lowered as companies find new ways to redefine outside entities as partners and providers so that they can freely share our data with them without violating their legal agreements. In the case of Facebooks latest fiasco, the company has repeatedly emphasized that it had parental consent for the teenagers as young as 13 years old that granted it the right to harvest their data. Yet, when I asked how precisely it ensured that teenagers didnt just sign the consent forms on behalf of their parents and how they controlled who had access to the intimate details of children so young, the company never responded. It turns out the reason for Facebooks silence is that the companys parental consent was merely a sadly comical click-through form that did not require even the most rudimentary of verification to ensure that teens didnt just sign for themselves. It is a truly extraordinary commentary that weve reached a point in data ethics where companies now see it as entirely acceptable to treat simple click-through forms that teens can fill in themselves as proof of parental consent for a child as young as 13. The company did not respond to a request for comment. Given current academic IRB ethical trends, it is unlikely that any major US university ethical review board would raise even the slightest objection to treating this data as exempt preexisting public data and permitting academic researchers to do as they please with the digital lives of these children. Putting this all together, the digital world has undone decades of progress on building ethical standards around how the public is treated when it comes to research. It took a series of atrocities for society to agree to the ethical standards that governed research up through the digital era. It seems breach after breach, scandal after scandal has done nothing but accelerate this trend, with companies treating privacy scandals not as evidence that we need more ethical protections, but rather as evidence that ethical protections are outdated and irrelevant in the digital age. In the end, perhaps weve been so programmed by the digital world that we dont care about our privacy anymore and welcome the idea of being reduced from being human to being just a number. If so, perhaps the AI revolution is closer than we thought. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2019/02/02/what-does-it-mean-to-consent-to-the-use-of-our-data-in-the-facebook-era/ |
Are We Past the Golden Era of iPhone Launches? | Just a few years ago, Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone launch events were so popular that people were sleeping outside the stores to ensure they got their hands on one of the new models the day they came out. If you didn't, you might have to wait a month until they were restocked. But the era of camping outside Apple stores may be over. This year, Apple's three new iPhone models launched without much fanfare and to lackluster demand. For the past quarter, iPhone revenue fell 15% year over year. While the iPhone business used to be central to Apple's revenue growth, this year it weighed on the company. Apple said its total quarterly revenue declined 5% year over year to $84.3 billion. Apple CEO Tim Cook opens the doors of an Apple store on launch day 2016. More Apple's annual iPhone launch days used to be a cultural phenomenon. Image source: Apple. Reminiscing on the golden years of the iPhone launches Apple's iPhone became a lucrative overnight phenomenon the day the original model launched on June 29, 2007. The company even had to make a rule limiting customers to two devices per person. On that first day of sales, the atmosphere at the crowded Apple store in New York City's SoHo neighborhood was like a rock concert, CNN reported. In fact, the intersection around that store had to be shut down due to the number of people trying to get a peek at the first-generation iPhone. The hype around iPhone launches kept this same level of enthusiasm into 2014, when Apple announced that it sold over 4 million iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus phones within the first 24 hours after pre-orders began. Apple had to warn customers that demand for the new iPhone models had already exceeded its initial pre-order supply. iPhone launches begin to lose their luster You might have noticed that it has become a lot easier to get your hands on new iPhone models the day they launch. While Apple still had a few loyal customers line up outside its stores this past September, the lines were noticeably shorter compared to past years. In fact, last quarter, Apple overestimated how many customers would be interested in upgrading to one of its three new iPhone models. Hence, the downward revision in its revenue guidance in early January and the drop in iPhone and overall revenue for the quarter. If you were watching closely, there were signs of iPhone sales weakness even a year ago when Apple sold nearly a million fewer iPhones than it had in the same period a year earlier. The company tried to brush over this fact by reminding investors that it had still hit a new record for quarterly iPhone revenue thanks to the higher average selling price (ASP) of its newer models. If you need more proof that the golden age of iPhone sales might be over, consider the fact that Apple isn't reporting iPhone unit sales anymore. It's not necessarily Apple's fault that iPhone launches have lost some of their excitement. The overall smartphone market has matured. For 10 years, the company was able to offer big enough changes in the new models to warrant a considerable upgrade cycle. But that couldn't last forever. | https://news.yahoo.com/past-golden-era-iphone-launches-213600744.html |
Where is the center of gravity in the Democratic Party? | The opening weeks of the Democrats 2020 nomination campaign reflect the partys continuing leftward movement. Presidential candidates have sketched out an agenda of big social welfare ambitions and a bigger federal government. What the party needs is a rigorous debate about those programs and the details behind them. The planks of a progressive platform roll off the lips of the presidential candidates to enthusiastic applause from party activists, who are turning out in big numbers to get a look at the field. Many of the planks were promoted by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., in his 2016 campaign. He lost to Hillary Clinton but succeeded in making his ideas mainstream in the party. Other proposals the candidates have adopted reflect the priorities of some newly elected progressive members of the House, led by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The package includes Medicare for all, tuition-free or debt-free college, higher taxes on the wealthy and a Green New Deal. In their most expansive form, these proposals would cost trillions of dollars in government spending, or