text
stringlengths 627
100k
|
|---|
The Hajj, the fifth pillar of Islam and one of the largest religious pilgrimages in the world, is currently taking place in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Starting earlier this week, and continuing through Monday, approximately 3.4 million Muslims from around the world are participating in several rituals, including the Tawaf -- the circumambulation of the Kaaba, the enormous cube-shaped building in the center of the Masjid al-Haram mosque. The pilgrims are are also taking part in the Sa'i, traveling back and forth between the mountains of Al-Safa and Al-Marwah, and Ramy al-Jamarat, in which they throw pebbles at three walls in the city of Mina to show their defiance of the Devil. The rituals and locations date back to the 7th Century, but much of the surrounding area has grown and changed radically over the years. For comparison, I've included several historical images of Mecca as well, dating back as far as 1889. The rest of the photos depict this year's Hajj and the pilgrims on their sacred journey.
|
CLOSE In Des Moines on Monday, at least 200 Iowans gathered to march at Mercy Hospital in support of higher minimum wages, fair union rights, and safe working conditions.
Buy Photo Hundreds of protestors gathered outside of Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines on Monday, Sept. 4, 2017, to advocate for union rights, higher minimum wage, and safer working conditions. According the the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2016 report, Registered Nurses in Iowa were ranked 50th in salary. (Photo: Bryon Houlgrave/The Register)Buy Photo
Amy Smith's voice shook slightly as she talked to 200 workers in Des Moines Monday about the need for higher wages.
Smith makes $13 an hour as a certified nursing assistant at Mercy Medical Center but must also work a second job to help her and her fiance make ends meet.
"We're not comfortable," said the 23-year-old, who wants to return to school to become a nurse but struggles to save money.
"It's an important issue and worth being a little nervous for," Smith said. "I work with a lot of moms, and they need more money."
In Des Moines and across the nation, hundreds of workers spent their Labor Day calling for $15-an-hour minimum wage.
Organizers criticized Gov. Kim Reynolds and Iowa lawmakers for a law that rolled back minimum wage increases this year in Polk, Johnson, Linn and Wapello counties and prevented other counties from adopting higher wages.
Iowa's minimum wage is now $7.25 an hour.
Protesters said the current minimum pay leaves working families living in poverty.
The event, organized by the Fight for $15 and the Service Employees International Union, was one of dozens held nationally, targeting health care, fast food and other service industries.
CLOSE House Study Bill 92 would immediately roll back minimum wage increases approved in Polk, Johnson, Wapello and Linn counties. Kevin Hardy/The Register
Des Moines area workers marched at the Burger King on Southeast 14th Street and at Mercy Medical Center on Monday. They also closed a Burger King in Ankeny Sunday night.
Cathy Glasson, a registered nurse and Democratic candidate for governor, said more than half of Iowa health care workers earn less than $15 an hour.
Mercy-Des Moines' CEO "is making over $900,000 and most people caring for patients, cleaning the rooms, cooking the food, pushing the wheelchairs are making less than $15 an hour," said Glasson, who is president of SEIU Local 199.
Buy Photo Protestors march across 6th Ave. on their way to Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines on Monday, Sept. 4, 2017. Hundreds gathered to advocate for union rights, higher minimum wage, and safer working conditions. According the the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2016 report, Registered Nurses in Iowa were ranked 50th in salary. (Photo: Bryon Houlgrave/The Register)
Sandy Doerring just finished a 12-hour shift at Broadlawns Medical Center before arriving at the protest across from Mercy.
The nurse said she's had to work two jobs for about 30 years to support herself and her family.
Iowa nurses earn an average of $26 an hour, but they rank 50th lowest nationally.
Doerring said many nurses train in Iowa, then move away to earn more.
"You can get a double-digit pay increases," she said.
Holly Muir said it's tough to support her 10-month-old son earning minimum wage at her Burger King job.
"Even $10 an hour would make a big difference," said Muir, 21, who must live with her mother so she has enough money to care for her son, QueLeone.
Buy Photo Hundreds of protestors gathered outside of Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines on Monday, Sept. 4, 2017, to advocate for union rights, higher minimum wage, and safer working conditions. According the the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' 2016 report, Registered Nurses in Iowa were ranked 50th in salary. (Photo: Bryon Houlgrave/The Register)
Mike Duttlinger said he's worked as a cook for 20 years but earns only $8.25 an hour at Burger King.
The 53-year-old said he has little left after paying his housing costs, buying food and paying for gas.
"The money goes pretty fast," he said.
Read or Share this story: http://dmreg.co/2eDLEqy
|
For the Paris climate agreement to go into effect, 55 countries representing 55 percent of global emissions had to sign up. That’s finally happened.
While 195 nations endorsed the agreement at the COP 21 climate meeting in Paris last December, those countries then had to approve them domestically and submit their final approval to the United Nations. Earlier this week, the European Parliament voted to ratify the Paris agreement, which in turn allowed the European Union and seven of its member states to sign up to the pact. Canada, Nepal, and India have all also stepped up to the mark.
And with that, the limits are met—73 nations accounting for over 56 percent of the world’s emissions are now signed up to the accord. It’s hoped that the pact will be activated on November 4.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and U.S. President Barack Obama shake hands after China and the U.S. signed on to the Paris climate agreement in September 2016.
That’s commensurate with the hopes of U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. Two weeks ago at the U.N.’s General Assembly meeting, he said that he was “ever more confident” that the accord would be ratified this year. His hopes have been realized. Reacting to the the news, President Obama has said that enactment of the pact “gives us the best possible shot to save the one planet we got.” (Killer rhyme, Barack.)
Now comes the hard part. There’s still a long way to go if we’re to ensure that the planet doesn’t warm by more than the 2 °C described in the pact. The agreement is, after all, little more than a piece of paper. Now we need action by local and national governments to save us from ourselves.
(Read more: Science, The Guardian, “The Paris Climate Accord Just Passed a Crucial Threshold,” “Six Months after Paris Accord, We’re Losing the Climate-Change Battle”)
|
Discussion about fees and taxes for bicycles so that we cyclists “pay our fair share” often turn to mentions of the “Fourth Power Rule.” What is this mysterious Fourth Power Rule?
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, highway engineers researched damage done to road beds and road surfaces for the purposes of allocating who should pay how much into the various road maintenance funds. The American Association of State Highway Officials (AASHO; they added Transportation to their organization name during the 1973 OPEC oil embargo) collated this research and published their findings as a “Special Report” for a highway engineering conference in 1962.
What these researchers found is that damage to the roadbed is proportional to the 4th power of the axle load of the vehicle, and they called this “the Generalized Fourth Power Law.” This means that if you double the weight on an axle, your vehicle does sixteen times the damage to the road. The result is those signs you see on the backs of truck trailers that say “This truck paid $4,182 in highway taxes last year.”
Let’s take an example. A Toyota Prius weighs about 3,000 lbs, which is 1,500 lbs per axle. A Lincoln Navigator weighs in with a curb weight of 6,000 lbs, or 3,000 lbs per axle.
(3000 / 1500)4 = 24 = 16
Because of this extra highway wear and tear, the extra real estate required by these larger vehicles (the trend to larger vehicles during the 90s and 2000s contributed all by themselves to 20% more highway congestion over this time period), and the higher law enforcement and emergency services expenses incurred by these vehicles, the owners of large, heavy SUVs pay sixteen times what the owners of economy cars do in registration fees and gas taxes.
Oh wait, no they don’t, because we live in Bizarro Land. Owners of large vehicles can often take advantage of tax incentives not available to the owners of smaller vehicles. But I digress. Let’s look at another example.
We’ll start once again with our 3000 lb Prius and compare that against a tractor trailer with a gross weight of 70,000 lbs. The Prius, as before, has 3000 lbs over two axles, so that’s 1500 lbs per axle. The tractor trailer has 70,000 lbs spread over five axles; the weight distribution isn’t even across those five axles, but for the purposes of this exercise we can pretend that we have 14,000 lbs per axle.
(14,000 / 1,500)4 = 94 = 6561
You saw that, right? A tractor trailer causes roughly 6500 times more road damage than a Prius.
It’s a Rule of Thumb
Let’s break now to remind our listeners that the Fourth Power Rule is a rule of thumb. It’s meant to give rough guidance for policy makers if they want to figure out what the “fair share” of the cost is for road maintenance. Research on this topic since the 1960s has shown that the actual road damage from light vs heavy vehicles can vary significantly depending on existing road conditions, the road construction methods, and even factors like tire pressure and suspension systems.
In other words, since we’re talking about transportation and tax policy, the Fourth Power Rule is good enough for government work.
There’s also a speed component to the Fourth Power Rule. It’s usually not talked about because vehicles all mostly travel at the same speed, but when we compare a 15 MPH bicycle against a 60 MPH Prius, that 4X speed difference means a 4X difference in road damage.
Unlike axle loading, the damage due to speed is mostly linear. In other words, twice the speed equals twice the damage. To keep things simple, I’ll ignore this factor, but when you see the bicycle numbers below feel free to multiple by two times to four times.
Bicycles bicycle bicycles bicycle bicycles
Let’s come full circle to the topic at hand, which is the perennially proposed bicycle tax. We’ll start once again with our hypothetical Prius, and this time compare it against a fully laden bike commuter with loaded panniers who might weigh 220 lbs with bike. That’s 1,500 lbs per axle for the Prius, and 110 lbs per axle for the bike and rider.
( 1,500 / 110)4 = 144 = 38416
We see the Prius does 38,000 times more road damage than a bicycle.
California Senator Mark Deaulnier’s proposed bicycle tax doesn’t have an amount – that will be left to local jurisdictions who may wish to impose such a tax – but let’s use Colorado Springs’ modest $4 bicycle sales tax as an example. If cyclists pay our “fair share,” the sales tax on a small automobile such as the Prius should come in at a cool $154,000. The Lincoln Navigator and other vehicles with twice the weight of the Prius have a sales tax sixteen times higher, which comes to $2.5 million.
So how about we propose an amendment to Senator Desaulnier’s bill? Any bicycle tax imposed will also have a “fair share” clause, such that the new car sales tax be equal to the fourth power of the axle loading difference between a bicycle and the motor vehicle.
A little more seriously: a $150 thousand sales tax for vehicles is more than a little ludicrous. A $4 bike tax might seem reasonable, but in my view it’s equivalent to charging hundreds of thousands of dollars for vehicles.
Share this: Email
Facebook
Reddit
Google
Tumblr
Pinterest
Twitter
LinkedIn
Pocket
|
- The Future Cannot Last Four Minutes - By FINA 21 November 2014
Cultural phenomena can be found at the bus stop: wait two thousand years and it all comes in a rush. As we wait, we witness the expiration of the popular modern method. We witness the expiration of the brand and the capriciousness of its ideas rooted in retrospection: music which wants to be heard, but has been heard already.
Culture subservient to past iconography produces fatalism betraying the unlimited creative potential of today. The pretty little heads of Brighton Fashion Week and London Fashion Week and garb meisters around the world showcase a zeitgeist devoid of spirit; the ego all-encompassing and closed, clutching at the certainties of the rear-view mirror. And at the bus stop, if the phenomena doesn't arrive, we will start walking: we will find a way. Only t-shirts can save the world now: fatalism is not the end!
The image shown is part of a three piece T shirt collection 'No Glory...' to be released soon on the Fina Boutique shop
|
The month-long Occupy Wall Street movement shows no sign of slowing down. A second day of demonstrations in Long Beach ended with two arrests following a busy weekend for the movement in Southern California and all over the world.
Occupy Long Beach protesters gathered at Lincoln Park on Sunday. Just before 10 p.m., police warned them to break up because the park was closing.
Officers said they were trying to get people in tents to leave and the group chanted and yelled in defiance. Two protesters were arrested for camping in a public park during prohibited hours. Two others were cited and released.
There were reportedly up to 150 people protesting but most of them left the park when they were told.
"We ask for many things. We're supposed to have it, you know, like education. Be more concerned about workers and students," said demonstrator Louis Rodriguez of Lakewood.
The Occupy protests started on Wall Street against corporate greed and economic inequality, and they've gone global.
The Occupy Los Angeles movement is protesting against a number of different issues, and people are hoping to narrow the focus.
Oscar Bay of the Ethnic Majority Organizing Committee said his group hopes to put people back in homes that have been foreclosed.
Some Los Angeles Unified School District teachers and employees are planning to march and set up tents in downtown Tuesday to protest cuts in education.
"I would like to not be in debt after I graduate. I'm afraid to go to school, because I know that once I graduate, I will be $50,000, if not more, in debt," said one Occupy Los Angeles protester.
Meantime, rioters in Rome infiltrated a march by thousands of demonstrators over the weekend and caused almost $1.5 million in damage to city property.
About 175 people were arrested in Chicago after they refused to leave a park where they were camped. Seventy protesters were arrested in New York City and 100 were arrested in Arizona.
Princeton University Professor Cornel West was among 18 people arrested while protesting on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington D.C.
See photos of Occupy protests being held around the world.
|
New works of art usually enter the public domain through a process involving death and patience. It is a rarer occasion that living people set about to make a resource public domain, and even rarer so when that effort involves thousands of people collaborating and pooling their time, energy, and money. That's what's happening on MuseScore.com with the first public review of the Open Well-Tempered Clavier score, a new edition of J.S. Bach's musical masterpiece (BWV 846-869).
In music, the source code for a composition is usually expressed as musical notation. In that respect, music that is to be performed is akin to a scripting language (like PHP or Javascript), which (barring deliberate obfuscation), is delivered to the interpreter in readable form. Bach released his works hundreds of years ago, and while the notes and ideas themselves have long been part of the public domain, the individual editions of his work, complete with skilled engraving, editorial opinion from musicologists, and performance tips from famous performers, are usually protected from copying and derivative use by copyright.
That's why the Open Well-Tempered Clavier project (campaign on Kickstarter) was created: to make a modern, digital version of Bach's work, and to license it freely (in this case with the Creative Commons Zero—CC0—license remover). So that there is no doubt about allowed use—all uses are allowed and encouraged. The companion recording of the work, played on piano by Kimiko Ishizaka, also CC0, will be released in March of this year.
Participants in the public review of the score are asked to study the notation carefully, either in the browser or by downloading the individual scores into the open source MuseScore program. Compare the notes and markings to other editions of the score, or to the very manuscripts themselves, and note the differences. The MuseScore.com website has a feature that provides for the annotation of the scores (one of the advantages gained by making digital versions that are expressable in standard formats such as MusicXML).
Nightly builds of the MuseScore program (which is the version suitable for viewing the Open Well-Tempered Clavier) can be downloaded for Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.
|
A good programmer is able to manage their time perfectly. We try to write an optimal code spending as little time as possible. But sometimes we are just forced to stop. So what do app developers do then?
I faced this problem a few times at work. The project I participated in was finished and a new project hasn’t started yet. It seems that I could just relax: drink coffee, chat in a social network, read something interesting on the web or watch funny videos on YouTube (I’m sure anyone can add something to this list).
Then I realized, I’m getting even more tired while doing nothing. I made a conclusion that it’s nice to do nothing when you have something to do, but not when there is no work at all…
So I started thinking and searching for help on the web. Below you’ll find a list of tips that will help you to spend your time with benefits.
IMPROVE YOUR SKILLS
Programmers work is continuous improvement. Every day a new technology or programming language is born, languages we use gets updated, a new functionality is added to libraries or frameworks. So it’s important to boost your knowledge. And it’s crucial to understand that every new skill is an investment in your career.
What should you learn? Of course, it depends on what you work on and what you are interested in. But it’s better to focus on the things that can improve your daily programming life.
I believe that one of the ways to keep up to date is to read. Today we have a free access to great content online. You can read books and articles (and discussions to the articles).
However, reading is not enough. And the best way to learn programming is coding.
You can check new features by yourself or help other programmers in your company. You will consolidate knowledge or learn some new stuff while helping others.
OPTIMIZE TEAMWORK
Many people believe that everything programmerapp developer needs is a computer. However, a significant part of programmer’s work is connected with other people. Developers work in a team, which includes not only programmers but also a project manager, designers and testers. And a success of the project depends on a good communication in such a team.
A free time – is a great chance to suggest your ideas for a teamwork optimization and improve your soft skills. So you can try to think about ways to make your current or future products better. For example, you can help the design team or the business team come up with ideas for future releases, new features that can be added, removed or replaced. You can also observe how your colleagues work and figure out how you can help them do their jobs better.
REFACTOR CODE
Developers understand that their code is never perfect and it can always be improved.
It can be your app architecture, localization, accessibility, layouts, just style of your code and so on. Obviously, there is always something that an app developer can do better.
Here are some universal sources about refactoring:
The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers by Robert C. Martin
This book is packed with practical advice about everything from estimating and coding to refactoring and testing. It covers much more than technique – it is about attitude. Martin shows how to approach software development with honor, self-respect, and pride, work well and work clean, communicate and estimate faithfully, face difficult decisions with clarity and honesty, and understand that deep knowledge comes with a responsibility to act.
Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship by Robert C. Martin
Even a bad code can work. But if code isn’t clean, it can bring a development organization to its knees. Every year, countless hours and significant resources are lost because of poorly written code. But it doesn’t have to be that way.Martin has teamed up with his colleagues from Object Mentor to distill their best Agile practice of cleaning code “on the fly” into a book that will instill within you the values of a software craftsman and make you a better programmer – but only if you work at it.
I hope, that these tips will tell you something interesting about programmers’ work and help you spend your time with benefits. Never stop learning, growing, and exploring!
|
Alshon Jeffery made the bold prediction in January that the Bears would win the Super Bowl next season. Perhaps he should have just said "I" will win a Super Bowl.
The impending free agent receiver told ESPN's Josina Anderson on Thursday he's looking to sign with a contender when the market opens on March 9.
"I don't have any hard feelings towards the Bears -- it's all love," Jeffery said. "Whatever the next chapter is, I'm ready for it. I'm looking at the teams that obviously need a wide receiver, but also put me in the best situation to win a championship right now. I also want to see what other free agents may be attracted to the same teams I'll be looking at. That can help that goal."
While both Bears general manager Ryan Pace and coach John Fox said at the NFL Scouting Combine they are still interested in re-signing Jeffery, his quote certainly smacks of a player ready to move on.
Chicago declined to use the franchise tag again on Jeffery, which would have put them on the hook for more than $17 million.
With plenty of teams like the Bucs, Eagles, Rams, Titans, 49ers, etc., in need of receiver help, Jeffery will have a healthy market come free agency. When it comes down to it, he'll sign with the highest bidder, even if that squad is no closer to a Super Bowl than the Bears.
|
PHOENIX (Reuters) - Dozens of inmates in Arizona jails run by a sheriff who has been a controversial figure in the national immigration debate have been put on a diet of bread and water for desecrating U.S. flags that hang in each cell, authorities said on Friday.
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio addresses the media about a simulated school shooting in Fountain Hills, Arizona, February 9, 2013. REUTERS/Darryl Webb
Maricopa County lawman Joe Arpaio, who has been called “America’s toughest sheriff,” said 38 inmates were currently getting these meals twice a day as punishment for destroying government property while in custody at six jails.
“These inmates have destroyed the American flag that was placed in their cells. Tearing them, writing on them, stepping on them, throwing them in the toilet, trash or wherever they feel,” Arpaio said in a statement. “It’s a disgrace to those who have fought for our country.”
The punishment will last for seven days, he said, and a second offense would bring 10 more days of the sparse diet.
A sheriff’s spokesman said the bread provides the daily requirement of calories and nutrients that is necessary. There are about 8,300 inmates in the jail system.
In recent months, the Maricopa County jails have broadcast patriotic songs over the public address systems - “The Star Spangled Banner” in the morning and “God Bless America” at night.
Arpaio, a six-term sheriff, has come under increased scrutiny and criticism in recent years for his actions, including a hard-line stance on immigration.
Last week, a court monitor was appointed to oversee operations at his office after a federal judge found in May that Arpaio’s deputies had racially profiled Latino drivers. That ruling came in response to a lawsuit that tested whether police could target unauthorized immigrants without profiling U.S. citizens and legal residents of Hispanic origin.
Dan Pochoda, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union in Arizona, called the move a “publicity stunt.”
“It’s certainly not illegal, but what he is doing is bad policy,” Pochoda said. “It’s just another vindictive policy that has nothing to do with running a good jail system.”
The sheriff, who is facing a lawsuit and investigation from the U.S. Justice Department accusing him of civil rights abuses, strongly denies that he or his officers profile Latinos.
Under a portion of a controversial Arizona immigration law that was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, police in the state may ask people they stop about their immigration status.
|
In the web development world with MVC based back-end servers, nearly everything is kicked off with routes. Look at rails for example. If you want a list of items, you hit /items and the router executes the index method on ItemsController. Add a new item, view an item, edit an item and post the updates back to the server – even deleting an item works with a route.
Unfortunately I see the same patterns emerging in a lot of sample code for javascript MVC frameworks, like Backbone. Stop doing that. Now. You shouldn’t be using routes for functionality that can be achieved with a simple method call, a command, or an event.
Why It Works For The Server
A web application is a stateless system. Your browser does not have a live connection to the server for any more time than is needed to transfer the rendered html, css, javascript, images, etc to your browser. Once that data transfer is done, you are viewing the page on your local system. The server is not holding a ton of resources in memory, allowing you to manipulate them directly through your browser. You’re manipulating a representation of those things, that has been turned into a combination of technologies that your browser knows how to deal with.
Because of the stateless nature of web servers, it makes sense for every action you want to do to have a route associated with it. The server needs to have some context to tell it what you are trying to do, so it can figure out what code you’re trying to run. All of this is necessary because the browser is disconnected from the server. The server doesn’t know that you’re looking at item #1 or the list of items. It knows nothing about what you’re doing until your browser tells the server to do something.
State. Do You Speak It?
A Backbone app is closer to a desktop client application than a web application in a few respects. Not the least of which is that it has state. The objects and data that are loaded in memory will stay in memory. You can rely on the item that you loaded being there when you need it again, without having to reload based on an id every time you need it.
Because of the stateful nature of a Backbone application, there are times when it doesn’t make sense to use a route, though it technically works.
Problem: Routing A Delete
I’ve seen this a number of times – and have built it at least once, myself. When a developer who normally works with rails or another MVC server technology gets to the point where they need to delete one of the Backbone models, they add a route for delete. Then they use a link in the html to hit the route and cause the delete to happen.
The delete route and view often look like this:
With an HTML layout that looks like this (after being rendered):
Yes, this is functional. You can click on that link and it will delete the model in question. The rendered view for that model will also be removed from the HTML that is displayed on the screen. As functional as this is, though, there are several problems with it.
Browser History
One of the features that we get with Backbone’s router is the ability to control the browser’s history and the back button. Every time we send the browser to a new url#route, Backbone records it in the browser’s history. This allows us to move backward and forward in the application, using the browser’s backward and forward navigation button.
When we use a delete route, we get the deletion stuffed into our browser’s history. If we hit the back button, after navigating to another url#route, the router will try to find and delete the model again. It gets even worse if we are routing deletes of groups of things. Assume that we routed to #/delete/green in order to delete all items that are colored green. Then the user adds several new items that are green. Now that they are done, they click through the back button history in order to get to where they started. Along the way, they hit the #/delete/green route again, and all of the work they had just done is destroyed.
To prevent these bad scenarios and prevent unwanted errors from models not existing when the router fires the delete code again, we have to put null checks around things. This makes our code a little uglier, a little less readable and gives us more to maintain over time.
Bookmarks and Copy & Paste Urls
Another advantage of Backbone’s router and url#routes, is the ability to copy & paste the entire url or bookmark it, and get back to where we left at any time in the future. When we open that bookmark or paste the url with the url#route in it, the Backbone router will kick off the route’s code. Here, we end up in the same scenario as the browser history issue.
Unnecessary Lookup To Find The Model For Deletion
Backbone is a stateful framework. This means that we have whatever objects are instantiated hanging around and waiting to do work or have work performed on them. By using a route to find the model that we want to delete, we are ignoring the state that our Backbone application has already provided in order to look up a model that is already in memory, waiting to be used.
The result of this is negligible in terms of memory and performance, in the example of deletion. However, the problem extends beyond the simple model and into the views.
Breaking Encapsulation To Remove The View
The last line of the router’s delete method removes the view that was displaying the item because when you’re deleting an item, you will likely want to remove it from the view as well. By using a jQuery selector to find the view and remove the HTML that represents the view from the DOM directly, though, we are breaking the view’s encapsulation and creating spaghetti code which will likely become difficult to maintain over time.
A Backbone view provides a significant amount of functionality and capabilities. One of the convenience features that is provided for us is the `remove` method of the view. This method, according to the documentation, calls `$(this.el).remove()`. This is essentially the same code that we have called in our router’s delete method. However, this remove method is encapsulated within the view and uses the context and knowledge that the view holds in order to do the delete. Even if this convenience method doesn’t exist in your version of Backbone, it is 1 line of code to add it and allow work against your view to be encapsulated correctly.
By making this call outside of the view, we are breaking encapsulation. We are also opening up the possibility of bugs being introduced to the app in ways that are difficult to track down. If we have code strewn throughout the app that removes HTML elements, but we are not cleaning up the view objects that represent (and own) those elements, there could be problems. If a view tries to access an element that is no longer there, the work it’s trying to do will at best, not do anything. At worst, it will cause unexpected errors and potentially ruin the work that the user has been doing.
Other Issues
While the list of issues I’ve described is fairly comprehensive of the potential problems, it’s not complete. There are near countless combinatorial problems that can be put together between all of these and other potential issues that I haven’t expressed.
Solution: Let The View Be In Control
Given the number of problems that have been identified, it should hopefully be apparent that a route for a delete is probably not the best thing to do. Fortunately, we can solve these problems by building our Backbone views the way they were meant to be built, allowing them to encapsulate control of a model, including the model’s deletion.
Here’s an example of the code that we can use to allow deletion of the model via the view, directly:
And the view can be simplified a little, too:
You’ll notice that this is roughly the same amount of code. There may be 1 or 2 lines less in the new version, but that’s negligible at best. We don’t get any advantage from this perspective. However, we do get a number of advantages with regards to the previous problems that I described.
No Browser History For The Delete
We’ve changed the delete link in the HTML from “#/delete/1” to “#”. This could cause a browser history entry to be created, if the browser is currently pointing to a route other than “#”. However, there is a line of code in our delete method that will prevent this from happening. The first line, “e.preventDefault();”, tells jQuery to prevent the link from causing the browser to change it’s url. Thus, when we click the delete link, the item will be deleted but we will not navigate to “#” and therefore will not have a new route fired or a browser history entry created.
No Bookmark or Copy & Paste Urls For Deletion
Again, we’ve changed the delete link in the HTML from “#/delete/1” to “#”. This will prevent a bookmark or url copy & paste from triggering any deletion. Since you can’t create a bookmark to a specific line of javascript code, or copy & paste a url that starts out on a specific line of javascript code, we don’t have to worry about this problem at all.
No Unnecessary Lookup To Find The Model For Deletion
We’re taking advantage of Backbone’s stateful nature, in this case. When the view is instantiated and renders the HTML output, it stays around for us to use.
By using the declarative events of the view, we have bound the delete link to the view’s delete method with jQuery. When the link is clicked, the view is still around for us to execute code, and still has a reference to the model that was rendered. This allows us to call `.destroy` on the model directly, without having to do any lookups.
No Breaking Encapsulation To Remove The View
Lastly, we’re letting the view take care of itself, as it should. When the delete link is clicked and after the model is destroyed, the view closes itself. Notice that we’re not using a jQuery selector, either. We’re letting Backbone’s built in `.remove` method handle that for us.
Since the view is handling the destruction of the model – which is owns – and itself, there are no encapsulation breaks. Our view can then let itself fall out of scope and we no longer have to worry about any zombie view objects looking for elements that aren’t around anymore.
Other Niceties
Beyond the issues that I’ve addressed, there are additional benefits of building views and delete functionality in this manner. Backbone contains a tremendous amount of power and provides a lot of features for us to take advantage of. Every time we stay within the boundaries that Backbone outlines, it makes it that much easier for us to use the additional features provided to us.
Where Routing Works With Backbone
There are plenty of examples of where routes work well with backbone, of course. Imagine your building a large website that contains articles, for example. You could try to load all of the articles into the browser, all at once, using Backbone’s models and collections. It’s trivially simple to load a Backbone collection, after all. But loading all of these articles into the browser would cause the browser to slow down to a crawl, eat up a ton of memory and possibly crash the browser depending on the quality of browser and memory handling. Whatever the actual effects are, they would likely not be good.
The router is perfect for situations like this. You don’t need to load all of the articles from the server all at once. Instead, you can use routes to figure out which article the user wants and only load the detail for the one specified from the server or other data store.
Beyond This Simple Example
I’ve outlined a very simple example of a route that enabled some functionality while creating a slew of potential problems. This is a very simple example, as well. Imagine what could possibly go wrong if you have a very large Backbone app with nested views and the ability to move forward and backward in those views.
While there are some very distinct advantages of using a router, it should not be our default go-to object to enable functionality. MV* frameworks, like Backbone, give us the opportunity to bridge the gap between the web and the thick clients. We need to take off our stateless-web-server glasses and realize that Backbone opens a world of different principles and patterns. We need to look to the thick-client, desktop and native-mobile-device applications for guidance in some of these areas. Not every pattern we find will apply, of course. But many of them will, and they will help us produce much longer-lasting, maintainable solutions for our interaction-heavy web pages.
|
North Korea is so paranoid about its citizens accessing the internet that merely owning a computer requires permission from local government authorities, and all personal computers are registered with the police as if they were shotguns. Private ownership of fax machines is banned outright, and sending a single fax requires high-level authorization. Meanwhile, pirated DVDs of South Korean TV dramas are so illegal that North Koreans caught with them in regular police sweeps can be sentenced to years in labor camps. So you can imagine how tightly restricted internet access would be in the Hermit Kingdom.
Still, North Korea does have the internet. That small web of internet connections between North Korea and the outside world collapsed entirely on December, under an apparent mass cyber attack. While the US never claimed responsibility for the attack, President Obama had warned just days earlier of a "proportional response" to North Korea's hack against Sony. And on Tuesday, Rep. Michael McCaul, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, offered what may have been the first hint of US responsibility for the attack.
For many Americans, though, the entire idea of a North Korean internet seems surprising, and for good reason. Could one of the world's poorest countries, which puts its citizens under near-total control, really have the internet? How does it work? Who can access it? And why would North Korea allow any internet access at all?
What the few North Koreans who are allowed online think the internet means
If you went to North Korea and asked people about the internet, most of them would probably have no idea what you were talking about. Most of the country is still mired in poverty, much of it rural. But in Pyongyang, the privileged capital city, and perhaps in one or two other cities, North Koreans with good office jobs or coveted university slots might assume that you were talking about Kwangmyong.
Kwangmyong, which is Korean for "bright star," is North Korea's officially sanctioned intranet. It looks sort of like the internet circa 1994; many users even access it with old-school dial-up or computer labs. It is a closed network that runs on pirated Japanese versions of Microsoft software and looks sort of like the real internet but isn't. Rather, it runs rudimentary email and browser tools that are restricted to a hand-picked collection of "sites" that have been copied over and censored from the real internet.
This network is accessible by the handful of computer labs at major North Korean government offices, universities, and a small number of cyber cafes in major cities. (Internal travel is forbidden without permission in North Korea, so most citizens never see Pyongyang or can visit its cyber cafes.) But you need a computer to access it, and that's only possible with official permission.
Outside computers are illegal (except for the very highest elite, for whom many official rules do not apply); the only acceptable computers are produced by Morning Panda, a government-run company that makes only a few thousand computers every year.
The small core of elites who can see the real internet
Then there is a group of privileged elites in North Korea who can access the real internet, which is forbidden to everyone else. The number of people in North Korea with actual internet access is estimated at a few thousand — the tiny core of the country's sprawling government — most of them top government officials.
North Korea's circle of internet users is so small that the country has only 1,024 IP addresses for 25 million people, whereas the US has billions of IP addresses for 316 million people. While it's impossible to infer a specific number of internet-connected devices from this, it is safe to say that the number is very, very small.
Many of North Korea's physical internet connections go through a single line that runs from Pyongyang through North Korea's mountainous north and into China, where it connects via China's state-run telecommunications agency Unicom to the outside world. North Korea, in other words, is largely behind China's Great Firewall.
However, North Korea also appears to have routed some internet connections through satellite-based systems: those have included the Russian satellite company SatGate and a Hong Kong–based satellite network run by China's state-owned internet provider. (There are also long-running rumors of a second, secret North Korean T1 line that patches in the most elite officials' devices at much higher speeds and that resolves as Chinese IP addresses.)
If you saw the real internet in North Korea, it would almost certainly be running on a top-of-the-line computer — or even an Apple device such as an iPad or iPhone — which are smuggled in for the use of elite officials. It would likely be quite slow; all of North Korea's devices share a very small amount of bandwidth and run through aging equipment that goes down often.
Not everyone who can access the internet in North Korea is a member of the elite. The country runs some departments that simply need access to the web to do their jobs, namely propagandists and other media specialists as well as hackers and a small number of technocratic researchers. In order to prevent these people from trying to defect when they learn how hellish their country is compared with the rest of the world — or, worse, spreading what they learn to other North Koreans — jobs that require internet access typically come with lavish salaries, high-end government housing, and lots of prestige.
Either you are granted access to the internet because you are very elite, or you are granted elite status because of your internet access, but the two always go hand in hand.
Why North Korea allows the internet
This question — why? — is perhaps even more important than who is allowed to access the real web in North Korea, because it tells you so much about how the country really works.
There are, very broadly speaking, three kinds of internet connections between North Korea and the outside world. This revealing list of reasons one might have web access speaks volumes about the country's priorities.
The first and largest is propaganda: North Korea has graduated in recent years from the text-only rants of state media to surprisingly high-touch social media campaigns, including a steady stream of YouTube videos extolling the greatness of Kim Jong Un and the evils of the American imperialist dogs. North Korea does not have "hundreds of millions" of supporters abroad, as it claims, but it does have a real and important, if small, base of supporters in South Korea and among the ethnic Korean minority in Japan. It also wants to reach its non-supporters abroad, though whether North Korea thinks its propaganda might be earnestly believed or is just hoping to further gin up international tensions with its regular threats is debatable.
The second reason North Korea wants to access the internet is hacking. The country has aggressively grown its cyberwar divisions in recent years into a few thousand highly trained hackers. It uses cyberattacks as a sort of asymmetrical warfare; North Korea knows it would lose any real battles against much-stronger South Korea and the US, but it can still cause mayhem online and has been attacking US and South Korean online institutions for years. This is meant as a deterrent of sorts: don't step on our toes or we'll hack you. (There are also reports of North Korea using the web to run various money-producing frauds to bring in hard currency to a government that badly needs it.)
But the third reason is less straightforward. North Korea's very top elite, the inner core of the inner core, access the internet because they simply don't live in the same universe as their countrymen. While most of North Korea exists in a propaganda bubble where any outside information is an existential ideological threat and truth about the world is scarce, North Korea's top elite are perfectly aware of how it all really works. They allow themselves all the comforts: movies, books, internet access, forbidden technology, forbidden luxury goods, and foods and alcohol smuggled in for their pleasure. Kim Jong Un certainly participated in this, although it's also a tool by which he maintains the loyalty of the elite.
The country's elites also do need this information — what's really happening out there, how the world really works — to run their country, even if they are only running it to keep the cruel, despotic system in place.
What it means when North Korea's internet is shut down
There have been some objections that whoever shut down North Korea's internet in December, whether it was the United States or someone else, unfairly punished an entire country just for the bad behavior of its government.
The truth, though, is that the internet in North Korea is not a public good, nor even a good the public is aware of. It is purely and solely used as a government tool, for serving such ends as propaganda and hacking, and as a luxury good for the elites who run the government.
This is not necessarily to endorse shutting down the internet there as a good thing, but just to note that like so many things in North Korea, the Kim Jong Un regime has distorted it into something that exists almost purely to cement his government's rule and to reward himself.
|
Amy Elizabeth Fisher (born August 21, 1974)[2] is an American woman who became known as "the Long Island Lolita" by the media in 1992, when, at the age of 17, she shot and severely wounded Mary Jo Buttafuoco, the wife of her illicit lover, Joey Buttafuoco.[3] Initially charged with first-degree attempted murder, she eventually pled guilty to first-degree aggravated assault and served seven years in prison. Paroled in 1999, Fisher became a writer and a pornographic actress.
Early life [ edit ]
Fisher was born in Merrick, New York, on Long Island,[2] to Elliot and Roseann Fisher;[4] her father was Jewish while her mother's family, Fisher said, was "a mixture of a lot of different things, including English."[5] As a 16-year-old student at Kennedy High School in Bellmore, New York,[6] Fisher began an allegedly sexual relationship with 35-year-old Joey Buttafuoco, who denied her claim, after damaging the car her parents had given her for her 16th birthday and appealing to Buttafuoco, owner of the body shop to which she took it, to make the repairs without her family knowing of the damage.[7]
Crime and prison [ edit ]
Fisher gradually fell in love with Joey Buttafuoco and became increasingly jealous of his wife. Eventually the then 17-year-old Fisher shared with Buttafuoco her idea of murdering her. According to Fisher, Buttafuoco helped her plan the shooting and told her about his wife's habits and when she was usually home.
With the aid of Peter Guagenti, Fisher obtained a .25 caliber pistol and then went out to steal a set of license plates off a neighborhood car. On May 19, 1992, Guagenti helped Fisher put the license plates on his Pontiac Firebird and then drove her to the Buttafuoco home in Massapequa, New York. Fisher later explained to the police that she had expected Guagenti to carry out the shooting, but he refused. When Mary Jo Buttafuoco answered the door, Fisher told her that Joey Buttafuoco was having an affair with Fisher's (imaginary) younger sister, providing a T-shirt advertising Buttafuoco's auto body shop for her "proof." The conversation lasted about 15 minutes, but Buttafuoco became increasingly angry with Fisher's claims. She finally told her to leave and then turned her back to return into the house. Fisher then produced the gun, struck Buttafuoco in the head with it, and then aimed at her temple and fired. Buttafuoco fell to the ground, severely wounded. Fisher dropped the shirt and the gun and ran towards the car, but Guagenti told her to take the evidence with her, so she ran back to retrieve both items and then they both fled the scene. Neighbors called 911 and came to Buttafuoco's aid. She was operated on all night, and although unable to remove the bullet, the doctors were able to save her life.[8]
When interviewed by police, Joey Buttafuoco told them that Fisher could be the shooter. Police Detective Martin Alger obtained a photo of Fisher, and when Mary Jo Buttafuoco regained consciousness the next day, she was able to recognize Fisher from the photo. Fisher was arrested and charged with attempted murder, and on September 23, 1992, she pleaded guilty to first-degree assault.
Paul Makely tape/prostitution [ edit ]
In September 1992, the tabloid television show Hard Copy broadcast a videotaped conversation between Fisher and Paul Makely, the owner of a gym in Massapequa. In the tape, recorded hours before she agreed to the plea in court, Fisher could be seen talking about her future, saying that she wanted to get married to Makely so he could visit her in prison. Fisher explained that her lawyer believed requiring people to be married for such visits was unconstitutional, and that she intended to challenge the law on this matter. Fisher could be seen on the tape saying: "That will keep my name in the press. I want my name in the press. Why? Because I can make a lot of money. I figure if I'm going through all this pain and suffering, I'm getting a Ferrari." Prior to the Paul Makely Tape, Peter de Rosa, 29, secretly recorded Fisher in an act of prostitution with him in March 1992, Fisher was 17 at the time.[9][10][11]
Imprisonment [ edit ]
On December 2, 1992, Fisher was sentenced to 5 to 15 years in prison. She served seven years and was granted parole in May 1999 after Supreme Court Judge Ira Wexner vacated her guilty plea and shortened her sentence.[12][3]
Joey Buttafuoco denied having an affair with Fisher. In October 1992, the Nassau County District Attorney stated that Buttafuoco would not be prosecuted. However, in February 1993, the case against him was reopened due to rape charges made by Fisher. She testified against him in court and based on this testimony and hotel receipts (dated before Fisher's 17th birthday) with Buttafuoco's signature on them, Buttafuoco was charged with statutory rape. Buttafuoco pleaded guilty in October 1993. He served six months in prison.[13]
Life after prison [ edit ]
After her release from prison, Fisher became a columnist for the Long Island Press. She dictated a book about her experiences, If I Knew Then..., to Russell Wolliver, whose transcription of her dictations was published in 2004. In 2003, Fisher married Louis Bellera. The couple had three children before divorcing in 2015.[14][15]
Fisher and Buttafuoco revisited [ edit ]
In 2006, Fisher reunited with Mary Jo Buttafuoco in sessions televised for Entertainment Tonight and its spinoff, The Insider. Fisher said she wanted to heal and move on with her life. However, two years later, she said she felt "no sympathy for Mary Jo",[16] without giving an explanation. Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco eventually reunited for the first time at the 2006 Lingerie Bowl for the coin toss.
In May 2007, Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco met for dinner in Port Jefferson, Long Island, in what TV producer David Krieff said was an attempt to develop a reality-television show.[17][18] In June and July 2011 Fisher appeared as a cast member in the fifth season of the reality-television series Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, which aired on VH1.[19]
Sex tape and adult entertainment career [ edit ]
Fisher in 2010
In October 2007, the New York Post published allegations that Fisher's husband, Lou Bellera, had sold a sex tape of the couple to Red Light District Video of Los Angeles.[20] Red Light District Video published a press release stating that it intended to release a sex video of the couple.[21] On October 31, nude pictures of Fisher from the video were posted at various Internet sites, and on November 1, 2007, a teaser clip was released by Red Light District Video that showed a nude Fisher showering and sunbathing. Of note were a tattoo surrounding her navel and a breast augmentation. On November 6, 2007, Fisher sued Red Light District and its owner David Joseph, claiming copyright infringement and other damages.[22] But by November 8, 2007, amyfisher.com, a website of whose ownership Fisher had previously fought to win, had begun pointing directly to the Red Light District website.[23]
In early January 2008, Fisher announced that she had settled with Red Light and agreed to do a related promotional appearance. The same announcement indicated that she and Bellera had reconciled.[13] The promotional appearance took place at Retox in New York City on January 4, 2008.[24] Clips of the video were played on The Howard Stern Show. On March 6, 2008, Fisher was a guest on the Stern show, and one topic of discussion was meant to be her video. But after the first phone call, which was from Mary Jo Buttafuoco's daughter Jessica, Fisher left the show six minutes into her interview.[25]
On January 12, 2009, Fisher released a pay-per-view adult film titled Amy Fisher: Totally Nude & Exposed.[24] Fisher signed a deal with Lee Entertainment to become a stripper doing club shows at least once a month. Fisher claimed she planned to strip till her fans told her, "Dear, please put your clothes back on. You're too old."[26][27] In September 2010, DreamZone Entertainment released the adult film Deep Inside Amy Fisher, calling it the first of eight such films Fisher would produce and in which she would star. The company had announced the movie in July 2010 under the working title The Making of Amy Fisher: Porn Star.[28] In June 2011, Fisher said she was no longer making adult films.[14]
Books and films [ edit ]
Books by Amy Fisher
Fisher, Amy & Robbie Woliver (2004). If I Knew Then. iUniverse. ISBN 0-595-32445-2.
iUniverse. ISBN 0-595-32445-2. Fisher, Amy with Sheila Weller (1994). Amy Fisher: My Story. (Reprint edition.) ISBN 0-671-86559-5. (Originally published by Pocket Books in 1993; ISBN 0-671-86558-7.)
Books about Amy Fisher
Dominguez, Pier (2001). Amy Fisher: Anatomy of a Scandal: The Myth, the Media and the Truth Behind the Long Island Lolita Story. Writers Club Press. ISBN 0-595-18417-0.
Writers Club Press. ISBN 0-595-18417-0. Eftimiades, Maria (1992). Lethal Lolita: A True Story of Sex, Scandal and Deadly Obsession. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-95062-4.
Movies about Amy Fisher
According to Alan Ball, Fisher's story was an inspiration to him in his writing the script for the 1999 film American Beauty.[29]
|
We’re less than two weeks out from the Super Bowl, and now that we know it’s Denver and Seattle battling for the Lombardi Trophy, it’s time to start planning the game-time beer list. Priorities, you know.
In case you’ve been under a rock the last 12 hours—or asleep, which is understandable—the game’s making headlines: I’ve seen everything from the wink-wink “Super ‘Bowl’” to the less discrete “Pot Bowl,” “Weed Bowl” and “Bong Bowl.” Yes, both Colorado and Washington have legalized recreational marijuana. We know this. Since partaking in the substance will land you in the clink everywhere else, I’m officially hijacking this line of thinking and dubbing the upcoming event based on something else those two states are know for: hops. Let’s get ready for the Hop Bowl (I know it doesn’t make any sense, but let’s run with it).
There will be more Super Bowl drinking ideas in the weeks to come, but here’s a pretty easy one to tackle: Serve some of the best hoppy beers from each state, one brand for each category. Why? You like hops. Why else? Reasons: It’s simple, it’s easy, and—for the most part—these beers are pretty widely distributed. See, the NFL does open up avenues for cultural exploration.
Here’s my Hop Bowl lineup for 2014:
IMPERIAL IPA:
Washington
Pike Doubble Troubble IPA
Colorado
Avery Dugana IPA
AMERICAN IPA:
Washington
No-Li Born & Raised IPA
Colorado
New Belgium Ranger IPA
SPECIALTY IPA:
Washington
Elysian Avatar Jasmine IPA
brewed with jasmine
Colorado
River North Hoppenberg Uncertainty Principle
Belgian-style IPA
EXTRA/SPECIAL/BITTER (ESB):
Washington
Redhook ESB
Colorado
Odell 5 Barrel Pale Ale
ENGLISH-STYLE IPA:
Washington
Fish Organic India Pale Ale
Colorado
Left Hand 400 Pound Monkey
BARLEYWINE:
Washington
Old Schoolhouse Barley Wine Style Ale
Colorado
Great Divide Old Ruffian Barley Wine
Which state would win in this match-up?
EDIT: Ineligible player penalty rightly called by reader Chris below. Substitute Old Schoolhouse into the lineup. Continue play.
|
What the blazing hell is that? I haven’t ordered chinese! Yes, you haven’t, although we dared to take the initiative and brought forward the Wot Armory Type-analysis. The hard reason is, the servers are flooded again with the WG’s favourite cash-cow. We dedicate this article for the new buyers, the old buyers, for those who love them, for those who cannot stand them, for low tiers and high tiers, in short, for everyone. Because this tank brings out emotions from all of us.
Charcharo’s review
For the Horde!
Have you ever got the feeling, that something just does not belong? A sale stunt for the biggest market on Earth became an every hour reality on all servers. I’m afraid, I cannot be helped being opinionated, but the first introduction of the Type marked not only one of the biggest financial successes of Wargaming but the darkest hour for game balance.
Forerunner of the pay to win?
The Type then stood out among other toned down premium tanks compared to fully teched same tiers. It was not only a competitive tank, the favoured matchmaking and the still existing stacking lead to numberless random games, where Tier6 and 7 tanks (regardless of their module status) found themselves against these Tier8 credit-farmers, whereas Types didn’t have to face Tier10s. The matchmaking stacking created credit-hungry hordes, ad-hoc teams, mostly impervious to frontal fire of desperate lower tiers, and with enough mobility to counter flanking attempts, to hunt down those who tried to dodge/escape them. The Type also has exceptional tactical flexibility compared to other Tier8 premiums, the Type-wolfpacks could steamroll anything in their path. Dealing with such raider parties demand cooperation, map awareness and cold blood.
Great harvest is ahead. So said the golden tank… calf I mean. Or is this reference not Confucius enough?
The big cash-making had turned out to be a PR-disaster for the WG, so the Type 59 was removed from store, for a while. But the lack of availability created – maybe by purpose, since the continuous nerfs for the credit income of normal tanks – higher demand, and the chinese T-54 knock-off has reappeared in gift shop in the first week of May, where it could be bought only via real money, not with gold accumulated for lucky CW-fellas.
In the evening of the first day, numbers of the chinese tank long time not seen invaded the servers again. The favoured matchmaking had changed – partially – since the “dark ages”. These premium tanks can find themselves in Tier10 battles, but the stacking (putting the same tanks on one side) and problem of lower tier opponents in the opposite slots remained. One might think, the current matchmaking spread and the presence of the Types are tools for some forced evolution towards the more expensive and premium-demanding higher tiers…
The hull armor
Advertisements
Share this: Twitter
Facebook
Reddit
LinkedIn
Email
Like this: Like Loading... Related
|
EVEN as the dining room smouldered, soldiers moved about taking fingerprints and scanning eyes of the corpses of Taliban fighters. The ghoulish ritual followed an attack, on June 21st, on a restaurant beside Qargha Lake in Kabul. After the scans, the information was compared with a biometric database.
Gathering such data, even from the dead, is now standard practice in the Afghan war. Soldiers learn that usable scans can be harvested as late as six hours after death, depending on the heat. Investigators were confident of finding a match at Qargha Lake, and did so. Their success underlines the growth of the database and the ambition of those behind it.
Get our daily newsletter Upgrade your inbox and get our Daily Dispatch and Editor's Picks.
In this case an unnamed suicide-bomber had been scanned two years earlier, in Logar province, because he was looking suspicious, said Lieutenant-Colonel Mohammad Anwar Muniri, who leads the Afghan programme. However, he was not detained. A list of “martyrs” released by the Taliban after the attack in Kabul confirmed he was from that province.
His details could equally have got into the database in other ways. Few of Afghanistan's 30m people have a birth certificate, a second name or can read. Yet America's army and the Afghan government have collected digital records of more than 2.5m of them. Anyone arrested or imprisoned, or who seeks to join the army or police, is scanned. So are those, such as labourers, who attempt to get into a coalition military base. Each is checked against watchlists of suspects. Last year biometric machines were also put at all border crossings. In hotly contested areas any “fighting-age males”, meaning those between 15 and 70, may be scanned compulsorily.