require potentially wrenching economic changes, all in pursuit of affordable, universal health care, more equality of opportunity for higher education, a lessening of the income and wealth gap and a decidedly more aggressive effort to combat climate change. Republicans have been quick to pounce, seeking to paint the Democrats as a party that has moved from center-left to radical-left, asserting that this adds up to socialism-in-the-making that would threaten to bankrupt the country. GOP strategists say voters will recoil at this agenda in the general election. They see Democratic candidates as too narrowly focused on the partys progressive base, rather than worrying about a message that would appeal to a broader electorate. Candidates, however, know they cant beat Trump without winning the nomination, and that includes catering to the liberal wing of the party. So first things first but at some potential cost. You might think that Democrats with experience in presidential campaigns would be nervous about the potential bidding war thats unfolding. Surprisingly many are relatively sanguine. Its too early to draw too many conclusions, they say. The things that Democrats are addressing are things that are genuine concerns to people, said David Axelrod, who was Barack Obamas chief strategist in 2008 and 2012. I suspect the full complement of candidates will have a range of approaches to that. As Axelrod noted, the field of candidates is far from complete. The early entrants include some of the partys most progressive politicians, among them Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Kamala Harris of California and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York. But there are any number of Democrats who are now seriously considering whether to run who would not fall as far to the left as a Sanders or a Warren. The debate over health care is one example of a slogan in search of a policy, and within the party there are a variety of views about how to improve the system. When Harris was asked at a CNN town hall in Iowa last week whether Medicare for all meant an end to private insurance, she said it would, and the ease with which she answered caught many Democrats short. When he joined the race on Friday, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey said he would not be calling for an end to private insurance. Harris has since said she is open to other ways of achieving the same goal but stands by her main proposal. The 2018 elections provide some answer to where the partys voters stand, and that is in favor of candidates who can win. In urban districts like Ocasio-Cortezs, the partys progressive wing triumphed. In other, more competitive districts, more mainstream Democrats were prized by primary voters. Electability as much or more than positions on issues helped determine who the Democrats would nominate for competitive Republican-held seats. For many Democrats, defeating Trump is the main goal. Still, Republicans could be correct, that the Democratic nomination contest will turn into an expensive bidding war that will make the eventual nominees task of winning more difficult. Right now, things might seem easy. There are plenty of applause lines to be had with broad statements that touch the concerns of the voters. In the coming months, the candidates will be asked to go beneath those top-line appeals, at which point the debate about the future of the Democrats will be joined. That is something the party should welcome, but it will surely test the candidates and the voters as well. | http://www.startribune.com/where-is-the-center-of-gravity-in-the-democratic-party/505253802/ |
Is Sibanye-Stillwater a Buy? | Sibanye-Stillwater (NYSE: SBGL) was created by the May 2017 merger of gold miner Sibanye Gold Limited (under which you might still see the company's name listed on some stock price services) and platinum group metals miner Stillwater Mining. It was a huge, transformative transaction that shifted the company's metals profile in a dramatic way. An expensive deal Sibanye agreed to buy Stillwater in late 2016 for roughly $2.2 billion. The announcement sent Stillwater's shares soaring, because that represented a 23% premium to the stock's closing price the day before the acquisition news hit the market. Structured as an all-cash deal, Stillwater shareholders got a nice bounce. But Sibanye investors weren't quite as well rewarded. Two people looking at a notepad with a mine truck in the background More Image source: Getty Images. Sibanye had to take on a material amount of debt to get the deal done. To put some numbers on that, at the end of 2016 Sibanye had $600 million in long-term debt, which ballooned to $1.9 billion by the end of 2017. Worse, the company issued $1 billion in stock along the way, enticing investors to buy the shares with a massive 60% discount to the then-current price. With Sibanye shareholders seeing material dilution, it isn't particularly surprising that the shares sold off in a big way following that sale. The stock, now known as Sibanye-Stillwater, has yet to recover. SBGL Chart More SBGL data by YCharts It's the operations that matter Which brings up the really big issue here: The pairing of Sibanye and Stillwater hasn't really created a better miner. The company's production profile is unique, at roughly 50% gold and 50% platinum group metals. However, it remains, for the most part, a marginal miner. And buying some platinum operations isn't enough to change the big picture here. Sibanye-Stillwater's all-in sustaining costs for gold (which add the cost of mining for gold to the capital expenditures needed to keep its mines running) are expected to be, at best, $1,311 per ounce in 2018. That's basically about the current spot price of gold. In the current environment, the gold division is barely profitable at best. The platinum side has been a little better, but the picture is still not great. | https://news.yahoo.com/sibanye-stillwater-buy-232000914.html |