Some patrols call all men from a village out of their homes and line them up by a mosque to be logged. At other times buses are stopped arbitrarily and all the men are taken off and scanned.
Elsewhere such intrusions would have caused an outcry. But few Afghans, so far, have protested. American officers praise the technology as a helpful counter-insurgency tool: if opponents can be identified, they can be separated from the wider, law-abiding populace. They cite examples of its usefulness. Nearly 500 Taliban prisoners tunnelled out of Kandahar's Sarposa prison last year, but they had previously all been scanned. Within a month 30 had been recaptured because of random biometric checks.
The data are passed on beyond Afghanistan, to America's army, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security. Agreements to share data exist with dozens of allied countries. American soldiers in Ghazni once described scanning a dead insurgent, then two days later getting a call from the CIA to say that his record matched someone first scanned in Iraq.
Yet as the system grows, so do worries about it. It is involuntary and shrouded in secrecy. It is easy to come across Afghans who claim that they were wrongly denied foreign visas or jobs after a biometric scan flagged up their presence on some watchlist. Evidence held against them is rarely divulged, nor is it clear how they can challenge it.
“There is a vetting process to be put on a watchlist,” says Sergeant-Major Robert Haemmerle, of the American army's Afghanistan biometrics programme. “It's not just a matter of ‘I don't like this guy'. There is a deliberate policy and process to ensure that people's rights are respected, that it's not abused.”
Yet those policies and processes are kept classified by NATO and America's Defence Department. Jennifer Lynch, a lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group based in San Francisco that keeps a watch on how digital technology encroaches on civil freedoms, also questions the quality of the data. She fears that scans done quickly in the field, or by inexperienced technicians, could lead to cases of mistaken identity.
Neither Afghan nor American officials have described their ultimate plans for the project, nor whether they want to log the whole population. Talk of a new national identity card has fallen quiet. But the more people who are scanned, the more powerful the database becomes.
|
They started out small. Their first foray was Free Pie Day, during which Project M members stood on a Belfast street corner and handed out slices of pecan pie, pumpkin pie and apple pie to passers-by. The idea was to spur community and conversation, one slice at a time. Free Pie Day inspired similar efforts in Washington, Brooklyn and elsewhere. Most important, it inspired PieLab.
“WHEN I SAW THEM out front, I walked over,” Charles Johnson, a beauty-shop owner, said. “I saw the sign” — the one that spelled out LAB with stainless-steel pegs and washers — “and I asked, ‘Is this some kind of radio technology or space-center stuff?’ ”
PieLab opened in a makeshift space on a Greensboro side street in May of last year. Five of the original Project M team members in Maine had come south at the invitation of the Hale Empowerment and Revitalization Organization (HERO), a housing-advocacy nonprofit, which also sponsored community-minded local initiatives. The Project M team conceived of their pie shop as a pop-up — a temporary cafe — describing it as a “negative-energy inverter, fueled by pie.”
The term “pop-up” implies that a concept may be too cutting-edge to sustain. And so it was with PieLab. No one expected this pop-up to last, least of all the designers who transformed the original space in a breakneck three-week stretch and managed it with gusto for the rest of the spring and summer.
But that first day at the PieLab was a success. There was music, courtesy of a customer with an acoustic guitar. The crowd was diverse. Ideas were exchanged. Intergenerational friendships were forged. The take, at two bucks per apple-pie slice, was something like $400.
PieLab had visual style. And PieLab had a formula, a back-of-the-bar-napkin equation, sketched in Maine and refined on the ground in Greensboro:
PieLab = a neutral place + a slice of pie.
A neutral place + a slice of pie = conversation.
Conversation = ideas + design.
Ideas + design = positive change.
Yet for all its ambition, PieLab never had a business plan or a firm grasp on what sort of change was sought. This was intentional. Bielenberg wasn’t much interested in long-term goals; he believed in setting something in motion and letting the momentum guide the effort.
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
The plan was simply to open PieLab’s doors, begin conversations with the people of Greensboro and encourage them to create progressive inititatives of their own. “We had an idea,” said Brian W. Jones, a collaborator from Virginia. “That was it. We opened without a business license or the complete approval of the health inspector.”
PieLab’s logo — two crimp-crusted pie slices, positioned tip to tip to form a double beaker, an hourglass or some other old-school scientific apparatus — said it all. Here food wasn’t just fuel. And design wasn’t merely a way to arrange your living room furniture. Design, when applied to food, could be a catalytic force for good, even if the good wasn’t specified.
PieLab operated out of temporary quarters for four months. HERO, under the direction of Pam Dorr, served as host and landlord. Six years earlier, Dorr left a job as a production manager for the Gap in California to join the social-service efforts in Hale County. Dorr collaborated with Project M on earlier projects, finding practical applications for their ideas. To support PieLab, she secured government grants, helped build ties in the community and served as a hands-off adviser.
That first PieLab space, in a tin-roofed clapboard home behind the HERO offices, was spare and studied, with glossy white walls, high ceilings and open shelving. A hand-cranked cash register sat on the front counter, alongside a silverware tray and a decommissioned library card catalog. Inscribed with the names and check-out histories of old books, the cards served as sketch pads and, on occasion, order pads for $3 slice-and-coffee combos.
The earnestness was palpable. The Project M crew baked pie and brewed coffee. They crimped crusts with forks and piled on pears and pecans gathered and delivered by neighbors. They designed Web sites for the Hale County Humane Society and created logos for the nearby city of Northport.
For the socially engaged members of Project M, PieLab was a clubhouse. For small-town characters, it was a magnet. College students from Sewanee, Tenn., ate through all the pecan pie one afternoon. A film director just back from Thailand came in for coffee and talked about his next project, a Big Foot horror movie.
Over time, the Project M folk befriended Scott Hamilton, an aspiring artist. They designed a Web site on which he posted his paintings of cities of the future, shaped like skyscraping minarets. When Charles Johnson, a regular, was in a good mood, he performed on the pine floors, moving to a line-dance routine called the Cupid Shuffle.
Within a few months of opening, following a spate of positive design-industry press, PieLab-inspired efforts popped up in cities like Portland, Ore. In Greenville, Ala., southwest of Montgomery, Nancy Rhodes recently opened Polka Dots Café, cater-corner from the town’s Confederate memorial. She serves kolaches, a Czech pastry popular in Texas. Inspired by PieLab, she plans to operate a “neutral space,” where people of all races and classes can gather.
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
“THAT FIRST SPACE was really grass roots,” Megan Deal recalled. “It was so easy to build, so easy to run. There was an honesty about it, a purity. It was all about pie and conversation. All about what we intended. It worked.”
More significant, it seemed to work in the Black Belt, a region that a New York Times writer, in the days before the cotton economy went bust, described as a “garden of slavery.” Poverty rates may register higher in other counties in the region, and racial disparities have proved wider, but Hale County has long been the Black Belt’s front porch. Hale was where James Agee and Walker Evans drew their famed portrait of Depression-era tenant farmer life, “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men,” a book that has served as a primary text for students of rural America in the decades since. And Hale was where Samuel Mockbee and D. K. Ruth established the Rural Studio, a design-and-build program for Auburn University architecture students, focused on creating high-concept, low-cost homes for indigent residents. Don’t be “house pets to the rich,” Mockbee told his charges, sounding a clarion that inspired, among others, John Bielenberg.
All this attention to social ills did not come without social costs. Almost 75 years have passed since Agee and Evans traveled the county to document the lives of poor white folk, but their work still has the power to inflame residents. If outsiders see Evans’s photos and Agee’s text as a candid examination of an ailing region, insiders often see the book as the product of crusading interlopers, the sort of people who parachute into the region today with little understanding of local concerns.
Amanda Buck is not the only Project M collaborator who has walked into the Hale County Library on Main Street to check out “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men” and learned that lesson. “Everybody who comes down here wants to read that book,” Buck recalled a librarian saying as she handed her a copy. “You know this doesn’t paint the whole picture. There are other perspectives.”
BUCK, A NATIVE OF Brunswick, Ohio, who was a member of the original 2009 Project M program and later traveled south to work at PieLab, showed up thinking that she was to be a “change agent.” But when she talked about change, many Hale County residents heard condemnation. No matter, she thought. “What are we doing here if we’re not working for change?”
Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters.
In the Black Belt, Project M collaborators could afford to be idealists. They worked hard, but their lives unspooled like summer-camp deferments. “On weekends we swam in the river,” Brian Jones recalled. “We wandered down Main Street at sunset and admired the way the light bounced off the buildings.”
They ate lunches of fried whiting and fried okra at Flava, a soul-food cafe set in a brick compound one block off Main Street. And they listened as Eugene Lyles, who built the restaurant in the 1960s, told them that, back when the black-power movement was ascendant, he was an idealist, too. Weekday afternoons, they walked the town, past shuttered storefronts. At night, they sometimes played four-square games on Main Street, sidestepping pulpwood trucks as they downshifted from the highway. They measured success in modest exchanges. Buck and Robin Mooty, another early PieLab worker, designed and painted a new sign for Charles Johnson’s salon. In return, Johnson took Buck and Deal golfing.
PieLab efforts played well to the news media. Here was hope, and apple pie, and a seemingly robust new economic engine in the Black Belt, a seemingly hopeless American place. And here was an effort that aligned nicely with the national trend toward food activism. “PieLab provides a neutral environment in a traditionally segregated town where people from every race and class are welcome to sit together and talk candidly about whatever is on their mind,” Brian Jones told Fast Company magazine.
PieLab, along with projects like Mission Pie in San Francisco (which employs at-risk youth and uses local ingredients for its pies), is part of an American movement to deploy food-focused initiatives, including restaurant operation and artisanal food production, to foster social change. The culinary establishment embraced PieLab. The magazine Southern Living, the prevailing arbiter of middle-class regional taste, dubbed its apple pie one of the South’s best. The James Beard Foundation named the Main Street PieLab space one of three 2010 finalists for its restaurant design award.
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
All the attention buoyed the PieLab collaborators. But it also created problems. When Project M first arrived in Greensboro, some folk bristled at the language it employed. The conflicts began with the 2007 Buy-a-Meter project. To get the initiative under way, Project M used stark black-and-white photos (and starker messages) to draw attention to area families who lacked access to the municipal water supply. The pamphlet campaign raised about $50,000. HERO, working in conjunction with Project M, used this money to purchase and install more than 100 water meters. Beyond Alabama, Buy-a-Meter was celebrated as a financial and critical success. But back home, the slogan — “In Hale County, Alabama, Water Is Not a Right,” splayed across a gatefold photograph of Greensboro’s Main Street — did not always play so well. Tensions increased when a group of designers proposed a National Design Center for Rural Poverty Programs in Greensboro. To make clear the need, they described Hale County as a place where an “impoverished population suffers from substandard housing, education, health care and job opportunities.”
In Greensboro, such sweeping generalizations, no matter their accuracy, stung. “What does some guy in Maine know about my life in Alabama?” asked Ann Langford, chief clerk of the Hale County Probate Court and onetime Rural Studio administrator. “Who gave him the right to speak for us?”
By that point, a number of new voices were speaking for the Black Belt. At least seven windmill-tilting organizations were doing good works in Hale County, including Project Horseshoe Farm, a residential mental-health facility. Those programs brought youthful energy to Greensboro. They also brought trouble.
“You have the same town-and-gown tensions here that you would find in a small Massachusetts college town,” said Winnie Cobbs, a retired college professor who operates a local bed-and-breakfast. As she talked, two young women, wearing jogging bras and college mascot tank tops, race-walked through downtown. Inside PieLab, a Horseshoe Farm fellow hunched over her laptop, filling out medical-school application forms.
“It’s universal,” Cobbs said. “You hear the same talk about the loose morals of young kids. And you hear the same suspicion of the motives of outsiders.”
“I WAS NAÏVE,” BUCK SAID. “I knew nothing about baking pies and running a business.”
As Buck talked, she squirmed in her chair in what was the original pop-up PieLab space and is now used by AmeriCorps Vista volunteers who run BikeLab, a bicycle-repair and reclamation project also initiated by Project M and HERO. “We came with preconceived notions about what we would find in Alabama,” she said.
In October 2009, as the PieLab crew worked to refurbish their new brick-fronted space on Main Street — the one with polished wood floors and a balloon-whisk bathroom light fixture — tensions reached a pitch in what came to be known as the “cake thing” or the “poster incident.”
Designed by a couple of the PieLab workers, the poster was printed in an array of colors, the most arresting of which was bright red. Rendered in a bold, black font and capped by an exclamation point, were the words: “Eat pie.” Stacked beneath, in far smaller type, was a command that began with a sexually explicit four-letter word and ended with the word “cake.”
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
To the PieLab crew, the poster was an over-the-top exercise in sloganeering. To members of the Greensboro community, who followed the workings of PieLab on various Web sites, the document was a totem of the group’s cultural insensitivities.
“The humor might have played well in Brooklyn,” Buck said, taking pains to explain that the posters were never intended for local distribution. “But here it wasn’t funny at all.”
Posters quickly found their way into the hands of city and county powerbrokers. Things came to a head during a heated conversation in the street, which Pam Dorr, of HERO, playfully described as a “near riot.”
“I understand what they intended,” Winnie Cobbs said. “It was playful and frivolous. I got the Marie Antoinette reference. It takes us back to the time of the French Revolution. But you have to pick your place to use that word. And posters, plastered around this town, would not have been that place.”
Ann Langford still keeps a rolled copy beneath her desk at the courthouse. “I can’t take a poster with that word on it home,” she said. Langford understands youthful indiscretion. Yet she still gets agitated when she talks about the incident.
“So is that the best that you can come up with after going off to college?” she asked a group of PieLab workers who came to apologize. “Is that what your parents sent you to school to learn? I thought y’all were supposed to set examples.”
THREE MONTHS HAVE now passed since “the takeover.” That’s the term that Pam Dorr uses to describe the process by which she jettisoned the design side of the PieLab equation. Her technique was simple: Rather than renew some of the governmental programs under which the original crew was employed, Dorr allowed certain sources of financing to lapse. One by one, the founders departed.
Under Dorr’s leadership, PieLab may still realize some of the transformative goals imagined by the original crew. Early in the process, PieLab began working with YouthBuild, a job-training-and-remedial-education program, affiliated with the U.S. Department of Labor. At first, 20-somethings from programs like that were ancillary to the PieLab effort. Now job training appears to be primary. Some of the changes have been more pragmatic. PieLab no longer opens at 9 in the morning, as it did when the Project M crew ran the show. Gone are the stacks of take-one, leave-one cards with recipes for graduate-student fodder like tofu stroganoff. Gone, too, is the pie-only menu. PieLab now serves homemade biscuits at 7 in the morning to farmers and construction workers. In the afternoon, it sells butter-crusted quiches, piled with precut nubs of ham, to lunchtime tourists, drawn by glossy photos in magazines like Bon Appétit.
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
One recent morning, Melvin Webster, who is studying construction skills through YouthBuild while working on his G.E.D., drank coffee and talked of how he learned to blend pecan butter from cracked nuts for a HERO-sponsored initiative called Pecans! It was a task in which he seemed to take great pride. Across the counter, Sam Heartsill, a mother of two whose work at PieLab is financed in part by a federally subsidized employment program, drained a bottle of lemon-juice concentrate into homemade custard. At PieLab, both the food and the focus are still works in progress. Dorr leads the progress. As executive director of HERO, she has helped dozens of Hale County families move from busted trailers to tidy bungalows. Now, in her work with PieLab, she has proposed courses for young cooks to learn about the virtues of local produce and traditional techniques. And she holds hospitality classes for those aspiring to careers in the food industry.
When Dorr talks about PieLab, she typically drops the word “lab” and the baggage associated with it. As in, “Let’s go down to Pie and get a slice.” Or, “Modern Woodmen of America are having their lunch meeting at Pie.” Or, “Let’s go see what the girls are up to down at Pie.”
“It began as cool place to drink coffee and eat pie,” she said between bites of a blueberry-and-cream-cheese pastry cup. “Now it has the chance to be more than that. It may not be as cool, but it’s a life-full place.”
|
2014 Red Bull Global Rallycross champion Joni Wiman finally won his maiden Red Bull GRC Supercars final in Las Vegas as Scott Speed won his first championship crown.
Horrendous weather conditions effected the event with much of the field involved in incidents in the early heat races, notably Ken Block – who was looking for his third straight Las Vegas win. He had a heavy wreck in the first heat race, and although he managed to continue in the event, the early shunt appeared to end any hopes of a Vegas hat trick.
Steve Arpin and Speed shared the early heat wins. Speed’s victory in Heat 1B came in an event blighted by an early crash that wiped out Austin Dyne, Tanner Foust and David Higgins, who was unable to rejoin the race – a race which was eventually red flagged early due to heavy rain.
When the racing resumed, Nelson Piquet Jr. took first in heat 2A with the Olsbergs pairing of Sebastian Eriksson and Joni Wiman sweeping 2B.
Piquet looked set to back up his heat win with a victory in Semi Final A after holding off a charging Patrik Sandell at the start. However, it wasn’t Sandell which would snatch victory from the Brazilian, Joni Wiman moved up to first place with a move on the last lap of the race. Sandell eventually missed out on a top three and automatic transfer spot in the final as he ceded third to Steve Arpin, who battled back from a stop/go penalty, on the final lap.
Another driver who missed out on a chance to advance to the final despite being in a position to do so was Sverre Isachsen. The Subaru driver was running in third position until he made heavy contact with an outside wall.
In Semi Final B, Scott Speed used his front row start to his advantage to take an early lead. He was never troubled, taking the semi final win, giving himself pole position for the final. Sebastian Eriksson finished in second place with Foust clinging onto his slim championship hopes with a third place finish.
The Last Chance Qualifier saw Brian Deegan, Austin Dyne, Bucky Lasek and Ken Block advance to the final after an early race red flag which was the result of a first lap incident involving Pat Moro and David Higgins as well as Dyne and Block.
In the final, Scott Speed only needed a top eight finish to clinch the title. Despite that, the former F1 driver launched into an early lead, although he didn’t keep it for long. Joni Wiman and Sebastian Eriksson soon got by Speed, who looked to be playing the conservative game with the championship on his mind.
Wiman and Eriksson held onto their 1-2 finish, Wiman taking the win by just under eight seconds at the checkered flag. Speed held onto third which was more than enough to secure the championship.
Steve Arpin finished the final in fourth place, ahead of Brian Deegan and Nelson Piquet Jr. Austin Dyne and Bucky Lasek were the last two drivers to finish on the lead lap.
Speed’s championship rival and Volkswagen Andretti Rallycross team mate Foust had his title hopes ended on lap one as he was forced into the wall at the first turn. He eventually finished in ninth, two laps down, ahead of only Ken Block who retired.
The final points standings see Scott Speed at the top of the table, 56 points ahead of Sebastian Eriksson who took fellow Daytona winner Foust’s runner-up spot thanks to his Vegas podium. Foust did manage finish in the top three however, 68 points back from Speed, with Nelson Piquet Jr. and Joni Wiman completing the top five.
In GRC Lites it was 16-year-old Oliver Eriksson who continued Olsberg’s domination of the category by taking the championship crown in his first season. He went in the final GRC Lites race second in the standings to team mate Austin Cindric but the American was involved in a first lap incident that took him out of the race, handing the title to Eriksson. The race win went to Alex Keyes.
|
Judge halts Pennsylvania voter ID law
Scene from an NAACP rally against Pennsylvania's voter identification law. (Photo11: John C. Whitehead, AP)
A Pennsylvania judge is putting a halt to the state's new voter identification law, ordering today that it not be enforced for the presidential election just five weeks away.
The ruling by Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson could be appealed to the state's Supreme Court. Simpson's ruling says the law -- requiring each voter to show a valid state-issued photo ID at the polls -- would be fully implemented next year.
Simpson's ruling means Pennsylvania voters will be asked to show photo ID, but can still vote if they don't do so. The same policy was in effect during the state's primary earlier this year.
The judge said during hearings last week that he was considering invalidating a part of the six-month-old law -- considered one of the toughest in the nation -- for the Nov. 6 election.
Democrats and their allies, such as the NAACP, have been opposed to the voter ID law, saying it would harm minorities and low-income voters. Republicans have praised the law as a way to reduce election fraud.
Pennsylvania, a swing state, has 20 electoral votes up for grabs. President Obama is leading statewide opinion polls by an average of 8 points, according to six recent surveys compiled by RealClearPolitics. Mitt Romney said during a recent campaign stop in Pennsylvania that he believes he can carry the state.
Simpson said today that he "expected more photo IDs to have been issued by this time. For this reason, I accept petitioners' argument that in the remaining five weeks before the general election, the gap between the photo IDs issued and the estimated need will not be closed."
Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project, which challenged the law in court, hailed Simpson's ruling. "The evidence made it clear to the judge that this law would indeed disenfranchise voters and that the Commonwealth was not equipped to implement it fairly right now," she said in a statement.
Rob Gleason, chairman of the Pennsylvania Republican Party, said in a statement that he was "disappointed" by the ruling. "We shouldn't have to wait for this commonsense reform to be enacted," Gleason said. "With that being said, voter ID is still Pennsylvania law, was found to be constitutional and we will work to encourage voters to bring their photo identification with them to the polls."
(Contributiing: Associated Press)
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/SkNwll
|
The price of the bitcoin (BTC/USD) cryptocurrency has galloped past $450, according to CryptoCoins News. The 52-week high bitcoin price is $462.99, which was observed in early December 2015. Activity among market participants over the past 24 hours has taken prices from the near-$430 level to volatile trade near $460.
In late 2013, the price of bitcoin skyrocketed to close to $1200 before quickly falling back to earth and bottoming near $210 in the summer of 2015. Through the fall of 2015, the price of bitcoin rallied, more than doubling from its low to sit at its current price of $462.27.
Bitcoin, after beginning to receive somewhat of a bad reputation due to its association with the now closed Silk Road online drug superstore run by Ross William Ulbricht, as reported by the Inquisitr, and failed bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox, as reported by CoinBase, has some observers believing that, this time, its price move may have lasting power.
“This time bitcoin’s price increase is both logical and sustainable,” Martin Tillier with the NASDAQ wrote. “Whereas 2013’s spike was a mystery in many ways, this run up is happening for a recognizable, indeed even predictable reason.”
Tillier has speculated that with its relatively small market capitalization of near $7 billion, bitcoin may have been the target and unwitting victim of a Wall Street hedge fund with the resources to put a multi-billion dollar corner, or near-corner, on a market where such a thing was possible.
This time, bitcoin’s price advance may have more staying power. Over the past 30-day period, China’s contribution to the total number of bitcoin transactions was described as “creeping up” to 81 percent.
Early Thursday morning, the Chinese government devalued the national currency, the yuan, by 0.5 percent, according to Reuters. The move by the ruling communist party created the biggest fall permitted in the value of the yuan in over five months. The increased bitcoin activity among Chinese traders combined with the aggressive currency market intervention on the part of the government may be an indication of a source of the cryptocurrency’s relative price strength.
Bitcoin is also described as receiving “attention” from institutional Wall Street investors, with ETFs and derivatives based on underlying bitcoin holdings being traded, in addition to the currency itself.
The large swings in price that accompanied bitcoin in 2013 and 2014 that were cited as a reason that some merchants eschewed adopting it is seen as potentially diminishing as the future draws nearer. Tillier feels that because the advance in bitcoin price appears to be logical, the chance of a sharp sell-off following an inevitable top are less likely than more orderly trade, with gentle swings in price.
“Supporters of the digital currency should hope that this is the case from here on out, as a more predictable, less volatile price is essential if the number of merchants accepting bitcoin is to once again begin to increase, and that is what will drive sustained growth in price,” Tillier writes.
Expert predictions for how high the value of bitcoin could reach ranged between $500 and $100,000 in 2014, as reported by Founders Grid. Many of the experts questioned, such as the founder of the Bitcoin Association of Ireland, Alan Donohoe, believe that because a maximum number of bitcoins will exist at some point in the future — 21 million, which is quite a limited number, not nearly enough for every person on the planet to own one, and not even enough for every American. Some believe, as Donohoe does, that this scarcity will push the average price of bitcoin higher for many years to come.
Continued weakness in Chinese equity markets, followed by the Hang Seng (^HSI) and SSE Comp (000001.ss), on Friday has the potential to add further buying pressure to bitcoin prices.
[Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images]
|
A Texas firm recently unveiled its new CUPID drone equipped with a Taser capable of delivering an 80,000-volt shock.
Austin-based Chaotic Moon Studios demonstrated its CUPID at the SXSW (South by Southwest) trade show in Austin on March 10. Billed as a “stun copter,” CUPID (Chaotic Unmanned Personal Intercept Drone) mounts its Taser on a remote controlled Tarot Hexacopter. (According to a description on the website hexacopter.us: “A hexacopter is a radio controlled flying machine similar to a helicopter but the hexacopter has six rotors mounted in an array instead of one and unlike the helicopter, it does not have a rudder.”)
Hexacopters have until now been equipped mostly with cameras designed for aerial photography. Paparazzi have been known to use drones to photograph celebrities! But Chaotic Moon Studios put a Phazzer Dragon “conductive energy weapon” (a generic “Taser,” which is a brand name of TASER International) into the drone helicopter to shoot electrified darts into its targets.
Chaotic said that CUPID could be used by law-enforcement personnel to apprehend fleeing suspects. It requires two operators, one to fly the copter and a second to fire the dart.
“The drone can be deployed when an alarm is triggered. It can find a subject and send live video to the owner's phone and ask if you want to authorize the subject or detain them. If you detain them, it drops into fully autonomous mode to detain them until police arrive. If need be stunning them with 80,000 volts of electricity to render them incapacitated,” said a statement from Chaotic.
Chaotic co-founder, William Hurley, was quoted by Fox News of Austin: “If you imagine a S.W.A.T. raid and people running, why send officers, with guns blazing, down an alley way where they can shoot and harm an innocent person or whatever, when you could just have the drone autonomously follow them.”
Hurley told Fox News that his firm has had lots of interest in CUPID from military and law-enforcement agencies.
“This is something that’s affordable for almost everybody and in the next two or three years the technology will probably cut in half, by price,” said Hurley. “Right now, the FAA just has some vague, basic rules around them.”
However, maintains Hurley, his firm’s demonstration of CUPID at SXSW was not intended to attract business because it has "no intention of commercializing it.”
When Fox News asked Hurley why his company built CUPID, if they have no intention of producing it commercially, he replied: “I think that’s hopefully, a wake-up call. We, as a society, should all be involved in the conversation of technology governance, not just the legislators who often do a knee jerk reaction, or the inventors and entrepreneurs who often don’t think about some of the consequences of their technologies.”
If Hurley’s firm invented CUPID merely to demonstrate how it might be abused, and expect that its demonstration might lead to greater restrictions on drone use, that is an overly idealist expectation. Why does he think that the military and law-enforcement agencies have expressed interest in CUPID, if not to use it?
An article in Popular Mechanics noted that CUPID is made from many commonly available parts already used by hobbyists and that Hurley admitted that knowledgeable people could probably figure out how his team built the stun-gun-equipped copter. So although Chaotic Moon is not releasing the drone’s blueprint to the public, copycat versions could easily emerge.
Davey Alba, who wrote the Popular Mechanics report, appeared to be a little perplexed by Hurley’s inconsistent statements:
Hurley says he wants the project to raise awareness about what some hyped technologies — like drones — can actually accomplish in the real world, and to start realistic discussions about public response to technology and regulation. It certainly got people talking at SXSW, but the specifics of the discourse he wanted to spark seemed a little vague to me.
CUPID is a relatively simple device compared to some drones that our military already has produced. For example, in an article published by The New American last May, we learned that the Navy launched a prototype X-47B drone from the deck of the aircraft carrier U.S.S. George H.W. Bush. Two months later, the Navy reported that an X-47B had landed on the same ship on July 10, being “the first time a tailless, unmanned autonomous aircraft landed on a modern aircraft carrier.”
What also made the X-47B unique is the fact that it is not only unmanned, but unpiloted — it uses a pre-programmed algorithm and GPS data.
“The Navy’s model is different from the Air Force’s,” said Rear Admiral Ted Branch, the commander of Naval Air Forces Atlantic. “We don’t have someone actively flying this machine with a stick and a throttle. We fly it with a mouse and a keyboard.”
Of course, technology can be used in ways that are beneficial or harmful, the distinction often being determined by whether the party using it has secured legitimate authority. This may be a congressional declaration of war, if its use is by the military. Or it may mean getting a search warrant, if it is used for surveillance of civilians.
The absence of such authority is always problematic. When our government uses drones to strike targets within sovereign nations with which we are not engaged in a declared war, resentment and blowback against us always ensues. This has been the case in Pakistan, where Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif shortly after his election last year charged that the United States was violating the sovereignty of Pakistan by ordering deadly drone missions without the approval of Islamabad. “Drones indeed are challenging our sovereignty,” said Sharif. “I think this is a very serious issue, and our concern must be understood properly.”
Drones can also be misused in actions against Americans. This usage represents such a grave threat to our citizens’ privacy, that the Utah Senate voted 23-0 on March 4 to approve a bill restricting law enforcement’s use of unmanned aerial systems. Among other restrictions, the bill requires law enforcement to obtain a warrant before using a drone.
While it is uncertain whether it was Chaotic Moon Studios’ intention to draw attention to potential misuse of drone technology by demonstrating its CUPID system, the publicity should serve to awaken Americans to exactly how invasive such technology can become.
Related articles:
Border Patrol Loaning Predator Drones to Military, State, and Local Police
As Drone Tech Improves, Blowback From Drone-targeted Nations Worsens
Senate Subcommittee Hears Harrowing Story of Drone War in Yemen
Obama Administration Tries To Justify Proliferating Drone Strike
Drone Strike in Yemen Kills Five
Drone Operators Feeling the Effects of Carrying Out Kill Orders
State Legislatures Pass Bills Limiting Domestic Drone Use
The Thistle and the Drone: The Real Story Behind the War on Terror
U.S. Drone Strike "Mistakenly" Murders 15 Wedding Guests in Yemen
Obama Orders Drone Strikes, Killing of 6 "Suspected Militants" in Yemen
AG Holder Acknowledges Drone Killings of Four U.S. Citizen
Does Pres. Obama Commit War Crimes in Ordering Drone Strikes?
U.S. Begins Drone Strikes in Somalia
First Man Arrested By Aid of Drone Convicted in North Dakota
Obama Considers Killing American with Drone
U.S. Commits to Dial Down Drone Strikes in Pakistan
Utah Legislature Sends Drone Surveillance Nullifying Bill to Governor
Pakistan’s Sharif Asks Obama to End Drone Strikes
Domestic Drone Launch Date Approaches; Drones to Be Autonomous
Military and Police Drones Exempted From New Texas Drone Law
Pakistani PM Accuses His Own Military of Deadly Collusion With CIA
|
ESPN has been handing out their NFL offseason grades over the past week, and no one was given more praise than the Indianapolis Colts.
ESPN writer Bill Barnwell authored a lengthy recap for each of NFL teams and at the end assigned each team a grade. The Colts were given an A-minus, which was the highest grade of any team.
Barnwell liked the first big move the Colts made over the offseason, which was to bring in Chris Ballard as general manager after firing Ryan Grigson.
"It's hard to think of an NFL general manager who did less with more than Grigson," wrote Barnwell, "who had Andrew Luck fall into his lap with the first pick in his first draft and spent most of the next five years putting obstacles in the QB's way... Ballard's first offseason with the team has been very promising, both in terms of attacking weaknesses and identifying value within the market."
On that note, Barnwell liked what Ballard did in free agency. Not only did Ballard go heavy on defense in free agency, he did so without tying up much guaranteed money in the long-term.
"The Colts have brought in a ton of young, short-term defensive help with upside in what will be an evaluation year," wrote Barnewell. "Grigson made some moves like this early in his tenure with Indy, targeting players like Greg Toler and Ricky Jean-Francois, but they were on far larger deals and expected to be long-term starters at their positions. With the sort of contracts Ballard is handing out, the guys who stick will be under contract for a couple of more seasons, while the ones who don't will be giving way to a more sustainable defensive model."
Barnwell also liked the decision to go heavy on defense in the draft.
"No draft strategy is foolproof," Barnwell wrote. "These guys may not work out. Chuck Pagano hasn't done a great job of bringing along young defensive talent in Indy, and this new batch of defenders could fall victim to the same fate. As a coherent plan, though, what Indianapolis did this offseason made a ton of sense."
If there was a flaw in the Colts offseason for Barnwell, it's the same that several other analysts have mentioned -- the lack of help added on the offensive line. Even if the offensive line showed some improvement towards the end of the 2016 season, Barnwell would have liked to have seen them spend some money on more right side help.
"This wasn't a great draft for offensive linemen, and the cost of signing linemen in free agency was exorbitant this offseason, but the Colts may regret not making one big splash to upgrade the right side in front of Luck," wrote Barnwell.
Ultimately Ballard will be judged by how his offseason efforts translate to the field, of course. If the defensive acquisitions wind up being disappointing and the offensive line turns out to be a problem, there will probably be some criticism thrown his way. On paper though, the Colts got a lot right this offseason. The defense may not prove to be where they want it to be, but the first step in rebuilding the unit was completed, and that was to get younger, deeper and more athletic. If the free agent signings don't work out, the contracts the Colts handed out will allow them to move on fairly easily. And Ballard stuck to his mantra of competition on the offensive side of the ball as well, adding players who could at least turn out to be key depth pieces in WR Kamar Aiken, OL Brian Schwenke, OT Zach Banner, and RB Marlon Mack.
The Colts made some big steps this offseason, and the team looks much different as a result. We'll find out soon enough if those steps lead to success on the field in 2017, but for now, the team is decidedly moving in a new direction that is widely perceived to be positive.
Click here to read Barnwell's full analysis at ESPN.
|
Yes I'm apart of the Overwatch bandwagon now! I am in love with all the characters and wanted to make my own! Since I am a writer and not a drawer I obviously went to my good friend to help bring my ideas and design to reality. She literally went to hell and back trying to draw this lmao Again pleeaaasssseeee go check out her page! she's an amazing artist. Her full lore, personality, and inspirations are below. This was just a fun thing I wanted to do quickly to take my mind off school and stuff. If you have any questions about her please feel free to askLore: Dorothea Giannidis grew up in a wealthy life and only lived with her father in addition to various omnic butlers and maids. Her father, Hugo Giannidis, worked for Overwatch as a scientist and he was revered in his work with Mercy and her healing technology. When the topic of using the healing tech in unethical ways came about, Hugo supported the idea which caused strife between Mercy and him. He went behind her back and started selling the tech for profit. He was exposed and excommunicated from Overwatch and had a warrant for his arrest out. He went into hiding and changed his last name but when Overwatch disbanded, he could sell his tech without opposition and became insanely wealthy. Dorothea disputed with her father a lot because of her fiery nature and often wandered off most of the time. She wanted to explore the world but because of her family's deeds, her father kept her on tight lockdown in their hometown of Illios, Greece. One day, she came back to her family home to see all of her friends(butlers and maids) destroyed and a T insignia spraypainted on the wall. She searched for her dad but could not find him. This caused her to start her journey of finding out what happened to her father. She stole various techs from her father's lab and began her quest. Along the way she saved a puppy from a fighting ring in Dorado and trained her to help her on her journey.Personality: Hecate loves to perform and is very lively and theatrical on stage. She often transfers this energy into her off-stage personality and is very dramatic in her ways. She's warm and kind with all of her fans and puts on free shows for them from time to time. Because of her rich upbringing, Hecate can be vain and cares about her appearance and social status. She can also be stubborn, hotheaded, and prideful often rushing actions without thinking. She is driven by her need to learn the truth about her family history, TALON, and her father. Hecuba is fierce and vicious on the battlefield but dopey, dumb, and cuddly outside of it.Gameplay: Her primary role is to support allies and debuff enemies. She should be in the fray do to her close range healing and close/mid range primary fire.Strengths- Great AOE abilities, does good damage, high utility, good sustainabilityWeaknesses- low mobility, inconsistent escape, long-ranged heroes,IdeasHighlight Intros:Good Girl- Hecuba runs up to Hecate and licks her face repeatedly causing Hecate to laugh.Easy as 1, 2, 3- Hecate summons her two illusions and does a variety of cute poses with themAbracadabra- Hecate performs her ult on Hecuba and rides on top of him as they rush towards the camera.Skins:Hecate as Queen of the Underworld and Hecuba as CerberusFashion Forward- Hecate and Hecuba in fashionable outfitsSummer Games-Synchronized Swimming outifits with HecubaHalloween- Hecate as Medusa and Hecuba as a stone GargoyleChristmas- Hecate as a Snow Queen and Hecuba as a Winter WolfInspirations:Greek Goddess Hecate, Mismagius, Little Witch Academia, Tangled Floating Lanterns, The Sun,
|
Arsene Wenger has explained why he does not delay loan moves until after Arsenal’s Capital One Cup campaign.
The Gunners currently have 11 players gaining further first-team experience at teams in the Premier League, Championship, League One and abroad.
Some would otherwise have played in Tuesday night's League Cup tie at Sheffield Wednesday, but Wenger has no regrets at letting them go.
Login or register to play video 09:37 Sheffield Wednesday (a) - Highlights
“I think we were a bit punished by the fact we had many players out on loan, but it's difficult to block them until November and not let them go just because you have a League Cup game,” he told Arsenal Player.
“So this season, for example, I had many players go who would have played on Tuesday night like Chuba, Gedion, Maitland-Niles, Dan Crowley - they would all have played. But I think about the development of the player and they are at an age where they need competition.
“We play them early so they arrive [in the squad] at the age of 19 and they've already played two or three years in the under-21s. You don't feel they move forward anymore, they need something different, to feel that their progress continues.
“The only thing is to play regularly for a first team that has a responsibility for results.”
|
A Virginia man smuggling a quarter of a million dollars' worth of heroin blew his cover making up the world's dumbest alibi.
Jefferson County police pulled a 64-year-old man over for an obscured license plate on the man's GMC SUV on Monday night. The responding officer noticed the man appeared "extremely nervous" and asked him where he was going.
The man said he was on his way to Houston to visit with a sick elderly friend — in a children's hospital. Apparently the first place he could think ofwhen officers asked him where his friend had been hospitalized was Texas Children's Hospital.
Officers then asked to search the car and quickly found a satchel in the back seat with $250,000 worth of heroin wrapped in bundles.
He's being held on $100,000 bail.
[image via Shutterstock]
|
Despite the Italian judicial system finding Amanda Knox guilty of murder twice and requesting her extradition from the US, the convicted murderer is currently a freelance journalist for her neighbourhood's daily, West Seattle Herald.
It doesn't matter what people say or think—the truth is that she's a West Seattle resident, she grew up here. Why not give her the opportunity to be an actual human being versus a celebrity? - Patrick Robinson, Web Editor, West Seattle Herald
According to the Daily Beast, Knox was presented with the job not because The Herald wanted to use her notorious status but rather to give her the opportunity to lead a normal life.
"We approached her originally to give her the opportunity of a normal life," said Patrick Robinson, web editor for The Herald.
"We simply asked her as we would ask anyone of that age and stage, if they would be interested in writing for us as a qualified writer of that scale and this level of journalism."
Knox had initially preferred to freelance using a pen name, which the paper had permitted her to do.
"That was purposely to give her the protection of that and to give her the opportunity. She showed us writing samples and they were good," said Robinson.
Knox soon began writing under her own name after she "got her feet wet," and is covering a variety of news from human interest stories to local theatre.
"Amanda's a very bright, very capable, highly qualified writer. She's certainly been through a lot and been very easy to work with and very interested and eager in doing stories," added Robinson.
Knox has also signed a book deal in 2012 for an estimated $4m and a movie based on the book is in the works with Kate Beckinsale in the lead.
The murder
Knox was studying writing in Italy when she was found to be a murder suspect in the death of her roommate Meredith Kercher in 2007.
Both Knox and her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito were found guilty of murder in 2009, and the duo spent four years in prison before being acquitted in 2011 after independent experts put the evidence against them in doubt.
Knox returned to the US shortly after. However, a court upheld the 2009 guilty verdict in January 2014, sentencing Knox and Sollecito to over 25 years.
Knox has still not been extradited back to Italy as the case is being appealed.
Robinson says The Herald was aware of the negativity that was attached to Knox and hired her with a "note of caution,".
"It doesn't matter what people say or think—the truth is that she's a West Seattle resident, she grew up here. Why not give her the opportunity to be an actual human being versus a celebrity?" he added.
According to Robinson, all meetings with Knox are held privately though, "she's not hiding."
|
The Barcelona and Spain defender talks eloquently about the Catalan referendum and says he is not retiring from international football because that would give satisfaction to the people who ‘whistle and insult’
Gerard Piqué has admitted he considered leaving the Spain team after he was whistled and verbally abused by supporters at a training session on Monday but insisted he would not give those fans satisfaction by walking away. The Barcelona defender appealed for respect and dialogue in the wake of Sunday’s Catalan referendum as the political situation grows increasingly tense. He also refused to reveal whether he had voted yes, describing that as the “$1m question”, but did dismiss the popular assumption that he is in favour of independence.
Gerard Piqué jeered by spectators at Spain’s World Cup training session Read more
Barcelona played behind closed doors on Sunday in protest at the conduct of Spanish police in trying to prevent Catalonia holding a referendum that the central government and constitutional courts declared illegal. As images of violence emerged, Barcelona asked for the game against Las Palmas to be postponed, opting to play in an empty stadium when the request was denied. Afterwards Piqué, visibly affected and close to tears, criticised the Spanish government and reaffirmed his long-standing public support for the Catalans’ right to vote. He said he felt Catalan and offered to step down from international duty if the coach, Julen Lopetegui, wanted him to.
The following evening, with political positions increasingly entrenched, supporters gathered for the evening session at the Spanish Football Federation’s Las Rozas headquarters. Piqué has been whistled playing for Spain before but he admitted he had not expected the intensity of what awaited him on Monday. Some carried banners demanding he leave the national team. There were reports that his relationship with the captain, Sergio Ramos, had broken down and worse is expected when Spain play Albania in Alicante on Friday. The situation appeared to have become unsustainable.
Piqué, who said he had decided to speak because he wanted to find a solution and because it was not fair on his team-mates who have grown “tired” of the issue to have to face endless questions about him, said that it “hurt” that people questioned his commitment to the national team. He said he had thought about departing in the wake of the referendum, but also that he had thought about continuing after 2018 – the date he had previously set for his international departure. “I don’t want to leave out the back door,” he said.
Play Video 1:24 Emotional Piqué offers to end Spain career after Catalonia violence – video
“From the age of 15 I have considered this a family: that’s one of the reasons I’m here,” Piqué said. “My commitment to the national team is maximum. I feel very proud to be here. I have thought about [leaving] and I think the best thing is to stay. Going would mean that those people have won, those who think the best solution is to whistle and insult. I’m not going to give them that satisfaction.
“There are lots of people who want me to stay. If you talk, you can reach an understanding. I am sure that if I sat down with them all, it would be different. There are people in Spain whose positions are very diverse and if you talk, you can find a solution. I’d like people to listen and think: ‘What he says is reasonable.’ And the Sergio Ramos thing is a myth. I’ve said it 15,000 times: we get on fantastically well. In fact we’re going to go into business together.
“Politics is a drag, but why shouldn’t I express myself? I understand those players who don’t want to say anything. We’re footballers but we’re people too. Why can a journalist or a mechanic express themselves but not a footballer?”
Piqué insisted his politics were not incompatible with the national team. He reiterated that he has “never” declared for independence. Indeed, the way he returned to the theme and framed his argument implied he does not support separatism. He agreed when it was put to him that Spain and Catalonia would be weaker in the case of independence; argued that the “world is so connected that countries are the least important thing”; and described his family as “Colombian, Lebanese, Catalan and Spanish”.
Asked if his Catalan sentiment meant that he should not play for the national team, he replied: “No. And I would take it even further than that – and this is not the case with me – I would say that even a supporter of independence could play for Spain. There is no other national team and they’re not against Spain. Spain is a country that’s the hostia [the business] and the people are de puta madre [bloody brilliant], so why not play for Spain? I repeat: it’s not the case with me. But why not? We reduce it to sentiment, but we’re here to help Spain win.”
Chelsea optimistic Álvaro Morata injury is not as severe as Spain fear Read more
“I am in favour of people voting. They can vote yes, no, or abstain,” he said. “I’m not on the front line. I don’t think I have ever positioned myself on one side of another. And my opinion is not so important. I have never fought tooth and nail to defend a particular side. Some say there should be independence, some say there should be a vote, some say there should be nothing. All three points of view are licit. There are lots of people in Spain that support Catalans voting. There were demonstrations in Madrid and Seville.”
When it came to direct questions, Piqué avoided a direct answer. How had he voted, he was asked. “That’s the $1m question,” he said. “I can’t give an answer on that. I can’t back one side or the other: I would lose half of my supporters.”
And who would he choose to play for if Catalonia did get independence, he was asked.? “I imagine it would be a process of three or four years, like Brexit,” he said. “I’ll be 33, so I haven’t really thought about it.”
Piqué said he had not seen King Felipe’s speech the previous night accusing the Catalan authorities of attempting to break the unity of Spain the previous night before because he was playing cards but said people in Catalonia would have liked a more conciliatory message and he appealed for dialogue. “Spain has a history that goes back I-don’t-know-how-many years, and there is a part that wants to go. That’s way more important than what I think.”
|
Ten Squads, Ten Stories is a series that concentrates on one team in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL), and highlights a player or theme. This installment features Chicago Red Stars players Arin Gilliland and Courtney Raetzman, University of Kentucky alumnae playing together again the professional level.
“We just get along really well and I’m enjoying the experience playing with her again.” — Courtney Raetzman
“If you want to be a pro, there’s a level of work and a level of attention to detail that is involved. I’m going to help you get there but you are really going to need to focus on being your best,” Jon Lipsitz, head women’s soccer coach at the University of Kentucky said.
“And it can’t be just about the three, four months of the college season. If you want to be a pro, you have got to act like that and train like that on a year-round cycle. It doesn’t mean you have to be your best every day, there’s always ups and downs, but you have got to be training at that level. And we are excited that is something that we are creating here at Kentucky.“
Lipsitz has been creating that atmosphere in Lexington since he took over the head coaching position prior to the 2009 women’s soccer season at the University of Kentucky. His job was to establish the program as a women’s soccer power, as well as create an environment in which players build and grow to their maximum potential. It’s paid off — the Wildcats have appeared in the SEC tournament in the past six seasons and qualified for the NCAA Tournament in four of the past five seasons.
Out of that success, Kentucky is seeing players make the jump from the college game to the professional ranks. Two such players are Arin Gilliland and Courtney Raetzman, who are teammates once again in Chicago after playing together at Kentucky for three seasons (2012–2014).
Gilliland, now in her second year with the Red Stars, and a two-time All-American in college, credited the way the Kentucky program has established itself as a strong program and was surrounded by great players, which helped her improve to get to the next level.
“Starting in the class in front of me, there were girls who had that drive and could have played at bigger schools but wanted to play at Kentucky and build the program, and that was exactly what I wanted to do.”
“When you have that, your team starts to get better and go farther. Like making the NCAA Tournament, and making the second round, and third round. I think people took notice of that and realized like ‘Oh, wow, where did Kentucky come from? I want to go there.’ and then that’s when we started getting real quality into our program.”
Growing, Learning, and Taking the Next Step
“I thought that one of the things that I saw [Arin] do is that she is a very quick learner about what she needs to do to be successful,” said Lipsitz. “When she meets new challenges and scenarios, she quickly learns and uses her strengths.”
Gilliland said she played almost every position during her four years at Kentucky, from target striker to outside back. Developing the skills necessary to be an all-around player while in college is one reason Gilliland feels she’s had a successful start to her professional career.
Whether it was the one year where she led the team in shots (100) and assists (10) in 2013 or goals (14) in 2014 or helping the defense pick up clean sheets as a defender, she did a little bit of everything for the team.
“I played almost every position while at Kentucky and I think that is one of the best things that could have happened to me because I got better well-rounded,” she said. “I carved myself to be able to do every trait there is and maybe I’m not the best at every trait, but at least I can do all of them. So I think that was the best thing that he taught me while I was there.”
Unlike Gilliland, who played all over the field, Courtney Raetzman filled a different role on the field for Lipsitz. After making the transition to the college game and recovering from a medial collateral ligament injury in her sophomore year, she made the move to a deeper-lying position in the midfield the following season.
It was when the midfield move happened that Lipsitz saw Raetzman’s drive and will and knew she had what it takes to transition to the professional level.
“There are some players that you have to coach and make sure they do see what they need to work on,” he said. “Courtney is the opposite. You need to say to her, ‘Actually, you played really well,’ but she would come to me and say that ‘But remember in the 42nd minute that the touch I had wasn’t smart.’ That’s how she is.”
“And so what I started noticing was that she was becoming a student of the game, was asking me who to watch online, and what videos to look at. When you take her incredible intensity and intelligence on the field and her training work ethic, and then you add that piece, which is that film study, that’s when I realized that she knows that [becoming a professional] could happen and she is going to go for it.”
Raetzman’s tireless work ethic dates back to her younger days. She’s always wanted to do her best, work hard, and be the ultimate team player. At Kentucky she was surrounded by players who worked with that same mentality, which ultimately pushed her to work harder.
“I had Jon as a coach and I was playing with quality players as well,” Raetzman said. “I think that’s always been in me with wanting to do well in school as I had my sights on trying to play after school as well. I just always wanted to learn more and become a better player, and I knew that it was going to take work rather than just showing up every day.”
“So I knew I had to do extra work to do those things and a lot coaches always said to study film and to watch other players. So I definitely noted that.”
Landing Together In the Windy City
After Gilliland was selected in the first round of the 2015 NWSL Draft by the Red Stars, she put together a very strong rookie campaign en route to being named to the All-NWSL Second Team. She started in 17 of the 19 games she played in during the regular season and chipped in a pair of assists and started in the semifinal against FC Kansas City.
While Gilliland was enjoying her rookie season in Chicago, Raetzman was having a standout senior season at Kentucky. She was named to the All-SEC First Team and started all 20 of her team’s matches, adding her name to the pool of possible NWSL draft picks.
The Red Stars already have a duo who share an alma mater in Julie Johnston and Sofia Huerta, both of whom attended Santa Clara (Huerta finished school one year after Johnston). And with Raetzman being a Chicagoland native, the possibility of becoming a Red Stars prospect almost seemed natural.
“Rory is always looking at people,” said Gilliland. “If he drafts someone from a certain place, he is obviously going to have interest in that area. If you know people and you let him know about them, he is going to take a look. He’s never going to turn a blind eye on someone who came from the same university, and I think Courtney is great for this league.”
A year before, Lipsitz started getting phone calls from Rory Dames, the head coach of the Red Stars, about Gilliland when she was a senior. There was some prior familiarity between the two coaches; Lipsitz started the Ohio Premier soccer club in Columbus and often coached against Dames, who coached the Eclipse Soccer Club. When the phone rang again in Lipsitz’s office in late 2015, it was again Dames, who wanted to talk about Raetzman. Lipsitz couldn’t have been more thrilled, just as he had been when he spoke with Dames about Gilliland.
“Our relationship goes way back but when the relationship got to the point where we truly got to know each other so much better was in the last few years when this started happening,” he said. ‘I felt from very early on that Chicago was the right place for Gilly. I felt like how much he believes in the wide backs attacking and being a key part of the attack. So when that worked out, we talked about it a lot beforehand and since then, and that continued this past year with questions about Courtney and her development.”
When NWSL Commissioner Jeff Plush called out Raetzman’s name this past January at the draft in Baltimore, she knew she was headed back home to play the game she loved.
“It’s been a great experience,” Raetzman said. “I’ve dreamed of doing this since I was a little girl so to actually get this opportunity to live out my dream, I can’t ask for anything better than that, and to be playing with such great soccer players all around and everyone who has also had the same dream, it’s kind of awesome.”
“I was so excited for her,” added Gilliland. “I knew that this was her dream to play here in the NWSL and for a moment before the draft, she thought that it wouldn’t happen and would have to go play overseas. And she wanted to play professional here in her hometown, and I couldn’t have been more happy for her. Seeing her live out her dream and watching her grow from her freshman year to now has been awesome.”
Excelling at the Next Level
Coming into the final stretch of the season after the Rio 2016 Olympics break, the Chicago Red Stars find themselves in fourth place and four points out of first. Both Gilliland and Raetzman know that it will be a grind to the finish after the break and hope to help guide their team to the playoffs for a second consecutive season.
Gilliland says the team’s goal is the same from a year ago, but the team wants to have a different mentality. She now believes things are starting to click as the season heads toward it’s final few weeks.
“For a team that has got a lot of very, very good soccer players with very good soccer IQs, rather than being that blue-collar team [from 2015] that pushed through to get results — that’s still something we still want to have but we are trying to evolve ourselves to being a blue-collar, soccer-minded team — I think we have been struggling to find our identity with that and to make it work, but it has been coming together these past few games and our practices have been really good,” she said.
While Gilliland continues to lead by example on the field, she has also been a mentor to her former UK teammates as well. Raetzman, like many NWSL rookies, has to deal with a big transition from college to the professional game. It always helps having someone you know well in your corner and who you can go to for guidance on being successful in the NWSL.
“Arin and I have always gotten along great. Whenever we are with each other, our relationship grows,” said Raetzman. “We spent one of our whole summers in Canada playing soccer together and I think that really helped our relationship. We just get along really well and I’m enjoying the experience playing with her again. I look to her for guidance and help since she has gone through a lot and has been in the NWSL longer than I have, so I can definitely go to her and ask her questions and she is always there for me.”
W
hile both players continue to set goals, be it a call-up to the national team or establishing themselves in the league, Lipsitz knows that his two former players have the energy and will to keep pushing toward reaching those goals.
“[Arin] is ready for the moment and that time but that is up to the national staff to decide, and I respect them and when they decide that Gilly can be successful at that level, they will call her. She has dramatically changed her level to play technically and to connect, and I know Rory is really working with her about what she needs to do to get to that level.”
“Courtney is continue to prove that she belongs and is doing a great job of doing that. I’ve never coached a player that works harder in training on a daily basis than Courtney Raetzman. She will continue to prove that she is a true professional because of what she does on a daily basis.”
|
Hackaday and Adafruit have joined forces to present the Raspberry Pi Zero Contest. A great contest is nothing without entries though. This is where the Hackaday.io community is proving once again that they’re the best in the world. The contest is less than a week old, yet as of this Thursday evening, we’re already up to 33 entrants! You should submit your own project ideas now for a chance at one of the many prizes. This week on The Hacklet, we’re going to take a look at a few of these early entrants!
We start with [usedbytes] and Zero Entertainment System [usedbytes] has crammed an entire emulator into a classic Nintendo Entertainment System control pad thanks to the Raspberry Pi Zero. Zero Entertainment System also has something the original NES couldn’t dream of having: An HDMI output. The emulator uses the popular RetroPie front end. We’re happy to say that [usedbytes] knew that hacking up a real Nintendo controller would be sacrilegious, so they grabbed a low-cost USB clone from the far East. A bit of creative parts-stuffing and point-to-point wiring later, ZES was ready to meet the world!
Next up is [Jenny List] with The Australia Project. [Jenny] is a hacker from Europe. She’s hoping to use a Pi Zero to talk to Australia. “Talk” may be pushing it a bit though. The Australia Project will use the Weak Signal Propagation Reporter (WSPR) network to transmit RF straight out of the Pi’s GPIO ports. All that is required is a good filter, an antenna, and a balun. The filter in this case is a 7-pole Chebyshev low-pass filter. The filter keeps the Pi’s harmonic filled square waves from messing up every band from DC to light. [Jenny] normally sells these filters as a kit, but she’s made a special version specifically for the Pi Zero.
[Radomir Dopieralski] has brought his signature walking robots to the Pi Zero world with Tote Zero. Tote Zero is a quadruped walking robot built mainly from 9 gram servos. [Radomir’s] custom tote board interfaces the servos to the Pi Zero itself. The Pi Zero opens all sorts of doors for sensors, vision, and advanced processing. The Arduino board on the original Tote would have been hard pressed to pull that off. Tote is programmed in Python, which will make the code quick and easy to develop. Tote Zero just took its first steps a few days ago, so follow along as a new robot is born!
Finally we have [julien] with PoEPi: Pi Zero Power over Ethernet with PHY. The Raspberry Pi Zero is so tiny, that it’s easy to forget it needs a fair amount of power to run. [Julien] is giving us a way to connect our Pi to a network while ditching the USB power supply using Power Over Ethernet (PoE). PoE has been powering devices like IP cameras for years now. It’s become a standard way of transmitting power and data. For the Ethernet physical interface, [Julien] is using Microchip’s ENC28J60, which has a handy SPI interface. Linux already has drivers in place for the device, so it’s a slam dunk. The “power” part of this system comes with the help of an LTC4267 PoE interface chip, which has a built-in switching regulator.
If you want to see more entrants to Hackaday and Adafruit’s Pi Zero contest, check out the submissions list! If you don’t see your project on that list, you don’t even have to contact me, just submit it to the Pi Zero Contest! That’s it for this week’s Hacklet. As always, see you next week. Same hack time, same hack channel, bringing you the best of Hackaday.io!
|
Several tips of the hat to Geoff for his generous donation of £100 towards this fundraiser, the total now stands at £960, still some way short of the £2,000 target. I’ve just donated £20 from my own limited funds (not J4MB funds).
With seven weeks remaining before the next International Conference on Men’s Issues, in Australia, time is rapidly running out to fund flights and other costs of Anthony Corniche, the man who did such a great job filming and editing the talks at the London conference last July – here (scroll down to 8-10 July).
Anthony will be devoting an enormous amount of time and effort to the project – post-filming editing takes up far more time and effort than the filming itself – and if his fundraiser isn’t successful (£1,040 more is required at this point) there will be no video record of the conference presentations. Anthony recently posted this on the website:
Everyone who has and will donate is going to get a credit on the videos when released. The bigger the donation the bigger the credit text. I will contact donors when in editing process around the end of June or early July.
If the fundraiser meets its target, the videos will be made available to view at no cost, on the J4MB and AVfM websites.
Please donate what you can, to help make this important project a reality. Thanks.
If everyone who read this gave us just £1 – or even better, £1 monthly – we could change the world. Click here to make a difference. Thanks.
Share this: Share
Facebook
Twitter
|
Okay, today we have another recipe from our collection. We would like to share the recipe for vegan meatloaf. So here it is!
Ingredients:
One package Boca vegan soy crumbles (Morning Star Soy Crumbles are not Vegan)
1/2 Cup Diced Mushrooms
1/2 Yellow Onion (Diced)
2 Tbsp. Vegetable or Canola Oil ( for sautéing veggies)
2 Tbsp. Diced Garlic
1/4 Cup Diced Jalapeños
4 Tbsp. Worcestershire Sauce
2 Cups Bread Crumbs or Crumbled Crackers
2 Tbsp. Mustard
2 Tbsp. Ketchup (will need more for topping as desired)
1/4 Soy Milk
1 Tbsp. Paprika (Optional)
1 Fake Egg (I use Ener-G Brand, it will work without this, but I have found it holds together better with it.) (optional)
Instructions:
1. Pre-heat oven to 375.
2.Defrost soy crumbles, but do not heat beyond defrosting.
3. In a small sauce pan start sautéing them onions, jalapeños, mushrooms and garlic. Do this for about 5-10 minutes on medium heat, stir frequently.
4. In a medium sized mixing bowl add together remaining ingredients. Mix together well.
5. Once the veggies have finished sautéing, drain any access oil that might remain and stir into the rest of the mixture.
6. Coat a medium sized glass baking dish, or bread pan with non-stick cooking spray. Add the entire mixture to the baking dish.
7. Cook mixture for about 20 minutes at 375, it should become a darker brown color.
8. Remove mixture from oven, coat the top with a layer of ketchup. about 3 Tbsp. Return to oven and let cook for another 5-10 minutes.
9. Remove and serve, should yield around 8 servings!
|
Electric scooters returning to Stillwater campus
Electric scooters will be available on Oklahoma State University’s Stillwater campus beginning Jan. 23.
Three major changes will be involved with their return: mandatory parking sites, lower costs and a company new to Stillwater.
Spin is providing the dockless, motorized scooters. The university is requiring the scooters to be parked in designated parking areas, which will have a special decal.
Spin will charge students, faculty and staff with an okstate.edu email address $.50 to unlock and $.15 per minute to ride a scooter. The cost to the general public will be $1.00 to unlock and $.15 per minute.
Spin is a Ford Motor Co. subsidiary based in San Francisco, which started in 2016. It has contracts with cities and college campuses across the country.
To address safety issues, the scooters will be limited to 10 mph in the core campus area. A campus map showing designated parking sites will be made available later this week. An example of a designated scooter parking area is shown on the right.
Download or Print Scooter Parking Map
SAFETY AT YOUR FINGERTIPS
ORANGE SHIELD is available to students, employees and visitors. Download the safety app today in the Apple or Google Play stores.
ORANGE SHIELD FEATURES
Connect to police immediately Connect to police immediately
Send a photo, video or report to police Send a photo, video or report to police Connect with police inside athletic venues Connect with police inside athletic venues Request Public Service Officer Request Public Service Officer Safety and OSU resources Safety and OSU resources Peer-to-peer text alert system Peer-to-peer text alert system See routes and schedules of The BUS See routes and schedules of The BUS OSU and City of Stillwater information OSU and City of Stillwater information Personal profile including medical information Personal profile including medical information
|
Although this spring was a disappointing one for morels in my area, the past week’s mushroom haul has more than made up for it.
One of the tastiest mushrooms in season now is the Oyster Mushroom.
[social_buttons]
You can hunt for this common variety of mushroom from spring through fall (and even during warm, wet spells during the winter). If mushroom hunting isn’t your thing, you can look for cultivated varieties at farmers markets or Asian markets. You can also grow your own oyster mushrooms at home using kits.
Oyster mushrooms can be found on living and dead tree trunks and logs. They are fairly easy to identify, but be wary of look-alikes such as the orange mock oyster and bear lentinus. These look-alikes are not dangerous, but may be woody or unpleasant-tasting. As with all foraging, the safest way to learn how to find oyster mushrooms is to go hunting with an expert before heading out on your own.
Oyster mushrooms have a chewy texture and a delicate, sweet flavor. Use them in any recipe that calls for “wild mushrooms,” such as these vegan roasted wild mushroom tacos.
I chose to saute my oyster mushrooms in olive oil with garlic, spring onions, chili flakes, and the first patty pan squash of the season. Delicious!
For more information on oyster mushrooms, visit:
Recommended reading:
Image courtesy of a.bower via a Creative Commons license.
|
Sad news arrived for fans of Syfy's Dark Matter recently: the show was not picked up for any further episodes.
The third season of the series, based on Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie’s graphic novel, came to a close last week, and with news breaking that Killjoys had been renewed for another two seasons, hopes had been raised that Dark Matter would receive the same treatment. Unfortunately, this was not to be, and word of the cancellation hit the crew behind the cult favourite hard.
Now, co-creator Mallozzi has taken to his blog to explain exactly why the series was nixed.
“Working against us was the fact that we weren’t a SyFy original. We were an acquisition," he revealed. "For those not in the know, an original is a series that is developed by the network and, more importantly, owned by the network, allowing them to monetize the show through things like international sales, streaming, etc. The network pays a lot more but presumably reaps the benefits down the line.”
Mallozzi went on to say that he pitched a much shorter final season to Syfy to wrap up the story, which was left on a cliffhanger. Unfortunately, they weren't interested in doing that, so he's now attempting to get another network to step up to the plate and save the show.
More if we have it.
H/T Dark Horizons
Previously, Mallozzi had revealed the first news of the show's cancellation to fans.
"It is with great sadness that I confirm the news. Syfy has cancelled Dark Matter after three seasons,” he confirmed. “To say that I’m incredibly disappointed would be an understatement. I’ll save my comments and field your questions in a future blog entry. For today, I just want to extend a heartfelt thanks to my amazing crew, my wonderful cast, and to all of you, our incredible fans. You all deserved better.”
Fans had been giving the show one last push of support online last week, and the cancellation news certainly came as a shock to some - Dark Matter's ratings have not only been on par with other successful series on Syfy, averaging over 600,000 weekly viewers with a 0.15 share of the 18-49 audience; it has also improved in the Live +7 ratings substantially, sometimes as much as 200%. These numbers have also remained steady across three seasons, which is rare for any series and shows that the audience has been sticking around.
Deadline
|
Garfield Boothe and Nichelle Boothe-Rowe were found guilty Saturday of second-degree murder in the 2011 death of 10-year-old Shakeil Boothe.
Boothe and Boothe-Rowe were convicted by a jury during the second day of deliberations.
The two had pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder. The verdict means an automatic life sentence for both but the court will determine when each can apply for parole at a sentencing hearing scheduled for May 12.
Boothe was Shakeil’s father and his wife Boothe-Rowe was his stepmom. They were arrested soon after police found the child dead in their Brampton home on May 27, 2011.
Shakeil first came to Canada from Jamaica in 2009 to live with his father.
The jury heard what the house of horrors that actually awaited the little boy.
When he misbehaved, Garfield Boothe took a belt to his son and encouraged his wife to do so as well.
Boothe intensified his discipline and by early 2011 he was chaining Shakeil to his bed every day and hitting once or twice a week.
In the meantime, Boothe had pulled his son out of school.
When the boy tore a page from a Bible that he’d been forced to read aloud in May 2011, Boothe-Rowe told the jury she saw her angry husband chase him up the stairs and stomp on his chest while she begged him to stop.
A few weeks later, Shakeil was forced to sleep in the basement for wetting his bed. He had a black eye at this time, cuts on his legs, injuries to his knuckles and a cold that wouldn’t go away.
On May 26, 2011, Shakeil didn’t respond to Boothe-Rowe’s calls for breakfast. When she went down to the basement, she found him lying lifeless on the floor, still dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, his foot blue and cold to her touch.
Instead of calling 911, she phoned her husband at work. She said he wasn’t shocked and insisted that she not call for help.
Instead, they packed and moved all her belongings and those of their infant son into storage. She and the baby would then take a bus to the U.S.
His wife Boothe-Rowe told the court she could not rescue Shakeil from his father because she was terrified of her husband.
Her lawyer Brian Ross said Saturday he found the verdict “disappointing.”
“I was obviously optimistic that the jury would accept the defence of duress so it’s disappointing,” he said after the verdict was passed.
“Nichelle had always admitted responsibility for failing to protect Shakeil and her defence was that she herself was a victim of violence and abuse from Garfield, and because of that, she was relying on the defence of duress,” he continued. “The jury obviously did not accept that.”
|
Posted by Scott Main and David Braun
Sending and receiving SMS messages are fundamental features on mobile devices and many developers have built successful apps that enhance this experience on Android. Some of you have built SMS apps using hidden APIs—a practice we discourage because hidden APIs may be changed or removed and new devices are not tested against them for compatibility. So, to provide you with a fully supported set of APIs for building SMS apps and to make the user experience for messaging more predictable, Android 4.4 (KitKat) makes the existing APIs public and adds the concept of a default SMS app, which the user can select in system settings.
This means that if you are using the hidden SMS APIs on previous platform versions, you need to make some adjustments so your app continues to work when Android 4.4 is released later this year.
Make your app the default SMS app
On Android 4.4, only one app can receive the new SMS_DELIVER_ACTION intent, which the system broadcasts when a new SMS message arrives. Which app receives this broadcast is determined by which app the user has selected as the default SMS app in system settings. Likewise, only the default SMS app receives the new WAP_PUSH_DELIVER_ACTION intent when a new MMS arrives.
Other apps that only want to read new messages can instead receive the SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION broadcast intent when a new SMS arrives. However, only the app that receives the SMS_DELIVER_ACTION broadcast (the user-specified default SMS app) is able to write to the SMS Provider defined by the android.provider.Telephony class and subclasses. As such, it's important that you update your messaging app as soon as possible to be available as a default SMS app, because although your existing app won't crash on an Android 4.4 device, it will silently fail when attempting to write to the SMS Provider.
In order for your app to appear in the system settings as an eligible default SMS app, your manifest file must declare some specific capabilities. So you must update your app to do the following things:
In a broadcast receiver, include an intent filter for SMS_DELIVER_ACTION ( "android.provider.Telephony.SMS_DELIVER" ). The broadcast receiver must also require the BROADCAST_SMS permission. This allows your app to directly receive incoming SMS messages.
( ). The broadcast receiver must also require the BROADCAST_SMS permission. In a broadcast receiver, include an intent filter for WAP_PUSH_DELIVER_ACTION ( "android.provider.Telephony.WAP_PUSH_DELIVER" ) with the MIME type "application/vnd.wap.mms-message" . The broadcast receiver must also require the BROADCAST_WAP_PUSH permission. This allows your app to directly receive incoming MMS messages.
( ) with the MIME type . The broadcast receiver must also require the permission. In your activity that delivers new messages, include an intent filter for ACTION_SENDTO ( "android.intent.action.SENDTO" ) with schemas, sms: , smsto: , mms: , and mmsto: . This allows your app to receive intents from other apps that want to deliver a message.
( ) with schemas, , , , and . In a service, include an intent filter for ACTION_RESPONSE_VIA_MESSAGE ( "android.intent.action.RESPOND_VIA_MESSAGE" ) with schemas, sms: , smsto: , mms: , and mmsto: . This service must also require the SEND_RESPOND_VIA_MESSAGE permission. This allows users to respond to incoming phone calls with an immediate text message using your app.
For example, here's a manifest file with the necessary components and intent filters:
<manifest> ... <application> <!-- BroadcastReceiver that listens for incoming SMS messages --> <receiver android:name=".SmsReceiver" android:permission="android.permission.BROADCAST_SMS"> <intent-filter> <action android:name="android.provider.Telephony.SMS_DELIVER" /> </intent-filter> </receiver> <!-- BroadcastReceiver that listens for incoming MMS messages --> <receiver android:name=".MmsReceiver" android:permission="android.permission.BROADCAST_WAP_PUSH"> <intent-filter> <action android:name="android.provider.Telephony.WAP_PUSH_DELIVER" /> <data android:mimeType="application/vnd.wap.mms-message" /> </intent-filter> </receiver> <!-- Activity that allows the user to send new SMS/MMS messages --> <activity android:name=".ComposeSmsActivity" > <intent-filter> <action android:name="android.intent.action.SEND" /> <action android:name="android.intent.action.SENDTO" /> <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" /> <category android:name="android.intent.category.BROWSABLE" /> <data android:scheme="sms" /> <data android:scheme="smsto" /> <data android:scheme="mms" /> <data android:scheme="mmsto" /> </intent-filter> </activity> <!-- Service that delivers messages from the phone "quick response" --> <service android:name=".HeadlessSmsSendService" android:permission="android.permission.SEND_RESPOND_VIA_MESSAGE" android:exported="true" > <intent-filter> <action android:name="android.intent.action.RESPOND_VIA_MESSAGE" /> <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" /> <data android:scheme="sms" /> <data android:scheme="smsto" /> <data android:scheme="mms" /> <data android:scheme="mmsto" /> </intent-filter> </service> </application> </manifest>
Any filters for the SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION broadcast in existing apps will continue to work the same on Android 4.4, but only as an observer of new messages, because unless your app also receives the SMS_DELIVER_ACTION broadcast, you cannot write to the SMS Provider on Android 4.4.
Beginning with Android 4.4, you should stop listening for the SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION broadcast, which you can do at runtime by checking the platform version then disabling your broadcast receiver for SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION with PackageManager.setComponentEnabledSetting() . However, you can continue listening for that broadcast if your app needs only to read special SMS messages, such as to perform phone number verification. Note that—beginning with Android 4.4—any attempt by your app to abort the SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION broadcast will be ignored so all apps interested have the chance to receive it.
Tip: To distinguish the two SMS broadcasts, imagine that the SMS_RECEIVED_ACTION simply says "the system received an SMS," whereas the SMS_DELIVER_ACTION says "the system is delivering your app an SMS, because you're the default SMS app."
Disable features when not the default SMS app
In consideration of some apps that do not want to behave as the default SMS app but still want to send messages, any app that has the SEND_SMS permission is still able to send SMS messages using SmsManager . If and only if an app is not selected as the default SMS app on Android 4.4, the system automatically writes the sent SMS messages to the SMS Provider (the default SMS app is always responsible for writing its sent messages to the SMS Provider).
However, if your app is designed to behave as the default SMS app, then while your app is not selected as the default, it's important that you understand the limitations placed upon your app and disable features as appropriate. Although the system writes sent SMS messages to the SMS Provider while your app is not the default SMS app, it does not write sent MMS messages and your app is not able to write to the SMS Provider for other operations, such as to mark messages as draft, mark them as read, delete them, etc.
So when your messaging activity resumes, check whether your app is the default SMS app by querying Telephony.Sms.getDefaultSmsPackage() , which returns the package name of the current default SMS app. If it doesn't match your package name, disable features such as the ability for users to send new messages.
When the user decides to use your app for messaging, you can display a dialog hosted by the system that allows the user to make your app the default SMS app. To display the dialog, call startActivity() with the Telephony.Sms.Intents.ACTION_CHANGE_DEFAULT intent, including an extra with the Sms.Intents.EXTRA_PACKAGE_NAME key and your package name as the string value.
For example, your activity might include code like this:
public class ComposeSmsActivity extends Activity { @Override protected void onResume() { super.onResume(); final String myPackageName = getPackageName(); if (!Telephony.Sms.getDefaultSmsPackage(this).equals(myPackageName)) { // App is not default. // Show the "not currently set as the default SMS app" interface View viewGroup = findViewById(R.id.not_default_app); viewGroup.setVisibility(View.VISIBLE); // Set up a button that allows the user to change the default SMS app Button button = (Button) findViewById(R.id.change_default_app); button.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() { public void onClick(View v) { Intent intent = new Intent(Telephony.Sms.Intents.ACTION_CHANGE_DEFAULT); intent.putExtra(Telephony.Sms.Intents.EXTRA_PACKAGE_NAME, myPackageName); startActivity(intent); } }); } else { // App is the default. // Hide the "not currently set as the default SMS app" interface View viewGroup = findViewById(R.id.not_default_app); viewGroup.setVisibility(View.GONE); } } }
Advice for SMS backup & restore apps
Because the ability to write to the SMS Provider is restricted to the app the user selects as the default SMS app, any existing app designed purely to backup and restore SMS messages will currently be unable to restore SMS messages on Android 4.4. An app that backs up and restores SMS messages must also be set as the default SMS app so that it can write messages in the SMS Provider. However, if the app does not also send and receive SMS messages, then it should not remain set as the default SMS app. So, you can provide a functional user experience with the following design when the user opens your app to initiate a one-time restore operation:
Query the current default SMS app's package name and save it. String defaultSmsApp = Telephony.Sms.getDefaultSmsPackage(context); Request the user change the default SMS app to your app in order to restore SMS messages (you must be the default SMS app in order to write to the SMS Provider). Intent intent = new Intent(context, Sms.Intents.ACTION_CHANGE_DEFAULT); intent.putExtra(Sms.Intents.EXTRA_PACKAGE_NAME, context.getPackageName()); startActivity(intent); When you finish restoring all SMS messages, request the user to change the default SMS app back to the previously selected app (saved during step 1). Intent intent = new Intent(context, Sms.Intents.ACTION_CHANGE_DEFAULT); intent.putExtra(Sms.Intents.EXTRA_PACKAGE_NAME, defaultSmsApp); startActivity(intent);
Prepare to update your SMS app
We encourage you to update your apps as soon as possible to provide your users the best experience on Android. To help you make the changes, we'll soon be providing the necessary SDK components for Android 4.4 that allow you to compile and test your changes on Android 4.4. Stay tuned!
|
Curbing Islamic extremism will be one of the biggest proposals when the British government sets out its policy agenda later this month.
Measures including bans on organisations, prosecutions of individuals and closing downs premises used to “promote hatred” will be included in a new Extremism Bill that will be unveiled at the State Opening of Parliament.
The Times reports that the government will also announce an independent review into Sharia courts in Britain. Home Secretary Theresa May called for a review in December 2015 amid growing concerns such courts discriminate against women.
A study claimed the courts trap women in abusive marriages, with the judge in one case reportedly laughing at a woman and asking: “Why did you marry such a person?”
The bill will also expand the vetting process so that employers will be informed of known extremists to stop them working with children.
The media regulator Ofcom will also get new powers to suspend broadcasters who include “unacceptable extremist material”. In February, the regulator slammed Islamic channel Peace TV, which broadcasts to the UK, for including anti-Semitic material and blaming Jews for the Holocaust. It is run by a hate preacher who was banned from the UK in 2010.
Examples of views that may be criminalised include calls for the complete adoption of Sharia law in the UK and “hate messages” aimed at the armed forces.
Last year, it was revealed that the government’s anti-extremist ‘Prevent’ strategy is targeting 44 “terror hotspots” in Britain, including towns such as Brighton, Burnley, Calderdale, Coventry, Crawley, Portsmouth and Southwark.
One area, Crawley, only has a small Muslim population but it hit the headlines in 2014 as the home of the first British-born suicide bomber in the Syrian Civil War.
Brighton also gained notoriety after four young friends, nicknamed the ‘Brighton Boys’, travelled to Syria to join the Al Qaeda-affiliate Nusra front.
|
Izvor: N1 / Pixsell
Kako je poznato da u Novom svjetskom poretku imam dosta dobre veze i kontakte, odat ću don Ivanu i „objaviti“ odgovore na sva njegova pitanja
„Kao prvo, nameće se pitanje koliko dugo može ta ljudska rijeka teći i u stanovitoj mjeri rušiti sve pred sobom, odnosno je li dolazak te rijeke ljudi u Hrvatsku i Europu tek početak procesa kojemu se ne može predvidjeti kraj, možda ni godinama? Odgovor na to pitanje morali bi znati i Ujedinjeni narodi, sve vodeće međunarodne sile, vodstvo Europske unije, kao i hrvatski političari. Vjerojatno je da neki od spomenutih pouzdano znaju precizan i istinit odgovor na to pitanje, ali ga ne žele objaviti jer je to u njihovu interesu i u duhu igre koja je vrlo vjerojatno vrlo smišljeno režirana. Teško je reći znaju li odgovor na to pitanje hrvatski političari, ili se pak ne opterećuju tim pitanjem.“
Tako svoj uvodnik u novom Glasu koncila započinje glasnogovornik Kaptola Ivan Miklenić, zabrinut za sudbinu Hrvatske – „što tek čeka Hrvatsku, kad se već sada najavljuje da bi oko sedamdeset tisuća tih ljudi moglo ostati u zemlji barem preko zime?“ – ali i Crkve u Hrvata i Crkve u Cjelini, dakle Crkve Kao Takve.
„Poznato je da u toj rijeci ljudi osim Sirijaca i Iračana ima relativno puno Afganistanaca i Pakistanaca, a sve su to ljudi prikladni za ostvarivanje ciljeva ideologije globalizma koja ima naum razaranja ne samo obitelji, nacije, nacionalne države, kulturnoga identiteta, nego i, možda i osobito, monoteističkih svjetskih religija, posebno kršćanstva u svim njegovim pojavnostima“, objašnjava don Ivan, pa se pita: „Ako je riječ o takvom scenariju, a on se ne može isključiti, kako bi na to trebali odgovoriti i europski i hrvatski političari, kao i odgovorni u religijskim zajednicama? Može li se isključiti tajni plan da se ekspanzijom jedne svjetske religije potisne drugu, da bi se potom iznutra i izvana razaralo i tu religiju?“
Koliko dakle dugo može ta, kako reče don Ivan, „ljudska rijeka rušiti pred sobom“, je li „njihov dolazak u Hrvatsku i Europu tek početak procesa kojemu se ne može predvidjeti kraj“?Glasnogovornik Kaptola pretpostavlja da sile novog svjetskog poretka „znaju precizan i istinit odgovor na to pitanje, ali ga ne žele objaviti“.
Kako je poznato da u Novom svjetskom poretku imam dosta dobre veze i kontakte, odat ću don Ivanu i „objaviti“ odgovore na sva njegova pitanja, od onoga na kraju - „može li se isključiti tajni plan da se ekspanzijom jedne svjetske religije potisne drugu?“ – do onoga s početka: „Je li to tek početak procesa kojemu se ne može predvidjeti kraj?“
I odmah da kažem - ne, ne može se „isključiti tajni plan“. Da, to je „tek početak procesa“. I da, može mu se „predvidjeti kraj“. Naročito se može „predvidjeti kraj“.
Svakako, ne bi bilo prvi put, pa nije teško rekonstruirati kako će u nekoj razmjerno bliskoj budućnosti naša historija pisati „početak procesa“ i njegov kraj.
Bio je na Bliskom istoku, pisat će jednom povijest svijeta, strašan rat: sile sa Zapada svrgavale su afričke i azijske diktatore, crpeći prirodne resurse i zavodeći novi svjetski poredak. Imao je Zapad tako dolje političku vlast i među lokalnim moćnicima odane saveznike, ali nije mogao protiv najvećeg neprijatelja - duboke, upravo fanatične vjere tamošnjeg naroda i njihova neprijateljskog, opasnog boga, za kojega tim siromašnim i primitivnim jahačima deva ni umrijeti nije bilo mrsko.
Tako je bilo svugdje na Bliskom istoku, od sjeverne Afrike do Levanta, od Libije do Palestine. Tako je bilo i u Siriji.
Kad je tako „rijeka ljudi“ iz Sirije krenula na drugu obalu Mediterana, uplašio se Zapad da će imigranti razoriti „ne samo obitelj, naciju, kulturni identitet“, nego i „ekspanzijom“ svoje religije „potisnuti“ pradjedovsku vjeru „u svim njenim pojavnostima“, ukratko sve tradicionalne vrijednosti na kojima je dobra, stara Europa stoljećima spokojno počivala. Nije taj strah bio iracionalan, jer već je po njenom zapadu bilo prljavih stranaca s Levanta i među njima „spavača“, vjerskih vođa i fanatika što su propovijedale tu tuđu i Zapadu posve stranu vjeru.
Zato je Zapad nepovjerljivo gledao svakog sirijskog imigranta što se preko Grčke i Makedonije dokopao Balkana i zakucao na vrata civilizirane Europe, zato je s podozrenjem gledala i tog neuglednog, prljavog i koščatog tamnoputog bradonju što se jednog dana pojavio sa zavežljajem preko ramena.
- Odakle si? – grubo ga je upitao uniformirani muškarac.
- Iz Antiohije, iz Sirije.
- Gdje si pošao?
- Zapravo sam mislio u Dalmaciju. U Solin.
- Bogati? Na more, ha? – pogledao ga je vojnik s visoka. – A ti nisi jedan od onih…?
- Kojih, gospodine? – mirno ga je upitao stranac.
- Znaš ti dobro. Ono, „Bog je velik“, rajska čudesa, djevice i te pizdarije.
- A ne, gospodine – gledao ga je ovaj ravno u oči.
- Hmdobro, ajde da ti vjerujem – klimnuo je glavom vojnik, pa krenuo da ga upiše u registar. – Kako s zoveš?
- Domnius – odgovorio je neznanac. – Ali prijatelji me zovu Duje.
Dalje tu priču znate i sami: lažljivi sirijski imigrant, čim je došao do Solina, okupio je svoju sektu i stao širiti opasnu religiju s Levanta, kršćanstvo ili kako se već zvala, sve dok se po Solinu i okolici nije pročulo da je bradati fanatik navodno oživio mrtvog sina stare udovice Febronije, i da se sve više ljudi okreće toj novoj poganoj vjeri. Prefekt grada Salone, mudri Maurilije, bio je pod velikim pritiskom lokalnih svećenika, koji su – bilježe stari ljetopisi - tvrdili kako Duje iz Sirije „uvodi novu religiju protiv zakona koje su donijeli Augusti“ i žalili se kako novo „praznovjerje“ s istoka okuplja više ljudi nego gladijatorske igre, a kamoli javna žrtvovanja kultovima Jupitera i Serapisa, prijeteći naposljetku rimskom prefektu kako bi i sâm, ako ne poduzme nešto, mogao biti optužen za „podrivanje vjere u bogove“. I to u srcu Carstva, pred zidinama velebne palače koju je upravo tih dana, svega par milja od Salone, za sebe dovršavao sâm senior augustus Gaj Aurelije Valerije, rečeni Dioklecijan!
Tako je, eto, skončao zloglasni sirijski terorist Domnius iz Antiohije, našoj historiji poznatiji kao sveti Duje.
Prilično stoga „pouzdano“ i „precizno“ može se rekonstruirati kako ivani miklenići onoga doba u pravednom gnjevu kriče kako „ljudska rijeka“ iz Sirije i Bliskog istoka „ruši sve pred sobom“, pitajući se „je li dolazak te rijeke ljudi tek početak procesa kojemu se ne može predvidjeti kraj, možda ni godinama“, je li „njihov naum razaranje ne samo obitelji, nacije, kulturnog identiteta“, nego i, možda i osobito, Jupiterova kulta „u svim njegovim pojavnostima“, i – konačno - „može li se isključiti tajni plan“ da se ekspanzijom kršćanstva potisne vjera u rimske bogove? Sve lamentirajući kako bi „odgovor na to pitanje morali znati“ i rimska Kurija i gospoda senatori, kao i prefekt Maurilije, i kako „vjerojatno neki od spomenutih pouzdano znaju precizan i istinit odgovor na to pitanje, ali ga ne žele objaviti jer je to u njihovu interesu“.
Poučna priča o svetom Duji podsjeća nas tako da ne bi bio prvi put kako se u cikličkim historijskim amplitudama svoje ohole dekadence Europa nepovratno mijenja. Ivanu Mikleniću to se ne mora svidjeti – ne mora, najzad, ni meni ni vama – ali povijest se, jebiga, ne piše sama. Imam stoga za Ivana Miklenića dobru i lošu vijest.
Ako je, naime, historia zaista magistra vitae, bolje je da mu kažem odmah: za samo desetak godina nova će religija s Istoka biti proglašena službenom vjerom nove Europe, onako po prilici kako to u svom provokativnom romanu „Pokoravanje“ piše Michel Houellebecq. Jednako bi, najzad, taj njegov roman bio tjeskobna distopija i da ga je objavio prije hiljadu sedamsto godina. S te pak točke povijesti, dalje je prilično lako „pouzdano“ i „precizno“ rekonstruirati njen ostatak.
Za točno tri stotine godina – koja više, koja manje – u tu će novu, kršćansku Europu doći s Istoka nova „ljudska rijeka koja će rušiti sve pred sobom“, i opet će Zapad nepovjerljivo gledati svakog imigranta što se dokopa Balkana i zakuca na vrata civilizirane Europe, uključujući i onu brojnu, neuglednu, prljavu i bučnu imigrantsku obitelj što će se jednog dana pojaviti sa zavežljajima preko ramena.
- Odakle ste? – grubo će ih pitati uniformirani muškarac.
- Iz Perzije, gospodine.
- Gdje ste pošli?
- Zapravo smo mislili u Dalmaciju. U Solin.
- Bogati? Na more, ha? – gledat će ih vojnik s visoka. – A vi niste od onih…?
- Kojih, gospodine? – mirno će ga je pitati jedan od njih, očito najstariji.
- Znaš ti dobro. Ono, Svarog, Svarožići i te pizdarije.
- A ne, gospodine – gledat će ga ovaj ravno u oči.
- Hmdobro, ajde da vam vjerujem – klimnut će glavom vojnik, pa krenuti da ih upiše u registar. – Kako se zovete?
- Ja sam Klukas – odgovorit će neznanac. – A ovo su Lobel, Muhlo, Kosjenc, Hrvat, Tuga i Buga.
Hoće li to, dakle, biti „tek početak procesa kojemu se ne može predvidjeti kraj, možda ni godinama?“ Svakome će svećeniku solinske biskupije biti, naime, „poznato da u toj rijeci ljudi osim Huna i Avara ima relativno puno Hrvata i Srba, a sve su to ljudi prikladni za ostvarivanje ciljeva ideologije globalizma koja ima naum razaranja ne samo obitelji, nacije, nacionalne države, kulturnoga identiteta, nego i, možda i osobito, monoteističkih svjetskih religija, posebno kršćanstva u svim njegovim pojavnostima“. Ako pak bude riječ „o takvom scenariju, a on se ne može isključiti, kako bi na to trebali odgovoriti političari, kao i odgovorni u religijskim zajednicama?“ Hoće li se moći „isključiti tajni plan da se ekspanzijom jedne svjetske religije potisne drugu, da bi se potom iznutra i izvana razaralo i tu religiju?“
Kako je cijela ta historijska zgoda završila, danas znamo. Povijest je možda loša učiteljica, ali ne može se osporiti da je upravo urnebesno zabavna: čitajte samo četrnaest stoljeća stare uvodnike i ljetopise solinskog svećenika Ionannesa Micleniusa, iskreno u jesen 615. godine uplašenog što će biti s kršćanskom rimskom Dalmacijom pred rijekom Hrvata, „kad se već sad najavljuje da bi oko sedamdeset tisuća tih ljudi moglo ovdje ostati barem preko zime“.
Je li to pak za današnjeg Ivana Miklenića dobra ili loša vijest, zavisi samo o njemu: s koje će strane salonitanskih zidina biti kad ih zapljusne „ljudska rijeka“ s Istoka?
Hoće li, kad dođe vrijeme, biti glasnogovornik Crkve pred neprijateljskim Hrvatima - zabrinut za tradicionalne vrijednosti Europe i „kršćanstvo u svim njegovim pojavnostima“ – ili Hrvat pred neprijateljskim kršćanskim svećenicima, zabrinut za svoje tradicionalne vrijednosti, „obitelj, naciju i kulturni identitet“?
|
Fairfield teen busted with half pound of meth, guns, police say
Police in Fairfiled busted a teen with half a pound of meth, an ounce of weed, guns and cash during a raid Saturday. Police in Fairfiled busted a teen with half a pound of meth, an ounce of weed, guns and cash during a raid Saturday. Photo: Fairfield PD Photo: Fairfield PD Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Fairfield teen busted with half pound of meth, guns, police say 1 / 1 Back to Gallery
Police in Fairfield busted a teenager who was in possession of a half pound of methamphetamine, two guns, an ounce of marijuana and a wad of cash during a probation search Saturday evening, authorities said.
The raid happened around 5:45 p.m. at a home on the 800 block of Fifth Street, where officers discovered the teen and the trove of contraband, police said.
The teenager, a 17-year-old Fairfield resident, was arrested and booked into Solano County Juvenile Hall on suspicion of weapons and drug charges along with probation violation.
The juvenile suspect was not identified.
Authorities also arrested 25-year-old Martin Rodriguez of Vacaville at the home on an unrelated warrant.
Evan Sernoffsky is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: [email protected] Twitter: @EvanSernoffsky
|
When Sen. John McCain recently introduced legislation to reshape how consumers watch cable television, he knew he was picking a fight with some of the most influential companies in town.
“Today, we’re putting up a stop sign,” the Arizona Republican said in a May 9 floor speech. “And we’re going to find out how powerful these companies are.”
McCain’s bill would encourage cable providers to offer consumers the option of purchasing channels individually, rather than being forced to subscribe to a package of channels, or bundle. He blames the practice of bundling for the steady increase in the cost of basic cable, from $22 a month in 1995 to $54 in 2010. That’s an average annual rate increase of 6.1 percent, according to the Federal Communications Commission.
The battle is not a new one for McCain, who has railed against the bundling of cable channels for 15 years. He specifically points to the rapid increase in the cost of sports programming, noting that ESPN is by far the most expensive cable channel, costing four times that of second-place TNT. At a Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee hearing on the future of the video industry last week, McCain called it unfair that consumers with little interest in sports must still spend almost $80 a year for ESPN and ESPN2.
“Do consumers want bundles? The answer is obviously no,” he said.
While McCain’s bill (S 912) is not the first attempt by policymakers to tackle cable bundling, it comes at a precarious moment for the television industry. The rising cost of cable, combined with the increasing availability of video content online, has given rise to fears of “cord-cutting” — consumers choosing to go without cable and relying on the Web for video content. That threat is only increased by the emergence of companies like Aereo, which offers users a cheap way to stream live programming from broadcast channels such as NBC and CBS over the Internet.
The legislation wouldn’t require that cable and satellite operators offer channels a la carte, but if they fail to do so, they could lose privileges like their compulsory license for broadcast television. Delara Derakhshani, policy counsel for Consumers Union, said the bill should put downward pressure on cable prices while generally increasing choice for consumers.
“Right now, cable companies decide exactly what programming is bundled with what other programming and at what price it’s offered. Those sorts of decisions would be best left to consumers themselves,” Derakhshani said.
But cable and satellite companies, especially the independent providers represented by the American Cable Association, argue it’s the programmers driving the practice of bundling, not them. ACA President Matthew Polka said his member companies have no way to offer a la carte options to consumers without the cooperation of the six major media conglomerates that control roughly 90 percent of the TV market: Comcast/NBCUniversal, The Walt Disney Co., News Corp., Time Warner, Viacom Inc. and CBS Corp.
“What they’re selling is their big bundle of programming. In many cases, it comes down to take it or leave it,” Polka said. “Not one of these [cable and satellite] providers wants to be without [channels] carried by their competitors. Consequently, because of the competitive threat we face, we all agree to pay for the bundle.”
Polka agreed that sports programming has helped propel the cost increase but hesitated to place all the blame with ESPN. He acknowledged Disney has been especially successful at bundling ESPN along with other channels but said other major media companies such as Fox and NBC are planning to follow suit by creating national sports networks, which would only exacerbate the problem.
“The model that’s been created by ESPN is now being replicated by other programmers. Meaning the problem is only going to get worse as each one of these companies compete for sports right to carry programming,” Polka said. “I see price of sports skyrocketing with Fox and NBC competitors to ESPN.”
While advocacy groups including Consumers Union and Public Knowledge have thrown their support behind McCain’s bill, they see it as a first step rather than a panacea for the problems facing the TV industry.
Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld said the TV market has been distorted by consolidation, which has resulted in companies like Comcast and Time Warner that have significant interests in both programming and transmission. He said those companies only negotiate with other huge players like DISH Network, and have little incentive to break up their products for smaller competitors.
“It’s a dysfunctional market,” Feld said. “You have a few very large players on content side and cable side that negotiate contracts. The way that these things work, with most-favored nation clauses, there’s no room for any variation by anybody else.”
Whether a la carte programming would actually result in lower prices for basic cable customers also remains in doubt. Michael Powell, president of the National Cable and Telecommunications Association and a former FCC chairman, was skeptical at the Senate hearing that eliminating bundling would reduce costs for consumers, arguing that high-demand programming such as ESPN often subsidizes the cost of less-popular offerings that are expensive to produce.
“It’s not a good deal for consumers if you pay $10 for 10 channels, and you were paying $10 for 100, and I think that there’s been some quite serious academic work that that’s a possibly, a very likely possibility,” Powell told lawmakers. “And so while the concern is respectable and noble, and one that we should continue to work on, I think we have our profound doubts that a la carte would actually deliver a lower-cost product to the American consumer.”
Powell said his member companies, which include most of the major cable and broadband providers, would favor small changes to existing laws rather than a sweeping overhaul. That stance could prove appealing on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers are wary of interfering with a fast-changing market only to have their regulations quickly rendered irrelevant by new technology.
“The bill would have a long road to passage, but what’s important now is for discussion to begin in earnest,” Polka said. “There really is a role for Congress. Even though the marketplace is changing, it’s likely not going to change fast enough as content companies continue to get bigger and demand higher fees, bundle more programming and sports becomes a bigger part of their offerings.”
That conversation has already begun in Congress, but appears unlikely to result in legislative action anytime soon. Given the partisan divide in Congress and the generally hands-off attitude toward new or emerging technologies, an overhaul of the cable laws would appear to be a tough sell. However, all sides of the issue acknowledged that cable prices are reaching the point where consumers may force action.
“The government may be forced into this simply because the price reaches a point where it becomes untenable,” Polka said. “Where that is, I can’t predict, but I’ve seen articles that regular monthly cable could be $200 a month. Consumers, I think, would revolt sometime before then.”
Feld suggested that “without some kind of change in the market incentives, we’re going to continue to see the industry in the same cycle its been in for a number of years.”
“The most powerful content providers will continue to jack up the prices, the most powerful [cable and satellite] operators set terms for offering the stuff online and consumers continue to lose out on potential innovation,” he added.
|
Last week, I wrote about how the hacktivist group Anonymous has a new Chinese branch, Anonymous China, which has been very active since it launched its Twitter account on March 30, 2012. The group has hacked and defaced hundreds of Chinese government, company, and other general websites to the point where China even acknowledged the attacks. The hacking has continued against various websites, but even more importantly, the group has declared a new target: the so-called Great Firewall of China.
Since my last two reports, Anonymous China has hacked shangzhi.gov.cn, publicly posting eight user names and passwords on Pastebay. This was soon followed by the hacking of szzfcg.gov.cn, which resulted in the site's full database being leaked and posted to Wikisend. The document was hard to parse, but I could easily see that it included thousands of e-mail addresses, logins, and passwords.
Here are the corresponding tweets:
Our new IRC channel: http://cbe005.chat.mibbit.com/?server=irc.voxanon.net&channel=%23AnonymousChina channel: #AnonymousChina In a few minutes another hack ;) http://www.shangzhi.gov.cn/ hacked by Anonymous China. Leak: http://www.pastebay.net/380748 @YourAnonNews @YourAnonNews we already told the Chinese people to protest and do occupy. Now we have to wait http://www.shangzhi.gov.cn/ hacked by Anonymous China. Leak: http://www.pastebay.net/380748 its cold there :P http://www.szzfcg.gov.cn/ hacked by Anonymous China. All database! Leak: http://www.pastebay.net/395451
As I've already written before, the Anonymous China group has confirmed they are not Chinese and are not based in China. If they're going to succeed in their new mission, however, they're going to need help on the inside. It's thus not too surprising to see these two tweets:
Chinese hackers :) very well brothers ... we have expected you @YourAnonNews our brothers arrived :)
Below is a message from the one of the members, posted on Pastebay. The poor English makes me think that one of the Chinese hackers wrote this, as opposed to someone from the Anonymous China group, which has instead been writing terrible Chinese (they said they're working on it). Then again, it really can be anyone from Anonymous whose first language isn't English.
Hi, we won't speak in name of @AnonymousChina, this time, we are going to speak in name of every single Anonymous person. Anonymous is an idea and we aren't here for tell you that over and over again. In this moment, that you are reading this, we are going to tell you why "the haters" should like Anonymous. Of course, that would be more exciting and more inspiring if this message was a video in YouTube, with someone talking and pictures and a song that touch in your heart. So before we start, try to make yourself inspiring, play your song and let's start. Like we said, we are not going to talk about what is Anonymous, probably you already heard many times, and still, you think bad about us. First, about Anonymous hackers. We deface and leak government websites, we DoX politics, we try to share this particullary words:"Something is wrong in our world". So for that, i don't know why people still support their government, even knowing the truth, well deep inside. For those who hate that Anonymous go to protests, made a Free Hug day. What is your problem? Do you like that banks and the government still your money? Do you like to have no human rights? Do you like to be with no job? I think the answer is no! So if you read this and still think the same, read again and with a song more touching. If now you are part of an idea, welcome my friend, we were expecting you. We will always love everyone in the 99% if you are part of the 1%, because you are rich and don't care about people... We all hope you chnage your mind and help us.