Could Apple Ban Unethical Facial Recognition And Become The Patron Saint Of Privacy? | Apple stepped forward this week into the unexpected role of privacy regulator, banishing Facebooks ethically fraught data harvesting application from its devices. Apples willingness to stand up to Facebooks data practices raises the tantalizing question of how device manufacturers like itself could potentially help rid our devices of unethical applications as governments refuse to penalize the highly profitable world of the surveillance economy. Governments throughout the world have been reluctant to reign in the extraordinarily profitable world of data harvesting that powers the modern internet. Those that have tried have ultimately yielded to the demands of corporate lobbyists, ensuring the resulting laws have been so watered down as to be almost useless. In some cases technology companies have actually weaponized new legislation to reverse the previously strong privacy laws that had prevented them from rolling out particularly sensitive technologies like facial recognition. Our digital lives are increasingly lived through our smartphones, smart watches, tablets and other mobile devices. Companies like Apple wield near absolute control over their application ecosystems, directly approving each app that is permitted to be installed onto their devices. This was the power that Apple leveraged this past week to deactivate Facebooks entire suite of internal applications with the flip of a switch. Facial recognition has proven to be an increasingly controversial application of AI. While many applications of facial recognition do not involve smartphones, there are plenty that do, including the mass facial recognition performed by social media companies like Facebook. Apps that want to use the users face to authenticate the user in lieu of a password could still do so, as long as they agreed to use the biometrics exclusively for authentication and not for any other task. Any usage of the authentication biometric data for other tasks would result in an immediate lifetime ban for the developers from Apples ecosystem. While it would be difficult for Apple to identify every misuse entirely on its own, it would grant it the leverage to take immediate action against bad actors when it discovered them. Most facial recognition tasks are performed remotely in the cloud, rather than entirely on the local device. For example, Facebooks mobile application uploads images to Facebooks server farm where it runs its facial recognition models and tags the image with the people it contains. Apple could easily accommodate this in its terms of service for application developers, requiring them to agree not to perform non-authentication facial recognition in the cloud on any images taken by that device. In Facebooks case, such a rule would mean Facebook would not be permitted to perform facial recognition on any images submitted by its Apple users, cutting it off from harvesting the biometric information of a broad swatch of its user base. In essence, Apple users would become privacy privileged netizens, granted the right to use their phones without having themselves monetized into digital biometric models powering Facebooks surveillance engine. Of course, Facebook in particular has taught us how creative companies can get in pushing the boundaries of their legal contracts or even violating them outright. However, this has largely been because companies have faced few penalties for violating those restrictions. Even the Facebooks of the world would think twice about risking being entirely banned from Apple devices even temporarily. Larger companies could get around these rules by forming shell companies to perform the actual facial recognition and allowing those shells to be banned without impact to the parent company, though Apple could easily adjust its legal contracts to address this. Smaller startups would likely be the ones taking the risks to build illegal facial databases, but here again Apple could add contractual language legally encumbering these models from being used by any reputable company, dramatically reducing their value and permanently blacklisting their programmers from the Apple ecosystem. Given the immense economic havoc this would wreak to the surveillance economy, it is likely that companies like Facebook would respond by lobbying for new legislation that would enshrine their right to mine our biometrics and make it illegal for any company to protect us from having our bodies harvested and replicated into the digital world. Putting this all together, Apples sharp rebuke of Facebooks data practices this week has awakened a slumbering giant and shown us the power of the device companies like Apple to take a stand and protect us from unethical data practices. Likely Apple will quietly go back to the status quo, but it is worth considering what might be possible if Apple stepped forward and took a leadership role against some of the most egregious tactics of the online world like biometric harvesting for facial recognition. Perhaps Apple could become the new patron saint of our digital privacy. | https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2019/02/02/could-apple-ban-unethical-facial-recognition-and-become-the-patron-saint-of-privacy/ |
Will Venezuela oil sanctions be the silver bullet to fell Maduro regime? | Drivers in the oil-rich country fear the pumps may soon run dry as US tightens economic screw Outside a service station in eastern Caracas, the queue for fuel stretches for blocks. Drivers know that the US has leveled sanctions on Venezuelas state-run oil company and they worry that the pumps will soon run dry. Everything is going to get worse, said Toms Pacheco, who was waiting to fill his car. And these long lines are the new normal for us. The sanctions, which came in on Monday, ban US companies from exporting goods or services to PDVSA, as part of a campaign to force Maduro to step aside and cede power to Juan Guaid, the opposition leader. US refineries are also banned from buying crude from PDVSA unless the money is paid into accounts not tied to Maduro. The worry in Venezuela, however, is that the measures will only lead to more suffering in a country already mired in hyperinflation and chronic shortages of food staples and medicine. In all my years, Ive never seen something so drastic, said Carlos Fuentes, an engineer waiting in line for fuel. Read more Analysts say the goal of the sanctions is to increase the peoples suffering and trigger even larger protests than those that have rocked Venezuela over the last few weeks. The US is hoping that the huge outcry will be the silver bullet that finally kills Maduros regime, said Geoff Ramsey, assistant director for Venezuela at the Washington Office on Latin America. But as we have learnt from Cuba, authoritarian regimes can be very resilient. Opposition protests have outnumbered those in favour of the government, but Maduro has maintained the crucial support of the military by offering senior members positions in government and PDVSA. The sanctions also aim to hit those kingmakers in their wallets, although the vast illegal economies which they also run from drug trafficking to illegal mining and extortion will be unaffected. So much money comes out of the ground in Venezuela that finds its way into the regimes pockets, its hard to see these sanctions doing much apart from increasing the suffering of normal people, Ramsey went on to say. PDVSA, so long Venezuelas economic lifeline, is unlikely to be able to weather the current storm: while the country may have the worlds largest proven oil reserves, it has been increasingly racked by fuel shortages due to crumbling infrastructure. The crude that comes out of the ground is high in sulphur, which can only be processed into gasoline at certain refineries. With Venezuelas refineries in disrepair, oil is shipped to the US and refined there, before being sold back to the troubled nation to meet demand at the pumps. In the first eight months of 2018, imports from the US rose 76% to 125,000 barrels per day, according to the US Energy Information Administration. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A man holds a sign that reads in Spanish They attack for oil during a march of in support of the state-run oil company PDVSA, in Caracas on Thursday. Photograph: Ariana Cubillos/AP This is a company that has been completely mismanaged since Chvez stacked it with loyalists, said Gilberto Morillo, a consultant who served as PDVSAs chief financial officer until 2003, when Hugo Chvez, Maduros late predecessor, began the practice of staffing the company with political appointees. Morillo added that Maduro will try to court other crude buyers in an effort to alleviate the impending crisis, but those calls are likely to be rebuffed. Countries with the right refineries, like India, or countries in Africa, are on the other side of the globe shipping costs would be huge for them. PDVSAs woes could also isolate Maduro from his chief patron, Russia, which invests up to $20bn in Venezuela, experts say, of which a significant portion goes to PDVSA. Russian energy giant Rosneft has loaned more than $6bn to PDVSA. That loan is being repaid through deliveries of crude oil to Rosneft through 2019, and is dependent on PDVSAs ability to pump oil. Declining production in Venezuela last year led to reports that Igor Sechin, an influential ally of Vladimir Putin, personally flew to Caracas in November to complain to Maduro and signaled the Kremlins growing impatience. The collateral for part of that loan is PDVSAs 49.9% stake in the US refiner Citgo, and new US sanctions against PDVSA could make it difficult for Russia to take ownership in the case of a default. Rosneft also holds joint stakes with PDVSA in a number of oil fields in Venezuela. China, another vital ally to Maduro, is also showing consternation, with PetroChina planning to scrap a $10bn oil refinery in the south of the Asian superpower, Reuters reported on Thursday. Meanwhile as the fuel queues drag on in Caracas, some drivers welcomed the sanctions, even as they prepare for tough times. Sure, but they are necessary evil, said Mara Alexandra Villasuso, a video producer, as she filled up her vehicle. The government is already drowning, and if the ship sinks, so be it. At some point well float again. | https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/03/will-venezuela-oil-sanctions-be-the-silver-bullet-to-fell-maduro-regime |
Is Huawei a friend or foe in the battle for 5G dominance? | If, according to an ancient Chinese proverb, a crisis is an opportunity riding the dangerous wind, then Huawei is barrelling in on a storm force 12. Where the hurricane takes it, though, may be out of the telecoms giants control. A slew of bombshell allegations have raised troubling questions about the telecoms companys probity and revived long-held concerns about its relationship with Chinas intelligence services. The UK, in need of friends as Brexit looms, is struggling to negotiate the fallout. To ignore the mounting brouhaha risks alienating its closest ally, the United States, currently locked in a bitter trade war with China which has become synonymous with Huawei. But the UK needs Chinese technology to keep pace with the 21st century. The UK, like much of the west, struggles to know whether to see China as threat or opportunity, said Robert Hannigan, former director of the British intelligence centres GCHQ and now European chairman of the cybersecurity company BlueVoyant. Its a difficult balance. My view is that we want the benefits of Chinese technology and inward investment and we should find ways of managing the risks, pushing back where necessary. Last Monday a 13-count indictment unsealed in a New York court, charging Huawei and its chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, with Iranian sanctions-busting charges rejected by the company made the balancing act that bit more difficult. A second indictment, unveiled the same day, alleged that the firm tried to steal technology from mobile operator T-Mobile US. Huawei insists the matter has been settled. It was just another bad week for a company that is making a habit of garnering negative headlines. Not a week goes by without a UK politician taking aim. Defence secretary Gavin Williamson expressed grave concerns about Huawei in December. Last week Chris Bryant, the Labour MP and member of the foreign affairs select committee, claimed: Day by day we see more evidence that Chinese companies like Huawei are breaking all the rules and undermining British security. In December a Huawei executive was arrested in Poland on charges of spying for China, a dramatic development that the company insisted had nothing to do with its operations, a rebuttal that did little to convince sceptics who view it as an appendage of Chinas Communist party (CCP). While Huawei likes to portray itself as an independent enterprise wholly owned by its employees (were the John Lewis of China, one claimed), no Chinese company could succeed abroad so spectacularly without the partys patronage, said Martin Thorley, an expert on international engagement with China at the University of Nottingham. There are a growing number of exciting Chinese companies that could compete abroad in a range of sectors, but the CCP has made its choice, and it has chosen to retain power in all spheres to the detriment of these companies international aspirations. For westerners who struggle to understand the power of CCP patronage, Thorley offers an analogy. Imagine if the Conservative party in the UK controlled the army, the judiciary, all newspapers, the police force, major companies, all universities. It would be a very different country indeed. Huawei is a part of this network and subject to these forces, so the question is whether a company ultimately subject to the whim of the CCP should be involved in sensitive security projects abroad. Some may argue that it should but they need to understand that when called upon Huawei must do as the party says. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou faces a 13-count indictment. Photograph: Darryl Dyck/AP In the UK, however, Huawei has gone to great lengths to present itself as a paragon of corporate accountability. It hired the governments chief information officer, John Suffolk, as head of cybersecurity and its UK board is the envy of many FTSE 100 firms. Notable appointments include ex-BP boss Lord Browne of Madingley, Sir Andrew Cahn, the governments former chief trade ambassador, and, until her death in 2017, Dame Helen Alexander, a former CBI president. In addition to the links it has forged with academia, the company is a donor to the Chatham House thinktank and has funded two influential parliamentary technology committees. A former global sponsor of Arsenal football club, Huawei will achieve a rare PR coup on Monday when an unfinished symphony by Schubert, completed using the companys smartphone technology, will be performed for the first time at Londons Cadogan Hall. But its expert deployment of soft power cannot stanch the flow of bad publicity. Amid growing disquiet about Huaweis activities, UK operator BT has announced that it will remove Huaweis technology from parts of a network it acquired from a rival, a move that some suggested was down to security concerns. Last week Vodafone confirmed that it was restricting its involvement with Huawei in the UK. Huawei is already barred from supplying next-generation 5G equipment the technology that will connect the internet of things to Australia and New Zealand. Company insiders insist these developments have nothing to do with security issues, but the optics dont look good and several UK institutions have taken fright as the charges have piled up. Oxford University and the Princes Trust, two venerable organisations that have received Huawei funding, have broken links with the company in the last few days. Some 19 UK universities still enjoy Huawei sponsorship, but, given events, they may now be reconsidering their positions. More bad news is to come, on both sides of the Atlantic. The Observer understands a report to be presented to parliaments intelligence and security committee in the coming months will flag further concerns about the use of Huaweis software in the UK telecoms networks, something that will be seized upon by the companys critics, who warn that sensitive data generated in the UK is at risk of being re-routed to China. In the US, alongside its broader attack on Chinese imports, the Trump administration wants to ban US companies from using Chinese equipment in their critical telecoms networks. Some believe the administrations ultimate goal is to push Huawei out of Europe and the US, leaving America to frame the global standards for 5G. Behind the scenes, some see a level of coordination in the way the US and its allies have been gunning for Huawei. Each week theres a new hit, one seasoned Huawei watcher observed. Its really quite impressive, from a PR perspective. As China has pushed back, for one person at least the geopolitical row has become a matter of life and death. Following Mengs arrest in Canada at the request of the US, the Chinese authorities seized two Canadians and sentenced to death a third man, Robert Schellenberg, who had initially been sentenced to 15 years in prison. The decision prompted the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, to accuse China of arbitrarily applying the death sentence. In a rare meeting with journalists last month, a sign the company knows it needs to halt the flow of negative headlines, Mengs father, the companys founder, Ren Zhengfei, insisted the decision was not related to Huawei in any way. We are like a small sesame seed, stuck in the middle of conflict between two great powers, said Ren during the round-table discussion, a transcript of which has been shared with the Observer. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Chinese president Xi Jinping and president Donald Trump. The US and China are locked in a bitter trade war. Photograph: Carlos Barria/Reuters Not that small a seed. With 180,000 staff around the world (1,500 in the UK), Huawei produced revenues last year of more than $100bn. In 2017 it invested $13bn (10bn) in research and development, half what the UK spent. Not bad for a company founded in a small flat with a $2,500 loan barely more than 20 years ago. Curiously, as the row over Huaweis activities has sucked in each of the UKs intelligence-sharing partners in the so-called Five Eyes spying alliance the US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada Theresa Mays government has been strangely quiet about its position. But then, to be seen taking up the cudgels against Huawei would be to risk unpicking the years of work that the UK has spent assiduously wooing China. The dividends of this courtship are manifold. Between 2016 and 2017, Chinese investment in the UK doubled to $20.8bn, according to a report produced by the TMF Group, a consultancy, on behalf of the China-Britain Business Council. This was all the more astonishing given that, in the same year, overall Chinese outbound investment declined for the first time since records began in 2003. More is to come. Between 2018 and 2022, Huawei alone has pledged to spend some 3bn in the UK. It is perhaps no coincidence that, as Chinese money has poured into the UK, hundreds of Chinese investors have received golden visas granting them residency. And nowhere is the burgeoning Anglo-Chinese relationship more tangible than London. Two of the Citys most recognisable buildings, the 224m Cheesegrater and the 38-storey Walkie Talkie, are now owned by Hong Kong companies, while the multibillion-pound redevelopment of the Royal Albert Dock in east London is being spearheaded by the Chinese developer ABP. These projects pale into insignificance compared with the 20bn development of Hinkley Point C. The new nuclear station in Suffolk that will generate low-carbon electricity for about 6 million homes is a third-owned by Chinas General Nuclear Power Group. Huaweis cyber-security approach fell short but no hostile Chinese state activity was uncovered Robert Hannigan, ex-GCHQ But some experts question where this relationship will end. My fear is that, just as financial elite influence over government ensured light-touch regulation that led to financial disaster in 2008, so similar interests have steered the UK government towards the golden era policy with China, Thorley said. This policy has stalled somewhat since David Cameron and George Osborne left Downing Street, but we still may feel its consequences in the UKs energy strategy and beyond. The UKs assiduous courtship of China was evident in 2010 when Cameron set up his National Security Council, comprising eight committees, six of which he headed. Significantly, though, of the other two, the one relating to cybersecurity was to be overseen not by the prime minister but by the chancellor. At the time intelligence experts were quick to interpret this shift. One told the Observer that they believed the Treasury wanted to own cyber because it believed the opportunities afforded by the development of the technology should not be subsumed beneath national security concerns, a view that at the time alarmed some in the intelligence community. And for good reason. Under article 7 of Chinas 2017 National Intelligence law, companies like Huawei are legally obliged to help the Chinese