There's the usual signature, with a little bit extra thrown in:
We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us. And we will always being expecting you!
Last but certainly not least, here are the tweets regarding the Great Firewall of China mission:
To all people, reply this tweet saying all chinese websites you know that are blocked. Chinese government sweet dreams ;] Great Firewall - Power: 100% ... 90% .. 50% ... 20% ... Power off. #GFW will be dead soon. #Anonymous Chinese people, world people, ... reporters too, #GFW we all want it dead, wont be easy... Don't expect in next week, or whatever lol One day we are few, in the other we are some, the next day we are many... a few days after, we are China and all world against this system!
In the previous Anonymous China attacks, some targets have had their administrator accounts, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses posted publicly. On many of the hacked sites, the group even posted tips for how to circumvent the Great Firewall of China. Actually trying to take down the Great Firewall of China is a whole other ballgame.
The Great Firewall of China is a massive and complicated system that blocks all types of content that the Chinese government deems improper. It features firewalls and proxy servers at the Internet gateways, engages in selective DNS poisoning when particular sites are requested, and leverages various other methods to censor the Internet, including Connection resets, DNS filtering and redirection, IP blocking, Packet filtering, and URL filtering.
Frankly, I will be very surprised if Anonymous China succeeds. Then again, if they manage to pull off the feat for even a few minutes, it will be an accomplishment of epic proportions.
See also:
|
Thanks to feedback from Facebook and Reddit, I shaved several items off of my packing list. All clothes not on my person fit into one side of a packing cube. Electronic accessories, toiletries and medications fit into two small mesh bags. This efficiency led to an unexpected dilema.
in_question on Reddit commented “your bag is 2x too big.” After fitting everything into it, I agreed. John Gore, friend and efficiency packing aficionado, pointed out that there is a chance I might have to check my pack in some situations which is suboptimal. I bought this pack off of Craigslist for $80, but its 65 liter capacity is clearly designed for hiking through the wilderness with a sleeping bag, tent and food for three days.
For the last two years, I’ve been rocking a Timbuk2 Swig* as my go bag. It’s been a faithful companion through two biking seasons, daily grocery runs and numerous weekend overnighters without showing a glimpse of wear. I rarely leave the house without it, and have been consistently amazed by how much stuff I can cram into it: UPS shipments, groceries, and just last week, a half sheet tray. From the time Rachel and I decided to go on this trip, I’ve lamented not being able to take this bag with me — I just didn’t imagine that I’d be able to fit three months of clothes into it. But after John left that night, out of curiosity, I moved the contents from my hiking pack into my Timbuk2 bag.
For the last two days I’ve been torn on which bag to take. My Timbuk2 is emotionally comfortable. It’s an old friend, tested and true. It’s far less cumbersome, which on a trip governed by simplicity, seems reason enough. I feel it makes me look like less of a tourist, and perhaps, less of a target.
My two primary concerns are weight – without the frame and hip support of the hiking pack, I will be carrying all of the weight on my shoulders and back which could get painful if we find ourselves walking long distances. Last night I filled it to the brim, walked 1.5 miles around Rachel’s parents house in Buffalo and found that I was able to manage the 23 pounds without any soreness.
But what if it grows heavier? It seems reasonable to assume that we’ll pick up some things along the way, and I’m leaving the house with limited excess capacity. However, just like how moving into a 600 sqft. apartment would keep us from buying crap we don’t need, perhaps the smaller bag will do the same. But just in case, I also have the Patagonia Day Pack which stays compressed in my Timbuk2, but can be unfurled and checked or attached via carabiniere if necessary.
All in all, deciding to take the Timbuk2 has been a pleasant end to a surprisingly enjoyable packing experience. I’m quite pleased with how little we’re managing to escape with. Next week, we discover what we forgot….
*after looking at their site, it’s not obvious to me that Timbuk2 still sells the same size Swig that I purchased two years ago. I purchased the medium, and they now only have one size.
|
Graphics hardware and software firm Imagination Technologies has unveiled its newest graphics processing architecture which - given the company's previous work with Apple - may appear on future iPhones.
The newly announced PowerVR Furian offers improvements over Imagination's current-standing tech, with 35% greater GFLOPS density and 80% greater fillrate density.
This essentially translates to noticeably improved performance in day-to-day casual gaming and user interface experiences, but the Furian's capabilities don't stop there.
In addition to optimizing multiple graphics APIs, like OpenCL 2.0, OpenVX 1.1, and Vulkan, the chip tech also promises 70%-90% gaming density improvement - a boon to more demanding games on mobile devices.
This power is especially handy when aforementioned demanding games use augmented reality or virtual reality - two capabilities Imagination specifically had in mind when making the architecture for Furian.
Will it make it to iPhone 8?
Imagination's technologies have made repeat appearances in Apple's A-series chips, making it likely we'll see a modified PowerVR Furian GPU featured in upcoming iPhones.
In fact, a variant of Furian's predecessor, the PowerVR Rogue, was recently used in the Apple A10 chipset that powers the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus .
While it would seem logical to conclude that the iPhone maker has eyes for Furian, Apple has also been showing signs of wanting to go make its own chips independently, even going so far as considering buying Imagination Technologies outright last year.
That said, Imagination says the first products utilizing its latest graphics tech will be unveiled "mid-2017," which could come just in time if Furian is expected to debut inside the iPhone 8 later this year.
|
A/N: Long note ahead re: issues of Elsa and Anna in this story. I've had a couple of guest reviews that bring up a really good point about this story and where it's going: namely, the 'romance' between Elsa and Anna and the problematic nature of it. Elsa is a human, yes, but she does have the mind of a young child. Not only that, but she does have a 'hero worship' type love for Anna. I am aware of the problems of this, but don't worry! That's what character development is for :D I have no plans to add any smut to this story. As some of you may be aware, I have had some slightly NSFW headcanons I posted on Tumblr; these are just headcanons. They were posted because they weren't going in the story (and I thought they were funny enough to share anyway). To the reviewer who mentioned Anna being a jerk (which I'll talk about next), I do have a plan. I know that Elsa seems pretty ingrained in her dog ways, but I do have the scene planned in which her mentality... shifts, I suppose. There is a catalyst (because there's not enough development in the world to change her from a dog — human in the span of this story).
The other thing is that Anna has been OOC. I do know and apologise somewhat. She's been a bit all over the place. Anna is... well, she just broke up with someone she thought she genuinely loved. And then she bought a dog and loved it but the dog transformed into a human and she couldn't really deal with that. She thought to some extent that life was mocking her. Added to the fact that she's a stressed uni student... My point is that yes, compared to canon-Anna, she has been OOC. However, her development is going to move towards that end. I do apologise that it felt like she was doing it just for drama. But hey, Anna is dramatic. Don't worry, there's going to be very little drama of that sort in the future :) She is a jerk. But she won't be for long. We're already getting back into the swing of humour here :)
I hope that clears everything up! I'm sorry if it's confusing, but I do have some idea of what I'm doing (even if a lot of it is in flux). If you have any more questions, you can ask them here or on my Tumblr (link is on my profile). I'm likely to answer that quicker, too, because you don't have to wait for a new chapter for an answer :) Thank you~!
Clothes – $100
-underwear (yuck), pyjamas, socks (not for chewing) (underwear is also not for chewing)
Food – $60
-lotta spaghetti. bread. milk. no more pop-tarts ( D: )
TV – ?
-try the lost and found. ask kris. DONT ask punz–her bf seems shifty
REMEMBER TO CALL MOM AND THANK HER FOR MONEY!
Heaving a sigh, Anna shut her eyes for a moment as she lowered the list. She was skipping Weselton's class to be here (and though she'd use any excuse to get out of that toad's class, it was still unfortunate because she had like, exams and shit coming up) (it didn't stop Rapunzel from offering to tag along. Legit, any excuse—and it seemed to go for everyone).
Opening her eyes, Anna turned her left and opened her mouth to ask Rapunzel a question.
The girl had vanished.
Sucking in another breath, she turned to her right. Maybe Elsa-
Elsa had disappeared too.
Anna groaned and could only hope that the smell of the food court hadn't lured her. She'd have no idea how she'd explain that. Before she could get too worked up, however, her pocked vibrated, emanating a small ding to indicate that she'd received a message. Thanking the heaven's for modern technology, Anna opened up the text and spent a few seconds actually deciphering it.
From: Punz (sent 10:45am)
heya elsa followed me. come get her pls shes annoygn a baby and idk what to do
Anna rolled her eyes. She was just about to send a reply (a "where the hell are you?" when her phone beeped again.
From: Punz (sent 10:46am)
im in that huge department store. at the NOT AT THE KITCHEN STUFF. near the mattresses. youll see elsa as soon as yuo walk in omg omg hurry what the actuAL FUCK ELSA
And indeed Anna did.
She had to navigate her way through a rather dense crowd of children and mothers with prams (also, pregnant people? what was with all the babies?) to get to Elsa, who was rubbing her face into a rather expensive quilt that was spread across and even more costly mattress.
Rapunzel was at the side, gesturing helplessly. "She won't listen to me!" she cried out, slightly despairing and more than a little desperate. Anna remembered the Bisc- Spaghetti Incident and couldn't blame her cousin.
Especially when they could detect faint moans coming from Elsa. Oh dear.
"Hey, Elsa?" she ventured, stepping forward. She sort of wanted to call the dog- girl to her, but there was a crowd and, taking the Blue Fairy's words to heart (er... the meaning behind the words, rather) (Anna couldn't remember exactly what was said) she was trying to be nicer. Focus on the cute, not-completely-there Elsa, and not the she's-a-girl-and-should-know-what–she's-doing. Be nice.
She cleared her throat and called Elsa's name again. Elsa paused her... snuffling... and turned to look at Anna, a shy look on her face.
"Soft!" she called out. Anna noticed the crowd dispersing from the corner of her eye, and breathed a small sigh. Beckoning the blonde girl over, Anna realised that she'd have to actually... train the girl. Oh lord. Not that it was necessarily a bad thing (it would be worse if she didn't), but it was something she had no experience in.
She'd have to ask her mother that, too. That would... not be a fun conversation...
Grasping Elsa's hand, she pulled the girl along. She had a list and she'd be damned if she didn't use it. They needed- she checked the list.
They needed underwear.
"Hey, Elsa," she said to the girl next to her. "Don't leave my side, okay? It's really big and we don't want you to get lost. Okay?"
Elsa nodded her head emphatically. "Not lost!" she said. "Elsa always find Anna."
Anna let out a little smile. "Yeah. Okay, the first thing we have to get you is some underwear."
She let out a little laugh when Elsa stuck her tongue out, face contorting into a frown. It was stranger, though, watching the expression melt into a grin and Anna realised that it was the sound she had made.
"Come on, Elsa. It's not that bad."
It was that bad. It was even badder than 'that bad'. Anna wondered briefly if her mother ever had such difficulty buying her underwear. Perhaps that was misleading.
Getting the underwear was simple. All Anna had to do was find her own size and buy one of the pre-packed five-pairs-for-ten-bucks (she wore the same ones. She made sure to get different colours, though).
However, bra shopping was another matter entirely. Elsa had definitely... well.
Elsa definitely needed a bra. Possibly two, preferably three or four.
Elsa did not want a bra. At all. And dear lord the shop assistant's face when she noticed that Elsa was wearing a collar was... wow. Anna regretted not forcing Elsa to take it off that morning, but the damage was done. The blonde had argued against it being removed—out of all her items of clothing, she felt most naked without it on. She actually freaked out a little.
Now, in Bras 'n' Things, she was still freaking out. Rapunzel had disappeared quickly—fast enough to avoid looking like she was part of Elsa's group. Anna had no idea where she went, but resolved to force her to pay for lunch.
Perhaps the most annoying thing was that Elsa didn't mind the bras. She even put one on her head, Lilo and Stitch-style. But as soon as Anna had picked out three or four pretty ones (in a few different sizes because she had no idea what would fit Elsa), the blonde dug her heels in and refused to step into the change room.
"No! No nono Anna no!"
"Elsa, please. Come on, you've got to-"
"No! Anna no! NO!"
Once again, the stares were there. Anna shoved her hand over Elsa's mouth to silent her. only to yank it back a few seconds later, crying out.
The sight of a deep imprint of teeth, ringed red by small beads of blood, was enough to shut Elsa up.
"You bit me!" Anna accused, half in pain and half annoyed. Elsa's eyebrows furrowed, and she curled in on herself a little, tears filling her eyes.
And now that Anna was actually paying attention, she realised how quickly her anger faded at the submissive gesture. "Nono- Elsa, it's okay, okay? I'm sorry. My hand is fine." She wiggled her fingers at Elsa's nose, resulting in a watery laugh.
"Anna... not hurt? Elsa hurt Anna." Anna nodded.
"That did hurt, Elsa, but it's my fault and I'm sorry. Do you forgive me?"
Elsa nodded her head and threw her arms around Anna's neck. "Yesss..." she murmured. "Elsa... sorry too."
Anna gently unhooked the Elsa's arms from around her.
"It's okay, Elsa. I forgive you. It was an accident." She gave Elsa a small smile, pleased to see it echoed on the blonde girl's face. "Now... please will you at least get one?"
Elsa's smile dropped a little as she looked at the handful of bras still in Anna's hand. Actually, the smile turned into more of a grimace. "Elsa have to?"
Anna nodded. "At least one, okay? You'll thank me later, trust me."
But Elsa shook her head. "Make Anna happy?"
Anna could have let out a sigh of relief at that. "Fuck yes- I mean... yes, it will make me happy."
Elsa shot her a wary glance before finally nodding. "'Kay... One. Elsa put on one."
Anna nodded and exited the stall, giving Elsa her privacy. She didn't expect to have every single face in the store look at her. She let out a weak chuckle and a wave.
Oh my god this girl is going to be the death of me...
An hour and five bra mishaps later, Anna and Elsa finally walked out of the store. Mishaps like Elsa running out in a panic because she couldn't get one of them off, and like her running out of the store in pure excitement because she heard the Salvos bells ringing and she couldn't resist. Anna had thrown her wallet at the cashier as collateral while she chased down her half-naked charge. Thankfully, Elsa had become distracted by one of the swirly-donation boxes that looking like a coin was going down a drain. She had to drag Elsa into the nearest bathroom just so she could shove a shirt onto her.
Everyone had also happened to see the fact that she was wearing a collar. Hooray!
Anna had also learned some valuable information that she was probably going to forget later (like how Elsa actually had a pretty damn good figure and that wasn't fair because she didn't even realise how hot she looked. Also, blue. Perfect for her) (Anna wasn't going to forget that. She'd probably only forget Elsa's bra size, if she were honest. She couldn't even remember her own half the time). Anna had also had to buy a (now-broken) set of lace underwear after Elsa became bored waiting for her to try on her own set of bras and began chewing on them.
The store-ladies were not impressed. Elsa was delighted.
On the way to the huge department store at the end of the complex, Anna wondered if she could actually put a leash on Elsa's collar, because the girl seemed to have the fantastic ability to not listen to a single word Anna was saying and wander off. Honestly, she wasn't causing any harm, it was just incredibly stressful. Watching her toddle after little children was cute (until she got a 'stern talking to' by an angry mother about being a 'paedophile' and 'kidnapper' and promptly burst into tears because of it. She didn't know why she was getting into trouble! That wasn't fair. All she'd been doing was watching the kid as he attempted to eat his own toes. Y'know. Kid stuff).
So, Anna pulled Elsa to one of the seats along the side of the wall and pulled Elsa into a tight embrace because she was shaking so hard. She texted Rapunzel a quick food court in 10 as she attempted to calm Elsa down, though they kept getting weird looks from all the other shoppers, making Anna squirm uncomfortably in her place (which might have actually been because of Elsa's tongue, licking at her neck) (... actually, that probably waswhy people were staring, if she were honest. Somehow, that reason was far less... humiliating). Plus, it seemed to calm Elsa down, and calm Elsa was far less embarrassing than worked up Elsa (see: Salvos Incident during the Bra Shop).
"Elsa bad?" she asked a few minutes later, after she'd calmed down a bit. Eyes red-rimmed and puffy, mouth curled downward slightly, she just looked so despondent.
"No, Elsa. You weren't bad at all. That lady was mean, wasn't she?" Elsa nodded. "And you know, yelling at people doesn't solve anything coz they just get sad and upset." Anna brought her hand up and wiped a stray tear that trickled down Elsa's cheek. "You know what you should do when someone says something mean?"
"Bite."
"Mhmm, that's righ- wrong. That's wrong, Elsa. We don't bite. We ignore them because if they say something mean, they obviously don't know anything about you. Because you're not mean, are you?"
Anna gave a small smile when Elsa shook her head. "Elsa not mean. Elsa not mean. Elsa not mean," she repeated to herself, looking at her lap.
"Nope. Elsa very nice and friendly. And people who don't know that aren't worth your time at all. Understand?"
Elsa nodded slowly. Her eyes flickered to Anna's for a moment, mouth poised to speak before she shut her lips, nodding again. Anna grinned.
"Good. Now, how do you feel about lunch? I want a burrito..."
The way Elsa was looking at Anna, beneath heavy (still-red) eyes and light bang, was intense. And adorable. She puffed out her cheeks and blew a small breath.
"Elsa get biscetti?" she asked, and Anna couldn't help the eye-roll, topped off with a small grin.
"Of course you can get biscetti," she said. "Or maybe you want something else? Like a burger?" Elsa shook her head. "A sandwich? Pizza? Chinese food?" Elsa shook her head to all three.
"Biscetti!"
And how could Anna say no to that smile?
Taking Elsa's hand, they walked together to the food court. It had definitely been over ten minutes, but Rapunzel had definitely found a way to entertain herself in that time.
"Hi, Punz. Eugene."
"It's Flynn!" groused an olive-tanned, brown-haired boy. He gave Anna a cocky grin, and she found herself rolling her eyes again (this time unaccompanied by a smile).
It wasn't that Anna didn't like Eu- Flynn (though that name-switching didn't help. It wasn't a cool nickname when they first met, and it wasn't now). It was more... well, his rep. He'd been in foster care (not that there was a problem with that, but again. Rep) and had taken up petty thieving. When he met Rapunzel, he'd actually been on the run after lifting a pretty pricey piece of jewellery. He was lucky that her family owned the store. Anna didn't have the full story (it was very convoluted and it changed with each rendition), but after a lot of shit and then some, they'd managed to fall in love. He returned the pretty things he'd stolen, apologised, and they'd been going steady for over a year.
He was a nice guy. Funny, friendly, owns up to his mistakes. The whole shebang. He just... skeeved Anna out a little sometimes. So, she did what any skeeved person would do: she pulled Rapunzel to the side to hiss at her.
"What's he doing here?" she (actually) hissed. "Wasn't this a girl's day?"
Rapunzel rolled her eyes, not bothering to keep her voice down as Anna had done. The food court was pretty full, and the generic rumbling of chit-chat was enough to drown out most of their noise.
"He came up to me. It's not like I invited him. And anyway, you and Elsa were doing your thing. I was bored."
"Girl's. Day. It's not my fault you wandered off!" Anna pinched the bridge of her nose. "Whatever. We've done our underwear shopping so I guess it doesn't really matter."
It sort of did matter, though. Anna was trying to get Elsa used to people, especially people Anna knew and was close with. She didn't need Eugene—Flynn—corrupting her so early in her development. She needed Elsa to-
"No!"
Anna's thoughts broke when a loud cry punctuated the air. She turned (as did everyone, it seemed), only to see Elsa and Eug- fuck it. Eugene. Elsa and Eugene having some kind of showdown.
"No!" Elsa yelled again. Her hands were balled at her waist, knees bent and looking like she was a second away from leaping and smacking Eugene right in his 'smoulder'. Anna was next to Elsa in seconds, Rapunzel on her heels.
"Shh, Elsa. What is it? What did he do?" Anna asked, taking Elsa's head in her hands. Anything to calm the girl down and get the attention away from them. Everyone probably thought that she was a little special (and she was, in a way. Anna couldn't imagine that there were too many people that were once dogs living in her area).
Elsa didn't answer, though. She just squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. "Noooo..." she whined into Anna's hands. "Nooo..."
"Eugene, what did you do to my do- Elsa. What did you do to my Elsa?" she asked, pulling Elsa into a hug that the blonde accepted gladly. It was a struggle not to smile at the small, plaintive whines coming from the girl. Something like that should be annoying, not adorable!
Eugene shrugged. "Look, she was telling me about biscetti and all I said was that the pasta place shut down to make way for a Starbucks."
Elsa's small 'no's turned into cries of, "Biscettiiiiii..." that Anna absolutely couldn't hide away.
"Aww, honey," she cooed. "You want some of my burrito? Or chips? Taco?"
Elsa shook her head. And then she stopped. And she glanced up.
"Taco?" she asked, face breaking into a wide grin. "Tacoooo. Taco, taco, taco. Taco." She let out a giggle. "Taco."
Anna nodded emphatically. "Yep. Let's go get you a taco."
She ignored Eugene's parting, "... My Elsa?" comment.
Elsa didn't hate the taco. She curled her nose up at the guacamole and picked out the tomato, but other than that she seemed to enjoy it.
Naturally, the sour cream when up her nose and she panicked trying to get it out before Anna held a tissue in front of her nose and told her to blow. Elsa had dived right back into her food, a happy smile on her face as she chewed with her mouth open and Rapunzel and Eugene stared.
"So..." the only male at their table began. "How did you two meet?"
Oh shit, oh shit Anna hadn't come up with an excuse yet. She met Rapunzel's gaze, but her cousin was absolutely no help at all. She looked just as 'deer-in-the-headlights' as Anna felt.
And Elsa just sat there, scooping up the remnants of her taco (which now looked more like a baby had puked on her plate).
"Uhh..."
"Adopt!"
Three sets of eyes turned to look at Elsa. She had cream around her mouth (and a smudge on her forehead. And covering her hands), and if Anna were completely honest, it was a little... Gross. Even the kid at the table a few meters away was looking at Elsa in wonder.
Anna made a mental note to buy some wet wipes. For now, though, her friends were looking at her, waiting for her reaction to Elsa's declaration. Anna had no idea what to say, but Elsa seemed content to fill the silence.
"Elsa not have home, so Anna take Elsa to Anna's home. Elsa met Sven and Sven and made snowmen and biscetti." She looked up and grinned. "And now Elsa happy coz Elsa have Anna."
The red-head in question just sat there, slightly gobsmacked and more than a little surprised. She couldn't remember a time where Elsa been so understood. And helpful. This was about the most helpful she'd been.
No one else said a word, either. Anna was fairly confident that Rapunzel would keep her mouth shut as to Elsa's origins, at least until they figured something out. Or the fairy came back. Either or.
But Eugene didn't seem to care that the story was a little… suspicious. He was nodding, brows furrowed thoughtfully and sparing Anna a glance she wasn't sure she recognised.
"That's… really decent of you, Anna," he said after a moment. "I didn't think you'd do something like that."
Now it was Anna's turn to furrow her eyebrows. "Why not?"
Eugene shrugged. "Because you live on campus in a single-person dorm. There's barely enough room for you in there, let alone another person. And let's be reasonable, it's not like the campus police are happy about freeloaders. How you got permission is beyond me." He scratched the back of his head. "Anyway, I better go. Helping out at the store today coz one of the other guys called in sick. I'll see ya around." He bent down a gave Rapunzel a kiss on her cheek. "It was nice meeting you, Els-"
Eugene turned around, arm outstretched to shake Elsa's hand. Or, he would have, had the girl actually been sitting in her seat.
Anna's eyes widened and she shot out of her seat. "Elsa!" she called out. "Elsa?! Elsa-!"
Before Eugene or Rapunzel could say a word, Anna had burst forward, running towards a shock of blonde hair. Elsa seemed to be sniffing something along the wall of the food court, turning around in circles. The two adults left seated at the table watched in confusion as Anna reached Elsa and pushed her away from her spot.
"Your cousin is crazy," Eugene said.
Rapunzel could only sigh. "She's always been like that."
|
Police say they believe seven protesters who climbed a 270-foot crane at a downtown Washington construction site just blocks from the White House are associated with the environmental group Greenpeace.
Capt. Robert Glover of the Metropolitan Police Department told reporters Wednesday morning that officers were called to the area of 15th and L streets and found three people who weren't authorized to be at the site attached to the crane. He says another four people are now on the crane, too.
Glover says the protesters believed to be associated with Greenpeace told police they're conducting a First Amendment action.
The protests comes a day after President Donald Trump's administration moved to delay implementation of at least 30 environmental rules and froze new Environmental Protection Agency contracts and grant awards.
|
Australia is expected to announce as soon as Saturday that it will follow US President Donald Trump's lead and recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital (AFP Photo/AHMAD GHARABLI)
Vatican City (AFP) - Pope Francis Wednesday defended the "status quo" of Jerusalem, hours ahead of an announcement by US President Donald Trump in which officials said he will recognise the disputed city as Israel's capital.
"I cannot silence my deep concern over the situation that has emerged in recent days. At the same time, I appeal strongly for all to respect the city's status quo, in accordance with the relevant UN resolutions," the pope said in his weekly address.
The Argentine pontiff's call came a day after he spoke by phone with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, the Vatican said without elaborating.
"Jerusalem is a unique city, sacred for Jews, Christians and Muslims," he said, adding that it was home to sites deemed holy by followers of the three major monotheistic faiths.
Jerusalem, the pope said, holds a "special vocation for peace".
"I pray to God that this identity is preserved and reinforced, for the sake of the Holy Land, the Middle East and the whole world, and that wisdom and prudence prevail," he said.
The pontiff added that maintaining the status quo was important "in order to avoid adding new elements of tension to an already volatile world that is wracked by so many cruel conflicts".
|
She may of not known it, but when your mother used to make you eat at all your greens at dinner, she may have been keeping you cancer-free. A new study has found that an extract from cruciferous vegetables - such as broccoli, cabbage and garden cress - may help mitigate the effects of environmental carcinogens.
That's at least according to researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the UPMC Cancer Center, who recently announced the preliminary results of new and surprising research at the American Association for Cancer Research's (AACR) Annual Meeting in Philadelphia.
According to the researchers, their work was inspired by past studies and anecdotal evidence indicating that cruciferous vegetables with a high concentration of sulforaphane helps prevent cancer. To determine if this was true, lead author Julie Bauman, co-director of the UPMC center, worked alongside Daniel E. Johnson of the UPCI Head and Neck Cancer Program. The pair administered sulforaphane to mice predisposed to oral cancer and quickly found that it significantly reduced the likelihood that cancer would develop, when compared with an untreated group.
"The clear benefit of sulforaphane in preventing oral cancer in mice raises hope that this well-tolerated compound also may act to prevent oral cancer in humans who face chronic exposure to environmental pollutants and carcinogens," Johnson said in a statement.
The sulforaphane extract used - juice derived from broccoli sprout extract - was then tested in a controlled experiment on 10 healthy volunteers. These initial tests revealed that this natural extract is perfectly safe for human consumption, with no adverse effects detected.
These results will now allow researchers to move to human clinical trials, where they hope to recruit 40 participants at high risk for head and neck cancer recurrence later this year.
"People who are cured of head and neck cancer are still at very high risk for a second cancer in their mouth or throat, and, unfortunately, these second cancers are commonly fatal," Bauman explained. "So we're developing a safe, natural molecule found in cruciferous vegetables to protect the oral lining where these cancers form."
For more great nature science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
- follow Brian on Twitter @BS_ButNoBS
|
The year 2008 is far more complex — and exhilarating — than the old templates would have us believe. Of course we’re in pain. More voters think the country is on the wrong track (81 percent) than at any time in the history of New York Times/CBS News polling on that question. George W. Bush is the most unpopular president that any living American has known.
And yet, paradoxically, there is a heartening undertow: we know the page will turn. For all the anger and angst over the war and the economy, for all the campaign’s acrimony, the anticipation of ending the Bush era is palpable, countering the defeatist mood. The repressed sliver of joy beneath the national gloom can be seen in the record registration numbers of new voters and the over-the-top turnout in Democratic primaries.
Mr. Obama hardly created this moment, with its potent brew of Bush loathing and sweeping generational change. He simply had the vision to tap into it. Running in 2008 rather than waiting four more years was the single smartest political decision he’s made (and, yes, he’s made dumb ones too). The second smartest was to understand and emphasize that subterranean, nearly universal anticipation of change rather than settle for the narrower band of partisan, dyspeptic Bush-bashing. We don’t know yet if he’s the man who can make the moment — and won’t know unless he gets to the White House — but there’s no question that the moment has helped make the man.
For five years boomers have been asking, “Why are the kids not in the streets screaming about the war the way we were?” The simple answer: no draft. But as Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais show in “Millennial Makeover,” their book about the post-1982 American generation, that energy has been plowed into quieter social activism and grand-scale social networking, often linked on the same Web page. The millennials’ bottom-up digital superstructure was there to be mined, for an amalgam of political organizing, fund-raising and fun, and Mr. Obama’s camp knew how to work it. The part of the press that can’t tell the difference between Facebook and, say, AOL , was too busy salivating over the Clintons’ vintage 1990s roster of fat-cat donors to hear the major earthquake rumbling underground.
The demographic reshaping of the electoral map, though more widely noted, still isn’t fully understood. From Rust Belt Ohio through Tuesday’s primaries, cable bloviators have been fixated on the older, white, working-class vote. Their unspoken (and truly condescending) assumption, lately embraced by Mrs. Clinton, is that these voters are Reagan Democrats, cryogenically frozen since 1980, who come in two flavors: rubes who will be duped by a politician backing a gas-tax pander or racists who are out of Mr. Obama’s reach.
Photo
Guess what: there are racists in America and, yes, the occasional rubes (even among Obama voters). Some of them may reside in Indiana, which hasn’t voted for a national Democratic ticket since 1964. But there are many more white working-class voters, both Clinton and Obama supporters, who prefer Democratic policies after seven years of G.O.P. failure. And there is little evidence to suggest that there are enough racists of any class in America, let alone in swing states, to determine the results come fall.
Advertisement Continue reading the main story
As the Times columnist Charles Blow charted last weekend, Mr. Obama’s favorable and unfavorable ratings from white Democrats are both up 5 points since last summer in the Times/CBS poll — a wash despite all the hyperventilating about Mr. Wright and Bittergate. (By contrast, Mrs. Clinton’s favorable rating among black voters fell 36 points while her unfavorable rating rose 17.) Gallup last week found that after the Wright circus Mr. Obama’s white support in a matchup against Mr. McCain is still no worse than John Kerry ’s against President Bush in 2004.
But this isn’t 2004, and the fixation on that one demographic in the Clinton-Obama contest has obscured the big picture. The rise in black voters and young voters of all races in Democratic primaries is re-weighting the electorate. Look, for instance, at Ohio, the crucial swing state that Mr. Kerry lost by 119,000 votes four years ago. This year black voters accounted for 18 percent of the state’s Democratic primary voters, up from 14 percent in 2004, an increase of some 230,000 voters out of an overall turnout leap of roughly a million. Voters under 30 (up by some 245,000 voters) accounted for 16 percent, up from 9 in 2004. Those younger Ohio voters even showed up in larger numbers than the perennially reliable over-65 crowd.
Newsletter Sign Up Continue reading the main story Please verify you're not a robot by clicking the box. Invalid email address. Please re-enter. You must select a newsletter to subscribe to. Sign Up You will receive emails containing news content , updates and promotions from The New York Times. You may opt-out at any time. You agree to receive occasional updates and special offers for The New York Times's products and services. Thank you for subscribing. An error has occurred. Please try again later. View all New York Times newsletters.
Good as this demographic shift is for a Democratic ticket led by Mr. Obama, it’s even better news that so many pundits and Republicans bitterly cling to the delusion that the Karl Rove playbook of Swift-boating and race-baiting can work as it did four and eight years ago. You can’t surf to a right-wing blog or Fox News without someone beating up on Mr. Wright or the other predictable conservative piñata, Michelle Obama.
This may help rally the anti-Obama vote. But that contingent will be more than offset in November by mobilized young voters, blacks and women, among them many Clinton-supporting Democrats (and independents and Republicans) unlikely to entertain a G.O.P. candidate with a perfect record of voting against abortion rights. Even a safe Republican Congressional seat in Louisiana fell to a Democrat last weekend, despite a campaign by his opponent that invoked Mr. Obama as a bogeyman.
A few conservatives do realize the game has changed. George Will wrote last week that Mr. Obama was Reaganesque in the stylistic sense that “his manner lulls his adversaries into underestimating his sheer toughness — the tempered steel beneath the sleek suits.” John and Cindy McCain get it too, which is why both last week made a point (he on “The Daily Show,” she on “Today”) of condemning negative campaigning. But even if Mr. McCain keeps his word and stops trying to portray Mr. Obama as the man from Hamas , he can’t disown the Limbaugh axis of right-wing race-mongering. That’s what’s left of his party’s base.
|
NEW DELHI: A set of newly declassified files regarding the liberation of Hyderabad in 1948 provides interesting insights into the recent history of Andhra Pradesh , its unification, the end of Nizam’s rule and the faultlines that have contributed further to the creation of Telangana
Several secret coded telegrams sent by the Nizam of Hyderabad over the tense months of 1947-48, after he had declared his intention not to join India and Pakistan, also provide insights into his bitterness and his plan to hire a European prime minister for Hyderabad. The standoff finally ended after India launched Operation Polo to liberate Hyderabad in September, 1948."Gandhi has started his fast with the intention of unifying the Muslims but he is an old fool and his character is doubtful," the Nizam says in one of his several telegrams to his legal advisor Sir Walter Monckton, who played a key role in the Nizam’s negotiations with Lord Mountbatten after Hyderabad declared its intention to remain independent.In another telegram, the Nizam tells Monckton to find a European prime minister for Hyderabad, so as to further firm up his declared independence, which was being opposed by the communists, the Congress and the Indian state. "Try for dominion status for Hyderabad within the Commonwealth. Try to get a European prime minister," according to the Nizam’s telegram to Monckton.According to a note of the Intelligence Bureau (IB), these telegrams were sent by the Nizam to Monckton "in code," after the arrival of K M Munshi as India’s agent general in Hyderabad and Mahatma Gandhi’s fast.The telegrams show that the Nizam was heavily dependent on Monckton to advice him through the crisis. "Come early, the condition in the state is worsening day by day. India government is trying to strangle Hyderabad and is giving all kinds of difficulties. She is encouraging border incidents. These rascals are unnecessarily creating trouble regarding the Rs 20 crore loan to Pakistan. There was nothing wrong in transferring the Indian securities into Pakistan securities. Hyderabad is prepared for the worst. Give also this information to the authorities in England. Come early," the Nizam wires Monckton.In another telegram, the Nizam tells his advisor that Mountbatten is likely to come to Hyderabad and force it to accede to the Indian Union. "If he comes here with that intention, the condition here will worsen as the people would not like that. I have already declared my independence and I am not ready to rescind from that position and accede, whatever may happen. My people are also with me," the Nizam says. And then again appeals to Monckton to come early because Mountbatten was expected to visit in February, 1948.The Nizam also reveals in one of his telegrams that the ‘Stand Still Agreement’ signed on November 29, 1947 with India was only to "mark time".Also among the declassified documents are many other intelligence reports that bring out the deep suspicion that Indian agencies had of British officers of the Indian Army. One assessment says they are mostly "pro-Muslim and are creating as much trouble as they can before they quit India next year", and they must be sent back at the earliest.This particular report — put up by V P Menon for the perusal of Mountbatten — also talks of the need to remove the British brigadier posted in Secunderabad. Among the intelligence reports are also several inputs about the irregular fighters, communists, movement of foreign journalists and others.As tensions further mounted, in August 1948, the agent general was told in a detailed secret report that "aerial gun running is still going on between Karachi and Hyderabad. The planes are mostly landing at Warangal and occasionally at Bidar. Incidents have been reported of two and even three planes arriving the same day. It is through these planes that emissaries of Hyderabad travel to Pakistan and the places abroad".On September 18, 1948, Major General Syed Ahmed El Edroos, the commander-in-chief of the Hyderabad State Forces, surrendered his army to Indian troops under Major General J N Choudhuri, who later became the Army chief. Hyderabad became an independent state between 1948 and 1956, and then it was split up among Andhra Pradesh, Bombay — later divided into Gujarat and Maharashtra — and Karnataka.
|
The Stack Archive
News Article
Adobe develops AI-driven approach that could end the age of the ‘green screen’ in movies and VR
Wed 15 Mar 2017
Researchers at Adobe have collaborated with the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology to develop a new system, based on deep convolutional neural networks, which can extract foreground content from its background intelligently and accurately – and with no need for the blue/green-screen techniques which have dominated cinema for nearly a century.
The paper Deep Image Matting outlines the process of evaluating the object which needs to be ‘clipped’ out of its background, which involved the generation of a novel dataset containing 49300 training images intended to accustom algorithms with the challenges of distinguishing backgrounds and eliminating them.
Traditional methods of extracting actors or elements from backgrounds, so that they can be inserted into other footage, have always centred around recording the elements (actors, miniatures, etc.) to be extracted in front of a flat field of colour, and relying on photochemical or (later) digital procedures to remove the background.
In earlier times, film production workflows generally used blue as a key colour to remove, though Walt Disney studios (which famously took on visual effects work for Alfred Hitchcock’s chiller The Birds) used a sodium-based process which keyed on yellow – however, its greater accuracy was offset by the complexity and weight of the equipment required, and the sodium process never gained widespread industry popularity.
In the last 15-20 years, green has been adopted as a drop-out colour, since it was proved to be present in less foreground material than blue (for the filming of Superman in the late 1970s, it proved necessary to shoot title actor Christopher Reeve in a costume which was nearer violet than the traditional blue of the man of steel, and to tweak the costume’s colour chemically later, so that Reeve did not completely disappear when extracted from a blue background).
Adobe has been at the forefront of this field for at least 27 years. Acclaimed visual effects producer John Knoll, then working as an employee at Lucasfilm’s Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) effects facility, worked with his brother Thomas in the late 1980s to develop the early versions of Photoshop, which pioneered the digital alpha matte and ultimately joined CGI to transform the visual effects landscape. Later these principles were incorporated into the video-effects suite After Effects, and an industry-wide raft of programs which put the Chroma Key compromises of the 1970s to shame.
But the prospect of casual background removal via the use of neural networks seems likely to be a game-changer not only for the VFX industry but also for the much more potentially lucrative VR/AR sphere – which has some issues to face in this particular regard. Naturally latency will be a critical issue in any AI-driven approach to foreground extraction.
Tags:
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.
|
Data analysis is hard.
What makes it hard is the intuitive aspect of it - knowing the direction you want to take based on the limited information you have at the moment. Additionally, it's communicating the results and showing why your analysis is right that makes this all the more difficult - doing it deeply, at scale, and in a consistent fashion.
Having been a part of many of these deep-dive analyses, I've noticed some "principles" that I've found useful to follow throughout.
Know your approach
Before you begin the analysis, know the questions you're trying to answer and what you're trying to accomplish - don't fall into an analytical rabbit hole. Additionally, you should know some basic things about your potential data - what data sources are available to answer the questions? How is that data structured? Is it in a database? CSVs? Third-party APIs? What tools will you be able to use for the analysis?
Your approach will likely change throughout, but it's helpful to start with a plan and adjust.
Know how the data was generated
Once you've settled on your approach and data sources, you need to make sure you understand how the data was generated or captured, especially if you are using your own company's data.
For instance, let's say you're a data scientist at Amazon and you're doing some analysis on orders. Let's assume there's a table somewhere in the Amazon world called "orders" that stores data about an order. Does this table store incomplete orders? What is the interaction on Amazon.com that creates a new record in this table? If I start an order and do not fully complete the payment flow, will a record have been written to this table? What exactly does each field in the table mean?
You need to know this level of detail in order to have confidence in your analysis - your audience will ask these questions.
Profile your data
Once you're confident you're looking at the right data, you need to develop some familiarity it. Not only will this allow you to gain a basic understanding of what you're looking at, but it also allows you to gain a certain level of comfort that things are still "right" later on in the analysis.
For example, I was once helping a friend analyze a fairly large time series dataset (~10GB). The results of the analysis didn't intuitively jive with me - something felt off. When digging deeper into the analysis, I decided to plot the events by date and noticed we had two days without any data - that shouldn't have been the case.
Profiling your data early on helps to ensure your work throughout the analysis - you'll notice sooner when something is "off."
Facet all the things
I'm increasingly convinced that Simpson's Paradox is one of the most important things for anyone working with data to understand. In cases of Simpson's paradox, a trend appearing in different groups of data disappears when the groups are combined and looked at in aggregate. It illustrates the importance of looking at your data by multiple dimensions.
As an example, take a look at the below table.
The above table shows admission rates for men and women into the University of California, Berkeley's graduate programs for the fall of 1973. Based on the above numbers, the University was sued for an alledged bias against women. However, when faceting the data by sex AND department, we see women were actually admitted into many departments' graduate programs at a rate higher than men.
This is probably the most infamous case of Simpson's paradox. The folks over at Berkeley's VUDLab have put together a fantastic visualization allowing you to explore the data further.
When going through your data, do so with Simpson's paradox in mind. It's extremely important to understand how aggregate statistics can be misleading and why looking at your data from multiple facets is necessary.
Be skeptical
In addition to profiling and faceting your data, you need to be skeptical throughout your analysis. If something doesn't look or feel right, it probably isn't. Pore through your data to make sure nothing unexpected going on, and if there is something unexpected, make sure you understand why it's occurring and are comfortable with it before you proceed.
I'd argue that no data is better than incorrect data in most cases. Make sure the base layer of your analysis is correct.
Think like a trial lawyer
A good trial attorney will prepare their case while also considering how the opposition might respond. When the opposition does present, our attorney will (hopefully) have prepared for that very piece of new evidence or testimony, easily allowing he/she to counter in a meaningful way.
Much like a good trial attorney, you need to think ahead and consider the audience of your analysis and the questions they might ask. Preparing appropriately for those will lend to the credibility of your work. No one likes to hear "I'm not sure, I didn't look at that" and you don't want to be caught flat-footed.
Clarify your assumptions
It's unlikely that your data is perfect and it probably doesn't capture everything you need to complete a thorough and exhaustive analysis - you'll need to hold some assumptions throughout your work. These need to be explicitly stated when you're sharing results.
Additionally, your stakeholders are crucial in helping you determine your assumptions. You should be working with them and other domain experts to ensure your assumptions are logical and unbiased.
Check your work
It seems obvious, but people just don't check their work sometimes. Understandably, there are deadlines, quick turnarounds, and last minute requests; however, I can assure you that your audience would rather your results be correct than quick.
I find it useful to regularly check the basic statistics of the data (sums, counts, etc.) throughout an analysis in order to make sure nothing is lost along the way - essentially creating a trail of breadcrumbs I can follow backwards in case something doesn't seem right later on.
Communicate
Lastly, the whole process should be a conversation with stakeholders - don't work in a silo. It's possible your audience isn't necessarily concerned with decimal point accuracy - maybe they just want to understand directional impact.
In the end, remember that data analysis is most often about solving a problem and that problem has stakeholders - you should be working with them to answer the questions that are most important; not necessarily those that are most interesting. Interesting doesn't always mean "valuable."
|
U.S. Marine Corps Fighter Attack Squadron 121, the service’s first overseas-deployed F-35B squadron, is now up to full fighting strength with the arrival of the last three F-35B stealth fighters on November 15, according to a U.S. Pacific Command statement. The squadron now has a full complement of 16 aircraft.
The last three F-35B aircraft of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 arrived at an Iwakuni airbase in Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan last Wednesday. The F35B is the U.S. Marine Corps variant of the supersonic fifth-generation F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter, capable of vertical or short takeoffs and vertical landings without requiring a catapult launcher.
The F-35B was developed as a replacement for the Marine Corps’ F/A-18 Hornet, AV-8B Harrier and EA- 6B Prowler aircraft. “The F-35B brings strategic agility, operational flexibility, and tactical supremacy to the Pacific with a mission radius greater than that of the F/A-18 Hornet and AV-8B Harrier II in support of the U.S.- Japan alliance,” according to the U.S. Marine Corps.
The first ten F-35Bs deployed to Japan from Marine Corps Air Station Yuma in Arizona in January. “The unique combination of stealth, cutting-edge radar and sensor technology, and electronic warfare systems bring all of the access and lethality capabilities of a fifth-generation fighter, a modern bomber, and an adverse-weather, all-threat environment air support platform,” the U.S. Marine Corps noted in a January 12 statement.
As I reported previously, the first two of 12 U.S. Air Force F-35A Lightning II — the F-35s conventional takeoff and landing variant — arrived at Kadena Air Base, Okinawa for a six-month rotation earlier in November. “This long-planned deployment is designed to demonstrate the continuing U.S. commitment to stability and security in the region,” said in a press release.
As I explained elsewhere, the United States regional allies, Japan and South Korea, will also soon operationalize their new fleets of F-35 fifth-generation fighter jets to the dismay of China and North Korea:
The Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) took delivery of its first F-35A fighter jets this year through the U.S. Foreign Military Sales Program. (…) Japan’s Ministry of Defense selected the F-35A in December 2011 following the F-X competitive bidding process. (…) The JASDF is expected to induct a total of 42 new F-35As in the coming years. Another U.S. ally, South Korea, will begin receiving its first F-35As in 2018. The South Korean government has ordered 40 F-35A aircraft with delivery expected to be completed by 2021. South Korea has been considering procuring 20 additional F-35As.
The United States, Japan, and South Korea will not be the only powers operating advanced stealth fighter jets in East Asia. According to Chinese media reports, the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) first fifth-generation fighter aircraft, the Chengdu Aerospace Corporation (CAC) J-20 multirole fighter is slated to enter serial production in the coming months.
|
80,000 South African Platinum Miners Strike For A Living Wage
More at The Real News
JESSICA DESVARIEUX, TRNN PRODUCER: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Jessica Desvarieux in Baltimore.
In South Africa, miners have rejected a 9 percent wage increase offer from the platinum industry as their strike enters its second week. Tens of thousands of members of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, or AMCU, walked off the job last week to protest harsh working conditions. They are also asking for a living wage that will double their current wages. Tensions have been high between the sides, with the media reporting several acts of violence in mining towns.
This is the largest strike in the mining sector since the Marikana strike in 2012. South Africa is the leading supplier of the world’s platinum, and the strike is expected to take a toll on its economy.
Now joining us to discuss all this is Patrick Bond. Patrick is the director of the Centre for Civil Society and professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa.
Thanks for joining us, Patrick.
PATRICK BOND, DIRECTOR, CENTRE FOR CIVIL SOCIETY: It’s great to be back. Thanks, Jessica.
DESVARIEUX: So, Patrick, apartheid ended in South Africa two decades ago, yet we still have low wages, harsh working conditions, and extreme inequality. So can you tell us why these workers are on strike? And what are their demands?
BOND: Well, you’re exactly right that the background is one of desperation. It’s–April 27, 1994–the twentieth anniversary of our liberation coming up. But unemployment is quite a lot higher, about 10 percent higher than then. And the inequality rate, the GINI coefficient, is much higher. Poverty is about the same. So in this context, those who have jobs often need to feed quite a few more people.
In the case of mineworkers, the migrant labor system of apartheid continues. And indeed for the Marikana platinum miners and the others in the Platinum Belt, they often have a family locally plus back in their original home areas, the old bantustans. And that, plus the credit system being completely out of control and massive consumer debt–what are called mashonisas (loan sharks) here have really taken away the pay packets through stop orders, garnishee orders, on these miners’ salaries. So they’ve been demanding an increase from around $400 a month for the starting wage to a starting wage of about USD 1,100. And the big platinum companies don’t, obviously, want to give that kind of concession to some 70,000 workers now on strike. And the price of platinum’s gone up because of the anticipated supply constraint, since South Africa supplies 80 percent of the world market.
The share prices of the companies have gone up, but the South African economy is crashing. Our currency, along with, I suppose, the Argentine peso, really lead the fragile five economies. South Africa was once considered a rising BRIC, one of the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa new bloc, the BRICS bloc.
But it’s a very tumultuous situation, and it’s also with memories a year and a half ago of the massacre of 34 mineworkers in the very same space where this strike is going on. It’s really reminded many in the working class of the need for quite dramatic changes in the political configuration, with an election probably in May, a national election, and with the largest union having just broken away from the ruling party. That’s the metalworkers union, the National Union of Metalworkers, NUMSA. There is a great fluidity that I haven’t seen in my 25 years living in this country.
DESVARIEUX: You mentioned Marikana and the massacre that took place there. Can you speak a little bit more about the significance of the strike being launched from that location?
BOND: It’s so significant because no one’s really found out who ordered these shots to be fired and under what conditions, though for about a year we’ve had a commission looking into this, the Farlam Commission, and it has unveiled some secret police video and emails that are very, very incriminating for the police, because it seems now that instead of the original media reports from August 2012, in which the mineworkers were allegedly charging the police with their machetes, their knives, and then were mowed down by automatic police fire, instead those workers now, with new video tape that was previously unavailable, were actually walking more casually and then began to panic as they saw barbed wire being rolled out. And that Farlam Commission investigation also showed the number-two man in the ruling party, Cyril Ramaphosa, formerly a mineworker leader, having sent some emails–again very incriminating–as a 9 percent owner of Lonmin, the main company under strike at that time, that company then calling in the police, calling in the mining minister. In other words, a very important connection–maybe collusion is the proper word–between big business, big government, and a police force that then, and still today, seems ready to shoot to kill.
Indeed, Jessica, in the same municipality as Marikana, two weeks ago people who were protesting because they didn’t have any water for weeks were then mowed down. Four were shot dead by police–what is reported to be a peaceful protest–another protester shot dead just west of Johannesburg in another mining community last week, and then two days ago two more civilians shot dead in protests against police in another agricultural area north of the mining belt. In other words, the police are now seeming to be quite panicky, using automatic fire, not rubber bullets or tear gas, at the slightest provocation. It’s a very, very dangerous time to be an activist in South Africa.
DESVARIEUX: And, Patrick, I want to speak about the government’s role in all of this and specifically speak about the African National Congress. What is their position on the strike, and what is motivating that position?
BOND: Well, they’re very closely aligned, through the so-called alliance, the big alliance of trade unions, the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the Communist Party and the African National Congress. Critical in that alliance, the glue, really, is the National Union of Mineworkers. Indeed the current general secretary, the sort of political manager of ANC, was a former leader, and indeed the country’s deputy president, Kgalema Motlanthe, was also a former NUM leader. And the new, the incoming deputy president to Jacob Zuma, Cyril Ramaphosa, the man with the Lonmin connections, also had been a NUM leader. So this is the union to have a ladder into government.
And as a result, it seems that this union, which has become very cozy with big business–some call it really the sweetheart union–this union is panicking. It’s lost tens of thousands of its members, who feel that the leadership are too close to corporations and too close to the government. And as a result, from being the largest union in South Africa about a year ago, NUM has now descended to about number four. And what that means for the ANC government is they’ve really lost the confidence of organized workers, at least a large fraction, represented perhaps best by the National Union of Metalworkers, NUMSA. And with the walkout about a month ago of NUMSA away from the ANC alliance, what we now see is a reconfiguration of the left.
This week, NUMSA is holding meetings all over the country, and especially in Johannesburg on Saturday, with its social movement partners that I think in the coming months, maybe years, will become, as it’s been called, the united front of the independent left. So we’re seeing, really, a configuration of independent civil society, social movements, these very, very prolific protesters–last year there were about 1,800 protests that turned violent, according to police statistics. So we have community protests going on–about 30 per day, many of them turning violent.
And these protests are the stuff of what we call popcorn–they pop up, they fall back down. And what they have lacked is the sort of coherence that a major trade union, with its experience of democratic shop floor organizing, has typically given community activists. Twenty-some years ago, every community group that was protesting was invariably led by a seasoned trade unionist. And in the 1990s, many of those trade unionists had better wages. They moved out of the lowest-income communities. And as a result, what we’ve seen in the last few years: huge uprise, protests, but without much direction and no ideology. And that may now change.
On Saturday, a struggle exposition is going to take place in Johannesburg, hosted by the metalworkers, to try to compare notes amongst hundreds of the leading activists in South Africa. And that may mean that the ANC, not in the coming election, but in future elections, municipal elections in 2016 or national election, 2019, may be faced with the Workers Party. Currently, they’re faced with one political threat from the left, the Economic Freedom Fighters, led by Julius Malema, who was a very militant youth leader in the ruling party, and he was kicked out, partly for corruption, but mainly because he questioned the conservatism in the ruling party. And this all means that on the left, quite a lot of explosions are happening. Some say this is the transition from the so-called war of position to a war of movement, to use the terms of Antonio Gramsci. And meanwhile on the right, this week has also seen a merger of the two main classically liberal or, some may say, neoliberal free-market oriented parties, one led by Steve Bico’s former partner, Mamphela Ramphele, the other by the traditionally white centrist party, the Democratic Alliance. And that may mean that this right wing could consolidate some 20 to 25 percent of the vote, and in the May or June election (it’s not yet been called), the ANC may fall from 66 down to the low 50s. And that remains to be seen, but to me it would appear likely that the ruling party is now possibly going to start fragmenting quite badly.
DESVARIEUX: Well, Patrick, we’ll certainly keep tracking this story. Thank you so much for that update.
BOND: Thank you.
DESVARIEUX: And thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
Patrick Bond is the Director of the Center for Civil Society and Professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Bond is the author and editor of the recently released books, Politics of Climate Justice and Durban’s Climate Gamble.
|
ALEXANDRIA, Virginia (Reuters) - A Michigan man was sentenced on Friday to four years in prison for trying to get a job with the CIA so he could spy for China, just as Chinese President Hu Jintao was wrapping up his U.S. visit.
Glenn Shriver, 29, pleaded guilty in October to conspiracy to communicate national defense information after admitting he met Chinese officials about 20 times and took about $70,000 from Chinese intelligence officers.
Shriver said at the sentencing hearing he made a “terrible decision” to try to spy for China and “somewhere along the way I got into bed with the wrong people.”
U.S. District Judge Liam O’Grady sentenced Shriver to four years in prison, as called for in the plea agreement, followed by two years of supervised release.
“Mr. Shriver sold out his country and repeatedly sought a position in our intelligence community so that he could provide classified information to the PRC (People’s Republic of China),” U.S. Attorney Neil MacBride said in a statement.
Prosecutors said Shriver was caught before he could begin working at the Central Intelligence Agency and that he never was close to getting access to classified information.
Shriver spent a year during college studying in Shanghai in 2002-2003 and moved there in 2004 to continue his studies and to work. Prosecutors said he responded to an advertisement for a writer on U.S.-Sino relations and the contact he met later introduced him to Chinese intelligence agents.
Shriver took the U.S. Foreign Service exam twice at the State Department, failing both times, but the Chinese still paid him $30,000 for his “friendship” and efforts, according to court papers.
He then applied for a job in the CIA’s National Clandestine Service and demanded $40,000 from the Chinese intelligence officers, according to prosecutors.
During his final employment processing last May, he failed to disclose his contacts and the money he received.
Shriver said he considered the initial contacts “very innocuous” and the offers of money were explained to him as a stipend for living expenses. He said only once did the Chinese contacts say they wanted U.S. secrets.
The sentencing came as Hu wrapped up a four-day visit to the United States that included talks with President Barack Obama and the announcement of numerous commercial deals.
Relations between the two countries have been strained at times over issues including China’s currency policies and its position as the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt, as well as tensions over the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea.
|
Motorists in Belchertown were forced to brake for a large moose in traffic on Thursday.
Belchertown resident Ethan Bloomfield captured the incident on video and shared it on his Facebook page. It has been viewed more than 100,000 times.
“I was actually kind of nervous,’’ said Bloomfield about being so close to the moose.
He said he had visions of it jumping on his car.
Bloomfield was on his way to a meeting just before 7 a.m. when he saw a car ahead of him in the distance with its lights flashing and what he thought was a person walking down the middle of the street in front of it, he said.
Advertisement
“As it got closer, I saw that it was a giant moose,’’ he said.
That’s when he grabbed his phone and began taking video.
The video shows a line of cars, with their hazard lights on, following the moose as it walked — ever so slowly — on Route 9.
Belchertown Animal Control Officer Anna Fenton said motorists reacted correctly.
“Slow down and let it go where it’s going,’’ said Fenton. “You really don’t want to startle it and spook it because you don’t know what it’s going to do. It could wind up running into oncoming traffic.’’
Fenton said it’s not uncommon to see moose, deer, and even bears in the western Massachusetts town.
“We have lots of wildlife,’’ she said.
This isn’t the first moose to cross Route 9, which is heavily traveled by wildlife, said Fenton. A couple of years ago, a mother moose and her baby crossed the same road.
Bloomfield said he’s surprised by the moose mania he’s experiencing today — all the social media shares and friends who have reached out with reactions.
“I told my friends, ‘Everything I’ve ever posted, none of you have ever shared [until now]. I’m way more interesting than a moose!’’’
Advertisement
|
August 11, 2009
Nicole Colson examines revelations about the acts of violence committed by soldiers returned from Iraq--and how the military is trying to evade responsibility.
"I TOLD them he was a walking time bomb."
That's how Teresa Hernandez remembers describing her son Anthony Marquez--a soldier in the Army's 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment--to his sergeant at Fort Carson, Colo., after Marquez returned from a tour of duty in Iraq. Teresa had become alarmed, she told the Associated Press, because her son "was showing signs of violent behavior, abusing alcohol and pain pills, and carrying a gun."
But rather than take her concerns seriously, the sergeant dismissed them--and even used his mother's phone call to berate Marquez, taunting him about it.
In 2006, Marquez became the first soldier from his unit to murder someone in the U.S. after a tour in Iraq. Three days before he was scheduled to be honorably discharged because of a dispute over a marijuana sale, he used a stun gun to shock a drug dealer in Widefield, Colo., and then shot and killed him.
But Anthony Marquez wasn't the only soldier from his unit to kill at home. In all, 14 Fort Carson soldiers--including 10 infantrymen from the 4th Brigade Combat Team--have been accused of murder, attempted murder or manslaughter after coming back from Iraq between 2005 and 2008. Four more soldiers from other Fort Carson units committed suicide during the same period.
Combat exposure and post-traumatic stress are factors for soldiers who commit violence back at home (U.S. Army)
Most of those accused of killing were from a 500-soldier unit within the brigade, called the 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment, which nicknamed itself the "Lethal Warriors."
According to the Colorado Springs Gazette, the list of alleged violent incidents includes:
-- The rape and murder of 19-year-old Judilianna Lawrence last October. Prosecutors have charged a Fort Carson soldier. The killing of Cesar Ramirez Ibanez and Amairany Cervantes, who were mowed down with an AK-47. A soldier is charged. The shooting death of Spc. Kevin Shields in December 2007. Three soldiers are in prison for that. A few months earlier, Pfc. Robert James was shot to death in a robbery. Two soldiers are doing time for it. Before that, a taxi driver in Pueblo, Colo., was gunned down by a Fort Carson GI, who has since been convicted... One soldier killed his infant. Another killed a friend with a fireplace poker. Another killed his wife and then himself.
Taken together, the crimes were so startling that, once the media began asking questions about the possible link between these violent incidents and the soldiers' military service, the Army began a study of Fort Carson servicemen.
What else to read The Colorado Springs Gazette has a two-part series, "Casualties of War, Part I" and "Casualties of War, Part II," detailing the crimes committed by Fort Carson soldiers, including interviews with soldiers. Salon.com's Mark Benjamin has done some of the best writing about the Army's neglect of soldiers' mental health problems and the consequences in "Coming Home: The Army's Fatal Neglect." The 2008 Rand Corporation study "Invisible Wounds of War: Psychological and Cognitive Injuries, Their Consequences and Services to Assist Recovery," details the levels of untreated post-traumatic stress among veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Last month, the Army released the results of that study, which admits that combat stress and mental health issues, combined with substance abuse problems, contributed to the violence. Soldiers who see more combat and have more of their comrades killed may be more likely to find trouble when they come home, the study said.
The investigation suggested "a possible association between increasing levels of combat exposure and risk for negative behavioral outcomes" and stated that its "findings are consistent with recent research on combat exposure and subsequent behavior outcomes among soldiers."
In other words, this kind of violence is what can happen when the war comes home.
Yet despite the findings of its own study, the military predictably downplayed the effects of war on soldiers' behavior. Army Surgeon General Lt. Gen. Eric Schoomaker stressed, for example, that the Army was unable to identify any "single factor or grouping of factors" to explain the cluster of violent crimes committed at Fort Carson since 2005.
According to the Pentagon's American Forces Press Service: "The study did not reveal any one single cause, but rather a comprehensive list of individual predisposing factors, such as prior criminal behavior, drug or alcohol abuse, prior behavioral issues and barriers to seeking behavioral health care."
"INDIVIDUAL PREDISPOSING factors" is the military's polite way of saying that it shouldn't be held responsible for the breakdown and trauma suffered by soldiers--or the violence they commit as a result. Certain factors--like combat--may have acted as stressors, according to the study, but the core problem is always with the individual soldiers, as far as the Pentagon is concerned.
This has become a common line from the military. Soldiers back from Iraq who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) report being told that their psychological conditions were "pre-existing"--in what many claim is an effort by the government to refuse paying for treatment.
According to official army statistics, the number of U.S. service members wounded in Iraq is 31,000, but others estimates put the real number at least three times higher. The statistics don't include traumatic brain injuries that often go undiagnosed, or cases of PTSD that the military denies--instead attributing cases of depression, anxiety disorders, inability to concentrate and night terrors to pre-existing "personality disorders," a designation that will follow soldiers around for the rest of their lives (and can prevent them, ironically, from getting VA benefits and treatment).
A soldier may have been well enough to get into the military and be sent into battle (often multiple times). But once they're ready to be discharged and are experiencing symptoms of PTSD or other behavioral problems, the military often "discovers" they had an underlying mental illness or disorder that should have disqualified them from service in the first place--leaving them potentially ineligible for benefits at the time they need help the most.
According to "Invisible Wounds of War: Psychological and Cognitive Injuries, Their Consequences and Services to Assist Recovery," a study of troops released by the Rand Corporation last year, some 300,000 U.S. troops are suffering from major depression or post traumatic stress from serving in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and 320,000 suffered brain injuries.
Yet only 43 percent reported ever being evaluated by a physician for their head injuries. And only 53 percent of service members with PTSD or depression had sought help during the year prior to the study.
As Salon.com reporter Mark Benjamin--whose excellent series "Coming Home: The Army's Fatal Neglect" detailed the downward spiral of several Fort Carson soldiers accused of committing violent crimes--noted, the Army's claims that there was no direct "cause" for stateside violence has a perverse rationale. "Without causation, there is no way to establish how the murders could've been prevented," Benjamin wrote. "Without causation, there is also limited accountability."
Incredibly, Army officials even seemed to blame soldiers themselves for not seeking help, saying for example that soldiers in the 3rd Brigade were more willing to ask for care for their "emerging behavioral health problems--alcohol and drug problems" as opposed to the members of the 4th Brigade (the unit of the majority of those who are accused of committing violent acts).
Yet as Mark Benjamin pointed out, Schoomaker "also claimed that the experiences of the 4th and 3rd Brigades in combat were 'similar.' That's not what's indicated in the report--the 4th Brigade, where the murder suspects were clustered, had eight times more combat deaths than the 3rd. Moreover, the report indicated that the Army itself played a role in denying care to the soldiers--half, some with suicide issues, were sent back to Iraq 'early,' according to the report."
DESPITE THE military's conclusions, soldiers and their families have a different story to tell about the role their experiences in combat played in shaping their actions after the war.
Anthony Marquez told the Gazette that his combat experience made him predisposed to commit murder. "If I was just a guy off the street, I might have hesitated to shoot," Marquez told the Gazette in an interview from the Bent County Correctional Facility, where he is currently serving a 30-year prison term. "But after Iraq, it was just natural."
Kenneth Eastridge, an infantry specialist who served two tours in Iraq and has nearly 80 "confirmed kills"--and who is now serving 10 years in prison for accessory to murder--had a similar story to tell in an interview with the Associated Press. "The Army pounds it into your head until it is instinct: Kill everybody, kill everybody," he said. "And you do. Then they just think you can just come home and turn it off."
As the Associated Press noted:
Both [Marquez and Eastridge] were wounded, sent back into action and saw friends and officers killed in their first deployment. On numerous occasions, explosions shredded the bodies of civilians, others were slain in sectarian violence--and the unit had to bag the bodies. "Guys with drill bits in their eyes," Eastridge said. "Guys with nails in their heads."
And in addition to these horrors, some of the Fort Carson soldiers say they witnessed or participated in acts of brutality, including the murder of civilians and other war crimes.
Anthony Marquez, for example, described the killing of an Iraqi boy to the Denver Post in 2007:
He remembers the car advancing toward a checkpoint. "I was the gunner on the Humvee. I told my sergeant I was going to give them a warning shot, and I shot some warning rounds. We didn't know what it was, so I had to take the car out," Marquez said. He killed the driver, an old man, and a child who was about 11.
Soldier John Needham, who allegedly beat a woman to death in 2008, had, according to his father, repeatedly tried to get treatment for his post-traumatic stress disorder.
In a December 2007 letter to the Inspector General's Office of Fort Carson, Needham--who earned a Purple Heart in Iraq--detailed a list of alleged war crimes committed by members of his unit in Iraq, including commanding officers.
In one instance, an Iraqi was shot "without cause or provocation" by a staff sergeant. When a private asked to administer first aid to the man, Needham said he was told no, and to "let him bleed out." In another instance, Needham says an Iraqi man was killed despite the fact that the unit had no evidence that he was an insurgent or terrorist. He wrote:
Although I did not personally witness the killing, I did observe [REDACTED] dismembering the body and parading of it while it was tied to the hood of a Humvee around the Muhalla neighborhood, while the interpreter blared out warnings in Arabic over the loudspeaker. I have a photo that shows [REDACTED] removing the victim's brains.
The list of atrocities continues, with Needham describing at least one point-blank execution of an injured Iraqi, and the shooting of an Iraqi teenager riding his bicycle down the street. As Needham noted in his letter, "My experiences have taken a terrible toll on me. I suffer from PTSD and depression. I had no way to stop the ugly actions of my unit. When I refused to participate, they began to abuse and harass me."
According to the Associated Press, the Army's criminal investigation division interviewed unit soldiers but said it couldn't substantiate the allegations that Needham had made.
According to Salon.com's Mark Benjamin and Michael de Yoanna, Needham:
brought home photos from the spring and summer of 2007 that showed the gore he saw with the 2-12. One picture showed a dead body, still dressed in traditional Iraqi clothing, with a rotting skull for a head. Another picture showed an Iraqi with the top part of his head blown off, covered in blood, eyes open, his body placed in a black bag alongside his brains... While still in Iraq, Needham sought help. He wrote to his father that he saw a doctor and was given a small handful of Zoloft pills, which treat depression and anxiety, and Ambien for sleeplessness. It didn't seem to work. "I'm stressed out to the point of completely losing it," Needham later wrote in an e-mail to his father. "The squad leader brushed me off and said suck it up."
IN 2007, while still in Iraq, Needham attempted to shoot himself in the head--he was prevented by a comrade who knocked the gun away. Yet despite his suicide attempt, he was never sent for a psychiatric evaluation. Instead, he was punished--confined for more than two weeks and told that he could face charges and possible time in military prison for illegal discharge of a weapon.
"After he tried to kill himself, they said he was a criminal," John Needham's father, Mike Needham, told Benjamin and de Yoanna. "I couldn't believe it. I called his commander to try to say that John might be suffering from combat stress. I offered him literature. [Lt. Col. Michael] told me John deserved to be in military prison. When I argued, he said, 'Fuck off,' and hung up the phone."
After Mike Needham intervened for his son, asking Fort Carson's inspector general for help, John Needham finally received treatment and a diagnosis of PTSD and depression. After being released from Walter Reed Army Hospital, he was sent back to Fort Carson where, according to his father, he faced abuse, which he recorded in notes he kept about his treatment. According to Benjamin and de Yoanna:
On November 16, 2007, Needham, still wondering if he'd face charges stemming from his suicide attempt in Iraq, wrote in black pen that he felt drowsy and laid his head on a desk. According to Needham's notes, a staff sergeant found him there and yelled, "This is no time to sleep." The sergeant then threatened Needham, saying, "I will break your fucking face." Needham told the sergeant to go ahead. The sergeant closed in, inches from Needham's face, and "called me a pussy and a scared little kid," Needham wrote.
Weeks later, after receiving an official transfer to the Naval Medical Center in San Diego, according to Benjamin and de Yoanna, John Needham was "charged with 'patterns of misconduct' for failing to appear in formation, insubordination to superiors, and other problems. To Mike Needham, it seemed like the Army, which had acknowledged that John had PTSD, was now punishing his son for displaying the symptoms."
His family was unable to get John the intensive help he was in need of and, within two months of his honorable discharge, John Needham attacked police at his home--while nude and drunk. In another room, the police found 19-year-old Jacqwelyn Villagomez, who had been severely beaten. She later died.
Needham's family believes he had a post-traumatic flashback, and lost control. He is currently on bail as he awaits trial and is receiving inpatient treatment at a VA facility.
Needham's case is just one of many caused by the military's turning soldiers into the human equivalent of loaded weapons--and then failing to help them deal with mental health and other health problems, as well as the transition back to civilian life.
As the violence of Fort Carson soldiers shows, the Army doesn't only have blood on its hands for the civilians injured and murdered in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is responsible for the deaths and ruined lives of soldiers driven past the breaking point--and civilians back at home unlucky enough to be caught in the crossfire.
|
Advertisement 8 people robbed at gunpoint in five separate holdups in New Orleans Share Shares Copy Link Copy
Eight people fell victim to armed gunmen Friday into Saturday morning in five separate robberies that were reported in different areas of New Orleans. New Orleans police said the armed robberies were reported between 10:30 a.m. Friday and 4 a.m. Saturday in areas including the Upper Ninth Ward and Gentilly. The first robbery was reported just before 10:30 a.m. in the 1100 block of Louisa Street. Police said a 32-year-old man was approached by two or three men who struck him several times with a gun. The robbers took the victim's bicycle and money before leaving. Officials said the second robbery was reported after 2 p.m. in the 5100 block of Arts Street. The victim, a 19-year-old man, was robbed at gunpoint by two people whom police said he knows. The third robbery was reported after 5:30 p.m. in the 6000 block of Wildair Drive. Detectives said two men and a woman were in a vehicle when three men surrounded them. One of the culprits took out a gun and demanded their property. Police said the victims complied and the men left in a vehicle. Over near Delgado Community College, officials said the fourth robbery was reported just after 1:30 a.m. in the 5400 block of Vicksburg Street. Two men with guns approached a 47-year-old man who was sitting on his front porch. Detectives said the man demanded the victim's belongings. The man brought both men inside his home to get his money. Once the robbers were inside, the two met met with another man and demanded his money. Both robbers left the home with items that belonged to the two men, police said. The fifth robbery was reported just after 4 a.m. in the 1800 block of Henriette Delille Street. Detectives said a 57-year-old man was approached by two men, one of whom struck him in the head with a blunt object and demanded his property. Officials said the victim complied and the two robbers left with his bicycle and other property. Additional details about the robberies have not been released. Detectives have not provided descriptions of the robbers. Anyone with information is asked to call Crimestoppers at 504-822-1111. Keep up with local news, weather and current events with the WDSU app here. Sign up for our email newsletters to get breaking news right in your inbox. Click here to sign up!
|
Twenty years ago, shock washed over Ireland. After the Catholic Church sold a parcel of a North Dublin convent’s grounds to a commercial developer, and the construction dig began, 155 bodies were discovered in unmarked graves. The place had been a Magdalene asylum for “wayward girls.” Apparently, inmates who met an early end had been buried in secret — many without a death certificate, without notification of parents or other family, and all without the dignity of even the simplest grave marker.
Initially conceived as rehabilitation centers for prostitutes, the Magdalene asylums — also known as the Magdalene Laundries for the “women’s work” slave labor expected of the residents — eventually grew into houses of horror. The girls, some not even teens, were forced to work seven days a week without pay. The short-term treatment intended by the founders eventually gave way to long-term incarceration. Though conditions varied from one asylum to the next, a strict code of silence was in place for most of the day throughout the Magdalene system. Long prayer sessions were mandatory.
Worse, for over a hundred years, beatings and sexual abuse are thought to have been endemic.
And you didn’t have to be a sex worker to “qualify” to be saved by God’s representatives on Earth. By the 1870s, asylum candidates
… extended beyond prostitutes to unmarried mothers, mentally retarded women and abused girls. Even young girls who were considered too promiscuous and flirtatious, or too beautiful, were sent to an asylum by their families.
Others reportedly ended up in a Magdalene asylum for being “slow learners.” They might never receive a lick of non-religious education again. The nuns were known to forge “school reports” and send those to the girls’ relatives, to conceal that their charges had been turned into slave laborers.
Recalls one former resident:
“We never saw daylight or heard music, and it was normal for girls to fall ill and never be seen again. Sometimes, we used massive industrial irons to press sheets for local hotels. They were raging hot and you had to concentrate hard to make sure your hands didn’t get caught. The steam nearly took your skin off. In the end we got used to getting burned — it was part of everyday life.”
If it didn’t take much to be sent to one of these hellholes, getting out wasn’t so easy.
Without a family member on the outside who could vouch for them, many incarcerated individuals stayed in the asylums for the rest of their lives, many taking religious vows. Given Ireland’s historically conservative sexual values, Magdalene asylums were a generally accepted social institution until well into the second half of the twentieth century. They disappeared with changes in sexual mores — or, as [historian Frances] Finnegan suggests, as they ceased to be profitable: “Possibly the advent of the washing machine has been as instrumental in closing these laundries as have changing attitudes.”
Those 155 bodies? After they were discovered, in early 1993, they were cremated quickly, and reburied in a mass grave. That raised a lot of suspicion. Why weren’t forensic investigators allowed to work the scene? What were the Church and the civil authorities hiding?
The latter, at least, are now offering an apology to all the Magdalene survivors — as well as a financial olive branch. That’s because the Irish state was complicit in the scandal, having botched its oversight and having profited from the girls who worked the laundries washing and repairing prison uniforms and the like.
Ireland will pay several hundred former residents of Catholic-run Magdalene laundries at least 34.5 million euros ($45 million) to compensate them for their years of unpaid labor and public shame, the government announced Wednesday following a decade-long campaign by former residents of the workhouses. Justice Minister Alan Shatter apologized to the women — an estimated 770 survivors out of more than 10,000 who lived in the dozen facilities from the 1920s to 1996 — that it had taken so long for them to receive compensation. The move marked the latest step in a two-decade effort by Ireland to investigate and redress the human rights abuses in Catholic institutions.
The women will also qualify for state-funded pensions and free medical care.
Not all of them think that’s enough contrition — or enough money. Maureen Sullivan, who co-founded Magdalene Survivors Together, says that justice is still not being served.
“I was 12 years of age — I was a child. My education was taken from me, my identity was taken from me. We [had] no outside communication, our letters were checked. … We had no play time. All that was taken from us and none of that has been taken into consideration, and I think that’s what we’re annoyed about.”
Ireland’s Catholic Church, meanwhile, continues to wash its hands of the affair.
The Irish government has at last made a serious gesture. The Church could show it has a conscience after all by doing the same.
P.S. If you want a haunt-your-dreams glimpse of what life was like in the Magdalene Laundries, get your hands on a copy of The Magdalene Sisters, the critically acclaimed movie by Peter Mullan. Highly recommended.
(Images via the Sun)
|
By Edward Chaykovsky
Back in 2012, Paul Williams was scheduled to face Saul "Canelo" Alvarez in the main event of a Showtime Pay-Per-View on September 15th of that year at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. But then tragically, a few months before the fight, Williams was severely injured during a motorcycle accident and he was paralyzed from the waist down.
There were several replacements who fell through before Josesito Lopez was placed in and destroyed in five rounds. At the time Williams was viewed as a very big step up in class for Canelo and there were some experts who were picking him to get an upset win. Williams strongly believes he would have won the fight if it would have happened.
"Of course I would have beaten him! Nothing against his skills but like Floyd said, 'he’s never been tested.' I was gonna be that guy that was gonna be in his face the whole night. I would be getting my punches in, I know he would be getting his in and he was gonna hit me with good shots but he wasn’t gonna knock me out," Williams told On The Ropes Boxing Radio.
"If it would have gone the twelve rounds, I was gonna get it. Other than knocking me out, he wasn’t gonna get it. They know my fighting style but I look at it like it was probably a blessing for me to go down on that motorcycle because say if I would have taken that fight with him, I know I would have won but I would have been taking punches like I always took punches and I thought I could have been brain dead. I could have been messed up, talking all kind of crazy. So I thank God and it is what it is."
|
FILE In this file photo taken on Thursday, Dec. 7, 2017, Vitaly Mutko, Russian Federation Deputy Prime Minister & Russia 2018 WCup Local Organising Committee Chairman, speaks with press during the opening of the WCup Fan ID distribution center in Moscow, Russia.Vitaly Mutko, a Russian government official who has been dogged by allegations of involvement in doping, has temporarily stepped down as president of the Russian Football Union, a move apparently intended to deflect international criticism as Russia prepares to host the 2018 World Cup. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin, File)
MOSCOW (AP) — Vitaly Mutko bowed to mounting pressure and stepped down as chairman of the 2018 World Cup organizing committee on Wednesday after being dogged by investigations that highlighted his role in a state-backed doping program.
Alexei Sorokin, the chief executive of the committee, will also assume the chairmanship vacated by Mutko. Sorokin also took Mutko’s spot on the FIFA Council this year after he was blocked from seeking re-election due to his promotion to Russian deputy prime minister.
The high-ranking government position ensures Mutko will still retain involvement in logistical planning for the World Cup in June and July.
“Mutko will continue to oversee the preparations of the regions as well as coordinate the construction of the necessary infrastructure,” the organizing committee said in a statement that expressed “great regret” over his departure.
Mutko’s resignation comes two days after he said he would temporarily step down as president of the Russian Football Union while fighting a lifetime ban from the Olympics.
Investigations by the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Olympic Committee alleged Mutko was involved in a state-sponsored doping program during the 2014 Sochi Olympics. Mutko, who served as Russia’s sports minister during the Winter Olympics, has strongly denied all doping allegations.
The IOC didn’t accuse Mutko of being personally involved in doping, but banned him from the Olympics for life, saying he and his ministry bore overall responsibility for “failure to respect” anti-doping rules.
Mutko had been defiant at the World Cup draw in Moscow this month, dismissing calls for him to leave his role as front-man of the tournament.
FIFA, which has faced calls to open disciplinary proceedings against Mutko, did not mention the doping cases in a statement acknowledging the resignation.
“FIFA thanks Mr. Mutko for his invaluable contribution to the preparations for the competition so far,” the governing body said. “FIFA will continue to work in close collaboration with the LOC (local organizing committee) under its new leadership as well as with the Russian government, the Russian Football Union and the host cities with the aim to deliver an exceptional event in June and July.”
Russia opens the World Cup against Saudi Arabia on June 14 in Moscow where the final will be staged on July 15.
“The change in the leadership ... will not affect the preparation of the 2018 FIFA World Cup,” local organizers said.
___
Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow and Rob Harris in London contributed to this report.
|
Home > Issues
This is racism, not Buddhism by Sanitsuda Ekachai, The Bangkok Post, Sept 5, 2012 Bangkok, Thailand -- How do you feel when you see rows of stern-looking Buddhist monks marching through the streets in full force to call for violent treatment of the downtrodden? << Myanmar Buddhist monks rally on the streets of Mandalay (AFP) That was what thousands of Myanmar monks did when they took to the streets in temple-studded Mandalay on Sunday to support the government's brutal persecution of stateless Muslim Rohingya. What were they thinking? The world is full of injustice. But isn't it the business of monks to advise against it, and not to be supportive of any form of prejudice and human cruelty? Aren't empathy and non-exploitation the key words in Buddhism? Aren't monks supposed to devote their lives to deepening spiritual practice in order to see through the different layers of we-they prejudice so that compassion prevails in their hearts, words, and actions? Many people outside Myanmar were asking these questions because the anti-Rohingya monks were the same ones who dared challenge the government in 2007 to champion the people's cause, and who themselves faced a violent crackdown by the military junta. If the Buddha's words were not important to them when they took to the streets, then what was? The answer is quite simple - racist nationalism. The monks do want justice for people, but just for their own kind. As part of the dominant ethnic Bama Buddhists, they believe deeply the dark-skinned Rohingya are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, aggressive outsiders who will steal land from the Buddhist folk. The monks therefore feel that it is just to support the government to eliminate the perceived threats to their motherland, their ethnicity, and their religion. Call it patriotism, ultra-nationalism, ethnic prejudice, or racism. Whichever the label, it is mired in the we-they prejudice that divides people, fosters hatred, and triggers violence - everything Buddhism cautions against. But should people who live in glass houses throw stones? Our monks may still stop short of marching in the streets to call for the elimination of Malay Muslim separatists, but they have done so several times to call for a law which will help them retain supremacy over other religions. Every time I cover their Buddhism-for-national-religion campaigns, I never fail to hear their deep suspicions of Islam. Meanwhile, bombs have blasted and killed people for eight years running in the restive South, yet we never hear our monks mentioning any concern about justice for the locals, nor for the need to open political space for Malay Muslims to voice their needs, address inequalities, and to extinguish the root causes of ethnic frustration and violence. Instead, we see monks taking the defensive and dangerous route of ordaining soldiers to increase their number while allowing temples to be used as barracks. Like their peers in Myanmar, our monks are in full support of the military to maintain the supremacy of the Buddhist majority. If violence must be used in this suppression, so be it. But Thailand is also witnessing a rapid growth of lay Buddhism which focuses on meditation retreats and core Buddhist teachings. Can this movement act as a voice of sensibility when the country is mired in political divisiveness? If that's your expectation, be prepared to be disappointed. For its members, too, generally share the belief that the elimination of perceived threats is necessary, like the need to eliminate germs and diseases to restore one's health. When this is your mindset - left or right, red or yellow, pro-or anti-establishment - you'll believe the use of hate speech, half truths, and violence by your camp is perfectly all right. No, we are not Buddhists. We may pray to the Buddha and close our eyes to meditate, but what shapes our thoughts, words, and actions is ideological extremism of all different shades. The Buddha's path leads to peaceful co-existence and sharing. Ideological extremism leads to control, suppression, and winner-takes-all. If left to fester, ideological extremism and race-based nationalism will breed more violence. The country's goal of regional integration will be sheer nonsense. And for both monks and lay Buddhists, all those longs hours of meditation will be simply wasted.
|
EMI/Virgin Records Sues Platinum Selling Band For $30 Million... Despite Not Paying Them A Dime In Royalties
from the the-music-business-at-work dept
If you think the fact that we have sold in excess of 2 million records and have never been paid a penny is pretty unbelievable, well, so do we. And the fact that EMI informed us that not only aren't they going to pay us AT ALL but that we are still 1.4 million dollars in debt to them is even crazier. That the next record we make will be used to pay off that old supposed debt just makes you start wondering what is going on. Shouldn't a record company be able to turn a profit from selling that many records? Or, at the very least, break even? We think so.
It's always fun to remember stories like the following one the next time you hear some RIAA exec claim that it represents musicians. The RIAA represents the record labels and record labels are continually at odds with musicians -- sometimes to extreme levels. Wired reported that EMI/Virgin Records had sued the band 30 Seconds To Mars for $30 million recently. The band is apparently fronted by movie star Jared Leto, and is considered something of a success. Its last album went platinum and won some awards. So why the lawsuit? Well, EMI implied that the band failed to deliver its latest record on time, but members of the band have now responded with a very different story. Wired now points us to the response from 30 Seconds To Mars , where the band notes that the lawsuit appears to have a lot more to do with the band opting out of its contract. The band points out that, under California law, a contract of more than seven years is not valid -- and the contract EMI held with the band was for nine years.So why opt out? Perhaps this has something to do with it:This is, of course, rather par for the course in the recording industry. As Courtney Love explained years ago , it's quite rare for a recording artist to ever see a dime of royalties from selling music. The label gives the band an "advance" which really isn't that much, and then uses some funky accounting tricks to claim all of the band's royalties as paying off that advance as well as covering other fees involved in the marketing and distribution of the album. In this case, apparently, despite selling 2 million records, EMI is still claiming that the band has $1.4 million to pay back. Not so long ago, we noted that Lyle Lovett was in the same boat : 4.6 million albums sold, no royalties paid.So, at what point will the press and politicians stop buying the RIAA's claims that it's looking out for the musicians and trying to get them paid? The RIAA has always been in the business ofpaying musicians.
Filed Under: 30 seconds to mars, advances, contracts, jared leto, music, royalties
Companies: emi, virgin records
|
Trade talk is finally on the uptick in the NHL, several GMs told ESPN.com Saturday, but there still is the sense most transactions will drag out until closer to the Feb. 28 deadline. As always.
"The chatter has picked up tremendously," a Western Conference GM told ESPN.com Saturday.
Ottawa is a good place to start. Sens GM Bryan Murray will be as busy as any of his peers as he attempts to bring change to a roster that has greatly disappointed this season.
Center Mike Fisher, signed through 2012-13 at a $4.2 million cap hit, is a popular name when other teams phone the Senators these days. His no-movement clause expired last summer, so the Sens are free to deal him. They aren't shopping him, but other teams sure are interested. It would take a pretty good offer to move him. But he's not an untouchable. I believe the Nashville Predators are among the many teams that covet Fisher.
The most obvious player to move is Chris Phillips, a UFA July 1. Phillips and Murray have recently chatted, the GM asking the veteran defenseman to get back to him by the end of next week on whether he'd waive his no-trade clause. Montreal and Boston are among several teams that have shown interest, league sources told ESPN.com. The Habs make sense for him because his family wouldn't even have to move for now with the Canadiens just 90 minutes down the highway. The Bruins have obvious connections with former Senators teammate Zdeno Chara and GM (and former Sens executive) Peter Chiarelli.
Emery's comeback
Expect to see Ray Emery sign a one-year, two-way deal Sunday or Monday with the Anaheim Ducks. Emery will begin his comeback in the AHL, but to do that, he will need to clear NHL waivers because he's a veteran. He could avoid waivers if the Ducks simply assign him to a two-week conditioning assignment, but everyone involved, most notably Emery, feels he'll need more time than that to get his game back.
Leafs' trade talk heating up
The action on Francois Beauchemin and Kris Versteeg has gone from kicking the tires to legitimately heating up. Beauchemin has a list of 12 teams he'd be willing to move to, although some teams that aren't on the list have called as well, in which case the Leafs would just run it by him if they decide to make one of those deals. Both players have one more year on their respective contracts.
On the Tomas Kaberle front, status quo as of Saturday. There has not been a list of teams handed to Toronto from the Kaberle camp (he's got a no-trade clause). My sense is that Toronto is just going to have to go to him and agent Rick Curran closer to the trade deadline with the best offer they've got and run it by him.
Again, I think Northeast Divisional rivals Boston and Montreal both have interest in Kaberle, as do the New York Rangers, but as one NHL executive told ESPN.com on Saturday, "Any team looking for a top D-man is interested in Kaberle."
Rangers interested in defensemen
The Rangers' power play has consistently struggled (23rd), so a veteran point man such as Kaberle, Bryan McCabe or Sheldon Souray would likely interest the Blueshirts. Each would also provide a veteran presence on a really young Rangers blue line.
McCabe, UFA on July 1, is still injured. He began off-ice workouts last week, and it's still not clear when he'll begin to skate. Florida Panthers GM Dale Tallon, by the way, had preliminary contract discussions with McCabe agent Ian Pulver at the Top Prospects Game last month. The price has to be right for the Panthers. McCabe told ESPN.com at the start of the season that he loves it in South Florida and doesn't want to leave.
Savard's future and Bruins' options
Marc Savard was scheduled to meet with agent Larry Kelly on Saturday night to discuss his future. Kelly also met with Chiarelli before Saturday's game. In all likelihood, Savard is going to be shut down for the season. You have to feel for the guy with everything he's gone through.
So what now for the Bruins? They've got major cap savings to spend. I'm told they'll be on the lookout for both a defenseman and a forward.
As mentioned above, Phillips is of interest. Kaberle would interest them as well, as would Versteeg. But Boston is looking at many options at this point.
Oilers put high price on Penner, Hemsky
The Oilers are not desperate to deal Dustin Penner or Ales Hemsky (both of whom have one more year on their deals), but as one opposing GM told ESPN.com on Friday, "Believe me, those two guys are in play, but right now they're asking for too much."
My sense is that the Oil will only move them if they really like what's offered. No urgency to move them.
Red Wings' goalie situation
The Red Wings are 19th in goals against, strange territory for them, and given their failed pursuit of Evgeni Nabokov, the question many Detroit fans have asked in cyberspace is whether GM Ken Holland will try for another goalie given the struggles of Jimmy Howard and the injury to Chris Osgood.
"At this time, unless I get bad news on the rehab front between now and the deadline on Chris Osgood, I'm not looking to do anything in goal," Holland told ESPN.com Friday.
"Jimmy Howard was a Calder Trophy nominee last year. The last month we haven't played well defensively. We know we have to play better defense. We've also been able to score a lot of goals and maybe that's why we haven't always buckled down. But long-term, that's not a winning a formula."
As for the impression Detroit wanted to upgrade in goal with its pursuit of Nabokov?
"We took an opportunity with Nabokov for a variety of reasons," said Holland. "A major reason was that he was prepared to do a cap number ($570,000) that would allow us to carry three goalies after March 1. He was UFA, there were no assets I had to give up. He was a Vezina runner-up in 2008. Last year he took his team to the final four. It was a combination of things. It was a unique opportunity. The rest is history. He belongs to the New York Islanders."
Jagr would consider NHL return
Had a chance to catch up with Jaromir Jag after his team's 18-16 win in the KHL All-Star Game on Saturday, in which Jagr netted a hat trick.
I told him he's got lots of people back in North America who miss having him around.
"I miss you guys too," Jagr said with his trademark laugh. "It was a great run for me there."
He added that he's having a blast in the KHL, especially this season with Avangard Omk leading the standings.
It just so happens, however, that Jagr has options after this season.
"Yes, I'm a free agent after the season," Jagr told ESPN.com. "I want to finish season here and then think about what I'm doing next. But right now our team is doing really well, we're first overall in the league. We have a pretty good chance to do something good and that's why I'm really excited, although you never know what can happen in the playoffs."
But, I pressed on, what if an NHL team called next summer?
"If I had a chance to join a team that has a chance to win, maybe I'd think about it," Jagr said. "I'd like to go on a team that has a chance to win the Stanley Cup or at least get into the playoffs and go far. I'd like just to help a team like that on the second or third line."
Jagr turns 39 on Feb. 15. Are the legs getting heavy?
"I actually feel better now than I did my last year in the NHL," said Jagr. "More skating here on the big ice. I don't feel my age."
Heritage Classic to top Winter Classic?
With all due respect to my pal Scott Burnside who considers the Heritage Classic the ugly Canadian stepchild of the Winter Classic, here's something that might raise a few eyebrows.
"Sponsorship on this game is going to surpass even the Winter Classic to give you a sense of the size of this thing," NHL COO John Collins told ESPN.com Friday. "And the Winter Classic was a beast."
Iconic Canadian brands such as Tim Horton's and Canadian Tire have jumped on board with guns a blazing as have other companies for the Feb. 20 Montreal-Calgary game at McMahon Stadium. The gate revenue won't be as much because there aren't as many seats in the CFL stadium compared to Heinz Field. But the corporate base has really jumped on board.
"To really make the model work in these less than NFL or big-time baseball stadiums, sponsorships needs to really carry the day," said Collins, the mastermind behind the Winter Classic. "I think the size of the sponsorship market and also the activation by the sponsors is going to be even bigger than the Winter Classic."
From a business perspective, that's why it was no-brainer for the NHL to extend itself with two outdoor games. Still, the question remains whether or not having two games will dilute the product. Not to mention the fact there are only six Canadian NHL teams, so that means lots of repeat performances by the same six clubs in the Heritage Classic? Or maybe not ...
"I always resist the idea that the Winter Classic is a U.S.-only event, similarly now I'm going to resist the fact that the Heritage is just a Canadian event," Collins said. "At the end of the day, these events should appeal to all hockey fans."
To be clear, I asked Collins if he was talking about maybe putting Canadian teams in the odd Winter Classic and maybe an American team in the odd Heritage Classic?
"We're always kicking around everything," Collins said. "That's the fun part of this gig, to be creative. This is a league that's taking risks and pushing the envelope."
The fact is, the future of these outdoor games will depend greatly on the next U.S. TV deal. Once the U.S. TV deal is in place, it allows for a more concrete discussion of where these outdoor games are headed.
|
Once upon a time, transactions between people were more or less done in person. The druggist you bought methamphetamine from at the pharmacy (yes, meth) had a name and a face. The chap you bought a car from had a name and a face, too. So did the florist, grocer, doctor, mechanic, and everyone else you might transact with.
This gave rise to a reputation system, and reputations work pretty well at discouraging people from cheating one another. After all, if you cheat one customer, she'll tell all her friends. And those friends might tell their friends. Your business will suffer. The potential losses make it foolish to even consider cheating a customer.
But what if you could run a business, and never reveal either your face or your name? What if the profits of cheating a whole bunch of customers in one shot outweighed the profits of honestly serving them over time? This can only happen if no one knows your face or name – in other words, if you don't have to worry about your reputation.
And this is what the Internet has given us – the opportunity to facelessly and namelessly conduct business. Without personal reputation. And though the ability has been a blessing in some ways, it's been a curse in others.
The recent and massive exit scam at the online market Evolution – in which the site's founders made off with US$12 million of their customers' bitcoins – is just one of several similar examples. Each sad story further suggests that this problem won't go away on its own.
Not without the complete elimination of third parties from the Internet.
But what about multisig?
There has been a novel attempt at a solution in the advent of Bitcoin multisignature transactions. “Multisig”, as it's called, creates a sort of escrow situation in which funds cannot be moved without two of three signatures from buyer, seller, and escrow agent.
But this doesn't eliminate the problem of untrustworthiness in a third party (the escrow agent). If a bad actor, the agent could collude with the seller to split the funds without shipping the product to the buyer. Or he could refuse to sign the transaction entirely, leaving the buyer and seller to sort things out themselves. If the buyer and seller can never agree, the funds will remain frozen indefinitely.
The disgraced Evolution marketplace offered multisignature transactions, but not many customers used them. Even if they had, they'd still have been subject to all the aforementioned risks.
If third parties can't be trusted – and as long as you're talking about humans, they can't – how can you confidently buy and sell online?
Losses: can't be eliminated, but can be minimized
OpenBazaar, a decentralized protocol for buying and selling, is an example of a commerce solution that eliminates third parties. Its developers recently published these five benefits they believe will come from a complete decentralization of online commerce:
Markets are persistent. There’s no central point of control that can be taken down, either by outside actors or internal ones. Funds aren’t centrally controlled. There’s no central authority to trust and no jackpot to steal. Individuals control their funds directly and likely use multisig for transactions. No fees. Trade occurs directly between parties; there’s no site operator to take a cut. No data aggregation. Site operators (and data thieves) profit from aggregation of data on centralized systems, but there’s no single trove of data on decentralized systems. Trust and reputation are dynamic. In a centralized system, you are forced to trust the site operators, and the reputation system is static (as determined by site operators). In a decentralized system, you aren’t forced to trust any parties, and reputation systems can emerge without any control or censorship by central authorities.
Reputation in its rightful (cyber) place
And so it turns out that in a market without central escrow agents, reputation still plays a very important role. Though a seller may not have a name or face, which enables him to cheat without revealing his identity, his incentive to do so is far less when he's not holding US$12 million of other peoples' bitcoins. When he's holding no one's bitcoins but his own, the incentive to behave honestly over the long-term is restored. It's the only way to be profitable.
The decentralized, no-middle-man model has already worked wonders in money just since Bitcoin's release in 2009. And decentralized shopping protocols like OpenBazaar, Nxt Marketplace, and FreeMarket are remaking commerce the way Bitcoin remade money. The likes of Bitnation are even remaking the very notion of governance.
Everything that can be decentralized will be decentralized – what persistent problem will peer-to-peer technology solve next? Internet service, anyone?
Did you enjoy this article? You may also be interested in reading these ones:
|
This October 21, 2013 photo shows the US government internet health insurance exchange Healthcare.gov. US President Barack Obama on Monday defended his problem-plagued health reform plan, declaring at a White House event that, despite numerous glitches, the program is already helping many uninsured Americans. "Let me remind everybody that the Affordable Care Act is not just a website," Obama said, after the troubled online rollout of the plan. "It's much more...You may not know it, but you're already benefiting from these provisions in the law."AFP PHOTO / Karen BLEIER (Photo credit should read KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images) (credit: KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images)
SALEM, Ore. (AP) — With a reputation as a pacesetter in health care, Oregon laid out bold plans for complying with the federal overhaul.
The state wouldn’t just create a health insurance exchange, a complicated undertaking in its own right. Oregon officials set out to build one of the biggest and best in the nation — a model that other states would want to copy.
But more than a month after Cover Oregon’s online enrollment was supposed to launch, reality is lagging far behind Gov. John Kitzhaber’s grand ideas. The online system still doesn’t work, and the exchange has yet to enroll a single person in health insurance.
Interviews with state officials and a review of public records by The Associated Press suggest Cover Oregon officials bit off more than they could chew and clung to their ambitious vision even when their risk management consultants raised alarms.
While rushing to get the exchange done, programmers and project managers also were busy with separate complex computer projects for the Oregon Health Authority and the Department of Human Services.
Cover Oregon officials say they’re working hard to finish the project and insist the features they’re creating will be worth the wait — even if it remains unclear when the site will go online.
“We stuck to the vision, and we’re experiencing now the bumps that go along with having a grand vision that doesn’t work out exactly the way you hope it will,” said Amy Fauver, chief communications officer for Cover Oregon.
Fauver said “we’re confident that we will get the system up and running here in the near future” and that it “will be something we can be really proud of.”
More than $300 million has been spent on the exchange so far, but the online enrollment system is still having trouble accurately determining whether people in complex family arrangements are eligible for Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
Cover Oregon officials say their launch has been delayed because they refuse to put out an imperfect product and fix the bugs later. And they say their whole system is more complex and has more features than most other states — but that also means more things can go wrong.
Some of the complexity they face is inherent in Oregon’s health care environment, which is unusually competitive. Eleven insurers are selling plans through Cover Oregon; some states have just a handful. Oregon also has complicated eligibility rules for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program — known here as the Oregon Health Plan and Healthy Kids.
Some of the complications, though, are self-imposed, by the aspirations of the Legislature, the governor and the exchange’s own leadership. When other states delayed or gave up on a concept called “no wrong door,” Oregon held on, and is still holding on. The goal is to give people one portal — the Cover Oregon website — to sign up for insurance, whether they qualify for commercial insurance or Medicaid. In most other states, people who appear to qualify for Medicaid are sent to a separate enrollment process through the state Medicaid office.
From the very beginning, Oregon promised a “one-stop shop” for health insurance and, for better or worse, has refused to waiver. That means the state is seeking an entirely automated process for determining Medicaid eligibility and enrolling.