intelligence agencies upon request. This fact alone might convince many that Huawei should be nowhere near the UKs critical infrastructure. But Huawei is subject to unique supervision by the UKs intelligence services. In 2010 the UK government established the Huawei Cyber Security Evaluation centre, overseen by GCHQs national cybersecurity centre, to monitor the companys operations in the UK. Staffed by 35 heavily vetted analysts, the centre flags security issues arising from Huaweis activities to government. A report issued by the centres oversight board last July raised serious concerns about the poor quality of Huaweis security engineering. As a result, the board conceded that it could provide only limited assurance that any risks to UK national security from Huaweis involvement in the UKs critical networks had been sufficiently mitigated. Another report from the board, to be published this spring, is expected to raise similar concerns, giving more ammunition to Huaweis critics, the Observer understands. However, while the intelligence agencies may harbour concerns about the robustness of Huaweis software, the centre has never found evidence of the fabled backdoors that would allow China to penetrate the UKs telecoms networks. Critically, it has concluded that Huawei falls short in its approach to cybersecurity, but it has never uncovered hostile state activity by Chinese government agencies, Hannigan said. Ren, a former officer in the Peoples Liberation Army, insists Huawei would never betray its customers. When it comes to cybersecurity and privacy protection, we are committed to siding with our customers. We will never harm any nation or any individual. The extraordinary level to which the UK has gone to accommodate a company regularly accused of spying for a foreign state says much about where the shifting balance of power now lies in the world. In the era of techno-nationalism, countries that innovate dominate. Last year the broadband comparison website, Cable, published an annual league table revealing that the UK had the 35th fastest broadband in the world, a slip of four places since 2017, one that put it behind almost all other EU member states and Madagascar, one of the least developed nations in the world, according to the UN. Huawei knows it is one of the very few companies that can drag the UK up the table. Huawei is the only company in the world that can integrate 5G base stations with the most advanced microwave technology, Ren said. With that capability, our 5G base stations dont even need fibre connections. Instead, they can use superfast microwave to support ultra-wide bandwidth backhauls. This is a compelling solution that makes a lot of economic sense. For economic, read cheap. To switch to an alternative supplier, such as Swedens Ericsson, would be hugely costly, Whitehall mandarins concede. Inevitably, the significantly higher prices would be passed on to consumers. Jo Platt, shadow minister for cyber, said UK reliance on a few key tech firms was a concern. Why are we spending huge amounts of public money on mega-companies like Amazon Digital Services and Huawei; how do we redress that? Perhaps Huawei itself will provide the answer. Amid reports that Poland is pushing fellow Nato members to adopt a unified position on Huawei, something that could make life difficult for the UK as it scrambles to keep Huawei onside, Ren promised the company would scale back if it was not allowed to sell its products in certain markets. Such a pledge would never be made by a western company beholden to shareholders. But, as Ren acknowledged, Huawei is different. We are not a public company we arent overly concerned about beautiful numbers. He was talking about Huawei. But he may as well have been talking about China. 22 August 2018 The US issues a warrant for Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Huawei and daughter of its founder, Ren Zhengfei 1 December Meng Wanzhou is arrested at Vancouver airport after US says Huawei was involved in breaking Iran sanctions 10 December Two Canadians are detained in China, four days after Justin Trudeau refuses to intervene in Mengs case 14 January 2019 Canadian Robert Lloyd Schellenberg is sentenced to death by a Chinese court for drug smuggling 24 January Huawei says it will not use US-made components for its next generation of smartphones 28 January Meng is charged with misleading US banks about Iran dealings. Huawei is accused of stealing T-Mobile US technology | https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/feb/03/huawei-friend-or-foe-global-5g-dominance |
Can Mozart survive #MeToo? | Take Count Almaviva's first scene in The Marriage of Figaro, which features the terzetto "Cosa sento" ("what do I hear?"). In it, the Count angrily calls for the banishment of the pageboy Cherubino after overhearing rumors that he's in love with his wife, the Countess. The Count's melody is, essentially, a scale the simplest musical configuration that exists. But it halts before each step upward and repeats the last pitch before proceeding to the next, as if even this most basic of constructions is too much for the Count's plodding intellect. Rhythmically, Mozart utilizes a dotted figure, a motif he generally employs to depict strength and nobility. But he undercuts this with a series of grace notes in the orchestra, which sound like short comedic "blips," thus mocking the Count's self-regard and bravado. Mozart also plays with the listener's expectations of strong and weak beats, making it sound as if the Count's first phrase finishes early. This, coupled with the sudden harmonic drama of the cadence (the kind normally reserved for the end of a piece) parodies the Count's impulsiveness, and very possibly hints at his sexual ineptitude. Within the context of an opera buffa (a genre bound by the rules of comedy and satire), ridicule is the most castigating treatment a character can receive, and Mozart goes to great lengths to ridicule the Count not only in this opening scene but throughout the entire work. Mozart's treatment of the opera's female characters is more revealing still. In the duettino between the Countess and Susanna, "Sull'aria ... che soave zeffiretto" ("on the breeze, what a gentle little zephyr / this evening will sigh") which many will recognize from The Shawshank Redemption the two women formulate a letter designed to trick the Count into abandoning his designs on Susanna. Because the letter is deceitful, Da Ponte's words are rather superficial, and Mozart could have easily written a score to match. Instead, what begins as a sweet, lilting theme opens up into a soaring combination of rich harmonies and sweeping melodies, with the two soprano lines arching over one another, passing gentle echoes back and forth. It's difficult, while listening, not to feel that this is a celebration of the bond between these two