Once state lawmakers approved the exchange in 2011, the first stages of development were done by the Office of Information Services for the Oregon Health Authority and the Department of Human Services. At the same time, as it was overseeing construction of the exchange’s back-end information technology, the information office was also working on a massive project to modernize the internal computer systems for the health authority and human services agency. They were trying to use the same software to determine whether people are eligible for all public-assistance programs — not just Medicaid, but also programs like food stamps and welfare.
Carolyn Lawson, chief information officer for the health and human service agencies, said she doesn’t think work on modernizing her department’s own systems slowed down the architecture for Cover Oregon.
“There was always the fear that one project would overtake the other in importance, but it was two separate agencies and two separate projects,” Lawson said. “It was a risk, but it did not happen.”
Eventually, it might allow someone to fill out a single form and find out automatically whether they’re eligible for a variety of public assistance programs.
Over the past year, Cover Oregon’s risk consultant, Maximus, warned that the project was in danger of missing the Oct. 1 deadline to go live. In March, Maximus suggested that Cover Oregon re-organize its business to make individuals, small businesses and Medicaid distinct so one piece could be delayed if it was holding up the others. Cover Oregon rejected the suggestion, saying it was required to launch everything together on Oct. 1.
Oregon’s exchange struggles are far from isolated. The federal website running exchanges for 36 states has been mired with problems, and many states that are running their own exchanges have endured small glitches. But Oregon’s problems stand out, both because of their severity and because the state has held itself out as a leader.
There’s still no estimate for when online enrollment will be available, and officials are now urging people who need or want insurance to fill out a paper application or an online PDF and send it in as soon as possible. Applications are being processed by hand — a process that’s likely to take weeks, rather than the minutes that the website promised.
On Friday, the state announced plans to hire at least 400 people to process the paper applications.
“It is a complex system,” Kitzhaber said at a recent news conference when asked whether the state took on too much complexity. “But I think once we get through this initial rollout phase it’s going to be a real asset for us.”
(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
|
by giving it to people who have never had it before; by giving people very high doses that they are not used to (or giving it orally to people used to smoking it); and by giving people very hard things to do, especially things that they have never had a chance to practice while under the influence of the drug.
"To my mind, the best term for marijuana is active placebo - that is, a substance whose apparent effects on the mind are actually placebo effects in response to minimal physiological action."
a person who had never smoked marijuana before and just had; a marijuana smoker who had never driven while high and was just about to; a high marijuana smoker who had practiced driving while high; and a person with any amount of alcohol in him.
"The user who correctly interprets the significance of his spontaneous highs takes the first step away from dependence on the drug to achieve the desired state of consciousness and the first step toward freer use of his own nervous system. All drugs that seem to give highs behave this way; all are active placebos. But the less physiological noise, the easier it is for a user to understand the true nature of drugs and their highly indirect relationship to states of consciousness."
I've learned to do a lot of things when I'm stoned and seem to function well in all spheres of activity. I can also "turn off" a high when that seems necessary. The one problem I have, however, is talking to straight people when I don't want them to know I'm stoned. It's really scary because you constantly imagine you're talking nonsense and that the other person is going to realize you're high. That's never happened, though, so I conclude that I don't sound as crazy to others as I do to myself. It's worst on the telephone. Someone will call up and be talking to me, and when he stops I'll have no idea what he just said. Then I don't know what I'm supposed to answer and I have to stall until I get a clue as to what's expected of me. Again, even though this is very disconcerting, the other party never seems to notice that anything's wrong unless he's a heavy grass smoker, too, and then it doesn't matter. 1
From A Practical Guide to Yoga by James Hewitt
When the mind is stilled by Raja Yoga, time--that is to say, psychological time--ceases to exist. For time is relative. It only exists when one thing is taken in relation to another. If I go on a train journey my leaving the train at my destination, taken in relation to my getting in, shows a passage of time. Similarly, if I think of "fruit," and in a split second follow with another thought "apples," time has passed, and I am aware of its passing. But if the mind takes one thought and holds it, one-pointed and still, time is erased; it ceases--psychologically--to exist.
In the hurly-burly of civilized living we rarely find time, or even give a thought to living in the NOW. We spend our NOW thinking of the past or dreaming of the future. Raja Yoga enables us to be still and experience eternity, as defined by Boethius: "to hold and possess the whole fullness of life in one moment, here and now, past and present to come." 3
The following excerpt is from C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters--a witty and practical statement of orthodox Christian theology cast in the form of letters from a senior devil, Screwtape, to a junior devil, Wormwood, who is trying to capture the soul of an earthly "patient":
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
I had noticed, of course, that the humans were having a lull in their European war [World War II]--what they naively call "The War!"--and am not surprised that there is a corresponding lull in the patient's anxieties. Do we want to encourage this or to keep him worried? Tortured fear and stupid confidence are both desirable states of mind. Our choice between them raised important questions.
The humans live in time, but our Enemy destines them to eternity. He therefore, I believe, wants them to attend chiefly to two things, to eternity itself and to that point of time which they call the Present. For the Present is the point at which time touches eternity. Of the present moment, and of it only, humans have an experience analogous to the experience which our Enemy has of reality as a whole; in it alone freedom and actuality are offered them. He would therefore have them continually concerned either with eternity (which means being concerned with Him) or with the Present--either meditating on their eternal union with, or separation from, Himself, or else obeying the present voice of conscience, bearing the present cross, receiving the present grace, giving thanks for the present pleasure. Our business is to get them away from the eternal and from the Present. 4
From Concentration and Meditation by Christmas Humphreys:
As the sequence of day and night, so is the alternation of work and rest, and it is in the minutes of comparative repose that the difference appears between the trained and the untrained student of mind-development. The beginner allows his energy to drain away in idle conversation or mental rambling, in vague revision of past experiences or anxiety of events as yet unborn, or in a thousand other wasteful ways for which, were he spending gold instead of mental energy, he would be hailed as a reckless spend-thrift to be avoided by all prudent men. 5
The following summary of J. Krishnamurti's philosophy of time is from Metaphysical Approach to Reality by Ganga Sahai, Mr. Krishnamurti's recent books are widely available in the West.
There is a state of being which Krishnamurti calls the timeless. It comes with the realization that the only real moment is the moment of the Now, the eternal present; the past and future taken as "no-more" and "not-yet" are illusions.
The center, the observer, is memory. The center is always in the past. Therefore, the center is not a living thing. It is a memory of what has been. When there is complete attention, there us no observer....
Life is broken up and this breaking of life, caused by the center "me," is time. If we look at the whole of existence without the center "me" there is no time.
The new dimension is the silent mind. It is always in the present, always in the Now. It is the timeless mind that really exists. 6
It would make more sense to look for effects not on the ear but rather on that part of the brain that processes auditory information. Cannabis seems to affect the secondary perception of sensory information, not the primary reception of it. Unfortunately, it is considerably harder to study secondary perception because the neural organization underlying it is less accessible to direct experimentation and much less well understood. A working hypothesis is that incoming sensory information (such as auditory signals representing music) normally follows conditioned pathways through the secondary perception network in order to get to consciousness. Under Cannabis, which might interfere with this normal processing, information may take novel routes to consciousness and thus be perceived in novel ways. Such a model would explain why users often say that under Cannabis they see things for the first time "as they really are," or why they dwell on aspects of complex visual or auditory stimuli they would ordinarily ignore. 7
References
Because marijuana is such an unimpressive pharmacological agent, it is not a very interesting drug to study in a laboratory. Pharmacologists cannot get a handle on it with their methods, and because they cannot see the reality of the non-material state of consciousness that users experience, they are forced to design experimental situations very far removed from the real world in order to get measurable effects. There are three conditions under which marijuana can be shown to impair general psychological performance in laboratory subjects. They are:Under any of these three conditions, pharmacologists can demonstrate that marijuana impairs performance. And if we look at the work being done by NIMH-funded researchers, all of it fulfills one or more of these conditions. In addition, the tests being used by these scientists are designed to look for impairments of functions that have nothing to do with why marijuana users put themselves in an altered state of consciousness. People who get high on marijuana do not spontaneously try to do arithmetic problems or test their fine coordination.What pharmacologists cannot make sense of is that people who are high on marijuana cannot be shown, in objective terms, to be different from people who are not high. That is, if a marijuana user is allowed to smoke his usual doses and then to do things he has had a chance to practice while high, he does not appear to perform any differently from someone who is not high. Now, this pattern of users performing better than nonusers is a general phenomenon associated with all psychoactive drugs. For example, an alcoholic will vastly outperform a nondrinker on any test if the two are equally intoxicated; he has learned to compensate for the effects of the drug on his nervous system. But compensation can proceed only so far until it runs up against a ceiling imposed by the pharmacological action of the drug on lower brain centers. Again, since marijuana has no clinically significant action on lower brain centers, compensation can reach 100 percent with practice.These considerations mean that there are no answers to questions like, What does marijuana do to driving ability? The only possible answer is, It depends. It depends on the person - whether he is a marijuana user, whether he has practiced driving while under the influence of marijuana. In speaking to legislative and medical groups, I have stated a personal reaction to this question in the form of the decision I would make if I were given the choice of riding with one of the following four drivers:I would unhesitatingly take driver number three as the best possible risk. One may wonder how many drivers of types one and two are on our highways. Probably many. But there is some consolation in the fact that persons learning to do things under the influence of marijuana almost always are anxious about their performance and therefore tend to err on the side of overcaution.The tendency for novice users of marijuana to imagine that their psychological functioning is disrupted to a much greater degree than it actually is, is most noticeable in conection with subtle changes in speech. People who are high on marijuana seem to have to do slightly more work that usual to remember moment to moment the logical thread of what they are saying. This change manifests itself in two ways: as a tendency to forget what one started out to say, especially following an interruption, and a tendency to go off on irrelevant tangents. Zinberg, Nelson and I were able to pick up these changes in tape recordings of our Boston subjects, but I must emphasize the adjective subtle in describing them. Someone not specially trained to listen for these changes would not hear them. Interestingly enough, however, marijuana users themselves often imagine they are not making sense and become anxious about other people guessing that they are high. Some users experience this subjective anxiety about speech most intensely when they are talking on the telephone. Here is a quote from such a user (a twenty-four-year-old male medical student), which Zinberg and I included in a paper published in Nature in 1969:Probably, the subtle difficulties in speech that high users pay great attention to are themselves manifestations of a change in a more general psychological function called immediate memory. It seems valid to distinguish three kinds of memory in man. The first has been termed immediate and seems to cover events of the past few seconds only. It is as if all information coming into the brain is held in some location for a very short time before a decision is made about where to store it. If it is to be filed in an accessible place, it passes to a second storage location called recent memory, where it may remain for days or, perhaps, weeks; otherwise it is salted away out of reach of ordinary consciousness. Eventually, if it is to be kept in an accessible place for a longer time, it moves to a third long-term storage location, which is the permanent memory file. Each of these locations has active connections to ordinary consciousness so that memories may be quickly retrieved from all of them in our normal waking state.In senile dementia, the classic psychological change is loss of recent memory with sparing of immediate and long-term memory. A senile patient can remember a string of numbers read to him long enough to recite them back and can go into autobiographical detail about his childhood. He cannot remember the date or the events of the previous day. By contrast, in certain forms of post-traumatic amnesia, immediate and recent memory are spared, but information filed prior to the trauma cannot be retrieved from the long-term memory storage. A person high on marijuana seems to have difficulty remembering what happened in the past few seconds, and the subtle speech changes reflect this difficulty. Furthermore, it looks as if a significant disturbance of immediate memory retrieval has few noticable consequences in terms of behavior, although it may cause great anxiety in the mind of the person experiencing it.This last observation raises an interesting question. Is the problem disturbance of immediate memory or anxiety about this change? Most people who have read the hypothesis Zinberg and I first presented in Nature have drawn the conclusion that marijuana interferes with immediate memory. In fact, the director of the National Institute of Mental Health, in testimony before Congress in 1970, used our results to support the statement that "more recent studies . . . in which researchers have learned some troublesome facts . . . make it impossible to give marijuana a clean bill of health."I would once have gone along with this kind of reasoning, but the more I have thought about the matter, the more it has become clear to me that it is not useful to think of marijuana as interfering with one's awareness of the immediate past.For one thing, disturbance of immediate memory seems to be a common feature of all altered states of consciousness in which attention is focused on the present. It can be noticed in hypnotic and other trances, meditation, mystic ecstasies, and highs associated with all drugs. Therefore, to call marijuana the cause of the phenomenon is probably unwise. In addition, the phrase disturbance of immediate memory bristles with negativity. Is it a negative description of a condition that might just as well be looked at positively? I believe so. In fact, the ability to live entirely in the present, without paying attention to the immediate past or future, is precisely the goal of meditation and the exact aim of many religious disciplines. The rationale behind living in the present is stated in ancient Hindu writing and forms a prominent theme of Buddhist and Christian philosophy as well: to the extent that consciousness is diverted into the past and future -- both of which are unreal -- to that extent is it unavailable for use in the real here and now. Consequently, monastic systems of all faiths have used devices like gongs and bells to focus the consciousness of the novice on the immediate reality of the present, and contemporary instructional materials on mental and spiritual development stress the same theme. Here are a few examples:Thus the pharmacological way of thinking leads to the formulation of a hypothesis built upon an incorrect causal attribution and a negatively biased description of a phenomenon assigned great value in other ways of thinking. The pharmacologist says marijuana interferes with immediate memory, and by using tests in which one is penalized for not paying full attention to the past, the pharmacologist can produce evidence to document his hypothesis. The National Institute of Mental Health is supporting this kind of research with money appropriated by Congress. It is not funding research designed to look for the positive advantages of having one's full awareness focused on the present.In a similar way, all other psychological effects of marijuana turn out to be common features of altered states of consciousness unassociated with drugs, and whenever pharmacologist describes them in negative ways, it is possible to look at them positively from the point of conscious experience. The perceptual changes reported by marijuana users are another example. Here again is an apparent paradox since all testing to date has failed to show any objective changes in sensory function during acute marijuana intoxication. If pharmacologists paid closer attention to what users say, they would find their way out of this paradox. There is no indication from persons high on marijuana that their sense organs are working differently from usual. Rather, the change seems to be in what they do with incoming sensory information. For instance, many users claim that listening to music is more interesting and pleasurable when they are high. They do not claim that they hear tones of lower volume or that they can better discriminate between pitches of tones. Yet all of the testing of auditory function under marijuana has been aimed at the ear--at auditory thresholds, pitch discrimination, and the like.In 1969, when I still thought as a pharmacologist in my professional life, I wrote the following paragraph in an article, "Cannabis," published in England in Science Journal:I now realize that altered secondary perception of sensory information is intrinsic to all altered states of consciousness, whether triggered by drugs or not. Therefore, it no longer seems profitable to me to try to understand how marijuana "causes" the effect. In addition, I no longer subscribe to the negative hypothesis that marijuana interferes with normal processing of perceptual data. Rather, I observe that in altered states of consciousness, one frequently gains the ability to interpret his perceptions in new ways and that this ability seems to be the key to freedom from bondage to the senses. For example, hypnotic anesthesia is nothing more than another way of perceiving pain. The patient, fully aware but in a state of focused consciousness, learns the "trick" of separating the pain itself from his reaction to it. He is thus free to perceive the pain in a novel way - something going on "out there" but not hurting. (One hypnotist I know produces this state with the suggestion that "the hurt is going out of the pain.")Furthermore, the ability to produce anesthesia at will (a power frequently demonstrated by adepts at yoga) may be no more than a trifling use of this freedom to experience sensations in other ways. Once one learns the process, he may become aware of many more useful things to do with it than ignore pain. For example, the conscious experience of unity behind the diversity of phenomena - said by sages and mystics of all centuries to be the most blissful and uplifting of human experiences - may require nothing more than a moment's freedom to stand back from the inrush of sensory information and look at it in a different way from usual. If all the so-called psychological effects of marijuana are really not attributable to marijuana, and if the physical effects that are attributable to it are so unimpressive, what, then, is marijuana? To my mind, the best term for marijuana is active placebo - that is, a substance whose apparent effects on the mind are actually placebo effects in response to minimal physiological action. Pharmacologists sometimes use active placebos (in contrast to inactive placebos like sugar pills) in drug testing; for example, nicotinic acid, which causes warmth and flushing, has been compared with hallucinogens in some laboratory experiments. But pharmacologists do not understand that all psychoactive drugs are really active placebos since the psychic effects arise from consciousness, elicited by set and setting, in response to physiological cues.Thus, for most marijuana users, the occasion of smoking a joint becomes an opportunity or excuse for experiencing a mode of consciousness that is available to everyone all the time, even though many people do not know how to get high without using a drug. Not surprisingly, regular marijuana users often find themselves becoming high spontaneously. (The pharmacologist invokes "residual concentrations of Cannabis constituents in the body" to explain this observation.) The user who correctly interprets the significance of his spontaneous highs takes the first step away from dependence on the drug to achieve the desired state of consciousness and the first step toward freer use of his own nervous system. All drugs that seem to give highs behave this way; all are active placebos. But the less physiological noise, the easier it is for a user to understand the true nature of drugs and their highly indirect relationship to states of consciousness. Alcohol users are less likely to find themselves spontaneously high because they have come to think that "high" includes all the pharmacological noise of alcohol. At the same time, marijuana, while providing a better opportunity to make the jump to drugless highs, is more insidious as a creator of illusion, for it enables the user to pretend that he is not really dependent on it at the same time that it reinforces the notion that highs come in joints, an irony that recalls another unsettling comment of C. S. Lewis' Screwtape: "Nowhere do we tempt so successfully as on the very steps of the altar."
|
WASHINGTON — The number of American workers filing new jobless benefit claims unexpectedly jumped above 600,000 last week to a fresh 26-year high, signaling that the nation's recession is widening and deepening.
Separately, U.S. productivity growth -- a measure of how much workers produce per hour of labor -- more than doubled between the July-through-September quarter and the final three months of the year. But instead of seeing the data as evidence of improvement, analysts said the jump from an annual average of 1.5% to 3.2% was yet another sign of trouble.
In essence, companies reacted to the economy's sharp contraction by cutting workers at a faster pace than output, making it appear that those who remained on the job were growing more efficient.
The latest economic soundings bode ill for today's January jobs report, which many forecasters now say could show a monthly loss of 500,000 or more positions.
|
After the United States government announcement that it will no longer challenge a nationwide hold on protections for transgender students, nearly 800 parents of transgender children sent a letter to President Donald Trump condemning the decision and calling on his administration to fully enforce federal civil rights laws. The letter, signed by parents from 45 states plus Washington, D.C., was organized by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), and its newly formed Parents for Transgender Equality Council, a coalition of the nation’s leading parent-advocates working for equality and fairness for transgender people.
In his first days as Trump’s Attorney General, Sessions withdrew a request to halt an order against the Obama administration’s protections for transgender students. The 781 parents, representing the thousands of families of transgender children across the country, write, “No young person should wake up in the morning fearful of the school day ahead. When this guidance was issued last year, it provided our families — and other families like our own across the country — with the knowledge and security that our government was determined to protect our children from bullying and discrimination. Please do not take that away from us.”
“Just 48 hours after the confirmation of his anti-equality attorney general, Donald Trump’s administration directly attacked LGBTQ equality and took aim at the rights of transgender youth,” said HRC President Chad Griffin. “This disgraceful action exposes transgender students to harassment and discrimination and emboldens bullies from classrooms to state legislatures. These 781 courageous parents are asking that the federal government protect their children at school, something that all families deserve. We stand with these parents and urge President Trump and Attorney General Sessions to listen to families across the country demanding basic fairness and respect for every child.”
|
NEW DELHI: In a move that is aimed at speeding up the decision making process, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has decided that various ministries can now approve projects up to Rs 1000 crore without the Cabinet approval.Till now the process entailed inter-ministerial discussions, Finance Ministry being kept in loop and finally the cabinet approval, ET Now reported.According to ET Now, the ministries were required to seek Cabinet approval for projects above Rs 200 crore. The five fold hike in the discretionary spending power of ministries is meant to allow faster clearances of projects, particularly those related to infrastructure.The infrastructure sector is a key focus area for the Modi-led government. The Centre is keen to speed up infrastructure development and investment to boost economic growth which remained at sub-5 per cent level during the previous two fiscals.Last week it was reported that the government is set to finalise the policy for implementing its ambitious plan to convert 100 existing cities into smart cities, where it will allow large-scale participation of private sector.Apart from the 100 existing cities that will be retrofitted to smart cities, the government is also considering developing three-four greenfield cities, urban development secretary Shankar Aggarwal told ET. A key to developing the smart cities will be unravelling the large number of rules and regulations that have slowed down development for years, the secretary said.PM Modi has already asked the government to revisit all old rules and regulations, manuals and laws, and cut them down wherever needed.(With inputs from ET Bureau & PTI)
|
It has been a long two years, but the collaborating team behind the brewery Together We're Bitter is excited to finally be opening near downtown Kitchener.
"It has been forever," Culum Canally, one of six co-owners of TWB, said in an interview with CBC News.
In September, they found a 1,500 sq. ft. building to turn into the brewery, the former Eco Coffee Roaster building at 300 Mill Street. In January, they had all their licenses in place.
But they are waiting until Feb. 10 to open to ensure they have enough beer in the tanks, Canally said. They are very aware of embarrassing stories involving other local breweries that opened but then sold out within days, forcing them to close until they had more beer available.
Canally said they wanted to avoid that and, he said, their supporters seem willing to wait a few more days to ensure stability.
From finding co-owners in the co-operative brewery, to a crowdfunding campaign to buy a fermenter, to shifting the planned opening day, Canally said people who were excited when the brewery was first announced two years ago have continued to support their journey.
"We've been pleasantly surprised that our community that's been following us and supporting us has not gotten as weary as we thought they would get at hearing the same refrain that we're still looking for a location and going to open," he said.
"We're hoping there's going to be a good, loyal crew of followers and supporters there to purchase beer."
Growth in local beer
For a long time, Brick Brewing and Lion Brewing in the Huether Hotel in Waterloo were the only beer players in town. But in 2013, Block Three in St. Jacob's opened. Then in 2014, Abe Erb and Innocente both opened in Waterloo.
TWB will open next week. Descendants Beer and Beverage Co. plans to open its Victoria St. storefront in March.
As well, two breweries are in the planning stages in Cambridge, WT BrewCo and Barncat Artisan Ales.
For the first couple of years, we're just going to sell beer and try to have some nice parties. - Culum Canally, part owner of Together We're Bitter
Despite the growing market, Canally said he is not concerned about so many breweries opening in such a short time.
"I am a little surprised but I am also really heartened that a place like Kitchener-Waterloo, that has such a history of brewing, is finally getting some of that brewing tradition back," he said.
"I don't think it's a bubble, I hope it's not a bubble. I think it's just more of growing the market and taking market share away from the large macro international breweries."
Future plans
TWB is unique in that it is a co-operative brewery, so there are six owners as well as several community supporters who have a stake in the business.
Canally said those who initially proposed the business model felt it was a natural extension of the craft beer industry, which is often very much about collaborating with one another and being connected to the communities where they are based.
The Together We're Bitter brewery in Kitchener has been in the works for about two years. (Twitter)
"We felt that really roots us in the community, it drives us, it gives us a lot of support to draw on in terms of ideas and links to the community to be more authentically linked to the community," he said of having so many people involved.
The initial plan for TWB was to be a brewpub, but Canally said the prices to rent a space in downtown Kitchener that could accommodate the brewing equipment was "out of our reach."
Not only were rents too high, Canally said the downtown Kitchener foot traffic after 8 p.m. needed to sustain a brewpub is just not there.
The owners also wanted to have a brewery people could walk or bike to, and while they are not far from the downtown core, Canally said they did opt to go with a building that had lots of parking.
"For the first couple of years, we're just going to sell beer and try to have some nice parties and nice events," he said.
|
(UPDATED) 'Ang nangyari kasi sa police – 'yung pagkapatay nung prinesent kong hold-upper is parang stage play o scripted 'yung pagkapatay,' says taxi driver Tomas Bagcal, who also says he now fears for his safety
Published 6:00 PM, September 10, 2017
MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – The taxi driver involved in the case of slain 19-year-old Carl Arnaiz surfaced on Sunday, September 10, saying that a robbery indeed took place. But he said the killing of Arnaiz seemed "staged."
In a press conference on Sunday organized by human rights group Rise Up for Life and for Rights, Tomas Bagcal said that about 15 minutes after he picked up Arnaiz along a "highway in Navotas," the latter declared a hold-up and asked for his wallet.
Arnaiz allegedly pulled the trigger of his gun but it malfunctioned, so he hit Bagcal's wrist with the gun instead. (READ: Carl Arnaiz tested positive for gunpowder – PNP)
After the supposed robbery, Bagcal claimed the teenager was then mauled by bystanders. (READ: Carl Arnaiz handcuffed, beaten up, killed – PAO autopsy)
"'Yung bugbog sarado, do'n sa mga tambay doon. Inawat ko na nga eh, sabi ko dalhin na lang sa presinto... Ang purpose ko doon, para i-inquest siya," the taxi driver said.
(He was beaten up by bystanders there. I even told them to stop, I said we should just bring the suspect to the police station... My purpose for bringing him there was so an inquest could be conducted.)
Bagcal said he took Arnaiz to the police station located along 9th Avenue. He claimed that police did not ask him questions about the robbery, and only asked him about his age, birthdate, address, and details of the cab he was driving – which would mean that police fabricated the rest of the information in his first affidavit.
Bagcal said that after he brought Arnaiz to the police station, cops then instructed him to follow them and the suspect to C3 Road where he was allegedly robbed. It was then that Arnaiz was shot dead.
"Nakita ko na naglalakad [si Arnaiz], and then a few seconds [later], may putukan na akong narinig. At that time, nagtago ako sa poste ng Meralco kasi hindi naman bulletproof 'yung taxi ko... Kita ko bagsak na 'yung naglalakad na naka-itim," he said.
(I saw him walking, and then a few seconds later, I heard gunshots. At that time, I hid behind an electrical post, because my taxi is not bulletproof... I saw the boy wearing black fall to the ground after getting shot.)
"Ang nangyari kasi sa police – 'yung pagkapatay nung prinesent kong hold-upper is parang stage play o scripted 'yung pagkapatay," he also said.
(What happened with the police – it seems that the killing of the hold-upper who I presented seems like a stage play, or it seems the killing was scripted.)
The Public Attorney's Office (PAO) earlier said the crime scene appeared to be "staged." (READ: PNP autopsy shows Carl Arnaiz had 'difficulty' fighting back)
Bagcal on Sunday said that the two policemen linked to Arnaiz's killing, PO1 Jeffrey Perez and PO1 Ricky Arquilita, were the same cops "in civilian clothes" he met on the night of the alleged robbery.
'Immense pressure'
Bagcal said he approached Rise Up because he feels immense pressure and fears for his family's safety. A relative, he added, told him about the group.
"May rumansack sa apartment ko, nakatiwangwang... pati 'yung bahay ko, ganoon rin, may pumunta ro'n, hinahanap ako," he said.
(Someone ransacked my apartment, left it in shambles... even my house, someone went there, looking for me.)
"Ang laki ng pressure ko kasi nadadawit 'yung pamilya ko sa dami ng pumupunta sa bahay at naghahanap sa akin kaya ako lumapit dito sa Rise Up," he added.
(I feel immense pressure because my family is getting dragged into this mess. Many people have come to our house, looking for me, so I decided to seek help from Rise Up.)
Bagcal was earlier criticized for issuing two contrasting affidavits on the alleged robbery. In the first affidavit on August 18, he supposedly failed to provide any details of the supposed robber's appearance. In the second affidavit on August 29, however, his description of the robber matched the clothes Arnaiz was wearing.
On Sunday, Bagcal said he issued the second affidavit to clarify that there was only one robber, since a 14-year-old boy was also being implicated in the case. Bagcal did not mention that boy's name, but Arnaiz's companion, 14-year-old Reynaldo de Guzman, was later found dead in Nueva Ecija with around 30 stab wounds.
Last September 5, PO2 Rodolfo Bautista, the investigator, told senators in a legislative hearing that Bagcal was too "afraid" to speak to him in detail the first time.
Bagcal said on Sunday that he is willing to face the Senate probe into Arnaiz's case.
"Isa akong tatay din, at masakit mawalan [ng anak]. Kasi ako may anak din akong lalaki, masakit talaga. Pero wala tayong magagawa, 'yun na 'yun," the taxi driver added.
(I'm also a father, and I know it hurts to lose a child. I also have a son, so I know what happened is painful for them. But we can't do anything about it now, that's what happened.)
According to Rise Up, Bagcal prepared a written statement to clarify further questions and inconsistencies in his claims, and this will be presented in the "proper venue." (READ: Duterte calls Carl Arnaiz his 'relative') – Rappler.com
|
When you shoot a zombie, does it count as murder, or at least attempted murder?
That question actually is of some epistemological importance in the context of President Donald Trump’s decision last month to reverse most – but not quite all – of his predecessor’s actions opening up travel to and trade with the Caribbean communist island of Cuba. That policy change triggered accusations from some quarters that Trump is killing the U.S.-Cuba travel market.
But can one kill that which was already dead?
U.S. airlines jumped in to the U.S.-Cuba market with great fanfare in 2016. The early projections from the Obama White House and economic team were that soon there would be 1.8 million passengers a year flying between this nation of 320 million people who are, by Cuban standards, nearly all insanely wealthy, and the impoverished island 90 miles south of Florida.
So, most U.S. carriers rushed to offer service to Cuba. Since no market existed previously, and since the Cuban economy is so stunted it’s likely that they did not expect the kind of immediate profitability that the Obama Administration had implied. So perhaps they rushed to launch service to Cuba in an effort to stake an early claim in a market that they might eventually actually be worthwhile to serve, to grab free service rights that they might be able to sell later at a profit to a stronger competitor, or to protect their market share positions in U.S. markets like south Florida where large numbers of Cuban-Americans live and conceivably might want to visit their familial homeland and relatives from time to time.
But it never made any economic or marketing sense for U.S. carriers to pour 10,000 seats a month into the U.S.-Cuba air market, as U.S. carrier did initially. The per capita income in Cuba is around $5,500 a year, or roughly one-seventh that of the state of Mississippi, which at just under $37,000 ranked last in 2014 among the 50 states in per capita income. But while Mississippi ranks just 31st in population among the states with just under 3 million residents Cuba’s population of 11.4 million would place it 8th, if it were a state, just behind Ohio and just ahead of Georgia. That means Cuba has, in relative terms, an inordinate number of extremely poor people. Developing profitable traffic demand among such a population likely will take decades, even if they eventually are allowed to travel at will, a right they still don’t have today.
Thus, nearly all of the passengers flying between the two nations were – and continue to be – Americans. Indeed, restrictions still imposed by the Castro regime block most Cubans from flying north, even if their American family members pay for the tickets. And most of those Americans flying to Cuba are, and likely will be for the foreseeable future, Cuban Americans traveling to visit family and friends who still live on the island. As leisure, rather than business travelers, they can be expected to be very price sensitive, a factor that promises to make it even more difficult for U.S. carriers to earn profits from their Cuban routes.
Meanwhile Americans who did fly to Cuba after the market opened last year quickly discovered that there’s not much to do there.
Cuba once was renowned as a vacation and party Mecca for wealthy Americans before the communist takeover of the government in January 1959. But since then there’s been effectively zero spending on tourism infrastructure. And what little tourism the island did receive came from budget-conscious vacationers from Central and South America, Canada and Europe. So there was little money to spend on keeping up the tourism infrastructure even if parties in power had wanted to do so.
Today, most Cuban hotels are run-down and staffed by Cubans who have no concept of the kind of service levels most Americans expect. The food in Cuban restaurants reportedly is quite tasty but in short supply, thanks to chronic shortages of meat and other key menu items. And an economy that purposely has been retarded by its dictatorial regime for more than 50 years cannot be expected to create very quickly, or maintain the kind of high-dollar, high-quality infrastructure necessary to support even a modest tourist industry.
And now, in the wake of President Trump’s reversal of the market-opening policies of President Obama that infrastructure development almost certainly will be further delayed. Indeed, that’s the point of Trump’s policy, which prohibits Americans from transacting business with government-owned entities in Cuba. Nearly all of Cuba’s hotels are operated by foreign companies under contract, but they’re owned almost exclusively by the Cuban military. So are most tourist-type restaurants. Even the properly licensed cabbies, driving their famous 1950s-era American classic cars, are, for the most part, off-limits to Americans in Cuba because most of the money from their fares goes to government entities.
So it’s no surprise that U.S. airlines are now stumbling over one another to get out of Cuba. U.S.-Cuba air capacity this fall will be down at least 20% from what it was at the start of 2017. And nearly all service to Cuban destinations other than the capitol city, Havana, either already has been discontinued or soon will be. On paper several carriers are requesting more service rights to fly to Havana. But, again, those requests, which aren’t being pursued with any real fervency, are being made not because the carriers think they can make money flying to Havana today (or any time soon), but to lay claim to assets (route rights) that are limited and which eventually might be worth something.
What may come as a surprise to Americans, however, is that the U.S. carriers began their retreat from Cuba well before President Trump announced his policy change. Heck, it began before he even took office. It was obvious very early on after U.S.-Cuba flying began that the passenger traffic numbers were horrendously low.
Break-even load factor – the percentage of seats an airline needs to fil to cover direct operating costs – used to be a really important number in the airline industry, back in the days when they were losing billions annually and struggling to fill seats. These days, with load factors running at 85% or higher and carriers reporting the first string of double-digit annual profit margins in their histories, most carriers don’t even bother to include their breakeven load factor numbers in their quarterly or annual public reports. But it’s generally understood that on most routes each of their flights needs to fill around 65% of their seats to fully cover its operating costs.
Given that assumption, the representative load factor data by U.S.-Cuba route (from January of this year) below explains why so many carriers are backing out of that market partially or entirely:
Delta – from Atlanta – 53.2%
American – from Charlotte – 49.1%
United – from Newark – 64.5%
JetBlue – from New York (Kennedy) – 58.3%
Delta – from New York (Kennedy) – 50.8%
Jet Blue – from Orlando – 56.1%
Jet Blue – from Fort Lauderdale – 63.2%
Spirit – from Fort Lauderdale – 43.2%
Only routes from Miami and Tampa – and one of three from Fort Lauderdale - operate above the assumed 65% breakeven load factor:
American – from Miami – 79.7%
Delta – from Miami – 71.8%
Southwest – from Fort Lauderdale – 70.5%
Frontier – from Miami – 67%
Admittedly, these weak performance numbers came early on in the lifecycle of U.S.-Cuba air service. And new routes often take time to develop before reaching profitability. But that development has not yet begun. Nor is it likely to any time soon. That’s why carriers are dropping lots of flights and discontinuing service altogether in some cases.
Tiny Silver Airways, flying turboprop planes from Fort Lauderdale to eight secondary cities in Cuba, cancelled all of those flights in April.
Spirit canceled service on its Fort Lauderdale-Havana route at the end of May, only six months after launching it.
Frontier a week later gave up its Miami-Havana flying.
American began cutting back service to secondary Cuban cities last November.
JetBlue switched from 200-seat Airbus A321s to 162-seat A320s on its Fort-Lauderdale-Havana routes and from A320s to 100-seat Embraer 190s on its Orlando-Havana flights. That move instantly improved its actual load factor performance but likely raised its breakeven load factor percentage point well into the 70s.
Just last week Southwest announced that it will drop two of its three routes to Cuba on Sept. 4.
The company issued a statement saying the decision came “after an in-depth analysis of our performance over several months which confirmed that there is not a clear path to sustainability serving these markets, particularly with the continuing prohibition in U.S. law on tourism to Cuba for American citizens.”
None of this should have come as a surprise to folks in the airline industry, though it appears, in some cases that it did. Nearly two years ago, in August 2018, writing in this space, I quoted outspoken industry analyst (and fellow FORBES.com contributor) Michael Boyd saying that there were greater profit opportunities for U.S. airlines in serving Golden Triangle Airport than in service Cuba.
“Never heard of it?,” I wrote then. “That’s understandable. It’s in eastern Mississippi, about half-way between Columbus (2012 estimated population about 23,500, down 2,500 from the 2000 census) and Starkville (2010 census population 23,888 not counting dorm-dwelling students at Mississippi State University). West Point (2010 census population 11,307) is the third “city” in the triangle referenced in the name of the airport, which boasts one 8,000-foot asphalt runway, free wi-fi, short security lines, close-in parking, 150 seats in the terminal plus modern restrooms and vending machines.”
Boyd noted that a vibrant and expanding manufacturing industry with strong international ties in eastern Mississippi created “much stronger airline revenue opportunities” there than existed in all of Cuba.
That’s still the case today, and likely will be the case for many, many years to come.
President Trump’s new policy for trading with and traveling to and from Cuba is intended to speed up Cuba’s economic and tourism development by forcing the government to privatize its holdings in the tourism and other industries. The hope is that by removing the financial incentive for those government entities to retain their control over those key economic sectors the Cuban people, likely with financial backing from foreign investors, will take control of those sectors and begin developing a capitalistic system once again on the island. But who knows how long it will take for that happen, if it happens at all?
So, it’s probably not fair to say that the President killed the development of the U.S.-Cuba travel market. It was, at best, only a zombie market. But it’s far from clear when, if ever, that zombie of a market will come to life.
|
Image caption The measures have been unpopular across a broad section of the Greek population
The Greek parliament is preparing to vote on further austerity measures to try to meet its terms for another payment under the bail-out from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
The five-year plan was changed to allow for more money to be raised through tax increases and less money to be saved through spending cuts.
The plan involves cutting 14.32bn euros ($20.50bn; £12.82bn) of public spending, while raising 14.09bn euros in taxes over five years.
These are some of the austerity measures planned.
TAXATION
Taxes will increase by 2.32bn euros this year, with additional taxes of 3.38bn euros in 2012, 152m euros in 2013 and 699m euros in 2014.
A solidarity levy of between 1% and 5% of income will be levied on households. It will be raised twice next year.
The tax-free threshold for income tax will be lowered from 12,000 euros to 5000 euros, rather than the original plan of 8,000 euros.
There will be higher property taxes.
VAT rates are to rise: the 19% rate will increase to 23%, 11% becomes 13%, and 5.5% will increase to 6.5%.
The VAT rate for restaurants and bars will rise to 23% from 13%.
Luxury levies will be introduced on yachts, pools and cars.
Some tax exemptions will be scrapped.
Excise taxes on fuel, cigarettes and alcohol will rise by one third.
Special levies on profitable firms, high-value properties and people with high incomes will be introduced.
PUBLIC SECTOR CUTS
The public sector wage bill will be cut steadily to shrink it by more than 2bn euros by 2015.
Nominal public sector wages will be cut by 20%.
Wages of employees of state-owned enterprises will be cut by 30% and there will be a cap on wages and bonuses.
The number of civil servants to be suspended on partial pay will rise to 30,000 by the end of this year, from 20,000 planned initially. They will receive 60% of pay for one year, having been promised a job for life.
All temporary contracts for public sector workers will be terminated.
Only one in 10 civil servants retiring this year will be replaced and only one in 5 in coming years.
SPENDING CUTS
Defence spending will be cut by 200m euros in 2012, and by 333m euros each year from 2013 to 2015.
Health spending will be cut by 310m euros this year and a further 1.81bn euros in 2012-2015, mainly by lowering regulated prices for drugs.
Public investment will be cut by 850m euros this year.
Subsidies for local government will be reduced.
Education spending will be cut by closing or merging 1,976 schools.
CUTTING BENEFITS
Social security will be cut by 1.09bn euros this year, 1.28bn euros in 2012, 1.03bn euros in 2013, 1.01bn euros in 2014 and 700m euros in 2015.
There will be more means-testing and some benefits will be cut.
Monthly pensions above 1,000 euros to be cut by 20%
Existing retirees aged under 55 to lose 40% of any pensions over 1,000 euros.
The government hopes to collect more social security contributions by cracking down on evasion and undeclared work.
The statutory retirement age will be raised to 65, 40 years of work will be needed for a full pension and benefits will be linked more closely to lifetime contributions.
PRIVATISATION
The government aims to raise 50bn euros from privatisations by 2015, including:
Selling stakes this year in the betting monopoly OPAP, the lender Hellenic Postbank, port operators Piraeus Port and Thessaloniki Port as well as Thessaloniki Water.
It has agreed to sell 10% of Hellenic Telecom to Deutsche Telekom for about 400m euros.
Next year, the government plans to sell stakes in Athens Water, refiner Hellenic Petroleum, electricity utility PPC, lender ATEbank as well as ports, airports, motorway concessions, state land and mining rights.
It plans further sales to raise 7bn euros in 2013, 13bn euros in 2014 and 15bn euros in 2015.
LABOUR MARKET REFORM
The law will make it easier for companies to cut their payroll costs. It will do this by suspending industry-wide wage bargaining.
Sources: Reuters, Greek Ministry of Finance Economic Policy Programme Newsletter
|
Cyrstal Meth Addiction
Crystal meth addiction is out of control in America. The State of California is leading the way with the city of Riverside being the Crystal meth capital of the world. The epidemic is so bad, the U.S. Department of Justice recently claimed Meth has surpassed Cocaine as the new "drug of choice" by our youth.
The Associated Press quoted the White House National Drug Policy Director as saying, "Methamphetamine, also known as speed, is the worst drug menace facing the United States and is a growing threat in Asia."
The target for this growing threat are the youth in our society ravaged by broken homes, neglect and little parental influence. Physically and emotionally vulnerable to their environment, they adopt the look and values of the people they love and esteem. When these people are drugged out musicians, Hollywood actors, or Vogue models rather than members of their family who can return that love, it's easy to see the potential for a downward spiral. Social influences like family and close friends, once the center of our society, do not stand against the pervasive power of the media, which collectively impacts young lives by glamorizing destructive attitudes and actions.
In recent times, those in the spotlight, including the mainstream news personalities, have chosen to mock family values, and reject forms of authority which at one time were greatly respected role models, which once included father figures, school teachers and police officers, have been replaced by cynical, sarcastic media personas who promote a "feel good" philosophy.
Many young people who may be too immature to recognize the long term repercussions of this approach to life, are easily influenced and swayed into this lifestyle until it destroys them. Research has proven that youth who grow into maturity without using illegal drugs, alcohol or tobacco are likely to remain drug free the rest of their lives. Our main objective at EscapeMeth.com is to educate youth, parents, school and law enforcement officials about the ever increasing use of Methamphetamine (speed), and the life threatening damage to all who come in contact with it.
TWO NEW FILMS NOW AVAILABLE ON DVD
Our main objective is clearly demonstrated in our two-part film project: "Tweaked" and "Tweaked: A Generation in Overdrive", which present a warning of the real dangers associated with Meth abuse growing in America. The first film, "Tweaked", presents the problem with little hope or solution. Running 20 minutes, the length and graphic content send a devastating wakeup call to any addict or potential user that SPEED KILLS. Designed for use in the classroom or counseling session, it will, without a doubt, stir the viewer toward a more realistic viewpoint of the drug and it's potential danger.
"Tweaked: A Generation in Overdrive" is a 50 minute film with the same message as "Tweaked" plus the intimate details of a family who struggled through crystal meth addiction to recovery. This longer, more detailed version, is informative and should be viewed by youth, parents and community leaders in order to fully understand the problem and see the potential for escape.
A WARNING
These two films contain hard to watch images of graphic violence and abuse caused by those addicted to Crystal Meth. (Click Here) for more details on how you can obtain your own copies.
THE TRUTH ABOUT METHAMPHETAMINE:
As society expands, so do the needs of those living within society. Everything is new. Advances in technology are made daily. Fashion is as mutable as the weather. New and old conspiracies hit the newspaper headlines without ceasing. One cannot help feeling at a loss living under such demands to keep up. Searching for ever elusive identity and security in the midst of an upbeat nation seems to deepen the void within. Almost everyone longs for comfort and escape. These needs are often pacified through outlets like exercise, work, eating and gambling, to name a few. Unfortunately, many people fall face-first into a drug lifestyle. It always seems like the right answer...until people find themselves fixed, unable to escape from the bondage they have created. Inevitably, they are back where they started, drowning in self-condemnation and despair.
NICKNAMES FOR METH
The increasingly popular trend in drug use is methamphetamine, also known as speed, crank, ice, glass, crystal meth, sketch, go, junk, wake up, zoom, crystal, cridium, stuff, tweak, dope, and lines. It can be snorted, smoked, injected and eaten, making it a versatile drug to administer. Crystal Meth is typically sold in 1/4 gram ($20-25), one gram ($50-75), and 1/8 ounce ($140-180). It is cheaper and more accessible than cocaine and appears not to have the same stigma associated with it. Police say $100 can buy a cocaine user a twenty-minute high; the same amount can keep a meth user buzzed for a day or two.
INCREASED POPULARITY
Crystal meth now rivals cocaine as the drug of choice in many parts of the United States. Unlike cocaine, meth does not need to be smuggled into the United States. It costs less with similar effects and it can be made in people's homes. The Federal Government recently reported, "While cocaine use continues to slow, meth has taken its place as the most widely abused drug in the United States." At the same time, the U.S. Department of Justice has named meth the "drug of choice" among youth.
THE EFFECT
Methamphetamine, or Phenyl Isopropyl Methyline, is a classified stimulant. Stimulants, by definition, are chemical compounds that accelerate activity within the central nervous system. Stimulants appear naturally in animals and in humans in the form of adrenaline and epinephrine. Much like natural stimulants, man made ones stimulate the body's ability to perform physical activity under situations of stress.
At low doses the drug can block hunger, focus attention, steady the hear and boost endurance. At high doses the drug briefly makes the body feel good, but kills the brain in the process. Meth sends a message to the brain cells to fire more dopamine, a feel-good chemical that is also critical to normal brain functioning. Hours after it is ingested, cell receptors begin to turn off to slow the flow of dopamine, and this is where meth differs from other stimulants, such as cocaine. While other stimulants allow brain cells to capture and repackage dopamine, meth does not. The brain cells respond by releasing an enzyme to knock out the extra dopamine. With repeated use, the enzymes eventually kill the dopamine cell, which leads to a chemical change in the way the brain works.
The physical effects of meth use include diarrhea, palpitations, dizziness, jaw clenching and facial ticks. Chronic use leads to sever weight loss and exhaustion, tremors, ataxia, disturbances of the cardiac rhythm, pain in the muscles and joints, and reduced resistance to infections. Meth decreases the appetite, blood flow, and saliva. It increases the heart rate to the extent that sudden heart failure can occur under strain. The rise of blood pressure and sugar levels and the vasoconstriction of peripheral blood vessels occurs. Other consequences include bronchial dilation, dilation of the blood vessels to the skeletal muscles, dilation of pupils and the emptying of the bladder and intestine. The most important central effects are an increase in alertness, sensitivity to stimuli, and self-awareness. Apart from the nervous system, meth damages multiple other organ systems including the heart, lungs, kidneys and liver.
Meth abusers who overdose do not have any warning signs. Without these signs, death can be unexpected and very sudden. The heart rate will rapidly increase and the abuser will collapse and suffer a fatal heart attack or stroke. Medical professionals treating drug abusers maintain that heroin addicts can frequently live longer lives, whereas meth abuses often do not.
THE GROWING PROBLEM
Recent data from the Drug Abuse Warning Network records 487,600 drug-related emergency department episodes and climbing. The increment is due to an expansion of operating meth labs throughout the country. Meth-related hospital admissions increased more than 366% during the last ten years in California alone.
Users who have witnessed a change in habitual use report the shift to aggressive or non- affectionate behavior. Abusers become nervous and agitated, a condition described as "tweaking" that makes them prone to violence. During the National Methamphetamine Conference in May, the President stated, "Substance abuse continues to plague our nation, Methamphetamine is now threatening to overtake crack cocaine as the most virulent illegal substance linked to violent behavior. It is leaving a trail of crime and death in its wake. Chemically and physiologically volatile, methamphetamine ravages the lives of its users..."
INCREASE IN VIOLENCE
SPIN Magazine, describes methamphetamine as a "synthetic drug that produces a synthetic rage and the kind of grisly crimes that Hard Copy's dreams are made of: limb-snapping, organ-grinding freak-outs, a steady diet of hostage-taking, and mini-mart stickups super-sized into murder. These days, there are West Coast countries where eighty percent of the domestic violence is reported as tweaker-fueled."
Rolling Stone, reiterates by stating, "Where meth thrives, so does David Lynchian violence. After zooming, levels of dopamine and serotonin, two of the brain's regulators, plummet; paranoia takes over, and shadow people appear. A lurid meth-related murder happens somewhere around the country every few months."
A speed freak in New Mexico cut off his 14 year-old son's head and tossed it out the window of his van.
Chronic use can lead to acute psychosis with auditory hallucinations and extreme paranoia. Unlike cocaine psychosis, it does not pass away rapidly, but can last for weeks. Methamphetamine psychosis is inevitable with high doses. Behavior fixation, compulsiveness, and the sensation of "bugs" crawling are merely a few symptoms. Doctors are not sure why one- third of heavy users will develop bizarre, paranoid behavior and suffer hallucinations and voices in the mind that are "as real as real gets." It can lead to paranoid psychosis. The resultant psychotic reaction is indistinguishable from schizophrenia except on some subtle dimensions.
Meth users experience severe disturbances of mood and thought that may be sustained well beyond the binge. The disturbance often persists for days, sometimes weeks. Similarly, the meth crash is more prolonged, and the drug-related depression that users may undergo upon awakening can be more severe than anything familiar to cocaine users. Massive, frequent doses create a two to five day run resulting in a crash that is approximately 24 hours and can last for days.
THE ESCAPE ROUTE IS FILLED WITH POT HOLES
According to several studies, criterion for addiction includes: unsuccessful attempts to quit, persistent desire and craving, continued use despite knowledge of harm to oneself and others, and taking the drug to avoid or relieve withdrawal. Withdrawal symptoms after chronic use include the need to catch up on lost sleep. Genuine physical dependence does not occur, but repeated continuous use results in extreme exhaustion and depression, which can be self-awareness and confidence during use result in a loss of self-criticism, which in some cases can lead to psychological dependence. An abuser can build up a high tolerance with increased dependence, leading to an increase in dosage.
Methamphetamine is a drug with high burnout potential. Treatment providers in all states report users enter treatment more rapidly with addiction to meth than with either heroin or cocaine. Individuals who seek treatment have a rough time kicking the drug, and can still suffer from psychosis for up to a half-year. Cravings, irritability, nightmares and depression are common for months after someone quits. The Los Angeles Times Associated Press reported, "Soon-to-be-published medical studies state that brain scans of lab animals show that the effects of meth last two years after abuse of the drug stops." The cravings eventually wane, but sometimes the irreparable damage will not show for years.
TREATMENT REALITY
In many communities, the demand for meth rehab far exceeds treatment capacity. In urban centers, such as Lost Angeles County, large numbers of hard-core addicts never make it into a program because the wait can take up to six months. In California, as many as 8,000 addicts are on waiting lists for a chance at one of 54,000 publicly funded treatment slots--nearly half of which are in Los Angeles County. Studies show that an untreated addict can cost taxpayers as much as $90,000 a year in welfare., medical care, law enforcement and losses resulting in crime, eclipsing the $21,000 annual cost for long-term residential treatment. Addicts who do not receive necessary rehabilitation usually continue using or promote themselves to selling or manufacturing drugs.
THE INGREDIENTS
Methamphetamine is both domestically produced and imported into the United States in an already processed form. For the local producers the processing required to make meth from the precursor substances is not only easier than it once was, but also more accessible. There is no specific recipe for making it. Methamphetamine is not derived from a plant, only chemicals. No smuggling or foreign connection is required. Meth is completely homemade; most of the chemicals required to manufacture meth are readily obtainable from hardware or drugstores. Meth normally contains ephedrine or pseudo-ephedrine, which is found in over-the-counter cold medications. Depending on the recipe, other ingredients used in the cooking are that of the skull-and-cross bone labels: lye, rat poison, battery acid, and various chemicals such as acetone and gasoline.
Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of chemistry can cook meth in a garage in two to four hours. The drug can be made with a skillet and stove, in a bathtub, or even in a car trunk with a plastic drinking cup. Once the chemicals are obtained, meth can be produced anywhere the manufacturer, or "cook", cares to work.
Illicit drugs are manufactured under crude and hazardous conditions, using inadequate or makeshift equipment by persons with little or no chemistry background. The chemicals utilized by clandestine lab "cooks" can fit into a suitcase and are therefore easily transported from location to location. Meth is produced in what are referred to as clandestine laboratories. These "Clan Labs" generally contain an assorted variety of hazardous and volatile chemicals. These chemicals create a major health and environmental problem as they are discarded illegally by the cooks who manufacture methamphetamine. The chemicals are dumped into old wells, waterways, ponds, lakes, public sewer systems, and onto the ground.
Meth labs are frequently located in public locations such as residences, hotels, motels, and storage facilities. The proximity of the labs to residential areas makes the general population extremely vulnerable to the hazardous conditions associated with their operation. Clandestine labs present numerous hazards to people and the environment. There is extreme potential for fires, and exposure to hazardous chemicals and fumes. The manufacture of meth is particularly dangerous because the manufacturing process poses the risk of explosion, and the potential of highly toxic chemicals injuring or killing innocent parties. There is also a great risk of cancer due to the carcinogenic effect of the chemicals used or produced in the manufacturing of meth.
Usually by the time police find a lab, there is nothing left but a cancerous bog. At some site, the chemicals in the soil cause the earth to spontaneously ignite. California's "cooks" empty their kettles in the dirt so that the cost of mopping up doubles yearly. It reached close to $7 million last year, second in the state only to oil spills.
Small meth labs, using glass beakers and countertop burners, can be set up and taken down in hours and are notoriously hard to detect. Steve Davis, Bonneville County Sheriff's narcotics investigator says "As bad as cocaine was, meth is worse. Cocaine, you can take out the suppliers and dry up the town...Meth is a lot harder to control."
THE PROFIT MOTIVE
Long a problem in the west and southwest, especially in California, where last year over 1,000 meth labs were seized, the drug has spread to the heartland partly because it is so easy to make and partly because of the money that can be made. "Police say a $1,000 investment can reap a $20,000 profit in less than four hours of work," reports The Los Angeles Times. The Drug Enforcement Administration shuts down an equal amount each year in the United States.
IT'S ORIGIN
Although it is a new trend, meth is not an original drug for the new millennium. According to National Trends in Drug Abuse, early in the 1900's, its parent drug, amphetamine, also known as Benzedrine, was used in nasal decongestants and bronchial inhalers and in treatment of depression. narcolepsy, schizophrenia, alcoholism and obesity. In the 1940's, Adolph Hitler took Benzedrine and mixed it with various chemicals to create Methamphetamine. This gave his army the ability to fight for days without food or sleep. Around the same time, Japanese Kamikaze pilots took Methamphetamine to numb fears prior to diving their planes into American ships. In the 60's, as drug use became culturally acceptable, Methamphetamine became widely available through prescriptions and a booming black market. Methamphetamine use waned during the 70's as many overdosed and died. But, in the 80's, Methamphetamine re-appeared and seemed to be spreading like wildfire through the country, being used very casually by many to heighten energy and lose weight quickly. Because meth of today is more pure and potent than it ever was in the past, the drug is even more dangerous and fatal.
NEW CONSUMER BASE
Once stereotyped as a "biker drug," meth has a broad new consumer base. It is commonly used by the gay community, blue collar workers, young professionals, college students, mostly white males, the Hispanic population, high school students as y9oung as ninth grade, people in their early thirties, rural bikers, street youth, a growing number of Native Americans, service workers, farm and oil workers, employed and unemployed people in their twenties, Asians, both men and women, and cocaine users who can no longer afford cocaine. All types of people use meth. There are no boundaries. It includes all classes and all professions. Anybody and everybody...Meth is not a respecter of persons.
THE EFFECT ON INFANTS
Methamphetamine also produces high-strung children similar in many ways to crack babies. There are two possible mechanisms by which meth may complicate pregnancy. The first if vascular, which leads to reduced blood flow to the fetus. The second is a direct toxic effect on the developing fetal brain. The impact of reduced blood flow in a developing fetus can be manifested by significant limb reduction deformities. The tendency to sleep nearly all the time exists during the first month of life. Babies sleep so deeply that the jaws must be pried open to get the baby to suck. Meth babies also exhibit a pronounced aversion to being touched on the head or feet. Jannie M. Sims, child psychologist states, "You think of a cocaine baby as the worst that it could be." She paused then added simply, "They're not."
Methamphetamine is predicted to alter child development more than cocaine. Unlike coke, meth is toxic to the brain cells because it sharply reduces levels of the neuro-transmitters dopamine and serotonin, which regulate motor skills and moods such as behavior control, anger, and attention deficit. United States Department of Health and Human Services reports that by age seven, children begin to have higher levels of aggressive behavior, more problems with adjusting to environments, and higher rates of school failure.
"Overall, National drug abuse continues to decline but, as other reports have found in recent years, it is on the rise among those under twenty years of age. Methamphetamine users in California tend to be either high school and college students or twenty-something's of any economic status," declares The National Drug Control Strategy. Recently, in Irvine, California, a sixteen-year-old was arrested for cooking up meth using a step-by-step recipe taken off the Internet. "One treatment program in Northern California reported fifty percent of the adolescent clients enter with meth as their primary drug of abuse and eighty percent report that they use if regularly," says Pulse Check, National Trends in Drug Abuse.
The survey conducted by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University found that substance abuse trends among high school and college students are rooted in behavior beginning in middle school. Researchers also found that preteens are smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana at earlier ages and that adolescents who abuse these "gateway drugs" run a higher risk of abusing harder drugs in the future. The statistical correlation between tobacco and drug abuse is high. Youths aged twelve to seventeen who smoke are eight times more likely to use illicit drugs than a non-smoking youth.
A report by The Indiana Prevention Resource Center at Indiana University revealed that Ritalin (methylphenidate), often used to treat hyperactivity in children, is often abused an can be another "gateway drug" if not taken properly or as needed. "Producing cocaine-like stimulant effects, snorted or injected Ritalin is just the latest trend in a resurgence in abuse of stimulant drugs that recalls the 'Speed Freak' era of the late 1960's." Often prescribed by "interview" versus physical testing, Ritalin is regularly over-prescribed, and contributes to many youth being exposed and addicted to this "speed" like substance at an early age. When not taken with caution and care, this popular drug prepares many for future methamphetamine use.
A MESSAGE FROM THE WHITE HOUSE
According to the Director of White House Drug Control Policy, Substance abuse among young people has grown during the past five years. Pro-drug messages are communicated to children through the most sophisticated, multimedia techniques while anti-drug forces typically fight back with bumper stickers: that is, with one-dimensional approaches. Material legitimizing drugs can be found in music, film, television, the Internet, and mass market outlets."
The media also makes a profound impact on women, influencing them to use drugs. Because meth imitates the effects of adrenaline, it produces the side effect of appetite suppression. This is very attractive to young women who want to be as thin as the models and actresses they see on television, in the movies, and on magazine covers.
Research from The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse indicates that forty-nine percent methamphetamine users are now listed as women, the majority are between ages twenty and thirty-nine. About seventy percent of women who report using drugs also reported having been sexually abused before the age of sixteen. More than eighty percent had at least one parent addicted to alcohol or one or more illicit drug.
"Trends in drugs, like those in music or politics, often hatch in California and then spread to the rest of the country. Meth is no different. The west's little problem is moving eastward. In December, the Feds arrested 100 suspects in an operation that spanned the nation. They seized 133 pounds of meth and $2 million, and followed the product clear down the I-40 to the virginal nostrils of North Carolina," says SPIN Magazine., "Its tentacles reach from backwoods barns in southeast Missouri's boot-heel to desolate Indian reservations in North Dakota and South Dakota to Nebraska and Iowa." According to a speed user quoted in the same article, "I've met lots of people from Nevada. I've met a lot of Mormon white kids from Utah. They love their crank. I know people who are taking it everywhere...Tennessee, New York, Kentucky, Georgia. It hasn't ever begun to peak yet."
THE DEVASTATING EFFECTS ON SOCIETY
The popularity of methamphetamine is directly altering society. A number of violent crimes can be traced directly to meth users. Clandestine laboratories contribute to health and environmental problems. The average age of drug users is continuing to decline. Addicts are left financially, spiritually, and emotionally empty because of meth. Everyone reaps the consequences. Society no longer has the control...Methamphetamine does.
A FINAL NOTE:
"The Truth About Methamphetamine" was originally written by a bright, well educated 19-year-old female during the time she was trying to kick the meth habit. Shortly after finishing this article, she ran off to live with her addicted boyfriend on the streets and once again began using methamphetamine. She was eventually arrested on felony counts for possession and dealing in methamphetamine, was jailed and her bail was set at $20,000.
For more information about Methamphetamine, check out our Meth Links page.
|
February 22
Window Improvements (Coming in 0.10.xx)
Kitchen Improvements (Coming in Future Updates)
Introduction of Scrap Metal and Metal Canteens
Game Achievement Rework (coming in 0.10.xx+)
Backend Workflow
Next Week's Devblog (Staring Camps | Vehicle Development)
Links
Hello all,Thanks for checking out our 15th devblog! Progress is moving along nicely on 0.10.xx. We've had some feedback and the issues found are being worked on. If you're testing 0.9.22, please share any issues you find on our tracker or come share on our Discord. Below we'll discuss a few upcoming features and exactly what the team has been working on.As we discussed a bit last week, we're having a revamp on all the current structure windows. The system in place is universal which allows us to create a prefab that we can constantly update and all in game structures are affected. Our windows have always lacked any depth beyond being able to fortify them. As with most of our features, they've been in place as a base for some time but are now getting some attention and improvements.Previously, windows had no glass, no inner structure and were just an open framed hole in the wall. We've added glass and wood cross panels.This adds a great deal of depth to a structure. It also creates an additional barrier and block for the player. Players could previously make a quick escape by jumping through an open window. Now players and zombies alike will need to deal with the glass and framework.Our current kitchens are a bit static and they're also rather massive in scale. They're original models from a way's back. The team and community felt the need for an upgrade. @Rik Konings has been hard at work re-working all of our kitchen models. We'll be introducing these in coming updates with continued design work. These kitchen cabinets and appliances/fixtures will be animated. The player will see doors open or animate slightly to add a bit of life to the world.We'll soon be introducing scrap metal piles, a plan we've had from the concept. You'll see them all around the world but mostly at starting camps (also being introduced shortly). These piles will allow the player to scavenge them for chance to pick up some scrap metal. These metal scraps will be used to create a wide variety of starting items in game including axe heads, hammer heads, machetes and the newly introduced canteen.We're reworking and properly introducing our achievement system. There's a core system in place now but it needed to be shored up and Jayty has that sorted now. You'll be seeing working achievements in upcoming builds. Our new media/design intern Ids has also begun reworking our actual achievement artwork below you can see some of his concepts and our current direction with them.Jiras workflow allows us to break what needs to be done up into bit sized pieces. Large tasks are called epics and the team will set out a large set of these to work off. Each epic may have numerous issues within. Cooking Improvements, for example, would be an epic, inside of which could be numerous ‘issues’ - Import New Cooking Grill, Create Tinder from Cloth Recipe and so on. These issues are grouped together and placed into what Jira calls a sprint. The team creates these sprints based on how many points (these points basically set a difficulty level) they feel each task or issue within will take them to resolve or develop. We typically create two week long sprints. Two of them per update with a week or two to allow for revisement.Yesterday the team finished up the 'Final Fantasy' sprint and begun work on the 'Goldeneye' sprint. Below you can see exactly what went into the coming update's first sprint, Final FantasyWe'll go over how the current sprint is going, talk a little about starting camps and discuss vehicles! Believe it or not the core of the reworked backbone for vehicles will be going in very soon (some already have). The team is reworking all things vehicles and we're very excited to get the ball rolling. Here's what we're currently poking around in, for testing purposes of course! ;)Thanks much for checking on our development of Survive the Nights and, as always, thank you for the continued support. The project has come a long way and we're excited for the coming months leading up to our public alpha release!Discord: https://discord.gg/survivethenights Forum: https://community.survivethenights.net Twitter: https://twitter.com/STNgame Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/STNgame YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/a2zinteractive Website: https://www.survivethenights.net
|
GENEVA — Donald Trump has officials in this world capital of trade running scared.
Faced with the prospect of a U.S. president who pledges to rip up trade agreements, slap tariffs on allies and pull out of the World Trade Organization, top trade officials are in various states of denial and dread.
Story Continued Below
Some attending a WTO meeting this week consoled themselves the populist billionaire couldn’t really win the election — “though after Brexit, nothing can be ruled out,” warned Jonathan Peel, a member of the European Economic and Social Committee.
Others say they doubt Trump "really means what he says” about trade agreements, as one high-ranking official here put it.
A few cling to the hope that even if he were elected and tried to deliver on his pledges, he would be stymied by Congress, the courts or other impediments. “Policy has to be built on reality, and if you are elected, you cannot disregard reality — not even Trump,” said another official.
These are confounding times for global trade officials who have spent their careers promoting the gospel of open markets as the path to prosperity and peace, and who regard recent developments in the U.S. with “a mix of amazement and consternation,” as one official put it.
In the short term, many fear Trump’s election would mean the U.S. would step back from its leadership role in the WTO, which would undermine the group’s clout, whether negotiating new agreements, resolving disputes or enforcing participants' adherence to existing pacts.
But more broadly, Trump’s slashing anti-trade rhetoric as well as Hillary Clinton’s opposition to the pending Trans-Pacific Partnership — following on the heels of the United Kingdom’s vote to leave the European Union — are such significant rebukes they are causing many officials to re-examine some of their most cherished assumptions.
“What is of concern is that those words are finding echo in the population,” said WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo, referring to the campaign rhetoric of both Trump and Clinton.
“We cannot turn a blind eye to that and assume that everything is OK once the campaign is over,” said Azevedo, a Brazilian who has led the global trading body since 2013. “That’s one problem that we have today: Those voices have been there for a while, and nobody ever took the time to really understand it and find a solution for that problem.”
Most of the Geneva-based officials interviewed for this story declined to talk on the record, saying it was inappropriate to comment on U.S. domestic politics and noting they may have to work with President Trump in the not-so-distant future. One exception was Russian Ambassador to the WTO Gennady Ovechko, who asserted the “Russian Federation never intervenes in domestic affairs of foreign states” and that he would work with whatever administration the American people elect.
But all said they have been paying close attention as the raucous presidential campaign pulled trade policy from a wonky side topic to one of the most hotly debated electoral issues.
Trump’s anti-trade rhetoric is not unheard of in Europe, where nationalist parties in Britain, Denmark, the Netherlands, Greece and France espouse similar themes. Many officials here trace such sentiments to the continued effects of the 2008-2009 financial crisis and the “sense that trade did not deliver all of its promises,” as one put it.
Yet they still fully believe that international trade is a net positive for individual countries, and that closing borders would be a way of “shooting yourself in the foot,” even while they acknowledge that some people have been hurt by trade, and their plight ignored by their governments.
“The fact that trade has a net positive effect in the economy is no consolation for the guy who lost his job due to cheaper imports,” Azevedo said. “That’s something that governments need to be mindful of. They have to prepare those people for new opportunities, new jobs, retrain them, which is not easy — easier said than done. And in many instances you have to provide … temporary support to help them to wait and get another job … which will probably be not as well paid as the previous job. It's a complex equation."
The focus on job losses is much more an American than a European issue, several officials said. The overriding argument against trade in Europe is that it pushes down labor and environmental standards.
“But that is a different story from Donald Trump,” one official said. “I’m not certain that Donald Trump is extremely interested in any environmental standards.”
Many international trade officials say they are also concerned about Clinton, citing her pledges to focus on enforcement of trade rules and her turnabout on the still-pending Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Compared to Trump, however, the former secretary of state who once called the TPP the “gold standard” of trade deals is considered far less trade-averse — someone who will eventually pursue a trade strategy at least somewhat similar to Obama’s, if not quite as ambitious.
At the first debate earlier this week, for instance, she called for “smart, fair trade deals,” adding that the United States accounts for only 5 percent of the world’s population but needs to “trade with the other 95 percent.”
If Clinton wins, then, trade supporters will more easily be able to brush off the current spate of anger as something that will fade as the economy continues to improve.
If it’s Trump, though, trade officials acknowledge that “we have to defend what we have achieved,” one official said. “We have to explain better what we’ve done, what we’re doing here, in order to dispel misunderstandings.”
But doing so is challenging, officials say, when the solutions involve extolling the benefits of trade to people who have been hurt by it and pressing member nations to build up their social safety nets.
It is much easier to deny the situation could ever become reality.
“I don’t want to even entertain the idea of Mr. Trump becoming president of the U.S.,” said another senior Geneva official when asked about the U.S. presidential campaign. “Because that would be a disaster.”
|
(CNN) Donald Trump and John Kasich's teams are at war over whether the Republican presidential nominee ever seriously wanted the Ohio governor to join the ticket.
Multiple sources close to Kasich said Trump's son, Donald Jr., tried to entice Kasich with a position as the most powerful vice president in history, but he turned it down. Kasich would have been in charge of all domestic and foreign policy in a Trump White House, Kasich sources said.
But Trump's communications adviser insisted Wednesday that, while a call occurred between Donald Trump Jr. and top Kasich adviser John Weaver, a vice presidential offer was never on the table.
"It's completely ridiculous," Jason Miller said. "There was never an offer made. It's completely made up."
Miller added: "Gov. Kasich is just being a sore loser."
Donald Trump Jr. also denied making such an offer.
"You know the way I conduct myself. Do you really believe I would say, '(John Kasich) is in charge of foreign and domestic policy and (Donald Trump) will focus on making America great again'? What am I, a meathead?" he told CNN.
The competing narratives highlight the escalating animosity between the Kasich and Trump campaigns -- a dynamic that's likely to continue unhindered as Donald Trump delivers his biggest speech yet Thursday.
Trump -- never one to take stories of rejection lightly -- also denied ever personally asking Kasich to be his running mate in a tweet.
"John Kasich was never asked by me to be V.P. Just arrived in Cleveland - will be a great two days!" Trump tweeted.
Kasich sources said the vice presidential back-and-forth began when Donald Trump Jr. reached out to Weaver, Kasich's adviser, shortly after Kasich dropped out of the race in May.
Weeks later Trump and Kasich spoke on the phone and afterward Weaver sent Trump's campaign chairman Paul Manafort Kasich's "Two Paths" speech -- a pretty clear signal Kasich had no interest, a Kasich source confirms.
Another Kasich source says there were also separate instances of Trump allies reaching out to Kasich allies asking whether the Ohio governor might consider the VP slot.
Manafort also described the vice presidency in a Trump administration as being similar to the COO of a company in an interview with the Huffington Post in May, a role that would appear consistent with the job being described by Kasich sources.
"He needs an experienced person to do the part of the job he doesn't want to do. He sees himself more as the chairman of the board, than even the CEO, let alone the COO," Manafort said.
But on Wednesday, another Trump aide dismissed the news of a vice presidential offer, which was first reported by The New York Times
"Completely false. His vetting read like a trashy novel," the aide said, when asked by CNN about the reports.
The Trump campaign compiled a dossier on Kasich, but never actually vetted him.
A source close to Kasich responded by saying, "Their comments are demonstrably false given the effort they put forward -- and offer they made -- to get Kasich to join the ticket. They must be confusing it with the file on Manafort, which must read like a Russian novella."
Trump sources have acknowledged, though, that long before Trump settled on Indiana Gov. Mike Pence for his running mate, top Trump aides viewed Kasich as their best bet for winning the White House in November.
Kasich, however, has remained steadfast in his opposition to Trump, following a vicious Republican primary which tore the party in pieces.
The Republican National Committee and the Trump campaign launched a concerted and sometimes public effort to woo Kasich back into the fold ahead in the weeks before the convention. But Kasich rebuked their advances.
This week relations between the two camps have grown even more strained after Manafort told MSNBC that Kasich was "embarrassing his state" by skipping the convention.
Kasich has been trolling the convention in his home state all week -- attending fundraisers and talking with delegates everywhere in Cleveland except The Quicken Loans Arena itself.
That was enough Wednesday for Steve Stepanek, co-chairman of the Trump campaign in New Hampshire, to call on delegates to boycott Kasich's speech to the New Hampshire delegation.
"Gov. Kasich has refused to endorse Donald Trump, he refused to welcome us as Republican delegates to his great state of Ohio. He's refused to participate in the Republican National Convention, which I think is totally inappropriate," Stepanek told CNN. "Since he's refused to participate in the convention or endorse Donald Trump, I think its totally inappropriate to attend any event he is sponsoring."
|
Hegarty Announces Fall Schedule
Schedule | PDF Schedule
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Seven individual tournaments across the country will highlight a competitive fall slate for the 2017-18 Arkansas women’s tennis team, head coach Michael Hegarty announced Monday.
“We are very excited about the fall schedule,” Hegarty said. “It’s probably our toughest one since 2009. We will use it to test us greatly in preparation for another step forward this spring. We lost two great seniors in Shannon (Hudson) and Sasha (Shkorupeieva), but we return such a loaded group and know we have one of the top newcomers in the nation.”
The fall campaign will begin Sept. 15-17 with the Razorbacks heading to the Midland Invitational in Midland, Texas. Arkansas will then compete in the Milwaukee Classic in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from Sept. 21-24, before traveling to Evanston, Illinois, for the Northwestern Invite from Sept. 29-Oct. 1.
The Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships is scheduled for Oct. 1-9 at the Riviera Tennis Club in Pacific Palisades, California. Individual selections for the nationally renowned tournament will be announced at a later date.
Arkansas will then compete in the Husky Classic in Seattle, Washington, from Oct. 13-15.
The ITA Central Regional Championships is set for Oct. 19-23 in Lawrence, Kansas. The ITA Regional Championships will feature some of the top men’s and women’s players across the country. Over 8,000 student-athletes from NCAA Division I, II, III, NAIA, Junior and Community Colleges compete across 85 ITA Regional Championships around the nation.
Select Razorbacks will compete in the inaugural Oracle ITA National Fall Championships from Nov. 1-5 at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden in Indian Wells, California. The 2017 Oracle ITA National Fall Championships, which serves as the concluding event to the fall portion of the college tennis schedule, is the only intercollegiate event to feature competitors from all five divisions competing for a national championship.
Arkansas will return 10 letterwinners from a squad that captured the program’s 15th NCAA Team Championship bid and posted 18 wins in 2017. The Razorbacks defeated 11 teams featured in the final national rankings, including No. 14 Auburn, No. 16 Texas A&M, No. 21 LSU and No. 24 Tennessee. Arkansas checked in at No. 19 in the final national rankings after holding a top-20 ranking in each of the last 10 weeks of the season.
For more information on Arkansas Women’s Tennis, follow @RazorbackWTEN on Twitter.
|
It’s four in the afternoon as I sit in the Gómez’s living room, up on the seventh floor of their apartment building in the eastern outskirts of Madrid.
The year is 2011, and young Rodrigo is dancing around in his chair as I try to get him to focus on our English lesson.
“Rodrigo, how old are you?” I ask the energetic boy.
“I’m fine, and you?” he answers quickly, almost robotically. I smile, not expecting his answer, and then repeat my question with a new emphasis: “How old are you?”
Rodrigo lets out an “Ahh,” in a tone that matches the understanding that has flashed across his face. “I have seven years,” he confidently responds this time.
My days and evenings that year were spent teaching English to native Spanish speakers, but doing so actually taught me to avoid mistakes that Spanish learners often make.
By paying attention to the English blunders that my students frequently made, I was able to understand why they made these mistakes, since I knew the Spanish grammar behind them. Unsurprisingly, the corresponding errors in Spanish are ones made often by new Spanish learners.
These confusions will happen a few steps past learning basic Spanish greetings, but aren’t as common for learners as advanced as the Spanish subjunctive.
Here are seven mistakes I often heard or saw in English, and how you can avoid making the same mistakes in Spanish.
7 Spanish Mistakes You Don’t Want to Make
1. “I have 18 years.”
In English we use the verb “to be” when talking about age: “I am 25 years old.” But in Spanish the verb “tener” (to have) is used with age. To say that you are 25 years old, you would say “Tengo 25 años” (I am 25). This translates literally to “I have 25 years,” hence the common mistake by both English and Spanish speakers in their respective second language.
There are a quite a few other Spanish phrases that use the verb “to have” (tener) while their English counterparts use “to be”. Here are ten of these phrases with which you should tener cuidado (be careful) when using:
tener calor (to be hot)
tener cuidado (to be careful)
tener frío (to be cold)
tener hambre (to be hungry)
tener miedo de/a (to be afraid of)
tener prisa (to be in a hurry)
tener razón (to be right)
tener sed (to be thirsty)
tener sueño (to be sleepy)
tener suerte (to be lucky)
2. “I am boring.”
I heard this one a lot when students actually wanted to express that they were bored. And while I admit, it was a bit entertaining for me to hear these young adults call themselves boring, you could easily be making the same mistake in Spanish! But not to worry, we’ll keep it simple and leave out the verb aburrir(se), so this is all you need to know:
Soy aburrido. (I am boring.) – I’m a boring person in general.
Estoy aburrido. (I’m bored.) – Right now I feel bored.
The first uses ser, while the second uses estar. Both verbs mean “to be” in Spanish, which can cause continual head scratching throughout your lovely relationship with the Spanish language. I learned a little rhyme in high school that I’ve never forgotten, and it’s helped me time and time again to distinguish between these two verbs.
“How you feel and where you are, that is when you use estar.”
So if you’re feeling bored in the moment, use estar: “estoy aburrido“. And remember, ladies, we would say “estoy aburrida” with the feminine “a” at the end of the adjective.
3. “The people is very kind.”
In English the word “people” is a collective noun that must always be used with verbs in the third person plural: “People are good-hearted.”
In Spanish, however, the word for “people” (la gente) is singular. Yes, it’s a strange concept to get used to at first, but once you get the hang of it the word shouldn’t cause you any more trouble.
Here are two examples to get you more comfortable with the idea:
La gente tiene hambre. (The people are hungry.)
¿Sabes que la gente es muy lista? (Do you know that people are very clever?)
4. “My mom is teacher.”
When stating occupations in Spanish, do not use the indefinite article (un/una). Rather, just the verb “to be” (ser) plus the occupation is all that’s needed. Sentences describing people’s occupations will look like this:
Soy profesora. (I am a teacher.)
Eres artista. (You are an artist.)
Él es ingeniero. (He is an engineer.)
Since you don’t use the indefinite articles (un/una) in Spanish, many native Spanish speakers forget to add them in when using English. Likewise, as native English speakers we love to throw in an unneeded “un” or “una” in these types of sentences. But you have been warned, and as a reader of this FluentU Spanish blog, you are well prepared to avoid this common trap.
5. “I like the bag blue.”
In English, our adjectives come before the noun: kind heart, blue shirt, dazzling smile. In Spanish, however, adjectives often come after the noun: corazón amable, camiseta azul, sonrisa deslumbrante.
Be aware that there are certain instances where the adjective does come before the noun in Spanish, but here we’ll focus on the majority, when it comes after. Here are a few more examples to see the difference between Spanish and English.
un hijo inteligente (a smart son)
(a son) la noche tranquila (the calm night)
(the night) el vaso vacío (the empty glass)
6. “I didn’t write nothing.”
Double negatives in the English language often make us cringe because they’re simply poor grammar. But in Spanish, double negatives thrive!
For example, take the phrase “I didn’t write anything.”
In Spanish, you would say “No escribí nada.”
Translating it part by part (instead of as a whole phrase) we get:
No escribí = I didn’t write
nada = nothing
So you can see why native Spanish speakers could easily say “I didn’t write nothing” by mistake.
By this same logic, when saying negative phrases in Spanish, make sure to avoid translating word for word! You’ll end up with an incorrect “No tengo algo” (“I don’t have something”) when it should be “No tengo nada” (I don’t have anything). “No tengo algo” is just as cringeworthy for a Spanish speaker to hear!
As a general rule, Spanish phrases don’t mix positive and negative words. So if you have a “no” before your verb and there’s more to the sentence, you’ll only ever see a negative word (nadie – nobody, nada – nothing, ningún or ninguna – no/none, nunca – never, jamás – never, tampoco – neither). With positive verbs you’ll use the positive equivalencies (alguien – somebody, algo – something, algún or alguna – some/something, siempre – always, también – also).
Take a closer look at these examples to get a better feel for the concept.
No la he visto nunca. (I’ve never seen her.)
No hay nadie aquí. (There isn’t anyone here.)
No cocinaron nada. (They didn’t cook anything.)
Ella tampoco hizo los deberes. (She didn’t do the homework either.)
7. “On mondays I study english.”
Capitalization rules are very different between Spanish and English, with significantly less capitalization on the Spanish side.
Words that are capitalized in Spanish:
Names of people (Cristiano Ronaldo)
Names of places (Madrid, España)
Names of newspapers and magazines (El País)
The first word of titles (movies, books, articles, plays)
Words that are not capitalized in Spanish:
Days of the week (lunes, martes, miércoles – Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday)
Months of the year (enero, febrero, marzo – January, February, March)
Words in titles, except the first (“Cien años de soledad” – “100 Years of Solitude”)
Languages (Estudio español. – I study Spanish.)
Religions (Mis padres son católicos. – My parents are Catholic.)
Nationality (Soy estadounidense. – I’m American.)
By learning to avoid these seven common mistakes, you’ll boost yourself up to a whole new level of Spanish. You’ll also understand when you hear these errors in English made by native Spanish speakers, as I did that afternoon with Rodrigo.
The young boy’s second response doesn’t throw me off guard since I’ve heard the error time and time again. “Oh, you are seven years old,” I say back, making sure he notes the mistake. “Yes, I am seven.” he says at last, triumphantly.
Rebecca Thering is a freelance writer and editor who has lived abroad teaching ESL in Spain and South Korea. Valuing education and things that aren’t things, she inspires and helps others by writing about her experiences abroad, cultural insights and self-improvement pursuits at her personal blog, Rebe With a Clause.
And One More Thing…
If you like learning colorful, memorable Spanish lessons like these, then you’ll love FluentU.
FluentU takes real-world videos like music videos, commercials, news, and inspiring talks and turns them into Spanish learning experiences.
Other sites use scripted content. FluentU uses a natural approach that helps you ease into the Spanish language and culture over time. You’ll learn Spanish as it’s actually spoken by real people.
FluentU has a wide variety of videos—topics like soccer, TV shows, business, movies and even magical realism, as you can see here:
FluentU brings native videos within reach with interactive transcripts. You can tap on any word to look it up instantly. Every definition has examples that have been written to help you understand how the word is used. If you see an interesting word you don’t know, you can add it to a vocab list.
Learn all the vocabulary in any video with FluentU’s Learn Mode. Swipe left or right to see more examples of the word you’re on.
The best part is that FluentU keeps track of the vocabulary that you’re learning, and it recommends you examples and videos based on the words you’ve already learned. Every learner has a truly personalized experience, even if they’re learning the same video.
Start using FluentU on the website with your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the FluentU app from the iTunes or Google Play store for iOS and Android devices.
|
The entire Bannon -vs- Kushner storyline is beyond silly for all the aforementioned reasons. However, The Hill is reporting today that R&R Mercer may have recalled Bannon for duties elsewhere.
Unfortunately, the ridiculous presentation of the Hill outline completely skips the entire connection between Robert Mercer, Rebekah Mercer, Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway and Breitbart media. The article makes it seem as if they are disparate entities.
[…] Two two sources briefed on the meeting told The New York Times that Bannon met with Rebekah Mercer, the daughter of major Republican donor Robert Mercer, last Friday. According to the newspaper, the meeting took place in Mercer’s office at Cambridge Analytica in New York and focused on possibilities for Bannon if he decides to leave the White House. (read more)
If you know the relationship between each of the aforementioned entities I would strongly suggest you read the article to see just how obtuse The Hill can be in one outline.
For those who don’t know the relationship, here’s a quick explainer.
Billionaire Robert Mercer owns the majority stake in Breitbart Media. Mercer invested $15 million in Breitbart when Bannon was editor. Breitbart media then went full bore in support of Ted Cruz. Mercer then established the Cruz Super-PAC “Keep the Promise”.
Robert Mercer’s daughter is Rebekah Mercer, a friend of Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway.
Cambridge Analytica, one of Robert Mercer’s enterprises, was the primary data-gathering organization for Ted Cruz’s data-driven campaign. Under Steve Bannon’s leadership Breitbart Media ran a candidate poll for two years gathering the user data on behalf of Cambridge Analytica and Robert Mercer who then sold the data back to the Cruz campaign to use in donor solicitations.
These are not unfamiliar people.
White House strategist Steve Bannon meeting with Robert or Rebekah Mercer is essentially Bannon meeting with his former boss and his bosses very political daughter.
Advertisements
|
Mosul-The elegant columns of a west Mosul church stand plastered with ISIS propaganda after the jihadists’ infamous religious police took over the Christian place of worship.
The sign above the door of Um al-Mauna (Our Mother of Perpetual Help) in Iraq’s second city reads “Chaldean Catholic church”, but its jihadist occupants had other ideas.
“No entry, by order of ISIS Hesba Division (the religious police), they wrote on the building’s outside wall.
The church “was an important office for the authorities tasked with making sure (Mosul) residents had a beard, wore short robes and followed their extremist convictions,” says Lieutenant Colonel Abdulamir al-Mohammedawi of the elite Rapid Response Division.
According to Agence France Presse, five jihadists lie dead outside, their bodies twisted and one with the top of his skull blown off, after Iraqi forces retook the neighborhood from ISIS this week.
Not a single symbol of Christianity has survived in the building.
Only the grey marble altar remains. In the church’s empty alcoves lies the base of a statue that was probably also destroyed, decorated with red and yellow flowers.
The posters on the church’s marble columns give an indication of what life was like under ISIS.
One shows religious invocations to repeat in the mornings and evenings, while another explains the benefits of praying in a mosque.
A “town document” lists the 14 rules of life in Mosul under jihadist rule: “The trade and consumption of alcohol, drugs and cigarettes is banned.”
Women should wear modest attire and only appear in public “when necessary”, it says.
A pamphlet on the rubble-covered ground explains the different forms of corporal punishment prescribed for theft, alcohol consumption, adultery and homosexuality.
It comes complete with chilling illustrations.
Jihadists have scribbled their noms de guerre on the church’s walls, and a large chandelier has been dumped in the yard.
In the church’s small side rooms, artificial flower garlands are draped near posters explaining how to use a Kalashnikov rifle.
Chaldeans make up the majority of Iraq’s Christians. But a community that numbered more than a million before the 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein has since dwindled to less than 350,000 in the face of recurring violence.
In June 2014, jihadist fighters led by ISIS seized control of Mosul and ordered the city’s Christian community to convert to Islam, pay a special tax, leave or face execution.
Weeks later, the jihadists swept through Qaraqosh and the rest of the Nineveh Plain east of Mosul, where an estimated 120,000 Christians lived, prompting them all to flee.
But the Um al-Mauna Church is in a better condition than most of the rest of the Al-Dawasa neighborhood, which has been ravaged by the fighting.
On one of its empty trading streets, once flashy shop facades have been reduced to contorted iron and shredded concrete.
On one poster advertising male clothing, ISIS members have blacked out the faces and bare arms of the models.
Asharq Al-Awsat Asharq Al-Awsat is the world’s premier pan-Arab daily newspaper, printed simultaneously each day on four continents in 14 cities. Launched in London in 1978, Asharq Al-Awsat has established itself as the decisive publication on pan-Arab and international affairs, offering its readers in-depth analysis and exclusive editorials, as well as the most comprehensive coverage of the entire Arab world. More Posts - Facebook - Google Plus - YouTube
|
(We pack and sell raw local honey in plastic jars.)
Customer: “I don’t like these plastic jars. They are messy. You should use glass jars.”
Me: “Glass is much heavier, and it breaks so easily. But I’ve never noticed it being messier to deal with. How does it trouble you?”
Customer: “Plastic leaks.”
Me: “I beg your pardon?”
Customer: “I take a bit of honey each night before bed. And every morning there is a ring of honey on the nightstand where it has leaked out of the jar.”
Me: “I know if the jar is poured, you must wipe it off or the drip will run down the outside and make a sticky mess. But the same is true of any honey jar.”
Customer: “No, it leaks out the bottom. And only plastic jars.”
Me: “But all these boxes here are full of plastic jars, and the box bottoms are clean and dry.”
Customer: “Well, of course it doesn’t do it here. It’s only on nightstands!”
|
by Adam Armstrong
IBM Releases 30TB LTO-8 Tape Drive
Today IBM announced the release of the Linear Tape Open Ultrium 8 Tape (LTO-8) drive. The LTO-8 doubles the capacity from the LTO-7 to 30TB (with compression) and IBM states that the new tape drive accelerate data access times while driving the price below half a cent per GB. Spectra Logic is also announcing a pre-purchase program for the LTO-8.
Data is growing at an almost alarming rate. While there are valuable insights to be harvested from this data, it mainly comes from a relatively small portion. A good example would be autonomous cars where there is important insights to avoid accidents, however, there is a massive amount of data generated just from everyday actions that provide little use. All of this data still needs to be stored. While the price of disk is dropping, it still can’t beat tape for price per gigabyte. And the LTO-8 drives the price down even farther.
The LTO-8 essential marks a 65-year culmination of research and commitment from IBM. Not only does the drive have 30TB compressed (12TB native), IBM reports speeds up to 360MB/s. The new LTO-8 also comes with AME and AES-256 standard encryption and Write-Once-Read-Many (WORM) functionalities adding an extra layer of security. The new LTO-8 will be compatible with LTO-7 media.
Also today, Spectra Logic launched its pre-payment program for the LTO-8. This program allows for Spectra customers to be the first to get their hands on the new higher capacity tape drives. The LTO-8 will work with Spectra’s BlueScale library software as well as all of Spectra’s tape libraries. Spectra Logic announced their MigrationPass program to provide customers with customized options for their LTO-4, LTO-5 and LTO-6 tape to easily migrate data to the newest LTO tape technology.
Availability
The IBM LTO-8 Drive is expected to be available in the fourth quarter of 2017. Spectra Logic’s pre-purchase program is available now.
IBM LTO-8
Spectra Logic’s pre-purchase program
Discuss this story
Sign up for the StorageReview newsletter
|
Tom Hiddleston was JUST ABOUT to give us the lowdown on what REALLY happened between him and Taylor swift, but whaaaat?? Nicole Kidman cut him off! Ok, so that may have been an over exaggeration on the content of the interview. Sadly, Tom was not about to reveal inside info on Hiddleswift, but Nicole DID really hijack Tom’s interview. So, Tom was really talking to the Golden Globes about his character in ‘The Night Manager.’ But right behind him, Nicole Kidman and her husband Keith Urban were greeting other stars on the red carpet. That’s when the actress came over and took over the interview. Apparently, she wanted Tom to be DONE. Tom tried to play off the awkward moment by actually interviewing Nicole, who looked slightly embarrassed by what she’d just done. But the actress did reveal why she had interrupted the interview. Well, we certainly enjoyed it. Did you? Let us know below.
NICOLE Kidman displayed “bizarre” and “loose” behaviour at the Golden Globes, interrupting interviews and “shooing away” a cocktail waitress, according to a new report.
Woman’s Day magazine claims the Australian actress left “some observers wondering whether she’d had a few too many pre-show wines.”
The January 8 event began with the Lion actress interrupting British actor Tom Hiddleston’s red carpet interview to say she was having fun.
“Sorry to crash. I’m so happy to be here and I’m determined to have fun. That’s why I came here and did that,” she laughed.
At an after-party, the magazine reports she “shooed away” a cocktail waitress and “constantly ushered over” waiters with pizza.
The magazine claims the 49-year-old star dropped crumbs on her husband, Keith Urban.
The report comes after Kidman drew outrage and praise for saying Americans should support US President-elect Donald Trump.
She later clarified that her comments were merely a statement of her belief in democracy, not an endorsement of the incoming president.
The Hours actress was born in Hawaii to Australian parents and holds dual citizenship in Australia and the US.
|
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cleveland Councilman Zack Reed wants a good crowd when George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic perform July 30 in Luke Easter Park. What he doesn't want is a flash mob.
At Reed's urging, City Council voted Wednesday to outlaw use of Facebook and other social media to call together unruly crowds.
Reed's concern stemmed from recent disturbances by flash mobs in the suburbs. He said he did not want trouble to mar summer gatherings like his Family Unity in the Park celebration, featuring Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic.
Violations of the new law will be a misdemeanor punishable by a $100 fine on the first offense, $250 on the second and $500 on the third. The fines could come on top of jail time for disorderly conduct and other crimes.
Reed acknowledged concern on the part of the administration that the law will be difficult to enforce.
Follow Thomas Ott on Twitter @thomasott1.
|
“Let Us Rise Up and Build”
Ezra 1–8; Nehemiah 1–2; 4; 6; 8
LDS manual: here
Reading
As this lesson opens, Israel is having one of its times when they’ve forgotten all about that bastard Jehovah (soon to become Jesus). And what a great time that could have been. They could have done regular things like other people, and not have had to engage in bizarre loopholes and workarounds for their unworkable lifestyle, like hanging strings on poles all over town, or getting other people to turn on their lights for them. But no, as we saw in lesson OT 29, some blamed fool decided to revive the curse and return religion to largely secular Jews.
That blamed fool was actually two people: Ezra, a priest, and Nehemiah. The two of them were influential in building the wall of Jerusalem (Nehemiah) and rebuilding the temple (Ezra). As always, religion builds walls and creates differences between people.
Main points from this lesson
Cyrus did not read about himself in Isaiah.
The LDS lesson manual slips up on the very first step.
Ezra 1–6. King Cyrus reads his name in Isaiah’s prophecies and is filled with a desire to do the Lord’s will.
This refers to Cyrus giving the okay for the Jews to build a temple.
And:
The words of Cyrus that are recorded in Ezra 1:2 refer to a prophecy in Isaiah 44:28 that mentioned Cyrus by name (see also Isaiah 45:1–5; explain that although the story of Cyrus comes before the book of Isaiah in the Old Testament, Isaiah lived about 150 years before Cyrus was born).
As we’ve already seen in our lessons, Isaiah (or rather, Deutero-Isaiah) would not have mentioned Cyrus 150 years before Cyrus. Isaiah v2 only knew Cyrus once he’d hit the political scene, and it was then that he started dropping in references to him.
In other words, if Cyrus ever did see his name in the OT, the ink was still wet.
Back to the manual.
• Why did Cyrus decree that a temple should be built again in Jerusalem? (See Ezra 1:1–2.) How did Cyrus know the Lord wanted him to do this?
Who knows what he thought, but it was probably one of those bursts of tolerance that leaders are prone to, especially when they want to ingratiate themselves with a troublesome rabble. Cyrus probably realised fairly quickly that letting the Jews build a temple was the quickest way of getting them onside. Then they’d be babbling away in their temple, not causing trouble for him.
As always…
Where did the Mormons get the idea that Cyrus saw his name in the Bible, anyway? From an ancient Jewish historian.
The words of Cyrus that are recorded in Ezra 1:2 refer to a prophecy in Isaiah 44:28 that mentioned Cyrus by name (see also Isaiah 45:1–5; explain that although the story of Cyrus comes before the book of Isaiah in the Old Testament, Isaiah lived about 150 years before Cyrus was born). The ancient Jewish historian Flavius Josephus reported that Cyrus read his name in Isaiah’s prophecies, was touched by the Spirit of the Lord, and desired to fulfill what was written (The Works of Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, trans. William Whiston [n.d.], bk. 11, chap. 1, pars. 1–2).
Mormon scholarship doesn’t seem to have progressed far beyond the ancient, or maybe it’s just a case of picking whatever works.
More from the manual:
• How would you feel if you were reading the scriptures and read a prophecy that gave your name and described specific things you would do?
I would think “How clever I am to have retconned myself into the Scriptures,” just like Joseph Smith did when he wrote himself into the Bible and the Book of Mormon.
I would also think: If I actually decide to do this because I just read it, doesn’t that kind of invalidate the prediction? That way, the prophet wouldn’t have really been seeing the future; he basically just wrote a suggestion saying, “Someone should totally do this.” Self-fulfilling prophecies kind of run counter to the spirit of the thing.
How Mormons should relate to ex-Mormons.
One of the stated purposes of this lesson is:
to show Christlike love to those who oppose the work of the Lord.
With that in mind, here’s a question from the manual:
How did the Jews respond to these efforts to stop the construction of the walls? (See Nehemiah 4:9, 13–15.)
Good question, manual. Let’s read the answer.
Neh. 4:9 Nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night, because of them.
…
4:13 Therefore set I in the lower places behind the wall, and on the higher places, I even set the people after their families with their swords, their spears, and their bows.
4:14 And I looked, and rose up, and said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, Be not ye afraid of them: remember the LORD, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.
4:15 And it came to pass, when our enemies heard that it was known unto us, and God had brought their counsel to nought, that we returned all of us to the wall, every one unto his work.
Answers: They set a watch against them, and armed themselves to the teeth.
Wait, is that what they meant? I thought the idea was to be kind and to show some lurve. But that wasn’t the view of Brigham Young.
“I say, rather than that apostates should flourish here, I will unsheath [sic] my bowie knife, and conquer or die [Great commotion in the congregation, and a simultaneous burst of feeling, assenting to the declaration.]. Now, you nasty apostates, clear out, or judgment will be put to the line, and righteousness to the plummet [Voices, generally, ‘go it, go it.’]. If you say it is right, raise your hands [All hands up.]. Let us call upon the Lord to assist us in this, and every good work.”
– Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, p. 83; online at http://journals.mormonfundamentalism.org/Vol_01/refJDvol1-16.html
Or Sidney Rigdon.
…it was the imperative duty of the Church to obey the word of Joseph Smith, or the presidency, without question or inquiry, and that if there were any that would not, they should have their throats cut from ear [to] ear.”
– Sidney Rigdon letter to Apostle Orson Hyde, October 21, 1844, in Nauvoo Neighbor, December 4, 1844; see also Quinn, Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power, p. 94
Back to the lesson manual:
Elder Marvin J. Ashton counseled: “Certain people and organizations are trying to provoke us into contention with slander, innuendos, and improper classifications. How unwise we are in today’s society to allow ourselves to become irritated, dismayed, or offended because others seem to enjoy the role of misstating our position or involvement.”
I wonder how Elder Ashton would have felt to realise that the LDS Church has had to publish information that essentially confirms what Mormons used to call “slander and innuendo”.
New rule: the church doesn’t get to complain that sources are misstating the church’s position when those sources turn out to be a better source of information about the church than the church itself.
Ashton continued:
“Ours is to explain our position through reason, friendly persuasion, and accurate facts.”
This strategy was dropped because reason and accurate facts are not advantageous to the church.
[Church history] if not properly written or properly taught, … may be a faith destroyer… The writer or teacher who has an exaggerated loyalty to the theory that everything must be told is laying a foundation for his own judgement… The Lord made it very clear that some things are to be taught selectively and some things are to be given only to those who are worthy.
Apostle Boyd K. Packer, “The Mantle is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect,” Reprinted in BYU Studies, v.21, no.3, 1981, pp.259-277
“Ignore them.” How Mormons engage with critics
This lesson manual is decades old, but conditions have shifted since its publication. The LDS leadership is having to deal with a member exodus, Kirtlandian in its extent. With more members leaving the church than ever, it seems likely that almost every Mormon will be familiar with someone who has left. How would the church like its members to engage with challenges from former members? Let’s see what the manual has to say.