women, whom circumstances might have made into enemies but have instead found comfort and strength in their alliance. Mozart was the impetus behind the setting of Marriage of Figaro, having taken a liking to the then-banned Beaumarchais play it's based upon. But it was Da Ponte who first suggested an opera based on the legendary Don Juan. Of the two, Marriage of Figaro is the more inherently feminist story, with Susanna and the Countess masterminding traps for their male counterparts at every turn. It's also a more obvious fit for Mozart's characteristic witticisms. Da Ponte's Don Giovanni, on the other hand, is an odd mixture; at times the title character is clearly vilified, while at others Da Ponte's interpretation is unclear. As a dramma giocoso, it treads the line between comedy and tragedy, making it harder for Mozart to employ the same effects he applied to Count Almaviva without undermining the work's seriousness. Still, from the opening scene, Mozart quietly champions Donna Anna, Don Giovanni's would-be victim, as she chases him from her rooms. Mozart sets her words to militant dotted rhythms, this time without the subverting grace notes, that climb for two and a half measures before her line peaks and cascades to a resolution. Don Giovanni's subsequent answer falls after only one measure before reaching the equivalent high point, indicating Donna Anna's moral high ground and foreshadowing her eventual triumph. Donna Anna later sings the commanding "Or sai chi l'onore" aria ("now you know who sought to steal my honor"), in which she commands Don Ottavio to aid her in avenging her father, whom Don Giovanni has killed. The aria utilizes a combination of dotted figures and dramatic leaps to show her anger, strength and nobility. These figures rise in a majestic sequence, celebrating her righteousness and imbuing her character with tremendous power. Don Giovanni's arias are comparatively simpler, both harmonically and structurally, with none of the substance or complexity Mozart gives to Donna Anna. Mozart's handling of the opera's two death scenes makes for an even clearer comparison. The murder of the Commendatore (Donna Anna's father) is followed by a sad and somber interlude, set over pulsing, unsettling triplets in the accompaniment. It's followed by Donna Anna's tragic and unusually melodic recitative, which leads into her duet with Don Ottavio, set in the opera's primary key of D minor. Meanwhile, Don Giovanni's death is followed by a cheerful chorus, set in G major, a key which traditionally symbolizes peace and accord. In this final chorus, each character is given a short epilogue, taking us through several modulations and tempo changes, after which Mozart ends the opera in the key of D major the key of victory and rejoicing (used by Beethoven for his Ode to Joy some 36 years after Don Giovanni's premiere). The #MeToo movement has done much for the classical music world. It has illuminated our dusty little corner of society and begun to expose the many spiders and cockroaches we've allowed to nest and flourish over the years. But Mozart and his operas are not among the guilty, despite the fact that his works have often fallen into the hands of directors who prioritized novelty and licentiousness over the integrity of the music. Given the often feminist sensibilities of his scores, the measures he takes to demonstrate disdain for sexual offenders and respect for women, one might easily surmise that he would have even celebrated the fall of so many unworthy figures. Absolutely. When I was 2 years old I lost my voice because I wouldn't stop singing the Queen of the Night's famous "Der Hlle Rache" aria from The Magic Flute (or Florence Foster Jenkins, if you're a Meryl Streep fan). But in this case, there's also ample evidence to back me up, and I will happily share it with anyone who remains unconvinced in an agonizingly technical measure-by-measure analysis of all of Mozart's operatic scores. Arianna Warsaw-Fan Rauch is a violinist. She wrote this column for Slate. | https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2019/02/03/can-mozart-survive-metoo |
Can the arts afford to be too fussy about how sponsors make their money? | The Man Group pulled out of the Booker prize and the hunt is now on for a replacement. The true purpose of art is to recycle money, or so once said the American theatre director Peter Sellars. Its a mischievous suggestion that is a favourite with Ruth Mackenzie, the British arts director and curator. Lets face it, there are ethical issues about money pretty much wherever it comes from, said Mackenzie, speaking from Paris, where she is soon to launch her first season as artistic director of the Chtelet theatre. Arts organisations anywhere are lucky to find a business prepared to support them. And it is crucial now. These are very difficult circumstances. In the past few days the big-bucks mechanics of corporate backing for the arts have come under scrutiny following Man Groups decision to pull out of sponsoring Britains leading fiction prize, known commonly as the Booker. Its high-profile termination of a relationship that, by the time they bow out in October, will have cost them 25m is thought to have been prompted by the author Sebastian Faulks, who last year suggested the global hedge fund managers behind the prize were, in fact, kind of the enemy and ought not to be applauded by literary figures. Faulks has since denied this is what he meant, and its probable that the 18-year annual prize sponsorship was already at the end of its natural life, but in an era when businesses find it difficult to plan just one month ahead, and when arts institutions face shrinking state subsidies, corporate philanthropy is especially precious. Peter Bazalgette, the former chair of the Arts Council of England, recalls the difficulty of getting cultural organisations to seek greater support from the world of business immediately following the credit crunch: Every organisation, whether a book prize, a theatre or dance company, or a little gallery, needs to have a properly worked-out policy about whose donations it accepts. All these policies will be different, but it is very important that a board has agreed it with the executive. Among other sponsorship deals under the ethical microscope are the oil giant BPs support of the British Museum, the annual portrait award and the Royal Shakespeare Company, an arrangement particularly unpopular with actors Mark Rylance, Vanessa Redgrave and Maxine Peake. Shells former sponsorship of the National Theatre also prompted protests a decade ago, as did last springs abortive attempt by BAE Systems, the weapons manufacturer, to support the Great Exhibition of the North. Eyebrows will no doubt also rise when Huawei, the Chinese technology company accused of high-tech state espionage, unveils its latest creative venture in London, a musical collaboration that has used artificial intelligence to complete Schuberts Unfinished Symphony. It may not allay fears to hear that Huaweis European boss, Walter Ji, said this weekend: If our smartphone is intelligent enough to do this, what else could be possible? Yet it is no time for British arts to be squeamish. The chair of the governments digital, culture, media and sport select committee, Damian Collins, has called for more corporate sponsorship of the arts outside London. Meanwhile, the Arts Council of England is carrying out a major review of its grant-giving strategy for the next 10 years, with a predicted new emphasis on improving diversity and correcting geographical bias. This could mean a threat to the museums, galleries, theatres and opera houses of the capital city. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Anna Burns receives the Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2018. Photograph: Getty If so, willing corporations will have plenty of fresh holes to plug, and for Mackenzie, whose Parisian project is sponsored by the US financial media company Bloomberg, the hope remains that world-class firms will always want to be associated with top-quality art. Organisations in Britain are now very good at getting sponsorship from everywhere; local and national governments, and from charitable foundations. But the government needs to help them along, she saidNevertheless, a survey conducted a year ago by the online magazine Arts Professional detected that British arts workers are resistant to dirty lucre from the commercial world. Nearly all of those asked wanted their organisation to look carefully before signing up, while 73 per cent feared they were vulnerable to reputational damage through links with the wrong sponsor or donor. Bazalgette respects, he says, the ethical positions adopted by arts organisations, but he praised Man for promoting the book prize for so long and the Edinburgh-based investment firm Baillie Gifford for supporting the arts in its home city, as well as sponsoring the non-fiction book award he currently chairs, known as The Samuel Johnson Prize until 2015. The key thing is that each organisation develops its own rationale, Bazalgette said. Personally, I also think BP have been magnificent supporters of the arts and I would happily take money from them. I see everyone driving around in cars, so I think that is reasonable. Several arts prizes are so tightly entwined with the name of a former longterm sponsor it takes time for public perception to shift. For many, Britains leading annual award for fiction remains The Booker, in recognition of its first corporate sponsor, a food distributor. Similarly the Womens Prize for Fiction still looks distinctly Orange to some, while on the Edinburgh fringe circuit comedians continue to yearn for a prize once associated with a particular French fizzy water, some 13 years after Perrier walked away.The Edinburgh comedy prize, run by Nica Burns, has moved through several sponsors since Perrier and the key, she believes, is finding the right fit. I would say you need a sponsor who is genuinely going to benefit, she said. Done properly, it gives them a lot of brand awareness and the longer it goes on, the more benefit they get. A good match is so vital for Burns that she funded the comedy prize herself one year because you have to be comfortable with a sponsor. On the broader cultural field, Burns believes prizes are a great way to find unsung talent, but admits lengthy sponsorship deals have become trickier to secure. I could look any sponsor in the eye and say it would be good for them, but a longer commitment is hard now because the commercial world is changing so fast. Toby Mundy, director of the Baillie Gifford Prize, also sees backing an arts prize as tremendously good value. Not only is there an annual news hook for media coverage, but also a clear association with excellence. Arts organisations may have become more cautious, Mundy adds, but with a good partner the benefits are better than just cash. Generally theres tremendous asymetery between a wealthy sponsor corporation and the sponsored arts organisation, who are usually short of the business advice a sponsor can offer. For Mundy, changing the name of a prize seems a small concession to make for a corporation putting a ton of money in. Among the other corporate benefactors out there are Merrill Lynch, Deloitte, Coutts and Travelex, which until last year provided the National Theatre with 15 years of discounted tickets, and the French champagne maker Ruinart which supports the annual Frieze art fairs in London.Philanthropy, whether personal or via a legacy foundation, is a different but equally fruitful source of arts funding. Illustrious surnames such as Clore, Duffield, Sainsbury, Blavatnik and Manoukian regularly reappear across the cultural piste. Sackler has proved more problematic, with the Tate and the New Yorks Metropolitan Museum of Art criticised for their association with a family linked to the US opioid epidemic through their company Purdue Pharma. Some argue that at least global corporations, whatever their flaws, are forced to be transparent due to the pressure exerted by shareholders and regulators. Risk of reputational damage swings both ways, of course, because artists are inclined to be volatile. In 1972 the late novelist John Berger blamed Booker for exploiting workers at its sugar plantations in Guyana when he won the prize for his book, G. Similarly when Hyundai sponsored the latest installation in Tate Moderns Turbine Hall, it could not have guessed it would be drawn into a diplomatic dispute when its Cuban creator, Tania Brugera, was detained for four days on her native island. Moral implications on both sides of a sponsorship deal are increasingly soupy, agrees Stephen Deuchar, director of The Arts Fund. Fiscal propriety, personal behaviour, and even historical links to a colonial past are all now likely to be spotlighted. The ethical tide is certainly rising, said Deuchar, a former director of Tate Britain, but good models include the arrangement between Ernst & Young and the Tate. It works when there is a long-term affinity. Mackenzie, who was once Chris Smiths advisor at department of culture and is current London head for the Arts Council, thinks companies must be encouraged to see that British cultural institutions are world leaders. Whatever happens, the British Museum and the National Theatre are not moving out. They are staying where they are. And, within reason, we should agree there is no such thing as totally clean money. After all, I dont ask the people buying tickets for my shows where their money comes from. | https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/feb/03/arts-funding-booker-prize-how-sponsors-make-money-ethical-tide |
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