What did Nehemiah do when Sanballat asked him to stop working and meet with him? (See Nehemiah 6:1–4.) How do some people try to distract Church members from the Lord’s work today? How should we respond to such distractions?
Let’s look at the relevant scripture:
Neh. 6:1 Now it came to pass when Sanballat, and Tobiah, and Geshem the Arabian, and the rest of our enemies, heard that I had builded the wall, and that there was no breach left therein; (though at that time I had not set up the doors upon the gates;)
6:2 That Sanballat and Geshem sent unto me, saying, Come, let us meet together in some one of the villages in the plain of Ono. But they thought to do me mischief.
6:3 And I sent messengers unto them, saying, I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down: why should the work cease, whilst I leave it, and come down to you?
6:4 Yet they sent unto me four times after this sort; and I answered them after the same manner.
The implication, it seems to me, is that members should ignore critics. I can see why that option is attractive — it allows members to disengage from ideas that might get them thinking and asking questions.
It’s a strategy that Mormons are very good at. Here are some thoughts I learned from my years in the church that allowed me to avoid uncomfortable lines of reasoning.
Some people will be hostile to the church, no matter what.
They don’t want to find out more; they just want to argue.
They can leave the church, but they can’t leave it alone.
Even just branding a person, a book, or a website as “anti-Mormon” is a way of categorising and dismissing ideas so that they don’t need to be dealt with. They are, to use a term popularised by psychologist Robert Jay Lifton, thought-terminating clichés.
The language of the totalist environment is characterized by the thought-terminating cliché. The most far-reaching and complex of human problems are compressed into brief, highly reductive, definitive-sounding phrases, easily memorized and easily expressed. These become the start and finish of any ideological analysis.
What other thought-terminating clichés have you heard (or used) to dismiss criticism of the church? I’d love to see them in comments.
Additional teaching ideas
How religion separates people
Israel was on a course to integrating itself with its neighbours. This swing toward religious bigotry stopped that. Nehemiah’s reading of the law caused them to block intermarriage…
Neh. 10:29 They clave to their brethren, their nobles, and entered into a curse, and into an oath, to walk in God’s law, which was given by Moses the servant of God, and to observe and do all the commandments of the LORD our Lord, and his judgments and his statutes;
10:30 And that we would not give our daughters unto the people of the land, not take their daughters for our sons:
…and exclude people of Ammonite and Moabite descent.
Neh. 13:1 On that day they read in the book of Moses in the audience of the people; and therein was found written, that the Ammonite and the Moabite should not come into the congregation of God for ever;
13:2 Because they met not the children of Israel with bread and with water, but hired Balaam against them, that he should curse them: howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
13:3 Now it came to pass, when they had heard the law, that they separated from Israel all the mixed multitude.
It looks like linguistic discrimination was part of the deal.
13:23 In those days also saw I Jews that had married wives of Ashdod, of Ammon, and of Moab:
13:24 And their children spake half in the speech of Ashdod, and could not speak in the Jews’ language, but according to the language of each people.
13:25 And I contended with them, and cursed them, and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair, and made them swear by God, saying, Ye shall not give your daughters unto their sons, nor take their daughters unto your sons, or for yourselves.
Religion may give some benefits to members of the in-group. But the end result is discrimination against members of the out-group. I suppose this is because religion sets up a system of beliefs, goals, habits, and practices common to members, but that non-members don’t share. That helps members forge a common identity, but it makes it hard for members and non-members to understand each other. In good times, it can engender polite curiosity, but in bad times, it can lead to hostility and bloodshed. This is the social cost of religion, and it’s just too high.
Modern wall builders
The current-day spiritual progeny of Ezra and Nehemiah are Wallbuilders, a political group that promotes pseudo-history and serves as a vehicle for ersatz historian David Barton.
You can find out more about Barton on his Right Wing Watch page.
|
The Future of Listening
Zoom in When:
Friday, Oct 28, 2016 6:30p -
Sunday, Oct 30, 2016 5:00p Where:
Cambridge Innovation Center
1 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 02142 Admission:
FREE Categories:
Business, Innovation, Lectures & Conferences, Meetup, Tech Event website:
thefutureoflisteninghackathon.bemyapp.com
The Future of Listening Hackathon is a three-day event for developers, designers, and idea generators to explore the world of storytelling using the all-new Audible APIs.
You will gain exclusive access to private APIs, individualized mentorship from Audible experts, present your apps in front of Audible CEO Don Katz, and compete to take home the $10,000 Grand Prize.
The hackathon will be held at the Cambridge Innovation Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Click the map to view more details.
Teams should apply by October 14, 2016, to participate. The application is open to the public and individuals who apply will still go through a team formation before the hackathon, but forming a team in advance is recommended.
|
In 1824 the viceroy of Egypt sent a unique gift to the new king of France: a two-month-old giraffe that had just been captured in the highlands of Sudan. In this week’s episode of the Futility Closet podcast we’ll follow the 4,000-mile journey of Zarafa, the royal giraffe, from her African homeland to the king’s menagerie in Paris.
We’ll also visit Queen Victoria’s coronation and puzzle over a child’s surprising recovery.
Intro:
In 1952 a stray cat made a home in Classroom 8 of a California elementary school.
Abe Lincoln’s ghost seems to spend a lot of time in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Sources for our feature on Zarafa the giraffe:
Michael Allin, Zarafa, 1998.
Erik Ringmar, “Audience for a Giraffe: European Expansionism and the Quest for the Exotic,” Journal of World History 17:4 (December 2006), 375-397.
Heather J. Sharkey, “La Belle Africaine: The Sudanese Giraffe Who Went to France,” Canadian Journal of African Studies 49:1 (2015), 39-65.
Olivier Lagueux, “Geoffroy’s Giraffe: The Hagiography of a Charismatic Mammal,” Journal of the History of Biology, 36:2 (June 2003), 225–247.
Samuel J.M.M. Alberti, “Objects and the Museum,” Isis 96:4 (December 2005), 559-571.
Philip McCouat, “The Art of Giraffe Diplomacy: How an African Giraffe Walked Across France and Became a Pawn in an International Power Struggle,” Journal of Art in Society (accessed May 14, 2017).
Olivier Lagueux, “Zarafa: A Giraffe’s True Story, From Deep in Africa to the Heart of Paris [review],” Isis 92:1 (March 2001), 186-187.
S. Mary P. Benbow, “Death and Dying at the Zoo,” Journal of Popular Culture 37:3 (2004), 379-398.
Elena Passarello, “Beautiful Animal of the King,” Paris Review, Dec. 20, 2016.
Henry Nicholls, “Meet Zarafa, the Giraffe That Inspired a Crazy Hairdo,” Guardian, Jan. 20, 2014.
Olivier Lebleu, “Long-Necked Diplomacy: The Tale of the Third Giraffe,” Guardian, Jan. 11, 2016.
Today Zarafa stands on the landing of a stone staircase in the Museum of Natural History in La Rochelle.
Listener mail:
Julia Baird, Victoria, 2016.
C. Dack, “The Coronation of Queen Victoria,” Pall Mall Magazine 48:219 (July 1911), 2-5.
Wikipedia, “East Asian Age Reckoning” (accessed May 26, 2017).
Josh Clark, “How Thoroughbred Horses Work,” How Stuff Works, Oct. 4, 2011.
This week’s lateral thinking puzzle was devised by Greg. Here are two corroborating links (warning — these spoil the puzzle).
You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on iTunes or Google Play Music or via the RSS feed at http://feedpress.me/futilitycloset.
Please consider becoming a patron of Futility Closet — on our Patreon page you can pledge any amount per episode, and we’ve set up some rewards to help thank you for your support.
You can also make a one-time donation on the Support Us page of the Futility Closet website.
Many thanks to Doug Ross for the music in this episode.
If you have any questions or comments you can reach us at [email protected]. Thanks for listening!
|
Hexvessel – No Holier Temple
Label: Svart Records
Released: September 7th, 2012
I had never heard Hexvessel and am astounded by the originality of the music.There are direct influences of bands like Amon Düül II, Joe Byrd and Field Hippies, HP Lovecraft and King Crimson as well as many elements of other artists that appear momentarily in the music such as Tom Waits, The Beatles, Black Sabbath, The Doors. Hexvessel never directly copies the sound of any of these artists, instead drawing on them as herbs in a sonic stew of their own making.
The album opens with “Heaven and Earth Magic” an acoustic incantation of sorts. Preparing the listener for the journey. This is quickly followed by “Woods to Conjure” with classic muddy crunch guitar, drums and bass. Setting a tone for rich vocals harmonies and trumpet accompaniment. The timbral qualities of this recording are exactly what the listener wants and expects of this sort of music. The attention to the detail of sound sculpture really sets this recording apart.
“Wilderness Is” has a lilting chamber quality to it and serves as an extended introduction to “A Letter in Birch Bark”. A song that blends a wonderful rich male vocal performance with earthy guitar and organ. “Elegy to Goyahkla” is another short work that conveys the listener to the classic psychedelic sounding “His Portal Tomb”. This ten minute piece brings forth distorted heavy tones mixed with flute and vocals, with drones of sound pulsing in waves. Having reached this far into the album, the listener is now treated to what starts as a simple guitar motif turned into some dark germanic carnival music on “Are You Coniferous”.
“Sacred Marriage” again finds that deep psychedelic rock sound, not heavy but deep. While “Dues to the Dolemen” finds Hexvessel creating the sounds of invocation with spoken word over acoustic instrumentation followed by a droning instrumental riff.
The opus “Unseen Sun” clocks in at nearly thirteen and a half minutes. This work sums up the whole album experience in a single piece of music with great vocal parts, extended droning riffs that carry the listener on waves sound. This is the music that brings the listener full circle from where the journey began.
The last cut on No Holier Temple is a cover of “Your Head is Reeling” by Ultimate Spinach. I actually prefer this version to the original. And though I really love the recording it feels that it does not completely belong on this record. This song has a great jam in the middle. I would love to hear Hexvessel put out an entire album in this vein.
As I stated in the beginning, No Holier Temple is not an album for everybody. However if you do enjoy that lo-fi sound of a psychedelic yesteryear, check this album out.
Buy the album:
[amazonmp3 asin=”B008UVXG3Y”]
|
Truman Tells Stalin, July 24, 1945
Most of the groups and individuals who had considered the subject — from the Scientific Panel to the writers of the Franck Report — believed it necessary to inform the USSR of the imminent success of the Manhattan project. Failure to do so, they believed, would guarantee a post-war atmosphere of suspicion and hostility.
At the Potsdam Conference, however, President Truman chose to tell Stalin only that the U.S. possessed “a new weapon of unusual destructive force.” Truman’s decision raises an obvious question: Since Stalin would learn of the existence of the atomic bomb the day it was used, if he did not know already, what purpose could be served by Truman’s tactic?
Truman’s announcement to Stalin can be seen here from the accounts of the various observers. Each describes the same event, but the event appears in a different light to each observer. Did the “master politicians” Truman, Churchill, and Byrnes know what they were doing? Or did they make a tragic blunder?
President Truman's version:
On July 24 I casually mentioned to Stalin that we had a new weapon of unusual destructive force. The Russian Premier showed no special interest. All he said was he was glad to hear it and hoped we would make “good use of it against the Japanese.”
Harry S. Truman, Year of Decisions (Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, 1955) p. 416.
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s version:
I was perhaps five yards away, and I watched with the closest attention the momentous talk. I knew what the President was going to do. What was vital to measure was its effect on Stalin. I can see it all as if it were yesterday. He seemed to be delighted. A new bomb! Of extraordinary power! Probably decisive on the whole Japanese war! What a bit of luck! This was my impression at the moment, and I was sure that he had no idea of the significance of what he was being told. Evidently in his immense toils and stresses the atomic bomb had played no part. If he had the slightest idea of the revolution in world affairs which was in progress his reactions would have been obvious. Nothing would have been easier than for him to say, “Thank you so much for telling me about your new bomb. I of course have no technical knowledge. May I send my expert in these nuclear sciences to see your expert tomorrow morning?” But his face remained gay and genial and the talk between these two potentates soon came to an end. As we were waiting for our cars I found myself near Truman. “How did it go?” I asked. “He never asked a question,” he replied. I was certain therefore that at that date Stalin had no special knowledge of the vast process of research upon which the United States and Britain had been engaged for so long...
Winston Churchill, Triumph and Tragedy (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1953) pp 669-70.
Secretary of State James Byrnes’ version I:
At the close of the meeting of the Big Three on the afternoon of July 24, the President walked around the large circular table to talk to Stalin. After a brief conversation the President rejoined me and we rode back to the “Little White House” together. He said he had told Stalin that, after long experimentation, we had developed a new bomb far more destructive than any other known bomb, and that we planned to use it very soon unless Japan surrendered. Stalin’s only reply was to say that he was glad to hear of the bomb and he hoped we would use it. I was surprised at Stalin’s lack of interest. I concluded that he had not grasped the importance of the discovery. I thought that the following day he would ask for more information. He did not. Later I concluded that, because the Russians kept secret their developments in military weapons, they thought it improper to ask us about ours.
James F. Byrnes, Speaking Frankly (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1947) p. 263.
Secretary of State James Byrnes’ version II:
I am just as convinced now as I was when I wrote that first book, “Speaking Frankly,” in 1947, that Stalin did not appreciate the significance of the statement. I have read stories by so-called historians who assert that he must have known, but they were not present. I was. I watched Stalin’s face. He smiled and said only a few words, and Mr. Truman shook hands with him, left, coming back to where I was seated and the two of us went to our automobile.
I recall telling the President at the time, as we were driving back to our headquarters, that, after Stalin left the room and got back to his own headquarters, it would dawn on him, and the following day the President would have a lot of questions to answer. President Truman thought that most probable. He devoted some time in talking to me that evening as to how far he could go — or should go.
Stalin never asked him a question about it. I am satisfied that Stalin did not appreciate the significance of President Truman’s statement. I’m pretty certain that they knew we were working on the bomb, but we had kept secret how far that development had gone.
James Byrnes, interview in U.S. News and World Report , August 15, 1960 pp 67-68.
Truman’s Interpreter Charles Bohlen’s version:
Three days after the successful test blast, after consulting his advisers and Churchill (the British had cooperated in the project), Truman decided it would be wise to tell Stalin the news. Explaining that he wanted to be as informal and casual as possible, Truman said during a break in the proceedings that he would stroll over to Stalin and nonchalantly inform him. He instructed me not to accompany him, as I ordinarily did, because he did not want to indicate that there was anything particularly momentous about the development. So it was Pavlov, the Russian interpreter, who translated Truman’s words to Stalin. I did not hear the conversation, although Truman and Byrnes both reported that I was there.
In his memoirs, Truman wrote that he told Stalin that the United States had “a new weapon of unusual destructive force.” Apparently, the President did not tell Stalin the new weapon was an atomic bomb, and the Soviet leader did not ask or show any special interest. He merely nodded and said something. “All he said was that he was glad to hear it and hoped we would make good use of it against the Japanese,” Truman wrote. Across the room, I watched Stalin’s face carefully as the President broke the news. So offhand was Stalin’s response that there was some question in my mind whether the President’s message had got through. I should have known better than to underrate the dictator. Years later, Marshal Georgi K. Zhukov, in his memoirs, disclosed that that night Stalin ordered a telegram sent to those working on the atomic bomb in Russia to hurry with the job.
Charles E. Bohlen, Witness to History 1929-1969 (New York: W. W. Norton, 1973) pp. 247-248.
British Foreign Minister Anthony Eden’s version:
Mr. Churchill and I had previously discussed together the problem of telling Stalin and, if so, whether before the explosion of the bomb or after. If we did tell him would he ask for the know-how at once? A refusal would be awkward, but inescapable.
There were embarrassments every way, but on balance I was in favour of telling Stalin. My chief argument was that the United States and Britain would have to refuse the secret information. They would be better placed to do this if Stalin had already been told that we possessed this weapon and meant to use it. There was not much to this, but the Prime Minister thought it the better way.
On the question of when Stalin was to be told, it was agreed that President Truman should do this after the conclusion of one of our meetings. He did so on July 24th, so briefly that Mr. Churchill and I, who were covertly watching, had some doubts whether Stalin had taken it in. His response was a nod of the head and a brief “thank you.” No comment.
Anthony Eden, The Reckoning: The Memoirs of Anthony Eden, Earl of Avon , (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1965) p. 635.
Soviet Marshal Georgii Zhukov’s version:
I do not recall the exact date, but after the close of one of the formal meetings Truman informed Stalin that the United States now possessed a bomb of exceptional power, without, however, naming it the atomic bomb.
As was later written abroad, at that moment Churchill fixed his gaze on Stalin’s face, closely observing his reaction. However, Stalin did not betray his feelings and pretended that he saw nothing special in what Truman had imparted to him. Both Churchill and many other Anglo-American authors subsequently assumed that Stalin had really failed to fathom the significance of what he had heard.
In actual fact, on returning to his quarters after this meeting Stalin, in my presence, told Molotov about his conversation with Truman. The latter reacted almost immediately. “Let them. We’ll have to talk it over with Kurchatov and get him to speed things up.”
I realized that they were talking about research on the atomic bomb.
It was clear already then that the US Government intended to use the atomic weapon for the purpose of achieving its Imperialist goals from a position of strength in “the cold war.” This was amply corroborated on August 6 and 8. Without any military need whatsoever, the Americans dropped two atomic bombs on the peaceful and densely-populated Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Georgii Konstantinovich Zhukov, The Memoirs of Marshal Zhukov (New York: Delacorte Press, 1971) pp. 674-675.
|
Tunisia, Jordan and Lebanon have scrapped laws that allow rapists to escape punishment by marrying their victims
Laws that allow rapists to marry their victims in order to escape prosecution are being repealed in countries across the Middle East.
Within the last six weeks, parliaments in Tunisia, Lebanon and Jordan have all amended laws that provide legal loopholes for rapists to avoid punishment for their actions.
On 26 July, Tunisia closed such loopholes while passing a landmark law which aims to eliminate violence against women. Meanwhile, on 1 August, the lower house of Jordan’s parliament approved a repeal, now set to go to the upper house and the king before becoming law. And in Lebanon on 16 August a law was repealed that not only allowed rapists to escape prosecution by marriage, but also included loopholes for offences relating to sex with children aged 15-17 and seducing virgin girls into having sex with the promise of marriage.
The news might all seem bad, but good things are happening too.
“Provisions like these are largely colonial-era relics and remain on the books in many other countries in the region and beyond,” said Rothna Begum, a researcher for Human Rights Watch.
“Some permit exoneration for a range of offenses, including kidnapping, rape, and consensual sex with a child (statutory rape) if the perpetrator marries the victim.”
Such laws are thought to be inspired by the French Napoleonic Code of 1810, which allowed men who kidnapped women to escape prosecution if they married their victims. France only repealed the provision in 1994.
The latest set of repeals follows Morocco in 2014 and Egypt in 1999. But similar laws still exist across much of the Middle East and north Africa including Algeria, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Syria, and Palestine. In many countries, rape survivors are considered unmarriable.
These reforms are credit to the intense campaigning by women’s rights organisations in these countries
It is thought that pressure from women’s rights groups in the region helped lead to the reforms in Tunisia, Lebanon and – soon – in Jordan. Campaigners hope that other countries will follow suit but warn that work still needs to be done, even in countries where laws have been changed.
“These reforms are credit to the intense campaigning by women’s rights non-governmental organisations in these countries, but laws alone can’t change practices,” said Begum.
“Even if such provisions are removed, forced marriage may continue unofficially as it has in many countries. The authorities should take steps to change the discriminatory attitudes and stigma that fuel forced marriages of rape survivors to their rapists.”
Tired of divisive, scaremongering media?
|
At source{d} we believe there’s a possibility for programs to write code, and for new forms of automatic programming to emerge. Our Roadmap states the first step in this direction as: Build representations of source code, developers and projects.
Today we are announcing Babelfish, the project we are developing to build these representations of source code.
What’s Babelfish?
Babelfish is a universal code parser. It aims to parse any file, in any language, extract an abstract syntax tree (AST) from it, and convert it to a Universal Abstract Syntax Tree (UAST)
Well, that’s our objective, we are not there just yet, but we have designed an architecture to achieve exactly that, and we’re currently working on it.
The architecture of Babelfish
As shown in the figure, Babelfish is a client/server system. Clients are source code analysis tools that rely on the server for actual source code parsing, written in different programming languages.
Architecture overview.
The server itself uses language drivers to perform the parsing, which are divided in two parts, in order to minimise the work of developing a new driver:
A language code parser, which builds a native AST. This parser can be built directly from the target language’s compiler tools or libraries.
An AST normalizer written in Go, that gives the UAST as a result.
The server uses containers to run these drivers through libcontainer. This frees the user from having to handle dozens of different language ecosystems, since the server executes drivers using Docker images.
Have a look at the documentation for further architecture details.
What can I do with Babelfish today?
Babelfish project is still in an early development stage, but we already have some components of its architecture working.
We have a working server, which can accept parsing requests, launch the corresponding language driver, and return a response with the parsed file.
We have a dozen language drivers in various stages of development, with a quite advanced python driver, and a usable java driver.
We have a set of tools that showcase how babelfish works, and how it can be used to build your own code analysis tools on top of it.
If you can try it yourself, you can do so with a small set of commands. First, make sure you have Go installed and GOPATH properly set.
We can then install the tools with the following commands:
mkdir -p ${GOPATH}/src/github.com/bblfsh/ cd ${GOPATH}/src/github.com/bblfsh/ git clone https://github.com/bblfsh/tools.git cd tools make dependencies go build
This will build the our showcase tools and install them in ${GOPATH}/bin .
We can get the server running just using docker:
docker run --privileged -p 9432:9432 --name bblfsh bblfsh/server
And verify that everything is working properly:
> ${GOPATH}/bin/bblfsh-tools dummy /usr/lib/python2.7/base64.py DEBU[0000] executing command DEBU[0000] reading file /usr/lib/python2.7/base64.py DEBU[0000] dialing request at localhost:9432 It works! You can now proceed with another tool :) DEBU[0087] exiting without error
Note that this command may take a while, since the server will have to get the python driver the first time it runs.
Now we can try for example, the cyclomatic complexity sample tool:
> ${GOPATH}/bin/bblfsh-tools cyclomatic /usr/lib/python2.7/base64.py DEBU[0000] executing command DEBU[0000] reading file /usr/lib/python2.7/base64.py DEBU[0000] dialing request at localhost:9432 Cyclomatic Complexity = 47 DEBU[0000] exiting without error
How can I contribute?
Babelfish’s development is open and is based on BIPs. The code is available at bblfsh project Github, and discussions are held at source{d} community Slack (#babelfish channel).
If you’re interested in the project, you can look further at the documentation, give it a try, and report back any issues you have.
If you find it useful, you are more than welcome to contribute code to any of its components, or even to write a driver for your favourite language! Drop by the slack channel and tell us about it :)
P.S. Santiago is giving a talk about Babelfish both at Curry On and Docker meetup. Don’t miss it if you have the chance to be there!
|
And entering their sixth draft together, the Schneider-Carroll partnership is viewed by many as the model for running an NFL team.
Attempting to explain the key to success for one of the better teams in the NFL, former coach Brian Billick pulls out a statistic.
This one, though, is about an even more universal topic.
“What’s that they say, 60 percent of marriages in this country end in divorce?’’ Billick asks.
NFL draft Begins Thursday. The Seahawks do not have a first-round pick but do have 11 picks overall, the most in the NFL. Their first selection will No. 63, in the second round.
The number actually is closer to 50 percent. And the relationship being discussed — that of Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider — isn’t technically a marriage.
But Billick said it’s best viewed that way, carrying many of the same challenges and stresses.
“Just like any marriage, if you have the right two people it’s pretty good,’’ said Billick, who coached the Baltimore Ravens to a Super Bowl XXXV win and is an NFL Network analyst. “If you don’t, it’s hell on Earth. They’ve been able to sustain it.’’
The final play of the most recent Super Bowl aside, the Schneider/Carroll partnership has been more than “pretty good,’’ with the Seahawks averaging 10 regular-season wins a year since the two arrived, including the team’s first Super Bowl win following the 2013 season.
And entering their sixth draft together, the Schneider-Carroll partnership is viewed by many as the model for running an NFL team — the Seahawks have a deep-pockets owner who doesn’t meddle and a general manager and coach working in collaboration.
Schneider is perceived as having final say over the 90-man roster the team brings to camp each year, with Carroll having final say over who is kept on the 53-man regular-season roster. If there have been disagreements, they apparently weren’t major, and they weren’t public.
“It’s really a great study in how to operate a franchise,’’ said Bill Polian, a longtime NFL exec with the Bills and Colts and now an ESPN analyst. “ … They’ve got a great working relationship with a great understanding of what fits their system, and they’ve executed it perfectly.”
Seattle’s mode of operation is far from the only way to run an NFL franchise. And in something as complicated as running billion-dollar businesses, every team has some unique characteristics in how it operates.
But in general, there are a few basic NFL organizational structures.
When (their moves) don’t work, they aren’t afraid to admit a mistake and let them go. That’s critical.” - Jed Hughes, consultant who helped connect Schneider with the Seahawks
There are teams where owners are heavily involved and call just about every shot — Dallas with Jerry Jones the most notable example (and the Raiders in the Al Davis days).
There are teams with strong general managers who essentially have all the power when it comes to personnel — think Denver with John Elway.
There are the teams with coaches calling all the shots — New England with Bill Belichick, and now, after an offseason housecleaning, Chip Kelly in Philadelphia.
And then there is the collaborative approach with a GM and coach largely sharing responsibilities, one that has been the norm in the NFC West with partnerships such as that of Seattle’s as well as GM Steve Keim and coach Bruce Arians in Arizona, and GM Trent Baalke and coach Jim Harbaugh in San Francisco.
Most around the league view a buddy-system approach as the best way to go, given the complexities of the modern-day NFL.
“It’s beyond just one man,’’ Billick said. “This (collaboration) is the model.’’
But as the recent Baalke-Harbaugh breakup after just four years illustrates, sustaining a partnership isn’t easy.
“A lot of it has to do with ego — I don’t need you anymore,’’ Billick said. “Trent Baalke doesn’t need Jim Harbaugh now. So now we are going to find out whether he does or not. And sometimes it’s one side saying ‘I need more input’ or ‘I had more to do with this than I am getting credit for.’ ’’
So far, those are pitfalls that have escaped the Seahawks, and one reason may be the way Seattle’s braintrust was assembled.
Carroll was hired first in January 2010 after the firing of Jim Mora. He was told by CEO Tod Leiweke he could be his own general manager.
But Carroll, having been fired already by the Jets and Patriots, had a clearer understanding when he got to Seattle of what he thought would work.
“I knew that I couldn’t do that (be general manager),’’ Carroll said. “I wanted to find a guy like John Schneider if we could, and between that process we were very fortunate that we hit it right, and we figured out through the interview process that John would be an extraordinary partner to do this with, and on we went.’’
As the story has famously been told, Schneider had a job offer waiting for him before his plane landed back in Green Bay, where he had worked the previous eight years in the personnel department.
“It was a vision that Pete put in place right away, that all he cared about was that he wanted to have an influence in who the general manager was going to be so that in his mind he could make it like the best relationship that ever existed,’’ Schneider recalled this week of that initial meeting. “That was his goal — that he wanted to do it better than anyone has ever done it before.
“So that, the way it was presented to me, and then being able to just have that inspiration and that confidence that what he was saying, and that it was ego-less, I think that’s probably where that trust level comes in that he had a clear vision in mind of how he wanted to interact with a general manager. And that’s why it was such an attractive job, in my mind.’’
That both arrived at the ground floor of a rebuilding process hasn’t hurt, many say. There have been no conflicting agendas between a GM looking for the long term and a coach wanting to win immediately, a common malady in sports organizations.
Jed Hughes, a consultant for the search firm Korn Ferry, which helped connect Schneider with the Seahawks, points to what might be the biggest personnel misstep of the Schneider/Carroll era — the trade for Percy Harvin — as a sign of their strong relationship.
Teams often feel compelled to hang on to disappointing players to try to improve the public perception of the move. But Seattle’s trade of Harvin last fall is only the most notable example of the Seahawks being willing to move on quickly from something that wasn’t working.
“When (their moves) don’t work, they aren’t afraid to admit a mistake and let them go,’’ Hughes said. “That’s critical.’’
Carroll signed an extension last year keeping him with Seattle through the 2016 season, matching an extension given to Schneider the year before.
In the news conference announcing his extension, Carroll spent most of his time deflecting praise to Schneider.
“When we came here we really set a vision in place that started with the relationship between the two of us,’’ Carroll said. “I felt like we had an opportunity to demonstrate to professional sports how powerful and how crucial this relationship is. … I hoped that someday that we would be able to say that so other teams could see it and see that this is a format that is really a great way to do it.’’
|
William Gheen, the leader of an anti-illegal immigration group, has received considerable attention after asking Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to admit he’s gay — an unsubstantiated allegation — before liberals can use it against him.
Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert slammed Gheen Thursday and quipped, “Lindsey Graham, save your good name by releasing a sex tape!”
“Nine times out of ten I’m on the side of whoever is calling somebody gay,” Colbert said. “But the person being accused here is a senator from my home state, an I’m not going to let someone slander his good name.”
Graham, who has been the target of rumors about his sexuality for years, says he’s not gay. In this case, he was arguably targeting by Gheen because he is one of a few Republican senators willing to negotiate with Democrats for immigration reform.
“I hope this secret isn’t being used as leverage over Senator Graham, so today I think Senator Graham, you need to come forward and tell people about your alternative lifestyle and your homosexuality,” Gheen told a Crowd of Tea Partiers in South Carolina last weekend.
The remarks went viral after they were posted on YouTube by his group, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC). At one point, the video was marked with the tags “queer” and “fag.” ALIPAC claimed that their video page had been hacked and the tags were soon removed.
“I have to admit, that was very brave of Mr. Gheen. Outing someone usually takes the kind of courage only displayed by male prostitutes paid by tabloid magazines,” quipped Colbert in his “The Word” segment Thursday.
Colbert looked to an old “Sex and the City” episode for ways the senator can clear this up permanently. In season six, Kim Catrall’s character is determined to quash rumors that her male model boyfriend is gay, and decides that only by making a sex tape can her man prove he’s straight.
“Sir, it will save your career,” Colbert said. “Because any kind of straight sex seems to be okay with the GOP. I mean, just look at Governor Mark Sanford, Senator John Ensign or Senator David Vitter, who is still in office despite being named as a client by the D.C. madam three years ago and dogged by rumors that he allegedly likes prostitutes to dress him up in diapers.”
“So just rent the equipment. Hell, rent the girl. Just put it in there and get it out there,” Colbert suggested.
At that, Colbert turned his attention to Gheem. “He’s a big opponent of illegal immigration, and the immigration reform bill is the next big piece of legislation in Obama’s pipeline. Now, Gheen knows the Republicans only have 41 seats in the Senate. To block legislation, they have to march in unison. So the real threat is not the fact that Lindsey Graham is gay, which he isn’t, it’s that he’s bi, which he is, bi-partisan,” the comedian said.
Gheen has suggested Graham may be getting blackmailed into bipartisanship, but the activist hasn’t targeted other Republican senators — such as Sens. Olympia Snowe (ME), Susan Collins (ME) and Scott Brown (MA) — who have voted with President Obama on initiatives.
Even Gheen seems to swing both ways. “I just found out that he worked with the Democratic party in the 1990s. That sounds pretty bipartisan,” Colbert said.
Based on that fact, Colbert turned the tables in Gheen. “I’ve got to at least consider the possibility that someone found out he gets off by going to the ballpark on weekends and laying in a trough in the men’s room like a human urinal cake. I have got nothing to back that up. I just need to know that that’s not true,” he concluded.
This video is from Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, broadcast April 22, 2010.
Part 1
Part 2
|
A day after employees took to social media sharing firsthand stories suggesting IBM had begun a large round of job cuts, a source within the company told CRN on Thursday the layoffs will not be nearly as widespread as some feared.
Big Blue is cutting a percentage of its roughly 370,000-strong workforce in the "low single digits," meaning the extent of the layoffs globally will likely be just in excess of 10,000 workers, according to a source within the company who asked not to be identified.
While not directly addressing the layoffs, IBM, via email, described to CRN a dynamic in which the company was rejigging the skill sets of its employee base.
[Related: IBM Has Been Going Full Steam Ahead Since PartnerWorld Conference]
"IBM is aggressively transforming its business to lead in a new era of cognitive and cloud computing. This includes remixing skills to meet client requirements," IBM said. "To this end, IBM hired more than 70,000 professionals in 2015, many in these key skills areas, and currently has more than 25,000 open positions."
Also on Thursday, Reuters reported Big Blue was planning to cash out a large portion of its holdings in Lenovo.
IBM will put up for sale up to $150 million in Lenovo stock, according to the news service. Lenovo acquired IBM's x86 server business in October 2014 in a $2.1 billion deal, with $280 million going to IBM in the form of the Chinese PC-maker's stock.
On Wednesday, on a Facebook page that serves as a forum for IBM workers called Watching IBM, employees reported that the ax was falling across multiple locations and divisions of the company. Stoking employee consternation was a recent change in IBM's severance policy that reduced severance payments from six months to one, according to the posts.
One employee posted on the Watching IBM page: "I am a GTS Strategic Outsourcing casualty of the mass firing today. My manager told me it was big and widespread, and I'd be hearing from a lot of people that will also be notified today."
That employee was given 90 days until an official end date, and received a one-month severance package, according to the post.
Such reports suggest many of the cuts might come from Big Blue's consulting and services arms -- Global Business Services and Global Technology Services.
While job losses and employee unease about job security is always unfortunate, it's possible the company's channel will benefit by being asked to pick up some slack in delivering consulting services, said Kevin Goodman, managing director at BlueBridge Networks, a hosting provider based in Cleveland that partners with IBM.
"This gap that comes [from] growth, change and innovation also provides smaller regional boutique shops and providers like our company, BlueBridge Networks, the opportunity to provide service and meet and exceed business and IT objectives in the areas not filled by the void," Goodman told CRN.
The source inside IBM said the company has been increasing the number of its developers who work directly with channel partners, "and you can expect that to continue."
Goodman told CRN that any time a company backs off from an aspect of their services and consulting business, especially those focused on the SMB market, "there are players like us who are ready, willing and able to pick up the opportunities and serve them as we would to large enterprise-class companies."
IBM, like other established tech companies, needs to continue reinventing to maintain a leadership position in the digital age, with its ever-changing technology landscape, Goodman said.
IBM "continues to demonstrate the way to get to personalization in the world is by taking cloud platforms and infusing them with cognition and delivering them as a service. Much of what they do seems to reinforce this," Goodman said. "I fully expect IBM and other more established players in the digital age to take on new roles in the ecosystem in a nontraditional way to their DNA."
|
Aliens & U.F.O.s
Aliens and ufos are talked about and documented geologicallly dating back to as far as biblical times. several verses within the Old Testament of the Bible would lead one to assume these men were attempting to explain some kind of craft. However, Alien analysis, and sightings of UFOs have only in the near past became the discussion on everyones mouth over the past fifty - sixty years, with the govt. concealment of the Roswell observation and flying saucer crash back in 1947.
What truely happened in Roswell, NM that hot July night in 1947? certainly you have heard of the incident in Roswell that has remained an argument still to these days. there's absolute confidence that something crashed to the dessert that night, however there appears to be no robust drawn conclusion among the various theories. Was it a weather balloon or an alien UFO? an oversized cluster of individuals still say that the U.S. military and administration officials has several questions they've failed to answer regarding the Roswell crash. These theorists claim there was a massive conspiracy to cover up what truely happened. Whatever it truely was that crashed, left a path of rubbish reaching nearly a mile long and a around a few hundred feet wide. 1st discovered by an area ranch manager, the rubbish was recovered by the 509th Bombardment cluster Intelligence workplace with Major Jesse Marcel at the lead.
Immediately upon their return to the Roswell, New Mexico base, Area 51, there was an official press release stating that debris from some kind of flying disc had been recovered. It had been written by Lt. Walter Haut, and a newspaper story followed on July 8th with the headline "RAAF Captures Flying Saucer on Ranch in Roswell Region".
Mr. and Mrs. Dan Wilmot appear to be the sole individuals in Roswell which saw the flying disk. They were sitting on their front porch around 10 PM when an oversized glowing object soared out of the sky in a northwesterly direction at a high rate of speed. Wilmot directed his wife's attention thereto and each ran out into the yard to look at. it absolutely was in view less then a moment, Wilmot calculated. Wilmot same that it looked as if it was 1500 feet high and flying about four hundred to five hundred miles per hour. It looked oval in form like 2 saucers, facing mouth to mouth. The whole body glowed as if light were showing through from within. From wherever we stood Wilmot explained that the UFO looked to be close to five feet in size, and creating allowance for the space it was from the city he patterned that it should be fifteen to twenty feet in diameter, although this was simply a guess.
|
On issues of environment and energy development, the opinions of Albertans are diverging sharply from the rest of the country, according to a new Forum poll for the National Post.
The Forum Research survey, which questioned 1,863 Canadians and 682 Albertans across the country at the beginning of April, found a deep ideological split between the country’s oil-rich region and the other provinces.
“There’s been some speculation about the differences between the east and the west and I guess this confirms that. But when when we say those differences are in the west, they’re more centred in Alberta,” said Lorne Bozinoff, president of Forum Research.
A majority of Albertans, for example, supported construction of the contentious Keystone XL and Northern Gateway pipelines. A full 72% of Albertans surveyed believe in climate change, but they were less likely to attribute the phenomenon to human activities than Canadians elsewhere.
Of the 545 Albertans who believed in climate change, only 55% said it was caused by human activity. That was on par with respondents in Atlantic Canada, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, but very different from Quebec and B.C., where 78% and 72% respectively attributed the change to non-natural phenomena. About 64% of Ontarians surveyed believed the same.
While it should probably come as little surprise to see Albertans favouring policies that serve their own economic interests, the rest of Canada seems just as ready to do the same.
While the rest of the country overwhelmingly opposes Keystone XL and Northern Gateway, they seem to have no compunctions about benefiting from the wealth those pipelines and the oil in them would help generate.
About 60% of Canadians believe provincial resource extraction revenues should be shared equally. In Ontario 72%, felt this way, as well as 69% of Liberal supporters. Approximately a third of Albertans tend to welcome the idea of sharing the wealth.
“[Central Canada] wants to eat their cake and have it too, right. You have to forgive people who want to do that, I think. It’s kind of a human trait,” Mr. Bozinoff said.
“That probably bothers people in the industry and in Alberta. People in the east are consuming plastics and everything else.”
[Central Canada] wants to eat their cake and have it too
The survey found Canadians are split more by their region on these issues than by income, gender or education.
Following other polls, the survey also recorded an emergent Justin Trudeau. Canadians were asked which leader was best able to represent the interests of their respective regions. On the whole, they were about equally split between the new Liberal leader and Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. About a quarter of the respondents said Mr. Harper was best able to represent their region. That tracked with the 27% who awarded the distinction to Mr. Trudeau.
Mr. Harper remains the favourite in Alberta, while Mr. Trudeau has the edge in Atlantic Canada and Quebec.
NDP opposition leader Thomas Mulcair did not lead in any individual region.
While most of the poll questions centred around the oil industry, Mr. Bozinoff said Albertans have always tended to march to the sound of a different drummer. This is as true in politics and economic issues as in anything else.
That said: “If you look at the NDP or the Liberals, even in Alberta you saw in the recent Calgary Centre byelection that there are national currents … that do affect the province.”
The poll also found about a third of Canadians believe the western provinces are an equal partner in Confederation. Fewer than that, 31% said they were a less dominant partner.
About one in five respondents believe the west dominates the country.
In Alberta, about half said the west is not dominant. As many as 41% of Conservatives believe the west still “wants in.” That compares to 26% of Liberals and 29% of NDP supporters.
The poll, conducted through an interactive recorded telephone survey on April 3 and April 8 is considered accurate within a margin of error of between +/- 3%.
National Post
|
There’s far too much to say about an event like Charlottesville.
There’s the sorrow we all feel for the family of Heather Heyer, a young woman whose only crime was giving enough of a damn to risk her safety standing up to armed neo-Nazis. There’s the anger at an administration that has once again winkingly refused to condemn a white supremacist mob. There’s the frustration at the police, which is ever-ready to roll out tanks and dystopian armored warriors when it’s black people protesting against being murdered, but apparently stands on the sidelines whistling when armed racists rally in a public square. And there’s the fact that mainstream conservatives have been defending this exact type of violence for months.
Gallons of ink will continue to be justifiably spilled on these and other topics in the weeks to come. And the battle to defeat the far right — through political organizing, mobilization, and the elimination of the social and political conditions that allow it to gestate and thrive — will be long and ongoing.
But if there’s one thing the events of Charlottesville should immediately accomplish, in a world with even a semblance of reason and sense, it’s to once and for all bury the ugly lie that is the “alt-left.”
For months now, as part of the ongoing battle over the future of progressive politics in the United States, members of the liberal center have been warning about what they called the “alt-left,” the alt-right’s supposed mirror image. The term was first used in a Vanity Fair piece by James Walcott in March, in which he claimed there was a “kinship” between the two groups, and proceeded to rattle off a list of its supposed members, all of whom (bar Susan Sarandon) were men.
It should go without saying that the label refers to something that doesn’t exist. This very publication, for instance, was cited by Walcott as one of the alt-left’s “outlets,” despite the fact that we routinely spend our time criticizing Trump and his cronies and are rooted in a longstanding democratic socialist tradition.
The term was always intellectually lazy and dishonest, but veracity was never its point. Rather, it was an evolution of the “Bernie Bro” slur, a way to dismiss left-wing critiques of centrist Democrats by claiming those espousing them were racist, misogynistic, white men, even when they were people of color, women, or both. The insertion of the “alt” label was key — without needing to say a thing, the term drew up an affinity and connection between modern, rebranded white supremacists and those campaigning for universal health care and a higher minimum wage.
In the months that ensued, the epithet and the idea that underwrote it were picked up and used by members of the liberal center as a cudgel against socialists, right up until the events in Charlottesville.
“If the Bernie Bros wanted to make a show of force on behalf of progressive values, Saturday in Charlottesville would be a good time,” wrote Mieke Eoyang, former Ted Kennedy staffer and vice president of the National Security Program at Third Way, a centrist think tank.
One popular liberal Twitter account compared the tiki torch-wielding mob of racists to Bernie Sanders supporters.
Well, the neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville took place, and the same people who some have spent months dismissing as closet racists were on the front line, risking bodily harm to stand up against white supremacy. The International Socialist Organization (ISO) and Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) were part of the counter-protest, and their flags flew high after the alt-right marchers had gone. The DSA started a fundraiser to cover the injuries sustained by those attacked at the event, which has raised $138,000 as of the time of writing. Two of its members were injured in the attack on the protests. So were the family members of a staffer at Truthout, a publication that was critical of Clinton during the 2016 election, and one of whose journalists has featured on the “Trumpian Leftism” Tumblr as a “Bernie Bro” and alt-left member.
Or let’s look at Heather Heyer, the murdered young woman who is so far the only casualty of Saturday’s right-wing attack. Heyer was a committed civil rights activist, whose mother, Susan Bro, said “always had a very strong sense of right and wrong.” She was also a Bernie Sanders supporter.
This is hardly a new development. DSA and other left-wing organizations have been involved in anti-Trump protests, including those against the implementation of Trump’s travel ban. Socialists have been playing important roles in recent protests against police violence. If you go further back, you can find leftists organizing and defeating racists in places like Dubuque, Iowa during the nineties and in other campaigns for over a century.
It is neither tenable or acceptable to smear leftists and progressives who oppose corporate Democrats as analogous to neo-Nazis. While those of us on the Left will continue to battle against the policies of the center — policies we think not only cause harm in the here and now but will do nothing to stem the rise of the Right — we should stand united with those liberals who want to stand with us against racism and hatred.
There are some who are nonetheless clinging to a divisive and false narrative about the Left. The day after the incident, Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas wondered if anyone “outside of the alt-left” was “still pretending that “last year’s election was about economic anxiety.” A Daily Kos contributing editor blamed the neo-Nazi march on the “alt-Left,” who “in their drive to smear the ‘impurity’ of Clinton on economic justice issues, excused the racism and bigotry that is Trumpism,” which was “stinging very hard now.” Others made a similar point.
This has to stop. Heyer and those who were injured at Charlottesville are neither the first nor the last left-wing activists who will be hurt at events like this, particularly as radicals are often on the front lines of such confrontations. They deserve better than this.
The Left are neither supporters of white supremacy, nor supporters of Trump, and they never have been. But if liberals join the Left, they can help take the fight to the far right and end the seemingly neverending string of political violence committed by white supremacists. Uniting around this issue is a moral imperative.
|
Christian families fled Mosul in February 2010 successive to at least 12 people being killed in anti-Christian violence. Some of the refugees gathered in this monastery in Al Qosh.World Watch Monitor
A mass exodus is underway from Iraq’s second largest city Mosul after its seizure by the ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, an Iraq and Syria-based Sunni Muslim extremist group.
The BBC reports about 150,000 people have fled the city – population about 1.8 million. World Watch Monitor can confirm that up to a thousand Christian families have fled, for safer areas.
ISIS has been able to take military advantage of a political power vacuum as Iraq’s Prime Minister Nouri Maliki struggles to form a government after recent elections. ISIS wants to overthrow the Iraqi and Syrian Governments and establish a Sunni Muslim Caliphate in the Middle East.
It has been exercising informal control of Nineveh province, where Mosul is situated, for months. The Iraqi Parliament has declared a State of Emergency. The Prime Minister called for the Iraqi people to volunteer, and take up arms to defend the country. He also called on international organizations to support Iraq in maintaining peace, and on neighbouring countries to protect their boundaries, and not let “terrorists” enter Iraq.
Last Friday, 6 June, an estimated 3,000 fighters of ISIS entered Mosul. They killed many people, including 21 policemen. Local security forces fled from these attackers. According to sources on the ground in Mosul, army and police personnel took off their uniforms so as not to be identified.
ISIS now controls the airport in Mosul; taking its guns and some helicopters. Militants are said to be robbing and stealing in schools and banks; they have burned down several buildings and destroyed others.
Local media say militants took 70 female students hostage at the University of Mosul, and took 28 Turkish truck drivers hostage in the city. About 3,000 prisoners were reported to have been freed from the main jails.
One Mosul citizen reported “No water, electricity or food in the houses now” and “It is dangerous to go out as there is random sniper shooting in the city”.
Several sources in mainly Christian areas have confirmed that militants have entered their villages too. A local Christian reports that ISIS extremists are now in control of a well-known ‘Christian’ village in Qara Qosh, where the guards ran away. Another Christian declared that ISIS militants also entered the Mar Behnam Monastery.
Christian refugees living in tents
in a monastery in Al Qosh, North-Iraq.
February 2010World Watch Monitor
Some 200 families, many Christian, are now hosted at the Mar Mattai Monastery and about 50 families an hour are thought to be arriving in Al Qosh, 45km from Mosul, where there is another Monastery. Others have fled as far as Dohuk, 80km from Mosul.
Several schools in mainly Christian villages also opened their doors. New arrivals are desperate for mattresses and blankets, having left carrying only a plastic bag with a few clothes. Some said they had to leave their cars behind at check points and walk for many hours to safer regions.
“When this goes on like this, Mosul soon will be emptied of Christians”, said World Watch Monitor’s source in Iraq, who will remain unnamed for security. “This could be the last migration of Christians from Mosul.”
“Christian families are terrified”, one declared. A Christian man in Mosul said during a phone call: “I was able to make my wife and children leave Mosul, but now I am stuck in the house and can’t move.”
An elderly woman and her adult daughter are still in their house in Mosul. They posted on social media: “God, please save us and Mosul”. They said only they and one other family are left in their neighbourhood, all others have escaped.
The crisis worries many Christians in the neighbouring Northern Kurdish part of Iraq. “We are praying for safety in Kurdistan,” one said.
One Syrian refugee woman working in Erbil, an hour’s drive from Mosul, told World Watch Monitor, “What is happening in Mosul now can badly affect our stay as refugees here in Kurdistan, as some ISIS militia come from Syria…but I hope this will make the UN work more on our papers for emigration and allow us to travel abroad as soon as possible; we applied to migrate to Europe.”
|
Image caption A still from Mr Liu's dashcam video shows the car swerve off the road
A Chinese man has been awarded a lifetime supply of fish heads at a local restaurant, after he stopped his car en route to a fish head lunch to perform a dramatic underwater rescue.
Liu Xinting was driving on his lunch break from work when an oncoming car swerved off the road and into a lake.
Mr Liu dived in to the lake as the car sank, rescuing all four people inside including a pregnant woman.
Hearing of the rescue, a local company offered the unusual fish head reward.
"There was no time for me to think or be scared, the fastest thing I could do was save lives," Mr Liu told the local Hangzhou Daily.
"It is hazardous to jump into the water without taking off your shoes and clothes," he said. "But the situation was too urgent."
Image caption The red sedan is seen submerged in the lake
Video from Mr Liu's dashcam showed a pickup truck abandoning a dangerous overtaking move and swerving into the car, pushing it off the road.
The car plunged into man-made Qiandao Lake. Mr Liu rescued the occupants by pulling them out through the windows, Hangzhou Daily reported.
Mr Liu, who works for e-commerce giant Alibaba, was driving with colleagues at the time. The group had planned to enjoy cooked fish heads at a local restaurant.
The story made the local newspaper, and the Hangzhou Qiandao Lake Development Group has now offered to foot the bill for free fish heads forever.
An estimated 700 people are killed each day in traffic accidents, according to the World Health Organization.
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.